CHAPTER V THE AGE OF CHAUCER (1360-1400) THE Age of Chaucer is like a high table-land to which we ascend as by a long and gradual slope through the literature of the previous period and from which The Age of we descend again somewhat abruptly to the Chaucer literature of the period that follows. It is hardly forcing the figure to say that Chaucer himself rises from the midst of this table-land like a single, lonely peak, unmatched and almost unapproached. This is not to suggest that the age is separated by any gulf from what goes before and after. Quite the contrary is the case. The literary development is continuous, and what we have now reached is not so much different as it is higher and better. Romance During the latter part of the fourteenth century, as during the two centuries preceding, religion and romance are still the guiding impulses of English litera- Religion and ture. Life is growing more complex, and many minor influences are making themselves felt; the two great impulses are no longer so easily separable as before; but these two impulses are still operative and still dominant. Indeed, the two literary tendencies which we have traced through the previous period may be said to find here their culmination. The religious literature, which began with the Moral Ode and the Ormulum, and which ran through such works as the Orison of our Lady, Genesis and Exodus, the Bestiary, the Ancren Riwle, Robert Manning's Hand lynge Synne, the Cursor Mundi, Richard of Hampole's Pricke of Conscience, the Ayenbite of Inwit, Cleanness, Patience, and The Pearl, is now to find a higher exempli fication in the works of Langland and Wyclif. The romantic literature, which began with Layamon's Brut, and which ran through such works as Sir Tristrem, Havelok the Dane, King Horn, the great Cycles of Romance, and Sir Gawayne and the Grene Knight, is about to find a natural sequence in Gower and great poetic expression in Chaucer. How far religion and romance remain separate and how far they become united in their literary influence, we shall have occasion to see. People and We shall no longer have to take account of the difference of races, for Englishmen and Normans have now become welded into one great English people, stronger for action and better endowed for literary creation because of the mingled blood. The duality of language, too, has passed or is rapidly passing away; and the newer English, blending the might of two great tongues, is displaying its splendid powers as an instrument of literary expression. It is to be in large measure the task of this generation to rescue English from the chaos of dialects and to create for all time a great standard speech. One of the greatest personalities of the age is John Wyclif. He is famous not alone because of his literary work; for as a matter of fact his name belongs Wyclif even more to the history of religion and religious thought than to the history of literature. He was first of all a great theologian. At the age of forty or earlier, he was master of Balliol College at Oxford and one of the recognized theological scholars of his time. After occupying various positions in school and church, he became vicar of Lutterworth and occupied that benefice until his death in 1384. Not merely as a theologian and a churchman, however, does he claim our attention. A man of pure life and lofty character, filled with an intense religious zeal, he became the first great religious reformer. All his great learning was devoted to vigorous and at times violent controversy. His enemies abused him for his doctrines, deprived him of his preferments, and once summoned him to appear at St. Paul's in London to answer to a charge of heresy. Many of the greatest men of the time were divided into parties for or against him. One of his strongest partisans was John of Gaunt, the great Duke of Lancaster, son of Edward III. Opposition only moved him to a greater activity, and his work became more aggressive and more practical. His "poor priests" went throughout England, preaching the gospel, inculcating the new doctrines, crying out against formalism and luxury and corruption in the church, and exhorting men to purer life and faith. His followers were known as Lollards. They were the Protestants and Puritans of their day and the forerunners of the great movement which we call the Reformation. It is through this religious activity that Wyclif enters into literature. He wrote theological works in Latin and many sermons, tracts, and pamphlets in English. Wyclif's LitMost important of all, he planned and in large erary Work measure personally executed a complete translation of the Bible. By virtue of these works, he takes rank as the greatest English prose-writer of his century and as one who either directly or indirectly influenced prose style for some two hundred years. The various translations of the Bible are a most important part of English literature; and Wyclif's right to rank as one of the great translators is beyond dispute. He was not a great literary artist, but he played a distinguished part in the history of English thought and in the development of English prose as a medium of literary expression. By virtue of the fact that he wrote and translated in order to bring home to the common people the truths of religion, his style is simple, vigorous, and picturesque. His severe theological training served to make it also clear, logical, and accurate. It is the union, therefore, of trained intelligence, intense re Langland ligious fervor, and popular purpose that has made his trans lation of the Bible our first great monument of English prose. Even more unique than the figure of Wyclif is that of William Langland. Of his life and personality, we know very little. Some hints in his poem may possibly be interpreted as autobiographic; and on the basis of these, it has been customary to construct a more or less imaginative picture of the man. According to the traditional view, he seems to have been born at Cleobury Mortimer in Shropshire and to have been given a fair degree of education. Perhaps as early as 1362, he wrote the first version of his famous Vision of William concerning Piers the Plowman. Then he went to London, where he lived a precarious and somewhat discontented life, probably holding some minor office in the church. About 1378, he revised his poem and enlarged it to three times its previous size. Later, he returned to the West of England, and again, about 1393, rewrote his poem with many changes. He had much of Wyclif's religious intensity and puritanical spirit, but he was not a theological scholar and probably not a Lollard. There is an element of bitterness and misanthropy in his work which makes it somewhat sombre. The most interesting feature of his character is his sympathy with the poor and oppressed, and his earnest desire to better their condition and to lead them to a truer religious life. He was a religious reformer, but his concern was not so much with doctrine as with practical living. The three versions of Langland's poem differ greatly from each other. This variation, together with the fact that Langland, though a real poet, was but a poor literary architect, makes it somewhat difficult to present briefly a clear statement of the contents of the work. The poem is a vision, or rather a series of visions. The poet imagines himself as falling asleep on Piers the a May morning in the Malvern Hills, near his home. In his dream, he sees a "fair field full of folk," carrying on the various activities of the world. All are seeking their own selfish ends and courting the favor of Lady Meed, or Reward. She is the daughter of Falsehood and the promised bride of Flattery. Conscience and Reason are both hostile to her, and she stands in marked contrast with another fair lady called Holy Church. It was an evil world that Langland saw, a world full of selfishness, of treachery, of dishonesty, and of all manner of wrong. Through a series of pictures continually dissolving the one into the other, he continues his description. The treatment is allegorical, yet the allegorical figures are mingled with real human personages, and both classes seem to stand upon an even footing. The chief character is Piers the Plowman. At first he is a simple plowman, type of the humble and laborious poor. Then he is conceived as the faithful and lowly Christian, living a godly life himself and endeavoring to lead others to the truth. Finally, he is exalted into a type of Christ, opposing the corrupt priesthood of the age and striving to bring men to a true knowledge of the way of salvation. This confusion with reference to the hero of the poem is a fair example of Langland's desultory method and lack of literary art. He simply pours out into his poem, in vigorous and imaginative fashion, whatever he has to say concerning the degraded life and false religion of his time and concerning the way in which men may be saved from their sins. Three of his favorite allegorical figures are Dowell, Do-bet, and Do-best, typifying the three stages by which men may ascend to true godliness. They represent the poet's view that faith without works is dead, and that men need to have preached to them the doctrine of an honest, industrious, and godly life as the way to salvation. The poet is, in the main, orthodox in his faith; and in spite |