In the May weather of 1534, two Middlesex clergy, "walking to and fro in the cloyster garden at Sion, were there overheard compassing sedition and rebellion." John Hale, an eager, tumultuous person, was prompting his brother priest, Robert Feron, with matter for a pamphlet, which Feron was to write against the king.[398] "Syth the realm of England was first a realm," said Hale, "was there never in it so great a robber and piller of the commonwealth read of nor heard of as is our king..... He is the most cruellest capital heretic, defacer and treader under foot of Christ and of his church, continually applying and minding to extinct the same; whose death, I beseech God, may be like to the death of the most wicked John, sometime king of this realm, or rather to be called a great tyran than a king; and that his death may be not much unlike to the end of that manqueller Richard, sometime usurper of this imperial realm. And if thou wilt deeply look upon his life, thou shalt find it more foul and more stinking than a sow wallowing and defiling herself in any filthy place." [Sidenote: The Irish will persevere in the quarrel, and the Welsh will join them.] [Sidenote: Three parts of England be against the king.] These words were spoken in English; Feron translated them into Latin, and wrote them down. Hale then continued: "Until the king and the rulers of this realm be plucked by the pates, and brought, as we say, to the pot, shall we never live merrily in England, which, I pray God, may chance, and now shortly come to pass. Ireland is set against him, which will never shrink in their quarrel to die in it; and what think ye of Wales? The noble and gentle Ap Ryce,[399] so cruelly put to death, and he innocent, as they say, in the cause. _I think not contrary, but they will join and take part with the Irish, and so invade our realm. If they do so, doubt ye not but they shall have aid and strength enough in England. For this is truth: three parts of England be against the king, as he shall find if he need._ For of truth, they go about to bring this realm into such miserable condition as is France; which the commons see, _and perceive well enough a sufficient cause of rebellion and insurrection in this realm. And truly we of the church shall never live merrily until that day come_."[400] [Sidenote: The persecuting laws against the Catholics.] These informations may assist us in understanding, if we cannot forgive, the severe enactments--severely to be executed--which were passed in the ensuing parliament. [Sidenote: Effect of circumstances upon policy.] [Sidenote: A modern analogy.]