Sir P. Sidney The Speech of Rombus a school master
Now the thunder thumping Jove transfund his
dotes into your excellent formosity, which have with
your resplendent beams thus segregated the enmity
of these rural animals: I am Potentissima domina, a
school master, that is to say a pedagogue, one not
a little versed in disciplinating of the juvental fry
wherein (to my laud I say it) I use such geometrical
proportion, as neither wanted mansuetude nor correction
for so it is described. Parcere subjectos & debellire superbos.
Yet hath not the pulchritude of my virtues, protected
me from the contaminating hands of these Plebeians
for coming solummodo to have parted their sanguinolent
fray, they yielded me no more Reverence than if
I had been a Pecorius Asinus. I, even I, that am, who I am Dixi verbus sapiento satum est. But what
said that Trojan Aeneas when he sojourned in the surging
sulks of the sandiferous seas, Haec olim memonasse
juvebit. Well well, ad propositos revertebo, the
puritie of your verity is, that a certain Pulchra
Puella profecto, elected and constituted, by the integrated
determination of all this topographical region, as
the sovreign lady of this Dame May 's month,
hath been quodammodo hunted, as you would say pursued
by two, abrace, a couple, a cast of young men to
whom the crafty coward cupid had inquam delivered his
dire dolourous dart.
O Tempori, O moribus. in profession a child, in dignity a
woman, in years a ladie in ceteris a maid, should thus
turpify the reputation of my doctrine with the
superscription of a fool O Tempori, o moribus.
By Rombus,
in The Lady of May (95-134),
Sir Philip Sidney
in British Library Sloane MS 161, f. 29r
Heu, Ehem, hei, Insipidum, Inscitium, vulgorum &
populorum. Why the brute Nebulons, have you had my
corpusculum so long among you, and cannot yet tell how
to edify an argument? addent and throw your ears
to me, for I am gravidated with child, till I have
doctrinated your blumbeous cerebrosities. First you
must divisionate your point, quasi you should cut a cheese into two particles; for thus must I inform
my speech, to your obtruse conceptions. Exemplum
gratia. Either Therion must conquer this dame Maia 's Nymph, or Espilus must overthrow her & yet
secundum their dignity, which must also be
subdivisionated into three equal species. either
according to the penetrancy of their singing, or the
meliority of their functions, or lastly the superancy
of their merits. De singing satis. Nunc are you
to argumentate of the qualifieing of their estate
first, and then whether hath more Infernally, I
mean deeply deserved .
By Rombus,
in The Lady of May (282-301),
Sir Philip Sidney
in British Library Sloane MS 161, f. 29v
O tace, tace or all the fat will be ignified first let
me dilucidate the very intrinsical marrowbone of the
matter. He doth ye a certain rhetorical invasion
into the point, as if indeed he had conference with
his lambs, but the truth is he doth equitate you in
your mean time master Rixus. for thus he saith that
sheep are good ergo the shepherd is good. an
enthymome a loco contingentibris as my finger &
my thumb are contingentes: Again he saith who
liveth well are good but shepherd lies well
Ergo they are good, a syllogism in Darius
King of Persia a conjugatus but do
you but acquiescate to my exhortation and you shall
extinguish him: Tell him his major is a Knave, his
minor is a fool, and his conclusion both & ecce homo
blancatus quasi lilium.
By Rombus,
in The Lady of May (343-359),
Sir Philip Sidney
in British Library Sloane MS 161, f. 29v