Touching hospitality, there was never any greater used in England,
sith by reason that marriage is permitted to him that will choose that
kind of life, their meat and drink is more orderly and frugally
dressed, their furniture of household more convenient and better
looked unto, and the poor oftener fed generally than heretofore they
have been, when only a few bishops and double or treble beneficed men
did make good cheer at Christmas only, or otherwise kept great houses
for the entertainment of the rich, which did often see and visit them.
It is thought much peradventure that some bishops, etc., in our time
do come short of the ancient gluttony and prodigality of their
predecessors; but to such as do consider of the curtailing of their
livings, or excessive prices whereunto things are grown, and how their
course is limited by law, and estate looked into on every side, the
cause of their so doing is well enough perceived. This also offended
many, that they should, after their deaths, leave their substances to
their wives and children, whereas they consider not that in old time
such as had no lemans nor bastards (very few were there, God wot, of
this sort) did leave their goods and possessions to their brethren and
kinsfolks, whereby (as I can shew by good record) many houses of
gentility have grown and been erected.
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