The Game of the Chesse (Caxton, facsimile)

...your body is as large as your heart. All the world could not hold you, for you hold the East original: "orient" in your right hand and the West original: "ocident" in your left. Since this is the case, you are either a god, a man, or nothing. If you are a god, then do good and be kind to the people as God does, and do not take from them what they ought to have and what is theirs. If you are a man, remember that you shall die, and then you shall do no evil. If you are nothing, forget yourself.

There is nothing so strong and firm that a weak thing cannot sometimes cast it down and overthrow it. Although the lion is the strongest beast, yet sometimes a little bird eats him This is likely a reference to a medieval fable illustrating that even the powerful have vulnerabilities..

The second reason why this game was invented and made was to keep him from idleness. Seneca says to Lucilius Seneca the Younger was a Roman Stoic philosopher; Lucilius was his friend and the recipient of his famous moral letters. that "idleness without any occupation is the tomb original: "sepulture" of a living man." And Varro Marcus Terentius Varro was an ancient Roman scholar and writer. says in his proverbs that just as men do not walk just for the sake of walking, in the same way, life is not given just for the sake of living, but to do well and good.

Therefore, secondly, the philosopher created this game to keep the people from idleness. For there are many people who, when they are fortunate in worldly goods, give themselves over to ease and idleness, from which often come many evils and great sins. Through this idleness, the heart is extinguished original: "quenchyd", from which comes mad original: "wood" despair.

The third reason is that every man naturally desires to know and hear novelties and news. For this reason, the people of Athens studied, as we read. And because physical original: "corporal" or bodily sight sometimes hinders original: "enpessheth" and prevents the knowledge of subtle things, we read that Democritus the Democritus was a Greek philosopher; tradition states he blinded himself to prevent his eyes from distracting his mind from contemplation.