Laudator Temporis Acti

Anonymous, in F.J.E. Raby, ed., The Oxford Book of Medieval Latin Verse (1959; rpt. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1961), pp. 433-434 (at 434):

Dic, ubi Salomon, olim tam nobilis,
vel ubi Samson est, dux invincibilis,        30
vel pulcher Absalon, vultu mirabilis,
vel dulcis Jonathas, multum amabilis?

Quo Caesar abiit, celsus imperio,
vel Dives splendidus, totus in prandio?
dic, ubi Tullius, clarus eloquio,        35
vel Aristoteles, summus ingenio?

Tot clari proceres, tot rerum spatia,
tot ora praesulum, tot regna fortia;
tot mundi principes, tanta potentia,
in ictu oculi clauduntur omnia.        40

Anonymous, in R.T. Davies, ed., Medieval English Lyrics: A Critical Anthology (1964; rpt. Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1988), p. 174:

Telle me where is Salamon, sumtime a kinge riche?
Or Sampson in his strenkethe, to whom was no man liche.

Or the fair man, Absolon, merveilous in chere?        15
Or the duke, Jonatas, a well-beloved fere?

Where is become Cesar, that lord was of al?
Or the riche man cloithd in purpur and in pal?

Telle me where is Tullius, in eloquence so swete?
Or Aristotle the philisophre with his wit so grete?        20

Where ben these worithy that weren here toforen?
Boithe kinges and bishopes her power is all loren.

All these grate princes with her power so hiye
Ben vanished away in twinkeling of an iye.