Page:The Church, by John Huss.pdf/235



, as for the principal thing according to which they believe all their sayings to be necessary or true, the aforementioned doctors lay down that "obedience is due to the apostolic see and to prelates from inferiors in all things whatsoever, where the purely good is not prohibited or the purely evil commanded, but also in that which is intermediate, which, in view of the mode, place, time or person, may be either good or bad in accordance with the Saviour's statement, Matt. 23:2: 'Whatsoever they bid you, these do and observe.'" And they add the following from Bernard's Letter to Adam the Monk [Migne's ed., 182: 95], which begins thus: "'If thou remain in love, the law for obedience is fixed as in the tree of the knowledge of good and evil which was in the midst of paradise.' In such things certainly it is not right to submit our interpretation to the opinion of the magisters, and in such things neither the command nor the prohibition of prelates is in any wise to be spurned."

And they add: "But some of the clergy in the kingdom of Bohemia refuse to agree to this, endeavoring, as much as in them lies, to lead the faithful people to disobedience towards prelates and to irreverence towards the papal, episcopal, sacerdotal and clerical dignities, not giving attention to that which St. Augustine says in the words (Sermon 8): 'If thou hast fasted, hast made prayer night and day, if thou hast been in ashes or begging, if thou hast done nothing else except what is prescribed for thee in the law and thou hast been wise in thine own sight and not obedient to