Чаша и крест

It was a fantastical sight from the south side of the Thames. Houses and shops, painted all different colors, crowded on top of the stone bridge. I’d heard that bookmakers, merchants, and artists throve in their houses perched atop the Thames.

There is nothing on this earth to be prized more than true friendship.

Telling truth mixed with a lie is always preferable to telling a complete lie.

A recent Act of Parliament states that it is high treason to maliciously wish, will, or desire by words or writing, or by craft imagine, invent, practice, or attempt any bodily harm to be done or committed to the king’s most royal person. Almost anything can be bent or stretched to fit such a definition.

I do not follow the practices of Jews, but I tell you, the people of Israel will prevail upon the world, though the date is not set yet.

Do you know this is why I bought a house in Antwerp? My passion for books. I was a friend of Erasmus, a good friend. I spent long evenings debating the principles of humanism with him and others. Antwerp is the center of the world for books. You could probably smell the ink in the air when you walked the streets.

I approached the image of our founder slowly, reverently. A large stone dog sat faithfully at his side, a torch between its teeth. Saint Dominic’s mother had a dream when she was pregnant with him, that a dog would emerge from her womb carrying a torch. When, fearful, she approached her priest, he told her that the torch would set the world on fire through preaching the word of Christ. That was a prophecy that came true - and the dog became our symbol.

It’s not just Gertrude - the whole kingdom has gone mad. When I was a boy, there were no seers people rushed to pay, no revelations passed around. But now every village crone sprouts predictions. They claim they’re received wisdom from the Celts, from Merlin’s scroll dug out of the ground. It’s rubbish - and worse.

I see abbeys crumbling to dust. I see the blood of monk spilled across the land. Books are destroyed. Statues toppled. Relics defiled. I see the greatest men of the kingdom with heads struck off. The common folk will hang, even the children. Friars will starve. Queens will die.

It is so wretched to know the truth, Joanna. To see things no one else can see. To have to try to stop evil before it is too late.