Edmund Spenser was once commissioned by the Queen of England
to write a song for her.
The treasurer, being totally ignorant of this man’s talent,
challenged the one hundred pound fee for the poet, asked, “What? All this for a song?”
The queen then replied, “Then give him what is reasonable.”
Disappointed, Spenser wrote to Queen Elizabeth the
following:
I was promised on a time
To have reason for my rhyme.
From that time, unto this season,
I received not rhyme, nor reason.
Sharply reproving the Treasurer, the queen ordered the
payment of one hundred pounds.”
-Oxford Book of Literary Anecdotes
When you know something to be true, do not be swayed.
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