Page:The Acts and Monuments of John Foxe Volume 3.djvu/471



of the aforesaid kingdom of Bohemia, and your own also, you will make a short end about the affairs of Master John Huss; forasmuch as by the means of his strait handling he is in great danger by any longer delay; even as they do most specially trust upon the most upright consciences and judgments of your fatherly reverences. But, forasmuch as, most reverend fathers and lords! it is now come to the knowledge and understanding of the nobles and lords of Bohemia here present, how that certain backbiters and slanderers of the most famous kingdom of Bohemia aforesaid have declared and told unto your reverences, how that the sacrament of the most precious blood of our Lord is carried up and down through Bohemia in vessels not consecrated nor hallowed, and that cobblers do now hear confessions, and minister the most blessed body of our lord unto others: the nobles, therefore, of Bohemia here present, require and desire you, that you will give no credit unto false promoters and tale-tellers, for that, as most wicked and slanders, naughty slanderers and backbiters of that kingdom aforesaid, they do report and tell untruths; requiring also your reverences, that such slanderous persons of the kingdom aforesaid may be named and known. And the lord the king, together with your reverences, shall well perceive and see that the lords of Bohemia will go about in such manner as to refel and put away the false and frivolous slanders of these naughty persons, that they shall be ashamed to appear hereafter before the lord the king and your reverences.

As soon as this their supplication was read, the bishop of Luthonis, rising up, said, “Most reverend fathers, I well perceive and understand, that the last part of this writing doth touch me, my familiars, and friends, as though the kingdom of Bohemia were slandered by us. Wherefore I desire to have time and space of deliberation, that I may purge myself from this crime that is laid against me.” The principal of the council appointed him the seventeenth day of May, at which clay the lords of Bohemia should be present again, to hear both the answer of the council, and also the excuse of the bishop of Luthonis; which thing indeed was afterward performed, for, the seventeenth day of May, which was the fourth day before Whitsuntide, they met there again; where, first of all, a certain bishop, in the name of the whole council, answered by word to the nobles of Bohemia; the contents of whose answer may easily be known by the second supplication which the Bohemians put up to the council. But first, I shall here, in these few words, show how the bishop of Luthonis defended himself against that which is before written.

Most reverend fathers and noble lords! as Peter de Mladoneywitz, bachelor of arts, in the name of certain of the nobles of the kingdom of Bohemia, in his writings, amongst other things did propound how that certain slanderers and the bishop backbiters of the said kingdom, have brought to the ears of yovir reverences, that the most precious blood of Christ is carried up and down in Bohemia in bottles, and that cobblers do hear confessions, and minister the body of Christ unto others; whereupon, most reverend fathers and lords, albeit that I, together with the other prelates, doctors, masters, and other innumerable catholics of the said kingdom, who do desire, as much as in them lieth, to defend the faith of Christ, have laboured for the extirpation and rooting out of that most wicked and detestable sect of Wickliff's, which now (alas! for sorrow) beginneth to spring and rise in the said kingdom, as it is well known: notwithstanding, here, in this my oration, not for any shame or reproof, but for the honour of the kingdom aforesaid, I have propounded and declared a certain new sect, which is now lately sprung up in the said kingdom, the followers whereof do minister and communicate the sacraments in many cities, towns, and places of the said kingdom, under both kinds, both of bread and wine, and do constantly teach