Lyr Add: Happy Life (Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey)

Subject: Lyr Add: HAPPY LIFE (Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey)
From: GUEST,Jim Clark..London.England
Date: 20 Mar 03 - 04:09 PM

Here's some advice from Sir Thomas Wyatt's great friend Henry Howard Earl of Surrey 1517-1547 poet and courtier on how live a happy life..of course in the first Elizabethan age they didn't have mobile phones, colour televisions, computers and fast cars to worry them ha ha. Joking aside this great poem still speaks a great deal of good sense in its advocacy of our need to earn honest money for peace of mind, to treat others equally and not to bear grudges, to stay healthy, to eat healthily, and not allow alcohol to cloud your judgment, the need for a trustworthy partner (faithful wife), to be content with one's lot in life, and to come to terms with one's own mortality. Here's the link to the page with the sound file:
The Happy Life by Henry Howard Earl of Surrey 1517 - 1547 (sound poem)

Regards..

Jim Clark
PS..Dont forget you can if you prefer listen to my sound poems at my Yahoo "sound poetry" web group (look in "files") heres that link
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/bloozman_uk/

All rights are reserved on this sound recording/copyright/patent Jim Clark 2003


The happy life

MARTIAL, the things that do attain
The happy life be these, I find:--
The riches left, not got with pain;
The fruitful ground, the quiet mind;

The equal friend; no grudge, no strife;
No charge of rule, nor governance;
Without disease, the healthful life;
The household of continuance;

The mean diet, no delicate fare;
True wisdom join'd with simpleness;
The night discharged of all care,
Where wine the wit may not oppress.

The faithful wife, without debate;
Such sleeps as may beguile the night:
Contented with thine own estate
No wish for death, nor fear his might.

Subject: RE: The happy life - Henry Howard sound poem
From: GUEST,Jim Clark..London.England
Date: 22 Mar 03 - 07:11 AM

The wisdom of this poem endures after 400 years...