The Holinshed Project

Holinshed Project Home

The Texts
1587

Previous | Next

This yeere also,

Edw. Hal. Ccxvii [...].

Pauier a con|temner of the gospell, & his shamefull end.

one Pauier the towne clerke of the citie of London hanged himselfe, which suerly was a man that no wise could abide to heare the gospell should he in English. And I my selfe heard him once saie to me and other that were by, swearing a great oth, that if he thought the kings highnesse would set foorth the scripture in English, and let it be read of the people by his authoritie, rather he would so long liue, he would cut his owne throat, but he brake promise, for (as you haue heard) he hanged himselfe: but of what mind and intent he so did, maie be soone gathered. For God had (no doubt) appointed him to that iudgement, no lesse heauie than his offense was heinous; namelie the contempt of Gods word, the knowledge whereof Dauid desired, preferring it before gold and siluer, yea before pearles & pretious stones in richnesse; and before honie and the honiecombe in sweetnes, as the paraphrase noteth, saieng:
Quam tua verba meo sapiunt incunda palato!
Eob. Hess. in psal. 119.
Nulla magis fingi dulcia mella queant.
Iustitia doctrinae tuae mihi charior auro est,
Hac etiam argentum vilius instar habet.]

¶About this time the pope, by lingering sicknes, (whose grée [...]e in the first apprehension was the pains of the stomach, Guic. pag. 1182, &c. which drawing with them to pa [...]ions of a feuer and other accidents, kept him long time vexed and tormented) sometimes séeming to be re|duced to the point of death, and sometimes so eased and reléeued,Death of pope Clement the seuenth. that he gaue to others but not to him|selfe a kind of hope of recouering, being no longer able to make resistance against his maladie, exchan|ged his life the fiue and twentith of September, lea|uing behind him in the castell of saint Angcomanie rich stones and iewels, more than was expected of him, and in the chamber of the sée apostolike infinit offices, contrarie to custome and good order, but in the treasurie a verie small store of monie, wherin he beguiled the opinion of all men. He was raised from base degrée to the place of the popedome with woon|derfull felicitie, but in managing the place he proo|ued a verie great variation of fortune, wherein if both the properties of fortune be euenlie balanced the one with the other, the woorser fortune without all comparison was farre more familiar with him than the better.

For as there could happen to him no greater in|felicitie than the aduersitie of his imprisonment (for that with his owne eies he beheld with so great a ruine and destruction the sacke of Rome;Pope Cle|ment more infortunate than fortu|nate. a desola|tion which his fortune suffered him to bewaile with pitie and compassion, but not to turne awaie or re|medie the harme) so also by him mooued the generall desolation of his naturall countrie, to the which by how much more he was bound by perpetuall obliga|tions, by so much greater was his aduersitie to be a chiefe instrument in the ruine of the place where he had taken his first being.

Previous | Next