Page:Letters of John Huss Written During His Exile and Imprisonment.djvu/246

212 It follows from hence, that there are but few preachers whom God does not at present suspend from the ministry of his Word, because there are few who do not reject the knowledge of the Scriptures, and contradict, by their lives, the duties which they teach unto others.”

Huss concludes from this, that he was forced to preach against the vices of the clergy. “Wo unto me,” he exclaims, “if I had remained silent; for, according to the canon law, not to oppose an error is to approve of it; and to neglect denouncing the perverse when it is in our power to do so, is to shew ourselves their accomplices. ”

Afterwards passing to the subject of interdicts, a punishment which ecclesiastical dignitaries may inflict on a country or town, simply for the fault of one individual and forbidding divine service to be celebrated in the place, without distinguishing the innocent from the guilty, John Huss adds: “One of the manifest proofs that these censures, which are called fulminations, are derived from Antichrist, is, that they are cast against those who preach the Gospel, and expose the corruption of the clergy. Interdicts began after the year one thousand, and by the rage of Satan, when the clergy had become fat on the misfortunes of the world, and had grown in voluptuousness, pride, and impatience of submitting to any restraint.”

Huss calls to mind the worldly motives which led the