PASQVIL THE plain.  
LONDINI IN aedibus THOMAE BERTHELETI. M. D. XXXIII.   

¶ Thomas Elyot knight to gentle readers.  
SEns plainness in speaking is of wise men commen ded, and diverse do abhor long prohemes of rhetoric: I haue set out this merry treatise / wherein plainness and flateri do come in trial / in such wise as none honest man will be therwith offended. The personages, that do reason, be of small reputation: For Pasquillus, that speaketh most, is an image of ston, sitting in the city of Rome openly: on whom ones in the year, it is leeful to every man, to set in verse or prose any taunte that he will / again whom he lift, howe great an estate so ever he be. Not withstanding in this book he vsith such a temperance / that he noteth not any particular person or country. Gnatho was brought in by writers of Comedies for such a servant / as alway affirmed, what so ever was spoken of his master: but he was a greek born, and therfore he sauorith some what of rethorike. Pasquille is an old roman / but by long sitting in the street, and hering market men chat, he his become rude and homely.  
Harpocrates was the prelate of the temple of Isis and Serapis, which were honorid for goddis in egypt / whose image is made holding his finger at his mouth, betokeninge silence. These three communed to gether, as it followeth / but where, I had forgotten to ask,. All be it because the matter is merrily brought in, and therwith savoureth somewhat of wisdom: I thought hit not inconvenient to participate it with you that will not interpret it but according to the beste meaning, And in the reading this littill treatise distinctly, will consider diligently the state and condition of the person that speaketh / with the order and conclusion of his hole reason. And if it seem to you, that pasquil saith true, in declaring howe much ye do favour truth, defend him against venomous tongues and overthwart wittis, which doth more myschieffe, than Pasquillus babillinge.  
Fare ye well.   
Pasquillus. Gnato. Harpocrates. PASQVILL. 
IT is a wonder to se the world: Now a daies, the more strange the better liked, therfore vnnethe a man may know an honest man from a false harlot. But peace / who is this gentleman that standeth here harkenynge? What I say mine old fellow Gnatho, I pray the come forth, ye steal not so away. Perdye I know your old fashion / though ye be now thus strangely disguised.  GNATO. 
Who speaketh to me: pasquil? Sawest thou not Harpocrates late? I seek for him, he must come to my master.  PASQILL. 
I wote not whither thyneye sought for Harpocrates, but sure I am, that thyn ere sought for Pasquillus. But I pray the turn about: thou hast the strangest apparaise that ever I looked on: What haue we here? A cap full of aglettes & bottons this long estrige feather doth wonderly well / the tirfe of the cap turned down afore like a pentise hath a marvelous good grace: but this long gown with straight greves is a non sequitur, and hit shall let you to flee, & than your feathers shall stand you in no stede, and so might ye happen to be cumbered, if ye should come in to a stour, where ye would shift for yourself. God a vow what dost thou with this long typpet? If it were white as it is black, I wolde haue said, thou camest to challenge men at wrestling, but I ween ye haue walked latein the street, and pulled it from some worshipful doctor. What a gods name / haue ye a book in your hand? A good feloweshyp whereof is it? Let me se. Nouum testamentum? What / thou deceivest ●● / I had wend thou couldst haue skilled of nothing but only of flattery. But what is this in your bosom? An other book, or else a pair of cards of valery salse head? did I not say at the first / that it is a wonder to se this world? Lo some will be in the bowels of divinity er they know what belongeth to good humanity. Let se, what is here?  
troilus and Chreseyd? Lord what discord is between these two books? Yet a great deal more is there in thyn aparayll. And yet most of all between the book in thy hand and thy conditions. As god help me / as much as between trouth and leasynge.  GNA. 
Well Pasquillus / thou wilt never leave thyn old custom in railing. Yet hast thou wit enough to perceive what damage and hindrance thou hast thereby sustained: and more arte thou likely & with greater peril / if thou haue not good await / what, and to whom / and where thou speakest. I herde the words that thou spakest while ere, whereof it I wolde be a reporter, it might turn the to no little displeasure: but I know that thou arte a good fellow, and wouldest that all thing were well, though thy words be all crabbed. wherefore not withstanding that thou speakest rebukefully to me, I take hit in jape, ne will carry hence with me the presumptuous words that thou spakest. But by mine aduise leave now at the last thin undiscrete liberty in speech, wherein thou usest unprofitable taunts and rebukes / I may well call them unprofitable, whereby nothing that thou blamist / is of one iote amended, and thou losest thereby preferment, which thyn excellent wit doth require: & that wors is / trauailest in study of mind to augment thin own detriment, and therein losist much time, that might be better employed.  
¶ I remember, that ones I asked a man, that was wise and very well learned, howe I might soonest come to promotion: he said. using Aeschylus counsel / which was a writar of tragedies: and I demanded, what it was? And he answered, holding thy tongue where it behoveth the. And speaking in time that which is convenient. And the same lesson Pasquillus if thou woldeste observe / I doubt not, but that thou shouldest find therein no little commodity.  PAS. 
Mary Gnato I will no more wonder at thy side gown: for thou arte much wysar than I supposed. I had wende all this while, that by nature onely thou hadst ben instructed to flatter, but by saint I one I se now, that thou ioynest also thereto a shrewd wit, and preparest to the helping therof as it were a craft gathered of learning and scripture. Notwithstanding a good fellowship / if thy tarrying shall not be grievous or hurtful unto the( for I know howe expedient it is that thou be not long out of the sight of thy master, if thou wilt be Gna tho alone) tell me how thou understandest the said sentence of Aeschylus tragedy: for I fear we two do vnderstonde him dyuersely, & than thy counsel in respect to thy purpose shall little profit me.  GNA. 
Supposest thou so? In good faith and to me it seemeth so plain, that it needeth none expositor, but to the intent that my counsel to the may take some effect, in the little time that I may now tarry, I will as come pendiously as I can show my conceit / in declaring what I think / that Aeschylus mente by the said sentence.  
¶ It behoveth a man to hold his tongue, when he aforeseeth by any experience, that the thing / which he wolde purpose or speak of to his superior / shall neither be pleasantly herde nor thankfully taken. And in words opportunity & time alway do depend on the affection and appetite of him that heareth them.  
How sayest thou pasquil, is it not so?  PASQVILL. 
So? No so mote I go. But one thing here me. I will not flatter the Gnatho. If thou vnderstandeste no better the new testamtnt( which thou cariest as solemnly with thee, as thou shul dost rede a prive lesson / Hem I had almost told where openly) than thou dost Aeschylus sentence / which as if thou hadst been learned, thou toldest to me for a counsel, thy brethe will be so hote shortly, that thou wilt make men afeard to come within twenty foot of the.  
And hark in thine ear. By my trouth, I ween it be neither better nor warse.  GNATO. 
will ye not leave your overthwart fashion. I can no more. I se it is vain to counsel a mad man to look to his profit. Fare well, I haue somewhat else to do / than to attend to thy pratynge.  PASQVILL. 
What be you angry for this? look on the book in your hand: perdieu hit agreeth not with your profession to be out of charity. But gentle Gnatho tarry so long as I may show thee how I understand the said sentence of Aeschylus.  GNATO. 
Say on.  PASQVILL. 
¶ Where two hostes be assembled, and in point to fight: if thou be among them, though thou be a great astronomer / it behoveth the to hold thy tongue / and not to talk of conjunctions, and of the trine or quartil aspects, but to prepare the to bataylle. Where a good fellowship is set at dice or at cards, though thou be learned in geometry: hold thy tongue, and speak not of proporcions or figures. Where men be set at a good supper / and be busily occupied in eating and drinking, though thou be deeply sene in philosophy / hold thy tongue and dispute not of temperance / or moderate diet. Where thou arte among a great company, at bankettinges or other recreations: though thou be well learned in holy scripture, hold thy tongue, interpret not Paules epistles / for therein is no dalliance.  
when thou arte sitting in counsel about matters of weighty importance: talk not than of pass time or dalliance, but omitting affection or dreede, speak than to the purpose.  
Where thou seeste thy friend in a great presence hououred of all men, though thou knowest in him notable vices, yet there hold thy tongue, and reproach him not of them. Where thou seest thy lord or master in the presence of many / resolved in to fury or wantonness, though thou hast all redy advertisements, howe he shall refrain it: yet hold thy tongue than / for troublynge that presence.  
¶ On the other parte. If before battle joined, thou beholdest thy side the weiker: and thine aduersaries more puissant and stronger: speak than of policy, whereby thou hopest to obtain the victory.  
¶ Before that thy friend syttethe down to dice, if thou dost perceive, that he shal be overmatched: discourage him betime / or he repent him in poverty.  
¶ when thy friends be set down to supper / before the cups betwise filled: rehearse the peril and also dishonesti that happeneth by gluttony.  
¶ when young men and women haue appoynted a banquet, than er the ovens be heat / and tables all covered / rehearse hardly the sentences of saint paul, or saint jerome, if thou be learned.  
If thou be called to counsel / after thou hast either herde one raisonne bifore the / or at the masspriest weigh, in the balance of thine own raisin ponderid the question: spare not to show thine aduise, & to speak truly / remembring that god is not so far of, but that he can here the.  
¶ If thou knowest a 'vice in thy friend, which is of a few men suspected, er it be talked of at the tavern, or of his enemy reproached / warn him of the damage that may happen / if it be not amended.  
¶ when thou percciuest thy master to be resolved in to wrath or affections dishonest, Before wrath be incresed in to fury, and affection in to voluptuous appetite. As opportunity serveth the / reverently and with tokens of love toward him, speak such words as shal be convenient.  
¶ Oportunite consisteth in place or time / where and when the said affections or passion of wrath be some deal mitigate and out of extremity. And words be called convenient, which haue respect to the nature and state of the person, unto whom they be spoken, and also to the detriment / which might ensue by the 'vice or lack that thou hast espied, & it ought not to be as thou hast supposed. For oportunite & time for a counsayllour to speak / do not depend of the affection and appetite of him that is counseled: mary than counsel were but a vain word, and every man wolde do as him lift.  
For if he listed not to here any counsel, he should never be warned of his own error, but by satiety and tediousness of his own 'vice, or by grace( if he were worthy to haue it)  GNA. 
now by the faith I owe to god / I would not haue thought / that thou hadst ben so well raysoned. For men haue alway reputed the but for a babbler and raylar.  PASQVILL. 
Ye what men? By god those / which ought most to haue thanked me. I say, hark in thine ear: Popes, emperours / kings / and cardinalles. Thou hearest what I say. when they, by such as thou & Harpocrates be / were with flattery and dissimulation brought in to the hate of god and the people, ones in year / I gave thē warning, neither for menaces, nor yet for beatynges, I never cessed. Thou arte remembered when pope lo swore, that he wolde throw me in to the river of tiber. And that year I went to saint james on pilgrimage / which I avowed, if I escaped drowning. But in a unlucky hour was I a pylgreme: for sens there haue comen both to saint james at Compostella, and to saint Peter at Rome every year ten thousand pilgremes fewer, than there did a thousand yeres before that time. And men say, that in other countries dyvers monasteries be like to break hospitality, because their offerings be not the thyrde parte so much as they were accustomend. For in dede now a daies mens devotion waxeth even as cold / as the mounkes be in the quyer at midnyght. that commodity had Rome by mine absence. And yet after mi pilgrimage done, I had for mi trouth & plainness as much {per} done of god, as if I had bylded one cloister in Rome / and an other in Parise / & put in to everich of them an hundred friers conuentuals. And yet were that a blessed dede, if the lawe were not again incresing of valiant beggars. But to my purpose. If these men that we spake of / had wisely & coldly expended and tried my words, that they called railing, many things might haue ben prevented / that were after lamented.  
Germany should not haue kicked again her mother: Emperours and princis should not haue ben in perpetual discord / & often times in peril, prelates haue ben laughed at, as di●●sardes: saints blasphemed, and miracles reproved for iougglynges / laws and statutes contemned / and officers little regarded. What must needs follow / sens my breath faileth me? I leave that to the Gnatho to conject, for thou arte wise moughe to consider.  GNA. 
I know what thou meanest / but a fellowship leave thy bourdinge and currishe philosophy, sens it is neither profitable / pleasant, nor thankful. Who wolde be so mad to drive about a mill, and is sure / that all the meal / that he gryndeth / shall fall on the floor: saving a little mylduste / that shall fly in to his eyen, and put him to pain and perchance make him blind? And thou studyest ot speak many good words, which be lost in the rushes: and if any ill meaning may be pycked out, it is cast in thy nose to put thee in danger. Lese no more labour Pasquyll / but follow my counsel: and if within two yeres thou be new painted and gylt / and haue mo men wondryng at the, than at any other image in Rome, by my truth I will stand in the rain and son as long as thou hast done, and yet it were an vuresonable wager.  PAS. 
Go to let se what is thy counsel?  GN. 
Mary I will tell thee. Thou hast a very sharp wit and a redy: wherefore thou arte meet for the world. And pity it were, that such a jewel should be neglected.  PAS. 
And pity hit were, that such a flaterar as thou art / should long be vnhanged. But pass on a goddis name.  GNA. 
I wist well, that in such as frowarde pice of tymbre I should lose much labour: yet will I prove / if good counsel may work any thing in the. now here pasquil what I say. By thy long railinge, thy wit is well known. Now turn the lief. And when thou herist any thing purposed by them / whom thou hast offendid, what so ever it be, affirm it to be well / and therwith advance the wit and intent of the person that spake it, which thou mayst do excellently well. For he that can despise spytefully, can if he list, praise and commend also in comparably. And if thou canst not refrain from rebukinge and tauntinge: practise thy natural fury and woodenesse again them that repugn again the said purpose. And where thou didst wonder to see me haue in my hand the new testament / if thou wouldest do the same, and now in thyn age, lay apart the lesson of gentiles, called humanity, sens thou mayst haue good leisure / being not yet called to counsel / pike out here and there sentences out of holy scripture, to fournyshe thy reason with authority. I make god avow, thou shalt be within three months able to confound the greatest divine in all Italy. And when thy conversion and good opinion is known, than shalt thou be called fore. But than alway remember howe so ever the tenor bell ryngeth, he ryngeth alway in tune and though he jar somewhat / yet thou canst not here it / his soune is so great / and thine ears be so little. And if other men finde it, say that it is no fault, but a quaver in music / and became the bell, if they had the wit to perceive it. I teach thee in parables, for this craft wolde not be opened to every man: for it should not be for my profit: but thy subtle wit comprehendeth all that I mean, thou art so acquainted with all our experience.  PAS. 
Now on my faith well said / I could not haue founden a craftier knave to learn of between this and jerusalem. But cometh here? He seemeth a reverend {per}sonage, he is none of thy sort I trow?  GN. 
By god we be right cosens, I by the mother side, and he by the father. And that caused me to speak so much as I do / and him so little, and yet is there small diversity between our conditions.  PAS. 
What meaneste thou thereby?  GNA. 
For we both haue one master. And when he spekethe / or doethe any thing for his pleasure: I study with words to commend it. If my couseyn stand by / he speaketh little or nothing / but formynge his visage in to a gravity with silence / looketh as if he affirmed all thing, that is spoken.  PAS. 
What is his name?  GN. 
Harpocrates.  PAS. 
That is a hard name by Iesus. But why holdeth he his finger at his mouth.  GNA. 
For he hath espied me talking / and because he weeneth, that I speak to much, he maketh a sign / that I should cease: but I am glad, that I haue met with him. cousin Harpocrates I haue sought for you this two houres.  PAS. 
Why speaketh he not?  GN. 
O that is his gravity to pause a while or he speak, he learned it when he was student at Bonony.  HARPO. 
What is the matter Gnato?  GN. 
My master when he hath dined, will sit in counsel about weighty causes.  HAR. 
And when I haue dined / I will give attendance.  PAS. 
Lo is it not as I said, a wonder to se this world?  
In old time men used to occupy the morning in deep & subtle studies, and in counsels concerning the commune weal, and other matters of great importance. In like wise than to here controversies, and give judgements. And if they had any causes of their own / than to treat of them. and that did they not without a great consideration. proceeding both of natural reason, and also counsel of physic.  
And after dinner they refreshed their wits, either with instruments of music, or with redynge or hearing some pleasant story, or beholding some thing delectable and honest. And after their dinner was digested / joanne either they exercised themselves in riding / running on foot / shooting, or other like pastime / or went with their hawks to se a flight at the river, or would se their grehoundes course the hare, or the dere: which they did as well to recreate their wits / as also to get them good appetite. But lo now all this is turned in to a new fascion, god help us, the world is almost at an end: For after noon is turned to fore noon / virtue into 'vice, 'vice into virtue / devotion into hypocrisy, and in some places men say / faith is turned to herisye. did I not now say well at the beginning. That it is a wonder to see this world?  HAR. 
Hem Pasquillus.  PAS. 
well, ye think as much as I speak for all your pointing and wynking.  HAR. 
But in silence is surety.  PAS. 
perchance nay. If I perceived one at thy back with a sword drawn, redy to strike the / wouldest thou that I should hold my peace / or else tell the?  HARPOCRAT. 
nay, silence were than out of season.  PASQVILLVS. 
Now well fare you for your bald reason, a man may see what wisdom there is in your compendious speaking / ye will season silence. Marye I ween my lord should haue a better cook of you joanne a counsayllour. Not withstanding for your silence ye might be a confessor. But yet I doubt me: for I remember Gnato what thou least while ere / that when ye were present both with your master, if thou commendest his sayings or doings / this man would approve it with silence & countenance, which might do more harm / than all thy flatcry / than what mischief might follow of his damnable silence, if in secret time of confession, wherein confessors haue above all men most largest liberty to blame & reprove / he should either dissemble the vices that he knoweth in him, whom he hath in confession / or else forbear to declare to him the enormity of such capytall sins as he hath confessed.  GN. 
By my trouth thou art a busy fellow, dost thou remember / what thou least, when thou didst espy, that I had a book of the new Testament.  PASQ. 
What said I?  GNA. 
Mary this thou least / that some wolde be in the bowels of divinity or they know what belongeth to good humanity. now thou takest thyself by the nose: for without having regard to whom thou speakest / thou presumest to teach this worshipful man what he shall do in confession.  PAS. 
It is well raysoned of you by sweet saint Ronyon: ye define teaching, as well as he did season his silence. diddest thou here me teach him, what he should do? Nay and if thou hast so much wit to remember / vpon the words that thou thyself spakest / I declared what inconvenience might happen by the flaterynge silence of a confessor: weenest thou that I was never confessed? Yes I haue told a tale to a friar or this time, with a groat in my hand / and haue ben assoiled forthwith without any further rehearsal: where if a poor man had told half so much, he should haue ben made equal to the divell / and haue ben so chidde, that when he had gone from confession, he should haue hanged down the eres / as if he had ben learning of prick song. All be it / it is the custom of some of you, that be courtiars, when ye can not defend your matter with raisin, to embrayed him that speaketh with presumption, treason / misprision or such other like pretty morselles / to stop him of talking.  
But between two men full of words, truth shall never or late be espied: wherefore I will no more Gna tho meddel with thee, but from hens forth I will speak to Harpocrates: for if he can persuade me, that his silence is better than my babblynge. I will follow his doctrine rather than thyn / for I haue professed from my childhood never to speak in earnest to my master or friend / contrary to that, that I think.  GNA. 
Ergo thou hast professed to stand still in the rain / and ones perchance to be thrown in to tiber, or broken in pieces.  PAS. 
And perchance if god never lied / I may be in the palace merry / when thou shalt sit without on a ladder / and make all thy friends sorry. Herdest thou never, that the world is round, and therfore it is ever turning, now the wrong side upward, an other time the right, but let this pass. I pray the Harpocrates teach me howe thou dost season thy silence, dost thou hit with salt or with spices?  HARPOCRAT. 
nay, with sugar, for I use little salt.  PAS. 
And that maketh your counsel more sweet than savoury.  HARPOCRA. 
Ye speak like a poticary.  PASQVILL. 
And I haue known a wise poticarie done much more good, if he were trusted, than a foolish physician. But now to thy silence / that thou so much praisest Harpocrates, Thou least that in silence was surety. And I asked, If I perceived one at thy back with a sword drawn redy to strike the, whither should I speak or keep silence? And thou answeredst, that silence was than out of season.  HARPO. 
So said I.  PAS. 
I can the thank, thou abidest by thy word: although at this day / that be accomted no policy. But why saidst thou / that silence were than out of seson?  HAR. 
For I might be sore hurt, or perchance killed / if I were not than warned, mine enemy being so nigh me.  PASQ. 
Ye: I wist well / that ye would not be slain, nor yet wounded, of ye might haue rome enough to ronne / or your long clothis did not let you. But I put ease I knew, that your enmie were at your chamber door / or let it be further, at poitiers in France, who had avowed to slay you, & were in his iournay toward you / but when or where he wolde strike you / I know not: should I forth with warn you, or else keep silence until I saw his sword over your heed ready to kill you, that I might keep silence all way in season?  HAR. 
No that were no friendship but rather treason / to know me to be in such peril, and to hide hit from me, that there were no mean to escape, but only by fortune.  PAS. 
What no lasse than trayson? Peace ye are yet no pope, & because ye be a priest ye be exempted from being emperor or king.  HAR. 
Hast thou any other term more proper, where a man consenteth to the destruction of ceyued by him / that I trusted, and drink poison in the stede of wine: whereof I should either be dead / or fall in to such sickness and brekinge out / that all men should abhor me.  PASQ. 
I wolde to god / that thou wouldest affirm alway truth to thy master / as thou dost now to me. But Harpocrates thou wouldest not die / nor yet live to be abhorred of al men: therein I can preise the. Now sens thou arte a good man( as I suppose) and also learned, woldeste thou / that any warse thing should happen to thy master / that trusteth the / than thou wouldest to thyself?  HAR. 
No truly.  PAS. 
And if thou knewest any danger toward him / as I haue rehersedde / thou oughtest as well to warn him of it, as I ought the.  HA. 
I can not deny that.  PAS. 
And also thou wouldest.  HAR. 
Why, wherefore should I not?  PAS. 
For peradventure if your master mistrusteth him not / that hath avowed to kill him / & accounted your tale for a fantasy / or if he favoureth him much that ye know would poison him: he will suppose / that ye tell it him of some suspicion or malice, and will lean a dese ear toward you. And than he, on whom ye complained / being advertised, shall omit that / which he purposed, to prove you a liar. And than should ye both lese your thank of your master and be called a detractor: and also haue him, whom ye accused, and all his bend, vigilant espials to bring you in danger, is it not thus?  HAR. 
Ye sir by Iesus.  PAS. 
What if a neither man, which loveth your master no lasse than ye do, gave him such warning, and ye knew hir to be true: but ye perceive / that your master listeth not to here of such matter / or perchance commendeth him / which is complained on: wolde ye also praise him to support the trust that your master hath in him, or commend your master therein / for his constance and little mistrustinge?  HAR. 
Nay than were I worthy a hote mischiefing if I wolde help to bring so my master unto his confusion.  PAS. 
What, wolde you hold your rung / & say nothing?  HAR. 
No but I wolde forbear for a time / and a wait diligently, to see yf the perille wolde cease, or might be by some occasion prevented, or by my master other wise spied: but when it were imminent / joanne wolde I give warning.  PAS. 
Imminent, what call ye that?  HAR. 
when his enemy is at his back with his sword drawn / redy to strike him.  PAS. 
And what for poysonynge?  HAR. 
when I saw my friend haue the cup in his hand & were redy to drink.  PAS. 
now gate ye all this wit with so little learning?  
It is not for nought / that ye be a counsellor, sens ye haue such a pretty feat in seasonyng. Of likelihood ye be well sene in constellations, and do know perfettly the subtle distinctions of times & momentes / ye would forbear to warn your master at the beginning of danger / and when he is at the point to fall in to it, perchance or ye shall not be present, or else not able or of powar to resist it: but teach me I pray you, what ye call imminent, for hit is a word taken out of latin, and not commonly used.  HARP. 
Marye the thing that is imminent, is when it appeareth to be in the instant to be done or to happen: and after some mens exposition, as hit threatened to come.  PAS. 
It is well expouned and clerkly. Than if ye will divide the time into instantes / because perchance ye be a good Duns man: ye France, as I said at the first, if ye know, that he purposeth to sle him: than it appeareth to you, that the killing of your master is in the instant to be done, & is threatened to happen, ergo the perille is imminent, and ye are bound to give your friend warning.  HAR. 
perchance I may know a thing, and yet it appeareth not to me / and than your argument availeth not an herring. As I may know by other mennes telling, or by conjecture of a light suspicion.  PAS. 
Nay than shall we haue much a do with you, if ye will compel me of every word that I speak, to make definition. though I haue not so much learning as you / I use alway my words in their proper signification, and to serve to the matter that I reason unto. I know a thing / which by a cause I consider euidentely. And that which is onely reported / I do here / but I know not: but coniceture is by signs / resemblance, or likely hood, which may be false: and yet is hit not to be neglected, as it shal appear afterward. But now return we to knowledge, which being certain, as I haue defined hit, as soon as thou knowest that one will kill or poison thy master, the peril is imminent: than by thyn own reason / thou oughtest to warn him: it not, thou art by thin own sentence condemned of treason.  HAR. 
Thou sayest sore to me pasquil. Not withstanding yet me scmethe: I should not warn him so soon, for the dangers, which thou rehersiddest, might happen unto me / if I lacked a thankful and secret hearer / or else the purpose were changed: but it were better to tarry, until it came to such preparation, that it mought not be denied.  PAS. 
So might it be / if ye were partner of the conspiracy, for than 〈…〉 happen to be made privy to 〈…〉 when / & the place, where 〈…〉 master should stand in suc 〈…〉 die: but else ye might know 〈…〉 a thing purposed / & ye be 〈…〉 of the time / when it should 〈…〉 cuted. Than if ye forbore to 〈◇〉 your master until the peril mough● be more evident / and as ye say / mought not be denied: before that time it might be more than imminent, and in the second instant, that is to say in the self doing / or to speak hit more cleanly, in execution.  HAR. 
But than were I out of danger.  PAS. 
ye / that is all that he care for: yet mought ye happen to be deceived, and your silence in stede of surety turn you to trouble. For seldom is the master in jeopardy, and the servants at liberty, specially they which be next about him: Or if ye happen to escape enemies, if 〈…〉 perceived / that ye knew 〈…〉 le / and would not discover 〈…〉 de perchance escape hard 〈…〉 er, though ye had shaken 〈…〉 r long robes, and were 〈…〉 erkynne Yet if ye warned 〈…〉 master at the beginning, 〈…〉 gh he took it not thankfully / yet 〈◇〉 you your duty / & can not lack reward of god, who loveth truth / for your fidelity. And though he, whom ye disappointed, or his affinity / shall seek howe to be aucnged on you: either god will defend you, or if there fall to you thereby any adversity / finally falschode long kept in / will braste out at the last, and than shal repentance cause your simplicity to be had in renome and perpetual memory: which part of honour to every honest man, passeth alother reward, that may be given in this life that is transitory. But because we spake while ere ●f coniement? Or dost thou esteem the death of the soul to be of lasse importance than the death of the body? What sayest thou? that judgment belongeth to thy faculty.  HAR. 
indeed there ye touch me.  PAS. 
like wise, a knock on the heed / though it be to the skull / is not so daungerous to be healed / as an evil affection thrast in to thy maisters brains by false opinion. Nor a wipe over his face with a sword, shal not blemmishe so much his visage / as 'vice shall deform his soul & deface his renome / whereby he is further known than by his phisonomy. Is there any poison can make him to be so abhorred of man / as avarice, tyranny / or beastly living shall cause him be hated of god and of man universally?  HAR. 
No in good faith, I think thou sayest truly.  PAS. 
Than conferre all this together, with that which we before raysoned / and se where in any thing that thy master speaketh or doth / if there by any of the perils imminent / which I late rehearsed: whither it were better to speak or keep silence, and in which of them were most surety. And consider also, that between these two perils, that I haue rehearsed / is no little diversity, besides that the one is much more than the other. For in the bodily peril / in the time of the stroke perchance your master wolde here you / & thereby escape, or ye might defend him: but the other peril of soul or mind, the longer that he continueth therein / the more gladly he receiveth the stroke, & the more he will disdain to be warned by you: and than ye put yourself in more danger of that / which we spake of before: but for all that neither in time of danger thou oughtest to leave thy master vnwarned, which thou hast all redy granted: nor yet when thy master is stricken or poisoned, speech is unprofitable as thou hast supposed.  HAR. 
Now prove you that? For if ye be a surgeon, ye know it must be your deeds and not your words, that must help him.  PAS. 
Now it is well remembered ye shall haue goddes blessing. I never herd a more fool by my holy doom / doth a surgeon all his cure with plasters and instruments? sometime he speaketh also / or if he be dumb, one speaketh for him, and telleth his patient, what meats and drinks be unwholesome, which be leuitiues and helpeth his medicine. Also when he perceiveth him to be faint or discomforted, than with sweet words and faire promisis he reviveth his courage. If he be disobedient or riottouse / he rebuketh him, and do aggravate the danger to make the sickness more grievous. The same is the office of a good confessor, where he perceiuith mannes soul to be wounded with vicious affections / syns that a confessor serveth for none other purpose / but to cure mannes soul of deadly sins, which be hyr mortal diseases: but can he do that without speaking? Also ye said / where might be no longer resistance / speech nothing auaylled: I ween ye said truer than ye were ware. For when Gnatho with his flateri / and ye with your silence haue ones rootid in your maisters hart false opinions, & vicious affectis, which is the poylon, that we so much spake of, though ye perceue the danger, and than sore repent you, yet shall it perchance be impossible with speech to remove those opinions, & cure those affectis, except ye loved to well your master, that for his health ye wolde confess your own errors.  GNA. 
Nay goddis body, to might we get for ourself a pair of tariars.  PAS. 
Well it were better tarry, than run to the devil with your master / or that good renown should run away from him. But tell me Harpocrates as thou thinkest, were not speech now expedient? or howe might thy master be otherwise curid? with silence trowist thou?  HAR 
It seemeth that silence should nothing profit / nor speech should any thing auaille / if the opinions and affects be so impressed / that they can not be removed.  PAS. 
Yet again / if ye speak no wiseliar to your master / than ye do me / he hath of you a worshypful counsayloure, I demand of you remedy to cure wrong opinions and vicious affects: and ye answer me, that neither speech nor silence is profitable. Like as if I had asked counsel of a physician what thing would hele me, of my sickness / & he would say / that giuing to me medicine or giving me none, should not avail me.  HARP. 
Spake I not well / where I finde no remedy?  PAS. 
No / and ye look wisely. For and if ye remember, I did not affirm expressly / that it should be impossible to remove false opinions or vicious affects, where they were impressed: but I joined thereto peradventure / and also an exception, if ye that induced them / confessed not your own error. Than if your confession mought cure them, speech were than not unprofitable. And if your own confession auaylid not, sens I affirmed not expressly, that the said diseases were incurable: if neither silence / nor speech should be profitable, what should than be the remedy?  HARPOCRAT. 
I make god a vow / I can not tell / except it were grace.  PAS. 
I herde the never speak so wisely. But yet supposest thou / that grace will so lightly entre / where false opinion and vicious affects be so deeply imprinted / except they be first some what removed by good persuasion? unless thou thinkest, that every man shall be called of god, as saint paul was / who was elected. And yet now I remembre me / at his conversion christ spake unto him, and told him, that it was hard to spurne again the prick: where if christ had hold his peace, Saule which was joanne beaten down to the ground / mought haue happened never to haue ben called saint paul: but if he had escaped, he would by likelihode haue continued still in his error.  HAR. 
It is not for us pasquil to inserche the impenetrable judgements of god: but the grace of god hath happened far above mennes expectation: & where all other remedy lacked. For than the pvissance of all mighty god is specially proved.  PAS. 
But trusting onely therein to leave our own endeavour, I think it presumption. And what endeavour may be in silence? wherefore speech is not onely profitable but also of necessity must be used in healing the diseases / both of the soul & also the body.  HAR. 
I can not deny that, if I say truly.  PAS. 
Than when is your silence in season?  HAR. 
I can not shortly tel / I am so abashed at thy froward reason.  PAS. 
Than will I help you to know your own virtue, wherein ye haue such delectation. I trow ye herde not, howe I did expound the sentence of Aeschylus, which Gnatho rehearsed to me for a counsel?  HAR. 
Yes that I did / for I stood all that while at the window herkenynge of the.  PAS. 
Se howe full the world is of such false images, that do here all, when they seem to here nothing: as I trust to be saved / with such fellows hit is perilous dealing. But yet that shal not cause pasquil to leave his bablinge. now Harpocrates / bear away the said sentence with mine exposition / and use it.  HAR. 
So I will, as much as pertaineth to silence.  PAS. 
Ye god a vow and also to speaking / or else all the counsel is not worth three halfpens. think ye to be a counsaylour / and speak not? What were the Emper our the better, if instede of counsellors he had set in his chamber the images of Cato, Metellus, Lelius, Cicero, and such other persons, who living / far excelled in wit, experience / and learning, them, which be now about him? be men that sit and speak nothing, any better than they? No, but rather much warse: for they serve for nothing, yet the images do that, wherefore they be ordained / that is to say / bring to mens remenbrance the wisdom and virtue of them, whom they represented. But dumb counsellors do not their office / wherefore they be called to counsel / but by their silence they cause many things to be brought to an unlucky conclusion.  HAR. 
And thou that art not called to counsel, arte full of bablynge.  PAS. 
But ones in a year: and wotist thou why that is?  HAR. 
Nay, tell me I pray the.  PAS. 
Mary if they that be called, wolde alway play the parts of good counsellors: And both spiritual and temporal gouernours wolde banysshe thee and Gnatho out of their courts, except ye amend your conditions / I wolde speak never a word, but sit as still as a ston, like as ye se me: But for as much as it happeneth all contrary / and that things be so far out of frame, that stones do grudge at it( remembrest thou not what a clatteryng they made at the last warres in Italy?) and yet counsellors be spechelesse: I that am set in the city of Rome, which is the heed of the world / ones in the year shal here of the state of all princis and regions. And because in the month of may men be all set in pleasure / & than they take merili such words as be spoken again them: joanne boldly I put forth my verdict / and that openly.  HAR. 
There thou dost folyshely: for thou shouldest do more good, if thou spakest privily.  PAS. 
Tusshe man, my playnnes is so well known, that I shall never come unto privy chamber or galeri.  HAR. 
Sens thou profitest so little, why arte thou so busy?  PAS. 
To thintent that men shal perceive / that their vices / which they think to be wonderful secret, be known to all men. And that I hope alway, that by much clamoure / and open repentance, when they see the thing not succeed to their purpose / they will be ashamed.  HAR. 
Yet mayst thou happen to be deceived.  PAS. 
But they much more, when they know not who loveth them truly.  GN. 
Harpocrates, it is time that we repair to the court / leste we be blamed. And let us leave pasquil with his pratery.  PAS. 
And I wyllcue you both with your slatery. Yet I trust in god to see the day, that I will not set by the best of you both a butterfly. As great a wonder haue I seneer this time.  HARP. 
Fare well pasquil, and think on silence.  PAS. 
Fare well Harpocrates / and think on thy conscience. I ween I might bie as much of the costerde monger for two pence.  
now when these two fellows come to their master / they will tell al that they haue herde of me / it maketh no matter. For I haue said nothing / but by the way of advertisement / without reprochynge of any one person, wherewith no good man hath cause to take any displeasure. And he that doth / by that which is spoken he is soon spied, to what part he leaneth, Iuge what men list, my thought shall be free. And god / who shall judge all men / knoweth / that I desire all things to be in good point, on the condition that I mought ever be specheles / as it is my very nature to be. A dieu gentill herers, and say well by pasquil, when he is from you.  
cum PRIVILEGIO.