f God:

"To this we do say that a delay without reasonable cause, and for a
lucrative intent, is detestable in spiritual men, and the doers cannot
eschew punishment: but otherwise a delay is sometimes expedient to examine
the clerk, and sometimes necessary when the title is in variance. All other
bargains and covenants being contrary to the law ought to be punished, as
the quality is of the offence more or less, as simony or inordinate
covetousness.

"Item where they say that we give benefices to our nephews and kinsfolk,
being in young age or infants, whereby the cure is not substantially looked
into, nor the parishioners taught as they should be; we reply to this that
the thing which is not lawful in others is in spiritual men more
detestable. Benefices should be disposed of not _secundum carnem et
sanguinem, sed secundum merita_. And when there is a default it is not
authorised by the clergy as good, but reproved; whereupon in this the
clergy is not to be blamed, but the default as it may appear must be laid
to particular men.

"And where they say that we take the profit of such benefices for the time
of the minority of our said kinsfolk, if it be done to our own use and
profit it is not well; _if it be bestowed to the bringing up and use of the
same parties_, or applied to the maintenance of the church and God's
service, or distributed among the poor, we do not see but that it may be
allowed.

"Item where they say that divers and many spiritual persons, not contented
with the convenient livings and promotions of the church, daily intromit
and exercise themselves in secular offices and rooms, as stewards,
receivers, auditors, bailiffs, and other temporal occupations, withdrawing
themselves from the good contemplative lives that they have professed, not
only to the damage but also to the perilous example of your loving and
obedient subjects; to this we your bedesmen answer that beneficed men may
lawfully be stewards and receivers to their own bishops, as it evidently
appeareth in the laws of the church; and we by the same laws ought to have
no other. And as for priests to be auditors and bailiffs, we know none
such.

"And where, finally, they, in the conclusion of their supplication, do
repeat and say that forasmuch as there is at this present time, and by a
few years past hath been much misdemeanour and violence upon the one part,
and much default and lack of patience, charity, and good will on the other
part;