o do justly; in warning such as kept public-houses for
entertainment that they should not let people have more drink than would
do them good. In fairs also and in markets I was made to declare against
their deceitful merchandise, cheating, and cozening; warning all to deal
justly, to speak the truth, to let their yea be yea, and their nay be
nay. Likewise I was made to warn masters and mistresses, fathers and
mothers in private families, to take care that their children and
servants might be trained up in the fear of the Lord; and that they
themselves should be therein examples and patterns of sobriety and
virtue.

But the earthly spirit of the priests wounded my life, and when I heard
the bell toll to call people together to the steeple-house it struck at
my life; for it was just like a market-bell to gather people together,
that the priest might set forth his wares to sale.

_III.--In Perils Oft_

Now as I went towards Nottingham on a first-day, when I came on the top
of a hill in sight of the town, I espied the great steeple-house, and
the Lord said unto me, "Thou must go cry against yonder great idol, and
against the worshippers therein." When I came there all the people
looked like fallow ground, the priest (like a great lump of earth) stood
in his pulpit above. Now the Lord's power was so mighty upon me that I
could not hold, but was made to cry out.

As I spoke, the officers came and took me away, and put me into a nasty,
stinking prison, the smell whereof got so into my nose and throat that
it very much annoyed me. But that day the Lord's power sounded so in
their ears that they were amazed at the voice. At night they took me
before the mayor, aldermen, and sheriffs of the town. They examined me
at large, and I told them how the Lord had moved me to come. After some
discourse between them and me, they sent me back to prison again; but
some time after the head sheriff sent for me to his house. I lodged at
the sheriff's, and great meetings we had in his house. The Lord's power
was with this friendly sheriff, and wrought a mighty change in him; and
accordingly he went into the market, and into several streets, and
preached repentance to the people. Hereupon the magistrates grew very
angry, and sent for me from the sheriff's house, and committed me to the
common prison. Now, after I was released from Nottingham gaol, where I
had been kept prisoner for some time, I travelled as before in the work
of the Lord.