for bét|erẹ is án | elmés|se bifórẹn || þénne | bóð efter | sóuẹne
Álto | lómẹ ich | hábbẹ i|gúlt || a wérk|e ént | o wórde
Ál to | múchẹl ich | hábbẹ i|spént || to lítẹl | ihúd | in hórde
Ne béo | þe ló|ure þé|ne þe sólf || ne þín | mei né | þin máȝe
30 Soht is þét | is óð|ers món|nes frónd || bétre | þén his | áȝen
52 for þer wé | hit mích|te fínd|en éft || ⁊ hább|en bút|en énde
Elision of e occurs under the usual conditions: pronouns like me 6, 10, 15, þe 23, and nouns of the type of wintre 1, 4 are not subject to it. Instances of hiatus are worde 3, þe 13, werke 27. Syncopation of e occurs in muȝẹn, houẹne 25, biforẹn, souẹne 26, litẹl 28, and probably in muchẹl 28, though it might be regarded as forming part of a trisyllabic verse. The prelude is wanting in the first section, 4, 5, 6, 14, 20, 27, 28; in the second section, 8, 12, 13, 15, 18, 19, 26, 30; in both, 7, 11, 20, 24. It is doubled in the first section, 30, 52; in the second, 17. The first foot of each section is sometimes a trochee instead of an iamb; so in the first section, 9, 15, 17, 21, 25; in the second, 9. The unstressed element in a foot is sometimes wanting, 15, 20, 22; sometimes it is of two syllables, 8, 12, 24, 26 (three times), 29. Feminine endings before the caesura are not uncommon, 2, 9, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 24; but the ending of the line is invariably feminine. A comparison of the manuscripts shows that the author’s practice was more correct than the representation of any of them; thus the unmetrical second section of 25 is in e, þe hwílẹ | he méi | to héuẹne. But it is clear that he used all the licences detailed above.
[Introduction:] The Moral Ode is, to all appearance, an original work, the natural product of an old man’s musings on life with its lost opportunities, death, and judgement. Its manner and spirit, simple, earnest, austere, sententious, are of the Old English cast. The author lived in Hampshire somewhere near the junction of the Stour with the Avon. He was probably a secular priest, for he makes no reference to the life of the cloister and names no saint or holy place. His theological learning was of a commonplace kind and without subtilty. He may have had some skill in medicine. He lived through the Anarchy, and the faithless vassal and the tyrannous noble wallow in his Inferno with the corrupt judge and extortionate official.
Another poem of similar content, the Sermon of Guischart de Beaulieu in Anglo-Norman, was written in England about the same time as the Poema Morale. If the author took his name from Beaulieu in Hampshire, where King John founded a Cistercian Abbey in 1204 A.D. (Dugdale v. 680), he may have written not far from the home of our poet. It abounds in striking parallels to the PM, but the editor of the Sermon thinks the resemblances are not sufficiently close to prove that Guischart used the English poem.
[1]. nu: in LT only. awintre ⁊ a lare: a winter and ek on lore J; of wintre ⁊ of lore M. ⁊ = ent; see 38/159.