The Faerie Queene ( Book 4.8) Edmund Spenser

CANTO VIII

The gentle Squire recouers grace,
Sclaunder her guests doth staine:
Corflambo chaseth Placidas,
And is by Arthure slaine.

W Ell said the wiseman, now prou’d true by this,
Which to this gentle Squire did happen late.
That the displeasure of the mighty is
Then death it selfe more dread and desperate.
For naught the same may calme ne mitigate,
Till time the tempest doe thereof delay
With sufferaunce soft, which rigour can abate,
And haue the sterne remembrance wypt away
Of bitter thoughts, which deepe therein infixed lay.

Like as it fell to this vnhappy boy,
Whose tender heart the faire Belphebe had,
With one sterne looke so daunted, that no ioy
In all his life, which afterwards he lad,
He euer tasted, but with penaunce sad
And pensiue sorrow pind and wore away,
Ne euer laught, ne once shew’d countenance glad;
But alwaies wept and wailed night and day,
As blasted bloosme through heat doth languish & decay;