Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

Edward Farr, ed. Select Poetry of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth. 1845.

To the Men of Rome, As Well Laiques As Cleriques

LXXI. Thomas Tvke

PRIEST make their Maker Christ, yee must not doubt;

They eat, drink, box him vp, and beare about:

Substance of things they turne; nor is this all,

For both the signes must hold him severall:

Hee’s whole ith’ bread, whole ith’ cuppe;

Theye eat him whole, whole they suppe;

Whole ith’ cake, and whole ith’ cuppe.

This with you all doeth goe for veritie;

To hold contrary is meer heresie:

This is pure catholique, pure divine.

And thus feast ye; he with his Christ, thou with thine:

Without bread and wine, indeed,

For this is your Roman creed;

Whom ye make, on him ye feed.

The bread and wine themselves away are gone,

Shewes of them tarry still, but substance none:

They make their God, and they eat him vp;

They swallow down his flesh, and blood vp sup.

They’ll taste no flesh on frydayes (that’s not good);

But of their new-mad God, and of his blood.

And as the whale did Jonas, so they eat

Him up alive, body and soule, as meat.

As men eat oysters, so on him they feed,

Whole and alive, and raw, and yet not bleed.

This cookerie, voyd of humanitie,

Is held in Rome for sound divinitie.

And is not this strange to heare,

That God, whom ye say ye feare,

Ye should eat as bely-cheare?

The graver, painter, baker, even these three,

Your priest have reason for to magnifie:

Perhaps the baker thinks he merits more,

Yet both advance their honor and their store;

For they, with their gentle feat,

Help them to money and to meat,

Making gods to begge and eat.

And now, me thinks, I heare old Laban say,

“See, they have stoln and born my gods away.”

Me thinks, I heare and see that mountineer,

Micha of Ephraim, who did idols feare,

Chiding with the Danits, for that they had

Took’s priest and gods away, which made him mad.

Mee thinks I see the Philistins bereft

Of their vaine gods, which they to David left,

And how that noble worthy made them bee

Destroyed of his souljers presentlie.

Both men and beasts (a thing to be deplored)

May bear away the things you adored:

The things you worship with your heart and minde,

Men like yourselves can burne, can melt, can grinde.

Baruch’s base things (a shame it is to thinck)

Can marre the things ye worship, and make stinck.

And is not this great folly,

More than childish vanity,

To dote on things so silly?

The foolish heathens were not all so mad,

For they devoured not the gods they had:

The wiser knew their vanities were wood,

Or such like stuffe; not gods, nor flesh and blood.

But yee, as if bewitcht, do count and call

That poore thing God, Maker and Lord of all,

Which is plaine bread, in substance very bread,

Made of wheat-flower, ground with man’s hand, and knead.