A68306:28
The copy of an epistle sentThe copie of an epistle sent
The copy of an epistle sent by John Knox one of the ministers of the English Church at Geneva unto the inhabitants of Newcastle, & Berwick. In the end whereof is added a brief exhortation to England for the speedy embracing of Christs gospel heretofore suppressed & banished.The copie of an epistle sent by Iohn Knox one of the ministers of the Englishe Church at Geneua vnto the inhabitants of Newcastle, & Barwike. In the end wherof is added a briefe exhortation to England for the spedie imbrasing of Christes gospel hertofore suppressed & banished.
At Geneva : s.n., M.D.LIX. 1559
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.
Enter in judgement with your selves, dear brethren, & consider earnestly, what exchange ye have made. Ye have refused & denied God the father & his dear Son Christ Jesus, & so the whole joy & comfort of his kingdom: ye have quit the portion of your inheritance & have despised the benediction promised to such, as should abide ⟨p. 46⟩in the trueth to the end. And what reward have ye received? a mess of pottage, yea, much less, if the matter shall be well considered. For the favour of your Queen accursed by God, the friendship of the counsel destitute of wisdom, and your wretched and miserable lives, compared with the things, which ye have lost, are much inferior to the pottage, for ye with Esau sold his birthright. For his appetites and lusts were sacia• for a time, but I am assured that your bellies, for the which ye have refused God, are more empty, than they were before. Now are ye compelled to feed the proud Spaniard both within and without your country. Tax followeth tax and one exaction calleth for an other. The lands and inheritances must pay at pleasure of the parliament▪ the movable goods can not escape valuation and censure,1 where oppression and extortion ⟨p. 47⟩bear rule & dominion. These are the great benefits, which of Jezebel ye have received for refusing of God & bowing at her commandment to Baal. But let it be that you had received since your revolt & falling from God the greatest riches, the greatest honour, the greatest victory, & the most established rest, that ever nation had since the beginning: yet had ye changed your former glory for a mess of pottage. For do ye not know that all these things shall cuanish as a dream in the night season? And as concerning the preservation & safety of your lives, for that which ye have refused God, who only is the author of life, the day shall shortly come, when ye shall prove this sentence of Christ Jesus to be true in experience,2 3that whosoever to keep or find his life denieth Christ Jesus before men, shall lose his life both corporal & eternal. For as your Jezebel can nothing without the