M. Hardinge.
You haue neuer donne with your what ifs. Your interpreter good Gentil woman, that fauou∣reth your pleasant Diuinitie so muche, seemeth to be weary of it. her selfe. For here shee tourneth your, Quid si, into what will ye saie, if. And nowe Syr, doo you demaunde of vs, as Madame In∣terpreter maketh you to speake, what we will saie. Forsooth, for this you alleage against the Popes aduocates, Abbattes, and Bishoppes, we saie, that the moste parte is very false, and slaunderous: somewhat maie be taken for truthe in a right sense. As for the aduocates, I minde not to be their Aduocate,* 1.1 neither haue they neede of my helpe. Let them answeare one for an other: Hostiensis for Abbot Panormitan, and he for Hostiensis. In good sooth were those excellent men at this daie liuing, I thinke verely, they would not doo you that honoure, as to answere you them selues. Or if they would vouchesaue to doo so muche, I doubt not, but they woulde make shorte woorke with you, and take you vp roundly for haltinge, with one woorde, Mentitis, dasshinge all your allegations. VVhich woorde in your Diuinitie is a verbe Commune.
Thus leauinge Hostiensis, and Panormitan to defence of the Canonistes, tellinge you by the waie that in questions of Diuinitie wee stande not alwaies to their saieinges:* 1.2 wee answeare you on the behalfe of Cornelius the Bishop of Bitonto in Italie, (for him ye meane, I suppose, puttinge in your margent the name of Cornelius onely) that he neuer saide,* 1.3 the Pope is the Lighte, whiche shoulde come into the worlde, in that sense, as it is spoken of Christe. If you were hardely charged to shewe, where he saide it, or where be wrote it, * you would be founde a lier, as in many other pointes you are founde already. That he neuer wrote it in any of his eloquent Italian Sermons, set foorthe in Printe, I am assured. And more hath he not set foorth. Now it remaineth, that you tell vs where he saithe so, * or els confesse your slaunderous lie.