Another thing yet is greatly more damnable:
Of rascolde poetes yet is a shameful rable,
Which voyde of wisedome presumeth to indite
Though they have scantly the cunning of a snite;
And to what vices that princes moste intende,
Those dare these fooles solemnize annd commende.
Then is he decked as poete laureate,
When stinking Thais made him her graduate.
When muses rested, she did her season note,
And she with Bacchus her camous did promote.
Such rascolde drames promoted by Thais,
Bacchus, Licoris, or yet by Testalis,
Or by suche other newe forged muses nine
Thinke in their mindes for to have wit divine.
They laude their verses, they boast, they vaunt and jet,
Though all their cunning be scantly worth a pet.
(Eclogue IV: 679-694 [ed. White 165])
Let raylynge poetes for help on Venus call,
Which hath in Venus theyr pleasour and delyte,
Whose wrytynge uttreth theyr lyvynge bestyall.
With barayne termys, suche thynges they indyte
Which may the reders to vicious lyfe excyte
And nat to vertue. He which is lawreat
Ought nat his name with vyce to vyolate.
(Life of St. George 113-119 [ed. Nelson 14])