The universities and their colleges

Falsehood. It still seems that you hint at the destruction of the clergyclerus; clericus: the clergy; cleric in England, and consequently of the law of Christlex dei / lex Christi / lex evangelica: God's law / the law of Christ / the gospel law. Who, I ask, among the secularssecularis (noun): a secular would know how to defend the faith of the churchecclesia: church against heretics, if there were not colleges in the universities established upon temporal lordshipsdominium: lordship and appropriatedappropriare; appropriacio: to appropriate; appropriation churches,¹ as is clear from the heresy on the eucharist and other like ones which at the end of time the devil has sown more thickly?²

Truth. Once this teachingsentencia: teaching moved me, but he who separated me from the womb of proprietary affectionaffeccio proprietaria: proprietary affection told me that one must leave all these affections and put faith in the ordinanceordinacio; ordinancia: ordinance; of the sacrament, ordination of Christ and of God.³ Since, then, Christ did not ordain these universities or colleges, it seems manifest that they, like the graduationsgraduacio; graduati: graduation; graduates in them, are a vain heathenism brought in; in token of which the collegiates as well as the other graduatesgraduacio; graduati: graduation; graduates 54in the universities "seek the things that are their own", forsaking the rules of charitycaritas: charity; from which sprout envies, comparisons of persons and of homelandvia / patria: the way / the homeland, and many other seedbeds of the father of lies, as those know who consider this school closely.⁴ Therefore the objections against the secular lordships of clericsclerus; clericus: the clergy; cleric and the appropriationsappropriare; appropriacio: to appropriate; appropriation of churches stand vigorously against these. And as to fruit, it seems certain that one unlearned man, by means of God’s grace, profits more towards building up Christ’s church than many graduates in the schools or colleges, because he sows the law of Christ more humbly and more abundantly, in deed as well as in word. Therefore if all cares superfluous to the building up of the church were cut away from these scholastics, either the whole or the greater part of this occupation would be scraped away from the church. Yet it is granted that all these, the studies as well as the colleges, have been of profit, as the devil’s purposes are, but not directly; rather, by means of God’s grace; and had they been purely according to his law and ordinance they would have profited the church more.⁵ And as to the destruction of heresies, it seems to many that such studies are the nest and tinder of heresy; or if they sometimes profit by accident, as the sciences do which sometimes serve the graduation and confirmation of a lord of theology,⁶ this rarely happens, and their sins, whether of omission or of commission, happen more often in these places. For example, what security is there in these [places] in defending that the consecrated host is not the Lord’s body but an unknown accident without a subject, as the new sectsreligio privata; secta: private religion; sect disclose?⁷ And so it is with other heresies newly sprouting against the faith; for the inspiration of simple priestssacerdos / presbiter: priest / presbyter, in knowledge as well as in voluntary working, will profit the capacity of the faithful laity more than all the said universities with their adjacent studies, or with the privileges, hypocritically brought in, that press down the laity. Nor do we assert these things out of envy, but for love of 55the church’s progress, and for the free course of the law of Christ.⁸ And we say the same of the houses of the friarsfrater: friar (of the mendicants) / brother and of the other orders that are established in such universities. For Paul, once a Pharisee, as is clear from Philippians 3, for the better sect of Christ, and by his leave, abandoned that sect, as a prudent man;⁹ why then ought not priests today to work in conformity with him? And this is the reason why cloisterersclaustrales: cloisterers, of whatever sect they may be, or bound by whatever obligation or foolish oath, ought freely, by Christ’s command, to go out of these bonds and freely put on the sect of Christ. For we take it, as faith teachesex fide: as faith teaches; with a genitive, from the faith of [scripture], that that sect in its liberty is better, easier and in every way more useful. Now what faithful man doubts that the good God gives his servants leave freely to choose this part and to let go the other, of the contrary condition? For the constitutions of the popepapa: pope or other private rules cannot break this law. What reason, I ask, would lead a faithful man to be troubled in conscience overhabere conscienciam super: to be troubled in conscience over this, that he chooses what is better, more conformed to God’s ordinance, and more useful to the church militantecclesia militans / triumphans / dormiens: the church militant / triumphant / sleeping? And since he is not troubled in conscience over the omission of this will of the Lord, as over many grave sins which he commits both openly and in secret, do we not believe that by so preferring human traditions he, as by idolatry, sets up false gods for himself, since whatever a man loves preponderantly he sets up as his god?¹⁰ Now by loving such human traditions preponderantly, beyond the Lord’s ordinance, he prefers the one who ordained them.¹¹ And the same seems [true] of the temporal lordsdominus; dominari: lord; to exercise lordship / to lord it who, out of proprietary affection and [affection] for a worldly name, set up or consent to novelty of this kind. For all of them seem, out of a certain folly, in some manner to blaspheme.