A Clerk. And the Clerk said to me, "Thou wouldst make us to fond with thee! Say we not that the Gospels are written in the Mass book?"
William. And I said, "Sir, though men use [are accustomed] to say thus, yet it is unperfect speech. For the principal part of a thing is properly the whole thing: for, lo, man's soul that may not now be seen here, nor touched with any sensible thing, is properly Man! And all the virtue of a tree is in the root thereof, that may not be seen; for do away with the root, and the tree is destroyed! And, Sir, as ye said to me, right now, GOD and His Word are of one authority; and, Sir, Saint Jerome witnesseth that Christ, Very GOD and Very Man, is hid in the letter of his Law; thus also, Sir, the Gospel is hid in the letter!
"For, Sir, as it is full likely many divers men and women here in the earth touched Christ, and saw him, and knew his bodily person; which neither touched, nor saw, nor knew ghostly his Godhead: right thus, Sir, many men now touch, and see, and write, and read the Scriptures of GOD's Law, which neither touch, see, nor read effectually the Gospel. For as the Godhead of Christ, that is, the virtue of GOD, is known by the virtue through belief; so is the Gospel, that is Christ's Word!"
A Clerk. And a Clerk said to me, "These be full misty matters and unsavoury, that thou showest here to us!"
William. And I said, "Sir, if ye, that are Masters, know not plainly this sentence, ye may sore dread that the Kingdom of Heaven be taken from you! as it was from the Princes of Priests and from the Elders of the Jews."
A Clerk (? Malveren). And then a Clerk, as I guess Malveren, said to me, "Thou knowest not thine equivocations! for the 'Kingdom of Heaven' hath diverse understandings. What callest thou the 'Kingdom of Heaven' in this sentence, that thou shewest here?"
William. And I said, "Sir, by good reason, and sentence of Doctors, the Realm of Heaven is called here, the understanding of GOD's Word."
A Clerk. And a Clerk said to me, "From whom, thinkest thou, that this understanding is taken away?"
William. And I said, "Sir, by authority of Christ himself, the effectual understanding of Christ's word is taken away from all them chiefly which are great-lettered [learned] men, and presume to understand high things, and will be holden wise men, and desire mastership and high state and dignity: but they will not conform them to the living and teaching of Christ and of His Apostles."
Archbishop. Then the Archbishop said, "Well, well, thou wilt judge thy sovereigns! By God! the King [Henry IV.] doeth not his duty, but he suffer thee to be condemned!"