Note 291 — Chapter XIV

Very few of these are now known to be in existence. Roy’s Satire is one of the best. It would be excellent if reduced to reasonable length. The fury which the mystery plays excited in the Catholic party is a sufficient proof of the effect which they produced. An interesting letter to Cromwell, from the author of some of them, is among the State Papers. I find no further mention of him:—

“The Lord make you the instrument of my help, Lord Cromwell, that I may have liberty to preach the truth. I dedicate and offer to your lordship a ‘Reverend receiving of the sacrament,’ as a lenten matter declared by six children, representing Christ, the word of God, Paul, Austin, a child, a man called Ignorancy, as a secret thing that shall have an end—once rehearsed afore your eyes. The priests in Suffolk will not receive me into their churches to preach; but have disdained me ever since I made a play against the Pope’s councillors, Error, collyclogger of conscience, and Incredulity. I have made a play called A Rude Commonalty. I am making of another, called The Woman on the Rock, in the fire of faith refining, and a purging in the true purgatory, never to be seen but of your lordship’s eye. Aid me, for Christ’s sake, that I may preach Christ.”—Thomas Wylley, fatherless and forsaken: MS. State Paper Office, second series, Vol. L.