InHabite as anHarmet | unHoly of werkes,
WentWyde in thys world |Wonders to heare, &c."So that the author of this poem will not be found to have invented any new mode of
versification, as some have supposed, but only to have retained that of the old Saxon
and Gothic poets: which was probably never wholly laid aside, but occasionally used
at different intervals: though the ravages of time will not suffer us now to produce a
regular series of poems entirely written in it.
There are some readers whom it may gratify to mention, that theseVisions of
Pierce[i.e.Peter]the Plowman, are attributed to Robert Langland, a secular priest,
born at Mortimer's Cleobury in Shropshire, and fellow of Oriel college in Oxford,
who flourished in the reigns of Edward III. and Richard II. and published his poem a
few years after 1350. It consists of twenty passus or breaks,[4] exhibiting a series of
visions, which he pretends happened to him on Malvern hills in Worcestershire. The
author excels in strong allegoric painting, and has with great humour, spirit, and
fancy, censured most of the vices incident to the several professions of life but he
particularly inveighs against the corruptions of the clergy, and the absurdities of
superstition. Of this work I have now before me four different editions in black-letter
quarto. Three of them are printed in 1550 byRobert Crowley dwelling in Ely rentes
in Holbourne. It is remarkable that two of these are mentioned in the title-page as both
of the second impression, though they contain evident variations in every page.[5]
The other is said to benewly imprinted after the authors olde copy... by Owen
Rogers, Feb. 21, 1561.
As Langland was not the first, so neither was he the last that used this
alliterative species of versification. To Rogers's edition of the Visions is subjoined a
poem, which was probably writ in imitation of them, intitled Pierce the Ploughman's
Crede. It begins thus:
"Cros, andCurteisChrist, this beginning spede
For theFadersFrendshipe, thatFourmed heaven,
And through theSpecialSpirit thatSprung of hem tweyne,
And al in one godhed endles dwelleth."
The author feigns himself ignorant of his creed, to be instructed in which he
applies to the four religious orders, viz. the gray friars of St. Francis, the black friars
of St, Dominic, the Carmelities or white friars, and the Augustines. This affords him
occasion to describe in very lively colours the sloth, ignorance, and immorality of
these reverend drones. At length he meets with Pierce, a poor Ploughman, who
resolves his doubts, and instructs him in the principles of true religion. The author was
evidently a follower of Wiccliff, whom he mentions (with honour) as no longer
living.[6] Now that reformer died in 1384. How long after his death this poem was
written, does not appear.
In the Cotton library is a volume of ancient English poems,[7] two of which
are written in this alliterative metre, and have the division of the lines into distichs
distinctly marked by a point, as is usual in old poetical MSS. That which stands first
of the two (though perhaps the latest written) is intitledThe Sege of I'erlam, [i.e.
Jerusalem], being an old fabulous legend composed by some monk, and stuffed with
marvellous figments concerning the destruction of the holy city and temple. It begins
thus:
"InTyberiusTyme. thetrewe emperour
SirSesar hymself. beSted in Rome