Early English Meals and Manners

by Unknown

To Vengable, to Envious, and waste nat to muche;

To Wylde, to Wrathefulle, and Wade nat to depe;

A Mesurable Mene way ys beste for vs alle;

¶ Yitte. Lerne. or. Be. Lewde.

[A Dietary given ‘vnto Kyng Herry v^te’ ‘by Sigismounde, Emperour of Rome,’ follows, leaf 91. The colophon (leaf 98, back) is ‘¶ Thus endithe this Dyetarye Compyled And made by Plato and Petrus Lucratus, Grete Philosophers and Astronomers.’]

A complete copy of the A B C Alliterative Poem of which the foregoing LERNE OR BE LEWDE is a fragment, occurs in the Lambeth MS. 853, and is therefore added here.

[Lambeth MS. 853, ab. 1430 A.D., page 30, written without breaks.]

Alternative readings are incorporated from the [Collations and Corrigenda] section: