The Phaerie Duchess: Booke I, Post II.

IV.
And as he yode an elder led him out,
That Rhetor hight, well-versed in grammarye,
Whose taske it was to set that young clerke’s route,
For he knew where those spells were said to be
Which lost were to antique catastrophe
And would the titan Ignourance defeate,
So he that clerke advised in his degree,
And oft a proverb old would he repeat:
That spells were hid ’til magi them could list complete.

VI.
This saw the Greatbooke clerke did but frustrate,
For he mote not list spells he never knew,
Nor things he never heard of yet  relate,
And so he knew not what he did pursue:
As when that child of Danaë did subdue
The gorgon, victim both of wrath and love,
And, forced to fight a fiend he mote nat view,
Look’d onely at his shield, and blindly strove,
So he that elder followed wherever he did rove.

VI.
Eftesoons beside the path they did behold
A gorgeous damzell on an iuory mare,
Yclad in verdant dress, and locks of gold,
And well did she her tender tresses wear.
To accent her endowments, and a pair
Of scales shee held, shee Aura hight,
And eke her buxom sister, no less faire,
With face that seem’d to spurn and to invite,
Term’d Fama, looked fair from on her palfrey’s height

VII.
Those two to distant Conference were bound,
And they that clerk bade also to attend,
For sure they were that wizards did abound
Who surely would their wisdomes gladly lend
To one who sought that giant’s reign to end.
The elder daungers dire perceived in this,
And warned his charge what mischiefs did portend,
But here those ladies offered him a kisse:
The smallest fauour, yet to him it seemed the highest bliss.

That would the titan Ignorance defeat,