Page:A history of Bohemian literature.pdf/146

Rh riches and of worldly advantage. No rank in Christendom, indeed, is nearer to a fall. For if he (the Pope) does not follow Christ and Peter in his way of life more than others (do), then he should be called not a successor, but an adversary of the Apostles. Therefore every one who strives for this dignity for the advantage of his person or for worldly honours is infected with simony. The second manner of committing simony consists in the various regulations which he (the Pope) issues for his bodily advantage and contrary to God's law, perhaps not openly, but they are regulations that may lead to something contrary to God's law. And is it not contrary to God's regulations that the Pope should decree that his cooks, porters, equerries, footmen, should have first claim on the most important benefices, even in lands of which they do not know the language? And again, that no one can announce anything (in church) if he has not paid down money, and whatever similar arrangements may be made. The third manner in which a Pope can commit simony consists in appointing bishops or rectors for the sake of money; and that case has been made quite clear to us recently, when many thousands of florins were paid down for the Archbishopric of Prague."

At the end of the same chapter Hus refers to the question of indulgences, which from his time to that of Martin Luther was ever before the Christian world. He writes: "With regard to the giving indulgences for money, St. Peter has sufficiently shown that they are worthless when he refused to give for money to Simon