Piers Plowman

by William Langland

     And have often exhorted you to think on your end,

    5  On the many years gone, the meager few remaining,

       And your wanton wildness when you were young,

       Which you ought to amend in your middle age

       Before you are old and too fragile and feeble

       To pray or put up with poverty and penance:

           And if he shall come in the second watch, or come in the third watch…1

   10  You’ve been warned to mend your ways while you may

       By outbreaks of Plague, and poverty and pain:

       God chides his children with these chafing rods:

           Such as I love, I rebuke and chasten.2

       “Yet the psalmist says of such that love Jesus,

           Thy rod and thy staff, they have comforted me3:

       ‘You may strike me with a staff, a stick or a rod,

   15  And I laugh for it salves and strengthens my soul.’

       But you play at poetry when you could be praying

       For the bakers of bread or saying your psalms.

       There are dozens of books about Do-this and Do-that,

       And plenty of friars to explain finer points.”

   20  I saw that he spoke the truth and said

       To excuse myself that the scholarly Cato

       Wrote poetry to solace his son and prescribed:

       Stop toiling and play from time to time.4

       “That’s how I behave, and I’ve heard holy men

   25  Are far more effective if they have some fun.

       But if someone can discern the secrets of Do-well

       And endeavor to explain to me Do-better and Do-best,

       I’ll cease my scribbling and skulk in the church,

       Unless sleeping or eating, reciting the psalms.”

   30  “Saint Paul explains in his Epistle,” he said,

           “And now there remain faith, hope and charity, these three: but the greatest of these is charity.5

       Thus to do well is to do as fidelity ordains;

       If you’re married, this means you should love your mate

       And you both should live your lives by the law,

       If in holy orders, the highway to heaven

   35  Is to be obedient and abide by your Rule,

       Not to run off to Rome or Rocamadour,6

       And if you’re still single and decide to stay so,

       For your soul’s sake don’t go to seek out more saints.

       See how Lucifer lost his lordly position,

   40  Solomon his wisdom and Sampson his strength,

       And Job the Jew paid dearly for his joy!

       Aristotle and others, Hippocrates, Virgil,

       And the Great Alexander ended in grief;

       Wealth and native wit merely served to destroy them.

   45  “Felicia’s loveliness led to disgrace,

       And Rosamund wrongly and wretchedly abused

       The beauty of her body and disposed of it badly.7

       I could mention many such men and women,

       Whose words were wise but their actions wicked—

   50  There are folk who are vile yet speak well of virtue—8

       The rich especially, scrimping and saving

       So that people they hate can inherit their hoard,

       And they lose their souls because seeing folk suffer

       They do not love them as our Lord ordained:

           Give, and it shall be given to you.9

   55  Intelligence and riches bring regular ruin,

       Harming who has them unless he’s alert:

           That servant who knew the will of his lord, and prepared not himself, and did not according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes.10

       Scripture says knowledge can swell a man’s soul:

           Knowledge puffeth up; but charity edifieth.11

       And riches are the same, unless righteously rooted.

       “Grace is a herb that can heal these hurts,

   60  But it only grows in the hearts of the humble.

       Patience and poverty are the place where it grows,

       In lives that are upright and honest and holy,

       Through the gift, says the Gospel, of the Holy Ghost:

           The Spirit breatheth where he will.12

       As the Bible says, both seeing and instruction

   65  Are needed for knowledge and native wit:

           We speak what we know, and we testify what we have seen.13

       But grace springs from love and is given by God,

       For no natural or scholarly understanding can say

           Whence he cometh, and whither he goeth.14

       “None the less, native wit and learning should be lauded

       Where the root of learning is love of the Lord.

   70  God laid down his laws to enlighten the Jews

       As Moses recounts, according to which code

       An adulterous woman, whether wealthy or in want,

       Was subject to stoning to death for her sin.

       But we find one woman convicted of that fault,

   75  Whom Christ in his kindness excused through learning

       By stooping to write a sentence in the sand

       Which said that the Jews were sinners themselves

       And their guilt before God was greater than hers.

       Christ’s learning released her, and they left in shame,

   80  And the Church knows for sure that her sin was absolved.

       “Thus learning is a palliative to people who repent,

       But a curse at their end to unshriven outcasts,

       Since but for learning the bread would be bread,

       Not the body of God, which brings grace to the good

   85  And endless damnation to any who die evil.

       As the sentence of Christ both succored the sinner

       Whom he sought to save and showed up her guilt—

           Judge not, that you may not be judged—15

       So brothers, God’s body, unless taken with truth

       Will condemn us like Jews at the Day of Doom.

   90  “So for Christ’s sake look that you love true learning

       For native wit and learning are related to our Lord,

       The closest of cousins and kindred of Christ,

       Mirrors to realize our wrongdoing and right it,

       Laying down guidance for learned and lay.

   95  So let’s not belittle philosophy or law

       Or question their customs or arcane conclusions.

       As a man cannot see if his sight is missing,

       His learning is lacking unless he reads books,

       For the people who pen them are apprenticed to God;

  100  Wh
at they say is inspired by the Holy Spirit.

       As sight serves a man to see down the street,

       So literacy leads the unlettered toward reason:

       A blind man in battle who bears good weapons

       Will hit out in vain at his enemy with his axe,

  105  So a man of intelligence trips without teaching,

       And cannot be saved despite his good sense.

       “The keys to Christ’s coffer are kept by the Church

       To unlock as it likes and to grant to laymen

       Mercy for faults if folk demand it

  110  With sincere subservience in search of grace.

       The Old Law allowed that the Levites kept the Ark16;

       No layman had leave to lay a hand upon it,

       Only priests and their sons, patriarchs and prophets.

       So when Saul made a sacrifice sorrow befell him

  115  And his sons also suffered for the sin he committed.

       Many others as well who walked with the Ark

       In worship and wonder but were not Levites

       Lost their lives when they lifted it up.

       I advise all folk to defer to the clergy,

  120  To admire their learning, no matter how they live,

       And give weight to their words for their witness is true.

       We may not meddle or move them to anger

       Lest arguments incite us to harm one another:

           Touch not my anointed.17

       “Clergy are the keepers under Christ of heaven,

  125  And learning is needed and relied on by knights,

       While native wit stems from all sorts of sights,

       From birds and beasts, from bliss and sorrow,

       From fragments of experience, both factual and false.

       Before us folk marked the immeasurable marvels

  130  They saw in order to school their sons

       And held it high science to discern the source,

       But their science never saved a single soul,

       And no one was brought to bliss by their books,

       And their science only stemmed from the things they saw.

  135  Patriarchs and prophets disputed their conclusions

       And said that their words and their worldly wisdom

       Were crumbs by contrast to the learning of Christ,

           For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God.18

       “The Holy Ghost shall open the heavens on high

       And love shall be loosed and shall leap down to earth

  140  To pastors and priests, and the pure at heart:

           The shepherds said one to another: Let us go over to Bethlehem.19

       Neither clever nor rich men occur in that account,

       Nor illiterate lords, but the truly learned:

           There came wise men from the east.20

       And five shillings says no friar was found there!

       Nor was the babe born in a beggarly barn

  145  In Bethlehem but in a burgess’s house:

           Because there was no room for them in the inn, and

           A pauper has no inn.21

       The angel appeared to pastors and poets

       Bidding them witness God’s Bethlehem birth

       And singing with gladness, Glory to God!

       Rich men were snoring and sleeping soundly

  150  While a shower of bliss shone on those shepherds,

       And wise men had heard of the happening and hastened

       With presents to pay due homage and honor.

       “I have told you all this because it took my attention

       That you contradicted Learning crassly and crossly,

  155  Alleging the unlettered were more likely to be saved

       Than Christians who are clever or the learned clergy.

       That is true of some, but consider this example:

       Take two strong men and toss them in the Thames,

       Both naked as a needle and neither one stronger.

  160  The one is wise and has studied swimming;

       The other is ignorant and has not learnt.

       Of the two in the Thames, which trembles the more:

       The one who is ignorant and unable to swim,

       Or the confident swimmer who can strike out safely

  165  While his fellow is wafted by the waves where they will

       And dreads the prospect of dying by drowning?”

       “The one who can’t swim, for sure,” I said.

       “Just so,” the voice said. “It stands to reason.

       The learned can sooner surface from sin

  170  And be saved if they want than the simple unschooled,

       Though they frequently fall and commit an offense.

       For a scholar well knows the significance of sin

       And can understand the solace for his soul

       Afforded by contrition, even free of confession.

  175  As the psalms say, contrition strips away sin:

           Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered.22

       It relieves the learned and lifts them from despair,

       That slough in which Satan tries men most sorely,

       Where the witless wallow while they’re waiting to admit

       A few trifles each Lent without tasting contrition,23

  180  Trusting to the pardon promised by their teachers,

       Such as parish priests and parsons who may not be proper

       To instruct the unlettered, as Luke relates:

           If the blind lead the blind, both fall into the pit.24

       It is misery to trudge through the mire with the untutored,

       And children with books should bless those who bought them,

  185  For literate living will save life and soul!

           The Lord is the portion of my inheritance.25

       It has taken from Tyburn twenty bold thieves:

       See how they’re saved while others have swung!26

       “God granted his grace on Good Friday to the felon

       Who confessed his faith in Christ on the cross

  190  And begged for that grace, which God will grant

       To the meek who are willing to mend their ways.

       But the felon is found not so high in heaven

       As deserving saints such as Saint John.

       In the same way I may be served a supper

  195  And may be fed more than I need yet remain

       Below the lords and selected guests,

       On the floor with my food like a beggar at the feast.

       So it fares with the felon who was saved on Good Friday:

       He sits not with Simon, Saint Jude or Saint John,

  200  Nor with maidens or martyrs, monks or wid
ows,

       But singly and served by himself on the ground.

       For a person who has thieved is at permanent peril

       Of the law, which may let him live or die:

           Be not without fear about sin forgiven, and add not sin upon sin.27

       And to serve the same both a saint and a thief

  205  Would run against reason and not be right.

       The true knight Trajan did not toil deep in hell,

       Which allowed our Lord to release him lightly:

       So I think that the thief in heaven hovers

       At its lowest level, as Church law allows:

           Then will he render to every man according to his works.28

  210  “You may ask why one felon confessed his faith

       While the other did not, but no one can know;

       The question discomfits every Christian scholar:

           Why did it please him? Because it was his will!29

       I say that to you, who aspire to understand

       The answers to everything, arguing with Reason,

  215  Questioning how birds and beasts may breed,

       Why some are below and some are aloft,

       Wondering how flowers in woods and fields

       Came by their colors so clear and bright,

       Asking how it is that animals are wise,

  220  And studying stones and the stars, where even

       Native wit and learning are left at a loss

       Because none but Nature knows the cause.

       He’s the magpies’ master and murmurs in their ear

       Where the thorn is thickest to build and to breed;

  225  Nature taught the peacock to pair without pity

       And pointed out to Adam his privy parts

       And to him and to Eve how to hide them with leaves.

       The ignorant may ask the erudite and learned

       Why Adam chose to hide his organs not his mouth,

  230  Which ate the apple, but the answer again

       Is that Nature knows and no one else.

       “The birds and the beasts way back in the past

       Were taken as models for moral tales:

       The most beautiful birds give birth to the basest

  235  And the feeblest in flight of all that fly: