The sermons of Master Henry Smith gathered into one volume. Printed according to his…The sermons of Maister Henrie Smith gathered into one volume. Printed according to his…

To her silence and patience, she must add The acceptable obedience, which makes a woman rule while she is ruled. This is the wives tribute to her husband: for she is not called his head, but he is called her head. Great cause hath man to make much of his wife, for great and many are her duties to him, for Paul saith;¹ Wives submit your selves unto your husbands, as to the Lord. Showing that she ⟨p. 54⟩should regard his will as the Lords will,² but withal, as the Lord commandeth only that which is good and right, so she should obey her husband in good & right, or else she doth not obey him as the Lord, but as the tempter. The first subjection of woman began at sin: for when God cursed her for seducing her husband,³ when the Serpent had seduced her, he said, He shall have authority over thee. And therefore as the man named all other creatures,⁴ in sign that they should be subject to him, as a servant which cometh when his master calleth him by his name: so did he name the woman also,⁵ in token that she should be subject to him likewise. And therefore Assuerus made a law,⁶ that every man should bear rule in his own house, and not the woman,⁷ because she sinned first, therefore she is humbled most:⁸ & ever since, the daughters of Sarah are bound to call their husbands Lords,⁹ as Sarah called her husband: that is, to take them for their Lords,¹⁰