90 THE EFFECTS OF 



CHAP. XX. 



much knowledge of the state of the country gene- 

 rally, and of the change that was then going on in 

 the relations of the several classes of society to 

 each other. 



This work, published about thirty years after 

 the sermons of Latimer, from which quotations 

 have been presented to the reader, repeats and 

 extends the complaints which the pious prelate 

 uttered, and introduces a picture of future decay 

 in England which rivals that of the bishop. 



The quaint language and the ancient and un- 

 fixed spelling in this work will need no apology 

 with any reader, and the phraseology is much 

 more appropriate to the period it describes than 

 any sentences would be if constructed in more 

 modern English. We give the complaints, there- 

 fore, in their own words, though not exactly in 

 the order in which they stand in the dialogue. 

 The knight says, 



" All of my sorte I meaneall gentlemen have 

 " greate cause to complayne, now that the pryces 

 " of thinges are so risen of all handes that you 

 " may better lyve after your degree than we ; for 

 " you may and do rayse thepryce of your wares as 



and ventured, without authority or truth, to insert in the title- 

 page " By William Shakespeare, Gent.," doubtless thinking 

 the name of the great poet would sell the work. As Shakspeare 

 was born in 1564, and could be only seventeen at the time of 

 the publication, it is next to impossible he could have been the 

 author of a work containing so much accurate knowledge. 



