father's kingdom was
prepared not for such as should lay claim to it by austerities, prayers,
or fastings, but for those who should render themselves worthy of it by
the exercise of faith, and the offices of charity: I cannot own such as
depend on their own merits without a reliance on my mercy: as many of
you therefore as trust to the broken reeds of your own deserts may even
go search out a new heaven, for you shall never enter into that, which
from the foundations of the world was prepared only for such as are true
of heart. When these monks and friars shall meet with such a shameful
repulse, and see that ploughmen and mechanics are admitted into that
kingdom, from which they themselves are shut out, how sneakingly will
they look, and how pitifully slink away? Yet till this last trial they
had more comfort of a future happiness, because more hopes of it than
any other men. And these persons are not only great in their own eyes,
but highly esteemed and respected by others, especially those of the
order of mendicants, whom none dare to offer any affront to, because
as confessors they are intrusted with all the secrets of particular
intrigues, which they are bound by oath not to discover; yet many times,
when they are almost drunk, they cannot keep their tongue so far within
their head, as not to be babbling out some hints, and shewing themselves
so full, that they are in pain to be delivered. If any person give them
the least provocation they will sure to be revenged of him, and in their
next public harangue give him such shrewd wipes and reflections, that
the whole congregation must needs take notice at whom they are levelled;
nor will they ever desist from this way of declaiming, till their mouth
be stopped with a bribe to hold their tongue. All their preaching is
mere stage-playing, and their delivery the very transports of ridicule
and drollery. Good Lord! how mimical are their gestures? What heights
and falls in their voice? What toning, what bawling, what singing, what
squeaking, what grimaces, making of mouths, apes' faces, and distorting
of their countenance; and this art of oratory as a choice mystery,
they convey down by tradition to one another. The manner of it I may
adventure thus farther to enlarge upon. First, in a kind of mockery
they implore the divine assistance, which they borrowed from the solemn
custom of the poets: then if their text suppose be of charity, they
shall take their exordium as far off