A Pardoner's Tale

Radix malorum est Cupiditas, is the theme of the Pardoner's Tale. It translates to greed is the root of all evil. He preaches this to others, but is guilty himself of the sins. The pardoner is a clear representation of hypocrisy. He even confesses that he is a fraud motivated by greed and avarice. Throughout his sermon he shows multiple examples that he is a hypocrite.

A pardoner is a person who sells pardons or indulgences from the pope. Usually the money goes towards the church to help others, but he preaches about the sin of avarice to intimidate members into donating more money so he can use it for him own benefits - usually not something a pardoner would do. He even states " I only preach to satisfy my greed", the pardoner bluntly confesses that he only does his "job" in order to gain more money. As a pardoner, he is giving others advice on how to live their lives. He does this by talking about how gluttony, drunkenness and swearing is bad. Though he is guilty himself of these things; he can't even live up to what he is preaching to others, but supposedly expects others to believe him. Clearly, he as a pardoner shows him as a hypocrite.

He doesn't even care about what he preaches, " For my concern is only with collection and not with any sin that needs correction. This pardoner only preaches for the love of money and not about the correction other's sin, which is suppose to be his main priority as a pardoner. Ironically, despite the fact that the pardoner is a corrupted person himself, his powerful sermon still had on effect on people - making them believe that they sins are forgiven and they can now do good. Therefore the preachers deed is a hypocrisy because his intentions are not to be helping people, but just his greed. And as a result, despite his intentions, the pardoner does his job right by pardoning people's sins.

A pardoner is also suppose to be a man of God and cares about everyone's souls, but this pardoner is the complete opposite. He