+William.+ And I said to them, "Sirs, ye speak here full generally and largely! What, if a Prelate commanded his subject to do an unlawful thing, should he obey thereto?" +Archbishop.+ And the Archbishop said to me, "A subject ought not to suppose that his Prelate will bid him do an unlawful thing. For a subject ought to think that his Prelate will bid him do nothing but that he will answer for before GOD, that it is lefull [_lawful_]: and then, though the bidding of the Prelate be unlawful, the subject hath no peril to fulfil it; since that he thinketh and judgeth that whatsoever thing his Prelate biddeth him do, that is leful to him for to do it." =A MAN OF LAW AND A MASTER OF DIVINITY.= +William.+ And I said, "Sir, I trust not hereto! But to our first purpose! Sir, I tell you that I was once in a gentleman's house, and there were then two Clerks there, a Master of Divinity and a Man of Law; which Man of Law was also communing in divinity. And among other things, these men spake of oaths. And the Man of Law said, 'At the bidding of his Sovereign which had power to charge him to swear, he would lay his hand upon a book, and hear his charge; and if his charge, to his understanding were unlawful, he would hastily withdraw his hand from the book; and if he perceived his charge to be leful he would hold still his hand upon the book, taking there only GOD to witness that he would fulfil that leful charge after his power.' And the Master of Divinity said then to him thus, 'Certain, he that layeth his hand upon a book in this wise, and maketh there a promise to do that thing that he is commanded, is obliged there, by book oath, then, to fulfil his charge. For, no doubt, he that chargeth him to lay his hand thus upon a book, touching the book and swearing by it, and kissing it, promising in this form, to do this thing or that, will say and witness, that he that toucheth thus a book and kisseth it, hath sworn upon that book; and all other men that see that men thus do, and also all those that hear thereof in the same wise, will say and witness that _this man hath sworn upon a book!_ Wherefore,' the Master of Divinity said, 'it was not leful, neither to give nor to take any such charge upon a book! for every book is nothing else but divers creatures [_created things_], of which it is made of: therefore to swear upon a book, is to swear by creatures! and this swearing is ever unleful.' "This sentence witnesseth CHRYSOSTOM, plainly blaming them greatly, that bring forth a book for to swear upon, charging Clerks that in nowise they constrain anybody to swear, whether they think a man to swear true or false." And the Archbishop and his Clerks scorned me, and blamed me greatly for this saying. And the Archbishop menaced me with great punishment and sharp, except I left this opinion of swearing.