The English Moral Plays 313 
swyche to, hath euery man on lyue, 
to rewlyn hym & hys wyttis fyue.! (310—11) 
The responsibility is fully realised by Mankind, who prays that he may 
folwe, be strete & stalle, 
pe aungyl bat cam fro heuene trone. (316—17) 
But the tempter is insistent, and the sway of the evil powers, the 
World, the Flesh, and the Devil, who are seated on their thrones 
upon the stage, very near. The misguided soul, accordingly, is 
easily brought to forsake his true guide in order to seek in the 
world the base pleasures that Wealth and its privileges can give. 
Disregarding, then, the warnings of Good Angel, 
a! nay! man! for Cristis blod, 
cum a-gayn be strete & style! 
be Werld is wyckyd, & ful wod, 
& pou schalt leuyn but a whyle. 
What coueytyst bou to wynne ? 
man! bynke on pyn endynge day 
Whanne bou schalt be closyd vnder clay!, (403—09) 
and heeding the counsel of Bad Angel, 
With be Werld bou mayst be bold 
tyl bou be sexty wynter hold. 
wanne pi nosé waxit cold, 
panne mayst bou drawe to goode, (418—21) 
Mankind chooses his own course: 
I vow to God, & so I may 
Make mery a ful gret throwe; 
I may leuyn many a day; 
I am but zongé, as I trowe, 
for to do bat I schulde. (422—26) 
He is first introduced by Bad Angel to World and his attendants, 
Folly and Pride, who promise him for his submission the carnal 

1 In one of his sermons Jacques de Vitry told this story of Bonus 
Angelus. A man who has committed a heinous crime is led to confess 
to the Devil who has disguised himself as a priest. The Devil bids 
the man never mention the crime again, and when the man dies he 
claims his soul on the ground that his sin has never been confessed to 
a proper priest. Bonus Angelus appears just in time to insist that the 
man’s good intentions should be sufficient to save him. Zxempla, No. 303. 
