A57970:590
Joshua Redivivus, or Mr. Rutherford's Letters
Joshua redivivus, or, Mr. Rutherford's letters divided into two parts, the first, containing these which were written from Aberdeen, where he was confined by a sentence of the high commission ... partly on account of his non-conformance : the second, containing some which were written from Anwoth ... / now published for the use of all the people of God ... by a well-wisher to the work & people of God.Joshua redivivus, or, Mr. Rutherfoord's letters divided into two parts, the first, containing these which were written from Aberdeen, where he was confined by a sentence of the high commission ... partly on account of his non-conformance : the second, containing some which were written from Anwoth ... / now published for the use of all the people of God ... by a wellwisher to the work & people of God.
Rotterdam? : s.n., 1664
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
To the Earle of Cassills. [106]
Right honourable & my very good Lord.
Grace, mercy & peace be to your Lo: I hope your Lo: Will be pleased to pardon my boldness, if [upon report of your zealous & forward mind that I hear our Lord hath given you in this his honourable cause, when Christ & his Gospel are so foully wronged] I speak to your Lo: in paper, entreating your Lo: to go on in the strength of the Lord toward, and against a storm of Antichristian wind, that bloweth upon the face of this your poor mother-Church, Christ's lily amongst the thorns. It is your Lo: Glory & happiness when ye see such a blow coming upon Christ, to cast up your arm to prevent it: Neither is it a cause that needeth to blush before the sun, or to flee the sentence or censure of impartial beholders, seeing the Question indeed [if it were rightly stated] is about the Prerogative royal of our princely & royal law-giver, our Lord ⟨p. 208⟩Jesus, whose ancient march-stones & land-bounds our bastard Lord's, the earthly generation of tyrannizing Prelates, have boldly & shamefully removed: & they who have but-half an eye may see that it is the greedy desires of time-idolizing Demas's and the itching scab of ambitious and climbing Diotrephes's [who love the goat's life to climb till they cannot find a way to set their soles on ground again] that hath made such a wide breach in our Zion's beautiful walls: and these are the men who seek no hire for the crucifying of Christ, but his coat. Oh how forlorn & desolate is the Bride of Christ made to all passers by! Who seeth not Christ buried in this land, his prophets hidden in caves, silenced, banished & imprisoned; Truth weeping in sackcloth before the Judges, Parliament & the Rulers of the land? But her bill is cast by them, & Holiness hideth it self, fearing the streets for the reproaches & persecution of men: Justice is fallen a swoon in the gate, & the long shadows of the evening are stretched out upon us: Woe, woe to us, for our day flieth away: what remaineth but that the Antichrist set down his tent in the midst of us, except your Lo: & others with you read Christ's supplication, & give him that which the most lewd and scandalous wretches in this land may have before a judge, even the poor man's due, law and justice for God's sake.