David Lyndsay

“Selected works of Sir David Lyndsay”

“He usually lacks the originality of Henryson and the brilliance of Dunbar and Douglas. But what there is of him is good all through.”

“Lyndsay, with all his ancient coarseness…maintained for two centuries, even among the precise, his position as the popular poet of Scotland.”

“But in the glances of his eye,A penetrating, keen, and slyExpression found its home;The flash of that satiric rage,Which, bursting on the early stage,Branded the vices of the age,And broke the keys of Rome.          *          *          *Still is thy name in high account,And still thy verse has charms,Sir David Lindesay of the Mount,Lord Lion King-at-arms!”

“And to the Devill of hell condemne this mein3e;For quhy sic reformatioune, as I weineInto Scotland was never hard nor seine.”

“Ere I depart this natioun, I shall mak Reformatioun!”

“Sir, I wald speir at ȝow ane questioun.Behauld sum Prelats of this Regioun:Manifestlie during thair lustie lyvfis,Thay swyfe Ladies, Madinis and vther mens wyfis.And sa thair cunts thay haue in consuetude.Quhidder say ȝe that law is evill or gude?”

“Brother Wantonness, what thinks thou?Yon are the Three Estates I trowGangand backwart.”

“Heir entirs Flattery new landit owt of France”

“Heir sall Wantones ga spy them and cum agane to the king”

“Quhen the Sonne is at the hycht,Att nonne quhen it doith schyne most brycht,The schaddow of that hydduous strengthSax myle and more it is of lenth.Thus maye ye Juge, in to your thocht,Gyfe Babilone be heych, or nocht.”

“Quhowbeit that divers devote cunnyng ClerkisIn Latyne toung hes wryttin syndrie bukis,Our unlernit knawis lytill of thare werkis,More than thay do the rauyng of the Rukis.Quharefore to Colyearis, Cairtaris, & to Cukis,To Jok and Thome, my Ryme sall be diractit,With cunnyng men quhowbeit it wylbe lactit.”

“That nicht he sleipit never ane wink,Bot still did on the Ladie think.”

“Unthrift, sweirnes, falset, povertie, and stryfePat polacey in dainger of hir lyfe.”