The Fire of Love and The Mending of Life

Personally I should have preferred to retain all the words which Misyn employs, in the hope that some would find their way back into our too much latinized English; but I feared to outweary the patience of the reader. The following is a list of those which I have altered in the text, with their nearest modern equivalents.

addling to earning aseth satisfaction bolnes puffs up chinche miser fagiar, faged flatterer, flattered fliting reproof forthink repent foyd pledge groching grumbling groundly from the root inhiry inward or inner lat behave large generous leman beloved loving, lufing praise menged, melled mingled ugg abhor undirlowt overcome unneth scarcely sam together scrithe glide sparples scatter tityst soonest wode, wodeness mad, madness well to wither

I have kept words which are of common occurrence in the Bible and Prayer Book, and those still in use in Scotland. There are, however, some words which remain in modern English but which have altered or restricted their meaning. Such are very apt to mislead the modern reader. I have, therefore, treated them freely, retaining them when in a modern sense or when their meaning is quite apparent, but changing them if the meaning is at all ambiguous. I append here a full list of these, to avoid the multiplication of footnotes.

Misyn often uses “withouten” for “without,” for the sake of rhythm, and in this I have followed him; nor have I taken upon myself to suppress his constant repetition of “truly,” “forsooth,” “doubtless,” “certain,” “sickerly.” Sometimes these translate the Latin vero, valde, certe, etc., but more often than not stand for an ordinary conjunction, such as enim, namque, autem. O.E.D. against a word in the footnote signifies that the actual word or phrase found in Misyn is quoted in the Oxford English Dictionary.

against to towards avoid make void barely utterly beholding contemplating, or considering busily continually charge care, consider cherish allure deadly, deadliness mortal, mortality drawn to cleave (L. adhaerere) emonge in the meantime herefore hence honily honeyed, honey-sweet ill evil kind nature, essence lasts perseveres liking delight, pleasure lovely lovable longs languishes lust pleasure manner measure mind memory namely especially plainly entirely, altogether (L. penitus) rots, unable to rot corrupts, incorruptible softly little by little, slowly soundly with sweet sound, songful stands continues swells inflates show declare taken received taught imbued thinking meditating, or meditation use enjoy, exercise wanting lacking wherefore whence withhold hold to, retain worship honour wretchedness wickedness