The Vision and Creed of Piers Ploughman, Volume 2Langland, William
General
The Vision and Creed of Piers Ploughman, Volume 2
Langland, William
Christian pilgrims and pilgrimages -- Poetry
681. _Lucifer with legions._ The story of Lucifer's rebellion and fall was
extremely popular in the middle ages, and particularly among the
Anglo-Saxons, who, in the fine poem ascribed to Cædmon, had given it almost
as much detail as Milton had done at a later date. This legend is related
in prose in an Anglo-Saxon tract in MS. Cotton. Vespas. D. xiv, fol. 2.
682. The second Trin. Col. MS. has, _Leride it in hevene, | and as the
lovelokest | to loke on, aftir oure Lord_.
697-704. Instead of these lines, we find the following in Whitaker's text:
Lord, why wolde he tho,
Thulke wrechede Lucifer,
Lepen on a-lofte
In the northe syde,
To sitten in the sonne side
Ther the day roweth,
Ne were it for northerne men,
Anon ich wolde telle:
Ac ich wolle lacke no lyf,
Quath that lady sotthly.
'Hyt is sykerer by southe,
Ther the sonne regneth,
Than in the north, by meny notes,
No man loyne other.
For theder as the fend flegh,
Hus fote for to sette,
Ther he failede and fuel,
And hus felawes alle.
And helle is ther he is,
And he ther y-bounde,
Evene contrarie suteth Criste,
Cierkus knowen the sothe,
_Dixit Dominus Domino meo, sede a dextris
meis._
'Ac of this matere
No more mene ich nelle,
He was in the halyday
After heten wayten,
They care noght thauh it be cold
Knaves wen thei worchen.'
Whitaker has translated the last four lines of the foregoing extract thus,
"Excepting that hyndes on the holyday look out for warm places, but knaves
(servants) when working hard, are indifferent to cold."
695. Isaiah xiv, 14. The citation varies a little from the text of the
printed vulgate.
707. _Somme in the eyr._ The monks in the middle ages endeavoured to
explain the existence of different classes of spirits and fairies, which
the popular creed represented as harmless, or even beneficent creatures, by
supposing that some of the angels who fell with Lucifer were less guilty
than others, and were allowed to occupy the different elements on the earth
instead of being condemned to "the pit." In "The Master of Oxford's
Catechism," written early in the fifteenth century, and printed in the
Reliquiæ Antiquæ, vol. i, p. 231, we have the following question and
answer,--"_C._ Where be the anjelles that God put out of heven, and bycam
devilles? _M._ Som into hell, and som reyned in the skye, and som in the
erth, and som in waters and in wodys."
815. Mark iv, 24. In qua mensura mensi fueritis, remetietur vobis, et
adjicietur vobis.
835. Epist. Jac. ii, 17. Sic et fides, si non habeat opera, mortua est in
semetipsa.
862. Luke vi, 38.
901. The second Trin. Col. MS. has--
Frettid with rynges,
Of the pureste perreighe
That prince werde evere,
In red scarlet robid
And ribande with gold.
Ther nis no quen queyntere
That quyk is o-lyve,
'What is this womman,' quod I.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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