He who knows not what thing is Paradise,
  Let him look fixedly on Myrrha’s eyes.

The fourth Ballata sets forth the fifteenth-century Italian code of love, the code of the Novelle, very different in its avowed laxity from the high ideal of the trecentisti poets.

  I ask no pardon if I follow Love;
  Since every gentle heart is thrall thereof.

  From those who feel the fire I feel, what use
    Is there in asking pardon?  These are so
  Gentle, kind-hearted, tender, piteous,
    That they will have compassion, well I know. 
    From such as never felt that honeyed woe,
  I seek no pardon:  nought they know of Love.

  I ask no pardon if I follow Love;
  Since every gentle heart is thrall thereof.

  Honour, pure love, and perfect gentleness,
    Weighed in the scales of equity refined,
  Are but one thing:  beauty is nought or less,
    Placed in a dame of proud and scornful mind. 
    Who can rebuke me then if I am kind
  So far as honesty comports and Love?

  I ask no pardon if I follow Love;
  Since every gentle heart is thrall thereof.

  Let him rebuke me whose hard heart of stone
    Ne’er felt of Love the summer in his vein! 
  I pray to Love that who hath never known
    Love’s power, may ne’er be blessed with Love’s great gain;
    But he who serves our lord with might and main,
  May dwell for ever in the fire of Love!

  I ask no pardon if I follow Love;
  Since every gentle heart is thrall thereof.

  Let him rebuke me without cause who will;
    For if he be not gentle, I fear nought: 
  My heart obedient to the same love still
    Hath little heed of light words envy-fraught: 
    So long as life remains, it is my thought
  To keep the laws of this so gentle Love.

  I ask no pardon if I follow Love;
  Since every gentle heart is thrall thereof.

This Ballata is put into a woman’s mouth.  Another, ascribed to Lorenzo de’ Medici, expresses the sadness of a man who has lost the favour of his lady.  It illustrates the well-known use of the word Signore for mistress in Florentine poetry.

  How can I sing light-souled and fancy-free,
  When my loved lord no longer smiles on me?

  Dances and songs and merry wakes I leave
    To lovers fair, more fortunate and gay;
  Since to my heart so many sorrows cleave
    That only doleful tears are mine for aye: 
    Who hath heart’s ease, may carol, dance, and play
  While I am fain to weep continually.

  How can I sing light-souled and fancy-free,
  When my loved lord no longer smiles on me?

  I too had heart’s ease once, for so Love willed,
    When my lord loved me with love strong and great: 
  But envious fortune my life’s music stilled,
    And turned to sadness all my gleeful state. 
    Ah me!  Death surely were less desolate
  Than thus to live and love-neglected be!