through twelve lines, closing with an epigrammatic couplet. The
difference is obvious even in the translations from Petrarch.
Wyatt's couplet is not complete in itself, whereas Surrey's may
be detached as a quotation. That this form originated with Sur-
rey is very doubtful, since it was used by Wyatt, although with
a slightly different rime-scheme, by Grimald, and by several of the
Uncertain Authors; Surrey's use of it, however, in all probability
gave it currency. It was Surrey's fortune to be accepted as the
representative of the age,--the age when for the first time since
Chaucer, the language had become relatively fixed in the forms
of the words, and when the poetic technique had passed beyond
the obviously experimental stage.

Owing to this advantage of position, Surrey seemed to Sidney
to be the first modern poet. Whereas the language of Skelton
or Wyatt was archaic, Surrey's English was current for the next
two centuries. As the archaic effect in the previous quotations
is due primarily to the spelling, his translation of the forty-seventh
Epigram of the Tenth Book of Martial will be given, with the Latin
and with two later versions. The Martial is as follows: ¹

Vitam quoe faciant beatiorem,
Iucondissime Martialis, hæc sunt:
Res non parta labore, sed relicta;
Non ingratus ager, focus perennis;
Lis numquam, toga rara, mens quieta;
Vires ingenuæ, salubre corpus;
Prudens simplicitas, pares amici;
Convictus facilis, sine arte mensa;
Nox non ebria, sed soluta curis;
Non tristis torus, et tamen pudicus;
Somnus, qui faciat breves tenebras:
Quod sis, esse velis nihilque malis;
Summum nec metuas diem nec optes.

Surrey renders this as follows: ²

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:

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