N20568:4506
The new and complete book of martyrs; or, An universal history of martyrdom: being…
The new and complete book of martyrs; or, An universal history of martyrdom: being Fox's Book of martyrs, revised and corrected, with additions and great improvements. : Containing an authentic account of the lives, persecutions and sufferings of the holy martyrs; and the many dreadful persecutions against the Church of Christ in all parts of the world, by pagans, Jews, Turks, papists, and others, from earliest ages of the church to the present period. ... The whole forming at once a general Christian martyrology, and a complete history of persecutions. / By the Rev. Mr. John Fox, M.A. late of Magdalen College, Oxford. ; Now revised, corrected and improved, with many additional articles, relating to the acts and monuments of the church. By Paul Wright, D.D. ; Embellished with forty elegant copper plate engravings. ; In two volumes. Vol. I[-II].The new and complete book of martyrs; or, An universal history of martyrdom: being Fox's Book of marytrs, revised and corrected, with additions and great improvements. : Containing an authentic account of the lives, persecutions and sufferings of the holy martyrs; and the many dreadful persecutions against the Church of Christ in all parts of the world, by pagans, Jews, Turks, papists, and others, from earliest ages of the church to the present period. ... The whole forming at once a general Christian martyrology, and a complete history of persecutions. / By the Rev. Mr. John Fox, M.A. late of Magdalen College, Oxford. ; Now revised, corrected and improved, with many additional articles, relating to the acts and monuments of the church. By Paul Wright, D.D. ; Embellished with forty elegant copper plate engravings. ; In two volumes. Vol. I[-II].
New-York: printed by William Durell, 1794
Title page typeset from the transcription.
Volume 1 › Book 1 › Chapter 6 › BISHOP HOOPER's LETTER of CONSOLATION to the aforesaid PRISONERS.
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.
BISHOP HOOPER's LETTER of CONSOLATION to the aforesaid PRISONERS.
THE grace, favour, and consolation, and aid of the Holy Ghost, be with you now and ever. Amen. Dearly beloved in the Lord, ever since your imprisonment I have been marvellously moved with great affections and passions, as well of mirth and gladness, as of heaviness and sorrow. Of gladness in this, that I perceived how ye be bent and given to prayer and invocation of God's help in these dark and wicked proceedings of men against God's glory. I have been sorry to perceive the malice and wickedness of men to be so cruel, devilish, and tyrannical, to persecute the people of God for serving of God, saying and hearing of the holy Psalms, and the word of eternal life. These cruel doings do declare, that the popish church is ⟨p. 411⟩more bloody and tyrannical, than ever was the sword of the heathens and gentiles. WHEN I heard of your taking, and what you were doing, wherefore and by whom ye were taken, I remembered how the christians in the primitive church were used by the cruelty of unchristened heathens, in the time of Trajan the emperor, about seventy-seven years after Christ's ascension into heaven: and how the christians were persecuted very sore, as though they had been traitors and movers of sedition. Whereupon the gentile emperor Trajan required to know the true cause of christian men's trouble. A great learned man, called Pliny, wrote unto him, and said, "It was because the christians said certain Psalms before day unto one called Christ, whom they worshipped for God." When Trajan the emperor understood it was for nothing but for conscience and religion, he caused, by his commandments every where, that no man should be persecuted for serving of God. But the pope and his church hath cast you into prison, being taken even doing the work of God, and one of the most excellent works required of christian men; that is to wit, whilst ye were in prayer, and and not in such wicked and superstitious prayers as the papists use, but in the same prayer that Christ hath taught you to pray. And in his name only ye gave God thanks for that ye have received, and for his sake ye asked for such things as ye want. O glad may ye be, that ever ye were born, to be apprehended whilst ye were so virtuously occupied. Blessed be they that suffer for righteousness' sake.