For as in lyefe he loved best
The poore to clothe and feede,
So with the rich and all the rest
He neighbourlie agreed;
And did appoynte before he dyed,
A special yearlie rent,
Which should be every Whitsontide
Among the poorest spent.
_Et obiit Anno Dni_ 1534.
Although this benefaction is written in _brass_, the good man's
successors have found enough of the same metal to pervert it; for it is
now lost, and no person can give any account of it. It needs not brass to
outlive honesty; a mere breath will often destroy her. There are, however,
several substantial charities belonging to Lavenham, the disposal of which
has fallen into better hands.
In the churchyard is a very old gravestone, which formerly had a Saxon
inscription. Kirby, in his account of the monasteries of Suffolk, says
that here, on the tomb of one John Wiles, a bachelor, who died in 1694, is
this odd jingling epitaph:--
_Quod fuit esse quod est, quod non fuit esse quod esse_
_Esse quod est non esse, quod est non erit esse._
But as the point and oddity may not be directly evident to all, perhaps
some of our readers will furnish us with a pithy translation for our next.
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