There
Chaucer introduces an old woman of mean parentage, whom a youthful
knight of noble blood was forced to marry, and consequently loathed
her. The crone being in bed with him on the wedding-night, and finding
his aversion, endeavours to win his affection by reason, and speaks
a good word for herself (as who could blame her?) in hope to mollify
the sullen bridegroom. She takes her topics from the benefits of
poverty, the advantages of old age and ugliness, the vanity of youth,
and the silly pride of ancestry and titles without inherent virtue,
which is the true nobility. When I had closed Chaucer I returned to
Ovid, and translated some more of his fables; and by this time had so
far forgotten the Wife of Bath's tale that, when I took up Boccace
unawares, I fell on the same argument of preferring virtue to nobility
of blood, and titles, in the story of Sigismunda, which I had certainly
avoided for the resemblance of the two discourses, if my memory had
not failed me. Let the reader weigh them both, and if he thinks me
partial to Chaucer, it is in him to right Boccace.
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