“I cannot call riches better than the baggage of virtue; the Roman word is better, ‘impedimenta’; for as the baggage is to an army, so is riches to virtue; it cannot be spared nor left behind, but it hindcreth the march; yea, and the care of it sometimes loseth or disturbeth the victory; of great riches there is no real use, except it be in the distribution; the rest is but conceit.⁠ ⁠… The personal fruition in any man cannot reach to feel great riches: there is a custody of them; or a power of dole and donative of them; or a fame of them; but no solid use to the owner.”

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In this Canto is described the punishment of the Avaricious and the Prodigal, with Plutus as their jailer. His outcry of alarm is differently interpreted by different commentators, and by none very satisfactorily. The curious student, groping among them for a meaning, is like Gower’s young king, of whom he says, in his Confessio Amantis :⁠—