208. and we wer moo, 'if we were more', 'even if there were more of us'.
220. as my prisoune might be taken closely with here: 'in this place as my prison'. The Towneley MS. has in for as. Better would be prisoune<s> 'prisoners'.
240. wolle: read wille for the rime.
241. God<ys> sonne: MS. God sonne might be defended as parallel to the instances in the note to XVII 88.
256. Apparently, 'you argue his men in the mire', i.e. if Jesus is God's Son, the souls should remain in hell because God put them there. But the text may be corrupt.
267 ff. Cp. Ezekiel xxxi. 16, &c.
281 ff. Salamon saide: Proverbs ii. 18-19 taken with vii. 27 and ix. 18. It was hotly disputed in the Middle Ages whether Solomon himself was still in hell. Dante, Paradiso, x. 110, informs a world eager for tidings that he is in Paradise: but Langland declares Ich leyue he be in helle (C-text, iv. 330); and, more sweepingly, coupling him with Aristotle: Al holy chirche holden hem in helle (A-text, xi. 263).
285-8. Perhaps a gloss on Job xxxvi. 18 'Because there is wrath, beware lest he take thee away with his stroke: then a great ransom cannot deliver thee.'
301. menys, the reading of the Towneley MS. is better than mouys, which appears to be a copyist's error due to the similarity of n and u, e and o, in the handwriting of the time.
308. Judas hanged himself, according to Matthew xxvii. 3-5; Acts i. 18 gives a different account of his end. Archedefell: Ahithophel who hanged himself (2 Samuel xvii. 23) after the failure of his plot against David.