Specimens of English literature from the 'Ploughmans crede' to the ...

7. PERES THE PLOWMANS CREDE. 367about the disrepute of the monks, and the rise of the mendicant orders.It is certain that the friars succeeded at first because the monks hadbecome so dissolute, but it is not likely that this particular poem hadmuch to do with it. Gleyni — bird-lime, and hence subtlety, craft, guile.It is a strong metaphor, but explained by our author's own words in1. 564,'I liken it to a limed twig, to draw men to hell.'486. Cain's name was generally spelt Cairn or Cayjn in Early English :whence Wyclif declared that the letters C, A, I, M meant the Carmelites,Augustines, Jacobins, and Minorites, and he delighted in callingthe convents 'Cairn's castles,' an idea which appears below, at 1.559.It was common to call wicked people Cain's children or Judas's children; see Piers PI. A. prol. 35, and x. 149.'Nouse the sothe whedre it be swa,That frere Cannes came of a K,The frer Austynes come of A,Frer Jacobynes of I,Of M comen the frer MenoursThus grounded Caym thes four ordoursThat fillen the world ful of errours,And of ypocrisy.'—Political Poems, i. 266.487. The Wyclifites were never tired of comparing the friars to Pharisees;11. 487-502 and 546-584 are entirely devoted to this comparison,which, as well as that in 457, may be found into Wycliffeyned for gode, feigned to be good men.the Apology attributed489. Kynde ypocrites, natural hypocrites, hypocrites by nature.492. Wo worthe you, woe happen to you; worthe is the imperative ofworthen, to become, to happen ; see the next line.'498. Now maister (quod this lord) I yow biseke.No maister, sir (quod he) but servitour,Though I have had in scole such honour.God likith not that Raby men us calleNeyther in market, neyther in your large halle.'Sompnoures Tale, 1. 484.So too in the Comp. of the Ploughman ; Political Poems, i.337.499. Compare'Priestes should for no catell plede,But chasten hem in charite ;Ne to no battaile should men lede,For inhaunsing of her own degreeNat wilne sittings in high see,Ne soueraignty in house ne hall