Imagens das páginas
PDF
ePub

In vain he sought to find a ford, and presently he saw new marvel. A crystal cliff poured out many a royal ray, and at its foot there sat a child, a gentle maiden, shining white. "I knew her well, I had seen her ere." And long he looked towards her. "The longer, I knew her more and more." He would call, and feared to call to her in that strange place. She lifted up her face, white as pure ivory; that went to his heart, "And ever the longer, more and more".

"More than me list my dread arose,

I stood full still and durst not call; With eyen open and mouth full close

I stood as hend as hawk in hall."

He feared lest he should lose her if he broke the silence. Then fresh as a lily she came down the bank towards him; and he dwells upon her purity of beauty, and her bright array; a wondrous pearl, withShe out a spot, in midst her breast was set so sure. advanced to him, bent low to him in woman's wise; with a faint sound she greeted him from beyond the

stream.

"O Pearl, adorned with pearls," he said, "art thou my Pearl that I have plained'? What fate hath brought my jewel hither, and caused me this grief! for since we two were parted I have been a joyless jeweller." Then comes to him the voice of consolation. The Pearl is not lost, but is in that gracious garden where no sin comes near her-is become indeed a pearl of price.

"And thou has called thy wyrd a thief

That aught of naught has made thee clear, Thou blames the bote of thy mischief 3 Thou art no kindé Jewelere.'

"A Jewel to me then was this geste And jewels wern her gentle saws, I wis, quoth I, my blissful best,

My great distress thou all to-draws." 4

Henceforth, says the glad father, I will live in joy

"And love my Lord and all His laws

That has me brought this blissé near;
Now were I at you beyond these wawes
I were a joyful Jewelere."

But his Pearl teaches him that he errs in thinking that she is with him because his eyes behold her; that he errs in thinking he can be with her; that he errs in thinking he can freely pass this water that flows between. He must abide God's time; and he can cross only through death. Then rises again the note of despair for the child's loss. She replies with the lesson of Christian Patience. He must not strive

against God. He answers sadly and humbly to her

1 Plained, bewailed, lamented. From Latin "plango." 2 Wyrd, fate.

2 The bote of thy mischief, the remedy of thy misfortune.

4 Thou all to-draws, thou completely drawest from me. 5 Wawes, waves.

[blocks in formation]

But the Father, "Art thou the Queen to whom says all this world shall do honour? Can any take the crown from Mary?" Then the child vision kneels in worship to the Virgin before telling of the many mansions in Heaven, and of the crowns of glory that make kings and queens of all who enter, each delighting in the honour of the other. Still the Father asks to be taught. She lived but two years upon earth, was too young to have learned Pater or Creed-and Queen made on the first day! The child-angel answers.

66

"There is no date of God's goodness,'

Then said to me that worthy wight, 'For all is truth that He con dress.12 And He may do no thing but right.'

She tells him our Lord's parable of the vineyard. She too was in the vineyard but a little while, and was paid anon of all and some." The dialogue then dwells upon God's taking to himself the little ones, who have been baptized to Him, and have not lived till they could sin. They who live longer are tempted more, but let them pray and strive to keep their innocence to be as the children whom Christ blessed and would have come to him, for of such is the kingdom of Heaven. Forsake the mad ways of the world, and seek the kingdom that is like a pearl without a spot.

"O maskelless 13 Pearl, in pearlés pure,

That bears,' quoth I, 'the pearl of price,
Who formed thee thy fair figúre?

That wrought thy weed he was full wise.'"

She is adorned, she answers, by the Lamb, whose bride she is; the Lamb without spot who patiently suffered, and whose brides are the souls of the innocent and patient. She recalls the Vision of John. "I, John, saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming

[blocks in formation]
[merged small][subsumed][ocr errors][merged small][subsumed][subsumed]

mild that she will bring him to see that blissful bower. He can see only its outside, she says, but if he will trace the stream up to its source he will find a hill from which he can look out upon the distant glory of that city. Eagerly he seeks the hill, and sees from it the New Jerusalem. When he has dwelt upon its glories, the moon rises, and white-robed virgins issue from the city, each having bound on her breast the blissful pearl. They come forth in love and delight. The Lamb is before, and before the Lamb the elders bow. Legions of angels fill the air with a sweet incense, and a sweet song rises in praise of the Lamb that was slain. The Father looks among the shining company of those whose home is with the Lamb, and there he sees his Little Queen in peace and joy, and yearns towards her with love-longing in great delight. His delight urges him to seek to cross the stream and be with

1 This is one of four pictures which in the original MS. of the poem are added as illustrations, each of them upon one of its small 4to pages.

her. By the vain struggle his dream is broken, and he awakes to grief, with his head upon the little hill over his buried Pearl.

The next poem in the series illustrates Purity and Patience, by dwelling upon Scripture incidents that enforce such virtues; the Parable of the Marriage Feast; the Fall of the Angels; the sins of the world before the Deluge, and the Deluge itself; the Destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah; the Captivity of Judah; the Stories of Belshazzar and of Nebuchadnezzar; and the other poem is a lesson of patience enforced by the story of Jonah. The pieces show not only a poetical mind in their author, but variety of power. This poet, whose name is lost, can paint a storm with vigour, and look tenderly upon a vision of his little child among the angels worshipping the Lamb.

Another poet, whose name is forgotten, produced at the close of the fourteenth century, probably in 1394 and 1395, two pieces which he associated with the two greatest poetical works of his day. One was in alliterative verse, after the manner of "The Vision of Piers Plowman," and was called "Pierce the Plowman's Crede." The other was in rhyming ballad stanzas, and professed to be a story by the Plowman whom Chaucer had reckoned as one of his Canterbury Pilgrims-"The Plowman's Tale." Mr. Skeat has been the first to show that these two poems are from the same hand. When the Pelican in the Plowman's Tale says

[graphic]

"Of freres I have told before

In a making of a Crede,"

he refers certainly to the previously written "Pierce the Plowman's Crede." As the Pelican stands for every good Christian who was called a Lollard for endeavouring to check pride and worldliness among the clergy, it is not necessary to believe that the poet means himself by his Pelican when he says, "I have told before." But it is not improbable that he does; and when Mr. Skeat adds to the resemblance in tone of thought, good evidence of the frequent occurrence in both poems of such words and terms of speech as may more fairly be accounted proper to an individual writer than common to two, he adds all argument necessary to convince us that the author of "The Plowman's Tale" (which was first printed in Chaucer's works in the edition of 1542), did mean himself when he wrote that he had told before of the Friars "in a making of a Crede."

The Ploughman of the Creed is simply a ploughman. The poet supposes himself to know his Paternoster and his Ave Maria, but not yet his Creed. He must learn it before Easter, and would like to have it from a man, learned or unlearned,

"that liveth thereafter

And fully followeth the faith and feigneth none other; That no worldly weal wilneth no time,

But liveth in loving of God, and his law holdeth,

A making of, a poem about. "Maker" was the Old English name for poet, and "poet" in Greek means "maker."

And for no getting of good never his God grieveth,
But followeth Him the full way, as He the folk taught."

Where shall he find such a man to teach him his Creed properly? He asks the Friars; meets one morning a Minorite (Franciscan), and asks of him where he shall get the knowledge he needs. A Carmelite, he says, had offered to teach him. "But," he says to the Minorite " but, for thou knowest Carmes well, thy counsel I ask." The Minorite laughs at the questioner, and holds him mad for supposing that the Carmelites can teach anything of God, whom they know not. So the narrow feuds between order and order are suggested while the jugglings and backslidings of the Carmelites are dwelt upon by a Franciscan

[ocr errors][merged small][merged small]

"And mightest thou amenden us with money of thine own,
Thou shouldest kneel before Christ in compass of gold
In the wide window westward, well nigh in the middle,
And Saint Francis himself shall folden thee in his cope
And present thee to the Trinity, and pray for thy sins.
Thy name shall nobly be written and wrought for the nonce,
And in remembrance of thee y-read there for ever.
And, brother, be thou not afeard! Bethink in thine heart!
Though thou con not thy Creed, care thou no more.
I shall assoilen thee, sir, and setten it on my soul
An thou may maken this good, think thou no other."

When the seeker had applied Christ's words to this manner of well-doing, he went farther in search of a man to teach him, and came next to the Dominicans, whom he found housed in royal splendour. After he has painted in verse one of their great convents, he says―

"And yet these builders will beg a bag full of wheat
Of a pure poor man that may unnethe pay
Half his rent in a year and half ben behind!
Then turned I again when I had all y-toted3
And found in a freitour1 a frere on a bench,
A great churl and a grim, growen as a tun,
With a face as fat as a full bladder

Blowen bret full of breath, and as a bag hanged

[blocks in formation]

On bothen his cheeks and his chin, with a jowl lollede
As great as a goose egg, growen all of grease,
That all wagged his flesh as a quick mire.6
His cope that beclipped him well clene was it folden,
Of double worsted ydight down to the heel;
His kirtle of clean white cleanly y-sewed,
It was good enow of ground grain for to beren."7

To this Dominican the seeker told his want, and said that an Austin Friar had offered to help him. Thereupon the Dominican abused the Austin Friar, and said that his own order was greatest of degree, as Gospels tell.

666

'Ah, sir,' quoth I then, 'thou say'st a great wonder,
Sithen Christ said himself to all his disciples,
Which of you that is most, most shall he work,
And who is goer before, first shall he serven.
And said he saw Satan sitten full high
And full low ben y-laid. In likeness he told
That in poorness of spirit is speedfullest heal,
And hearts of highness harmeth the soul.

And therefore, frere, farewell; here find I but pride;
I preise not thy preaching but as a pure mite."

8

He tried next an Austin Friar, and opened upon him with talk of a Minorite. This brought abuse of the Minorites from the lips of one of a rival order, followed by the Austin Friar's picture of himself. Then visit was paid to a Carmelite, and to him a Dominican was cited, which brought down the contempt of the white friar upon the black. The Carmelite dwelt on the value of his prayers and masses, and wanted value for them—

"A mass of us mean men is of more meed
And passeth all prayers of these proud freres,

An thou wilt given us any good, I would thee here granten
To taken all thy penance in peril of my soul,

And though thou con not the Creed, clean thee assoil;
So that thou mowe amenden our house with money, or else
With some catel, or corn, or cups of silver.'"

But as the searcher said that he had not a penny, the friar left him in scorn to hie to a housewife, who had bequeathed to his house ten pounds in her testament.

"Then turned I me forth and talked to myself

Of the falsehood of this folk, how faithless they weren,
And as I went by the way, weeping for sorrow,
I saw a sely9 man me by upon the plough hangen,
His coat was of a clout that cary 10 was y-called,
His hood was full of holes, and his hair out,
With his knopped shoon clouted full thick,

altering. The root is, probably, First-English "breotan," to bruise or break.

• Quick mire, living, palpitating, mire; quagmire.

7 Good enow of ground grain for to beren, of texture good enough to be dyed scarlet. Grain was a name for scarlet or purple dye, because the dried cochineal insects from which dye was made resemble seeds. Scarlet and purple were associated with the finest textures in robes of state, and one born to empire was said to be born in the purple. 8 Preise, value, prize; value your preaching at a mere mite. 9 Sely, simple.

20 Cary, the name of a coarse kind of cloth.

His toen toteden out as he the land treaded,

His hosen overhungen his hockshins' on everich a side
All beslobbered in fen as he the plough followed;
Two mittens as mete, made all of clouts,

The fingers weren for-werd,3 and full of fen hanged.
This wight waseled in the fen almost to the ankle,
Four rotheren him before, that feeble were worthen,
Men might reckon each a rib,7 so rueful they weren.
His wife walked him with, with a long goad
In a cutted coat, cutted full high,

Wrapped in a winnow sheet, to werens her from weathers,
Barefoot on the bare ice that the blood followed.
And at the land's end lay a little crumb bowl,
And thereon lay a little child lapped in clouts,
And twain of two years old upon another side,

And all they sungen one song, that sorrow was to hearen,
They crieden all one cry, a careful note.

The sely man sighed sore, and said, 'Children, be'th still!'
This man looked upon me and let the plough standen,
And saidé, Sely man, why sighest thou so hard?
If thee lack livelihood lend thee I will

[blocks in formation]

u Lolled him, called him "Lollard." There are various reasons given for the name. I believe it to be an application to heretics of the word held to represent what was meant by the Greek zizania in the 13th chapter of Matthew, the tares sown by the enemy among the wheat. The Latin Vulgate version kept the Greek word zizania, and a collection of heretical writings was entitled "Fasciculi Zizaniorum." But the zizania were held to be darnel, lolium, then often spelt "lollium," which grows among good corn, having much resemblance to it, and is very poisonous. In the old Latin rendering of the Persian version of the Gospels, the passage runs : "Quin tu, O Domine, semen bonum in agro tuo seminasti, Lolium igitur inter illud unde provenit? Ille respondit, Quispiam per inimicitiam injecit. Servi dixerunt, Permitte itaque nobis ut Lolium exinde secernamus." Christ's answer by no means justified Church practice in dealing with the tares. William Langland, in the Vision of Piers Plowman, describing himself on Cornhill, played on the analogy of this word to Loller or idler, and so easily returned it on the friars. Chaucer seems to have had in mind the relation of the word to Lolium, when the Host having with an idle oath called on the Parson for a tale, is gently rebuked: "I smell a loller in the wind, quoth he. . . . This loller here wol prechen us

The Ploughman points to the likeness between fris and the Pharisees, and shows how far they were go from the teaching of the Sermon on the Mount

"Behold upon Wat Brute, 12 how busily they pursueden
For he said them the sooth: and yet, sir, further
They may no more marren him, but men telleth
That he is an heretic and evil believeth,

And preacheth it in pulpit to blinden the people.
They wolden awyrien 13 that wight for his welldeeds,
And so they chewen Charity as chewen schaf14 hounds,
And they pursueth the poor and passeth pursuits;
Both they wiln and they wolden yworthen so great
To passen any man's might, to murtheren the souls,
First to burne the body in a bale of fire

And sithen the sely soul slayen, and senden her to hell.''

The Ploughman spoke his mind also of the monk: and ended by the utterance of truth in simpl words. As God hath chosen the foolish things c the world to confound the wise, and base things c the world, and things which are despised hath Go chosen, the poor ploughman whose first impulse wa of Charity towards a sufferer, became the teacher o the Christian's Creed. 15

"The Plowman's Tale," by the same author, put into another form the common protest of the time against the worldliness that had corrupted those who should be guardians of faith, encouragers of hope. embodiments of the charity without which, though the Christian teacher speak with tongues of men and angels, he is nothing worth. It begins with direct reference to the rising controversy between those who were called Lollards and their persecu

tors:

"A sterné strife is stirréd new In many stedés in a stound;

somewhat;" and the Shipman, who stops him by interposing a tale, says of the good town Parson

"He wolde sowen some difficultee,

Or springen cockle in our clene corn,"

Such accusation levelled against the man whom he clothes with apostolic virtue, and whom he afterwards does make to preach, shows the goodwill of Chaucer to these persecuted Churchmen,

12 Wat Brute. Walter Brute was a learned private gentleman in the diocese of Hereford, who, though a layman, was urged by religious feeling to teach openly and privately, assisted by two intimate friends, William Swinderby and Stephen Ball. They sought reform of church discipline, and held the opinions of Wiclif. In 1392 Richard II. issued a commission, addressed to the Mayor of Hereford and noblemen and gentlemen of the county, authorising them to investigate charges against Walter Brute of heresy and keeping of conventicles. Walter Brute defended himself, and withdrew into private life; but William Swinderby and others, quitting the diocese of Hereford, continued their work in Wales. The persecution was continued, and in 1401 Swinderby was burnt in Smithfield.

13 Awyrien, curse. First-English "awyrian" and "awyrgian." 14 Schaf. This is said to mean "chaff," and Mr. Skeat interprets the line "They gobble down their charity as hounds do bran." But may not the sense be, "They champ at their charity as dogs do over food they will not swallow?" "Skaf," from "skafa," to scrape, was the Scandinavian name for peeled bark used as fodder for goats and cattle, and "schaf" was probably our name, derived from the Scandinavian, for some such cattle fodder as a dog might take into his mouth and try his teeth on, but could hardly be got to swallow.

15 "Pierce the Ploughman's Crede" has been edited from collation of two MSS. with the old printed text of 1553, and fully supplied with notes and glossary by the Rev. Walter W. Skeat, who adds to it in the same two-shilling book a poem of about A.D. 1500,"God spede the Plough." It is published for the Early English Text Society by Trübner and Co.

[blocks in formation]
« AnteriorContinuar »