To the Inhabitants of England: The Translator's Preface

Before time, not many years since (dearly beloved brethren and countrymen) the disciples of Antichrist, and apostles of Satan, for the establishing of their Lord's kingdom (knowing that the continuance thereof was the increase of their own estimation, wealth, and pleasure in this world) have devised many politic practices, so wicked and so devilish, that whoever beholds them well shall soon perceive they were not invented without the counsel of their Lord and master. Of these, this was the first and chief, and (as I may say) the ground of the rest: to keep all men, both princes and their subjects, in ignorance of God and his word, that they not knowing the truth might the more easily be brought into all kinds of devilish heresies; that they not understanding vice should not be able to reprehend the horrible wickedness of Antichrist and his ministers. To this end they have restrained all the laity throughout Christendom from reading the Scriptures, and have forbidden them to be printed in their vulgar tongues, and in place thereof have given them to occupy their brains withal, fables of Robin Hood, of Guy of Warwick, of Bevis of Hampton, of the Knights of the Round Table, of the 4 sons of Amon, filthy tales, Chaucer, the Court of Venus, most horrible and blasphemous lies out of Saints' Legends, and such like. Whereby men being drowned in ignorance and detestable heresies have been cast down headlong into the most miserable pit of hell. But now it has pleased almighty God, toward the coming of our Savior to Judgment, by the preaching of his word, through the working of his holy Spirit, to oppress the power of Satan, to cut the horns of Antichrist, to reveal the man of sin: who sitting in the Temple of God, boasts himself as God. Now it has pleased our Savior Christ to diminish the kingdom of Antichrist, and to advance his own kingdom, to deface the disciples of Antichrist, and to glorify his own disciples. He has driven out the filthy swine and wild boars that have spoiled his vineyard, and has hired laborers to husband it again, that it may yield him fruit now at harvest time, when he comes to receive the same into his everlasting kingdom. At which time his faithful servants shall receive for their hire, a piece of money that never shall fail, and shall eat and drink the fruits of their labors with him, world without end. Therefore it is convenient and necessary for all God's laborers, that is to say, princes and their magistrates, prelates, and all ecclesiastical ministers, to labor diligently in the Lord's vineyard, to keep out these swine, which Antichrist has sent to devour it: not only to yoke them, but also to set dogs on them, which will both bark and pluck off their [reconstructed: ears], if they attempt to break through the hedge, and to root up the vines with their devilish books, altogether void of God's word and of reason, to every man that has any understanding and knowledge of God. To this end, by the authority of our sovereign Lady the Queen's Majesty in our realm, and other princes in other realms, a great number of godly men have preached diligently, others have written very profitable books of Divinity, both in Latin and in their own vulgar tongue, and diverse have translated good books out of strange tongues into their own language, husbanding thereby the Lord's vineyard, and keeping out the swine that endeavor to destroy it. Among these, I being one more ready to show my good will than able to do any great service, have chosen this short Sermon of Martin Luther, the faithful servant of God, Grand Captain under our Savior Christ, and chief hunter of these wild boars, to their father the devil, from where they were sent to destroy the sincere and true worship of God. This man's Sermon (I say) concerning the coming of our Savior to Judgment, and the signs that go before the last day, I have chosen to translate into our English tongue, as that which I thought a most convenient labor in this last hour of the day, to preserve in the Lord's vineyard the ripe grapes from rotting and from wild beasts, and to hasten those that are unripe against the Lord's coming. That is to say: to comfort the faithful, to confirm the weak, and to instruct the ignorant in diverse necessary points of doctrine, or at the least to give them a watchword of our Lord's coming. That they may now at length cease from smiting their fellow servants and from eating and drinking with the drunken, and may make themselves ready with oil in their lamps to receive him: that when the trumpet blows and the bridegroom comes, we may all follow him into his everlasting tabernacle, therein to live with God the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost, in everlasting joy. To whom be all praise, honor, and glory, world without end.

Amen.

Anno 1569. March 22. T. B.