chmen over God's flock; and all are
watchmen (he goes on to explain, with that fine breadth of spirit that
characterises him even when, as here, he shows himself most narrow), all
are watchmen "whose eyes God doth open, and whose conscience he
pricketh to admonish the ungodly." And with the full consciousness of
this great duty before him, he sets himself to answer the scruples of
timorous or worldly-minded people. How can a man repent, he asks, unless
the nature of his transgression is made plain to him? "And therefore I
say," he continues, "that of necessity it is that this monstriferous
empire of women (which among all enormities that this day do abound upon
the face of the whole earth, is most detestable and damnable) be openly
and plainly declared to the world, to the end that some may repent and
be saved." To those who think the doctrine useless, because it cannot be
expected to amend those princes whom it would dispossess if once
accepted, he makes answer in a strain that shows him at his greatest.
After having instanced how the rumour of Christ's censures found its way
to Herod in his own court, "even so," he continues, "may the sound of
our weak trumpet, by the support of some wind (blow it from the south,
or blow it from the north, it is of no matter), come to the ears of the
chief offenders. _But whether it do or not, yet dare we not cease to
blow as God will give strength. For we are debtors to more than to
princes, to wit, to the great multitude of our brethren_, of whom, no
doubt, a great number have heretofore offended by error and ignorance."

It is for the multitude, then, he writes; he does not greatly hope that
his trumpet will be audible in palaces, or that crowned women will
submissively discrown themselves at his appeal; what he does hope, in
plain English, is to encourage and justify rebellion; and we shall see,
before we have done, that he can put his purpose into words as roundly
as I can put it for him. This he sees to be a matter of much hazard; he
is not "altogether so brutish and insensible, but that he has laid his
account what the finishing of the work may cost." He knows that he will
find many adversaries, since "to the most part of men, lawful and godly
appeareth whatsoever antiquity hath received." He looks for opposition,
"not only of the ignorant multitude, but of the wise, politic, and
quiet spirits of the earth." He will be called foolish, curious,
despiteful, and a sower of sedition