In this chapter, we will deepen our focus on the role that ecclesiastical discourse plays in Hoccleve's poetry, by focusing specifically on the role of the Eucharist in Hoccleve's works. In doing so, we will approach a clearer definition of how the old man and the Friend operate in Hoccleve's poetry, and will expand on Hoccleve's status as a religious poet – that is, as a vernacular writer with evident interests in the role and function of priesthood, the spiritual health of the institutional church, the treatment of laypeople within the church, and the ability of poetry to act as a conduit for prayer, penance, and devotional reflection. We will also further explore the communal role that the figure of Chaucer plays in Hoccleve's Regiment, and its implications for Hoccleve's own role as a spiritual and literary intermediary.

In the last chapter, I suggested a parallel between the old man's role in the Regiment and the role of Holy Church in Passus I of Piers Plowman. Hoccleve's old man proves unhelpful, however, not just because he expounds on lofty theological concepts of which the narrator has no natural understanding (or ‘kynde knowyng’ (C.1.137)), as in Will's case, but rather because he approaches the layperson as suspicious and potentially dangerous. Will's Holy Church expresses theological truths that, while lofty, are nonetheless potentially helpful; Hoccleve's old man does not even arrive at this point. He refers to Hoccleve as ‘my chyld’ (e.g., 441), and warns him that not following his advice would be an indication of Hoccleve's ‘childissh misreuled conceit’ (195). Such language – as well as the father/son terminology that Hoccleve and the old man use for each other throughout the first section – might seem to align the Regiment with prose spiritual guides such as Book to a Mother, where, in learning the ‘text’ of Christ, the reader becomes like a child learning the ABC, with a view to becoming literate through spiritual ascent. Other late fourteenth-century spiritual guides, such as Life of Soul and Walter Hilton's Mixed Life, use similar language to emphasize collaborative engagement: they focus on a ‘shared search for knowledge’ that can potentially ‘realize shared forms of intellectual authority’. Hoccleve's old man, however, seems less interested in positioning Hoccleve as a fellow traveler, and more interested in verifying his orthodox credentials and reinforcing the hierarchy of the church.