Walter Hilton wrote a number of works of spiritual guidance in Latin and English in the last quarter of the fourteenth century, some of which circulated widely enough and in forms varied enough to raise questions not merely of authorial or scribal revision, but even of fundamental change in the conceptualization of the work itself. The aim of the present study is to examine the patterns of circulation of, and variation in, the two books of the English text of The Scale of Perfection and Thomas Fishlake's Latin translation of the Scale, in order to unpack the changes of audience and intent manifest in them.

For the most part, Hilton's works are written as pieces of correspondence clearly aimed at the spiritual needs of those to whom he wrote. To Adam Horsley, an Exchequer official who wished to leave his secular clerical career to join the Carthusian order, Hilton wrote his Latin letter De Utilitate et prerogativis religionis. To another correspondent (possibly another lawyer, John Thorpe), he wrote the letter Ad Quemdam seculo renunciare volentem to discourage the fulfilment of an ill-considered vow made in illness to enter a religious order: ‘mihi videtur quod non convenit tibi ingressus religionis.’ (‘It seems to me that it is not appropriate for you to enter a religious order.’) To an unknown member of the gentry who desired to engage in contemplation but had family and responsibilities that prevented him from leaving the active world, Hilton wrote his English Epistle on the Mixed Life.

The Scale of Perfection presents itself similarly as a personal work of spiritual direction. The first book of the Scale, written for a woman who had recently been enclosed as an anchoress, comprises an introductory essay on the contemplative life and an introspective guide to the eradication of the impulse toward each of the seven deadly sins. In this programme of moral reformation, meditation on the humility and charity of Jesus, his incarnation, Passion, and death, plays an important role, as does the sensual experience (tears, warmth, and sweetness) of the love of God.