Against these examples of crime and ignorance may be set the fact that there was never any such violent and unanimous attack upon the secular clergy as we find against the friars. And we may fairly conclude that Chaucer’s portrait of the Parson was drawn from the life, and that there were among the London clergy many who might have sat for models:— “A good man was ther of religioun, And was a povre PERSOUN of a toun; But riche he was of holy thoght and werk. He was also a lerned man, a clerk, That Cristes gospel trewely wolde preche; His parisshens devoutly wolde he teche. Benigne he was, and wonder diligent, And in adversitee ful pacient; And swich he was y-preved ofte sythes. Ful looth were him to cursen for his tythes, But rather wolde he yeven, out of doute, Un-to his povre parisshens aboute Of his offring, and eek of his substaunce. He coude in litel thing han suffisaunce ... This noble ensample to his sheep he yaf, That first he wroghte, and afterward he taughte; Out of the gospel he tho wordes caughte; And this figure he added eek ther-to, That if gold ruste, what shal iren do? For if a preest be foul, on whom we truste, No wonder is a lewed man to ruste; And shame it is, if a preest take keep, A shiten shepherde and a clene sheep. Wel oghte a preest ensample for to yive, By his clennesse, how that his sheep shold live.” “A bettre preest, I trowe that nowher noon is. He wayted after no pompe and reverence, He maked him a spyced conscience, But Cristes lore, and his apostles twelve, He taughte, and first he folwed it him-selve.” Chaucer makes the wife of the miller of Trumpington daughter of a priest and brought up in a nunnery. On this fact Skeat has a note[17] of comment. “The statement, that the parson of the town was her father, has caused surprise. In Bell’s _Chaucer_ the theory is started that the priest had been a widower before he took orders, which no one can be expected to believe; it is too subtle. It is clear that she was an illegitimate daughter; that is why her father paid money to get her married to a miller, and why she thought ladies ought to spare her (and not to avoid her), because it was an honour to have a priest for a father, and because she had learnt so much good-breeding in a nunnery.” The Religious Life of a Mediæval City largely consisted of the monastic life, and this again was divided between the monks and the friars.