But though Henry neglected not to punish the Protestant doctrine, which he deemed heresy, his most formidable enemies, he knew, were the zealous adherents to the ancient religion, chiefly the monks, who, having their immediate dependence on the Roman pontiff, apprehended their own ruin to be the certain consequence of abolishing his authority in England. Peyto, a friar, preaching before the king, had the assurance to tell him, “that many lying prophets had deceived him; but he, as a true Micajah, warned him, that the dogs would lick his blood, as they had done Ahab’s.”[*] The king took no notice of the insult; but allowed the preacher to depart in peace. Next Sunday he employed Dr. Corren to preach before him; who justified the king’s proceedings, and gave Peyto the appellations of a rebel, a slanderer, a dog, and a traitor. Elston, another friar of the same house, interrupted the preacher, and told him that he was one of the lying prophets, who sought to establish by adultery the succession of the crown; but that he himself would justify all that Peyto had said. Henry silenced the petulant friar; but showed no other mark of resentment than ordering Peyto and him to be summoned before the council, and to be rebuked for their offence.[**] He even here bore patiently some new instances of their obstinacy and arrogance: when the earl of Essex, a privy councillor, told them that they deserved for their offence to be thrown into the Thames, Elston replied that the road to heaven lay as near by water as by land.[***] * Strype, vol. i. p. 167. ** Collier, vol. ii. p. 86. Burnet, vol. i. p. 151. *** Stowe, p. 562