Chapter II: On Well-doing
On the purse-mouth of charity, tie not a knot !Calling this, fraud and folly, and that, tricks and plot.The religious expounder makes injury spreadWho barters his knowledge and culture for bread.How can wisdom with law give decision, indeed !When a man who is wise, to the world sells the creed?And yet you should purchase, for he who is wise,From those who sell cheap, with avidity buys.
Words in this poem
- expounder n.
- One who expounds or explains; an interpreter.
- avidity n.
- Greediness; strong appetite; eagerness; intenseness of desire; as, to eat with avidity. [L. aviditas, fr. avidus: cf. F. avidité. See Avid.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Chapter II: On Well-doing is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Garden of Fragrance: being a complete translation of the Bostan of Sadi from the original Persian into English verse, by G. S. Davie (London: Kegan Paul, Trench and Co., 1882), Internet Archive, the G. S. Davie translation; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Saadi, Chapter II: On Well-doing, in The Garden of Fragrance (1882), text of Internet Archive, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/saadi-bostan/2-5.html, id L29562.
Form and metre
Chapter II: On Well-doing is 8 lines in a single stanza. It is in rhyming couplets. The metre is anapaestic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 92%).
See other poems in rhyming couplets, other poems in anapaestic tetrameter.
Measured by Laurel's pipeline, not copied from a handbook: how stress and metre are counted, how rhyme is lettered, how a drifted rhyme is found. Where the dictionary cannot confirm a rhyme the letter is withheld, not guessed.
Rhyme words, stanza by stanza
The word that ends each line, lettered by the rhyme it makes; a dash is a line whose rhyme the dictionary could not confirm.
- 1 AABBCCDD knotA · plotA · spreadB · breadB · indeedC · creedC · wiseD · buysD
Scansion, line by line
Each line with its syllable count and the stresses the words themselves fix: / stressed, ˘ unstressed, · a syllable the word leaves free and the metre decides. Read against anapaestic tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| On the purse-mouth of charity, tie not a knot ! | 12 | ·····/˘˘···· |
| Calling this, fraud and folly, and that, tricks and plot. | 12 | /˘···/˘····· |
| The religious expounder makes injury spread | 12 | ·˘/˘˘/˘·/˘˘· |
| Who barters his knowledge and culture for bread. | 11 | ·/˘·/˘·/˘·· |
| How can wisdom with law give decision, indeed ! | 12 | ··/˘···˘/˘˘/ |
| When a man who is wise, to the world sells the creed? | 12 | ············ |
| And yet you should purchase, for he who is wise, | 11 | ····/˘····· |
| From those who sell cheap, with avidity buys. | 11 | ······˘/˘˘· |
The reader shows the same poem with its rhymes coloured and a stress row above each line, the notes beside their stanzas, and any word's definition on a tap; the analysis page takes the whole book apart. How every part of this site was made.