[MATHETES.] My mind doth thirst, dear friend Philologus, Of former talk to make a final end: And where before we 'gan for to discuss The cause why God doth such afflictions send Into his Church, you would some more time spend In the same cause, that thereby you might learn Betwixt the wrath and love of God a right for to discern. PHILOLOGUS. With right good-will to your request herein I do consent, As well because, as I perceive, you take therein delight, As also for because it is most chiefly pertinent Unto mine office to instruct and teach each Christian wight True godliness, and show to them the path that leadeth right Unto God's kingdom, where we shall inherit our salvation, Given unto us from God by Christ our true propitiation. But that a better-ordered course herein we may observe, And may directly to the first apply that which ensue, To speak that hath been said before, I will a time reserve, And so proceed from whence we left by course and order due Unto the end. At first, therefore, you did lament and rue The misery of these our days, and great calamity, Which those sustain who dare gainsay the Romish hypocrisy. MATHETES. I have just cause, as hath each Christian heart, To wail and weep, to shed out tears of blood, When as I call to mind the torments and the smart, Which those have borne, who honest be and good, For nought else, but because their errors they withstood: Yet joyed I much to see how patiently They bore the cross of Christ with constancy. PHILOLOGUS. So many of us as into one body be Incorporate, whereof Christ is the lively head, As members of our bodies which we see With joints of love together be conjoined, And must needs suffer, unless that they be dead, Some part of grief in mind, which other feel In body, though not so much by a great deal. Wherefore by this it is most apparent, That those two into one body are not united, Of the which the one doth suffer, the other doth torment, And in the wounds of his brother is delighted: Now which is Christ's body may easily be decided; For the lamb is devoured of the wolf alway, Not the wolf of the lamb, as Chrysostom doth say. Again, of unrighteous Cain murthered was Abel, By whom the Church of God was figured: Isaac likewise was persecuted of Ishmael, As in the Book of Genesis is mentioned: Israel of Pharaoh was also terrified: David the saint was afflicted by his son, And put from his kingdom--I mean by Absalom. Elias the Thisbite, for fear of Jezebel Did fly to Horeb, and hid him in a cave: Michas the prophet, as the story doth tell, Did hardly his life from Baal's priests save: Jeremy of that sauce tasted have: So did Esay, Daniel, and the children three, And thousands more, which in stories we may see.