Page:The letters of John Hus.djvu/133

 to reach great heights in his flight, hath yet broken through their nets, we may the more confidently expect that other birds, which by God’s word and by their lives soar to high places, will break their traps in pieces. They spread out their nets and struck terror with their anathema as with a wooden toy-hawk and they shot their fiery bolt from Antichrist’s quiver, provided only they might hinder God’s word and worship. But the more they seek to conceal their true nature the oftener it betrays itself, and the more they strive to lay out their traditions like a net, the more they are broken through. In seeking to have the peace of the world, they lose both that and spiritual peace; in seeking to hurt others, they chiefly thwart themselves.

They suffer, therefore, the fate of the priests and high priests of the Jews, in that they lost what they tried to keep and fell into the pit they wished to escape in supposing that they could overcome and crush the truth, which always conquers. For its very property and nature is such that the more it is obscured, the more it shines forth, and the more it is laid low, the more it is raised up.

The high priests, priests, scribes, and Pharisees, the Herods, Pilate, and the people of Jerusalem condemned the Truth and gave Him to death and laid Him in the tomb; but He rose again, overcame them all, and gave in His own stead twelve other preachers. And it is this same Truth Who hath sent to Prague, in the place of one feeble, weakly Goose, falcons and eagles, which surpass all other birds in the keenness of their sight. These, by God’s grace, soar high and seize other birds for Christ Jesus, Who will strengthen these His servants and confirm all His faithful ones.