(1) Value not beauty, for it may be destroyed by a three days’ fever.
(See Chaucer’s Boethius, [p. 81].)
(2) There is no greater plague than the enmity of thy familiar friend.
(See Chaucer’s translation, [p. 77].)
Chaucer did not English Boethius second-hand, through any early French version, as some have supposed, but made his translation with the Latin original before him.
Jean de Méung’s version, the only early French translation, perhaps, accessible to Chaucer, is not always literal, while the present translation is seldom free or periphrastic, but conforms closely to the Latin, and is at times awkwardly literal. A few passages, taken haphazard, will make this sufficiently clear.
Et dolor ætatem jussit inesse suam. And sorou haþ comaunded his age to be in me ([p. 4]).
Et ma douleur commanda a vieillesse
Entrer en moy / ains quen fust hors ieunesse.