| William Langland and the Pearl-poet use grammatical metaphors to describe the relation between God and humanity. The poets rely on medieval traditions in poetry as well as in the philosophy of grammar in these metaphors. These traditions establish varying possibilities of the degree to which the order of grammar may manifest not only the ideal orders of society, but even the nature and existence of God. Langland and the Pearl-poet see in these traditions a grammatical means of revealing the structure of salvation.; Two philosophical views of grammar influence medieval poets. The first holds that grammar may reflect ideal orders of reality and hence may be a guide to divine truths. In the second view, grammar participates in the Fall and so while it may suggest truths about the way to God, it is not finally trustworthy.; Some medieval Latin poems reflect the first philosophical tradition in their grammatical metaphors. In these poems, grammar often serves to satirize corruption in the church. Using grammatical metaphor in De planctu naturae, however, Alanus de Insulis describes the degree to which all humanity has fallen away from God's will.; In Piers Plowman, Langland uses grammar as a mirror of ideal orders of reality. He structures his argument about "meed" in C:IV with a grammatical metaphor. A "relacion rect" between an adjective, humanity, and a substantive, God, reveals the relation of "mesure" necessary for salvation. In the Vita, Langland gives a grammatical structure to the progression of Dowel, Dobet, and Dobest, steps that Piers calls "infinites." This grammatical metaphor provides a means of moving toward God. Grammar thus both reveals the ideal and becomes a way to attain it.; The Pearl-poet, espousing the second philosophical tradition, orders the basic tension in his poem between earthly and heavenly realities in grammatical terms. Grammatical structures may hint at the nature of heaven and the way to it, but finally God eludes definition by human grammar. Grammar is absorbed and transformed in the mysterious sufficiency of the divine. |
