463 ff. See note on the Latin verses at the beginning of the Prologue, 5 f.
479. That is, rather than sing such a creed, I would choose to be unlearned and know no creed at all.
487. Upon hirself, i.e. upon her authority.
515. balketh. A ‘balk’ is a ridge left unploughed, and ‘to balk’ in ploughing is to leave a ridge either between two furrows or in the furrow itself, the plough being permitted to pass over a piece of ground without breaking it. Here it is referred to as an accident arising either from not ploughing straight or not keeping the ploughshare regularly at the proper depth. From this idea of leaving out something come most of the other meanings of the verb: see New Engl. Dict.
544. Hire oghte noght be. For this impersonal use with the simple infinitive cp. 704.
545. For I, i.e. ‘For that I’: cp. 820, &c.
585. This expression, which Pauli for some reason calls an ‘obscene proverb,’ seems to be nearly equivalent to the saying about the bird that fouls his own nest (cp. Mirour, 23413), and refers apparently to recriminations between the owl and the stock upon which he sits, on the matter of cleanliness. The application is to the case of the man who quarrels with his own performances, and naturally has the worst of it himself.
626. ‘World’ seems to be the true reading here, though ‘word’ stood in the earlier form of text. The meaning is ‘that state of things shall never be permitted by me.’ The use of ‘world’ is like that which we have in i. 178, where ‘mi world’ means ‘my condition’: cp. Prol. 383, 1081. The verb ‘asterte’ is used in the sense of escaping notice and so being allowed to pass or to happen: cp. i. 1934,
‘Bot that ne schal me noght asterte,
To wene forto be worthi,’ &c.