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⁴ Burdach, Konrad, Der Dichter des Ackermann aus Böhmen und seine Zeit (Vom Mittelalter zur Reformation 3.2; Berlin 1926–32) 265 n.Google Scholar

⁵ Worth Frank, Robert, Jr., Piers Plowman and the Scheme of Salvation (New Haven 1957) 13–15.Google Scholar

⁶ Morton Bloomfield, W., Piers Plowman as a Fourteenth-Century Apocalypse (New Brunswick, N.J. [1962]) 105.Google Scholar

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¹⁰ Robertson, D. W. Jr., and Bernard Huppé, F., Piers Plowman and Scriptural Tradition (Princeton 1951; rptd. New York 1969) 6–7.Google Scholar

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¹² Clemente Davlin, Mary Sister, ‘Petrus, id est Christus: Piers Plowman as “The Whole Christ,” ‘Chaucer Review 6 (1972) 280–92.Google Scholar

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¹⁴ Patrick Dunning, Thomas, Piers Plowman: An Interpretation of the A Text, 2d ed. rev. and ed. Dolan, T. P. (Oxford 1980) 88, 90.Google Scholar

¹⁵ Daniel Murtaugh, M., Piers Plowman and the Image of God (Gainesville, Fla. 1978) 114.Google Scholar

¹⁶ Zeeman, Elizabeth (Salter) has suggested the very general meaning for Piers of ‘the operation of the divine upon the human’ — ‘Piers Plowman and the Pilgrimage to Truth,’ Essays and Studies by Members of the English Association N.S. 11 (1958), rptd. in Style and Symbolism in Piers Plowman, ed. Robert Blanch, J. (Knoxville 1969) 125. Murtaugh's theme of the image of God in man represents only part of this divine operation upon the human. For example, Murtaugh describes Piers as the homo of Deus-homo, referring to the grammatical allegory of C (op. cit. 115, 117). But even within the grammatical allegory, that divine operation also expresses itself in the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, which is a doctrine quite distinct from that of Christ's restoring the image of God to man. Furthermore, as a doctrine of the Church the Deus-homo of the Incarnation has more to do with the idea of homo assumptus in Deo, which finds its central formulation in the Athanasian Creed, than with the Trinitarian image of God in man outlined by (among others) Augustine in De Trinitate. Murtaugh speaks of these latter two as freely as if they were identical (e.g., op. cit. 119); perhaps both play a role in Piers's conception, but an adequate interpretation of Piers must account for both the particularity of his meanings and the generality of his meaning.Google Scholar

¹⁷ Ed. cit. (n. 1 supra) II 221. Unless otherwise noted, quotations of the B-text are from the Athlone edition by Kane and Donaldson (London 1975); quotations of the C-text, from the edition by Derek Pearsall (Berkeley 1979).Google Scholar

¹⁸ Troyer, , ‘Who is Piers?,’ 370–71 (answered by Dunning, A-Text 91); and Kaske, R. E., ‘Patristic Exegesis in the Criticism of Medieval Literature: The Defense,’ in Critical Approaches to Medieval Literature: Selected Papers from the English Institute, 1958–1959, ed. Dorothy Bethurum (New York 1960) 40–42.Google Scholar

¹⁹ Donaldson, , C-Text 184, Kaske, ‘Defense’ 42–48, and Murtaugh, Image 118–21.Google Scholar

²⁰ Scriptural Tradition 17–19.Google Scholar

²¹ Ibid. 79–80.Google Scholar

²² Ibid. 81.Google Scholar

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²⁴ For example, ‘grafter’ in B Prol. 23 refers to ‘pride’ in the same line, not to the plowmen three lines above (cf. Robertson, and Huppé, , Scriptural Tradition 17).Google Scholar

²⁵ Stephen Barney, A., ‘The Plowshare of the Tongue: The Progress of a Symbol from the Bible to Piers Plowman; Mediaeval Studies 35 (1973) 278.Google Scholar

²⁶ Skeat, , ed. cit. (v. n. 1 supra) C 8.187.Google Scholar

²⁷ Barney, , ‘Plowshare’ 287.Google Scholar

²⁸ Ibid. 289.Google Scholar

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³³ Ibid. 283–84. Such a view is suggested, for example, by Horrell, Joe in ‘Chaucer's Symbolic Plowman,’ Speculum 14 (1939) 82–92.Google Scholar

³⁴ Barney, , ‘Plowshare’ 287.Google Scholar

³⁵ Ibid. 277–78.Google Scholar

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³⁷ Lewis, C. S., The Allegory of Love (London 1936, rptd. 1973) 44–48; Worth Frank, Robert, Jr., The Art of Reading Medieval Personification-Allegory,’ ELH: A Journal of Literary History 20 (1953) 237–50, rptd. in Vasta, ed., Interpretations (v. n. 8 supra) 336–92. Frank regards Piers, though, not as a personification but as a symbol: Salvation 14–15.Google Scholar

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³⁹ Concerning the mythographic tradition in Jean de Meun's Roman, see Seznec, Jean, The Survival of the Pagan Gods, tr. Barbara Sessions, F. (New York 1953; rptd. Princeton 1972) 106.Google Scholar

⁴⁰ Owst, G. R., Literature and Pulpit in Medieval England (2d ed.; Oxford 1961) 88–89.Google Scholar

⁴¹ de Lorris, Guillaume and de Meun, Jean, Le Roman de la Rose, ed. Felix Lecoy (CFMA 92, 95, 98; Paris 1973–76) line 10,984.Google Scholar

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⁴⁵ Ibid. 11,984–12,350.Google Scholar

⁴⁶ du Bus, Gervais, Le Roman de Fauvel, ed. Arthur Långfors (Paris 1914–19) 2.1579–85.Google Scholar

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⁴⁸ Cf. Owst, , Literature and Pulpit 278–79; Flowers Braswell, Mary, ‘Langland's Sins: A True Confession?’ American Notes and Queries 18 (1980) 154–55. We may, of course, accept the suggestions of Owst and Braswell that as a source for the portraits of the Sins Langland used the confessional manuals. Even if Langland takes this matter from non-allegorical sources which treat various estates randomly, his letting the fluidity of treatment characterize his allegories is legitimized by a specific vernacular allegorical tradition. We are concerned with the form of the allegorical figures.Google Scholar

⁴⁹ Guillaume de Deguilleville (Deguileville, Digulleville), Le Pèlerinage de vie humaine, ed. Stürzinger, J. J. (London 1893). Having equipped the pilgrim with spiritual armor, Grace-Dieu departs from him at the end of book 1 (line 5,030). The pilgrim faces conflict against the Seven Sins without her throughout Book 2 and most of Book 3, until he is assaulted by all the Sins at once, is overcome, and finds himself lamenting his neglect of penance and the sacraments and his loss of the staff of Hope. At this point she reappears, gives him back his staff, and leads him to the second baptism of penance; he endures it too briefly, so she departs again (10,753–11,372). In book 4 she reappears twice, once to guide the pilgrim as a reward for his having repelled Heresy with the staff of Hope (11,576), and once to bring him to the Ship of Religion after Tribulation has both cast him into the Sea of the World and led him out of it (12,349). Piers, of course, bears a much more complex significance than does Grace-Dieu, and the logic of his appearances and disappearances is more obscure. But he more resembles her than, say, Amors of the Roman de la Rose with his infrequent appearances to Amant, in that Piers and Grace-Dieu are explicitly sought as guides by the dreamer-protagonist.Google Scholar

⁵⁰ de Molliens, Reclus (Renclus de Moiliens), Li Romans de carité, ed. A.-G. van Hamel (Bibliothèque de l'École des Hautes Études 61; Paris 1885). The first suggestion of Piers as the object of search comes in B 13.133, before Will expresses his desire to find Charity in B 15.195; his search for Piers becomes explicit only after the Tree of Charity scene, in B 16.167–71. Melanie Kell Isaacson has made a detailed comparison of Piers and Charity as exiled virtues, in The Unachieved Quest for Social Perfection from the “Roman de Carité” to Piers Plowman’ (diss. Stanford 1976). Her ultimate gloss for Piers as ‘that neighbor of ours who can lead us to God’ (164) fits Piers better in the Visio than in his later identification with Christ and Peter.Google Scholar

⁵¹ Salter, Elizabeth, Piers Plowman: An Introduction (Cambridge 1962) 66.Google Scholar

⁵² Rutebeuf, , La Voie de Paradis, in Œuvres complètes de Rutebeuf, edd. Edmond Faral and Julia Bastin (Paris 1959) I 336–70. For other examples of the genre, see Raoul, [de Houdenc?], Songe d'Enfer and Voie de Paradis (Songe de Paradis), in Trouvères belges (nouvelle série), ed. Auguste Scheler (Louvain 1879) II 200–48; Baudoin de Condé, La Voie de Paradis, in Dits et contes de Baudoin de Condé, ed. Auguste Scheler (Brussels 1866) I 205–43; de Le Mote, Jean, Le Voie d'Enfer et de Paradis, ed. Sister Aquiline, M. Pety (diss. Catholic Univ. of America 1940). Langlois describes an anonymous fourteenth-century Voie de Paradis that translates Robert de Sorbon's Iter Paradisi, in Histoire littéraire de la France 36 (1927) 624–27. One may also compare a poem of a similar type by Bruyant, Jacques, Le Chemin de pauvreté et de richesse (or La Voie de richesse), in Le Menagier de Paris (Paris 1847) II 4–42. See Isaacson, , ‘Unachieved Quest’ 19.Google Scholar

⁵³ Roberta Cornelius, D., ed., Le Songe du castel, Publications of the Modern Language Association 46 (1931) 321–32. See also Cornelius, The Figurative Castle: A Study in the Mediaeval Allegory of the Edifice with Especial Reference to Religious Writings (printed diss. Bryn Mawr 1930) 14–36.Google Scholar

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⁵⁵ Dorothy Owen has noted the similarity of Jean de Meun's episode to Langland's, though without drawing interpretive conclusions for Langland's poem, in Piers Plowman: A Comparison with Some Earlier and Contemporary French Allegories (London 1912) 75.Google Scholar

⁵⁶ Roman de la Rose 7,201–7,764.Google Scholar

⁵⁷ Voie 43, 69, 150; Roman de la Rose 7,873–74, 7,867. Cf. Piers Plowman B 5.578, ‘Leve hem on þi lift half and loke noӡ3t þerafter.’Google Scholar

⁵⁸ Voie 35–48.Google Scholar

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⁶⁰ Ibid. 7,875–82.Google Scholar

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⁶² Ibid. 9,985–10,276, 10,651–900.Google Scholar

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⁶⁵ Ibid. 3,094.Google Scholar

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⁶⁷ Ibid. 8,205–14.Google Scholar

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⁹³ Carruthers, Mary, The Search for St. Truth: A Study of Meaning in Piers Plowman (Evanston 1973) 78. Carruthers has more recently retracted this reading; see her ‘Time, Apocalypse, and the Plot of Piers Plowman,’ in Acts of Interpretation: the Text in its Context, 700–1600: Essays on Medieval and Renaissance Literature in Honor of E. Talbot Donaldson, edd. Mary Carruthers, J. and Kirk, Elizabeth D. (Norman 1982) 180.Google Scholar

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¹²⁸ Luke 16.9, cf. Piers Plowman B 8.88–90. Major commentaries such as the Glossa ordinaria and Hugh of St. Cher's postilla held that the parable of the unrighteous steward in Luke 16 followed the three parables in Luke 15 because three lessons on repentance are rightly followed by a lesson on almsgiving. Hugh of St. Cher proposes several reasons why this order is appropriate, among them that ‘per poenitentiam culpa, per eleemosynam poena relaxatur, et prius est culpa, quam poena’ — Opera omnia in universum Vetus et Novum Testamentum (Lyon 1669) VI 227^va. Cf. Glossa ordinaria in Biblia Sacra cum Glossa interlineari, ordinaria et Nicolai Lyrani Postilla ac moralitatibus, Burgensis additionibus, et Thoringi replicis (Venice 1588) V 166^ra. In creating an allegorical pardon a pena et a culpa Langland did not necessarily have the parable of the unrighteous steward in mind (since he does not refer to it explicitly), but he certainly did have in mind almsgiving as a prominent work of satisfaction following penance.Google Scholar

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¹⁴⁸ William of St. Amour, in his famous tract concerning the mendicants at Paris, reports the mendicants’ use of the verse from Matthew. Commenting on 2 Thess. 3.10, ‘If any man will not work, neither let him eat,’ he writes: ‘Dicunt quidam de operibus spiritualibus hoc apostolus praecepisse; alioquin, si de opere corporali hoc dicerit, in quo vel Agricolae, vel Opifices laborant, videretur sentire adversus Dominum, qui dicit in Evangelio NOLITE SOLLICITI ESSE DICENTES, QUID MANDUCABIMUS; sed superflue conantur, et sibi, et caeteris caliginem obducere’ — De periculis novissimorum temporum, in Opera omnia quae reperiri potuerunt (Constance 1632) 49. I am grateful to the late Kaske, R. E. for making available his microfilm of this work.Google Scholar

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¹⁵¹ Walker, Marshall has, I believe, rightly stated the degree in which Piers rejects the life of a layman — ‘Piers Plowman's Pardon: A Note,’ English Studies in Africa 8 (1965) 70.Google Scholar

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¹⁷⁹ Ibid. 94.Google Scholar

¹⁸⁰ Ibid. 93–94.Google Scholar

¹⁸¹ Ibid. 95.Google Scholar

¹⁸² Lombard, Peter, Sententiae in IV libris distinctae (Spicilegium Bonaventurianum 4–5; Rome 1971–81) II 5, 68.Google Scholar

¹⁸³ Wyclif, John, Tractatus de benedicta Incarnatione, ed. Edward Harris (London 1886) 3.Google Scholar

¹⁸⁴ Ibid. 182–83.Google Scholar

¹⁸⁵ Netter, Thomas (Thomas Waldensis), Doctrinale fidei Catholicae (Venice 1757; rptd. Westmead 1967) I 231–32. Wyclif was by no means the first or only theologian to advocate the appropriateness of this latria toward the homo assumptus in Deo. But his rigorous Realism led him to make statements which were viewed as lacking necessary safeguards. Bonaventure, for instance, had argued that the humanity of Christ was to be worshiped inasmuch as it was united to the eternal Word, but not as considered by itself. However, he goes on to note that since that humanity is always conjoined to the Word, it should always be thus considered, and is therefore always to be adored with latria — Commentaria in quatuor libros Sententiarum III d.9 a.1 q.1, Opera omnia (Quaracchi 1882–1902) III 199–200. Most later scholastics follow this distinction between the human nature considered as separate and as united to the eternal Word, though sometimes they introduce other aspects: Pierre de Tarentaise and Durand de Saint-Pourçain speak of the humanity and the flesh of Christ as deserving latria not per se, but per accidens, as accidents in a supposit — Pierre de Tarentais (Petrus de Tarantasia / Pope Innocent V), In IV libros Sententiarum commentaria III d.9 q.1 a.2 (Toulouse 1642–52; rptd. Ridgewood, N.J. 1964) III 67; Durand de Saint-Pourçain (Durandus a Sancto Porciano), Petri Lombardi Sententias commentariorum libri IIII III d.9 q.2 (Venice 1571; rptd. Ridgewood, N.J. 1964) II 229^v. Duns Scotus defines the question more conservatively: ‘Utrum Christo debeatur Latria solum secundum naturam divinam.’ His answer is threefold, considered under various aspects. (1) The divine nature is a sufficient reason for latria, so the answer is ‘yes.’ (2) The human nature of Christ is not to be excluded from the object of latria, so the answer from another viewpoint is ‘no.’ (3) The human nature of Christ, as a principle of human redemption, does not provide a reason for latria, but only for hyperdulia, so from a third standpoint the answer is ‘yes’ — Quaestiones in IV libros Sententiarum (Commentaria Oxoniensia) III d.9 q.1 a.3, in Opera omnia (Paris 1891–95; rptd. Farnborough 1969) XIV 389–97. Against the background of this third point, the polemical value of one of Wyclif's syllogisms becomes clearer: ‘the humanity of Christ redeems; therefore, the humanity of Christ is God’ — and thus the humanity of Christ as a principle of redemption deserves latria. In contrast, Gabriel Biel in the fifteenth century takes a position more conservative than that of Bonaventure. Biel summarizes the state of the argument thus: ‘omnium in hoc concordat sententia, quod humanitati Christi in se considerate non ut unite Verbo ypostatice non debetur adoratio latrie proprie dicta sed dulia. Considerata autem ut a Verbo assumpta, sic de eius adoratione tres sunt opiniones. Una tenet quod ut sic considerata est adoranda dulia maiori sive yperdulia…. Secunda opinio tenet quod humanitas Christi considerata ut a Verbo assumpta est, et ei suppositaliter unita latrie est adoranda…. Tertio opinio, quod humanitas Christi ut Verbo unita adoratur latria non proprissime sed large sumpta.’ Biel agrees with the third opinion, denying latria strictly defined to even the human nature of Christ as united to the Word, but granting a lesser sort of latria: ‘Accipiendo latriam communiter humana natura in Christo adoranda est latria, patet quod hec adoratio nihil aliud est quam recognitio eius ut summe et singulariter unite deo, et eius ut sic dilectio’ — Biel, Collectorium in IV libros Sententiarum Guillelmi Occam III d.9 a.1 n.3 sect. C, and III d.9 a.2 concl. 4 sect. H (Tübingen 1501; rptd. Hildesheim 1977). For other scholastics on this question, see the following: Aquinas, Commentum in libris I–IV Sententiarum III d.9 q.1 a.2 quaestiuncula 7, in Opera omnia, edd. Fretté, S. E. and Maré, P. (Paris 1874–89) IX 154–55; Richard of Middleton (Ricardus de Media Villa), Super quatuor libros Sententiarum III d.9 q.1 (Brescia 1591; rptd. Frankfurt a. M. 1963) III 89; Egidio Colonna (Ægidius Romanus), In tertium librum Sententiarum d.9 p.1, q.2 a.1 (Rome 1623; rptd. Frankfurt a. M. 1968), 368.Google Scholar

¹⁸⁶ Wyclif, John, Sermones, ed. Johann Loserth (London 1887–90) III 55.Google Scholar

¹⁸⁷ Ibid. III 368.Google Scholar

¹⁸⁸ Kaske, , ‘Defense’ (v. n. 18 supra) 43–44.Google Scholar

¹⁸⁹ Aers, , Allegory 108.Google Scholar

¹⁹⁰ Ibid. Google Scholar

¹⁹¹ Murtaugh, , Image (v. n. 15 supra) 120.Google Scholar

¹⁹² On Luke 2.52, ‘Et Jesus proficiebat aetate et sapientia et gratia apud Deum et hominis’: ‘Et licet Jesus in se non proficiebat sapientia et cognitione habituali, quia haec in eo augmentata non sunt, ab instanti enim conceptionis plenitudinem huius habuit: proficiebat tamen et in se cognitione sensuali et experimentali, quia sensus ejus convertebatur de novo ad aliquid ad quod antea non convertebatur. Unde secundum Apostolum: Didicit ex his quae passus est obedientiam [Hebrews 5.8]. Non tamen de novo aliquid didicit quod prius nesciret, quia quod didicit, prius noverat scientia divina et inspirata. Unde Bernardus: Ut ab alienam miseriam cor miserum habeas, oportet ut tuam prius cognoscas, ut proximi mentem in tua invenias, et ex te noveris qualiter illi subvenias. Verus quippe Dei filius priusquam se exinanivisset formam servi accipiens [Philippians 2.7], sicut miseriam et subjectionem expertus non erat, sic misericordiam vel obedientiam experimento non noverat. Sciebat quidem per naturam, non autem sciebat per experientiam. At ubi minoratus est [Hebrews 2.9.] usque ad illam formam in quam et pati et subiici posset, in passione expertus est miseriam, et in subjectione obedientiam. Per quern tamen experientiam, non illi scientia, sed nobis fiducia crevit, dum in hoc misero genere cognitionis, is a quo longe erraveramus factus est propinquior nobis. Quando enim illi appropinquare auderemus in sua impassibilitate manenti? nunc autem monemur cum fiducia adire ad thronum gratiae ipsius [Hebrews 4.16], quern nimirum languoros nostros tulisse, et dolores portasse cognoscimus [Isaiah 53.4–5] et in eo, in quo passus est ipse, nobis compati non dubitamus. Haec Bernardus.’ — Ludolph of Saxony, Vita Iesu Christi (Augsburg 1729) 74 col. 1.Google Scholar

¹⁹³ Kaske, , ‘Defense’ 47.Google Scholar

¹⁹⁴ Ibid. 47–48.Google Scholar

¹⁹⁵ Aers, , Allegory 109.Google Scholar

¹⁹⁶ Murtaugh, , Image 119.Google Scholar

¹⁹⁷ Ibid. Google Scholar

¹⁹⁸ ‘Et quidem. Hic consequenter ostendit, quod in christus fuit maxima misericordia, quae debet esse in pontifice: quia cum esset deus ab eterno, in qua natura pati non poterat, ex sua pietate et misericordia, qua visitavit nos oriens ex alto, assumpsit naturam humanam passibilem, et ex passionis experientia ad compatiendum nobis quodammodo aptior redderetur. Et hoc est quod dicit Apostolus: Et quidem cum esset filius dei, id est ab eterno existens in natura divina’ — Nicholas of Lyra, Postilla super totam Bibliam, in Biblia cum Glossa VI 142^rb. Cf. also Alcuin, , PL 100.1054, Rabanus Maurus, PL 112.743, Hatto of Vercelli, PL 134.755, Bruno Carthusiensis, PL 153.514, Peter Lombard, PL 192.437, and Haymo of Auxerre, PL 117.856.Google Scholar

¹⁹⁹ PL 117.856. Cf. Alcuin, , PL 100.1055, Rabanus Maurus, PL 112.744, and Hatto of Vercelli, PL 134.755.Google Scholar

²⁰⁰ PL 192.438.Google Scholar

²⁰¹ Anderson, Judith, The Growth of a Personal Voice: Piers Plowman and The Faerie Queene (New Haven 1976) interprets Piers here as representing Christ's human will, one particular aspect of His human nature. This view works well for the leechcraft episode, which stresses Christ's voluntary learning through suffering, and it also accords with the replacement of Piers by Liberum Arbitrium in that one passage. However, Anderson encounters an obstacle in Piers's grasping the second stave just before the Incarnation: ‘It could look like a form of the Nestorian heresy … with the likely implication that a human being somehow earned, or initiated, the Hypostatic Union’ (136). Ultimately she interprets the grasping of the second stave as representing Christ's free love of the Father by which, from the instant of His conception, He merited blessing on the believer's behalf (138–39). However, she does not sufficiently explain the fact that this symbolic action precedes rather than follows Langland's account of the Annunciation and the Incarnation. Christ's meritorious actions performed from the instant of His conception should follow the Incarnation. If, however, Piers here represents a divine quality of character rather than a human will, the divine choice to take on human frailty naturally precedes the Incarnation. Furthermore, C's substitution of Liberum-Arbitrium-Dei for this divine quality of character is natural, and preserves a meaning similar to that of B. In contrast, Anderson sees a shift here from Christ's human will (in B) to the divine will (in C) — a more radical change of meaning designed, she proposes, to avoid the suggestion of heresy (139–40).Google Scholar

²⁰² Sanderlin, George, The Character Liberum Arbitrium in the C-text of Piers Plowman,’ Modern Language Notes 56 (1941) 453.Google Scholar

²⁰³ Lombard, , Sententiae IV d.14 c.1, ed. cit. II 315–16; cf. Bonaventure, , In Sent. IV d.14 dubia 1, ed. cit. IV 328.Google Scholar

²⁰⁴ Welter, J. Th., La tabula exemplorum secundum ordinem alphabeti: Recueil d'exempla compilé en France à la fin du XIII ^e siècle (Paris 1926) 60 no. 223. This same admonition was well known to the schools through the Lombard's Sentences themselves: ‘Quid enim interest ad naufragium, an uno grandi fluctu navis operiatur et obruatur, an paulatim subrepens aqua in sentinam per negligentium culpam impleat navem et submergat?’ (IV d. 16 c.5, ed. cit. II 341). For another example, the Dominican Hugh of St. Cher, in a discussion of various types of fear that in varying degrees fall short of the Christian's due confidence, identifies venial sins with ‘guttas aquae’ entering a boat which has not yet been shipwrecked — Opera VII 47^vb, at Rom. 8.15.Google Scholar

²⁰⁵ William of Auxerre (Guilermus Altissiodorensis), Summa aurea in IV libros Sententiarum III tr. 6 c.4 (Manuscripta microfilms List 9, no. 38) 158^ra.Google Scholar

²⁰⁶ Michael Landgraf, Artur, Dogmengeschichte der Frühscholastik (Regensburg 1952–56) I ii 111–12.Google Scholar

²⁰⁷ For scholastic treatments of this question later than that of William of Auxerre, cf. Bonaventure, , In Sent. III d. 30 a.1 q.1, ed. cit. III 656–58; and Colonna, Egidio, In III Sent. d.30 q.1 a.1, ed. cit. 618–21.Google Scholar

²⁰⁸ Pierre de Tarentaise gives a good summary of opinions on the question ‘An liberum arbitrium per se possit peccatum vitare.’ Having specified that he is speaking of free will not in the state of innocence (e.g., Adam) or of grace, but in statu culpae, he writes, ‘de mortali vero differentes sunt opiniones. Nam quidam dicunt quod potest peccatum mortale vitare in particulari, sed non in universali, quia non potest vitare quin cadet in aliquod mortale…. Ideo dicunt alii quod potest vitare omne, sed non diu…. Ideo dicunt alii quod potest vitare peccatum committendum sed non commissum: non enim potest facere quin habeat peccatum, sed potest vitare quod non faciat peccatum’ — In Sent. II d.28 q.2 a.1, ed. cit. II 244. Pierre ultimately favors the first opinion. Cf. Aquinas, Thomas, In Sent. II d.28 q.1 a.2, ed. cit. VIII 376–78; Richard of Middleton, In Sent. II d.28 a.2 q.2, ed. cit. II 359; Colonna, Egidio, In secundum librum Sentenitarum d.28 q.2 a.2 (Venice 1581; rptd. Frankfurt a. M. 1968) 2.373–74; de Saint-Pourçain, Durand, In Sent. II d.28 q.3, ed. cit. I 179^va; Duns Scotus, John, Commentaria Oxoniensia ad IV libros Magistri Sententiarum II d.28, ed. Marianus Fernandez Garcia (Quaracchi 1912–14) II 728–33. Egidio takes a more strictly Augustinian view; the Nominalist Durand distinguishes between sins violating natural precepts and those violating supernatural ones.Google Scholar

²⁰⁹ Bonaventure, , In Sent. II d.28 a.1 q.2, ed. cit. II 677.Google Scholar

²¹⁰ Ibid. 678.Google Scholar

²¹¹ Cf. de Tarentaise, Pierre, In Sent. II d.28 q.2 a.2, ed. cit. II 244–45, and Richard of Middleton, In Sent. II d.28 a.2 q.3, ed. cit. II 360. Egidio Colona again dissents, ruling out the possibility even of resisting the devil apart from grace: In II Sent, d.28 dub. 1 lateralis, ed. cit. II ii 375–76.Google Scholar

²¹² Lombard, , Sententiae II d.43 c.1, ed. cit. I 574.Google Scholar

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²¹⁴ Alexander of Hales, Summa Theologica II ii inq. 3 tr. 5 sect. 2 q.3 c.3 a.1 (Quaracchi 1924–48) III 668.Google Scholar

²¹⁵ Aquinas, , In Sent. II d.43 q.1 a.4, ed. cit. VIII 577–78.Google Scholar

²¹⁶ Scotus, Duns, Comment. Oxon. II d.43 q.2, ed. Garcia II 906.Google Scholar

²¹⁷ Bonaventure, , In Sent. II d.43 a.2 q.2, ed. cit. II 989.Google Scholar

²¹⁸ The relative view of irremissibility accords with Langland's treatment of the question at B 17.299–320, where remission fails ‘Noght of the nounpower of god, þat he ne is myghtful / To amende al þat amys is, and his mercy gretter / Than alle oure wikkede werkes,’ but because of despair and wanhope — in short, not from lack of grace but from lack of the disposition to penance and restitution.Google Scholar

²¹⁹ Ludolph, , Vita Iesu 307b.Google Scholar

²²⁰ E.g., Hugh of St. Cher, Opera VI 46^vb at Matt. 12.31.Google Scholar

²²¹ Wenzel, Siegfried, The Three Enemies of Man,’ Mediaeval Studies 29 (1967) 47–66.Google Scholar

²²² Britton Harwood, J., ‘Liberum-Arbitrium in the C-Text of Piers Plowman,’ Philological Quarterly 52 (1973) 689–90.Google Scholar

²²³ Robertson, and Huppé, , Scriptural Tradition 194.Google Scholar

²²⁴ Lottin, Odon, Psychologie et morale aux XII ^e et XIII ^e siècles (Gembloux 1948–60) V 245–48, no. 312.Google Scholar

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²²⁶ Wyclif, John, Tractatus de civili dominio 3.25, edd. Reginald Lane Poole and Johann Loserth (London 1885–1904) IV 589.Google Scholar

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²²⁸ Biblia cum Glossa V 42^va.Google Scholar

²²⁹ Hugh of St. Cher, Opera VII 356^vb at 1 John 5.16.Google Scholar

²³⁰ Heiko Oberman, A., The Harvest of Medieval Theology: Gabriel Biel and Late Medieval Nominalism (Cambridge, Mass. 1963) 131–45.Google Scholar

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²³⁴ Even the fifteenth-century Nominalist theologian Gabriel Biel, one of those most inclined to grant large powers to the will, who could write, ‘Liberum arbitrium ex suis naturalibus sine dono gratie potest quodlibet peccatum mortale noveum cavere’ (Epitome et collectorium ex Occamo circa quatuor Sententiarum libros [Tübingen 1501; rptd. Frankfurt a. M. 1965] II d.28 concl. 2, sect. K), nevertheless speaks with more gravity of the threat posed by each of the three temptations: ‘Secundo considerando quod licet voluntas humana sit libera ut cogi non possit, ut supra distinctione XXV, potest tamen modis variis ad varia volenda aut nolenda inclinari, trahi et persuaderi…. Quis enim fraudes et fallacias spiritualium nequitiarum diaboli, scilicet mille artificis, eius quoque temptationes occultissimas deprehendere; quis se de pugna sensualitatis continua sustinere et a carnis inclinatione semper avertere; quis totuplices mundi laqueos evadere potest?’ (ibid. II d.28 dub. 2, sect. N).Google Scholar

²³⁵ Robertson, and Huppé, , Scriptural Tradition 191–95; Ben Smith, H., Jr., Traditional Imagery of Charity in Piers Plowman (The Hague 1966).Google Scholar

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²³⁷ PL 176.646; Smith, , Charity 67. The relevance of the lignum vitae tradition to Langland's Tree is somewhat limited by the fact that in the former the tree is most often likened to Christ as the source of life rather than to the individual Christian. Even the tree of Ps. 1, which describes the man who delights in God's law, is identified by medieval commentators predominantly with the lignum vitae and with Christ, though sometimes with one ‘Christo similis’: PL 9.231, 14.921, 26.1355, 70.9, 93.477, 116.191, 131.145, 142.49, 152.637, 164.695, 165.1141, 172.269, 191.55, 193.619. The lignum crucis tradition founded on Ephesians 3.16–19, though strongly emphasizing charity, seems likewise to have limited relevance, for the cross bears little explicit resemblance to the living, blossoming, fruit-bearing tree, which in turn does not treat the notions of breadth, length, and height central to the allegorical explication of the cross.Google Scholar

²³⁸ Holkot, Robert, In librum Sapientiae Regis Salomonis praelectiones CCXIII ([Basel] 1586) 168.Google Scholar

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²⁴³ Simmons Greenhill, Eleanor, The Child in the Tree: A Study of the Cosmological Tree in Christian Tradition,’ Traditio 10 (1954) 346; cf. Watson, Arthur, The Speculum Virginum with Special Reference to the Tree of Jesse,’ Speculum 3 (1928) 451.Google Scholar

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²⁸⁹ Robertson, and Huppé, suggest that these ‘divisiones graciarum’ of 1 Cor. 12.4 fall under the two headings of sapientia and scientia — Scriptural Tradition 221. While this is true of Langland's text at 19.228–51, it is less true of the commentators. The exegetes generally propose that the gift of sapientia deals with heavenly or contemplative things and the gift of scientia with earthly, human affairs. Scientia, for example, includes ‘agros excolere, domum aedificare, familiam ordinare’ — Ps.-Haymo of Halberstadt (Haymo of Auxerre?), PL 117.577 (for attribution, see Stegmüller, , Repertorium III 15, no. 3102, and Glorieux, , Pour revaloriser Migne 57). In Langland's text the gift of sapientia seems to embrace ‘prechours and preestes and Prentices of lawe’ as well as those who ‘lyve in longynge to ben hennes’ (19.231, 248). The other have gifts of scientia. But those gifts are only two of the nine enumerated in 1 Cor. 12 and interpreted by the commentators (e.g., PL 134.125, 150.196–97, 153.189, 181.942–44, 191.1651–53). By omitting gifts of miracles, healings, tongues, interpretation of tongues, and so forth, Langland gives the Biblical text a markedly occupational significance.Google Scholar

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