227 (B.13.257) may no blessynge doen vs bote: I.e., heal our pestilence: see 217–18 (B.13.248–49) above. Cf. 5.115–17 (B.5.13–15, A.5.13–15), in which Reason in his sermon blames pestilence on pride, and 11.52–65a (B.10.72–85a), in which Dame Study rails about pride, pestilence, and the failure to share bread with the hungry. Actyf has taken on a preacher’s voice, which he has no business doing.
228 (B.13.258) Ne mannes prayere (B masse) maky pees amonges cristene peple: B’s mannes masse is a cynical phrase, softened in C. War is a new issue; Actyf has said nothing about it, nor has either of the other pride passages mentioned in the previous note. The doctor has raised the question at the dinner, however, speaking at lines 171–73 (B.13.173–76) of a peace between the pope and his enemies; and there were two popes, maybe, at the time of the poem; see 171–73 (B.13.173–76) note above.
229a-31 Habundancia … made: The Latin sentence means, “The vilest sin comes from an abundance of bread and wine.” It is probably by L; see B.14.77a and note. It is built, along with lines 230–31 (which translate both L’s Latin and Ezechiel’s in L’s free way), on Ezechiel 16:49, “Behold, this was the iniquity of Sodom thy sister: pride, fullness of bread, and abundance, and the idleness of her and of her daughters; and they did not put forth their hand to the needy and to the poor,” as Alford and Pearsall point out. Maillet 2014:70 adds Luke 17:28–29. A closer parallel to L’s Latin line than anything in Alford, because it mentions both bread and wine, is the Gloss on Isa 5:22, PL 113.1242: “Ex abundantia panis et vini peccatum Sodomorum crevit” (The sin of the men of Sodom came from abundance of bread and wine). See also Peter the Chanter, ed. Boutry 2004:107: he glosses “habundancia panis” as “quarumlibet copia deliciarum” (plenty of whatever delicacies). The line ends Actyf’s monologue eleven lines sooner than in B, moving immediately, and much more effectively, into Patience’s response, which in B has to wait for the whole long sin passage, and for Conscience’s exchange with Actyf (at the beginning of passus 14) as well.
B.13.260–61 For … morwenyng: I.e., For I have to work hard in the cold early mornings to make enough bread from grain to provide for the people. “For” implies that Actyf realizes that pride is not fordone in his own case: he is still subject to Adam’s curse, earning his bread through the sweat of his brow (Gen 3:19, a favorite verse of those who argued against mendicancy).
B.13.264–70 it is noʒt … Maire: Skeat quotes Stow p. 159 (presumably he used the original edition, 1698; I saw the second edition, “enlarged” by John Strype, 1720: 2, 85), who reports that it was once the practice for several carts of bread from Stratford-atte-Bowe, the penny-loaf weighing two ounces more than a London penny-loaf, to arrive in London daily, but that the practice disappeared about 1568. Stow illustrates the practice by citing ll. 265–69 (from manuscript, perhaps ms. R, as his readings show). Skeat also cites several sources that indicate that a dearth drove the price of wheat very high in 1370. John Chichester, goldsmith, was mayor from October 28, 1369 to October 27, 1370. This is the only reference in PP to a contemporary person, and suggests that B cannot be very far from 1370. 265 whan no cart com to towne: presumably for an extended period, perhaps all of April, not just one morning. 267 agast a lite: ironic understatement, presumably—surely they were shocked and dismayed. þouʒt: i.e., remembered (though in fact these lines are the only record).
Actyf’s sin-stained coat (B.13.271–14.28; not in C, though much of the sin material appears in C.6 and 7; see B.13.274–456n below)
B.13.271–14.28 Actyf’s sin-stained coat: Actyf in B now becomes the representative of sinful humanity, and the stains on his cote of cristendom are described, namely, the seven deadly sins (or six of them: wrath and envy are treated together). The coat, which disappears completely in the C version, is called my cristendom again at B.14.11. It is his coat of baptism (MED s.v. cristendom 2 [b]), vestimentum or vestis or tunica baptismi—a classic image, also called the coat of salvation (vestimento salutis, Theodulf, De ordine baptismi, PL 105.234) or coat of faith (vestimentum fidei, Tertullian, De baptismo, PL 1.1215, and everywhere)—conferred on him by baptism and symbolized by the white baptismal robe. It comes up especially in commentary on Apoc 3:4, “Sed habes pauca nomina in Sardis qui non inquinaverunt vestimenta sua, et ambulabunt mecum in albis, quia digni sunt” (But thou hast a few names in Sardis which have not defiled their garments; and they shall walk with me in white, because they are worthy); Apoc 16:15, “Beatus qui vigilat et custodit vestimenta sua, ne nudus ambulet et videant turpitudinem suam” (Blessed is he that watcheth and keepeth his garments, lest he walk naked and they see his shame); Gal 3:27, “Quicumque enim in Christo baptizati estis Christum induistis” (For as many of you as have been baptized in Christ have put on Christ); and sometimes Eph 4:22–24 and Col 3:9–10, on putting off the old man and putting on the new (see also 1 Cor 15:53, cited by Alford 1974:137). Frank (1957:71n) and Schmidt 1995 cite the “spotted garment which is carnal” of Jude 1.23, but there is in fact little use made of that in the commentary tradition.
All commentators say that the vestimenta of Apoc 3:4 are those put on at baptism; the Glossa says they are “vestes immortalitatis et innocentiae, quas acceperunt in baptismo, vel, sua bona opera” (the clothes of immortality and innocence that they received at baptism, or, their good works); both these meanings apply to Actyf. Most commentators acknowledge readily that the coat will need frequent washing, and that that is accomplished by means of the tears of penitence. Peter of Cluny is typical (PL 189.961): “Haec vestis sic mundata, si postmodum inquinetur, non aqua baptismatis, quae non novit nisi semel mundare, sed secundo lacrymarum fonte purganda est, qua et Petrus negationis maculas abluit, et Maria Domini pedes rigando, vitiorum flammas exstinxit” (If this clean coat is later dirtied, it has to be washed not in the water of baptism, which can only clean once, but in a second fountain, that of tears, the fountain in which Peter washed out the stains of his denial and Mary put out the flames of her vices by washing the Lord’s feet).
As I have mentioned, Staley 2002 argues for the relevance of Matthew’s parable of the wedding feast from which one man is cast out for not wearing a wedding garment (Matt 22:1–14, which L does treat at B.15.462–85 without mentioning the man improperly dressed). She shows that commentators regularly spoke of dirty clothes rather than the wrong clothes, but this tradition seems tangential in comparison to the commentary on Apoc 3:4 and the other passages cited above.
So the coat is Actyf’s Christianity, his identity as a Christian, or a little more palpably, his baptized soul. It is clean when he is in the state of grace, his condition at baptism; when he sins he soils it (B.14.276–408, 457–59; B.14.4, 12–15); but contrition, confession, and satisfaction, by restoring him to the state of grace, make it clean again (B.14.5–11, 16–28). Breen 2010:209–16 sees the coat in terms of the Latin word habitus, which means both “condition” and “dress” (as English “habit” still does), but surely L was thinking rather of the traditional Christian metaphor.
The details in the long account of the sins that foul the coat, B.13.274–456, which Langland removed completely from this scene in the C version (see next note), have no value as further characterizations of Actyf. As Robertson and Huppé say, “The result is a kind of general confession of sins of all types not necessarily consistent with a single personality, as though the poet had described all of the sins applicable to the active life which he found either in a confessional inquiry or in a manual for penitents” (1951:168–69). The many critics who draw on them in their account of Haukyn (Breen, for instance, who makes too much of the phrase “yhabited as an heremyte” 284) go astray, it seems to me.
Actyf commits the seven deadly sins (B.13.274–456)