"If I yede[32] to the plow, I pinched so narrow That a foot land or a furrow Fetchen I would Of my next neighbor, And nymen[33] of his earth. And if I reap, overreach." As might have been expected, the monkish dreamer, unusually liberal as he was in his views, had but a slighting opinion of women. Rarely does he refer to them except to rate them for their extravagance in dress and love of finery. The humbler class of women, he shrewdly insinuates, were fond of drink, and the husbands of such were advised to cudgel them home to their domestic duties. He credited the long-standing slander about woman's inability to keep a secret:-- "For that that women wotteth May not well be concealed." His opinion of the proper sphere of women in that time, and some knowledge of their ordinary feminine occupations, can be acquired from the answer made to the question of a lady as to what her sex should do:-- "Some should sew the sack, quoth Piers, For shedding of the wheat; And ye, lovely ladies, With your long fingers, That ye have silk and sendal To sew, when time is, Chasubles for chaplains, Churches to honor. Wives and widows Wool and flax spinneth; Make cloth, I counsel you, And kenneth[34] so your daughters; The needy and the naked, Nymeth[35] heed how they lieth, And casteth them clothes, For so commanded Truth." Marriage is an honorable estate, and should be entered into with proper motives, and in a decent and regular manner. It is desirable that most men should marry, for "The wife was made the way For to help work; And thus was wedlock wrought With a mean person, First by the father's will And the friends counsel; And sithens[36] by assent of themselves, As they two might accord." This is the essentially worldly way of making marriage arrangements yet practised in some aristocratic circles, but the more democratic and natural way is to reverse the process, and commence with the agreement between the two persons most concerned. Such unequal matches as age and wealth on one side, and youth and desire of wealth on the other, bring about, are sternly reprobated. "It is an uncomely couple, By Christ! as me thinketh, To give a young wench To an old feeble, Or wedden any widow For wealth of her goods, That never shall bairn bear But if it be in her arms." Such marriages lead to jealousy, bickerings, and open rupture, disgraceful to husband and wife, and annoying to others. Therefore Piers counsels "all Christians, Covet not to be wedded For covetise of chattels. Not of kindred rich; But maidens and maidens Make you together; Widows and widowers Worketh the same; For no lands, but for love, Look you be wedded";-- adding the sound bit of spiritual and worldly advice,