the divine word. But blessed are they who hear it and treasure it up in their hearts, and by good works observe it." On the festival of Christmas, he wrote to that community: "Though I am at present separated from you in the body, because perhaps I am not worthy to preach to you any longer the word of God; yet the love with which I infold you, impels me to come, in the way at least of addressing you a few words." The few words were to this effect: that what, in other circumstances, he would have said to them from the pulpit, was briefly summed up in this letter; that they should lay to heart the significance of the festival; that he wished them the heavenly blessings secured to the faithful by the event which this festival commemorated.† In another letter to the same community, he applies to himself the words of Paul in the epistle to the Philippians (i. 23): "I say to you, my beloved, though I am not in prison, yet I would gladly, for Christ's sake, die and be with him; and yet I would gladly too, for your good, preach to you God's word; but I am in a strait betwixt two, and know not which to choose. For I await God's mercy, and I fear again lest something bad be done among you, so as to expose the faithful to persecution and the unbelieving to eternal death." He says of his enemies: " They at present rejoice, and wish that not only in me the word of God may perish, but also that Bethlehem Church, where I preached to you the gospel of Christ, may be closed. But without God's permission they will accomplish nothing; if, however, he permits it, it will be done on account of the sins of unthankful men; as Bethlehem where he was born, and Jerusalem where he redeemed us, were utterly destroyed."‡ Although a presentiment of the death which might befal him in contending for the truth had long been on his mind, yet he had at the same time a prophetic consciousness that, though his person might perish, the truth would come forth triumphant out of the contest, and would by other instrumentalities be still more powerfully attested. We may look upon such utterances of Huss, which we * Ep. ad Mag. &c. fol. 98, 2, and fol. 99, 1. Ibid. fol. 97, 1. 66 shall occasionally come across, as a prophecy of the German Reformation, though Huss was really thinking of that which was presently to take place on the theatre of his own past labours. Thus he writes a letter to the Bethlehem community, at the time when various attempts were made to break it up: They have directed their attacks against many churches and chapels, that the word of God might not be preached in them. Yet Christ has not permitted them to accomplish their purpose. Already, as I hear, they are seeking the destruction of Bethlehem Chapel, and in other chapels they forbid the preaching of God's word. Yet I trust in God that they will accomplish nothing. At first they prepared snares, citations, and ban for the "goose," and already they are lying in wait for some of you. But since the goose, a tame animal, a domestic animal with no wings to soar aloft, has broken through their snares, we may the more confidently expect that other birds who, by the word of God and their lives do soar aloft, will turn their toils and plottings to nought. And after having remarked how, by the interdict, they were seeking to suppress the worship and word of God in Prague, he adds: "But the more they seek to conceal their own real character, the more openly it betrays itself; and the more they seek to spread out their decrees like a net, the more they are rent in pieces; and in seeking to have the peace of the world, they lose that and spiritual peace at the same time; in seeking to injure others they injure themselves most. It happened to them as to the priests of the Jews; they lost that which they were endeavouring to secure, and fell into the evil they were aiming to avoid, in fancying that they could overcome and suppress the truth, which always conquers; since this is its habit and nature, that the more it is obscured the more it shines out, and the more it is beat down the higher it rises. Priests, scribes, and Pharisees, Herod, Pilate, and the other dwellers in Jerusalem, condemned truth, and gave it over to death and the grave; but it arose again, all-conquering, and substituted in place of itself twelve other heralds. And this same Truth has sent to Prague instead of one feeble goose, many falcons and eagles, which excel in sharpness of vision all other birds. These, by the grace of God, soar upward, high upward, and swoop away other birds to Jesus Christ, who will strengthen them, and confirm all his faithful ones. For he declares I am with you always, unto the end of the world. If He then be with us, the true God and mightiest, best defender, who, in his malice, shall be against us? What fear or what death shall separate us from Him? What do we lose when, for his sake, we lose earthly goods, friends, honours, and this wretched life? Surely we shall then first be delivered from this wretchedness, and obtain a hundredfold greater possessions, dearer friends, and a more perfect joy. Death shall not deprive us of these things. For he who dies for Christ conquers, and will be delivered from all sorrows and attain to that eternal joy to which may our Saviour Jesus Christ bring us all! This letter," he concludes, "dearest brethren and beloved sisters, I have written to the end that you might stand fast in the truth you have known, fear no citations, and attend not a whit less than you ever did, on account of their cruel threats, to the preaching of God's word. For God is faithful, who will establish you and preserve you from evil." Then follows a postscript of requests, hinting at the labours to which Huss was then devoting himself in his retirement. Pray for those who preach God's truth with grace, and pray also for me, that I may more richly write and preach against Antichrist, and that God may lead me in the battle, when I am driven to the greatest strait, that so I may be able to maintain his own truth. For know, that I shrink not from giving up this poor body for God's truth, when I feel assured there is no want of the preaching of God's word, but that daily the truth of the gospel is more widely spread. But I desire to live for their sakes to whom violence is done, and who need the preaching of God's word, that in this way the malice of Antichrist may be discovered as a warning to the pious. I preach therefore in other places, ministering to whoever may be found there; since I know that God's will is fulfilled in me, whether it be by a death hung over me by Antichrist, or whether I die in sickness. And if I come to Prague, I am certain that my enemies will lie in wait for me and persecute you, they who do not serve God themselves and hinder others from serving him. But let us pray God for them, if peradventure there may be some elect ones among them, that they may be turned to the know ledge of the truth."* Respecting the attempts to shut up or destroy Bethlehem Chapel, he says: "They would suppress God's holy word, tear down a chapel erected for its service, and hinder the people in their salvation." He calls upon them to ponder well the disgrace which would be brought upon their country, their nation, their race; the calumny and shame which would fall upon themselves without any fault of their own. Antichrist and the devil could do them no harm, if they remained faithful to divine truth. They had now, for some years, been lying in wait for himself, and had not (as he hoped in God) hurt a hair of his head, but only occasioned him greater cheerfulness and hilarity. Great pains would be taken to induce them to abjure the errors imputed to them. Huss warns them that, by so doing, they would either deny the truth, or wrongly accuse themselves of errors which they were far from cherishing. He exhorts them to trust in Christ the Almighty.† He reminds the Bethlehem congregation of his many years of labour among them and of its fruits, and says: For the sake of this, as God is my witness, I have laboured more than twelve years in preaching among you the divine word; and in this my greatest consolation was to observe your earnest diligence in hearing God's word and to witness the true and sincere repentance of many." He warns them against the fickleness of those who once fought by him and then went over to the other side. "Have no regard for those persons walking a crooked path, who have turned about and are now the most violent enemies of God, and our enemies." He reminds them that, even among the disciples of Christ, were those who once walked with him and then fell away from him. Exhorting them not to follow such examples, but faithfully to persevere in the confession of the truth and in attachment to those whom the Lord had sent to preach it to them, he requests them to pray for himself, that God would give him good success in preaching his word. all the places," says he, "where a need exists, in cities, in villages, in castles, in the fields, in forests, wherever I can 66 * Ep. ad Mag. &c. fol. 96, 2, and fol. 97, 1. "In † See Ferd. B. Milowec, Letters of John Huss, written at Constance, 1414-1415, published in the original Bohemian. Leips. 1849. Let. 4. be of any use, pray for me, that the word of God may not be kept back in me."* Sympathy with the cause of Huss, we perceive, had spread into other cities of Bohemia. Thus we find a letter of his to a foreign community, exhorting them to concord and warning them against internal dissensions.† To a parish priest in Prachatic, one who had been concerned in passing the sentence of condemnation against the forty-five propositions of Wickliff and in burning his writings, and who persisted in clamouring against Huss himself as a heretic, he wrote a letter challenging the man to convict him of a single heresy, but upbraiding him with the fact that, with all his pretended zeal for orthodoxy, he had constantly neglected the duties of the pastoral office, for which he had been thirty years responsible. "You might yourself call to mind how, for about thirty years, you have sheared the sheep in Prachatic. And where is your residence, your work; where the pasturage of your sheep?" He reminds him of what Christ, to whom he must render an account of his doings, says against unfaithful shepherds (John x.), and adds: "This you should have thought of before you denounced your neighbour as a heretic." t From expressions which drop from him in several of these letters, it is evident that his separation from his beloved flock bore heavily upon his spirits. There may be some ground, therefore, for the report that Huss in the course of this year, 1413, went privately several times to Prague, and resided there; leaving the city, as soon as his presence became known, and began to make a stir."§ Some time afterwards, to be nearer to his church, he changed his residence, and accepted the invitation of a friend, belonging to the knightly order, Henry of Lazan, who offered him, as a place of refuge, his castle, the stronghold of Cracowec. From this spot, too, he laboured for the spread of evangelical truth, visiting those places where large multitudes were wont to gather, and preaching before them. From all quarters, it is said, the people flocked together in crowds to hear him. * Opp. I. fol. 99, 2, and 100, 1. Ibid. fol. 93, 2. + Ibid. fol. 100, 2. |