“I give praise where it is due. This is the work of a linguist and a poet.”

“Thank you,” I whisper.

* * *

Encouraged by the publication and the success of the book of psalms, I suggest to the archbishop that I might dare to start a great project—the translation of the four Gospels of the New Testament, the key documents of the life of Christ. I am afraid that he will say it is too great a task, but he is enthusiastic. We will start with the Latin translation of the scholar Erasmus, and try to render it into English, in beautiful but simple words that anyone can read.

And if they read of the life of Christ in simple language and understand it, can they not follow Him? The more that I study, the more certain I am that men—and equally women—can take charge of their own souls, can work for their own salvation, and can pray directly to God.

Of course, once I think this, the more I come to believe that the tricks and trades and treats of the Church of Rome are a shameful battening on ignorant people. To sell a woman a pilgrim badge and tell her that it shows that she has been on pilgrimage and her sins are forgiven is surely a sin itself. To assure someone that if enough nuns sing enough Masses, then her dead child will go to heaven is trickery as low as passing a false coin as good. To buy a pardon from the pope, to force the pope to annul a marriage, to make him set aside kinship laws, to watch as he fleeces his cardinals, who charge the bishops, who rent to the priests, who seek their tithes from the poor—all these abuses would have to fall away if we agreed that a soul can come to God without any intervention. The crucifixion is the work of God. The church is the work of man.

I think of the night when I prayed and I knew that God came to me. I heard him, I truly did. I think of the simplicity and beauty of the sacrifice of Christ, and I know in every way—from reading and from revelation—that the rituals of the old church must fall away and the people come to Christ one by one as He calls them. There shall be no blind obedience, there shall be no mumbling in a foreign tongue. The people will learn to read and will have a Bible so that they can learn their own way. This is what I believe now, and this is what I will achieve as Regent General and as queen. It is my holy duty. It is my calling.

* * *