From Colin Clout

What can it avail To drive forth a snail, Or to make a sail Of an herring’s tail; To rhyme or to rail, To write or to indict, Either for delight Or else for despight; Or books to compile Of divers manner of style, Vice to revile And sin to exile; To teach or to preach, As reason will reach? Say this, and say that, His head is so fat, He wotteth never what Nor whereof he speaketh; He crieth and he creaketh, He prieth and he peeketh, He chides and he chatters, He prates and he patters, He clitters and he clatters, He meddles and he smatters, He gloses and he flatters; Or if he speak plain, Then he lacketh brain, He is but a fool; Let him go to school, On a three footed stool That he may down sit, For he lacketh wit; And if that he hit The nail on the head, It standeth in no stead; The devil, they say, is dead, The devil is dead. It may well so be, Or else they would see Otherwise, and flee From worldly vanity, And foul covetousness, And other wretchedness, Fickle falseness, Variableness, With unstableness. And if ye stand in doubt Who brought this rhyme about, My name is Colin Clout. I purpose to shake out All my connying bag, Like a clerkly hag; For though my rhyme be ragged, Tattered and jagged, Rudely rain beaten, Rusty and moth eaten, If ye take well therewith, It hath in it some pith.