Middle English Literature. A Critical Study of the Romances, the Religious Lyrics, Piers Plowman

1952 ◽  
Vol 47 (2) ◽  
pp. 214
Author(s):  
John Lawlor ◽  
George Kane
Keyword(s):  
Middle English ◽  
English Literature ◽  
Piers Plowman ◽  
Critical Study ◽  
Middle English Literature ◽  
Religious Lyrics

Literature and Law in Medieval England

PMLA ◽  
1977 ◽  
Vol 92 (5) ◽  
pp. 941-951 ◽  
Author(s):  
John A. Alford
Keyword(s):  
Real Estate ◽  
Middle English ◽  
English Literature ◽  
Medieval Literature ◽  
Piers Plowman ◽  
Medieval England ◽  
Middle English Literature ◽  
Literature And Law

The use of law in Middle English literature is not extraneous but grows naturally out of a profound faith in law as the tie that binds all things, in heaven and in earth: all law—divine, natural, and human—is, in essence, one law. Hence, Christ's victory over Satan is dramatized in the language of Westminster, the promise of salvation is seen in terms of the emerging law of contracts, and our place in heaven is treated as real estate. The process is seen most clearly in the Château d'Amour, Piers Plowman, Pearl, and “Quia Amore Langueo.” With the disintegration of the belief in a single, coherent law, however, the legal metaphor lost most of its force and economy. As heirs of that disintegration, we must be careful not to impose it unwittingly on Medieval literature and thus fragment a vision that was whole.

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