I sat me downe, for as for mine entent,
The birds song was more conuenient,

And more pleasaunt to me by manifold,
Than meat or drinke, or any other thing,
Thereto the herber was so fresh and cold,
The wholesome sauours eke so comforting,
That as I demed, sith the beginning
Of the world was neur seene or than
So pleasaunt a ground of none earthly man.

And as I sat the birds harkening thus,
Me thought that I heard voices sodainly,
The most sweetest and most delicious
That euer any wight I trow truly
Heard in their life, for the armony
And sweet accord was in so good musike,
That the uoice to angels was most like."

There is here no affected rapture, no flowery sentiment: the whole is
an ebullition of natural delight "welling out of the heart," like water
from a crystal spring. Nature is the soul of art: there is a strength as
well as a simplicity in the imagination that reposes entirely on nature,
that nothing else can supply. It was the same trust in nature, and
reliance on his subject, which enabled Chaucer to describe the grief and
patience of Griselda; the faith of Constance; and the heroic
perseverance of the little child, who, going to school through the
streets of Jewry,

"Oh _Alma Redemptoris mater_, loudly sung,"