N20568:7418
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 2 › Chapter 10 › Letter 15: LETTER XV. From Mr. BRADFORD, to Dr. HILL, Physician.
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.
THE God of mercy and Father of all comfort at this present and for ever ingraft in your heart the sense of his mercy in Christ, and the continuance of his consolation, which cannot but enable you to carry with joy whatsoever cross he shall lay upon you, Amen.
HITHERTO I could not have the liberty to write to you, as I suppose you know: but now through God's providence I have no such restraint, and therefore I shall write something to clear myself of the suspicion of unthankfulness towards you in these dangerous days, […] you should wax cold in God's cause, (which God forbid) or suffer the light of the Lord, once kindled in your heart, to be quenched, and so become as you were before, after the example of the world, and of many others who would have been counted otherwise in our days, and still would be so accounted, although by their outward life they declare the contrary, as if they could keep the heart pure, while the outward man doth curry favour.
HITHERTO I could not have the liberty to write to you, as I suppose you know: but now through God's providence I have no such restraint, and therefore I shall write something to clear myself of the suspicion of unthankfulness towards you in these dangerous days, 〈…〉 you should wax cold in God's cause, (which God forbid) or suffer the light of the Lord, once kindled in your heart, to be quenched, and so become as you were before, after the example of the world, and of many others who would have been counted otherwise in our days, and still would be so accounted, although by their outward life they declare the contrary, as if they could keep the heart pure, while the outward man doth curry favour.
IN which doings, as they deny God to be jealous, and therefore requireth the whole man as well body as soul, being both created for immortality and society with him, and redeemed by the blood of Jesus Christ, and now sanctified by the Holy Spirit to be the temple of God, and member of his Son, (I say) by their parting stakes to give God the heart and the world the body, they deny God to be jealous, (for else they would give him both, as the wife would do her husband, whether he be jealous or no if she be honest) so they play the dissemblers with the church of God by their fact, offending the godly, whom either they provoke to fall with them, or make them more careless and conscienceless if they be fallen, and occasioning the wicked and obstinate to triumph against God, and the more vehemently to prosecute their malice against such as will not defile themselves in body or soul with the Romish rags now received amongst us. Because of this, I mean, left you, my dear master and brother in the Lord, should do as too many of our gospellers have done for fear of man, whose breath is in his nostrils, and hath power but of the body, not fearing the Lord, who hath power both of soul and body, not only temporally, but also eternally: I could not but write something unto you, as well because gratitude requireth it, (for the many favours I have received of God by your hands, for which may he reward you, for I cannot) as also because charity and love compelleth; not that I think you have need, (for as I may rather learn of you, so I doubt not but you have hitherto kept yourself upright from halting) but that I might both quiet my conscience, calling upon me hereabout, and signify unto you by something, my carefulness for your soul, as painfully and often you have done for my body.