N20568:4952
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.
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.
for their cruelty hath no further power than God permitteth them; and that which cometh unto us by the will of our heavenly Father can be no harm, no loss, neither destruction unto us, but rather gain, wealth, and felicity. For all troubles and adversity that chance to such as be of God, by the will of the heavenly Father, can be none other but gain and advantage.
THAT the spirit of man may feel these consolations, the giver of them, the heavenly Father, must be prayed unto for the merits of Christ's passion: for it is not the nature of man that can be contented, until it be regenerated and possessed with God's Spirit, to bear patiently the troubles of the mind or of the body. When the mind and heart of a man seeth on every side sorrow and heaviness, and the worldly eye beholdeth nothing but such things as be troubles, and wholly bent to rob the poor of what he hath, and also take from him his life: except the man weigh these brittle and uncertain treasures that be taken from him, with the riches of the life to come, and this life of the body with the life in Christ's blood, and so for the love and certainty of the heavenly joys contemn all things present, doubtless he shall never be able to bear the loss of goods, life, o• any other thing of this world.
THEREFORE St. Paul giveth a godly and necessary lesson to all men in this short and transitory life, and therein showeth how a man may best bear the iniquities and troubles of this world; "If ye be risen again with Christ, (saith he) seek the things which are above, where Christ sitteth at the right hand or God the Father." Wherefore, the christian man's faith must be always upon the resurrection of Christ, when he is in trouble; and in that glorious resurrection he shall not only see continual and perpetual joys and consolation, but also the victory and triumph over all persecution, trouble, sin, death, hell, and the devil, and all other tyrants and persecutors of Christ, and of Christ's people the tears and weeping of the faithful dried up, their wounds healed, their bodies made immortal in joy, their fouls for ever praising the Lord, in conjunction and society everlasting with the blessed company of God's elect in perpetual joy. But the words of St. Paul in that place, if they be not marked, shall do little profit to the reader or hearer, and give him no patience at all in this impatient and cruel world.