And therefore Pope John xxii. sent letters to them,
how Christian faith should be all one; and that they should be
obedient to the Pope, that is God's Vicar on earth, to whom God
gave his plein power for to bind and to assoil, and therefore they
should be obedient to him.
And they sent again diverse answers; and among others they said
thus: POTENTIAM TUAM SUMMAM CIRCA TUOS SUBJECTOS, FIRMITER
CREDIMUS. SUPERBIAM TUAM SUMMAM TOLERARE NON POSSUMUS. AVARITIAM
TUAM SUMMAM SATIARE NON INTENDIMUS. DOMINUS TECUM; QUIA DOMINUS
NOBISCUM EST. That is to say: 'We trow well, that thy power is
great upon thy subjects. We may not suffer thine high pride. We
be not in purpose to fulfil thy great covetise. Lord be with thee;
for our Lord is with us. Farewell.' And other answer might he not
have of them.
And also they make their sacrament of the altar of Therf bread, for
our Lord made it of such bread, when he made his Maundy. And on
the Shere-Thursday make they their Therf bread, in token of the
Maundy, and dry it at the sun, and keep it all the year, and give
it to sick men, instead of God's body. And they make but one
unction, when they christen children. And they anoint not the sick
men. And they say that there is no Purgatory, and that souls shall
not have neither joy ne pain till the day of doom. And they say
that fornication is no sin deadly, but a thing that is kindly, and
that men and women should not wed but once, and whoso weddeth
oftener than once, their children be bastards and gotten in sin.
And their priests also be wedded.
And they say also that usury is no deadly sin. And they sell
benefices of Holy Church. And so do men in other places: God
amend it when his will is! And that is great sclaundre, for now is
simony king crowned in Holy Church: God amend it for his mercy!
And they say, that in Lent, men shall not fast, ne sing Mass, but
on the Saturday and on the Sunday. And they fast not on the
Saturday, no time of the year, but it be Christmas Even or Easter
Even. And they suffer not the Latins to sing at their altars; and
if they do, by any adventure, anon they wash the altar with holy
water. And they say that there should be but one Mass said at one
altar upon one day.
And they say also that our Lord ne ate never meat; but he made
token of eating. And also they say, that we sin deadly in shaving
our beards, for the beard is token of a man, and gift of our Lord.
And they say that we sin deadly in eating of beasts that were
forbidden in the Old Testament, and of the old Law, as swine, hares
and other beasts, that chew not their cud. And they say that we
sin, when we eat flesh on the days before Ash Wednesday, and of
that that we eat flesh the Wednesday, and eggs and cheese upon the
Fridays. And they accurse all those that abstain them to eat flesh
the Saturday.
Also the Emperor of Constantinople maketh the patriarch, the
archbishops and the bishops; and giveth the dignities and the
benefices of churches and depriveth them that be unworthy, when he
findeth any cause. And so is he lord both temporal and spiritual
in his country.
And if ye will wit of their A.B.C. what letters they be, here ye
may see them, with the names that they clepe them there amongst
them: Alpha, Betha, Gama, Deltha, e longe, e brevis, Epilmon,
Thetha, Iota, Kapda, Lapda, Mi, Ni, Xi, o brevis, Pi, Coph, Ro,
Summa, Tau, Vi, Fy, Chi, Psi, Othomega, Diacosyn.
And all be it that these things touch not to one way, nevertheless
they touch to that, that I have hight you, to shew you a part of
customs and manners, and diversities of countries. And for this is
the first country that is discordant in faith and in belief, and
varieth from our faith, on this half the sea, therefore I have set
it here, that ye may know the diversity that is between our faith
and theirs. For many men have great liking, to hear speak of
strange things of diverse countries.
CHAPTER IV
[Of the Way from Constantinople to Jerusalem.] Of Saint John the
Evangelist. And of the Ypocras Daughter, transformed from a Woman
to a Dragon
NOW return I again, for to teach you the way from Constantinople to
Jerusalem. He that will through Turkey, he goeth toward the city
of Nyke, and passeth through the gate of Chienetout, and always men
see before them the hill of Chienetout, that is right high; and it
is a mile and an half from Nyke.
And whoso will go by water, by the brace of St. George, and by the
sea where St. Nicholas lieth, and toward many other places - first
men go to an isle that is clept Sylo. In that isle groweth mastick
on small trees, and out of them cometh gum as it were of plum-trees
or of cherry-trees.
And after go men through the isle of Patmos; and there wrote St.
John the Evangelist the Apocalypse. And ye shall understand, that
St. John was of age thirty-two year, when our Lord suffered his
passion; and after his passion, he lived sixty-seven year, and in
the hundredth year of his age he died.
From Patmos men go unto Ephesus, a fair city and nigh to the sea.
And there died St. John, and was buried behind the high altar in a
tomb.
