The Vocation of John Bale to the Bishopric

The preface.

Johan Bale to y ^e followers of Christ's Gospel.

FOr three consyderacyons chefely (dere bretheren) have I put fourth this treatise of my vocation to the church of Ossorye in Irelāde / of my hard chaūces therein / and of my fynall deliverance by the great goodness of God. The first of them is / for that mē should well know / that the office of a Christian bishop / is not to loiter in blasphemous papistry / but purely to preach y ^e Gospel of God / to his christened flock. The secōde is / that they should also understand / that continual persecucyons / and no bodily wealth / doeth follow the same most godly office / in them which truly executeth it. The third is / that they might behold how gracyously our most merciful God with his power waiteth upon them / and finally delyuereth them in most depe dangers.

These .3. things notable / concerning the elect members of God's congregation in this life / comprehendeth much matter in the scriptures of both testaments / with abundance of examples from Abel the first to Johan the euāgelyst / which was the last lyuer in the same. The examples also thereof are both lively and innumerable / in the first propagacion and longe contynuaunce of the christen church from his time to this our time / as the chronycles & histories most abundauntly specifieth.

First / as concerning the examples of holy scripture. Jesus the eternal son of the everlasting father / in the Godhede preached to Adam in paradyse terrestre / and constytute him so well an instructour as a father over his posteryte. He proved him also after he had sinned / by diverse afflyctyons / and finally promised both to him and to his / deliueraūce in the seed of the woman / which at the latter in his own person he lovingly {per}fourmed. Christ y ^e seyde son of God continually still taught / by the mouths of the fathers and prophets / till such time as he himself came in the flesh. Than was he above all others / of his heavenly father appointed / a universal doctor over all the world / and commanded to be heard / Math. iii. He followed his vocacyō in most ample wise / very cruelly was he of the clergy thā persecuted / and gloriously delivered in his resurrectyon from death. The members of his true church / the prophets and Apostles / were in case like as he their head was / first called / than afflicted / and gracyously always in the ende delivered. He that shall mark the laboriouse procedinges of Abraham / Joseph / & Moses / of David / Helyas / and Daniel / with the other old fathers and prophets / shall find it no less. He like wise that shall dyscretely search the doings of Peter / James and Johan / with the other of the Apostles and dysciples / shall well perceive the same.

Hieremye for the old law / Paul for the new law / and Johan Baptyst betwixt them both / were called from their mothers womb to that heavenly office of preaching. Hier. j. Luce. j. Gala. j. yea / they suffered extreme persecucyons under tyrants / and finally were delivered / in this life from parelouse dangers▪ and in death / frō sin / hell / and dāpnacyō. To rehearce the examples of the primatyue church / and of the ages following / concerning these matters / it would require much time / they are so many / and therefore at this present I omit thē. Thus ā I not alone in these 3. matters of vocaciō / persecucion / & deliueraūce / but have on my side an infinyte nonebre of examples. Which maketh me the more a great dele to rejoice / like as I wish them to do / which have in these troublouse days the like. Neither am I ashamed to tell my bretheren / what God hath most graciously done for me / nomor thā s. Paul was for himself in his own Epistles / and Luke in y ^e acts for saint Peter / though I be far unlike them. For I fare like the byrde which is delivered from the snare of the catcher. He flieth to a bough / and rejoiceth in his deliverance / and even so do I. In the which rejoice / I make not only myself merye / but also all my loving frindes. And as for my cruel enemies the papists / if I make them sorry in the rehearsal of my deliverance / I am not ill apayde thereof. For it is better (they say in Norfolk) that young lyddernes weep / than old men. I call them young and not old / for God is oldar than Satan / if age may be attributed to his eternyte / as Daniel saith it may / and Christ oldar than the devils vycar at Rome / their vngracyouse father.

As we are in most things contrary to these papists / so have we reioyces contrary to theirs. They rejoice in health / prosperite / riches and worldly pleasures for their bellies sake.

We in our infirmytees / afflictions / losses / and sorrowful crostes / for Christ's veritees sake. And thus may we well do / and boast of it also without offense / for so ded the forenamed S. Paul. 2. Cor. 11. and earnestly willed us to be his followers. Phil. 3. first he boasted of his vocation / and said. God sorted me out and appointed me from my mothers womb / and also he called me by his grace / to preach his lively gospel among the heathē / Gal. 1. what if I should in like case boast / y ^t he by his grace had also called me in this age / to preach the same Gospel to the Irishe heathens / w ^c never heard of it afore / to knowledge? I should not do other wise than the truth is. For I was put to it against my wille / by a most christen king / and of his own mere mocion only / without suit of friends / mede / labor / expensis / or any other sinistre mean else. By his Regal power and authority / which both were of God / Ro. 13. was I both allowed and confirmed / and not all vnioyfully received of y ^e people / which causeth me in conscience to judge my vocaciō just. Yet was not my rejoice so much in y ^e dignity thereof / as in doing for the time / the office therūto belonging. But now is it most of all in the leauinge of that bishopric / the Gospel being so unthankfully of the priests received / I so terribly of them persecuted / and my servants so cruelly slain.

Moreover saint Paul boasted much of his persecucions / & described them at large / concludinge thus in y ^e ēde / Very gladly (saith he) will I rejoice of my weakness / y ^t the strength of Christ may dwell in me. Therfor have I dilectaciō in infirmitees / in rebukes / in needs / in persecucion / and anguyshes / for Christ's sake. 2. Cor. 12. If I have like wise / felt a great meanie of the same afflictions / as I have done in deed / may not I also with him rejoice in them? Maye I not be glad / that I am in sorrows for the Gospel / like fashioned to him / & not pranked up in pōpe & pleasures / like y ^e wantō babes of this world? As at this day is lecherouse Weston / which is more practiced in the art of breche burninge / than all y ^e whores of the stues / to the great infamy of his virginall order. The truth of it is / that sense I toke that wayghtie office in hand / I have been sick to the very death / I have been grieved with the untowardness of ministers.

I have been in iournayes and labors / in iniuryes and losses / in peines and in penuries. I have been in strifes and contencions / in rebukynges and slaunderynges / and in great danger of poyseninges and killinges.

I have been in parell of the heathen / in parell of wicked priests / in parell of false iustyces / in parell of trayterouse tenauntes / in parell of cursed tyrants / in parell of cruel kearnes and galloglasses.

I have been in parell of the sea / in parell of shypwrack / in parell of throwynge over the boorde / in parell of false bretheren / in parell of curiouse searchers / in parell of pirates / robbers and murderers / and a great sort more.

Sanct Paul also rejoiced / that God had so miraculously delivered him from so many daungerouse ieopardyes / and spareth not so to report them. 2. Cor. 11. et. 12. Whie should I than shrink or be ashamed to do the like / having at God's hand the like miraculouse deliverance? Are they not left to us for example / that we should do the like whan we fele the like? Whatsoever things are writ̄ afore time (saith he) they are written for our learning / that we through pacyence and confort of the scriptures might have hope▪ Rom. xv. He in the city of Damascon / beīge laid wait for / by y ^e liefe tenaūt of Kinge Aretha / was lete down at a window in a basket / & so escaped his hands. Act. ix. I ī y ^e city of Dubline / beīge assaulted of papists / was cōuayed away in y ^e night in mariners apparel / & so escaped y ^e danger by God's help. Whan Paul's death was sought by certain Jews at Jerusalem / the upper captain there / commanded ii. under captains / ī the night to conveye hī to Cesarea with 200. souldyers .70. horsemen / and 200. spearemē / and so to to deliver him. Acts. 23. In lycke case / whā the priests with Barnabe Bolgar and other had sought my death at Holmes court / and had slain .v. of my howsholde servants by their hired kearnes / the good suffren of kylkennie with ā hundred horsemē / and 300. fotemē brought me thyder in the night and so delivered me that time.

As Paul against his will / was put into a ship of Adramitiū / coupled with other prisoners of Jewry / cōuaied fourh into Italy / and there safely delivered. Act. 27. and 28. So was I & my companyō Thomas against our willes taken into a ship of Zelāde / coupled with frenche prisoners / cōuayed forth into flanders / and so at the latter / safely there delivered. As their ship was caught betwixt Candia and Melita / and could not resyste the winds / so was ours betwixt Mylforde haven / and Waterforde. As they had an exceeding tempeste upon the sea / so had we likewise. As they were without hope of safeguard / so were we also.

As they feared Syrtes or daungerouse sandy places and rocks / so ded we. As they were almost famyshed and drowned / so were we. As God conforted them / so ded he us. As they were in conclusion cast into an ylande / so were we into S. Jews in Cornewale. As the people shown thē kyndnesse at Melita / so ded they us at the said S. Jews. As Paul gave thanks and brake bread among them / so ded we also. As the captain Julius courteously entreated him and gave him liberty to go unto his friends at Sidon / and to refresh him / so ded our captain Cornelis use us very gētilly with all favor and liberty / what though he had so currishely and cruelly entreated us afore. As Paul was stonge of a bytyng vyper and not hurt / so was I of that viperous Walter being most unjustly accused of treason afore y ^e iustices there / and yet through God's deliueraūce / not hurt. As he appealed to Caesar / so ded I to the trone of God.

As great dyspycyōs were among the Jews at Rome concerning Paul / so were there afterward among the shyppers in our return to their ship concerning us. As the souldyers gave counsel to kylle the prisoners / so were there some of our men that gave counsel to have drowned us for our money / and of some to have delivered us up to the counsayll of England / in hope of great rewards. As Publius gentilly received Paul / and by him was healed of all his dyseases / so ded mine host Lambert receive me also gentylly / and by me was delivered from his vain believe of purgatory / and of other Popysh peltryes. As the people reported Paul to be a murderer / and after changed their minds / and said he was a God / so our wicked mariners reported me to be a most heinous traitor / and yet afterward in my deliverance called me the servant of God. As he was for the hope of Israel led into captivity / and at last delivered / so was I also for the same captived / and in fine delivered into Germany. As the bretheren met Paul with rejoice at Appij forum / so ded they me in diverse partes of Duchelande / and lawded God for my so miraculouse deliverance. As he said that he had committed nothing against the law of his fathers / so say I also that I have in this act committed nothing against the Apostles and Prophets doctrine / I thanke my Lord God thereof. Thus had I in my troublous iournaye from Ireland into Germany all those chaūces ī a manner that S. Paul had in his iournaie of no less trouble / frō Ierusalē to Rome / saving that we lost not our ship by the way·

If Helias / that wetherdryuen rūnegate / remain now in a foren land in penury with the Sareptysh widow whyls Baals chatteringe chaplaynes and sorcerouse sacrifiers do dwell still at home florissing in prosperouse wealth / lecherouse ydelnesse / and lordely dignity / marvel not of it / for so hath he done afore. I speak not this for mine own part only / nether utterly exclude I myself / but I vttre it also for my exyled bretheren / of whom a great number is at this time in Germany / Denmarcke / and Geneva. The true church of God had never sumptuouse hospitalles any long time together but very simple cottages and caves / if ye mark the sacred histories and aūcyent cronicles. The plesaūt possession / and gorgeous dwelling places / have euermor remained to y ^e glorious Epicures / y ^e very enemies always of Christ's gospel. We are not now to learn how to take these our present afflictions in good part / for we know them afore hand / and have had them long time / as it were in an exercise. Nether are we all barayne of frindely receptacles / for the heavenly doctrynes sake / though our adversaries in England with violence throw stones at us / and seek utterly to destroy us. They are truly much deceived which thinketh the Christian church to be a political common wealth / as of Rome and Constantinople / maintained by human polyces / and not by the only word of God. Suche are they which now have the doings in these present controuersyes / and oppress the most manifest verite. God amende it.

I write not this rude treatise / for that I would receive praise thereof / but that I would God to have all the praise / which hath been a moste wonderful wurker therī. For I am but a clodde of corruption / felinge in myself as of myself / nothing else but sin and wickedness. I have done it also / to declare my most earnest rejoice ī the same God / which by grace hath called me by persecucion hath tried me / and of favor / beniuolence and mercy / hath most wonderfully delivered me. Lete him that rejoiceth (saith S. Paul) rejoice in the Lord. For he that praiseth him self / is not allowed / but he whō the Lord praiseth 2. Corint. 10. Moreover I have done it / for that my persecuted bretheren might in like manner have their rejoice in that heavenly Lord / which mightelye hath wrought in them their salvation / by his graciouse calling of them from wicked Papism to true christianyte / and now trieth their paciences by continual afflictions / and finally will deliver thē / either from tyrannouse molestacions / as he hath done me / either else into martyrdom for his truths sake. For god will be known by none other doctrine / than he hath sent hither by his son / whom he so earnestly commanded to be heard. He will also be worshipped by those rules onlie / whom he hath to his church proponed by his prophets and apostles. I besiche that everlasting God for his dere sonnes sake / ī the holy Ghost to rule us / and always to augmēt and preserve his true church confessing his only name. Amen.

I called upon the Lord in my trouble / and the Lord heard me at large. The Lord is my helper / I will not fear what man doeth unto me. Psal. 118.

Of Johan Bale tothe byshoprycke of Ossorye in Irelāde his hard chaūces therein / and final deliverance.

IN the old and new testament is it not expressed / that any just or faithful man ever yet toke upon him / the adminystracyon of the heavenly doctrine / in teaching the true worshippynges of God / and in persuadynge mē to repentance or amendment of their former life / without the vocation and special election of God. No truly / Balaam y ^e notable sothsayer could neither curse nor yet bless / without God's permission / as he apertly confessed / Nū. 22. And to begīne with the formest examples. Adam our first progenitour / which had received most helthsome instructiōs of God's eternal sonne in paradyse / and the fathers him succedīng in the righteous line before y ^e general flood / never had taken that high office vpō them / had not he therūto both called thē / & allowed them. Noah God's true servant / at his most graciouse appoītemēt also / by the space of an C. years & xx. earnestly preached to the people of that age / exhortīg them to cease / from y ^e abohminacions thā used / as thei would avoid the universal destrucciō w ^c followed. After y ^e said flood / by virtue of the self same precept and autoryte of God / Noah taught the people / than grown to ā increase again / by longe continuaūce. So ded Melchizedek ī Salem, Job in Arabia. Abraham in Chaldee, Jacob in Mesopotamy, and Joseph in Egypt, Helias with the other prophets in Israel, Jonah in Ninyue, Daniel in Babylon, Zerubbabel in Persie, and Johan Baptist in Iewrye. Mark the opē places of y ^e scripture / concerning Vocacion & Election.

And as towchyng Christ in our manhode / he was called of God his eternal father / as was Aaron / to be our everlasting priest / according to the order of Melchizedek. Hebre. 7. He was also by his own godly mouthe / to y ^e world declared / that well beloved sonne of his / in whom he was most highly both pleased & pacifyed. Finally he was by his most heavenly ordinance / constituted our universal doctor / and of him commanded / as a most perfight maistre / of all mē to be most diligently heard & obeyed. From the ship / frō y ^e costomehowse / & frō other homily ministerys / called he / not y ^e stought / sturdye / & heady sort of mē / but y ^e lowly hearted / simple / & beggarly ydiotes. Them he elected most gracyously / & they not him / to be the ministers of his holy Gospel / Iohā. 15. Them chose he out frō y ^e world / to give knowledge of salvation to his people / for y ^e remissiō of their sins. Mat. 10. Luce. 2. Those (saith S. Paul) whom y ^e Lord appointed before / those hath he also called / and those whom he hath called / those hath he likewise justified / or made mete for that heavenly office. Rō. 8. For how should they have preached (saith he) unless they had ben sent. Rom. 10. Peter was to him ā elect apostle / affirmīge his doctrine to be y ^e wurdes of eternal life / Ioā 6. John was his dearly beloved disciple / & became a most mighty thūderer out of the same. Act. 4. Paul was a peculiar chosen vessel unto him / to manifest his name before y ^e Gentyles / Kynges and children of Israel. Act. 9.

The Idolatour / the tyrant / and the whoremōgar / are no mete ministers for him / though they be never so gorgyously mytered / coped / and typpeted / or never so fynely forced / pylyoned / and scarletted. The deceitful prophets (saith y ^e Lord) made spedy haste / but I appointed thē not. They rāne a great pace / but I sent thē not. They prophesied fast / but not out of my spret. Hier. 23. To y ^e wicked doar y ^e Lord hath spoken it (saith David) why doest thu so vniusttly presume to talk of my righteousnesses / and with thy polluted mouthe / of my eternal testament / why makest thu relacion? Psal. 50. After y ^e Apostles immediately succeeded in y ^e primative church / Tymotheus, Ignatius, Polycarpus, Irenus paphnutius, Athanasius, Lactantius, and other true ministers of the Gospel. These loytered not in the vineyard of the lord / as our idle masmongers do / but faithfully they labored in sekinge God's glory / and the souls health of the people. But whan great Constantine the Emprour had given peace to the Christian church / that all persecucion ceased / thā came in ceremony vpō ceremony / & none ende was of thē. Every year entered one poison or other / as man's fyckle nature in this frail life / is never w ^t out vice.

So that s. Augustine in his time very much lamented / that so many superstitions were thā crept in / confessinge the servitude of the Christian church to be more grievous ī those days / than it was to the people under Moses. And so much the more he lamented the case / that being but one man / he could not reform it / neither was he able in every pointe to resist that evil / being with heretykes so sore tossed on every side. But what would he have said if he had seen the abhominable ydolatries of our time w ^t out nonebre? specially the worshiping of bread and of wyne / which are only the servants of our bellies / and corrupt in the same / yea / whan they are at the best & holiest. For whan they have done their office / being sacraments of Christ's body and blood / that is to say / preached the lords death till he come / and declared us of many members to be one mystical body in Christ / they ascend not into heaven / but being eaten and digested / they are immediately resolved into corruption. Yea / Christ saith / that they descend down into the belly / & are cast out into the draught / Math. 15. which declareth them unmeet to be worshipped.

This write I / not in vnreuerencinge the sacrament / but in detestacion of the abhominable ydolatries / therein most bestially committed.

And breuely to say somewhat of the Christian church of our realm / in those days called Britain / and now named England / what original it had and from whens / what continuance / what darkeninges / what decays / what fall / and what raise again.

To fatche this thing from the first foundaciō / for that land / like as for other lands. By the eternal son of God in Paradyse / received Adam the first {pro}mise of saluaciō in the womans seed. This acknowledged Abel in his first offerīge up of the firstlinges of his flock & fat of the same being so instructed by y ^e religious father of his Gene. 4. By faith ī his plētuouse sacrifice (saith s. Paul) obtained Abel / witness y ^t he was righteous / Heb. 11. This w ^t the right inuocacion of the name of God taught by Seth and Enos / was continued by the chosen of y ^e line / to remain still in remembrance to their posteritees / & was renewed after the flood by righteous Noah / Gene. 8. To S. Paul also in reuelacion / was this mystery shown / that the Gentiles likewise were partakers of the promise / Ephe. 3. Wherunto S. Johan saith / y ^t the lābe was slain frō the worlds begīninge / Apo. 13. y ^t is to say / in {pro}mise / in faith / & in mystery of their sacrifices. Applied is it also to those Gentiles / in the said Reuelaciō of S. Johan (who now among other includeth our lande) y ^t they frō y ^t time have cried w ^t a loud voice / seeing. Helthe be to him y ^t sitteth upon the seat of our God / & unto the lābe. Apo. 7. And therupō Gildas in Exeidio Britānigh, concludeth / y ^t the inhabitours of our realm / have always had knowledge of God / almost sense y ^e worlds begīnīge.

This rule of sacrifice and inuocacion / held Japheth after the flood also / the father of Europa cōtaininge our lande among others / according to the prayer of his righteous father Noah / y ^t he might dwelle in the tētes of Sem. Gene. 9. or in faith of the promised seed w ^c is Christ. Gala. 3. So perfect was Melchizedek or the forenamed Sem / a father than of y ^e Gentiles / for that his kinrede (saith Paul) is not reckoned among the tribes / y ^t he toke tithes of Abraham / & blessed him that had y ^e promises. Hebre. 7. et Gene. 14. For so much as God / (saith Luther vpō Genesis) established y ^e kingedomes of y ^e Ilādes / whā they were divided / by y ^e chosen fathers / it seemeth well y ^t they held his true worshippīges / received a fore of thē. To these holy fathers in the Gentilite for that realm / by course succeeded / as Berosus, Plini{us}, Strabo, Caesar, & other authors writeth, the Samothees, Sarronites, Druydes, Bardes, Sybylles, Eubages or Vates, Flamines, & such other / till the cōmīge of Jesus God's son in y ^e flesh. Which all acknowledged but one God / what though it were by the diuersite of rites & doctrines. This have I writ̄ here / to declare what church was ī our land afore Christ's cōmīge. I speak nothing of thē w ^c followed strange worshippynges or manifest ydolatryes of the heathen / as the papists do in this age. If it be reasoned / how they could hear? S. Paul answereth it out of David / y ^t the heavens preached to them / all the world hearing it / if none had done it else / Rom. 10. et Psal. 19. beside the law of nature / which was also their leader.

In the .63. year after Christ's incarnacion / to resort to my purpose / was Joseph an Hebrew and disparsed disciple thydre sent with his companyons / by Philipp the apostle than preaching in France / as Freculphus in y ^e secōde part of his Chronycle / & Isidorus also de vita & obitu sanctorū patrū, rehearseth. He published there among them / that Gospel of salvation / which Christ first of all / & afterwards his Apostles had taught at Jerusalem / Vntruly therefore are we reported of the Italyane writers / and of the subtylle deuysers of sāctes legendes / that we should have our first faith from Rome / and our christen doctrine / from their vnchristen bishops. From the school of Christ himself / have we received the documentes of our faith. From Jerusalem / & not from Rome / whom both Peter & also Christ hath called Babylō / for that she so aptely thereunto agreeth ī ministryng cōfusiō to the world. And this well accordeth with the wurdes of y ^e prophet / y ^t the law of y ^e Gospel should come frō Zion / & the word of God frō Jerusalem. Esa. 2. S. Paul also which had been christenly familiar at Rome / with Claudia Rufina a Britain borne / and with Aulus pudens her husband / of whom he maketh mention .2. Timoth. 4. should seme in his own person to have preached in that nation of ours / by this sainge of his in the same epistle and chapter. The lord assisted me and strengthened me at my first answeringe / that by me the preaching should be fulfilled to the uttermost / and that all the Gentiles should hear. That clause / all the Gentiles / includeth somewhat cōcernīge y ^e Britain's / if they were thā Gentiles / & in y ^e west part of y ^e world / as we cā say none other of thē.

Bartholomeus Tridētin{us} & Petrus Calo, reporteth in their books of y ^e lives of sanctes / y ^t Timothy S. Paul's disciple / by his preachīge in Britain / converted king Lucius & him baptized / in cōfirmaciō of y ^t is said afore. Nurrished / brought up / & continued was this British church in y ^e doctrine of faith / w ^t out mennes traditions / by y ^e wurthie doctors of y ^t age / Eluanus, Meduinus, Melaniu{us}, Amphibal{us}, & such other like / till y ^e time of Diocleciane y ^e tirānouse Emproure. Which by his wicked ministers / made havoc of the Christian flock there / as testifieth Gildas. Though the kings of Britain in y ^t age / Aruiragus, Marius, Coillus, Lucius, and Seuerus, with others / were not all Christened / yet were they no cruel persecutors of Christ's congregation / y ^t we read of. In the general quyetnesse provided to y ^e church by the forenamed Constantine, Arius, Pelagius, Leporius, and one Tymothe, partly by subtle allegories / and partly by open heresies greatly obscured the glory thereof. Anon after there followed a certē kind of monkery / with an heap of ceremonies / but yet w ^t out blasphemous superstitions / till Antichrist had fashioned them to his execrable use. In that age were Fastidius, Ninianus, Patritius, Bachiarius, Dubricius, Cōgellus, Kentigernus, Iltutus, David, Daniel, Sampson, Eluodugus, Asaphus, Gildas, Beulanus, Elbodus, Dionotus, Samuel, Nennius, & a great sort more / by Christ̄ doctrine the upholders of the British church / y ^e cyuyle governors for y ^e time being dissolute & careless / as y ^e forseyd Gildas very sharply, doth lay it to their charge.

Consequently whā the Barbarouse nations had subdued the Christian regions of Europa / specially here ī this realm / y ^e heathenish Saxōs the Christian Britain's / for not obeyenge and following God's word y ^e time faithfully preached. Than entered in another swarm of monks / much wurse thā the other. For they had their beginnīge of those solitary bretheren / which had fled to the wilderness in the time of persecucion. These like laysye locusts sprāge fourth of the pytt bottomless. They served God in liberty / and were fed of their own true labors. These served Antichrist in bondage / and devoured up the labors of other. They were somewhat ceremoniouse / but these altogether su{per}sticiouse. Of this latter swarm / after the first enteraunce of Augustine the Romish monk, was Egbert, Egwine, Boniface, Wilfride, Dūstane, Oswolde, Lāfranck, Anselm, & such other w ^t out nonebre / by whō y ^e sincere faith of the English church decayed. These were bitter stīgars ī Antichrists cause / yea / terrible accusers & supressers of kings & of other christē magistrates. These caused y ^e sūne / w ^c is y ^e clear verite of y ^e lord / to appear as sack clothe made of hear / Apo. 6. placinge in the room thereof / their own fantastical doctrines / vain traditions / & supersticiouse ordinances. So that they made God's heavenly word / to seme to the people / dark / rough / hard / & unpleasant / for their idle bellies sake.

Yet deny I it not / but some godly men were among them in those days. As Beda, Johan of Beuerle, Alcuinus, Neotus, Hucarius, Serlo, Achardus, Ealredus, Alexander Neckam, Nigellus, Seuallus, & such other. Which though they thā erred ī many things / yet was not their error of obstinacy and malice. Than followed the school doctors with the .iv. ordres of frires / very wicked kinds of men / and they with their sophistical sorceryes / poysened up altogether / clearly ouerthrowīge the Christian church / and setting up in her place the most filthy sinagoge of Satan. In that malignaunt assembly / were false wurshippinges commanded for God's holy service / and monstruouse buggery for a professed virginite / in our consecrate clergy admitted. Thus were y ^e people nus • ed up frō their yowth in calling upon dead mē and images / the preastes and religious in the mean time occupied / in all beastly wurkes of y ^e flesh. I have the registre of y ^e visitaciōs of y ^e cloisters of England / & therefore I know it to their cōfusiō. The monks afore their time / ded no more but mixte the Christ̄ religion w ^t the paganes superstitions / but these fowl lecherouse locusts have bānished the Christian religion altogether. They have taken upon them a power by vertu of trāsubstanciacion / far above God's power / as of corruptible creatures to make God's to be wurshipped / bearinge them a broad with Persicall pōpes as it were / in their gaddīge & gaglinge processions / fit for wantō gossippes to show their selves in their holy day apparelinges.

Yet were there always some in that miste of palpable darkness / y ^t smelled out their mischefes / & in part maintened the sincere doctrine / as Matthew parys / Oclyf / Wickleff / Thorpe / White / Purueye / Pateshulle / Paine / Gower / Chaucer / Gascoigne / Iue / & now in our time Williā Tindale / Iohā frith / Bilneye / Barns Lambert / & a great sort more. Now truly in this latter age and ende of the world God showing great mercy to his elected heritage / hath gathered them together from the parels of perdition / by the voice of his holy Gospel. Yea / like as by Hieremie the prophet before y ^e exile into Babylon / by Johan Baptist / Christ / & his Apostles before the destructiō of Hierusalē / and by the Apostles followers before the diuisiō and first ruyne and y ^e Romish empire / he called his disparsed rēnaunt / so doth he now again before his general coming to judgment / all together his church of true believers / by the godly preachers of this age. That wonderful wurke of God / that noble prince Kynge Henry the .8. within this realm by his royal power assysted / after that he had given an overthrow to the great Golias of Rome / our most godly souerayne Kynge Edward the .6. for his time perfourmyng the same.

The first with noble Kynge David / prepared this building of the Lord / but this other with the wise Kynge Solomon / to his power made all things very perfect. And though now after his death / a Hieroboam parauenture is risen / which will set up the golden calves in Samaria / or maintain the popish religyon again / in Ymages / Aulters / idle ceremonies / and blasphemous superstitions. Yet doubt I it not / but a faytfull Asa / shall follow / either else a Jehoshaphat / ā Hezekiah / or a mighty Josiah / which will dissolve those ydolatryes again. And as concerning the fornamed Kynge Edward / I will recite here / what his wurthinesse ded for me his most vnwurthie subject / y ^t I should among others be a collectour also a caller together of y ^e christē flock ī this age.

Upon the .15. day of August / in y ^e year from Christ's incarnacion .1552. being y ^e first day of my deliueraūce / as God would / from a mortal ague / which had hold me longe afore. In rejoice that his Majesty was come ī progress to Southampton / which was .5. mile from my personage of Bishops stock / within the same coūtie. I toke my horse about .10 of y ^e clock / for very weakness scant able to sytt him / & so came thydre. Betwixt .2. & .3. of the clock y ^e same day / I drew towards the place where as his Majesty was / and stood in the open strete right against the gallerye. Anon my frinde / Johan fylpot a gentylman / & one of his preuie chambre / called unto him .2. more of his companyōs / which in moving their heads towards me / shown me most frindely coūtenaūces. By one of these .3. the Kynge having information that I was there in y ^e strete / he marueled thereof / for so much as it had been told him a little afore / that I was both dead & buried. With y ^t his grace came to the wyndowe / and earnestly beheld me a poor weak creature / as though he had had upon me so simple a subject / ā earnest regard / or rather a very fatherly care.

In y ^e same very instaunt / as I have been sense y ^e time credibli infourmed / his Grace called unto hī / y ^e lords of his most honorable counsel /

In the same very instaunt / as I have been sense that time credibly infourmed / his grace called unto him / the lords of his most honorable counsel / so many as were than present / willing them to appoint me to the bishopric of Ossorie in Ireland. Wherunto they all agreeably consentinge / commanded the letters of my first calling thereunto / by and by to be writ̄ and sent me. The next day following / which was the xvj. day of August / the letter being writ̄ by B. Hamptone / a clarke of the counsel / they very favorably subscribed to y ^e same / in manner as hereafter followeth.

And to conclude / thus was I called / in a manner from death / to this office without my expectacion or yet knowledge thereof. And thus have ye my vocaciō to the bishopric of Ossorie in Ireland. I pass over my earnest refusal thereof / a month after that / in the kings majesties return to Winchestre / where as I alleged (as I than thought) my lawful impedimentes / of poverty / age / and syckenesse / within the bishops house there / but they were not accepted. Than resorted I to the court at London within .vi. wekes after / according to the tenure of the forseyd letter / and within vi. days had althinges performed perteininge to my election and full confirmation / freely without any manner of charges or expenses / whereof I much marueled.

On the .xix. day of decembre / I toke my iourneye from Bishops Stoke with my books and stuff towards Bristow / where as I tarried. xxvj. days for passage / and diverse times preached in that worshipful city at the instaūt desire of the cytiezens. Upon the .xxj. day of January / we entered into y ^e ship / I / my wife / & one servant. And being but .ii. nyghtes and .ii. days vpō the sea / we arryued most prosperously at Waterforde / ī the coldest time of the year / so merciful was the Lord unto us.

In beholdynge the face and order of that city / I see many abominable ydolatryes maȳteined by y ^e Epicurysh priests / for their wicked bellies sake. The Communion or Supper of the Lord / was there altogether used like a popish mass / with the old apysh toys of Antichrist / in bowynges and beckynges / knelinges and knockinges / the Lord's death after. S. Paul's doctrine / neither preached nor yet spoken of. There wawled they over y ^e dead / with prodigyouse howlynges and patterynges / as though their souls had not been quyeted in Christ and redeemed by his passion / but that they must come after and help at a pinche with Requiem Eternam / to deliver them out of hell by their sorrowful sorceryes. Whā I had beholden these heathnysh behauers / I said unto a Senator of that city / that I well perceived / that Christ had there no Bishop / neither yet the Kynges Majesty of England / any faithful officer of y ^e mayer / ī suffering so horrible blasphemies. The next day after / I rode towards Dublyne / & rested y ^e night folowīge in a town called Knocktouer / in y ^e house of master Adam walshe / my general cōmissarye for the whole dyocese of Ossorie.

At supper the parish pressed / called Syr Philypp / was very serviceable and in familyar talk described unto me y ^e house of the white fryres which sūtime was in that town cōcludīge in the ende / y ^t the last prior thereof called Wyllyam / was his natural father. I axed him / if y ^t were in marriage? He made me answer / No. For that was (he said) against his profession. Than counseled I him / that he never should boast of it more. Whie (saith he) it is ā honor in this lande / to have a spiritual man / as a bishop / ā Abbot / a Mōke / a Fryre / or a Prest to father. With y ^t I greatly marueled / not so much of his unshamefast talk / as I ded y ^t adultery forbid̄ of God / & of all honest men detested / should there have both praise & preferremēt / thīking ī process / for my part / to refourme it. I came at y ^e last to Dubline / where as I found my cōpanyō maistre Hugh Goodaker y ^e Archebishop of Armach elected / & mi old frynde / M. David Coper {per}son of calā. Much of y ^e people ded greatly rejoice of our cōmīge thidre / thinkīge by our preachīges / y ^e popes su{per}stiōs would diminish & the true Christ̄ religiō increace.

Upon the purificacion day of our ladye / the lord chancellor of Ireland / sir Thomas Cusake / our special good lord and earnest ayder in all our procedinges / appointed us to be invested or consecrated / as they call it / bi George the archebishop of Dublyne / Thomas the bishop of Kyldare / & Urbane y ^e bishop of Duno assisinge him. I will not here describe at large the subtle cōueyaūce of that great Epicure y ^e archebishop / how he went about to diffarre the day of our consecracion / that he might by that means have prevented me / in taking up the proxyes of my bishopric to his own glottonouse use / and in so depriuinge me of more thā half my living for that year. As we were coming fourth / to have recciued the imposicion of hands / according to the ceremonye / Thomas Lockwode (Blockheade he might well be called) the dean of the cathedral church there / desired the lord chaūcellour very instauntly / y ^t he would in no wise permyt y ^e obseruacion to be done after y ^e boke of consecratinge bishops / w ^c was last set fourth in England by act of parlement / alleginge y ^t it would be both an occasiō of tumulte / and also that it was not as yet consented to by act of their parlemēt in Ireland. For why / he much feared the new changed order of the communion therein / to hindre his kychin and belly. The lord chauncellour proponed this matter unto us. The archebisshop consented thereunto / so ded the other .ii. bishops. Maistre Goodaker would gladly it might have been otherwise / but he would not at that time contend there with them.

Whan I see none other way / I stepped fourth / and said. If England and Ireland be under one king / they are both bound to y ^e obedience of one law under him. And as for us / we came hither as true subjects of his / sworn to obey that ordinance. It was but a bisshopprick (I said) that I came thydre to receive that day. Which I could be better contented to tread under my foot there / than to break frō that promise or oath y ^t I had made. I bad them in the ende / set all their hearts at rest / for came I ones to the church of Ossorie / I would execute nothing for my part there / •• accordīge to y ^e rules of y ^e latter boke. With 〈◊〉 lord chaūcellour right honourably cōmaū •••• y ^e ceremony to be done after y ^e boke. Thā 〈…〉 asseheaded dean a way more thā halfecōf 〈…〉 Neither followed there any tumulte among the people / but every man saving the priests / was well contented. Than went the archebishop about that obseruacion / very vnsauerly and as one not much exercised in that kind of doing / specially in the administracion of the lords holy supper. In the ende the lord chauncellour made to us and to our friends / a most friendly diner / to save us frō excedinge charges / which otherwise we had been at that day.

Within .ii. days after was I sick again / so eagerly / that no man thought I should have lived / which malladie held me till after Eastre. Yet in the mean time / I found a way to be brought to kylkennie / where as I preached every sondaye & holy day in lent / till the sondaye after Eastre was fully past / never felinge any manner of grefe of my syckenesse / for the time I was in the pulpet. Wherat many men / and myself also greatly merualed. Neither had I for all y ^e time space / any mind to call for any temporal profits / which was afterwards to my no small hynderaunce. From that day of our consecraciō / I traded w ^t myself / by all possybylyte to set fourth that doctrine / which God charged his church with / ever sense y ^e beginning. And thought therw ^t in my mind also / y ^t I had rather that Aethna ded swallow me up / thā to maȳteine those ways in religion / which might corrupt the same. For my daily desire is / in y ^e euerlastīge school / to behold the eternal son of God / both here and after this life. And not only to see the fathers / prophets and Apostles therī / but also for love of y ^e doctrine / to enjoy their blessid feliship hereafter. And so much the rather I traded thus with myself / y ^t I see than the kings majesty / y ^e arhebishopp of Canterbury / and the honorable lords of y ^e counsel / so feruētly beent y ^e way / as to seek y ^e people's health in y ^e same. I thought it therupō no less thā my bound duty / to show myself faithful / studiouse / & diligent in y ^t so chargefull a functiō.

My first {pro}cedinges in y ^t doīge / were these. I earnestly exhorted y ^e people to reap̄taūce for sin / & required thē to give credit to y ^e Gospel of salvation. To acknowledge & believe y ^t there was but one God / & him alone w ^t out any other / sincerely to worship. To confess one Christ for an onlie saver & redeemer / & to trust ī none other mannis prayers / merits / nor yet deseruīges / but in his alone / for saluaciō I treated at large both of y ^e heavenly & political state of y ^e christē church / & helpars I found none among my prebēdaries & clergy / but adversaries a great nonebre. I preached the Gospel of y ^e knowledge & right inuocacion of God / I mayntened the political order by doctrine / & moved the cōmen's always to obey their magistrates. But whā I ones sought to distroye the ydolatries / & dissolve the hypocrites yockes / than followed angers / slaūders / cōspiricyes / & in the ende the slaughter of men, Much a do I had with the priests / for y ^t I had said among other / y ^t the white God's of their makīge / such as they offered to the people to be worshipped / were no God's but ydoles / and that their prayers for the dead procured no redēpciō to the solwes departed / Redempcion of souls being only in Christ / of Christ / & by Christ. I added y ^t their office by Christ's straight commandment / was chifely to preach / and instruct the people in the doctrine and ways of God / and not to occupy so much of the time in chauntynge / pypynge / and singing.

Muche were the priests offended also / for y ^t I had ī my preachīges / willed thē to have wives of their own / & to leave the unshamefast occupienge / of other mennes wives / daughters / and servants. But hear what answere they made me always / yea y ^e most viciouse mē among thē. What should we marry (said they) for half a year / & so loose our livings. Think ye not y ^t these men were ghostly inspired? either yet had knowledge of some secrete mischefe wurkīge in England? I for my part have not a little sense y ^t time marueled / whā it hath fallen to my remembrance. Well y ^e truth is / I could never yet by any Godly or honest persuasion / bring any of thē to marriage / neither yet cause them which were known for vnshamfast whorekepers / to leave that filthy & abominable occupyenge what though I most earnestly labored it. But sense that time I have considered by the iugement of the scriptures / that the impenytent ydolatour must therewith be also a fylthie adulterer or most detestable sodomite. It is his just plage. Rom. 1. We cannot stop it. Lyke wise the dissemblinge hypocrite / in cōtemning God's truth / must needs follow errors and lies in the doctrine of devils. 1. Timot. 4. to have in y ^e ende the greatter confusion. Lete him y ^t is wicked (saith y ^e Angel to S. Johan) become more wicked / and he that is filthy / become more filthy / that his damnation may be the depar / & his sorrows extremer. Apoca. 22.

The lord therefore of his mercy / send discipline w ^t doctrine / into his church. For doctrine w ^t out discipline & restraint of vices / maketh dissolute hearers. And on the other side / discipline without doctrine / maketh either hypocrites / or else desperate doars. I have not written this in disprayse of all y ^e priests of Kylkēnye or there about. For my hope is y ^t some of them by this time are fallen to repentance / though they be not many. An other thing was there / y ^t much had dyspleased the prebendaryes and other priests. I had earnestly / ever sense my first coming / required them to observe and follow y ^e only boke of common prayer / which the king & his counsel had that year put fourth by act of parlement. But that would they at no hand obey / allegynge for their vain and idle excuse / the lewd example of the archebysshop of dublyne / which was always flacke in things perteyninge to God's glory / allegīge also the want of books / and that their own iustices and lawyers had not yet cōscented thereunto. As though it had been lawful for their iustices to have denied y ^e same / or as though they had rather have hanged vpō thē / than upon the kings authority and commandment of his counsel.

In the week after Eastre / whan I had ones preached .xii. sermons among thē / and established the people / as I thought / in the doctrine of repentance and necessary believe of the Gospel in the true worshippings of one God our eternal father & no more / and in y ^e hope of one redeemer Jesus Christ and no more. I departed from Kylkēnigh to ā other place of mine .v. miles of / called Holmes court / where as / I remained till the assension day. In the mean time came sorrowful news unto me that M. Hugh Goodacker the Archebishop of Armach / that godly preacher and virtuouse learned mā / was poysened at Dubline / by procurement of certain priests of his diocese / for preaching God's verite & rebukinge their common vices. And letters by & by were directed unto me / by my special frindes from thens / to be ware of the like in my diocese of Ossorie / which made me parauēture more circūspect thā I should have been. Vpō y ^e assenciō day I preached agaī at Kilkennie likewise on Trinite sondaye / & on S. Peters day at midsomer than following.

On the xxv day of July / y ^e priests were as plesauntly disposed as might be / and went by heaps from tauerne to tauerne / to seek the best Rob dauie and aqua vite / which are their special drinks there. Thei cawsed all their cups to be filled in / with Gaudeamus in dolio / the mystery thereof onlie known to them / and at that time to none other else.

Which was that Kynge Edward was dead / and that they were ī hope to have up their maskynge masses again. As we have in S. John's Reuelaciō that they which dwell on the yearth (as do our earthly minded masmongers) should rejoice and be glad / whan God's true witnesses were ones taken away / and should send gifts one to another for gladness / because they rebuked them of their wicked doings / Apca. xi. For ye must consydre that the priests are commonly the first that receive such news. The next day following / a very wicked justice called Thomas Hothe / with the lord Moūtgarret / resorted to the Cathedral church / requyrynge to have a Communiō / in the honor of S. Anne. Mark the blasphemous blindness and willful obstinacy of this beastly papist. The priests made him answer / that I had forbydden them that celebracion / saving only upon the sondayes. As I had in deed / for the abominable ydolatries that I had seen therein. I discharge you (saith he) of obedience to your Bishop in this point / & cōmaūde yow to do as ye have done heretofore / which was to make of Christ's holy cōmuniō an ydolatrouse mass / & to suffer it to serve for y ^e dead / clean contrary to the Christian use of the same.

Thus was the wicked justice / not only a vyolatour of Christ's institution / but also a contempner of his princes earnest commandment / and a prouoker of the people by his vngraciouse example to do the like. Thys could he do with other mischefes more / by his longe being there by a whole months space / but for murders / theftes / ydolatryes / and abhominable whoredoms / wherewith all that nation habūdeath / for that time he sought no redress neither appointed any correction. The priests thus rejoicing y ^t the Kinge was dead / & y ^t they had been that day confirmed in their supersticiouse obstinacy / resorted to the forseyd false justice the same night at supper / to gratifye him with Rob Dauye and Aqua vite / for that he had been so friendly unto them / & that he might still continue in the same. The next day after was the Lady Jane Gylforde proclaimed their Queen / with solemnite of processions / bonefyres / and banquettes / the said justice / as I was infourmed / sore blamynge me for my absence that day / for in deed I much doubted that matter.

So sone as it was there rumoured abroad y ^t y ^e Kynge was departed frō this life / y ^e ruffianes of y ^e wild nacyon / not only rebelled against the English captains / as their lewd custom in such changes hath been always / chefely no English deputye being within the lande / but also they conspired into the very deaths of so many English men and women / as were left therein alive. Myndinge / as they than stoughtly boasted it / to have set up a king of their own. And to cause their wild people to bear y ^e more hate to our naciō / very subtly but yet falsely / they caused it to be noised over all / that the young Earl of Ormonde / and Barnabe the barn of upper Ossories son / were both slain in the court at London. Upon this wylye practice of mischief / they raged without order in all places / and assaulted the English fortes everywhere.

And at one of them by a subtle trayne / they gote out .ix. of our men and slew them. On the .xiii. day of August / a gentill woman / the wife of Matthew king / having a castle not far of / her husband than being at London / fleddde with her family and goods in cartes towards the forseid kilkennye / and in the high way was spoiled of all / to her very petycote / by the kearnes & galoglasses of the forenamed barn of upper Ossorie Mihell patricke and of y ^e lord Mountgarret / which ought rather to have defended her. In this outrage had she after longe cōflicte w ^t those enemies .iv. of her company slain, besides other mischefes more.

On the .xx. day of August / was the ladye marry with us at kylkennye proclaimed Queen of England / France and Ireland / with the greatest solempnyte that there could be deuysed / of processions / musters and disgysinges / all the noble captaynes and gentilmē there about being present. What a do I had that day with the prebendaryes and priests abought wearinge the cope / croser / and myter in procession / it were to much to write.

I told them earnestly / whan they would have compelled me thereunto / that I was not Moses minister but Christ's / I desired them that they would not compel me to his denial / which is (S. Paul saith) in y ^e repetinge of Moses sacraments & ceremonial sohaddowes Gal. v. w ^t y ^t I toke Christ's testament in my hand / & went to y ^e market cross / y ^e people in great nonebre following. There toke I the .xiii. chap. of S. Paul to y ^e Roma. declarīge to thē breuely / what y ^e authority was of y ^e worldly powers & magistrates what reverence & obedience were due to y ^e same. In y ^e mean time had the prelates goten .ii. disgysed priests / one to bear the myter afore me / and another the croser / making .iii. procession pageauntes of one. The young men in the forenone played a Tragedye of God's promises in the old law at the market cross / with organe plainges and songs very aptely. In the after none again they played a Commedie of sanct Johan Baptists preachings / of Christ's baptisynge and of his tēptacion in the wilderness / to the small contentacion of the priests and other papists there.

On y ^e thursdaye next following / which was S. Bartylmewes day / I preached again among them / because the prebendaryes and other priests there / had made their boasts / that I should be compelled to recante all that I had preached afore. And as I was entered into the pulpet / I toke this sainge of S. Paul for my thema. Non erubesco Euangelium. Virtus enim Dei est, in salutem omni credenti, &c. I am not ashamed of the Gospel. And why? For it is the power of God into salvation / to all them that believe it. Rom. 1. Than declared I unto thē / all y ^t I had taught there sense my first coming thydre / the justice both beīge present. As y ^t our God was but one God / & ought alone to be be worshipped. And y ^t our Christ but was one Christ / & ought alone to be trusted to for redēpciō of sin. I earnestly charged y ^e people / to rest upon these ii. principles firmly / as upon the chief stays of their salvation / as they would answer it at the dredefull day / and not to suffer themselves to be led by a contrariouse doctrine of deceitful teachers / into any other believe from thens fourth. Item concerning y ^e sacrament of Christ's body and blood / wherī they had been most {pro}digiously abused / through the vnsaciable covetousness of the priests. I required them very reverently to take it / as a sacrament only of Christ's death / whereby we are redeemed and made innocent menbres of his mystical body / and not to worship it as their God / as they had done / to the utter derogacion of his heavenly honor. And as I came in the Vsuall prayer / to remembrance of the dead. I willed thē to give hearty thanks to God / for their redempciō in Christ / largely declaringe y ^t the souls of y ^e righteous were in y ^e hand of his mercy without cruel torment. Sap. 3. & y ^t the priests with all their masses & funeral exequies / could nothing add to their redēpciō / if they had been otherwise bestowed.

After the prayer / I toke y ^e Gospel of y ^e day. Beati oculi qui vident quae vos videtis, &c. Luce. 10. Wherī I was occasioned to speak of certē degrees of mē / as of kings / {pro}phetes / lawyers / iusticiaryes / & so fourth. As y ^t the kings were desierouse to see Christ / the {pro}phetes to enbrace hī / y ^e swellinge lawyers to rise up against him and to tempt him / and the ambiciouse iusticiaries to toye with him and to mock him. The wounded mā to have need of him / the priest to show no compassion / the leuite to ministre no mercy / and last of all the contēptuouse Samaritaine to exercise all the offices of pitye / love / beniuolence / and liberal mercy / upon the same wounded creature.

As to resort to him / favorably to see hī / with layser to behold him / to have compassion on him / to bind up his wounds / to pour in oil and wyne / to set him on his own beast / to bring him to a place of confort / finaly to socour him and to pay his whole charges. All these matters I declared there at large / which were now to much to repeat here again. The same day I dined w ^t y ^e mayer of y ^e town / whom they name their suffren / called Robert Shea / a man sober / wise / and godly / which is a rare thing in that lande.

In the ende of our dyner / certain priests resorted / and began very hotly to dispute w ^t me concerning their purgatory & suffrages for the dead. And as I had alleged y ^e scriptures prouīge Christ's sufficiēcie for y ^e souls discharge afore God / w ^t out their dirty deseruinges. They brought fourth / as seemed to them / contrary allegacions / y ^t there should appear no truth in those scriptures. As S. Paul prophesied of thē. Rō. 1 That such as they were / should seek to turn the verity of God into a lie. And whan I had ones deprehended chem in that theuerie / and agreed both our alleged scriptures / to the mayntenaūce of my first princyple / to their manifest reproach. I demanded of them / what a Christ̄ mannys office was / whan such a scripture was uttered / as neither mā nor angel was able to deny any truth thereof? But they made me none answer. Than said I unto them. Ye have set me fourth a new lesson / and taught me this day / to know a good mā frō an hypocrite / & to discern a true Christiane frō a wicked papist. The good man (said I) believeth a truth in y ^e scriptures / y ^e hypocrite denieth it / y ^e christiā ēbraceth it / y ^e papist doubteth & disputeth against it / as ded y ^t devil ī y ^e wilderness w ^t Christ / whā he sought by one scripture to cōfound another.

The next day I departed frō thens & went home w ^c my cūpanye to Holmes court again.

Whereas I had knowledge the next day following / that the priests of my diocese / specially one Sir Richard Routhe / treasurer of the church of Kylkēnigh / and one Sir James Joys a familiar chaplain of mine / by y ^e help of one Barnabe Bolgar / my next neibour & my tenaūt at the said holmes court / had hired certain hearnes of the lord Moūtgarret / and of the barn of upper Ossorie / whom they knew to be most desperate thieves and murderers / to slay me. And I am in full believe / that this was not all without their knowleges also / for so much as they were so desierouse of my lands in diverse quarters / and could neither obtain them by their own importunate suits / nor yet by the frendeshipp of others. As for the lord Mountgarret / I suspect him by this.

An horse grome of his / withan other of his brechelesse gallauntes besides / came into my court one day / and made a stought brag among my servants / that he would both steel my horses / as it is there reckoned no great fault to steel / and also that he would have my head if I came abroad.

I sent my servant unto him / not as one desierouse to be revenged / but to know what cause his grome had / to vttre so much malice. Yea / I afterward complained thereof myself / to his own person / & had but a slendre answer / with no redress at all. The Barn of upper Ossorie / molested my pore tenaūtes in the quarter where as he dwelte / most maliciously / & Barnabe Bolgar married his young daughter to one of those murderers / called Grace graceless / to help y ^e matter forward. For he thought by that means to have y ^e full occupienge of Holmes court yet ones again.

On the thursdaye after / which was the last day of August / I being absent / the clergy of Kylkennie / by procurement of that wicked justice hothe / blasphemously resumed again the whole papisme / or heap of superstitions of the bishop of Rome / to the utter contempt of Christ and his holy word / of the king and counsel of England / and of all Ecclesiastical and politic order / without either statute or yet proclamacion. They ronge all y ^e belles in y ^e cathedral minstre and parish churches / they flonge up their cappes to the battlement of the great temple / with smylinges and laughinges most dissolutely / the justice himself being therewith offended. They brought fourth their coopes / candelstickes / holy waterstocke / cross and sensers. They mustered fourth in general procession most gorgiously / all the town over / with Sancta Maria ora pro nobis / & y ^e reest of y ^e latin Litany. They chattered it / they chaunted it / with great noise and deuocion. They banketted all y ^e day after / for y ^t they were delivered from the grace of God into a warm sun. For they may now from thens fourth / again deceive the people as they ded afore time / with their Latin mōblīges / and make marchaundice of thē. 2. Petre. 2. They may make y ^e witless sort believe / y ^t they cā make every day new gods of their little white cakes / & y ^t they cā fatche their frindes souls frō flaminge purgatory / if need be / w ^t other great miracles else.

They may now without check / have other men's wives in occupȳge / or keep whores in their chambers / or else play the buggery knaves / as they have done always / and be at an vttre defiaunce with marriage / though it be the institution of God / honorable / holy / righteous / and perfight.

I write not this without a cause / for why / there where some among thē / w ^c boasted both of this and much more / to vain to be told. And whan they were demanded / how they would afore God / be discharged?

They made answer / that ear confession was able to burnish them again / and to make thē so white as snow / though they thus offended never se oft. And one of them for example / was the drunken bishop of Galwaye / which besides these vncomly brags / furiosly boasted in the house of one Martin a faithful Italiane and servant to the Earl of Ormonde / and in other houses more / that y ^e bishop of Rome was the head supreme of the christē church in earth / and should so be proclaimed in Ireland / the said Martin as God's true frinde rebukīge him for it. The exercise of this beastly bishop / is none other but to gadde frō town to town over the English part / confirminge young children for .ii. pens a piece / without examinacion of their Christ̄ believe / contrary to the christē ordinances of England / and at night to drink all at Rob Dauye and Aqua vite / like a mā. To whom for a 〈…〉 ke now of late / a Galoglasse of the lande brought his dog wrapped in a shete with .ii. pens about his neck / to have him confirmed / among neybers children. In this he noted this beastly bishop / more fit to confirm dogs / thā christen mennes childrē.

On the frydaye next following / which was the eyt day of Septembre .v. of my howsholde servants / Rytchard Foster a deacō / Richard Headley / Iohā Cage / an Irish horsegrome / and a young maid of .xvj. years of age / went out to make haye abought half a mile of / betwixt .viii. & .ix. of the clocbe / after they had served God accordīge to y ^e day. And as they were come to y ^e enteraūce of that medowe / the cruel murderers / to y ^e number of more than a score / leaped out of their lurkynge busshes with sweardes and with darts / and cowardly flewe thē all unarmed & vnweaponed / without mercy. This ded they in their wicked fury / as it was reported / for y ^t they had watched so long afore / yea / an whole month space they say / and sped not of their purpose concernīge me. They fellonously also robbed me of all my horses / and of all maistre Coopers horses / which that time sojourned with me for safeguard of his life / to the number of vii. dryuynge them afore them. In the after none / abought .iii. of the clock / the good Suffreu of Kylkennye having knowledge thereof / resorted to me with an hundred horsemē / & iii. hundred fotemen / and so with great strength brought me that night to the town / the young men singing psalms and other godly songs all the way / in rejoice of my deliverance.

As we were come to the town / the people in great nonebre stood on both sydes of the way both within the gates and without / with candles light in their hands / shoughting out praises to God for deliuerynge me from the hands of those murderers. The priests the next day to color their mischief / caused it to be noised all the contrary over / that it was by the hand of God that my servants were slain / for that they had broken (they said) y ^e great holy day of our Ladies natiuite. But I would fain know / what holy days those bloudthurstye hypocrites / and malyciouse murderers kept / which had hired those cruel kearnes to do that mischief? O abominable traitors / both to God and to all godly order. Ye here cōmende murder / under a color of false religyon / to hyde your own myschefes to the eyes of the people / but the eyes of God ye cannot deceive. Youre horrible slaughter must now be God's doing / and yet was it the devil that set ye a wurke. Ye prate here of y ^e obseruaciō of y ^e holy day / which never yet kept the holy day as it should be kept. For ye never yet preached the word of God truly / neither mynystred the sacraments ryghtly / neither yet taught the people to honor God purely / and to keep his commandments inviolably / which are the only kepinges of the holy days.

But on those days more than on any other / ye pampre them up in all superstitions / false worshippynges / and ydolatryes / to the utter defilynge both of y ^e days and of them. Ye are much offended y ^t a good wurke should be done on the sabbath day / as were your forefathers y ^e Pharisees / but with whoredom / ydolatrye / drunk̄nesse / and slaughter of mē / ye are nothing at all offended / but wyckedly ye do maintain thē / as I am able to prove by a thousand of your lewd examples. The natiuite of our Lady / was at that day a feast abrogated / by authority of a Christian Kynge and his whole parlement / and yet you say / the holy day is broken / whan it is no holy day at all / but as all other days are holy to them only which are holy through their true obedience to God's most holy word. Ye had kept the day much holyar in my oppinyon if ye had in the fear of God obeyd the commandment of your christen Kynge. Whereas in disobeynge the same / ye have resisted the holy ordinance of God for a supersticyon / procuringe thereby to yourselves damnation. Roma. 1. Christ our heavenly maistre and redeemer / was well contented that his most holy natiuite gave place to an heathnysh Emprours obedience. Luc. 2. And yow disdain that day to obey a most christen king / counsel / & parlement / & yet ye are not ashamed to boast it / y ^t ye kept the day holy. O right Antichrists. On y ^e day next folowīge which was saturdaye / in the afternone y ^e forseid treasurer a man unlearned and therewith an outragiouse whorekepar / resorted to me with a number of priests / to tempt me like as Sathā ded Christ in y ^e wilderness / saving y ^t Sathā to Christ offered stones / & that temptinge treasurer both apples & wyne. And as they had than compassed me in round about / y ^e seid treasurer proponed unto me / y ^t they were all fully mīded to have solempne exequies for king Edward lately departed / like as y ^e quenes highness had had thē in England. I axed them / how that was? They made me answer / with a Requiem mass & Dirige. Than axed I of them again / who should singe y ^t mass? And they answered me / y ^t it was my bound duty to do it / being their bishop Than said I unto them. Massinge is an office appointed of that Antichrist the biship of Rome / to whom I owe no obedience / neither will I owe him any so longe as shall live. But if ye will have me there / to do that office / which Christ the son of God hath earnestly commanded / which is to preach his holy Gospel / I will do it with all my heart.

No said they / we will have a solempne mass / for so had the Queen. By my truth said I / than must ye go seek out some other chaplain. For truly of all generacions I am no massemongar. For of all occupacions me think / it is most foolish. For there standeth the priest disgysed / like one that would show some cōueyaūce or iuglyng play. He turneth his back to y ^e people / and telleth a tale to the walle in a forē language. If he turn his face to thē / it is either to receive the offering / either to desire thē to give him a good word / with Orate pro me fratres for he is a poor brother of theirs / either to bid them God speed / with Dominus vobiscū / for they get no part of his banket / either else to bless them with the bottom of the cup / with Benedictio Dei / whā all the brekefast is done. And of these feats (said I) can I now little skille. With that the Treasurer being in his fustene fumes / stoughtely demanded a determinate answer / as though he came not thydre without authority. Than suspected I somewhat the wickedness of justice hothe and such other Notwithstandinge I axed hī ones again / what profyght he thought the Kynges sowle to have of those funeral exequies? Than answered one of the priests / y ^t God knew well enough what he had to do. Yet you must appoint hī? said I

If these youre suffrages be a way for him to heaven / & that he cannot go thydre w ^t out thē / ye are much to blame / that ye have diffarred them so longe. Ye had (said I) a commandment the last saterdaye / of the justice hothe / to have solempnised them y ^t night and the next day after. But the devil which that day daūsed at Thomas town (for they had a processiō with pageaūtes) and the aqua vite & Kob Dauie withal / would not suffer ye than to do thē. I desire yow / considering that the last sondaye ye deferred them to see the devil daūce at Thomas town / that ye will also this sondaie differ them / till such time as I send to y ^e Queens cōmissioners at Dublyne / to know how to be discharged of the oath which I made to y ^e Kynge and his counsel for abolyshement of that popish mass. For I am loath to incur y ^e danger of perjury. With that after a few wurdes more / they seemed content / and so departed. The next day came thydre a proclamacion / that they which would hear masses / should be suffered so to do and they that would not / should not trerunto be compelled.

Thus was that building clearly ouerthroowne / and that practice of blasphemy would not take at that time / as God would

And as I had continued there certain days / I chanced to hear of many secrete mutteringes / that the priests would not so leave me / but were still conspiringe my death.

It was also noised abroad / by the bishop of Galwaye and others / that the Antichrist of Rome / should be taken again for the supreme head of the church of Ireland.

And to declare a contemptuouse change from religion to superstition again / the priests had suddenly set up the altars and images in the cathedral church. Beholdinge therefore so many inconveniences to ensewe / and so many dangers toward / having also (which was worst of all) no English deputy or governor within the lande to complain to for remedy / I shoke the dust of my fete against those wicked colligyners and priests according to Christ's commandment / Math. 10. that it might stand against them as a witness at the day of judgment. The next day early in the morning by help of friends / I cōuayed myself away to the castle of Lechline / and so fourth to the city of Dubline / where as I for a certain time among friends remained.

As the Epicurouse archebishop / had knowledge of my beīge there / he made boast upon his ale benche w ^t the cup in his hand / as I heard the tale told / y ^t I should for nomānis pleasure / preach in y ^e city of his. But this needed not. For I thought nothing less at y ^t time / than to pour out y ^e precious pearls of y ^e Gospel afore so brockish a swine as he was / becōmīge thā of a dissēblīge {pro}selite / a very {per}niciouse papist. And as touching learnīge / whereof he much boasted among his cups / I know none y ^t he hath so perfightly exercised / as he hath y ^e known practices of Sardinapal{us}. For his preachings twice in y ^e year / of y ^e plough mā in wīter / by Exit qui seminat / & of y ^e shepeherde ī somer / by Ego sū pastor bon{us} / are now so well known by rott of every gossipp ī Dubline y ^t afore he cometh up into y ^e pulpet / they cā tell his sermō. And as for his wife / if y ^e marriage of priests endureth not / he hath already provided his old shift of conueyaūce / by one of his servants. But I would wish y ^t among other studies / he remembered old debethes at Londō for surgerie. For ywys there is yet some moneie to be paid, and an Irish hobby also by promise.

About three years ago / he made interpellacyon to the Kynge in his lente sermon / for his daughter Ireland / but now he commandeth her to go a whoringe aganie / and to follow the same devil that she followed afore. For that he ded than / was but only to serve the time. He needed little than / to have accused sir Antony Sellenger of treason / if ye mark him well now / but that he thought by such cōueyaunce to win estimation / and to obtain the high primacy of Ireland from the archebisshoprycke of Armach / as he ded in deed. Full well bestowed. Suche dissemblinge gluttōs / and swynysh papists / are a sore plage to that lande / which for their wicked bellies / make the people believe / that sower is sweet and darkness light / w ^t their altars / masses / & images. And y ^t causeth me to write this to his shame. The salt (saith Christ) that is become unsavory / is frō thens fourth good for nothing / but to be cast out at the doors / and trodden under men's fete / Math. 5. After certain days / w ^t in my hosteshowse / a young man of Estsexe called Thomas / was coming and going / which for his masters affairs into Scotland / had hired a small ship / there called a pyckarde. I rejoiced at the chance / as one that had found great threasure / and thought it a thing provided of God / for my safeguard and deliueraūce at that present. Anō I couenaunted with him / to pay the half charges of that ship / that I might pass thydre with him / and delivered to him out of hand the more part thereof.

I thought at all times by him / and by another whom I there had also heard of / hauīge their continual occupyenges thydre / to have from time to time knowledge of the deputyes coming over into Ireland / and so to resort again to mine own / in case all things were to my mind. As that the tirannouse bishop of Rome had not his primacye and old doings there again / as it had been boasted he should / and that the christen religion gave not place to blasphemous papistry. And as he and I were together in the ship / there tarrienge vpō the tide for passage / ane Irishe pirate / yea / rather a cruel tiraunte of hell / called Walter / being Pylate as they call them / or loades man in a flemmish ship of war / made the covetous Captain thereof to believe that I was a freēche man / and that I had about me innumerable treasure. The Captain hearing of this / with an excedīge fearcenesse invaded our poor ship / and removed both the young man Thomas and me frō thens into his great ship of war. Whereas he searched us both to the very skins / and toke frō us all that we had in money / books / and apparel. He toke also from the maistre of our pickarde or little ship .v. pound / which I and the said Thomas had given to him in part of payment / with all his beer and vitayles / notwithstanding that he {per}fightly knew us to be English men / & no frenche men.

In the ende I looked fourth of the Captains cabyne / and beheld a fair house / as it had been a mile from us / and axed of the young man / whose house that was? He made me answer / that it was the house of one maistre Parker / the searcher there. I instauntly desired of the Captayne to be delivered to him / but in no wise would he grant it. I required anon after / as I beheld a far of / y ^e city of Dubline / to be brought thydre for my honest trial (for they had accused me of treason) but it might not be allowed. The next day after / we came into the havē of Waterforde / where as also for my trial / I desired to go a land / but in no wise would it be granted. After that we passed more than the half seas over / towards Cornewale / and were driven back again with so fierce and terrible a tempest / that y ^e whole seas to our sight and felinge / went over us. And as we were come yet ones again into the haven of Waterforde / I said unto the Captayne. God hath with violence brought us hither again (I perceive it) that I should try my innocencye. I desire yow (said I) as I have done heretofore / to deliver me into the city of Waterforde / where as I am well known. He refused utterly so to do / and after certain other talk / he desired me to content myself / and I should (he said) in the ship / have althinges to my mind. Whie (said I) ye go not my way / neither is it fit for me to seek for pryses and to go a roauinge as yow do / but to sattle myself sumwhere.

Sens ye came to our shyppe (said he) I heard yow wish yourself in Duchelande / & I promise yow / we will honestly bring yow thydre / and not longe tarry by the way. My chance was in deed / to find there among them / an Hollander / called Leonarde / which knew me in Nortwyck / with maistre Johan Sartorius. To him ī familiar talk / I had wished myself there at that present. But how will ye lead me (said I to the Captain) as ye have done hitherto / like a captive prisoner / or like a free passenger? No / said he / I take ye now for no prisoner / but for a mā of worship / and for a most honest passenger / and so will I deliver yow there. But all this time he had my moneie in his own kepinge. Within .ii. days after / we were drivē into S. Jews ī Cornewale / by extremite of wether. Whereas the forseid wicked pyrate Walter / get him a lande afore us / so fast as ever he could / & accused me there for an haynouse traitor / yea / for such a one / as for that cause had fled out of Ireland.

And to bring his wicked purpose to pass / of winninge somewhat by me / for he thought than to have half my money which was in y ^e Captains hands / he fatched thidre one Downinges from .vii. miles of / by the counsel of the mariners of that town / which was noised to be y ^e most cruel termagaūt of y ^t shire / yea / such a one as had been a begynnar of the last commociō there / both to examine me & apprehēde me.

And as I was common to that examinacion before one of the baylyfes / the constables / and other officers / I desired the said balyfe / apearinge to me a very sober mā / as he was in deed / to axe of the said Walter / how longe he had known me / and what treason I had done sense that time of his knowledge? He answered / that he never saw me / neither yet had heard of me / afore I came into that ship of war a iv. or .v. days afore. Than said the baylife. What treason hast thu known by this honest gentelman sense? For I promise the / he seemeth to be an honest man. Marry said he / he would have fled into Scotlāde. Whie saith the baylyfe / and knowest thu any impediment / wherfor he ought not to have gone into Scotland? No / said the fellawe / but he was going toward Scotland. If it be a treason (saith the baylyfe) to go towards Scotland / a man having business to do there / it is more than I knew afore. And truly (saith he) than are there many traitors abroad in the world. Good fellawe (said he) take hede y ^t thy ground be good / in accusinge this man / else art thu wurthie to suffer due ponnishiment for it. For thu doest it else upon some other affection / than desire of right. With that he stood still / and was able to say nothing / for he was as drunk as an ape / in hope of a bone viage.

Than came in the Captain and his purser / and reviled the said Walter / reportinge him to be a very noughtye fellawe / and a common drōkarde / and that I was a very honest man. For they feared at that time / the discharge of my money out of their hands / I offering myself / for my trial against him / to be brought to the sessions / which were than not far of. Thā said the forseid Downinges in great displeasure. God's sowle / what do I here? This is but a drunken matter / by the mass. And so went his way in a fume / and for anger would not ones drink with us. So that I went clear away in this prodygiouse conflict. The next day being sondaye / I resorted to the temple / to see the fashions there. As the peals were all ended / they sange / matins / hours / holy water making / & mass / all in Latin. Nothinge was there in English but the poor Litany / which the priest / a stought sturdy lubber said with least deuocion of all / much of the people lamentinge to behold so miserable a mutaciō / and saienge. A fore time might we have learned somewhat by our coming to the church / but now nothing at all to our understanding. Alas / what shall become of us?

After dyner / that priest resorted unto us / as bold as great Hercules / & after a little talk / fell to flat raylinge of good Myles Coverdale their bishop after this sort. Where is that heretic knave now (saith he) and other of his companions / vagabondes / apostataes / and rūnegates? With other vncomly wurdes. And as I was bent to have made him an answer / a gentilman of the cōtraie thereabout / rubbed me on the elbowe / and bad me in mine ear / to lete him alone / and I should hear wonders. And the seyde Gentilman brought him into another talk of old familiaritees. Wherī he confessed / that he had in one day / bygettē .ii. mennis wives / of that parish with child / to encreace the churches profyght in crisyms and offerings / where as their husbādes were not able to do it. Yea / mary sir / James saith the Gentilman / & ye have done more miracles than that. Went ye not one day a fishinge? saith he. Yes by y ^e mass ded I / said the priest again / and made the fishes more holy than ever the whoresons were afore. For I sent out my maker among them / whom I had that day received at the altar. By the mass (quoth he) I was able to hold him no longer. Sens that day / I am sure (quoth he) that our fyshars hath had better luck / than ever they had afore.

Thus whan he had raged / by the space of more than an hour / the last peal calling him thens to evensonge / y ^e Gentilmā said unto me. These are the ghostly fathers / which now are permitted to be our spiritual gydes. Are not we (saith he) well appointed think yow? The lord be merciful to us / for it is sure a plage for our vnthanke fullness whyls we had the truth. Suche lewd bawdye priests as this is (said he) doth wonderfully now rejoice / not for any virtue they loke for / but in hope to be maintained in liberty of all wickedness / more than of late days. Whan supper was done / certain of the mariners resorted to us / declaringe what an vncomly part the priest had played w ^t their pypar / as that he had pyssed in his mouthe / being gapinge a sleep in the church after euensonge. This is the bewteouse face of our Irishe and English churches at this present. The poor people are not taught / but mocked of their mynysters / their servants abused / their wives and daughters defiled / and all christen order confounded.

As the wether waxed fair / the Captayne went away with the ship / and was more thā ii. miles on his way / mindinge (as it apeared) to have gone away with all that I had / money / apparel / and books / if the wind had served him well. The costomers servant / an Irishe man also / being admonished by his contreymā Walter / of my money in y ^e Captains hands / came to my lodginge in the morning / and told me thereof / thinkinge as I had been in possession thereof / if I had come to lande again therewith / to have raised new rumors upon me / and so to have deprived me thereof. For he shown himself very seruisable in prouidinge me a boat / and in bringing me to the ship. But whan he ones perceived / that I would not demand my money of the Captain / and return again with him / though I gave him a crown for his boat and pains / yet went he away in great displeasure / with no small reproaches. And at that present / was the forseid Walter bannished the ship / for his only troublīge of me / so beniuolouse that hour was the Captain unto me.

The next day after / I demanded my money of the Captain / and it was very honestly delivered me / all scysmes / as I thought / pacified. Howbeit that wretched Mammō / most strongely wrought in the vnquietouse heart of the Captain / so that continually after that time / he threttened to set us on lande / and marvel it was / that he threw us not both over y ^e borde. Always were we well contented / to have gone to lande / but yet still he drove it of till we came into Dover road / I not vnderstādinge the mystery concerning the said money / as that it was in my hand and not in the Captains / which marred all the whole matter. In the mean time they went a roauinge by a whole wekes space and more. And first they toke an English ship of Totnes / goīge towards Britain and loaden with tin / and that they spoiled both of ware and money under y ^e color of French mennis goods. The next day in the afternone / beheld they .ii. English ships more / whom they chaced all y ^e night long / and the next day also till .x. of the clock / & of them they toke one by reason y ^t his topsaile brake / and that was a ship of lynne. In this had they nothing but apples / for he went for his loadinge. After y ^t traced they the seas over / more than half a week / and found none there but their own contrary men / being men of war and sea robbers as they were.

At the last they came to Dover road / and there would the Captain needs to lande with his purser. My companion Thomas and I / taking our selves for free passengers / desyered to go a lande with them / but that might not be (he said) till he had been there afore. Yes / saith Thomas / I will go a lande / if any man go / for I have nothing to do here. Thu shalt not go (saith the Captain) but I will lay y ^e fast by the fete / if thu prate anymore. With y ^t one Cornelis stood fourth / and said. We are much to blame / that we have not dispatched him ere this / and thrown him over the borde. Than doubted I some mischefe in working among them. For one Martin an English pyrate / but yet a frenche man borne / being sometime Tompsons mā and after that Stranguyshes mā / and now one and their unthrifty nonebre / had made them believe / that I was he / w ^c not only had put down the mass in England / but also I had caused Doctor Gardener / the biship of Winchestre to be kept so longe in the tower / & y ^t also I had poysened (whom I loved & reverenced above all mortal men) the king with many other most prodigiouse lies.

So went y ^e Captain & his purser w ^t all these news a land / having also w ^t thē my bishops seal / & .ii. Epistles sent me frō Conradus Gesnerus, and Alexander Alesius, with commondacions from Pellicanus, Pomeranus, Philippus Melancthō, Ioachimus Camerarius, Mathias Flacius, and other learned men / desierouse of the English churches Antiquytees and doctrines. Which letters I had received at Dubline / the day afore I came to the ship / and not yet answered them. These Epistles and seal / with another letter sent to me from the counsel of England / concerning my first calling to that pastoral office / they had taken out of my male / vnknowinge to me. For that they had seen the kings arms in my seal / as the manner is of bishops seals / they laid to my charge the coūterfettinge of the kings seal / upon the .ii. Epistles / heresy / and upon the counsels letter / conspiricie against the Queen / so well were they ouerseane in that malice for money. In Dover among all his cups / this captain discovered these matters / as what a man he had got̄ in the borders of Ireland / suspiciously passinge over from thens towards Scotland / with all the reest. And as he had perceived some of the hearers desierouse of that pray / he called a great piece of his tale back again / and said / that he had set us a land at Southamptō / and so letten us go. His mind was to have sold me / if any man would have offered him a good some of money.

After midnyght he returned again to the ship / pratinge among his cumpany / what he had done a lande / and how he had almost lost all / by his busy talk. But he had heard of me (he said) much more than he knew afore / and he trusted that I should be to him and to all the ship / a {pro}fitable prize. The next day in y ^e mornīge after his first sleep / he arose / and w ^t stought coūtenaūce boasted / y ^t he would straight to London with his most daūgerouse carrryage / which were we .ii. poor innocent souls that had done ill to noman / saving that we could not bear with the blasphemies of the papists against God & his Christ. Muche to and fro was among them about that passage. In the ende they all concluded / that better it was to tarry still there with y ^e ship / whyls one or .ii. of them went to the counsel of England / in massage and came again / than thidre to travail with ship and all. To land goeth the pursar and another besides / to hyer their horses towards Londō / For mountains of gold would be got̄ y ^e ways / they said.

As I beheld this madness / though I little thā cared for my life / yet said I to y ^e Captain. Maistre Captain, what do yow mean by these strange turmoilinges? Think ye there is no God? Neither yet a reckeninge to be made at y ^e latter day / of these mad {pro}cedinges? The time hath been sense our first metinge / that ye have taken me for an honest passenger / and defended my innocence against y ^e cruel pyrate Walter. How standeth it with equite than / that ye now proclaim me / so haynouse a traitor? I am sure that ye • now now no more by me / than ye ded afore. Your allegacions / that I had put down the mass / emprisoned Doctor Gardener / & poysened the king / are most false / as all the world knoweth. My seal & my other letters are plain arguments of my truth and honest estimation / and might be to your confusion / if I chanced to have righteous hearers. I pray yow therefore in conscience / that ye tell me / what evil ye know else by me / that ye make here so terrible doings? I cannot see / saith the Captain / that ye will be ordered after any good sort. My only misordre was than / that my money was in my purse / and not in his. Wherunto I answered / w ^t an heart full of dolour & heaviness / to behold mennis so damnable practices of mischefe for fylthie lucres sake.

I am contented maistre Captain (said I) to be ordered as ye will reasonably have me. What will ye give than (said the Captain) to be delivered into Flaunders / and our purser to be called again? I answered / that I would give / as his self would with reason and conscience require. If ye had told us so much yester night (said he) this matter had been at a point / & we by this time had been in Zelāde. Than was all the rabble of the ship / bag / tag / and rag / called to the reckenīge / rushelinge together as they had been the cookes of hell / with their great Cerberus / an whole hōdred pound demanded for my deliverance. In the ende it was concluded / that no less might aswage that Hungrye heat than fifty pound at y ^e least / with this Prouiso / y ^t all the moneie which I had in my purse / with part of my garments also / should be out of hand divided among them and the Captain / which was .xxj. pound in the whole. I instauntly desired / that it might be received in part and payment of the other some. They creed all with one voice / Nay / we will none of that. Than I besought them / that I might have at the least / an honest portion thereof / for payment of my charges / whils I should be prouidinge / of so great a ransom / as they had laid to me.

In fine they assented / that I should have .vi. crowns of mine own money allowed me / for my costs / till I had found out my frindes. Than caused the Captain a piece of ordinance to be fired / and a gunne to be lete / to call back the purser / and his companion. In whose return there was much to and fro. For some would needs to London / thinkinge that way to win more / thā to bring me into Flaunders. And of them which would into Flaunders / some would to land for a barrel of drīke / for in the ship at that time / was neither bread / befe / nor beer. Some feared the coming of the mayre and Captayne of the castle / for searchinge their ship. So that our Captain commanded them at the last / to hoise up the sails and speedily to pass towards Flaūders. In the mean time was I poor sowle compelled / to set my hand to a false bylle of their deuisinge / as that I had hired their ship in Ireland for fyftie pound / to bring me without delaye or tarriaunce into Zelande. Which I never ded / as the almighty lord well knoweth / but came from thens with them against my will / and was tossed to and fro upon the seas / by the space of .xxiiij. days / in following prises / as they call their roberies. And I was by y ^t time / so full of lyce / as I could swarm.

As we came ones thydre / they brought me into the house of one of the .iv. owners of the ship / which was a man fearinge God / and his wife a woman of much godliness also / which was to me careful creature / a singular confort provided of God. The next day were all the .iv. owners called to the reckeninge / & a Latyne interpretour with them / to know howe / where / and whā / this ransom of fiftye pound should be paid? And more than .xxvj. days of layser for the payment thereof / might not be granted. I desired to have had liberty to go abroad / to seek my frīdes / but that could I not obtain / though it were in my former couenaūt / whan the .vi. crowns were delivered me. In y ^e afternone was it noised abroad, by the drunken mariners all over / that they had brought such a one with them out of Ireland / as paid half an hundred pound for his passage / to the wonderinge of all y ^e town. So that my host / was fain to keep me close in his house / and to say both to the mariners and others / that I was gone to Andwerpe / the people there resorted so fast to see me. They reported there also in their drunkenness / that I was he which had put down the mass in England / and had thrown Doctor Gardyner into the tower / wytha great sort of lies and slanders more.

Thus continued I there / as a prisoner / by the space of .iii. wekes / sometime threttened to be thrown in their common iayle / sometime to be brought afore the magistrates / sometime to be left to the examinaciō of the clergy / sometime to be sent to London / or else to be delivered to the Queens ambassadors at Brucels / but always by God's prouysyon I had mine host and hostesse to friends. And behold a most wondrefull wurke of God. The person of the town / a most cruel monk / a maistre of Louayne / and an inquisitour of heretykes / as they call those Rabyes / the next day after my coming / sore syckened / and never came out of his bed so long as I was there / which was greatly marked of some of the inhabitauntes / being godly affected. At the last / in deliberatinge the matter / that they required so much money of me / and would not suffer me to go abroad to seek it / mine host bad the Captain and mariners considre / how far they had rōne beyond the limites of their commission / in mysusynge the English nation / with whom they had no war. It may chance hereafter (saith he) depely to be laid to your charges. Therfor by my assent / ye shall agree with this good man for less money. Than were they contented to receive .xxx. pound / as I should be able to pay it / and so to discharge me.

Thus hath my lord God most miraculously delivered me from all these daūgerouse parels / and from the gredye mouths of deuourynge lions / into the wurthie lande of Germany yet ones again, I hope to y ^e glory of his most holy name / euerlastīge praise be to hī for it. Amē. Here have ye dere friends / a most lively and wondrefull example of God's chastenynges / & of his most gracyouse delyueraunces again. For no chosen child receiveth he to enherytaunce / without much correction. Hebre. 12. The merciful lord throweth down into hell / and bringeth from thens again. 1. Reg. 2. Though Satan be suffered as whete to syfte us for a time / yet faileth not our faith through Christ's aid / but that we are at all times ready / to confirm the faith of our weak bretheren / Luce. 22. I thought myself now of late / for the cares of this life / well satteled in the bishoprycke of Ossorye in Ireland / and also well quieted in y ^e peceable possessiō of y ^e pleasant Euphrates / I confess it. But the lord of his mercy / would not there leave me / what though for the small time / I was in his vyneyearde / not all an idle wurkemā / but he hath provided me (I perceive it) to taste of a far other cup.

By violence hath he yet ones again / as ye in this treatise have red here / driven me out of that glorious Babylon / that I should not taste to much of her wanton pleasures. But with his most dearly beloved disciples / to have my inward rejoice in the cross of his son Jesus Christ. The glory of whose church / I see it well / standeth not in the harmoniouse sound of belles and organs / nor yet in y ^e glitterynge of miters and coopes / neither in y ^e shyninge of gylte images and lyghtes / as the blind bludderinge papists do judge it / but in continual labors and daily afflyctions for his names sake. God at this present / in England hath his fan in hand / and after his great harvest there / is now syftinge the corn from the chaff / blessed shall they be / which persevere in faith to the ende. In case without doubt / is England now / as was Iewrye / after the heavenly doctrine was there plentuously sown by Christ and by his Apostles / the true ministers of his word being partly enprisoned and partly dispersed / as they were. God of his great mercy preserve it frō that plage of destructiō / which not only Hierusalē but also y ^e whole lande tasted / for their willful contempt / of that massage of their salvation. Amen.

The conclusion.

I Wryte this unto the / thu sorrowful church of England / y ^t in y ^e middes of thy afflictions thu shuldest not despair. Behold how gracyously / yea / if I may so speak it / how miraculously and gloriously / the heavenly lord hath delivered me / his most unworthy servant of all men / and an excedinge great sinner. He called me of grace to that office in his vyneyarde / by sore persecuciōs he proved me of love / and at the latter of mercy & goodness he preserved me from the deadly fury of most fierce enemies. Thy calling to the Gospel is not unknown to the / thu careful congregation. Now suffrest thu persecucions diversely / for not regardinge the time of thy visitaciō. Repent yet in the ende / and doubtless thu shalt have a most prosperouse deliverance. They are no noble men / y ^t do vex the at this present. They are but pilde peltinge priests / knights of the dongehill / though they be sir Swepestretes / maistre doctors / and lord bishops. Loke upon their faces / though thu measure not them by their fruits / & thu shalt sone know their virtues. They are fierye / hawtie / and lecherouse as gootes / the chastest among them. But that shall other mennis wives know / & not thu. A well papped Pygion of Paul's / is wholesome (they say) for a tippetted gentilmā of the popes spialte / ī a dark euenīge / to cool the contagiouse heats of a coltish confessor.

No noble men are they / which trouble the in this age / as I told the afore. For true nobylite never yet hated y ^e truth of God / but hath advanced it by all ages. Examples we have in Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, David, Josiah, Nycodeme, Joseph, Kynge Lucius, Constantine, Iustinyane, Theodosius, king Arthour, AlPhrede, Ethelstane, Henry the seconde, Edward the third, and now last of all y ^e virgins Kynge Edward the .vi. which never was defiled with the popes ydolatryes. Immortal fame and note of renown / remaineth yet to them for it. Suche men (saith the lord) as worship me / will I make worshipful / and they that despise me / shall become ignoble or wretched .j. Reg. 2. These will not take away the key of knowledge from God's people / as do the hypocrites / Math. 23. and as the wicked lawyers do also / Luce. 11. woe to them for it. But as the noble David requireth / they will opē y ^e gates y ^t y ^e king of glory may entre. Open the gates (saith he) O ye noble men / lete the everlasting doors be opened / that the king of glory may come in / Psalm. 24. If any be wicked in this behalf / which bear y ^e name of noble men and women. Lete thē well weygh with themselves / how Pharo / Antiochus / Herod / and such other / whom God by princely authority had made noble / by only tyranny against his manifest truth / are now become more vile, thā any kichine slave or yet lazar. Felix (saith Horace) quem faciunt aliena pericula cautū. Happy is he / whom another man's misfortune maketh wise.

Ouer the now triumpheth the bishops / the pharisees / the priests / and the covetous lawyers. At thy late sudden fall / rejoiceth the hypocrites / the epicures / the ydolatours / and the wicked papists. What shall I say more? Iohā Baptist, is now derided in the prison. Jesus the son of God is grenned at upon the cross. Paul now in Athens is hyssed at. The poor Apostles are sliely laughed to scorn. Nay / shall I yet say more. Mycheas is smittē on the face / whils Sedechias playeth y ^e false harlot. 2. Parali. 18. Helias is drivē into y ^e wilderness / whils Baals chaplaines are banketinge among ladies. 3. Reg. 18. Isaiah is contēpned / whils the priests are given to ydolatrie and drunk̄nesse / Esa. 28. Hieremie is sore afflicted / whils▪ Semeias perverteth the truth of the lord / Hiere. .29. Daniel is thrown into the lions dēne / whils mischefes are in wurkinge among the wicked / Dan. 6. Peter is accused of the bishops wenche / whils Caiaphas sitteth in consistory, condēpninge y ^e innocent / Math. 26. Stephen is called to a reckenninge / whils the priests and wicked lawyers are bannishinge the Gospel / Acto. 6. Antipas (they say) is now slain at Pergamos, whils Simō Magus triūpheth in Samaria / Apo. 2. And Johan Zebede is sent into Patmos, whils Cerinthus, Menander, and Hebion play the heretic knaves at home / Apo. 1. well / lete them plye it a pace. It may chance to cost their polluted Jerusalem a fowl overthrow / for so persecutynge y ^e servants of God / in her whoredom / Esa. 1. yea / servants I say, for they served faithfully in the painful office of the Gospel.

Those idle mercenaries / not only loiter in y ^e vineyard / but also like cruel wolves they rauishe and destroy / John. 10. Of that which God hath expressly forbidden / they make now a solempne religion / both in the refusal of marriage / and in the prodygyouse veneracyon of images / sainge yea to his nay / and nay to his yea. God saith / it is not good for man to be alone / without an help / which is a wife in marriage / Gene. 2. They say contrariously / that it is more than good / for it is holy / religious / and prestlike / to have no wives of their own / what so ever they have of other mennis / besides buggery boys. I trow Doctor Weston will say none other at this day / what though not long a go he brēt a beggar in S. Botolphes parish w ^t out bishops gate, geuīge her no wurse thā he had received afore of y ^e religious occupienge. The same Westō {pro}poned to another womā of his parish / which was a man's wife / y ^t her husband being a sleep / she might lawfully occupy with him / by virtue of this text / Mulier dormiente viro, a lege soluta est. 1. Cor. .7. If this scripture were not religiously applied / lete them tell me which know the right handelinge of them. Whils this priapustick prelate / is prolocutour in the conuocacion house / I trust we shall lack no good laws for religiō, the man is so religious. O abomination. Though they now are busily spisinge and paintinge of a toorde (their ydolatrouse mass) yet will a toorde be but a stinkinge toorde / both in smelle and sight / pepper him and bawme him / garnish him and gilde him as well as they can / all the pack of them. To conclude. Now are their most filthy buggeries in the dark / with their other prodigiouse whoredoms, holden a most pure state of living, holy marriage disgraced / contempned / and bannished.

God saith. Thu shalt make no graven image to worship. They say / ye shalt not only make images / but ye shall also gylde them / sense them / worship them / and axe help of them / for why they are y ^e lay mennis Gospel. In deed Porphirius y ^e blasphemous heretic / and troubler of the Christian church / as Eusebius reporteth him / was the first that called thē the lay mennis Calender. And though S. Gregory the great / coming after / confirmed y ^e same Calender / yet shall it remain an horrible blasphemy / because God hath in pain of dāpnacion forbidden it. Epiphanius that worthy father of the church / nombreth the worshiping of our ladyes image among heresies. If we be of his opinion / we must judge yow no less than most perniciouse heretics. Moreover it is now become a religion again in England / to call upon dead men / with Sancte Petre ora pro nobis. This also is fatched from y ^e old paganes sorceries, for hold hath it none of the scriptures canonical. How howlinge and iabberinge in a foren language should become God's service, y ^t cā I not tell. But well I wote y ^t S. Paul's doctrine doth utterly cōdempne it / as supersticiouse beggary / because it is but an idle noise & nothing to edificaciō. 1. Cor. 14.

Some men perauenture will marvel / that I vtteringe matters of Ireland / should omit in this treatise / to write of Coyne and lyuerie. Which are so cruel pillages & oppressions of y ^e poor commens there / as are nowhere else in this whole earth / neither under wicked Saracene nor yet cruel Turk / besides all prodigiouse kinds of lecherie and other abominations therein committed. Thre causes there are / which hath moved me not to express thē here. One is / for so much as they pertain nothing to the title of this boke / which all concerneth religion. An other is for that the matter is so large / as requireth a much larger volume. The third cause is / for that I have known .ii. worthy men / whom I will not now name / to have done that thing so exactly / as noman / (I suppose) therein can amende thē. But this will I utter breuely / that the Irishe lords and their vndrecaptaines / supportīge the same / are not only companions with thieves / as the prophet reporteth / Esa. 1. but also they are their wicked masters and mainteners. So that they both coupled together / the murderer with his maistre / and the thief with his maintener / leave nothing vndeuoured behind them in that fertile regiō / no more than ded the deuouringe locusts of Egypt. Exo. 10. Anon after their haruestes are ended there / the Kearnes, the Galloglasses / and the other brechelesse soldiers / with horses and their horsegromes / sometime. .iii. waitinge upon one iade / enter into the villages with much cruelty and fearcenesse / they continue there in great rauine and spoil / and whan they go thens / they leave nothing else behind them for payment / but lice / lecherye / and intolerable penury for all the year after. Yet set the rulers thereupon a very fair color / y ^t it is for defense of the English pale. I besiche God to send such protection a short ende / & their lords & Captains also / if they see it not sone amended. For it is the utter confusyon of y ^e lande / and a maintenance to all vices.

Thre people's are in Irelāde in these days / priests / lawyers / and kearnes / which will not suffer faith / truth / and honestye to dwelle there. And all these have but one God their Bellye / and glory in that wicked seat to their shame / whose ende is damnation / Phil. 3. I speak only of those which are bred and borne there / and yet not of them all. These for the more part / are sworn bretheren together in mischefe / one to maȳtaine an others maliciouse cause / by murder preuily procured. And to bring their conceived wickedness to pass / they cā do great miracles in this age / by virtue of trāsubstanciacion belike / for therein are they very conninge. For they can very wittely make / of a tame Irishe a wild Irishe for need / so that they shall serve their turn / so well as though they were of the wild Irishe in deed. Lyke as they ded properly and fynely / in the most shameful and cruel slaughter of my .v. servants / by y ^e lord Mountgarrettes kearnes / and the Barn of upper Ossoryes farye knights. By such fine conueniaunce of accusinge the wild Irishe / and color of the holy day broken / as is written afore / they can always appear to have fair white hands / and to be innocent maids / what murder so ever is by thē committed. But I axe of the priests / chefely of Richard Routhe y ^e treasurer and of sir James Joys his companion / what they meant by their so oft rydinge to that Barn of upper Ossorie / whan I was dwellīge at Holmes court? Whome they nevertheless to me reported / to be the most errande thief and merciless murderer of all the lande. And what they have meant also / to be so familyar with the furiouse famelye of Mountgarrett? Commenly resortinge in the ends of all those iournayes / to the house of Barnabe Bolgar. As I suspected the matter thā / so have I sense y ^t time proved it effectually true. Moreover I might axe of the lawyers / why they seek to have so many thieves & murderers perdoned / specially whā they have slain English mē and done their robberies within the English pale? But at this time I leave thē / and return again to my purpose.

Now must I say somewhat to the / thu careful church of England / concerning thy misbehauer against thy most loving Creator. God chose the for his elect vyneyarde / yea / he plenteously pourged and prepared the. But whan thu shuldest have brought him fourth fruit / for grapes thu gavest him thorns / Esa. 7. He looked to have had at thy hands after the Gospel preaching there / faith / knowledge / fear / love / repentance / obedience / true inuocacion / & hearty thanks for his manifold gifts, with suthe other wholesome fruits of life. And in stead of them / thu hast brought fourth / ydolatrie / blindness / impenitence / frowardness / cruelty / pride / fornicacion / vnclennesse / covetousness / ungrateful cōtempt of the truth / and hate of the faithful preachers thereof / with other sower crabbes of damnation. Thu wouldest fain be like the Malignaūt church of the papists / prosperouse and welthye in worldly affairs / and therewith somewhat glorious. But thy eternal father in heaven / will not so have the / but by persecucions transfourmeth the into the very similitude of his dearly beloved sonne / to whom he hath espoused the / to reign w ^t him at the latter in eternal glory.

God hath sufficiently declared in the scriptures / what his church is in this world. As y ^t it is an afflicted and sorrowful congregation / forsaken in a manner / and destitute of all human confort in this life. It may right well be compared to a flock of orphans / which being destitute of father and mother / are in this world subject to many sorrowful calamitees & miseries. But because that poor church should not utterly discourage in her extreme aduersitees / the son of God hath taken her to his spouse / and hath promised her protectiō / help and confort / in all her afflictions and parels. So that she may at all times confort herself with this verse of David / Though my father and mother hath left me / yet hath the lord takē me up / for his / Psalm. 26. In the first promise was she taken to grace after transgressio 〈…〉 assured of deliverance from sin / death / hell / and the devil. For if God had not most wonderfully collected her together / preserved her / saved her / and defended her / it had not been possible for her to have escaped ī so horrible dangers / as were in the universal 〈…〉 ude / in the burninge of Sodom and Gomer / and the tirānigh of Pharaoh / in the iourneie through the read sea / in the captivity of Babylon / and destruction of Jerusalem / and in so many woderfull alteracyons and terrible ruyth •• of th • Roman Empire / so many Deuyls / Pagans / Mahumetes / Turks / Jews / Epicures / heretykes / popes / bishops / monks / priests / and tyrants reigninge.

A perpetual and vnplacable enemy is 〈…〉 than / and evermore hath been / to that poor congregaciō / sekinge not only to disfigure her / but also to spoil her and destroy her utterly. Like as it is said, Gen. 3. y ^t he should tread christe on the hele. This excedinge great benefigh • of the goodness of God / ought to be remembered / y ^t he after y ^e sin of our first parētes / not only received this church to grace / but also hath • uer sēs / both preserved & defended it. But 〈◊〉 great is y ^t untowardness & much is y ^t h 〈…〉 nesse / of manis heart / y ^t he neglecteth so high a benefight / as is also y ^e patefaction of Christ in y ^e Gospel / by whom we are redeemed / & so remain unthankfull for y ^e same. A most sweet voice is it unto us / frō y ^e son of God Jesus Christ / y ^t he will not leave us as orphans / or fa •• erlesse & motherlesse childrē without comfort, but will come unto us / Ioā. 14. That is / Like a gētill & merciful lord / he will continually stand by his church / assistinge / helpinge / & socourīge it alwai •• . I will be w ^t yow (saith he) to y ^e ende of y ^e world / Math. 28. Lete this be thy comfort y ^u sorrowful church of England, & stay thyself ī hī w ^c was incarnate / lived / wrought / taught / & died for thy sin / yea / he arose frō y ^e death & ascended to heavē for thy iustificaciō / Rom. 4. Cleaue thu fast to him / reap̄t thy folyes past / & take heed to thy doīges frō hensfourth. Praye & fast busily / for this frantyck kind of Deuyls is never taken away / but in prayer & fastīge Math. 17. So shalt y ^u be restored plēteously / & flourish in virtues hereafter frutefully / to the praise of one God eternal. Which liveth and reigneth world without ende. Amen.

The table of this boke.

• ABel the first elect / fol / 2.
• Abel acknowledgeth saluaciō in Christ / by sacrifice .11.
• Abhominacions advanced in England .45.
• Adam constituted a preacher .2. & 9.
• Adam called / persecuted / and delivered .2.
• Adultery maintained in Ireland .18.21.23.
• Antiquitees of England desired .38.
• Antony Sellenger / knight / accused .32.
• Apostles / called / persecuted / & delivered .3.10.
• Articles / maliciously practiced .38.39.41.
• Augustine complained of Ceremonies .10.
• Author favored of the king .4.16.

• BAylfye of S. Iuüs .34.
• Balaam the sothsayer .9.
• Barnabe Bolgar, a maintainer of thieves .5.26.27.47.
• Bishopp of Galwaye .28.31.
• Bishopp of Rome / noised head of y ^e church .28.31.33.
• Bishops .iii. at inuestinge .18.
• Boke / why it was written .7.
• Boke of common prayer resisted .19.21.
• Bread & wyne worshipped .11.15.20.22.25.27.
• Bretherne / called / afflicted and delivered .7.
• Britain's believe afore Christ's time .12.
• Britain's / subdued by the Saxons .14.
• Brytish church / first instituted .12.
• Buggerie / a professed virginite .14.27.

• CAptaine of the ship / taketh 33. excuseth .35. fleeth .36. thretteneth .37. and robbeth .40.
• Celibatus / a cloke of buggerie .14.36.45.
• Ceremonies of the church .10.
• Christ preached in paradyse .2.11. a universal doctor appointed .2.9. called / persecuted and delivered .2.9. obeyeth an heathen Emperor. 29.
• Church of Christ / what it is .7.48. preserved. 48.
• Church of y ^e Britain's instituted .12.
• Church of England / described .11. afflicted. .42.43.48.
• Claudia / a Britain / taught of S. Paul .13.
• Coyne and lyuery tirannouse .46.
• Commission / of the mariners abused .41.
• Commissioners at Dubline .31.
• Communion / for S. Anne .22.
• Confirmacion for money .28.
• Consecracion / or inuestinge at dublyne .18.
• Constantine the Emprour .10.13.
• Contencion about trifles .24.26.
• Contrarie are we to the papists .3.45.
• Cornelius and Julius Captains .6.
• Cornelis / a cruel pyrate .37.

• DAyes / hallowed and unhallowed. 29.
• David Couper / person of Calan .18.28.
• Degrees of men receiuinge Christ .25.
• Deliueraūce of the author .28.34.35.40.41.
• Deputy / none in Ireland .23.31.33.
• Discipline in the church / with doctrine .21.
• Doctors in the primative church .10.
• Doctors in the British church .13.
• Doctors in the Britysh monkerye .13.
• Doctors of the English monkerie .14.
• Doctors / smellinge out their mischefes .15.
• Doctrines ī Britain, afore Christ's birthe .12.
• Doctrine / of God commanded .19.
• Doctrine in the church / with discipline .21.
• Dog / brought to be confirmed .28.
• Dover road .37. much doubted .40.
• Downinges / a cruel commocioner .34.
• Dubline / head city of Ireland .18.31.33.
• Duste / shaken in witness .31.

• EAre confession / a salve for all sores .27.
• Election & vocatiō of God .9.
• Epicurish papists / enemies to Christ .7.
• Epistles .ii. from learned men .38.
• English Saxons subdue the Britain's .14.
• English church described .11. afflicted .42.48.
• English Antiquitees desired .38.
• English ships robbed .37.
• Example of God's chasteninges .42.
• Examples of vocation .2. of true nobilite .43.
• Examples notable / for afflicted preachers .44.
• Exercise of an Irishe biship .28.
• Exequyes for the king .30.31.

• FAlse prophets / are the papists. 21.
• False rumors of the Irishe men .23.
• Fathers called / persecuted / and delivered .3.9.
• Fathers / in darkness faithful .14.15.
• Fyshes / are howseled of a priest .36.
• Fryres and sophisters .14.
• From Jerusalem / and not from Rome .12.

• GEntyles / acknowlegynge Christ .11.
• Gentiles / partakers of the promise .11.
• Gentilman of Cornewale .35.
• George / archebishopp of Dubline / wicked .18. slack .21. an Epycure .18.32. seeketh the prymacie. 32.
• Gildas for the Britain's faith .11.13.
• God calleth / trieth / and delivereth .7.
• God now gathereth his church .15.
• God mocked of the papists .45.
• Good men from hypocrites are known .26.
• Gospel of the wounded man .25.
• Gossippes at Dubline .32. in procession .15.
• Grapes and thorns / what they are .47.48.
• Gregorius and Porphirius .45.

• HElias and Baals chaplaines .7
• Heretykes in Britain .13.
• Jerusalem / and not Rome / giveth faith to England .13.
• Jerusalem of the papists will fall .44.
• Hipocrites & Idolators with their plages .21. they dyfferre from good men .26. take away the key of knowledge .43.
• Holy day / observed in murder .29.
• Holmes court / a mansion .22.26.
• Horsegrome of lord Mountgarret .26.
• Hugh Goodaker / archebishopp of Armach .18. poysened .22.

• James Joys / a maliciouse Judas. 26.29.47.
• James parish priest of S. Jews .36.
• Jane Gilforde proclaimed Queen .23.
• Japheth the father of Europa .12.
• Idolatour / what he is else .21.
• Idolators no apt ministers .10.
• Idolators & hypocrites w ^t their plages .21.26.
• Idolatryes of our time .11.
• Idolatryes of Waterforde in Ireland .17.
• Idolatryes and hypocresies rebuked .21▪
• Jesus Christ called / persecuted / delivered .2.9.
• Ilandes established in faith .12.
• Images of our ladye heretical .45.
• Images / the lay mennis Calender .45.
• Impedimentes of the author .17.
• Johan Baptist / Hieremy / and Paul .3.9.
• Johan Evangelist .2▪ called .10. exyled .44.
• Johan / Peter / and Paul elected .10.
• Johan Zebide bannished .44.
• Johan Beuerle / a man of God .14.
• Johan Bale / called / afflicted / and delivered. .3.4.43. triumpheth in afflictions .4.7. rejoiceth in deliverance .3.4.41.43. defendeth y ^e kings boke .19. is sought to be slain .28.31. received at kylkennye .29. tempted of priests. .30. he fleeth .31. is taken of pirates .33. accused and examined .34.38. slandered .38. spoiled of all .40.41. and delivered .41.43.
• Joseph an Hebrew / preacheth in Britain .12.
• Irelād / a bishops daughter, & so brought up .32.
• Irish kearnes / conspire and rebelle .23.28.
• Judgment of popish governors .7.
• Julius and Cornelius Captains .6.
• Justices are wicked in Ireland .22.30.

• KEarnes / Irishe thieves and murderers .23.28.46.47.
• Kilkēnigh a civil town in Irelāde .19.24.27.
• Kinge Henry y ^e .viii. assisteth y ^e Gospel .15.
• Kīge Edward y ^e .6. favoreth y ^e author .4.16. Expelleth papystrye .15. his death .14. his exequyes .30. they help not .31. undefiled with papistrye .43.
• Kinge Lucius / converted of Tymothe .13.
• Kinge and counsel contempned .18.21.29.
• Kings of Britain / no persecutors .13.

• LAdy Mary / proclaimed Queen. 24.30.
• Lamb slain from the beginning .11.
• Lambert / abrenounceth papistrye .6.41.
• Latin service, of Antichrist .45.
• Lawers and priests in Ireland .46.47.
• Learned men saluteth the author .38.
• Lecherie of priests .18.21.27.
• Leonard / an Hollander .34.
• Lettre of the authors admission .16.38.
• Letters to be ware of poyseninge .22.
• Lord's and Captains cruel .46.
• Lucius / a king / converted of Tymothe .13.

• MAistres king was robbed .23.
• Marryage wyckedly contempned of priests .21.27.32.45.
• Martyne / a faithful Neapolytane .28.
• Martin an English pirate .38.
• Mass brought in again .22.27.30.35. what toys it hath .30. abolyshed .31. a torde newly painted .45.
• Melchizedek and other fathers .9. a father of the Gentyles .12.
• Mercenaryes loiter and ravish .44.
• Mihel patrick / maistre of thieves .23.27.47.
• Myles Coverdale / railed on .35.
• Miracles of deliverance .28.32.35.40.41.
• Moneye / y ^e cause of mischefe .34.36.37.38.40.
• Monkerye among the Britain's .13.
• Monks among the Saxons .14.
• Moūtgarret, maȳteineth murderers .23.26.46
• Murthers done of Irishe men .23.24.28.
• Murder keepeth holy day .29.

• NAtiuite of Christ .29.
• Natiuite of mary abrogated .29.
• Nobilite hateth not the truth .43.
• Noble mē / taketh not away the key of knowledge .43. how noble mē become ignoble .44.
• Noah preached afore y ^e flood & after .9.12.
• Noyses & rumors of mischefe .23.29.41.

• OBedience to magistrates .20.24.29.
• Office of a Christ̄ biship .2.
• Office of priests .20.
• Office of Christians .26.
• Ordre political and ecclesiastical .20.27.
• Ossorie / a bishopric in Ireland .2.16.42.
• Othe against papistry .31.
• Owners .iv. of the ship .40.

• PApistes / young lyddernes .3.
• Papists have contrary reioyces .3.22.24.27.36.
• Papism / resumed at kilkēnigh .27.
• Parels escaped of y ^e author .5.6.32.35.37.40.
• Paul boasteth of his vocation .4. He is elected. 10. He rejoiceth in persecucyons and deliverance. 3.4. He infourmeth Claudia / and seemeth to have preached in Britain .13.
• Paul's parels & the authors cōferred .4.5.6.
• People rejoiceth .4.18.28.29. Lamenteth the change in religyon .35.
• Peoples .iii. in Ireland .46.
• Persone / a monk and inquisitour .41.
• Peter / Johan / and Paul / elected .10.
• Philipp / y ^e Apostle preacheth in France .12.
• Philipp y ^e parish priest of knocktouer .18.
• Porphirius and S. Gregory .45.
• Practice / for the mass .23.30.
• Prayer of Noah / for Japheth .12.
• Prayer for the dead .17.20.25.30.
• Preachers of England now troubled .42.44.
• Prestes are persecutors and murderers .4.5.26.28.29.31. offended with God's word .20. .26. no redemers of souls .17.20.25.30. will not marry .20.27. prophecy with the devil▪ .21. disobedyent to the king .18.21.27.29. rejoiceth in king Edward's death .22.27.44. dispute for purgatory .25. perverteth the scriptures .26. resumeth papistryes .27. defendeth murder .29. keep holy days .29. compared to Satan .30. led by a daunsynge devil .31. setteth up images .31. afflicteth the English church .43. are lecherouse as gotes .43. and say yea & nay to God .44.45.
• Prestes in procession .ii. disguysed .24.
• Preste increaceth crysoms .36. howfeleth fishes .36.
• Preste at mass .30. turneth thryse .30.
• Primacye of Irelāde / ambicyously sought .32.
• Pryour of knoctouer W. had children .18.
• Procession general of priests .24.27.
• Proclamacion for both parties .31.

• REcantacyon of the author / looked for .24.
• Redēpciō is only of Christ / not of priests .20.25.26.
• Refusall / w ^t .iii. impedimentes .17.
• Registre of visitacions of England .14.
• Religion now in England .44.45.
• Richard Routhe / a lecherouse Judas .26.30.47.
• Robert Shea / suffren of kilkennie .5.25.28.
• Rome called Babylō / of Christ & of Peter .12.
• Ruffianes in Ireland / rebellinge .23.24.28.
• Rumours and noises .23.29.41.

• SAcrament preacheth .ii. things. 11.25.
• Saint Jews in Cornewale .34.
• Samaritan / and his offices .25.
• Samothees / and other teachers .12.
• Satan / always an enemy .28.48.
• Saxons subdued the Britain's .14.
• Scriptures {per}uerted of Sathā & y ^e papists .26.
• Seal of office / judged treason .38.39.
• Sermons of the author .21. last sermon .24.
• Sermons .ii. of the B. of Dublyne .32.
• Seruauntes .v. were slain .28.47.
• Seruaunt to the customer .36.
• Service boke / resisted .18.21.
• Seth / Enos / and other fathers .11.
• Syckenesse molesteth the author .16.19.
• Sowle of y ^e king, not holpen by funeralles .31.
• Sowles have not help of y ^e priests .17.20.25.27.
• States heavenly & political .20.27.
• Suffrages for the king .31.
• Sūme of y ^e authors doctrine .20.21.24.25.

• TEachers in Brytayne / afore Christ .12.
• Tempest of the sea .33.
• Thanks to God / for the dead .25.
• Thomas Cusake / lord chaūcellour of Irelan •
• Thomas Hothe / a wicked justice .22.24.27.30.
• Thomas lockwode / dean of Dubline .18.
• Thomas / a young man of Estsexe .32.37.
• Thorns & grapes / what they are .47.48.
• Thre causes of omittinge matters .46.
• Thre consideracions & chaunces .2.
• Thre people's of Ireland .46.
• Thre turns at mass .30.
• Thretteninges against the author .41.
• Tymothe / converteth king Lucius .13.
• Tyrauntes hate the verite of God .27.44.
• Transubstanciacion / or God making .15.
• Treason forged / to excuse theuerie .34.38.

• UAriaunce about shadows. 24.
• Viciose mē, no fit ministers .10.
• Vyllages tirannously oppressed .46.
• Vnthākefulnesse to God, plagued .36.42.43.49.
• Vocacion of the Author / just .4.16.
• Vocacion and election of God .9.

• WAlter / an Irish pirate / betrayeth .6.33. Accuseth .34. is bannished .37.
• Waterforde an ydolatrouse city .17.33.34.
• Weston / a lecherouse papist .4.45. interpreteth scripture .45.
• William / priour of knocktouer had childrē .18.
• Whoredom / boasted of a priest .36.
• Whoremongers / no apt ministers .10.
• Wyfe of a byshopp / provided for .32.
• Wyues persuaded to priests .20.
• Wounded man / restored .25.
• Writers, ii. against Coyne and lyuerye .4.6.
• Zele and study of the author .19.29.30.31

Correctyons / where as faults hath escaped in the pryntynge.

Fol. 6. pag. 1. li. 7. at Melita. li. 27. drowned. pag. ii. 14. at the last. fol. 8. pag. ii. li. 1. domini. fol. 9. pag. 1. li. 26. abominations. pag. ii. li. 24. customehowse. Itē homely. fol. 10. pag. ii. li. 6. Irenaeus. fo. 13. pag. 1. li. 26. Melanius. fol. 15. pag. ii. li. ii. call together. li. 26. or a caller. fo. 16. pag. 1. li. 6. Stoke. Itē do out the .iii. last lines. fo. 24. pa. ii. li. 24. justice Hothe. Itē li. 26. Our Christ was but one Christ. fol. 28. pag. ii. li. 3. the clock. fol. 29. pag. ii. li. 27. disdained. fol. 33. pag. 1. li. 17. an Irishe pirate. fo. 40. pag. 1. li. 10. in part of payment. fo. 45. pag. ii. li. 5. ye shall.

Imprinted in Rome / before the castle of S. Angel / at y ^e sign of S. Peter / in Decembre / Anno D· 1553.