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Poetic Edda

Wealth is as swift  as a winking eye, Of friends the falsest it is.
77. Cattle die,  and kinsmen die, And so one dies one's self;But a noble name  will never die, If good renown one gets.
78. Cattle die,  and kinsmen die, And so one dies one's self;One thing I know  that never dies, The fame of a dead man's deeds.
79.[1] Certain is that  which is sought from runes, That the gods so great have made, And the Master-Poet painted;................ .....of the race of gods: Silence is safest and best.
80. An unwise man,  if a maiden's loveOr wealth he chances to win,

    In the manuscript this stanza follows 78, the order being: 77, 78, 76, 80, 79, 81. Fitjung ("the Nourisher"): Earth.

  1. ↑ This stanza is certainly in bad shape, and probably out of place here. Its reference to runes as magic signs suggests that it properly belongs in some list of charms like the Ljothatal (stanzas 147-165). The stanza-form is so irregular as to show either that something has been lost or that there have been interpolations. The manuscript indicates no lacuna; Gering fills out the assumed gap as follows:
    "Certain is that  which is sought from runes,
    The runes—," etc.

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