Women’s Unknown Virtues
She, that was ever fair, & never proud;
Had Tongue at Will, & yet was never loud;
Never lacked Gold, & yet went never gay;
Fled from her Wish,
yet said, Now I may:
She that being angered, &
her Revenge being nigh,
bade her Wrong, Stay, & her Displeasure, Fly:
She, that
in wisdom was never so frail to change the cod's head for the salmon's trail. She that could think, & never disclose her Mind;
See Suitors following, & not look behind:
She
was a Wight, (if ever such Wights were)
By Iago,
in Othello (TLN923-933),
William Shakespeare
in Bodleian Library MS Sancroft 53, f.43