Page:The letters of John Hus.djvu/155

 Furthermore, they state that though the rector excommunicates some of the doctors, they themselves are not involved in the excommunication, thereby defaming others and exalting themselves.

Their judgment, therefore, inasmuch as it is disgraceful, should be rejected.

Worshipful rector, gracious master and father, I am greatly comforted by your letter, in which among other things you write: Whatever shall befall the just man, it shall not make him sad. And again: All that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution. From these words you infer that I am not broken, cast down, and saddened, but strengthened, uplifted, and gladdened by the tribulations of the moment and the absence of my friends. Very thankfully do I welcome this comfort, as I ponder the first sentence of the Scriptures you have quoted. For if I am just, nothing whatever shall make me so sad as to cause me to fall from the truth. But if I live godly in Christ and will so to do, then I must suffer persecution in Christ’s name. For if it behoved Christ to suffer and so to enter into His glory, it must needs be that we poor creatures should bear a cross and so imitate Him in His sufferings.

I assure you, therefore, worshipful lord rector, that persecution would never make me weary, if only I