VOLUME 3

AN ANSWERE VNTO SIR THOMAS MORES DIALOGE

LOCATION
KEY Commentary Side Textual Bibliographic Scriptural

as good case as they can be & haue all the delectacion they can haue / & therefore to wish them in better case or to studie to doo them more pleasure then they haue / is fleyshly minded popishnesse. The pleasure of them that be in heuen is / that we herken to God and kepe his commaundementes / which when we doo / they haue all the pleasure that they can haue in vs. If in this life / I sofre hell gladly / to winne my brother to folow god / how moch moare if I were in heuen shuld I reioyce that he so did? If in this world when I haue nede of my neyboure / by the reason of mine infirmites / yet I seke nought of him / saue his wealth only / whate other thynge shuld I seke of him / if I were in heuen / where he can do me no seruice ner I vse any pleasure that he can do me?

They that are in heauen do chiefly desire that we harken to God & do hys wyll.[1573]

yet . . . only. Cf. 2 Cor. 12.14.

2 Corinthians 12.14

The deuel desyred to haue his imaginacions worsheped as god / & his popish childern desyre the same / and compell men so to honoure them / and of their deuelish nature describe they both God and his saintes. And therfore I saye / al soch fleshly imaginacions / as to fast the wenisdaye in the worshepe of S. Ihon or of S. katerine or what saynt it be / or to fast sayntes euens or to goo a pilgremage vnto their images or to offer to them / to doo them pleasure / thinkynge therby to obteyne their fauoure and to make speciall aduocates of them / as a man wold winne the fauoure of a nother with presentes and giftes / and thinkynge that if we did it not / they wold be angrie / are playne Idolatrye and

The deuel . . . god. Cf. Lev. 20.2–5.

Leviticus 20.2–5

All popishe imaginations are Idolatry.[1573]

wenisdaye . . . S. katerine. Some fasted on Wednesdays in honor of John the Baptist, Catherine of Alexandria, Christopher, or Margaret of Antioch for the grace to receive the last sacraments before they died. See Here begynneth a lytel treatyse that sheweth how every mon & woman ought to fast and absteyne them from flesshe on the Wednesday (1500), STC 24224 (Duffy 319–20 and n48).

euens] eues [1573]

fast sayntes euens. Medieval Christians were required to fast on the day before the following feasts: Christmas, Pentecost, Birth of John the Baptist, Laurence, Assumption, All Saints; also on the vigils of the Apostles except Philip and James in the Easter season and John the Evangelist during Christmas week (Duffy 41). Tyndale mocks this heavy discipline by extending it to the vigils of lesser saints: Anthony the Hermit, Patrick, and Brendan (Matthew 15).