have been something, if it had been but a parson of a town, and
comfortable to many a poor man; and then mightest thou have clad here
and there the naked back, and filled the empty belly, and holpen many,
and men would have spoken well of thee, and of thyself thou hadst
thought well; and all this hast thou lost for lack of a word here and
there to some great man, and a little winking of the eyes amidst
murder and wrong and unruth; and now thou art nought and helpless, and
the hemp for thee is sown and grown and heckled and spun, and lo
there, the rope for thy gallows-tree!--all for nought, for nought.

"Forsooth, my friends, thus I thought and sorrowed in my feebleness
that I had not been a traitor to the Fellowship of the Church, for
e'en so evil was my foolish imagination.

"Yet, forsooth, as I fell a-pondering over all the comfort and help
that I might have been and that I might have had, if I had been but a
little of a trembling cur to creep and crawl before abbot and bishop
and baron and bailiff, came the thought over me of the evil of the
world wherewith I, John Ball, the rascal hedge-priest, had fought and
striven in the Fellowship of the saints in heaven and poor men upon
earth.

"Yea, forsooth, once again I saw as of old, the great treading down
the little, and the strong beating down the weak, and cruel men
fearing not, and kind men daring not, and wise men caring not; and the
saints in heaven forbearing and yet bidding me not to forbear;
forsooth, I knew once more that he who doeth well in fellowship, and
because of fellowship, shall not fail though he seem to fail to-day,
but in days hereafter shall he and his work yet be alive, and men be
holpen by them to strive again and yet again; and yet indeed even that