The Vision of William Concerning Piers the Plowman: In Three Parallel Texts; Together with Richard the Redeless, Volume 2Clarendon Press, 1886 |
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Common terms and phrases
alludes allusion Ancren Riwle Ayenbite of Inwyt B-text baselards Book of Days called Chaucer Christ Church clergy cloth common Conscience Cotgrave Crede Cursor Mundi Denoted Dict Dictionary Do-well edition Edward III England English explained expression friars Furnivall gives Glossary Gospel of Nicodemus Halliwell Hence Hist Holy Icel John king Langland Latin Layamon Leue Lord Luke Matt means Memorials of London mention Morris note to Pass occurs Ormulum Parv passage Passus phrase Piers Plowman Piers the Plowman poem poet pope priests printed Prol Prologue quotation quoted reference remarks Richard Robert of Brunne says sense shew Skeat spelt Stratmann subj suppose Synne Tale thee thou verb viii Vision Vulgate William word Wright Wyclif's xviii xxii xxiii þat
Popular passages
Page 164 - WHAT is truth ?" said jesting Pilate, and would not stay for an answer. Certainly there be that delight in giddiness, and count it a bondage to fix a belief, affecting free-will in thinking as well as in acting. And though the sects of philosophers of that kind be gone, yet there remain certain discoursing wits which are of the same veins, though there be not...
Page 72 - Love thyself last: cherish those hearts that hate thee; Corruption wins not more than honesty. Still in thy right hand carry gentle peace, To silence envious tongues. Be just, and fear not: Let all the ends thou aim'st at be thy country's...
Page 147 - And they say, How doth God know? and is there knowledge in the Most High? 12 Behold, these are the ungodly, who prosper in the world ; they increase in riches.
Page 25 - Quomodo cecidisti de caelo lucifer, qui mane oriebaris? Corruisti in terram, qui vulnerabas gentes, qui dicebas in corde tuo: In caelum conscendam, super astra Dei exaltabo solium meum, sedebo in monte testamenti in lateribus aquilonis; ascendam super altitudinem nubium, similis ero Altissimo.
Page 56 - What, art mad ? A man may see how this world goes with no eyes. Look with thine ears: see how yond justice rails upon yond simple thief. Hark, in thine ear: change places; and, handy-dandy, which is the justice, which is the thief?
Page 177 - No tool had he who wrought; no knife to cut; No nail to fix; no bodkin to insert; No glue to join; his little beak was all. And yet how neatly finished! What nice hand, With every implement and means of art, • And twenty years apprenticeship to boot, Could make me such another?
Page 56 - Thou hast most traitorously corrupted the youth of the realm in erecting a grammar school; and whereas, before, our forefathers had no other books but the score and the tally, thou hast caused printing to be used, and, contrary to the king, his crown and dignity, thou hast built a paper-mill.
Page 26 - 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.
Page li - It is in his intense absorbing moral feeling that he is beyond his age : with him outward observances are but hollow shows, mockeries, hypocrisies without the inward power of religion. It is not so much in his keen cutting satire on all matters of the Church as his solemn installation of Reason and Conscience as the guides of the self-directed soul, that he is breaking the yoke of sacerdotal domination ; in his constant appeal to the plainest, simplest Scriptural truths, as in themselves the whole...
Page lii - Host ; the \FriarjTjurnish every impersonated ^iceP are foes to every virtue ; his bitterest satire, his keenest irony (and these weapons he wields with wonderful poetic force) are against their dissoluteness, their idleness, their pride, their rapacity, their arts, their lies, their hypocrisy, their delicate attire, their dainty feasts, their magnificent buildings...