Yea a hundred in England .

Well I will cell you , the fearefull judgements of God hangs ouer our heades , and cannot be long deferred , but fall vpon the whole land ( where to such dumbe idolls as you are , is committed the charge of soules ) and to your selues eternall destruction of bodie and soule : wherefore M. Vicker , as you tender your owne saluation , leaue this your vnlawfull calling of the ministery , and betake you to some occupation , or husbandrie .

I care not what any of you spightfull Puritans say , so long as I can haue the fauor of my Lorde Bishop .

I pray you M. Vicker let me spurre a question vnto you , if I may be so bolde ? where do you serue ?

I serue in Middlesex Sir .

Who made you minister ?

My good Lord of London .

Like enough , he hath made a greate many of blinde guides in his time besides you , for hee made the Porter of his gate , minister of Paddington , being blinde .

O monstrous , is this true , did he so indeede ?

It is most true , for the Bishop of Winchester hath recorded it in a booke of his set forth in print .

Why what will our Bishops growe to in time if they be suffered ? for me thinks this is a feareful thing , to make such ministers , as can neither see nor speake , for it is like if he were his porter , ( no doubt of it ) he had not the gift of teaching ?

Very true , but because he could doe him noe longer seruice , he was so good to him , to prouide for the poore blinde man that he might liue .

Sure I thinke when they come once to be Lords , they cleane forget God and al godlinesse , for I haue heard that there was some good thinges in him before he was Bishop of London , for he wrote a book called the Harborowe of faithful subiects , against Bishops : wherein he saith , Come downe yee Bishops with your thousands , and betake you to your hundreds , let your fare be Priestlike and not Princelike , &c.

Indeede he wrote such a booke , and the same words that you repeate , I haue read in the same : but alasse , when he was at the best , he was but a corrupt man , and the best things in it , sauor but of earth : for there is many things handled in it very immodestly , and vnchristianly : but one thing especially he setts downe there , which himselfe practiseth cleane contrary : where he speaks of the habilitie that shoulde be in every minister of the worde , that he shoulde knowe his quarter strooks , to be able to conuince the aduersary , &c.

Why ? will you haue none Ministers but such as can preach ? I can tell you , that the twentieth minister in the lande cannot preach ?

The more the worse , for you and the rest howe many soeuer there be stand without repentance in a most damnable state , for you are most notorious murtherers of soules , in taking vppon you so high a calling , & being so farre vnfitte for it : so many as perish for want of teaching , in your charge , their bloude the Lord wil require at your hands :

The Bishop knewe my abilitie before he made me minister .

Wel , he stands in the state of damnation as you doe , and thus much I say vnto you , and to all Idole Ministers , and to him , and all vsurping Archbishops and Lord Bishops , leaue your vnlawful callings into which you haue intruded your selues , and with speed repent , and humble your selues before the Majestie of God , confessing your horrible and grecuous sinnes with Peters teares , in that you are the cause , yea and also the verye murderers of so manye soules , as perish in your charges : knowing that the Lord will in that greate and terrible day , require their bloode at your hands .

O Lorde , my heart quaketh to heare of so greate and greeuous sinns as are in our Bishops , and in the whole ministerie : but our Bishops are the cause of all .

I will tel you Sir , I am perswaded in my very conscience , that the Lorde hath giuen many of our Bishops ouer into a reprobate sence , for they doe wilfully oppose them selues against the Lord his knoen truth , yea and persecute it , ( and I suppose them to be in the state of the sinne against the holy Ghost ) for they haue manifested in their published writings , yea & pressed forth by authoritie , suche horrible blasphemous , hereticall , yea damnable doctrines , whiche my very heart trembleth to repeate , in sorte as they haue set them down : which if those ( whome they falsly call puritanes ) shoulde set downe or holde the like errors and dangerous points , I warrant you the should soone be cut of from the face of the earth , and right well they were worthy .

Nowe Sir I pray you let me heare some of the pointes they holde , and that are so dangerous as you say , that I may be able to justifie it to our dumbe doggs teeth , at Austins gate in London when I come home .

First you shal vnderstand , the Bishop of London hath published in print , & that in an Epistle or preface before Barnardeus de loques booke of the Church , published in english , that the puritanes may as well deny the sonne of God to be consubstantiall with God the father , as they may deny the superioritie of Archbishops and Lord Bishops , flat contrary to the saying of our Sauiour Christ , Luke 22.

O monstrous and blasphemous wretch , that to maintaine his fleshly pleasure , will make such an odious comparison .

Nay , what say you to a Bishop that hath two wiues and both nowe liuing ? Doe you not thinke it is a thing tollerable in a christian common wealth , where the Gospel is professed ?

No indeed doe I not , I hope our magistrats wil not suffer such a Bishop to liue , it were monstrous among common Infidels , much more intollerable , that a Bishop in such a land as ours is , where the Gospell is truely taught : But I pray you is there any such now liuing ?

Yes in deed is there , and the Bishop of Saint Dauids in Wales is the man , he is nowe liuing and both his wiues , and yet stil remaines a Bishop .

Is it possible that a Bishop shoulde commit such an horrible act as this , howe far are our Bishopps from obeing the commaundement of th' Apostle Peter : who saith , Feede the flocke , and be ensamples to the flocke : what ensample is this ? And doeth not the same God which saith , Thou shalt doe noe murther , which is death by our lawes , doth he not also say , Thou shalte not commit adulterie : And yet a Bishop to haue twoe wiues at once , & liue in a Church professing the sinceritie of the Gospell : What say you to this Master Vicker , is not our Church wel gouerned thinke you ?

If it be true , it is ( I must needs confesse ) a horrible thing and worthy of death , but I do not beleeue it .

It is very true , for the cause was brought before the high commissioners at Lambehith , and howe it is smothered vp among the Bishops , and the rest of the commissioners , I know not yet , but I could tel you the whole couclusion if I were at London but halfe an houre .

Why the suffering of this , & other like villanies , to be committed in our nation , are causes to stir vp the Lord to wrath , against the whole land , wherby he may spedily bring his judgments vpon vs , yea euen to our vtter destruction .

It is so if it be true ? but I wil not beleeue it .

Wel for the truth of the matter , I referre you to the high commissioners , where it is recorded , with his wiues names , vz. Elizabeth Gigge and Ales Prime .

Indeede I haue heard of the like before , that you puritans haue put forth a booke in print vnder the name of Martine Marprelate , wherein many such things are mencioned :

There is nothing set downe in it , but there is good proofe of the same , & the Bishop of Winchester , who took vpon him to confute it , hath confirmed it for the most part , & that he denies is most true .

What did he vndertake to confute it ? Alas he is altogether vnlearned , ( for I haue heard of him in Oxford , and the papists say , they can make him beleeue the moone is made of greene cheese ) marry to get him a name ( forsooth ) being a correcter with a Printer in fleetstreete in London , who printed a Dictionarie called Sir Thomas Eliotts dictionarye , Cooper translated a peece of Robert Stephanus his Thesaurus and joined it to the same with a fewe phrases , and so bereaued the famous Knight of his labor , and calls it by the name of Coopers Dictionary : howe say you Master Vicker , was not this a knauish tricke tel me ?

I say you deale very vnreuerently with my Lord : for I cann say nothing to the matter else , for I knowe it not to be true ?

What say you to this then master Vicker did you neuer heare of your Lord Bishop of London , whoe made the Dyars , in Thames street whoe were robbed , by theeues that stoale their cloothe , and brought it within his liberties , which when the poore diars hearing where their clooth was , and comming to the Bishop to demaunde their own goods , he said : if they woulde hang the theeues , he woulde then tell them more , which the dyars did , and at their deathes , confessed that to be the dyars cloth which the Bishop had , but the pore men were neuer the neere for their cloth , nor cannot get it or any parte of it to this day : and this is confessed to be true , by the bishop of Winchester in his answere to Martine Marprelate , published in print by authoritie : wherein he saith , it is the Bishop of Londons own , by the lawes of the land , because it was taken within his liberties , mary he speaks nothing of the lawe of God , according to conscience , in keping of thiefe stollen goods from their right owners , for conscience is fled from them ( it seemes ) so soone as they are gotten to be Lord Bishops once .

Yes Sir I knowe there is such a booke named Martin Marprelate , a most vile and ssaunderous libel , but I doe not thinke my Lorde of Winchester doth approoue any thing that is set downe there in any of those books , for they haue put forth three or foure books vnder that title .

Why Master Vicker , howe doe they to get their books printed ?

Tush they doe wel enough for that , there is a sedstious fellowe one Walde-graue , who comonly prints all such bookes , ( I knowe him wel enough ) hee did keepe a shoppe at the signe of the Crane in Paules Churchyarde : at which time he had his presse and letters taken away from him , and destroyed for the same cause , by my Lords grace of Canterbury , & nowe he workes in corners vp and downe the Country like a vagabond .

With a seared conscience , did the Bishops that violence to him , in regarde both of the cause , and also for the greate charge he hath of wife and six smale children , and nowe to bereaue his Poore family of him , whose labors was their only comfort & maintenance .

Master Vicker how long was it since Walde-graues gooods were destroyed , I haue heard of him before nowe , but I knowe him not ?

Tushe you knowe him well enough I am sure , it is since his goodes were destroied about Ester was a twelue moneth .

And hath he bene all this time absent from his family ?

I Sir , and if he had bin there , he would easily haue bin had , for he hath bin watcht wel enough for that ?

I will tell you Sir howe they deale with him , when they haue any suspition that he is at home , although he durst neuer come home , they sticke not in the deade time of the nighte , to breake downe the maine wales of his house , and enter in with constables and pursiuants , and this is a common thing with them .

I am perswaded , the Bishops had bin better to haue giuen him freely 2. hundred pounds towards the setting vp of a newe printinge house for himselfe , then to haue destroied his as they haue done :

I thinke so , for it may be he woulde haue followed his calling some other way , then to be imploied in those things ?