The Things That Cause a Quiet Life
A Martial's poem translated by Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey (1517 – 1547).
My friend, the things that do attain
The happy life be these, I find:
The riches left, not got with pain,
The fruitful ground; the quiet mind;
The equal friend; no grudge, no strife;
No charge of rule nor governance;
Without disease the healthy life;
The household of continuance;
The mean diet, no dainty fare;
True wisdom joined with simpleness;
The night discharged of all care,
Where wine the wit may not oppress;
The faithful wife, without debate;
Such sleeps as may beguile the night:
Content thyself with thine estate,
Neither wish death, nor fear his might.
Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey (1517 – 1547) was an English aristocrat, and one of the founders of English Renaissance poetry.
Surrey and his friend Thomas Wyatt were the first English poets to write in the sonnet form that Shakespeare later used, and Henry was the first English poet to publish blank verse.
The Things That Cause a Quiet Life
A Martial's poem translated by Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey (1517 – 1547).
My friend, the things that do attain
The happy life be these, I find:
The riches left, not got with pain,
The fruitful ground; the quiet mind;
The equal friend; no grudge, no strife;
No charge of rule nor governance;
Without disease the healthy life;
The household of continuance;
The mean diet, no dainty fare;
True wisdom joined with simpleness;
The night discharged of all care,
Where wine the wit may not oppress;
The faithful wife, without debate;
Such sleeps as may beguile the night:
Content thyself with thine estate,
Neither wish death, nor fear his might.
Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey (1517 – 1547) was an English aristocrat, and one of the founders of English Renaissance poetry.
Surrey and his friend Thomas Wyatt were the first English poets to write in the sonnet form that Shakespeare later used, and Henry was the first English poet to publish blank verse.