SOURCE: Conley, John. “The Doctrine of Friendship in Everyman.” Speculum XLIV, no. 3 (July 1969): 374-82.

In the following essay, Conley examines the portrayal of friendship in Everyman, comparing it to medieval doctrine of friendship.

The plot of Everyman obviously consists of a test of friendship made by a worldly young man when he suddenly learns that God has summoned him to his reckoning. The doctrine of friendship in this morality is accordingly worth examining even though our conclusion can be anticipated, namely, that this doctrine consists of the essential commonplaces of the mediaeval doctrine of friendship.¹ As in certain of the Faithful Friend analogues,² these commonplaces have been adapted to the plot in keeping with two articles of faith in particular: (1) the necessity, for salvation, of good works, and (2) divine judgement after death.

One of these commonplaces is that no one should be accounted a friend whose friendship has...