scattered about, so that he was put to a far greater expense in its management than if he had it all compact in one farm. This was perfectly true, and from a merely commercial point of view quite unanswerable; but he forgot that this communistic system was the surest protection that the men not gifted with business ability could have against those that were. Fill men with the idea that the summum bonum of social economy is to get the greatest pecuniary results at the least possible expense, and they will stop at nothing for so great an end.
Bernard Gilpin, preaching before Edward VI., described how Lady Avarice set on the mighty men, and the gentlemen, and all rich men, to rob and despoil the poor, and turn them from their livings and their right, and ever the weakest go to the wall. "And in the meantime these mighty and great men say that the commonalty live too well at ease, and grow every day to be gentlemen and know not themselves; their horns, say they, must be cut shorter by raising their rents and by plucking away their pastures. And hereby the commonalty come to hate the gentry, for they murmur, and grudge, and say that the gentlemen have all; and there were never so many gentlemen and so little gentleness." "Alas! noble Prince," said the preacher, turning to the King, "that the images of your ancestors graven in gold, and yours also, contrary to your mind, are worshipped as gods, and all the poor lively images of Christ perish with hunger."
A still more striking proof of the general impression of the extreme greed of the landlord class is the existence of a prayer for landlords, to be found in the Primmer or Boke of Private Prayer set forth in 1555, two years after this discourse by Gilpin, to be taught, learned, read, and used of the King's loving subjects.
"The earth is Thine, O Lord, and all that is contained therein, notwithstanding Thou hast given possession thereof unto the children of men, to pass the time of their short pilgrimage in this vale of misery. We heartily pray Thee to send Thy Holy Spirit into the hearts of them that possess the grounds, pastures, and dwelling-places of the earth, that they, remembering themselves to be Thy tenants, may not rack and stretch out the rents of their houses and their lands, nor yet take unreasonable fines and incomes after the manner of covetous worldlings, but so let them
