Piers Plowman Read online

       For rightful Reason should rule you all:

   55  Let the warden of your wealth be your Native Wit,

       To guard and give out your gold as required,

       And to keep both caution and thrift in your thoughts.”

       Then by him who made her I asked her to answer:

       “That dungeon in the dale which I gazed on with dread,

   60  What may that place mean, good madam, I pray you?”

       “That place,” she declared, “is the Castle of Care.

       If you set foot inside you’ll be sorry you were born

       For the house is the realm of a wretch called Wrong,

       The father of falsehood who founded and built it.

   65  Adam and Eve he enticed to do evil,

       And he counseled Cain to kill his brother;

       Judas he ensnared and incited with silver,

       And hanged him after from an elder tree.3

       He’s the hater of love and the lover of lies,

   70  And soonest betrays those who trust in his treasure.”

       Perplexed, I puzzled what person it was

       Who spoke with such sense the words of Scripture,

       And besought her to say by the sacred name

       What woman she was who advised me so wisely.

   75  “You know my name: I’m none but the Church.

       I took you to me and taught you the faith,

       And your godparents bound you to obey my bidding

       And to love me loyally throughout your life.”

       I commended myself to her mercy for my sins,

   80  Pleading on my knees for her prayers for God’s pity,

       Entreating her to teach me to turn to Christ,

       And to do as my Maker might command:

       “Don’t tell me of treasure but teach me simply,

       Since you are saintly, how to save my soul.”

   85  “When all treasures are tried,” she said, “Truth is the best,

       For God is charity, as the Gospel agrees.4

       It’s as priceless a precept as God is in person.

       If your tongue is true and you tell no lies,

       Act by that axiom and wish no one harm,

   90  Then the Gospel grants that you will be godly

       And like our dear Lord, as Saint Luke has said.5

       The wise who understand should spread that wisdom,

       Which is claimed in common by Christians and heathens.

       “Kings and knights should keep to that course,

   95  Riding to arrest in surrounding lands

       Offenders and felons and tying them fast

       Till Truth can determine the toll of their wrongs.

       For David in his day, when he dubbed his knights,

       Had them swear on their swords to serve the Truth.6

  100  Such pastimes are proper and appropriate for knights,

       Not fasting on Fridays every five score winters,

       But protecting the people who testify to Truth

       And letting neither love nor money delude them—

       And knights who lapse should lose their knighthood.

  105  “Christ King of Kings dubbed knights of ten kinds,

       Cherubim, seraphim, and seven or eight besides.7

       It pleased him in his glory to give them the power

       To act as archangels over his household.

       He taught them the Trinity and thereby the Truth,

  110  And to do as he urged was all that he asked.

       Lucifer, whose light was second to our Lord’s,8

       Thus learnt with his legions to be loyal to heaven,

       But abandoned obedience and was cast out from bliss,

       Falling from fellowship in the form of a devil

  115  To inhabit for ever a deep dark hell.

       And many, many more, a multitude of thousands,

       Leapt out with Lucifer in loathsome shape,

       Believing the lies of the angel who misled them:

           I will ascend above the height of the clouds; I will be like the most High.9

       Heaven could not hold those who hoped he was right.

  120  In devils’ guise they dropped for nine days

       Till God in his goodness stopped their giddy glide

       And stood the heavens still in absolute silence.

       When those angels fled, they fell in such a fashion

       That some stayed in the air while others sank to earth

  125  Or landed deep in hell, where Lucifer lies lowest,

       His peerless pride being endlessly punished.

       “Folk who do wrong shall follow in his footsteps

       And dwell with that devil after they die.

       But they that do right, as we read in Holy Writ,

  130  And are true to the Truth, which is tried and found best,

       May be sure that their souls will ascend to heaven,

       Where Truth in his Trinity will enthrone them all.

       And so, with the Scripture, I say as before,

       When all treasures are tried, Truth is the best,

  135  And the learned should teach what they long ago learnt,

       That the treasure of Truth is the truest on earth.”

       “But tell me,” I said, “for I still don’t understand,

       By what force Truth can enter my feeble frame.”

       “You simpleton,” she said, “you lack common sense;

  140  You learned too little Latin in your youth, my lad:

       ‘Alas that I led such a wasted young life!’10

       From the innate awareness that’s inherent in your heart

       You must learn to love more your Lord than yourself

       And to die far sooner than to do deadly sins:

  145  You should live by that lesson unless you’re taught better

       By someone who’s wiser, whose word you may spread,

       For that is God’s word, by which you should work,

       And Truth has testified that taking a tincture

       Of love will ensure that no sin can besmirch you.

  150  “What Truth has worked, he has worked with love,

       The divinest of virtues revealed to Moses

       And finest, most precious plant of peace.

       But love was so heavy that heaven could not hold it;

       It descended to us sinners and consumed the earth.

  155  Having fed in our fields on flesh and on blood,

       It was none the less lighter than a leaf on a linden,

       More piercing and potent than the point of a needle,

       So that armor and walls gave way to its weight.11

       That love is now leader of the Lord’s folk in heaven,

  160  As a mayor is the mouthpiece for monarch and commons,

       And love takes the lead in shaping
the law

       And imposing penalties on punishable acts.

       “Love is placed in our person by the power of God;

       Our heart is the center where we sense it most strongly.

  165  Our native knowledge is therefore innate

       And conferred by the father who fashioned and formed us,

       Who looked down with love and let his son die

       To redeem us meekly for our dark misdeeds.

       While wishing no ill to the wounding world,

  170  His mouth asked mildly for mercy and forgiveness

       And pity for the people who put him to death.

       You see in him the sovereign example:

       He was mighty and meek and merciful to those

       Who hanged him on high and pierced his heart.

  175  “So the rich, I propose, should pity the poor,

       And though mighty at court, should be meek and modest.

       For the deeds that you do, both damnable and good,

       Are the weights by which you’ll be weighed in the scales:

           In what measure you shall mete, it shall be measured to you again.12

       Your speech may be innocent, your earnings may be honest,

  180  You may be as chaste as a child in church,

       But unless you show love and relieve the poor,

       And share out the gifts that God has granted,

       You derive no more merit from the Mass or from Matins

       Than Malkin from her maidenhood that men don’t desire.13

  185  For the gentle James judged in his Epistle

       That faith without fact is not worth a farthing.

       Unless followed by deeds it’s as dead as a door-nail:

           Faith without works is dead.14

       Thus uncharitable chastity stays chained up in hell,

       Of as little use as a lamp with no light.

  190  Many chaplains are chaste but their charity is naught,

       They are greedy and grasping when gaining advancement,

       They’re unkind to their kin and to all other Christians,

       And they misuse their charity and moan for still more.

       Such uncharitable chastity will choke deep in hell!

  195  “Many parish priests appear to be pure,

       But cannot slough off their covetous crust,

       So surely and shamefully are they shackled to greed,

       Not the truth of the Trinity but the treachery of hell,

       So that lesser men learn to give less of their goods.

  200  That is why these words of the Gospel are wise:

       ‘Give, and it shall be given you for I give to you all15;

       It is love that unlocks and releases my grace

       To comfort the careworn encumbered with sin.’

       For love is closest, most loyal to our Lord,

  205  Love is life’s healer, the highway to heaven;

       I say therefore as I said from the Scripture,

       When all treasures are tried, Truth is the best.

       And now I have told you what Truth is, what treasure,

       I shall linger no longer; God love and protect you!”

  1Genesis xix 32.

  2Matthew xxii 21.

  3It was believed that Judas, having betrayed Jesus, hanged himself out of remorse.

  41 John iv 8.

  5Such a statement cannot be found in Saint Luke’s Gospel, although both Matthew and Luke refer to treasure in heaven.

  6In Skeat, lines 98–99 are placed before line 104.

  7There were said to be nine orders of angels, the tenth having at first been superior and headed by Lucifer, the “bearer of light.”

  8This line is not in Skeat.

  9Isaiah xiv 14.

  10A familiar proverb.

  11Love is here equated, first, with the commandments revealed to Moses, and then with Christ, who came down to earth and became flesh and blood.

  12Mark iv 24, cf. Luke vi 38.

  13Malkin was the name commonly given to a plain servant-girl.

  14James ii 26.

  15Luke vi 38.

  Step II

  In which the lady leaves me and I dream of the impending marriage of Miss Money to False Fickle-tongue, surrounded by clerics, lawyers and court officials. Theology intervenes, persuading them to seek approval for the marriage from the court at Westminster, where the King threatens to arrest the entire dishonest gang, who flee, leaving Miss Money alone.

       I stayed on my knees beseeching her and said,

       “Madam, a moment! For the love of Mary

       Who bore the blessed babe that bought our redemption,

       Teach me some test to tell true from false.”

    5  “Look to your left where they lurk,” she said,

       “Falsehood and Flattery and their favored friends!”

       I looked to my left as the lady told me,

       Aware of a woman in wealthy attire

       That was trimmed with fur, the finest to be found,

   10  And crowned with a coronet to rival a king.

       Her fingers were flush with fine gold rings

       Refulgent with rubies as red as fire,

       With dearest diamonds and deep blue gems,

       Preservative sapphires both sea-blue and Turkish.1

   15  Her robe was dyed scarlet, of richest red,

       And set with gold thread and sparkling stones;

       Her dress was dazzling, I’d not seen such adornment.

       I wondered who she was, whose wife she might be.

       “What,” I inquired, “is this well-clad woman?”

   20  “The mischievous minx,” Lady Church said, “called Money,

       Who disdains Fidelity, my dearest love,

       And lies about him to the lords of the law.

       She is privileged like me in the palace of the Pope,

       Though she’s base and a bastard and Truth tries to ban her.

   25  For her father was false and a fickle talker,

       Who has told no truth since the time he was born,

       And Miss Money has inherited his morals and manners:

           Like father, like son. Every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit.2

       “I ought to have precedence, my parenthood is pure:

       My father is God, the groundswell of grace,

   30  I’m the goodly daughter of God without beginning,

       Whose majesty has granted me Mercy in marriage:

       I shall love as my lord in the heights of heaven

       Any man who is merciful and loyally loves me,

       But I’ll wager the man who marries Miss Money

   35  Will exchange his charity for the chance of her love.

       For did not King David say in the psalms

       That those who speak truth shall truly be saved,

       But not the men who are moved by money?

           Lord, who shall dwell in thy tabernacle?3

    �
��  “Miss Money now means to marry a rogue

   40  Called False Fickle-Tongue, whose father was a fiend.

       It was fast-talking Flattery who persuaded folk,

       And Liar who led them to allow the match.

       Tomorrow’s the moment the marriage takes place,

       So you can, if you care to, discover what kind

   45  Of motley admirers consort with Money.

       Inspect them for sure, but stay well clear

       And keep disapproval and reproaches private

       Till Fidelity’s empowered to punish and reprove them.

       I commend you to Christ and his immaculate mother.

   50  Don’t covet Miss Money lest your conscience accuse you.”

       The lady then left me, lying asleep,

       And I dreamt of Miss Money’s marriage next morning,

       How the ruling rich, the retinue of Falsehood,

       Were bidden to join the bridegroom and bride

   55  With a welter of others to witness the wedding:

       All kinds of people, both prosperous and poor,

       Both knights and clerics and the coarser commons,

       Jurymen and summoners, and sheriffs and their staff,4

       Beadles and bailiffs and brokers of goods,

   60  Provisioners and victualers, and clerical counsel—

       I can’t count the crowd that clustered round Money,

       Though Simony and Civil-Law and assize-court jurors5

       Were most intimate allies of all with the maid.

       It was Flattery who fetched her first from her lodging

   65  And brought her as broker to be bound to Falsehood,

       And when Simony and Civil-Law saw how things stood,

       They consented for a fee to proceed as prescribed.

       Then Liar cried loudly, “Look, here’s a charter

       That graceless Guile has sworn to give them,”