¹ The most extensive studies of the sources of the Parson's Tale are, of course, those of Kate Petersen (The Sources of the Parson's Tale [Boston 1901]) and Wilhelm Eilers (Die Erzählung des Pfarrers [Erlangen 1882]). The most relevant and illuminating of more recent discussions of sources are those of Pfander, H. G. (Journal of English and Germanic Philology 35 [1936] 243-58, especially 253-58), Germaine Dempster (Sources and Analogues [Chicago 1941; reprinted New York 1958] 723-60), and Alfred Kellogg, L. (Traditio 8 [1952] 424-30).Google Scholar

² For the Parson's Tale I have used the text of Robinson, F. N., The Works of Geoffrey Chaucer (2nd ed. Boston 1957).Google Scholar

³ For bibliography of recent articles and monographs pertaining to the Moralium dogma and a concise and judicious summary of the scholarship, see R. Williams, John, Speculum 37 (1957) 736–47. For a brief account of the influence of the Moralium dogma, see Grabmann, Martin, ‘Handschriftliche Forschungen und Mitteilungen zum Schrifttum des Wilhelm von Conches und zu Bearbeitungen seiner naturwissenschaftlichen Werke,’ Sb. Akad. Munich 1935 (Heft 10) 13-15.Google Scholar

⁴ The evidence given here is consistent with what is known about Chaucer's practice elsewhere, his general preference to use French sources whenever possible; the most notable examples are the Livre de Melibée, the Livre Griseldis, and Jean de Meun's rendering of Boethius. For summary comment and bibliography, see Robinson, 740-41; 709-10; 797; in regard to a French source of Troilus and Criseyde, see the findings of A. Pratt, Robert, ‘Chaucer and Le Roman de Troyle et de Criseide,’ Studies in Philology 53 (1956) 509–39.Google Scholar

⁵ In purpose and structure the Moralium dogma owes much to Cicero's De officiis; a detailed study of the relationship of the two works has been made by Philippe Delhaye, ‘Une adaptation du De officiis au XII^e siècle: Le Moralium dogma philosophorum,’ Recherches de Théologie ancienne et médiévale 16 (1949) 227–58, and 17 (1950) 5-28.Google Scholar

⁶ Gautier, R.-A., ‘Les deux recensions du Moralium dogma philosophorum,’ Revue du Moyen Age latin 9 (1953) 176–81; 220-60. Of particular interest is the Anglo-Norman and Northern French provenance of the twelfth- and thirteenth-century manuscripts of the Moralium dogma. Philippe Delhaye writes: ‘… la plupart des manuscrits du XII^e siècle proviennent des milieux anglo-normands et font penser que le Moralium dogma aurait pu trouver là son origine’; Gautier de Châtillon, est-il l'auteur du Moralium dogma? (Analecta Mediaevalia Namurcensia 3; 1953). It is of some significance to note that two copies of the Moralium dogma were among the books Dan Michel of Northgate bequeathed to the library of St. Augustine's, Canterbury; see A. Pantin, W., The English Church in the Fourteenth Century (Cambridge 1955) 226.Google Scholar

⁷ I refer to the remarks of Dom Odon Lottin, Psychologie et morale aux XII ^e et XIII ^e siècles III (Louvain 1949) 187–90, and to the table of influences appended to that volume, pp. 688-713, where the influence of the Moralium dogma is maintained chiefly by the persistent borrowings from the Summa de virtutibus of the Franciscan Johannes de Rupella. Like Professor Williams (op. cit. 739), I am convinced by Delhaye's arguments for the originality and primacy of the Moralium dogma (Gautier de Châtillon … 43-51, 61-69).Google Scholar

⁸ Holmberg, John, ed., Das Moralium dogma philosophorum des Guillaume de Conches: Lateinisch, altfranzösisch und mittelniederfränkisch (Uppsala 1929), pp. 39 (and note)-44, R.-A. Gautier (op. cit. 208) points out that it is the Moralium dogma emendatum, a thirteenth-century redaction by Bartholomew of Recanati, that was rendered into French by Brunetto Latini and by the anonymous translator of the French text edited by Holmberg.Google Scholar

⁹ Holmberg's familial French MSS K and L (Paris, Bibl. Nat. MS fr. 25407, fol. 123^r-138^v, and MS fr. 1822, fol. 217^v-225^v) are particularly interesting in that, while they are most distant from the French ‘vulgata,’ their variant readings are generally closer to Chaucer's diction and phrasing than those of his established text. Unfortunately, Holmberg chose to notice and include in his apparatus only some of the variants in these MSS; a strange editorial omission.Google Scholar

¹⁰ The compiler extracted from the Moralium dogma principally but not exclusively definitions and other material pertaining to the virtues; the most obvious case of reordering is his adaptation of the order of the virtues in the Moralium dogma to conform with the order of the vices. The more important adaptations are discussed below.Google Scholar

¹¹ The reading ‘mauaises uices’ appears in Holmberg's MSS K and L, both of which reveal Anglo-Norman features; see his descriptions, ed. cit. 44. Google Scholar

¹² Worthy of note is Frère Lorens’ use of similar language to define not ‘force 'but ‘attemprance’: ‘La vertu de attemprance est lamour du cuer par quoi il sueffre viguereusement toutes les choses qui avenir …’ (Somme le Roi, Brit. Mus. Royal MS 19. C. II, fol. 49^r. I have consulted MLA Rotograph 306, lent me through the courtesy of the Library of Congress.) The confusion may be scribal rather than auctorial, for definitions are usually transmitted with care.Google Scholar

¹³ The reading ‘ne doute pas’ appears in Holmberg's MS For, C. his description of the MS, see op. cit. 41-2. Google Scholar

¹⁴ Holmberg, , p. 196, notes the omission but offers no comment.Google Scholar

¹⁵ Cicero, , De inv. 2.54.163.Google Scholar

¹⁶ Cicero, , De off. 1.26.90. ¹⁷ Seneca, Epist. 1.5.8.Google Scholar

¹⁸ For discussion, see below, p. 264-265.Google Scholar

¹⁹ Chaucer's ‘undertake’ (731) could have been suggested in his French source by the sentence that introduces the topic ‘hardemenz’ in the Romanz: ‘Atornez vos cuers a soutenir les vertueuses euures et les hauz trauax’ (134.21-2), translating Seneca, Epist. 1.5.8 (30.12-13).Google Scholar

²⁰ Typical of the adaptations of the Moralium dogma to be found in the Somme le roi are the following, which I include here only for the purpose of demonstrating the characteristic diffuseness of Lorens’ paraphrase. A close study of all the analogous sections reveals that the pieces under examination here could not have been transmitted by Lorens’ Somme. Even a casual comparison reveals that Chaucer's text is closer to the Moralium dogma than is Lorens’ (the text is that of Brit. Mus. Royal MS 19. C. II; rubricated initials are rendered in italics): (fol. 65^vb) Des. vii. degrez de force. Li philosophe qui des vertus traiteirent deuiserent ceste vertu en. vii. degrez per illec ou ceste vertu merite et proufite … Le premier point il apele magnaminite. Le secont fiance. le tiers seurite. Le quart pascience. Le quint constance. Le sizieme magnificence. Le septienne est celui que nostre sires yaiouste qui a non fam et soif de iustice. Ces vertus len ne puet pas si proprement nommei, comme li entende (fol. 66^ra) mens de ces mos le dit en latin. Magnanimite est haute grandesce et noble de courage par quoi li homs est hardis comme lyons, et de grant emprise. Ceste vertu a. ii. parties grans choses despire, et plus grant emprise emprendre et eslire … De la seconde partie dit li philosophes que magnanimite est resnable emprise de hautes choses et espoentables. (fol. 66^va) Le secont degre de ceste vertu est fiance. car a bonne vvre emprise il conuient que il tieigne fermement son propos, et que il ait bonne fiance en dieu que il parfera ce que il encommencera. (fol. 66^vb) Le tiers degre de force est seurte, si comme dit li phylosophes. et est une vertu par la quele len ne redoute point les maus, ne les perils qui sont deuant les yex. [The Somme offers no relevant passage on patience.] (fol. 67^rb) Le quint degre de ceste vertu est appelee constance. cest vne vertu qui fait le cuer ferme en dieu comme toux fondee sus ferme roche … (fol. 67^va) Le sizieme degre de force est appele magnificence. Ceste vertu nostre grant philosophe ihesucrist apele perseuerance …Google Scholar

²¹ That the passage in Chaucer's text derives from the Moralium dogma and not from Gregory or from a direct quotation of Gregory may be seen by examining the text of the Moralia in Book XXX, Chapter 18 (PL 76.556-7). The relevant passage runs: ‘Quinque modis gula nos tentat. Non cibus, sed appetitus in vitio est. Sciendum praeterea est quia quinque nos modis gulae vitium tentat. Aliquando namque indigentiae tempora praeventi; aliquando vero tempus non praevenit, sed cibos lautiores quaerit; aliquando quaelibet quae sumenda sint praeparari accuratius expetit, aliquando autem et qualitati ciborum et tempori congruit, sed in ipsa quantitate sumendi mensuram moderatae refectionis excedit. Nonnunquam vero et abjectius est quod desiderat, et tamen ipso aestu immensi desiderii deterius peccat.Google Scholar

²² For the divisions of temperancia the author of the Moralium dogma relied on the list given by Macrobius, In somn. Scip. 1.8.7. For a summary discussion of this set of ramifications and other divisions of temperancia, see Lottin, , op. cit. (n. 7 above) III 187-94.Google Scholar

²³ Cicero, De inv. 2.54.164. The translation in the Romanz is ‘Atemprance est vne seignorie de raison contra luxure et econtre les autres mauaises volentez’ (140.26-141.1). Chaucer's claim for ‘attemperaunce,’ that it ‘holdeth the meene in alle thynges’ (833) probably derives from the Horatian quotation (Serm. 1.1.106) included in the discussion of modestia (mesure in the Moralium dogma: ‘Est modus in rebus …’ (42.3); in the Romanz the translation begins: ‘En toutes les choses a mesure …’ (142.10).Google Scholar

²⁴ Cicero, De off. 1.35.126.Google Scholar

²⁵ The coupling of ‘Pacience’ with ‘Mansuetudo, that is, Debonairetee,’ is not found in the Moralium dogma. Mansuetudo is an Aristotelian virtue that as early as the twelfth century was called upon to supplement the traditional virtues supplied by Cicero and Macrobius. Alain of Lille, in his De virtutibus (ed. Lottin, Odon, Mediaeval Studies 12 [1950] 20-56) twice defines mansuetudo, first, among the partes of fortitude: ‘mansuetudo est animi uirtus qua homo se tolerabilem reddit’ (ed. cit. 32), and second, in discussing the relationship of the virtues to the gifts of the Holy Spirit, ‘mansuetudo uero uirtus est qua quis non mouetur contumeliis uerborum in facie objectis’ (ibid. 54). Chaucer's definition (655) doubtless derives from an adaptation of the latter definition. In verse 657, Chaucer translates: ‘This vertu [debonairetee] somtyme comth of nature; for, as seith the philosophre, « A man is a quyk thyng, by nature debonaire … »’. Alain, discussing human potentialities, writes: ‘Has potentias complexus est Aristoteles sub nomine mansuetudinis, cum ait: homo est animal mansuetum natura’ (ibid. 27; cf. p. 36). Chaucer's passage, at least the portion I exhibited here, is clearly indebted to the source Alain quotes.Google Scholar

²⁶ In the definition of ‘Mansuetudo, that is, Debonairetee’ (655) Chaucer, doubtless with both Latin and French sources before him, writes ‘stirynges and moevinges’ in paraphrasing the idea contained in the word ‘mouetur’ found in his Latin text (I have quoted Alain's definition in note 25).Google Scholar

²⁷ Cf. Cicero, De off. 2.15.54.Google Scholar

²⁸ Cf. ibid. 2.16.55-6.Google Scholar

²⁹ Petersen, op. cit. (n. 1 above) 41.Google Scholar

³⁰ In the Ysagoge in theologiam (ed. Landgraf, A., Écrits théologiques de l'École d’Abélard [Spicilegium sacrum Lovaniense 14; Louvain 1934] 74), a work that derives its material on the virtues from the Moralium dogma, is found the important separation of the ‘sciencie’ and ‘virtutes’ which necessitates the acceptance of only three of the traditional cardinal virtues as ‘virtutes’ and the relegation of prudentia to the ‘sciencie’: ‘Virtutem alii quadrifariam dividunt, alii in tres partes. Tullius enim in libro Officiorum et in Rhetorica sua, necnon Macrobius in Commento super sompnium Scipionis, et alii quam plures annumerantes prudentiam virtutibus, virtutem dividunt in iusticiam, prudentiam, fortitudinem, temperantiam. Hoc autem est Socraticum dogma. Socrates enim large accipiens virtutem secundum illam diffinitionem, quam secundam posuimus et que omnes rationabiles habitus colligit, scientias sub virtute ponit. Nos autem scientias separantes a virtutibus, virtutis nomen stricte accipimus secundum primam descriptionem [‘Virtus est animi habitus modo nature rationi consentaneus’: Arist. Eth. Nicom. 2.6, 1107a]. In quo Aristotilem sequimur, qui non putat prudentiam virtutem esse, quia eque inest bonis et malis nec in ea meritum ullum. Ideoque scientias a virtutibus separat dicens: Tales sunt scientie et virtutes [Arist. Categ. 8, 8a].’ — The lists of the ‘goodes of the nature of the soule’ (453) and the ‘goodes of grace’ (455) in the Parson's Tale derive from this separation; the former (bona naturalia spiritualis [Ysagoge 100]) represent the categories of prudentia, understood as ‘scientia,’ distinct in nature from the other three cardinal virtues, and the latter, the goods of grace, are an elaboration of the distinction between ‘scientie’ and ‘virtutes.’ Alain of Lille, following the Ysagoge, defends the separation of prudentia from the other three cardinal virtues: ‘ratio, intellectus, memoria virtutes non possunt, quia ui non stant’ (ed. cit. 28; cf. pp. 29 and 34).Google Scholar

³¹ There is one more possible indebtedness: at verse 762 Chaucer's text reads, ‘Wherefore I rede, do right so with thy cherl, as thou woldest that thy lord dide with thee, if thou were in his plit.’ The texts of the Romanz and the Moralium dogma that possibly underlie this commonplace statement are these: ‘Pour ce deuez vous garder que vous soiez autretez vers vostre sergant com vous volez que vostre sire soit vers uous’ (158.12-14); ‘Ideo sic cum inferiore uiuas, quemadmodum superiorem tecum uelis uiuere’ (57.24-5).Google Scholar

³² See reference at note 7.Google Scholar

³³ It is a well known fact that in England, during the period of French lingual dominance, the literate, particularly the clergy, spoke and wrote in both Latin and French. Dominica, M. Legge writes: ‘Except for some of the country parsons, who were so ill-educated that they knew little or no Latin, … the clergy, especially those with university degrees or members of the religious Orders, were accustomed to read, write, talk, and in consequence to think, in Latin with Anglo-Norman as a misericorde’; Anglo-Norman in the Cloisters (Edinburgh 1950) 88.Google Scholar

³⁴ It is perhaps necessary to emphasize that both Brunetto and the anonymous translator of the Romanz used as their source the Moralium dogma emendatum, the redaction of Bartholemew of Recanati (see note 6, above). Brunetto's borrowings from the Moralium dogma are scattered throughout Book II of the Trésor. I have consulted the edition of Francis Carmody, J., Li Livres dou Trésor (Berkeley and Los Angeles 1948).Google Scholar

³⁵ Despite the cautionary doubts expressed by Pfander, H. G. more than twenty years ago (Journal of English and Germanic Philology 35 [1936] 254-56), and the more recent and more telling criticism of the Peraldian derivation by Alfred Kellogg, L. (Traditio 8 [1952] 424-27), important and influential works continue to perpetuate the notion that Peraldus is the ultimate source of Chaucer's sins treatise: see the remarks of Germaine Dempster in the newly reissued Sources and Analogues (New York 1958) 723–24; the comment of Robinson, F. N. in his second edition of the Works (Boston 1957) 16, supported by his assumptions throughout the notes to the sins treatise; and the opinion of Pantin, W. A., op. cit. (n. 6 above) 226-27.Google Scholar

³⁶ Professor Kellogg (loc. cit.) emphasizes the fact that the order of the sins in the Parson's Tale is the reverse of that in Peraldus. He writes: ‘It is unquestionably true that there are many passages in the Parson's Tale to which Peraldus’ Summa de Vitiis offers more accurate correspondences than any other work yet discovered. However, these correspondences may, I think, be explained as Peraldus’ partial use of an earlier tradition founded upon the very brief Seven Deadly Sins passage in the Moralia’ (p. 425 n.).Google Scholar

³⁷ Miss Petersen noted (p. 45): ‘Beyond [the] fact … that Peraldus agrees with the Parson in expounding each remedium after its corresponding sin, there is no agreement to be noted between the tract of Peraldus and the first six remedia of the P. T….’ Cf. Germaine Dempster, op. cit. 744 n.Google Scholar

³⁸ Peraldus drew heavily upon the Moralium dogma for definitions of the virtues in compiling his Summa de virtutibus (see Holmberg, ed. cit. 11 n.), but his borrowings, because of the compendious nature of his work, are very widely scattered, and are sorted among other current definitions without identification. I have consulted Gvillelmi Peraldi, … Summae virtutum ac vitiorum (Lyons 1668), on a film kindly lent me by Professor Kellogg.Google Scholar

³⁹ The writer has in preparation a study of the traditional definitions of the vices in relation to the definitions found in Chaucer's text. The evidence to be offered links Chaucer's definitions to the older tradition and further dissociates the Parson's Tale from Peraldus.Google Scholar