ALBERT S. COOK, EDITOR

XXXVI

THE COMPLAINT OF NATURE

BY

ALAIN DE LILLE

Camus de Insulis

TRANSLATED FROM THE LATIN

BY

DOUGLAS M. MOFFAT

NEW YORK

HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY

1908

ง

whose great stores of recondite learn 'Doctor Universalis' of his day, the very sage,' the 'Doctor SS. Theologiæ known chiefly because of two lines famous poet of early England. H that number to whom the interests of give any present life. Still, in the e his importance is not inconsiderabl great interest attending everything with Chaucer, with the sources from w with the very hints which he throws also the extensive influence which the exerted on Jean de Meun's part of Rose, give him a position which all these fields of literature must recog ment of Langlois that 'more than fiv of the Roman de la Rose are translated spired by the De Planctu Nature' is ity that this mysterious scholar of whose very identity is unascertained, beget kings in literature, though he h

It is difficult to render the Latin translation which shall be at once not too much at variance with

a

translator hopes that he is not chargeab with the weaknesses of a compromise been thought advisable to render into prose those portions of the original

verse.

I have been unable to find any tho text of the De Planctu Naturæ. The have used as a basis is that of Th found in Satirical Poets of the Twelfth (Rolls Series, London, 1872); but s variants which he notes, and several of Migne in the Patrologia Latina, Vol. 21 which Wright does not note, have been a few emendations have been made. changes attention is called in the foot

I owe many thanks to Professor Cha of Yale University, and to Dr. Richard of Haverford College, for their caref large portions of the translation. To P S. Cook, of Yale University, at whose work was undertaken, I have been gr for help and guidance at every stage.

YALE UNIVERSITY,

May 2, 1908.

THE BOOK OF ALAIN ON THE COMPLAINT

OF NATURE.

METRE I.

In lacrimas risus, in luctus gaudia verto.

Laments.

I change laughter to tears, joy to sorrow, applause to lament, mirth to grief, when I behold the decrees of Nature1 in abeyance; when society is ruined and destroyed by the monster of sensual love; when Venus, fighting against Venus, makes men women; when with 5 her magic art she unmans men. It is not pretense that travails with sorrow, O adulterer! nor the tears of pretense, nor dissimulation; rather is it grief, and birth itself is given to sorrow. The Muse requests, this very grief commands, Nature implores that, as 10 I weep, I give them a mournful song. Alas! whither 2 has the loveliness of Nature, the beauty of character, the standard of chastity, the love of virtue departed? 3 Nature weeps, character passes away, chastity is wholly banished from its former high station, and become an 15 orphan. The sex of active nature trembles shamefully at the way in which it declines into passive nature. Man is made woman, he blackens the honor of his sex, the craft of magic Venus makes him of double gender. He is both predicate and subject, he 20 becomes likewise of two declensions, he pushes the laws of grammar too far. He, though made by Nature's skill, barbarously denies that he is a man. Art does not please him, but rather artifice; even that artificiality cannot be called metaphor; rather it sinks 25 1 Reading Naturam, with Migne. 2 Reading quo, with Migne. Reading secessit, with Migne.