SUMMERS, KAREN CRADY, Ph.D. Reading Incest - The University ...

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laboring-folk and Piers, in return, will plow for him. The church provides for those who
can not help themselves. The critique of the three estates—all of society—builds the case
that when people do not fulfill the duties of their stations in life, the land becomes
divided; people forget that they are part of a divinely ordered plan; and this forgetfulness
leads them to turn away from their God-given reason, the thing that separates them from
the beasts, and they sin. Sin is the “moder of divisoun” (Pr. 1030) and without good
kingly, clerical, or inner guidance people disintegrate into “disjunctive fragments” (Peck
13). Fallen England is rife with wars and dissension, and only a strong, righteous, and
reasonable king might set the example for men to achieve peace so that the “world may
stonde appesed” (191) and be reconciled with God. The poet offers a prayer that the
aristocracy—the “pouer / Of hem that ben the worldes guides / That hate breke noght
thassise / Of love, which is al the chief / To kepe a regne out of mischief” (Pr. 144-150).
The ruling class, it is implied, has forgotten its role as head of the nation. Importantly,
the motivation of each estate is love, modeled after divine love. As God gave kings the
right and responsibility to rule, their role was to act as his agent on earth, caring for his
subjects as God cared for his children. But Gower’s poet laments the loss of this guiding
love; could this be a reason for the sense of urgency in the second dedication to Henry?
Having expounded on the failings of the three estates, the final section of the Prologue
concludes that
And then men sen, thurgh lacke of love
Where as the lond divided is,
It mot algate fare amis:
And now to loke on every side,
A man may se the world divide