Stanza 158

Boccaccio:

Che si potrà dir qui? se non che anche nelle povere case piovono dal cielo de' divini spiriti, come nelle reali di quegli che sarien piú degni di guardar porci che d'avere sopra uomini signoria. Chi avrebbe, altri che Griselda, potuto col viso non solamente asciutto ma lieto sofferir le rigide e mai piú non udite prove da Gualtier fatte? Al quale non sarebbe forse stato male investito d'essersi abbattuto a una che quando, fuor di casa, l'avesse in camiscia cacciata, s'avesse sí a un altro fatto scuotere il pilliccione che riuscito ne fosse una bella roba.

Now what shall we say in this case but that even into the cots of the poor the heavens let fall at times spirits divine, as into the palaces of kings souls that are fitter to tend hogs than to exercise lordship over men? Who but Griselda had been able, with a countenance not only tearless, but cheerful, to endure the hard and unheard-of trials to which Gualtieri subjected her? Who perhaps might have deemed himself to have made no bad investment, had he chanced upon one, who, having been turned out of his house in her shift, had found means so to dust the pelisse of another as to get herself thereby a fine robe.


Petrarch:

et sepe nos multis ac gravibus flagellis exerceri sinit, non ut animum nostrum sciat, quem scivit ante quam crearemur, sed ut nobis nostra fragilitas notis ac domesticis indiciis innotescat. Abunde ego constantibus viris ascripserim, quisquis is fuerit, qui pro Deo suo sine murmure patiatur quod pro suo mortali coniuge rusticana hec muliercula passa est.


Chaucer:

And suffreth us, as for oure excercise,
With sharpe scourges of adversitee
Ful ofte to be bete in sondry wise,
Nat for to knowe oure wyl, for certes he
Er we were born knew al oure freletee,
And for oure beste is al his governaunce.
Lat us thanne lyve in vertuous suffraunce.


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