THE WORLD AND THE CHILD.
MR COLLIER'S PREFACE.
When the Rev. T.F. Dibdin asserted ("Typographical Antiquities," ii. 9.) that "in the Drama there is no single work yet found, which bears the name of Winken de Worde as the printer of it," he committed one of those singular over-sights of which very learned men have before been sometimes guilty. "Hickscorner," perhaps the most ancient printed dramatic piece in our language, and well-known to those who are at all acquainted with the history of our stage, was from his press, and his colophon is at its conclusion: "Enprynted by me Wynkyn de Worde." Mr Dibdin, in opposition to his own statement, inserts it among the works of that early professor of the typographic art.
The subsequent dramatic production is also from the types of Wynkyn de
Worde, but it was not discovered in the Library of Trinity College,
Dublin, until after the appearance of the second volume of Mr Dibdin's
new edition of Ames.[183]
[Yet a copy was in the "Bibliotheca Anglo-Poetica," 1815, and in 1817 the piece was reprinted for the Roxburghe Club].
"Hickscorner" is without date, but "The World and the Child" was printed in July 1522. Only one other copy of it is known, and it is here republished from a faithful transcript of the original.[184] As a specimen of our ancient moralities, it is of an earlier date, and in several respects more curious, than almost any other piece in the present collection. From a line in the epilogue, it might be inferred that it was performed before the king and his Court.
HERE BEGINNETH A PROPER NEW INTERLUDE OF THE WORLD AND THE CHILD, OTHERWISE CALLED MUNDUS ET INFANS, AND IT SHOWETH OF THE ESTATE OF CHILDHOOD AND MANHOOD.
MUNDUS. Sirs, cease of your saws what so befall,
And look ye bow bonerly[185] to my bidding,
For I am ruler of realms, I warn you all,
And over all fodes[186] I am king:
For I am king, and well known in these realms round,
I have also palaces i-pight:
I have steeds in stable stalwart and strong,
Also streets and strands full strongly i-dight:
For all the world[187] wide I wot well is my name,
All riches readily it renneth in me,
All pleasure worldly, both mirth and game.
Myself seemly in sale[188] I send with you to be,
For I am the world, I warn you all,
Prince of power and of plenty:
He that cometh not, when I do him call,
I shall him smite with poverty,
For poverty I part[189] in many a place
To them that will not obedient be.
I am a king in every case:
Methinketh I am a God of grace,
The flower of virtue followeth me!
Lo, here I sit seemly in se,[190]
I command you all obedient be,
And with free will ye follow me.
INFANS. Christ our king, grant you clearly to know the case.
To meve[191] of this matter that is in my mind,
[And] clearly declare it, Christ grant me grace.
Now, seemly sirs, behold on me,
How mankind doth begin:
I am a child, as you may see,
Gotten in game and in great sin.
Forty weeks my mother me found,[192]
Flesh and blood my food was tho:
When I was ripe from her to sound,
In peril of death we stood both two.
Now to seek death I must begin,
For to pass that strait passage
For body and soul, that shall then twin,[193]
And make a parting of that marriage.
Forty weeks I was freely fed
Within my mother's possession:
Full oft of death she was a-dread,
When that I should part her from:
Now into the world she hath me sent,
Poor and naked, as ye may see,
I am not worthily wrapped nor went,
But poorly pricked in poverty.
Now into the world will I wend,
Some comfort of him for to crave.
All hail! comely crowned king,
God that all made you see and save!
MUNDUS. Welcome, fair child, what is thy name?