In the dramatic fi fth part of the poem, the dreamer
addresses the pearl, asking her, “art thou my perle that
I have playned, / regretted by myn one on nyghte?” (ll.
242–243). He asks her if they are in the land of Para-
dise and tells her that he has been a “joyles jueler” (l.
252) and torn with grief since she had been lost. The
maiden speaks by responding that he is “mysetente”
(misconceived, l. 257) in believing that his pearl is lost.
Replacing her crown, the maiden tells him that it is not
lost but kept in the casket (“cofer,” l. 259) of the beau-
tiful garden, and she rebukes him for blaming his fate
for the loss of the jewel. She tells him he really only
lost a rose “that fl owred and fauled” as fl owers do (l.
270). The speaker answers that he is now happy at the
return of his pearl and that her gentle words are a com-
fort to him. He claims he plans to live with her and
“love [his] Lorde and al his lawes” (l. 285), living as a
“joyfol jueler” (l. 288) in contrast to the “joyles” one he
had been before.
The maiden responds to his words almost angrily,
wondering “wy borde ye men? So madde ye be!” (l.
290). She tells him that he has spoken three “una-
vysed” (l. 292), or ill-considered, things: that he
believes her to be in the valley because he has seen her
there, that he will come and live with her in this place,
and fi nally that no “joyfol jueler” could cross the water
before her. This speech transitions to the next part of
the poem, a debate between the maiden and the
dreamer, where she—as a messenger of God—can
instruct and teach him as to things he clearly does not
understand.
In part 6, the maiden expands on the three points
she rebutted in part 5. She begins by telling him that
he should not believe what he sees because that is a
mark of sinful pride. Second, she continues, only God
can grant him permission to live with her, and only
then after he has died. The dreamer asks sorrowfully
whether he will now lose his “precios perle” (l. 330)
again. She tells him that he does not profi t by his anger
and that he needs to praise God always, in both joy
and sorrow.
The narrator apologizes in part 7, claiming that his
grief has clouded his judgment, and that he meant no
offense to his Lord. He tells her his pain is softened
now that he knows where his pearl has gone, but that
he had been sad and dejected. He asks her what kind
of life she leads now. She responds that his words
please her for their humility, and that the Lord loves
meekness. She tells him that even though his pearl was
“young and tender of age” (l. 412) when it “con schede”
(fell down, l. 411), she has been taken into marriage
with the “Lorde the Lombe” (l. 413) and is crowned as
his queen in heaven.
The maiden continues to instruct the speaker in part
8, where he shows his confusion at her words by asking
“may thys be trew?” (l. 421) and wonders if she has taken
the place of the Virgin Mary as the queen of heaven. The
dreamer’s question causes the maiden to kneel and praise
Mary as a “makeles moder” (matchless mother, l. 435),
and assures the speaker that Mary is the empress of the
heavens and has been usurped by nobody. She teaches
him that in God’s kingdom, everybody is equal in cour-
tesy to their heavenly king and queen.
In part 9, the dreamer demonstrates his need for
further instruction from the maiden by trying to apply
a model of an earthly court to the heavenly one. He
argues that she had died at less than two years old
before she could earn her place with God, barely know-
ing her prayers, and could not be a queen. She responds
by reiterating that all are kings or queens in God’s
kingdom.
The maiden turns to the parable of the vineyard from
the Gospel of Matthew (20:1–16), continuing to recount
it in section 10, where laborers who worked long hours
are rewarded equally as those who work only one. She
tells him that this is divine justice, and though she
worked but a little, she received the same reward. The
dreamer continues to demonstrate his need for instruc-
tion by persisting with an earthly reason, arguing that
the system is “unresounable” (l. 590) where one could
receive the same payment as a laborer who had worked
all day for working less: “Now he that stod the long day
stable, / And thou to payment com hym before, /
Thenne the lasse in werke to take more able, / And ever
the lenger the lasse, the more” (ll. 597–600).
Parts 11 and 12 continue elaborating the heavenly
system, focusing on the importance of God’s grace.
Five stanzas end with the phrase “For the grace of
God is gret inoghe,” emphasizing God’s justice and
redemption.PEARL 313