351. The sense shews that _suggestion_ is really meant; but it only appears
in MSS. Selden and Lansdowne; all the rest have _subieccion_ or
_subieccioun_, which I have therefore retained in the text. The fact is,
that the words were confused in medieval Latin. Ducange gives _subjectio_,
as used for _suggestio_. However, we find the words 'by wikked
_suggestion_' just below, in l. 355.
_bely_, i. e. bellows; so in all the seven MSS. It is precisely the same
[454] word as the mod. E. _belly_, notwithstanding the present difference
in sense. The old sense was simply 'bag'; applied either to an inflated bag
for blowing, or to the abdomen. The pl. form _belies_ was also used in the
double sense, viz. (1) a pair of bellows, and (2) bellies; in fact, a pair
of bellows is still called _blow-bellis_ in some parts of Shropshire; see
_Blow-bellows_ and _Blow-bellys_ in Miss Jackson's Shropshire Glossary. And
see the full explanations of _Bellows_ and _Belly_ in the New Eng. Dict.
355. 'Perhaps there may be some such passage in the Rabbinical histories of
Moses, which the learned Gaulmin published in the last century (Paris,
1629, 8vo.), and which, among other traditions, contain that alluded to by
St. Jude, Epist. 9.'--Tyrwhitt. An apocryphal book, called the Assumption
of Moses, is mentioned by Origen.
358. Wycliffe protested against this attempted distinction between 'venial'
and 'deadly' sin; see his Works, ed. Arnold, iii. 452. See also Myrc's
Instructions for Parish Priests, p. 43.
362. Hazlitt gives this proverb in the form--'Many littles make a mickle';
from Camden's _Remains_. He adds several parallels from Ray's Proverbs.
Another similar proverb is: 'A little leak will sink a great ship'; cf.
363.
363. _crevace_, crevice. _thurrok_, the holde of a ship. 'Thurrok of a
schyppe, _Sentina_'; Prompt. Parv. The following remarkable passage occurs
in The Myroure of oure Ladye, ed. Blunt (E. E. T. S.), pt. ii. pp. 108,
109:--'Noe [Noah] ioyed that hys Shyppe shulde be so pycked [pitched]
wyth-in and wyth-out, that there shulde [be?] no _thorrocke_ [bilge-water?]
that myghte syee [leak, ooze in] or droppe in therto. Ye shall vnderstonde
that there ys a place in the bottome of a shyppe wherein ys gatheryd all
the fylthe that cometh in-to the shyppe, other by lekynge or by syinge
in-to yt by the bourdes, when the shyppe is olde, or when yt is not wel
pycked, or by eny other wyse. And that place stynketh ryghte fowle; and yt
ys called in some contre [county] of thys londe _a thorrocke_. Other calle
yt an hamron, and some calle yt the bulcke of the shyppe. And thys is the
_thorrocke_ that this Lesson spekyth of. For the shyppe of Noe was soo well
pycked, that there gatheryd no soche fylthe therin.' It is cognate with Du.
_durk_, Mid. Du. _durck_; Hexham's Du. Dict. has:--'_Durck_ van het schip
daer al het water ende vuyligheyt in loopt, The Bottom or Sink of a ship
where all the water and filth runs in.' Sewel's Du. Diet, has:--'_Durk_
(vuyl scheepswater), The foul water at the bottom of a ship.' This shews
that the word meant (1) the lower part of the hold; and (2) the bilge-water
that collects there. Probably a still older sense is simply 'hull'; for we
find A. S. _þurruc_, as a gloss to '_Cumba, uel caupolus_';
Wright-Wülcker's Gloss. 181. 35. And Ducange has:--'_Cumba_, cymba, navis,
seu potius navis species ... Glossar. Arabico-Latinum; _Lembus, navicula
brevis, dicta et_ caupulus, _et_ cumba, _et lintris...._ Ugutio: _Cumba et
cimba, ima pars navis et vicinior aquis._' [455]
This image is doubtless borrowed from St. Gregory; see Sweet's ed. of
Ælfred's translation of Gregory's Pastoral Care, cap. lvii.
378. _tale_, relate, narrate; cf. A. 772; Will. of Palerne, 160; Gower, C.
A. iii. 329. A. S. _talian_. Tyrwhitt reads _talke_.
384. I find, in Caxton's Golden Legende, the expression--'yf they had done
ony venyal synne, hit was anone putte awey by the loue of charyte, _lyke as
a drope of water in a fornays_.'--Of the Commemoration of Al Soules. See my
note to P. Pl. C. vii. 338.
386. _Confiteor_, I confess. In the Ancren Riwle, p. 137, the editor's
translation has:--'Wherefore every anchoress saith to every priest
_Confiteor_ first of all, and confesseth herself first of all, and often.'
387. Here begins the famous and very common subject of the Seven Deadly
Sins, largely borrowed from the treatise by Frère Lorens mentioned above
(p. 447). I give occasional quotations from the French text, marked 'Fr.,'
with references to the pages of Essays on Chaucer, Part V (Chaucer
Society).
I here repeat, from my note on P. Plowman, C. vii. 3, some of the
references to passages in which the Seven Sins appear. See, for instance,
Ælfric's Homilies, ed. Thorpe, ii. 219; Wyclif's Works, ed. Arnold, iii.
119, 225; The Ancren Riwle, ed. Morton, pp. 198-204; Religious Pieces, ed.
Perry (E. E. T. S.), pp. 11, 12; the Ayenbite of Inwyt, ed. Morris, p. 16;
Political, Religious, and Love Poems, ed. Furnivall, p. 215; Hymns to the
Virgin and Christ, ed. Furnivall, p. 62; Myrc's Instructions for Parish
Priests, p. 33; Dunbar's Dance of the Seven Deadly Sins; Spenser, F. Q. bk.
i. c. 4; &c. See also _Sins_ in Nares' Glossary.