have fish, spices, brawn, herrings, figs, almonds, Greek wine and
other luxuries. They generally drink good wine and rich beer in
large quantities, and so they go to sleep. When they cannot get
luxuries they fill themselves with vulgar puddings till they nearly
burst. And this is the way the priests fast." He wrote in a
similar strain of the mendicant friars. He had no belief in their
profession of poverty, and accused them of gathering as much money
as they could. They pocketed more money by begging, he declared,
than honest folk could earn by working; they despised plain beef,
fat bacon and peas, and they wagged their tails with joy when they
sat down to game and other luxuries. "Many citizens," said Peter,
"would readily welcome this kind of poverty."

He accused the priests of loose teaching and shameless winking at
sin. "They prepare Jesus," he said, "as a sweet sauce for the world,
so that the world may not have to shape its course after Jesus and
His heavy Cross, but that Jesus may conform to the world; and they
make Him softer than oil, so that every wound may be soothed, and
the violent, thieves, murderers and adulterers may have an easy
entrance into heaven."

He accused them of degrading the Seven Sacraments. They baptized
sinners, young and old, without demanding repentance. They sold the
Communion to rascals and rogues, like a huckstress offering her
wares. They abused Confession by pardoning men who never intended
to amend their evil ways. They allowed men of the vilest character
to be ordained as priests. They degraded marriage by preaching the
doctrine that it was less holy than celibacy. They distorted the
original design of Extreme Unction, for instead of using it to heal
the sick they used it to line their own pockets. And all these