Henry VI. was a devotee, and Edward IV. a voluptuary. The civil wars in England operated as fatally upon the noble order of knighthood as the civil wars in France had done in that country. In those contests, far fiercer than national hostilities, there was a ruthlessness of spirit that mocked the gentle influences of chivalry. Accordingly it was asked, in the time of Edward IV., "How many knights are there now in England that have the use and exercise of a knight? that is to say, that he knoweth his horse, and his horse him, ready to a point to have all things that belongeth to a knight; a horse that is according and broken after its kind, his armour and harness meet and fitting."[95] "I would," continues the father of English printing, "it pleased our sovereign lord that twice or thrice in a year he would cry jousts of peace, to the end that every knight should have horse and harness, and also the use and craft of a knight; and also to tourney, one against one, or two against two, and the best to have a prize, a diamond or jewel. The exercises of chivalry are not used and honoured as they were in ancient time, when the noble acts of the knights of England that used chivalry were renowned through the universal world. O ye knights of England, where is the custom and usage of noble chivalry? What do ye now but go to the bains and play at dice? Alas! what do ye but sleep and take ease, and are all disordered from chivalry? Leave this, leave it, and read the noble volumes of St. Graal, of Launcelot, of Tristrem, of Galaod, of Perceval, of Perceforest, of Gawayn, and many more. There shall ye see manhood, courtesy, and gentilness."[96] To this testimony of the decline of chivalry must be added the important fact that in 1439 people petitioned parliament for liberty to commute by a pecuniary fine the obligation to receive knighthood. This change of manners did not occur, as is generally supposed, in consequence of the use of gunpowder; for during the civil wars in England artillery was seldom and but partially used in the field, and, except at the great battle of Tewkesbury, in the year 1471, that arm of power had no effect on the general issue of battles. The cavalry and infantry were arranged in the old system: the lance was the weapon of those of gentle birth, while the bow and the bill were used by people of inferior state. Comines, who wrote about the close of the fifteenth century, says, that the archers formed the main strength of a battle.[97] [Sidenote: He exaggerates the evil.]