Passus Five

1 The unanimity achieved in the royal entourage at the end of the preceding passus is marked by the communal participation in religious services (matins and Mass) and in sharing a meal together.

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3ff. The waking of the Dreamer here marks him as separated from the community in the preceding lines. His 'wo,' then, may be at his waking to a world in which this dreamed ideal is missing.

It is not'realistic' to attribute, as he does, his inability to walk more than a furlong (a few hundred yards) to a literal lack of sleep: he's only been awake a few minutes, after all. If it is his absence from the sleeping world of his dream that is being emphasized, then this may reflect on his own moral and spiritual condition, his unworthiness to participate in the community united in the liturgy and at the dinner table. (A similar situation may occur at the beginning of B Passus 19, where the Dreamer wakes in the middle of the Easter Mass.) Is his saying his creed here an adequate substitute for Matins and Mass, and babbling probably has sufficiently negative connotations to make us suspect his status as something of an 'outsider' at this transitional point between the two dreams.

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8 The basic meaning of 'bedis' is prayers. Bennett (B Text, p. 151, n.) notes that they may refer to prayer beads, a rosary (or equivalent) for counting repetitive prayers, such as the Pater or Ave (Lord's Prayer and 'Hail Mary').

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9 The dream is presented as a continuation, or another episode, of the preceding dream. Conscience is replaced in the B Version by Reason. The 'cros' is probably here best interpreted as a bishop's crozier. A number of the elements in the sermon echo those in Reason's speech in the previous passus: Pernel and her 'purfil'; chastising children; requiring to priests practice what they preach; seeking St. Truth instead of going on pilgrimage to St. James or Rome.

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13 There were recurrent epidemics or plagues in the middle of the fourteenth century, the most famous of which, the Black Death, struck England in 1348-49 after ravaging much of the continent. There were notable pestilences also in 1361-62 and 1368-69. The specific reference, if one was intended, depends on what date we assign the poem.

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13. <b>the pestilence</b>. See INTRODUCTION, The Pestilence. If we accept the later date (1369-70) for the composition of the A-text, there were three violent epidemics in England which may be alluded to here: 1348-49, 1361-62, and 1368-69. Some A manuscripts have the reading "þise pestilences"; see TEXTUAL NOTES on this line.

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14 There was a famous storm with a southwest wind on Saturday, 15 January 1362. The pairing with the pestilence in the previous line may point to 1362 as the date after which (terminus a quo) the poem was written A number of the detailed effects of the storm here correspond to those mentioned in the chronicles.

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14. <b>the southwest wynd</b> refers to a storm which occurred on Saturday, January 15, 1362.

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18-20 The mention of Doomsday (20) suggests that the image of trees with their roots turned upward is to be associated with the familiar tradition of the Fifteen Signs of Doomsday: depictions of the earthquake of the eighth day include upturned trees: see Heist.

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24-5 The linking of 'winning' and 'wasting,' while probably a conventional alliteration, recalls the ME poem Wynnere and Wastoure, one of the earliest poems of the so-called Alliterative Revival, which has an opening very similar to that in Piers. Wynnere is dated to probably shortly after 1352 (the date of the Statute of Treasons to which it alludes), and refers to social and political upheavals following the Black Death. Much of its social and economic criticism finds echoes in Piers.

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28 The 'pyne' probably refers to the 'pynyng stolis' mentioned earlier (III.66). Wives were often punished publicly for shrewishness or gossiping. Tom is being told that it is his duty to correct his wife, with beatings if required, to prevent her having to be punished by ducking or sitting in the stocks.

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31 A case of spending an unconscionable amount on an ostentatious headdress: a mark (13s 4d) would be approximately a month's salary for a good worker, and forty times the cost of Watte's hood.

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42 This is probably best taken as the common ending of Latin liturgical prayers (to the Holy Spirit): 'who with the Father and the Son [live and reign, One God, forever and ever].' (The words appear, in a less 'conclusive' form in the Nicene Creed said at Mass, where it also refers to the Holy Spirit.) It identifies Seint Treuthe here, therefore, with the Third Person of the Trinity, rather than with the Father or Son (Jesus).

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42. <b>Qui cum patre et filio</b>. This is the formula with which sermons were concluded "Who with the Father and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns forever and ever." Here "Son" is substituted for "Holy Spirit," the latter apparently being identified with St. Truth in the preceding line.

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43ff. With the appearance of Repentauns, we begin the episode usually called the Confession of the Deadly Sins. These sins are traditionally seven in number: Pride, Lechery, Envy, Covetousness, Gluttony, Sloth, and Anger. However, the number (and the identity) of the sins varies from time to time: see Bloomfield, The Seven Deadly Sins.

In this episode Anger is omitted from the usual seven. Some have attributed substantial significance to this: for instance it shows that there has been corruption in the transmission of the text. Alternatively, it might suggest that the poet considers anger a righteous emotion rather than a vice (given the conditions of his time and his critical stance with respect to social and ecclesiastical misbehaving). Or perhaps anger has been subsumed into Envy.

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44ff. (= B Text 62) Wille may be (1) a momentarily personified abstraction of the human will -- referring to the wilful offenders about to express contrition: or (2) a personal name (in two MSS of A the form is William; H₂ has Wylcoc [Kane wylkoc]): in which case it is either an everyday name for a typical auditor or the dreamer (usually referred to as 'I'; but at xv. 148 as Longe Wille) or the author as distinct from the persona of the dreamer. A Wille evidently intended to represent a person (perhaps the poet) is introduced at A viii. 42-4 (but not in B); and at A ix. 118 (= B viii. 124) the poet indirectly but unmistakably indicates that his own name is 'Wille', as at B xv. 148. But the only strictly textual authority for Wille(e) as the name of the author is A xii. 99 (I MS.)--a conclusion probably added by one John Butt, perhaps from first-hand knowledge, perhaps as a deduction from the present and similar ll., perhaps from the colophon at the end of A viii, C x in some MSS. For occurrences in C v. Kane Evidence for Authorship, p. 63.

The long series of confessions that follows has long attracted attention, not only because of their vividness but also because the presentation differs considerably in each recension (though details of formal confession are found in each). The 219 ll. extant in A are extended to 457 in B and 596 in C, which cancels some of B's matter but adds much that is new-mainly from B xiii where one Haukyn the actyf man appears with his coat of Christendom (i.e. his white robe of baptismal innocence fouled with the capital sins). The omission of Wrath in A and the supposedly inappropriate confession that he makes in B were seized on some sixty years ago by certain critics as evidence in favour or 'multiple authorship'; J. M. Manly further claimed that the treatment of the confessions as a whole was intentionally different from A where they are 'sudden outcries from hearts wrought to repentance', significant of A's crypto-protestant views; but he exaggerated the differences. The subsequent discussions may be followed in The PPl Controversy (EETS, o.s. 139, extra issue, 1910)

The theme of the seven capital sins in medieval literature has been exhaustively treated by M. W. Bloomfield (The Seven Deadly Sins, Michigan 1952); v . also R. Tuve, Allegorical Imagery (1966), p. 90 etc., and S. Wenzel, Speculum, 43 (1968), 1-22. It is clear that L was indebted to a tradition far more than to a particular source-though the appearance of the sins in earlier (or even later) Latin and vernacular texts may well throw light on his manipulation of the theme. thus it is worth noting that the Sins are given seven 'pageants' in the Beverley Paternoster Play (1469), as in a play performed at Tours in 1390 (E. K. Chambers, The Medieval Stage, ii. 154), and the York Paternoster Play (apparently well-established by 1378) evidently included representation of Accidia and the other sins (H. Craig, English Religious Drama of the Middle Ages (1955), p. 338); cf. also The Castell of Perseverance, 830ff. (in Macro Plays). the influence of priests' manuals touching on confession is plausibly suggested by Pantin, p. 226; the poet's emphasis on the circumstances of the sin is certainly found in such manuals. Archbishop Thoresby's 'Catechism' (EETS 118) or summary of instructions on the seven sins, virtues, etc., had been put into English verse before 1356 (Pantin, p. 212); and the Speculum Christiani (1360-80) includes English quatrains in which the sins speak in the order: Superbia, Invidia, Ira, Avaritia, Accidia, Gula, Luxuria, somewhat unrepentantly.

Bloomfield shows that from patristic times the capital sins were usually enumerated in two orders -- the Gregorian (as above) or Cassian's, which begins with Gluttony. L follows Gregory inasmuch as he begins with Superbia, but no special significance can be attached to his ordering, which varies elsewhere in the poem (and considerably in the other texts). Pride comes first as the first sin denounced in the sermon; the sin of inward pride ('heiʒe herte') is emphasized, but the delight in ostentatious display typical of Lady Meed and touched on at 26 is also adverted to (66). As a sin lacking the 'degrees' of other sins it cannot be easily described in concrete terms; C extends the confession to 58 lines, but only by introducing allied vices; in any case Pride has already been embodied to some extent in Meed. It is perhaps for this reason that this sin (alone) is presented as a woman; though it also figures as a woman (that is to say as feminine) in (e.g.) the A-N 'Marriage of the Daughters of the Devil' ( v . ii. 68 n.) and in De Guilleville's P&eacute;lerinage (tr. Lydgate, 14826 ff.). For the iconography of the sins v. Tuve, op. cit., passim, and A. Caiger Smith, English Medieval Mural Paintings(1964). Some of the sins are illustrated in Cambridge MS Gg. 4. 27 (CT), others on bench ends at Blythburgh, Suffolk.

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44 The character Wille probably here stands for the personified human will, which is moved by Repentance's sermon to show his contrition by his tears. The theology of Confession (Penance) in the Middle Ages involves the necessity of three elements: contrition of heart, confession of mouth, and satisfaction in deed. In other words, in order to receive sacramental forgiveness of sins, the penitent must feel genuine sorrow, articulate the sins in words to the priest, and carry out the penitential actions he commands. The specifically detailed sins that follow require voluntary and genuine acknowledgment of sin within -- in the heart, in the consciousness, in the will.

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45 ff. Here begins the confessions of the Seven Deadly sins, so frequently referred to in medieval literature. They are: Pride, Lechery, Envy, Wrath, Covetousness, Gluttony, and Sloth. It will be noted that Wrath is omitted from this series.

Manly's much-discussed theory of the lost leaf (MP, III [1906], 359-66) is an attempt to account for the omission of Wrath and at the same time explain the rather sudden transition in the confession of Sloth from a vow to attend church regularly, to a promise to restore wicked winnings, made by a person identified as "Roberd the robbour." Briefly, Manly's theory is as follows.

In a MS which was the archetype of all extant A manuscripts, a leaf next to the innermost of a gathering was lost, thus creating two gaps in the text of which subsequent copyists were unaware. The first of these missing folios belonged between lines 5.105 and 106, and probably contained the conclusion of the confession of Envy as well as the whole of the confession of Wrath. The second belonged between lines 5.227 and 228, introducing "Roberd the Robbour." Between these two gaps in the text there are 122 lines, which would fill a leaf averaging about thirty lines to the page. The bearing of this theory on the problem of the authorship of the three version of the poem can easily be seen by observing the unsatisfactory alterations and adjustments made by the B and C revisers.

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48. Her 'serk' was the equivalent of a modern undershirt. Unlike the modern item, however, these were seldom removed, having been sewn after they were put on, and infrequently replaced.

Vices are corrected by penitential discipline (like the hair shirt here) and by actively practising the virtue that counters them. Here Pernel promises humility or meekness as a corrective to pride. Her identifying envy also as one of her sins indicates that these vices are not conceived as fully distinct and that we are dealing with more 'real' human personifications of sinful behavior than with absolutely distinct abstract allegorizations.

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54ff. Invoking 'oure lady' (Mary, the Virgin Mother of Jesus) is appropriate for a lecher. His promise to be abstemious of drink and food suggests that lechery and gluttony are connected. His promise to honor Saturdays (line 56) probably reflects the common devotional practice of celebrating votive Masses of the Virgin on that day of the week.

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61ff. CHECK: does all the clothing suit a friar? The caury-maury and fore-sleeves seem to (see Bennett). Or is this an odd composite, meant to suggest that envy is NOT limited to friars?

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66ff. These lines, with their prominent mention of 'wroth' (66, and cf. 79) and 'wrothlyche' (67), may indicate that 'Envye' combines elements of both Invidia and (the 'missing') Ira. (The connection is made explicit at the beginning of this confession in the Z Version: 'Envye ant yre ayther wep faste' [V.91]. And Wrath's confession follows Envye's in both B and C.) As noted earlier, however, many of these characters are not limited to features of the particular vices whose name they bear. this is perhaps intended to indicate that such vices come (like Hamlet's 'sorrows') 'not single spies / But in battalions.'

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69ff. needs a note (passage is only in A)

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101 Envy's expression of doubt about the power of the sacrament to cure sin prompts Repentaunce's response about the power of contrition.

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104f. This play on the idea of 'sorrow' is a pointed irony: unlike the previous sins (and those that follow), Envy doesn't evidence any serious sign of contrition, sorrow for his sin.

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107 The 'Sire' here suggests that that this Harvey (identity unknown) was of some importance, or was an ordained priest.

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The division of this and following two lines is quite irregular in Ra.

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This line combines the second half of the preceding line from K-F, with a rather formulaic extension. The second half of the preceding line in Ra also has the feeling of being 'filler.'

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114 The phrase 'at the [sign of the] oak' would identify where Simon conducts his business.

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116 He is studying the pages of his textbook of avarice. There are recurrent terms running through this passage associated with school: see 'lessoun' (118, 125) and 'donet to lere' below (123). His education in the ways of avarice starts with basics (those practiced, at least in the first instance here, in the wool and cloth trades). Many of the specific acts of fraud here are legislated against in contemporary ordinances: see Lipson, The Economic History of England (1959), pp. 274, 329, 461-65. (CHECK pages).

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118 The cathedral town of Winchester and Weyhill in Hampshire were sites of important fairs. Winchester was particularly important in the wool trade with France.

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122 The Latin grammar of Donatus was a standard school text for beginning students.

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This line is not in Ra: a unique omission.

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132ff. Fraudulent practises in the production and sale of ale are commonplace: see Lipson, 295-6 (461-5). Penny-ale (a penny a gallon) is apparently the cheapest. It's not clear what 'pile-whey' is (B/C has 'pudding-ale'), but it is likely that the mixture is intended not to improve the drink as to 'stretch' the thin penny-ale. Bringing out the choice ale from back room, for four times the price of penny-ale, could also permit deceptions in quality/measure. The alewife's 'private reserve' might have not more than the appearance of quality.

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134 ff. (B Text 221-5) hymselve (Crowley itselue): 'lay' can hardly refer to 'low folk'; the barrel from which they were served stood apart from the rest. hemselue (C) would imply that there were two barrels, one supposedly containing thin ale, the other thick. The best ale was kept in the parlour or bedroom, and one paid twice the usual price for it, as something special ('þerafter'). Moreover, ('And ʒit') she sold it by the cup, and could thus give short measure (especially if it was dented or had a false bottom).

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135-6 It is unlikely that anyone would willingly pay a grote for even the choicest ale if the ordinary was one-quarter that. The point is probably that by selling it only in (perhaps 'short') cups or pints, she was able to increase the real cost of a gallon.

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143 On Walsingham, see note to Prol. 51

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143. <b>Walsyngham</b>. See note on pr. 46 ff.

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144 (=B Text 231) Bromholm was (near) the site of the Priory of St. Andrew, Norfolk, founded in 1113 and originally subordinate to the Cluniac house of Castle Acre. Its possession of a patriarchal chross made from the true Cross and brought from Constantinople in 1223 or earlier made it famous even beyond England, and many miracles were attributed to it; cf. CT , A 4286. For a 14th-c. Latin prayer probably meant for recitation at the foot of the cross (. . . me defendas de peccato Et de facto desperato [trans. (MFV): protect me from sin and from desperate action]) v. VCH Norfolk, ii. 362, and M. R. James, Cat. of Fitzwilliam MSS. (1895), pp. 138-9. Pilgrims to Walsingham would be likely to visit Bromholm, only a few miles away; but a chapman would in any case know of it from the annual fair held there on the Feast of the Exaltation of the Cross (14 Sept.) and the day before and after it. oute of dette: i.e. save him from the debita of the Dominical Prayer. A concudes the confession at this point, but in B the promise of such a prayer is not sufficient to satisfy Repentance, whose searching question is the occasion for a self-portrait of Avarice in a new character--that of broker and money-lender.

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144 The priory at Bromholm, near Walsingham, had a relic of the cross (rood) on which Jesus was crucified. The 'dette' here is that referred to in the Lord's Prayer: forgive us our debts.

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152 (=B Text 311-13): He feels the need of something to nibble (? as a remedy against flatulence) whlst still half inclined to observe the fast (mandatory on Friday). Fennel seed was 'of much use to expell wind' (J. Parkinson's Paradisus, 1629). Peony seed was drunk with wine as a cure for palsy. Glutton knows than an alewife would be likely to have them on hand for use in brewing: cf. Roman de la Rose, 10896-8 (Romaunt, 6025-8). Spices were added to wines to mitigate their acidity, producing the mixture called piment, used much like a modern liqueur: cf. Meals and Manners (EETS), p. 87. Does Bet tempt Glutton in by suggesting that these seeds will 'keep him going' without really infringing his fast?

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154-5 The passage seems to claim that chewing spices may not break one's fast (since they are not real food). We may infer from line 203 that is is occurring on a Friday, which was regularly a day of abstinence from eating meat. In modern Ireland, it was usual to refer to it as a 'fast day.' Fennel might be mentioned because of its reputed ability to lessen flatulence, and similar benefits may have been imputed to the others. Alternatively, chewing garlic, pepper, or other 'hote spices' could be a means of masking signs of drinking.

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161 Cock's Lane was a site of brothels in medieval London.

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This line (in Knott-Fowler, but not Kane) is omitted from Ra and from many other MSS. Kane suggests its appearance in A Mss is influenced by the B Version's line.

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This line (in Knott-Fowler, but not Kane) is missing from Ra (and many other Mss). Kane suggests its appearance here is influenced by its presence in the B Version.

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170ff. The 'new fair' is a game (?=forfeits) in which an exchange of goods occurs, and the 'profits' are used to buy drinks for the judges and participants. There was, presumably, a general interest in how the exchange goods were valued and who 'won' (i.e., who had to fill the cup). In this instance, Clement's cloak was judged of less worth than Hikke's hood, so Clement had to pay the difference in drinks for the company.

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17 <b>the newe feire</b> was a game of mock-bargaining designed for the entertainment of the company. Cf. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, 981-89.

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190. in a pater noster whyle: in the time it takes to say the Lord's Prayer. Pater noster are the opening words of the prayer.

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195 This 'bicche' is probably a dog taught to perform this as a comic turn. Bennett rightly rejects Skeat's suggestion that it's a guide-dog for a blind fiddler: such a dog would would presumably be retained for her ability to go straight.

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Ra conflates two lines in K-F and Kane.

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198-99 His eyes long accustomed to the dark of the tavern and his senses affected by drink, when he got close to the door he was bllinded by the daylight (even though it's past evensong!)

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205 A nice realistic touch: when he first wakes, he thinks he's still in the tavern, and is feeling 'dry.'

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211 His proposed penance here goes beyond what is required (abstain from eating meat), and excludes even eating fish (which could be eaten on Fridays).

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215 The watchman ('veil') has the Latin name Vigilate, meaning 'watch; wake up; stay awake.' It may be intended as a specifically allusion to Matt. 26: 41 -- or to other passages in the New Testament: e.g., Mark 13: 33-7; 1 Cor. 16: 13; or 1 Peter 5: 8.

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215. <b>Vigilate</b>. A character by the name of "Watch" exhorts Sloth to repentance. Vigilate is apparently thought of as a nun ('þe veil"), though Skeat takes "veil" to mean "watcher" (OF veile, LAT vigilia). The Latin name, according to Skeat, is taken from Mark 13:37. In like manner we find in line 234 Reddite, "Make restitution" (Rom. 13:7), and in line 251 Latro, "Thief" (Luke 23:39).

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This line (in K-F and Kane) is omitted by Ra.

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226ff As in other cases, Sloth's confesses to other sins associated with Gluttony and Covetousness. His proposed pilgrimage to Truth (rather than Rome) recalls Conscience's sermon at the beginning of the passus (40-1).

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229. syn I wit hadde likely alludes to the idea that one reached a state of moral responsibility ('age of reason') sometime late in the first decade of life. Only from that point on, moral theologians held, could the individual be said to be capable of committing sin. The modern Catholic tradition suggests this occurs around the age of seven, at which point children are introducted to the Sacrament of Penance and allowed to receive Holy Communion.

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232 A legendary cross stood on Rood Eye (i.e., Cross Island) in the River Dee, near the walls of Chester.

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234ff Moved by Sloth's repentance (or by the entire series), an individual sinner despairs since he cannot see himself able to pay back (Reddite) what he has stolen The term may allude to Rom. 13: 7 or Matt. 22: 21 (or Mark 12: 17; Luke 20:25).

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238 Dismas is traditionally the name of the penitent thief crucified beside Jesus. In Luke's account only are the two distinguished. The memento ('remember') in line 239 is taken from this passage of Luke (23: 42).

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239. <b>memento</b>. "remember" (Luke 23:42).

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246 The narrator's uncertainty about the fate of Robert stresses his individual humanity, a nicely realistic touch after the confessions of the abstracted deadly sins. The doubt seems to derive from the fact that however repentant Robert is and however genuine and lasting his cries for forgiveness, he does not avail himself of the ordinary sacramental means to ensure forgiveness for sins contritely confessed to a priest.

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