John Ball

“ And now hear a marvel: whereas thou sayest these two times that out of one man ye may get but one man's work, in days to come one man shall do the work of a hundred men—yea, of a thousand or more: and this is the shift of mastership that shall make many masters and many rich men."
John Ball laughed. "Great is my harvest of riddles to-night," said he; "for even if a man sleep not, and eat and drink while he is a-working, ye shall but make two men, or three at the most, out of him." ”

“ John Ball saw at a glance that the man was above the vulgar, and rejoicing that he could add one intelligent being to the illiterate mass who had become converts to his doctrines, he gladly accepted the offer of an ally who promised to be so serviceable; and, apprehensive that as the hour for a simultaneous rising had not yet come, a further display might rather injure than benefit the cause, pronounced a benediction over the multitude, and promising to appear soon among them again, desired each man to go to his regular business, and remain quiet till the appointed hour. ”

“ Then again John Ball spoke and said, "In good sooth, I deem ye wot no worse than I do what is to do—and first that somewhat we shall do— since it is for him that is lonely or in prison to dream of fellowship, but for him that is of a fellowship to do and not to dream. ”

“ Yet, behold John Bull, junior, on the football ground! The hero of a bad cause, but for all that a hero; a lusty little fellow, fearless, hardy, strong-knit, iron-muscled, and mule-headed, who, rather than let go a ball that he holds firmly in his arms, will perform feats of valor; who, simply to pass this ball between two goals, will grovel in the dust, reckless of lacerated shoulders, a broken rib or jaw-bone, and will die on a bed of suffering with a smile upon his lips if he can only hear, before closing his eyes, that his side has won the game. ”

“ But John Ball stayed him, stayed all.—Not yet,—no blood shall flow. We have need of strong men. Remember!
So, except a buffet here and there, pushing and hindrance, and loud words, there was no battle. Women clung weeping to John Ball, but he was bound and set on a horse. Then came the faithless espier and cast himself down in the way of that horse, and was trampled and his skull clove in.
One of the soldiers ran to the cross and would have bound Calote, for he said: This wench also was speaking, exciting the people. ”

“ But while I pondered all these things, and how men fight and lose the battle, and the thing that they fought for comes about in spite of their defeat, and when it comes turns out not to be what they meant, and other men have to fight for what they meant under another name— while I pondered all this, John Ball began to speak again in the same soft and dear voice with which he had left off. ”

“ John Ball laughed aloud, and said: "Well, I perceive we are not yet out of the land of riddles. The man may well do what thou sayest and live, but he may not do it and live a free man."
"Thou sayest sooth," said I.
CHAPTER XI HARD IT IS FOR THE OLD WORLD TO SEE THE NEW
He held his peace awhile, and then he said: "But no man selleth himself and his children into thraldom uncompelled; nor is any fool so great a fool as willingly to take the name of freeman and the life of a thrall as payment for the very life of a freeman. ”

“ Hence it is that the Chronicon Angliae speaks of John Ball as having been imprisoned earlier in life for his Wycliffite errors, which it calls simply perversa dogmata. The "Morning Star of the Reformation" being therefore [Pg 39] declared innocent of complicity with the Peasant Revolt, it is interesting to note to whom it is that he ascribes the whole force of the rebellion. For him the head and front of all offending was the hated friars. ”

“ God spede everydele.
Now is tyme Lady helpe to Jhesu thi sone, and thi Sone to His Faður, to make a gode ende, in the name of the Trinité of that is begunne amen, amen, pur charité, amen.
Modern English
Exemplar epistolae Johannis Balle ("The copy of a letter of John Bell")
John Ball greeteth you well all and doth you to understand, he hath rungen your bell.
Now right and might,
Will and skill (reason) ,
God speed everydale [bring success to all your endeavours] . ”

“ Ball Hughes was a dandy of the Regency, and from his fortune he was nick-named “the golden Ball”; of him Gronow says: “His fortune had dwindled down to a fourth of its original amount, for he was, perhaps, the greatest gambler of his day. His love of play was such, that, at one period of his life, he would rather play at pitch and toss than be without his favourite excitement. ”

“ Only to Ball does he seem to have frankly bared his mind, and Ball's admiring delineation of him furnishes a singular picture of cautious astuteness and constitutional reserve. It is clear that his heart was firmly set on the propagation of the calvinistic theology; his posthumous works (edited by Richard Sibbes, John Davenport, Thomas Ball, and partly by Thomas Goodwin, D.D. [q. v.] ) are a storehouse of argument in its favour. ”

“ Balkh, anciently called Bactria, a district of Afghan Turkestan lying between the Oxus and the Hindu-Kush, 250 m. long and 120 m. broad, with a capital of the same name, reduced now to a village; birthplace of Zoroaster.
Ball, John, a priest who had been excommunicated for denouncing the abuses of the Church; a ringleader in the Wat Tyler rebellion; captured and executed.
Ball, Sir R. S., mathematician and astronomer, born in Dublin; Astronomer-Royal for Ireland; author of works on astronomy and mechanics, the best known of a popular kind on the former science being “The Story of the Heavens” ”

“ Prize-Fighting is not the aim of boxing. This noble exercise ought not to be judged by the dishonesty or the low lives of too many of its professional followers. Let it stand alone, an athletic practice, on the same footing as boating or foot-ball. ”

“ John Balle seynte Marie prist gretes wele alle maner men and byddes hem in the name of the Trinité, Fadur, and Sone and Holy Gost stonde manlyche togedyr in trewthe, and helpez trewthe, and trewthe schal helpe yowe. ”

“ Rising out of the horizon at six o’clock, the sun passed exactly through the zenith, and went down perpendicularly in the west into the boundless ocean. Who can wonder that this daily disappearance of the sun has had so large a share in the poetry and the religion of our race? In every land, under every climate, it is the one spectacle which is ever new and ever fascinating. ”

“ On a fine evening, with the gentle heaving of the broad Atlantic billows to tune all to harmony, we passed the headland of Cape Spartel, and received the first rays of the great lanthorn as they shot out seaward when lighted for the night. ”

“ The starting of a covey of flying-fish, the fringe of cocos palms rising against the horizon, the Southern Cross and the Magellanic clouds, the reversed apparent motion of the sun from right to left—none of them very marvellous as mere observed facts—are so many keys that unlock the closed-up recesses, the blue chambers of the memory, which the youthful imagination had peopled with shapes of beauty and wonder and mystery. ”

“ To be able to converse in a tone approaching to equality with powerful officials; to emancipate oneself from restrictions trifling, yet galling, in matters of dress and demeanour; to share in some measure in the vague sense of power vested in the representatives of the great European States—must be the climax of ambition to a member of a despised nationality in a land where neither intelligence nor wealth nor good reputation give a man security or social recognition. ”

“ The poor fellows who had for some way followed us without further remonstrance, now renewed with redoubled energy their appeal that we should return. Kissing the hem of our coats at one moment, brandishing their arms with passionate gestures, or actually pulling us back at another, they really impressed us more by their pitiable appearance, exposed with the slightest covering to the bitter blast, their feet and bare legs cut and bleeding from the rocks and thorny bushes of the way. ”

“ Jerusalem was laid wast and desolate, the Temple burnt with fire, the Princes led captive and made tributary, the aged were despised, the young men made slaves and bond men, maidens defloured, and children dashed against the walles. They were slaine with the sword, burnt up with famine, languished through oppression, misery and sorrow, had in contempt and derision daily, but there was none to pittie or comfort them. ”

“ A third meanes is to possesse our hearts with this, and to have it ever in our thoughts, that in all things, especially in matters of Religion, we have to doe with God, and are ever in his sight and presence. In our common daily duties to labour thus to performe them with our heart, as in the sight of God, to his glorie, is a ready way to get this grace of truth deeply rooted. ”

“ The Covenant of Grace calleth for perfection, accepteth sincerity, God in mercy pardoning the imperfections of our best performances. If perfection was rigidly exacted, no flesh could be saved: if not at all commanded, imperfection should not be sin, nor perfection to be laboured after. The faith that is lively to imbrace mercy is ever conjoyned with an unfained purpose to walke in all well pleasing, and the sincere performance of all holy obedience, as opportunity is offered, doth ever attend that faith, whereby we continually lay hold upon the promises once embraced. ”

“ A perfectly sheltered cove, with excellent holding-ground, is enclosed by steep forest-clad slopes, culminating to the north in a lofty conical hill easily recognized by seamen. The narrow fringe between the forest and the beach is covered with a luxuriant growth of ferns and shrubby plants, many of them covered in summer with brilliant flowers, blooming in a solitude rarely broken by the passage of man. ”

“ The parque of Lota, to which I directed my steps, has rather the character of an extensive pleasure-ground than of what we call a park; but the surface is so uneven, and the outline so irregular, that I could not estimate its extent. The numerous fantastic structures in questionable taste that met the eye in every direction create at the first moment an unfavourable impression, but the charms of the spot are so real that this is soon forgotten. ”

“ The vegetation of the Mediterranean coasts seems but poor and homely after the eye has dwelt on the luxuriance of tropical life, as though one were to compare a garb of homespun with trappings of velvet and embroidery. The islands of the bay present a ceaseless variety. Some are mere rocks, on which sea-birds of unknown aspect stood perched. Many of the larger are inhabited, and one, as I heard, has a population of thirteen hundred souls, and several charming villas showed it to be a favourite resort. ”

“ All nations, I say, but not every one in every nation, nor every nation in all periods of that time. For many nations have lived, we know, for a long time in infidelity, without the Gospell, without God in the world, aliens from the Common-wealth of Israel, and strangers from the Covenant of Grace. ”

“ God promiseth freely to recompence the good of obedience, which is already due, and might be exacted without promise of reward; man promiseth to pay that debt of duty, which he oweth unto the Lord, in respect of the manifold relations, wherein he stands obliged unto him. The forme of the Covenant stands in a Promise and restipulation, To will and to nill the same things is the sure bond of all amity and friendship. ”

“ And if Christ died thus for his people, seed, inheritance, sheep, and Church, he died not equally for all and every man: for then in his death he considered none to be made his sheep or brethren before others, nor did he purchase grace that one should be made the child of God rather then another. For though grace be distributed, in different degrees, yet that being so common to them that beleeve and them that beleeve not, that sometimes the greater measure is given to them that reject and cast it off, it cannot be the cause why one man differs from another. ”

“ By the Covenant of Nature Adam was not advanced above the condition of an honourable Servant. In the Covenant of Grace, man by nature the child of wrath, is made the child of God by grace and adoption. The Covenant of nature was neither the last nor everlasting, but being first made way for a better, and being broken was antiquated or disanulled to our singular comfort: but the Covenant of Grace shall continue firme and immoveable for evermore. ”

“ About thirty miles long and twenty in breadth, it is large enough to allow of spacious views, yet not so large as to lose in distance the marvellous background that is presented in every direction by the fantastic peaks that surround it. Numerous islands stud the surface, the larger telling their history in piles of huge blocks, either simulating rude Cyclopean architecture, or lying in wild confusion—granite pinnacles, half-decayed or fallen into utter ruin. ”

“ The moon stood high in the cloudless sky, wherein there was so little vapour that the stars seemed scarcely dimmed by her brilliancy. The great tower, stark against the black vault, appeared gigantic in its proportions as it looked down on the strange scene below. The noises of the city—even the howling of the dogs—were for the moment completely stilled; our camels, horses, mules, and asses lay resting after their day’s work, and amongst them the sleeping figures of our men, wrapped up in white haïks or jellabias, looked weird and ghostly in the moonlight. ”