if you make good your promise which we presume you will we our selves will not only serve you but we will procure all the Professors in Lothain to do the same c. These promises being made in the presence of God and hands being stricken by both parties the Earle took Master Wischard and so departed Master Wischard was carried to Edenburgh But gold and women easily corrupt fleshly men for the Cardinal gave Bothwel gold and the Queen that was too familiar with him promised him her favour if he would deliver Master Wischard into Edenburgh Castle which he did and shortly after he was delivered to the blood-thirsty Cardinal who seeing that it was forbidden by their Cannon Law for a Priest to sit as a Judge upon life and death he sent to the Governour requesting him to appoint some Lay-Judge to passe sentence of death upon Master Wischard The Governour would easily have yielded to his request but that David Hamilton a godly man told him that he could expect no better an end than Saul if he persecuted the truth which formerly he had professed c. Hereupon the Governour sent the Cardinal word that he would have no hand in shedding the blood of that good man The Cardinal being angry returned this answer that he had sent to him of meer Civility and that he would proceed without him and so to the great grief of the godly the Cardinal carried Master Wiseheart to Saint Andrews and put him into the Tower there and without any long delay he caused all the Bishops and other great Clergy-men to be called together to Saint Andrews Feb. ult 1546. Master Wischard was sent for to appear before them to give an account of his seditious and Heretical doctrine as they called it The Cardinal caused all his retinue to come armed to the place of their sitting which was the Abby-church whither when Master Wischard was brought there was a poor man lying at the door that asked his almes to whom he flung his purse when he came before the Cardinal there was a Dean appointed to preach whose Sermon being ended Wischard was put up into the Pulpit to hear his charge and one Lawder a Priest stood over against him and read a scrowle full of bitter accusations and curses so that the ignorant people thought that the earth would have opened and swallowed up Wischard quick but he stood with great patience without moving or once changing his countenance The Priest having ended his curses spat at Master Wischards face saying VVhat answerest thou thou Runnagate Traytor Thief c. Then did Master VVischard fall upon his knees making his prayer unto God after which he said Many and horrible sayings unto me a Christian man many words abominable for to hear have ye spoken here this day which not onely to teach but even to think I ever thought it a great abomination c. Then did he give them an account of his doctrine Answering every Article as farre as they would give him leave to speak But they without having any regard to his sober and godly answers presently condemned him to be burnt After which sentence he falling upon his knees said O immortal God how long wilt thou suffer the rage and great cruelty of the ungodly to exercise their fury upon thy servants which do further thy Word in this world whereas they on the contrary seek to destroy the truth whereby thou hast revealed thy self to the world c. O Lord we know certainly that thy true servants must needs suffer for thy names sake persecutions afflictions and troubles in this present world yet we desire that thou wouldest preserve and defend thy Church which thou hast chosen before the foundations of the world and give thy people grace to hear thy Word and to be thy true servants in this present life Then were the common people put out the Bishops not desiring that they should hear the innocent man speak and so they sent him again to the Castle till the fire should be made ready In the Castle came two Friars to him requiring him to make his Confession to them to whom he said I will make no confession to you but fetch me that man who preached even now and I will speak with him Then was the Sub-Prior with whom he conferred a pretty while till the Sub-prior wept who going to the Cardinal told him that he came not to intercede for Master Wischards life but to make known his innocency to all men at which words the Cardinal was very angry saying We knew long ago what you were The Captain of the Castle with some friends coming to Master Wischard asked him if he would break his fast with them yea said he very willingly for I know you be honest men In the mean time he desired them to hear him a little and so he discoursed to them about the Lords Supper his sufferings and death for us exhorting them to love one another laying aside all rancor and malice as becomes the members of Jesus Christ who continually intercedes for us to his Father Afterwards he gave thanks and blessing the bread and wine he took the bread and brake it giving it to every one saying eate this remember that Christ died for us and feed on it spiritually so taking the Cup he bade them remember that Christs blood was shed for them c. Then he gave thanks and prayed for them and so retired into his chamber Presently came two Executioners to him from the Cardinal one put on him a black linnen coat the other brought him bags of powder which they tied about several parts of his body and so they brought him forth to the place of execution over against which place the Castle windows were hung with rich hangings and Velvet Cushions laid for the Cardinal and Prelates who from thence fed their eyes with the torments of this innocent man The Cardinal fearing lest Wiseheart should be rescued by his friends caused all the Ordnance in the Castle to be bent against the place of his execution and commanded his gunners to stand ready all the time of his burning Then were his hands bound behind his back so he was carried forth In the way some beggars met him asking his alms for Gods sake To whom he said My hands are bound wherewith I was wont to give you almes but the merciful Lord who of his bounty and abundant grace feeds all men vouchsafe to give you necessaries both for your bodies and souls Then two Friars met him perswading him to pray to our Lady to mediate for him to whom he meekly said Cease tempt me not I entreat you and so with a rope about his neck and a chaine about his middle he was led to the fire then falling upon his knees he thrice repeated O thou Saviour of the world have mercy upon me Father of heaven I commend my spirit into thy holy hands
and so kneeling down and praying unto Christ the executioner with his bloudy hand finished her hope Basil in one of his Orations relates a story of one Jullitta from whom one of the Emperours officers tooke all her goods lands and servants contrary to all equity whereupon she complained to the Judges and a day of hearing was appointed where the spoiled woman lamentably declared her cause But the wicked villain that had robbed her said that her Action was of no force for she was an outlaw for not observing the Emperours gods and that she was a Christian His allegation was allowed incense was prepared for her to offer to the gods which if she refused she should neither have protection nor benefit of the Emperours Laws nor continue her life She hearing this in the mighty strength of God said Farewell riches welcome pouerty farewell life welcome death All that I have were it a thousand times more would I lose rather then speak one wicked word against God my Creator I yield thee most hearty thanks O my God for this gift of grace that I can contemn and despise this frail and transitory world esteeming the profession of Christ above all treasures And thenceforth when any question was proposed to her her answer was I am the servant of Jesus Christ. Her kindred and friends earnestly sollicited her to change her minde but she constantly refused with detestation of their Idolatry Then did the cruel Judge condemn her to be burnt which sentence she embraced joyfully as a thing most sweet and delectable and so she addressed her self to the flames in countenance gesture and words declaring the joy of her heart coupled with singular constancy and so embracing the fire she sweetly slept in the Lotd Barbara a noble woman in Thuscia after miserable imprisonment sharp cords and burning flames put to her sides was as last beheaded together with many others Here place the fourth Figure CHAP. XVII The Persecution of the Christians in Persia under Sapores about the same time THE Idolatrous Magicians in Persia taking counsell together against the Christians accused them to Sapores for keeping correspondence with and favoring the Roman Emperour which was Constantine the Great The King being much moved herewith took occasion to oppress them with taxes and tributes to their utter undoing and killed there Ministers with the sword Then he called before him Simeon their Bishop who remaining constant and valiant he commanded him to be led forth to torment yet did he neither shrink for fear nor make any humble suit for pardon which the King being offended at required him either to worship him after the countrey manner or else he would destroy him and all other Christians in his land But Simeon neither allured with promises nor terrified with threatnings could be induced to the Idolatrous worship for which cause he was sent away to prison and as he was going there was sitting at the Court-gate an Eunuch an old Tutor of the Kings named Usthazares once a Christian but now fallen from his profession who seeing Simeon led by rose up and did him reverence Simeon on the contrary rebuked him crying out against him for revolting from his profession Whereupon the Eunuch burst forth into tears layd aside his costly apparell and put on black mourning weeds and sitting at the Court-gate weeping he said to himself Wo is me with what face hereafter shall I look upon God seeing Simeon disdaineth with one gentle word to salute me This being carried to the Kings ears he was exceeding angry and sending for him he first with gentle words and large promises spake him fair and asked him why he mourned Whether there was any thing in his house that was denied him c. Whereunto Usthazares answered that there was nothing in that earthly house that was detained from him Yea said he O King would God any other grief or calamity in the world had happened to me rather then this for which I justly sorrow For this is my grief that I am alive this day who should have died long since and that I see this sun which dissemblingly to pleasure you I have seemed to worship for which I have deserved a double death First for dissembling with you secondly for that thereby I have denied Christ withall vowing that he would never hereafter forsake the Creator to worship the creature c. Sapores was much astonished hereat and doubted whether to use him gently or with rigour but at last in his mood he commanded him to be beheaded But as he was going to execution he requested an Eunuch that attended on the King to desire him for all the old and faithfull service that he had done to his father and him that he would cause it to be proclaimed openly at his death that he was beheaded not for any treachery against the King or Realm but for that he was a Christian and would not deny his God this the King yielded to and so it was performed and this he desired because by his former Apostacy he dad discouraged many Christians and therefore he sought by his profession and example to encourage them to the like sufferings Simeon in prison hearing of his death much rejoyced and praised God for it and the very next day he with above an hundred more Christians were beheaded likewise There was present at their Martyrdom one Pusices an officer to the King who beholding an aged Minister to tremble when he saw the others beheaded before him said unto him O father shut thine eys for a little moment and be strong and shortly thou shallt see God in glory Hereupon Pusices was apprehended and carried before the King in whose presence he made a bold confession of his faith for which cause they made a hole in his neck and pulled out his tongue backward and so he was put to death together with one of his daughters that was a virgin The year after when the Christians were met together to celebrate the memoriall of Christs passion Sapores sent forth a cruel Edict that all they should be put to death that professed the Name of Christ and this he did at the instigation of the wiâ—ked Magicians whereupon an innumerable company of Christians both in Cities and Towns were slain by the sword some being sought for others offering themselves willingly least they should seem to deny Christ In this Persecution many of the Kings own Court and houshold-servants suffered Martyrdom amongst whom was Azades an Eunuch whom the King entirely loved insomuch as hearing that he was slain he was so offended and grieved that he commanded that thenceforth no more Christians should be slain but only the Doctors and Teachers of the Church About this time the Queen fell very sick upon which occasion the wicked Jews and Magicians accused two of Simeons sisters which were godly virgins that by charms and
of thorns till they were torn in pieces and these newly converted Moors he caused their naked bodies to be haled backwards and forwards thorow bushes and brambles and others of them to be tied to wild beasts and so to be rent in sunder the poor Christians saying thus each to other O brother pray for me God hath fulfilled our desire O this is the way to the kingdom of heaven Genserick further raging against the Orthodox sent one Proculus into the Zeugian Province to dispoil all the Churches of their Ornaments and the Ministers of their books that thereby they might be disabled to holy services which command was executed with all rigour and whereas the Bishop of Habensa refused to deliver them up he was expelled the City and all men at great penalty were forbidden to harbour him so that being above eighty years old he lay naked for a long time under the open skie About Easter when the Christians were met together in a Church to celebrate the remembrance of Christs Resurrection the Arrians with a great power of armed men set upon this innocent company who with their naked swords slew many The Minister that was preaching they shot through the throat with an arrow and such of them as escaped death were by the command of the King executed by sundry kinds of torments In other places when the Christians were administring the Sacrament the Hereticks rushed in amongst them taking the bread and wine and trampling them under their profane feet Then did Genserick command that none but Arrians should bear any office either about himself or his children And a Bishop called Armogastes they took and first nipped his fore-head and legs with bow-strings then did they hang him up by one foot with his head downward yet did he seem to all men as if he slept in a feather-bed which so enraged Theoderick the Kings son that he commanded him to be beheaded but some about him disswaded him from it because said they he will be accounted a Martyr Then was he banished to dig in Mynes yet afterwards he was sent for again and made a Cow-heard near to Carthage that he might be a continual object of scorn There was also one Saturus a noble man eminent for holiness whom the Tyrant much laboured to draw to the Arrian profession but he refusing the King told him that if he presently consented not he should forfeit his house and goods that his Children and slaves should be sould and his wife should be given to the Camel-driver Yet no menaces could shake his faith His wife hearing of her doom went to her husband as he was praying with her garments rent her hair disheveled her Children at her heels and a sucking infant in her hands whom she cast at her husbands feet and took him about the knees saying Have compassion O my sweetest of me thy poor wife and of these thy Children look upon them let them not be made slaves let not me be yoaked to a base Marriage c. that which thou art required to do thou dost it not willingly but by constraint and therefore it will not be laid to thy charge He gave her an answer in the words of Job Thou speakest like a foolish woman thou actest the devils part if thou lovest thy husband thou wouldst never seek to draw him to sin which will procure the second death I am resolved therefore as my Lord commands me to forsake wife children lands house c. that I may be his Disciple and accordingly he was dispoiled of all and turned out a begging yet all were forbidden to harbour him Genserick having reigned thirty seven years and three moneths died Genserick being dead his son Hunrick succeeded him who at first was more moderate to the Christians insomuch as they began to hold their meetings as before time The Manichaean Hereticks he sought out and though most of them were of his own Religion yet he burnt some and banished others At the request of the Emperour Zeno and Placidia his wife he suffered the Church of Carthage to chuse their own Bishop having been destitute of one for twenty four years Then they chose Eugenius an humble holy and charitable man whose fame increasing the Arrian Bishops much envied him and put into the Kings head to forbid him to preach and not to suffer any to enter into the Church that were attired after the manner of the Vandals To which command Eugenius thus answered The house of God is free for all those which enter no man may drive forth The King being incensed with this answer placed tortures at the Church door who when they espied any man or woman in a Vandals habit about to go into the Church clapping flesh-hooks on their heads and twisting them in their hair with a strong twitch they pulled off hair scalp and all whereby some lost their eies and some their lives The women besides these torments they carried thorow the streets to be made a publick laughing-stock yet could they not force them to altar their Religion Then did Hunrick ordain that none of his Countries which dissented from his Religion should receive their ordinary pensions and salaries Then did he send many of them who had been delicately brought up to Utica in the parching heat of the sun to dig the land for corn yet they went cheerfully and comforted themselves in the Lord. Then did he command that no man should be a Knight or bear any publick office except he turned Arrian whereupon very many with invincible courage forsook their honours and offices rather then their faith Many Virgins he caused to be proved by the Midwives in a most shamefull manner hanging them up from the ground with mighty weights at their feet and putting to their sides breasts back and bellies red hot plates of iron to compell them to confess that their Bishops and Ministers lay with them that so he might from thence have an occasion to persecute them Many of these died under the pain and others remained lame and crooked all their lives after yet would they not confess any such thing Then did he banish into the wilderness of Bishops Ministers Deacons and other Members of Christ four thousand nine hundred seventy six some of them being lame with the gout others blind with age Amongst whom also was Foelix Bishop of Abiris possessed with a dead palsie and therefore unable either to go or ride which the cruel King being informed of and requested that he might be suffered to stay he answered if he be not able to ride let wild bulls be coupled to drag him to the place appointed So that they were fain to carry him on a Mules back across as if he had been a sack Then were all these holy Confessors brought to the City of Sicca where the Moors were to receive them and transport them thence to
having taken fourteen men they bound them and were leading them away prisoners but their wives and children pursued them so fiercely with stones that they were glad to let their prisoners go and had much ado to save themselves Two others that they caught they hung up by the heels and hands and having tormented them almost to death at last released them for a great sum of money Another Garison in the night went to Tailleret brake in at the windows and tops of houses spoiling all and took also fourteen prisoners whom they bound two and two together and were carrying them to the Fortress but two of them getting loose so valiantly assaulted the souldiers and beat them with stones that they forced them to let go their other prisoners Yet two others they took and carried them to the Fort one was but a child whom the Captain strangled with his own hands the other was sixty years old whom they bound and took a crature that lives in horse-dung and put into his navel covering them with a dish which in a short space did eat into his belly and killed him The Waldenses were in great perplexity by reason of these Garisons but especially for the want of their Ministers whereupon they resolved to call them back yet to have preaching only in private because they would not imbitter the souldiers till their messengers returned from the Duke These messengers were cruelly handled at the Court and at last sent back with a command that they should entertain Priests to say Mass c. When this Report was made to their brethren that sent them there was wonderfull lamentation weeping and mourning Then did they send two of their Ministers to the Church of Pragela to shew them of the pitifull condition of the Churches in Piedmont and to ask their advice how to prevent the danger and in the next place they all fell to prayer and having long called upon God for counsel and direction in so great a strait they resolved upon debate that the people in Piedmont and Dauphine should joyn in a League together wherein they promised through Gods grace and assistance to maintain the pure preaching of the Gospel and administring the holy Sacraments to yeeld obedience to their superior so farre as they were commanded by the Word of God and one to be aiding and assisting to the other that none should conclude any thing touching the estate of Religion without the consent of the rest of the Vallies During this Treaty all the housholders were required to be present at Masse and such as would do it should live in peace but such as refused should be condemned to be burnt or sent to the Gallies so that the people were constrained to fly die or renounce the Gospel The first they would have chosen but could not do it by reason of the great snow Whereupon they exhorted one another saying We shall be all called for to morrow to renounce God and to return to Idolatry let us therefore make a solemn protestation that we will live and die in the confession of Gods holy Word let us in the morning hear a sermon and then cast down to the ground all the Idols and Altars and to this all agreed In the morning they put their resolutions into execution beating down the Images and casting down the Altars Then they went to Villars to do the like there but by the way they encountred with a band of souldiers who where going to spoil a village and to fetch away the inhabitants prisoners These souldiers seeing them so ill provided mocked them and discharged their guns at them but they taking courage with stones beat the souldiers pursuing them to the Fortresse Then did they go to Villars and having destroyed the Idols and Altars there they returned to besiege the fortresse demanding the prisoners that were therein The Judge with many Gentlemen came that day to enroll their names that would go to Masse but seâ—ing the resolution of the people they fled into the Castle where they were besieged for ten daies Then did the Captain of Toâ—r go with a company of souldiers thinking to raise the siege but by those which kept the passages some of them were slain the rest were driven back again Then came they back with three bands which caused a furious fight wherein many of the souldiers were slain and hurt and not one of the besiegers was hurt The Waldenses attempted often to have taken the Fortresse but without Ordinance it was impossible also the Lord of Trinity was come back with his army and the next day would have raised the siege But it pleased God that very night that the souldiers in the Castle desired leave to depart with bag and baggage which was easily granted to them and the souldiers whiâ—h before had so cruelly persecu the Ministers were now fain to request them to protect their lives and to conduct them to a place of safty which the Ministers did willingly and the souldiers were very thankfull for it that night the Fort was razed to the ground The next day the Lord of Trinity cunningly sent to them of Angrogne that if they would not aid the other they should be gently dealt with but they knowing his fraud agreed with the rest to defend their Religion with their lives and that no one should make an agreement with out the consent of the rest Then did the Lord of Trinity assay with his Army to enter into the borders of Angrogne by certaine streights but the people having raised up some breast-works valiantly defended themselves and offended their enemies Trinities souldiers being weary fresh ones were brought in their stead so that the fight endured untill night wherein many of the enemies were slain more hurt and but two of the Waldenses and so the battell ceased for the present The next day the Army marched towards Angrogne five severall waies and there were none to resist but only a few that kept the Watch who valiantly fought for a space but seeing themselves in danger to be inclosed they retreated to an high place where the combate was renued with greater fiercenesse then before The Lord of Trinity seeing the losse of many of his men sounded a retreat and went to Angrogne but the people were fled into the medow of Tour therefore he burned and spoiled all before him He also oft set fire upon the two Churches where the word used to be preached but could not burne them and so he did to the Ministers house and yet it remained whole Amongst them of Angrogne there were but two that were enemies to the word of God and they were both slain that day Then did the Lord of Trinity send some to burn Rosa but the souldiers were driven back four daies together by them that kept the passages whereupon he sent his whole Army yet they valiantly withstood them from morning till night At last a party
gat behinde them over a mountaine so that the poor people seeing themselves environed saved themselves by running through the midst of their enemies and others of them gat into the rocks The enemies being entred Rosa destroyed all with fire and sword The people fled by secret waies toward Luserne wandring all night upon the mountains full of snow laden with their stuff carrying their infants in their arms and leading others by the hand with great pain and travell They of Luserne seeing them ran to them praising God for their deliverance and they all were very chearfull notwithstanding their extremities Shortly after the Lord of Trinity went to Luserne by three waies they which kept the passages resisted their enemies valiantly but when they saw themselves assaulted on every side they fled into the mountains Then did the souldiers sack and burn the houses staying all they could finde When they which were fled to the mountains saw their houses on fire they praised God and gave him thanks that thus accounted them worthy to suffer for his Name Then did the souldiers pursue them to the mountains but after they had called upon God a few of them beat back their enemies whereupon the Army retired They in the meddow of Tour perceiving a company of souldiers burning the rest of the houses in Angrogne they sent six harque-bushiers against them who from the higher ground discharging all their guns together the souldiers ran all away when none pursued them Shortly after as the Watch was hearing a Sermon they spied a company of souldeirs marching up the hill whereupon they ran to encounter them and easily discomfited them But whilest they pursued the chase some cried to them that another company was entred into the meddow whereupon they left the chase or else not one of their enemies had escaped Presently other companies came other waies which the Ministers and people seeing were much discouraged and therefore they fell to prayer and ardently called upon God with sighs and teares untill night And whereas seven spies were sent before the souldiers there went out five of the Waldenses against them and took some and chased the rest Then went out eight more against the whole company and pursued them with an undaunted courage from rock to rock and from hill to hill and then went out twelve more who joining with the other made a great slaughter of their enemies Another company from Luserne having a Minister with them as they used alwaies to have after they had made their prayers to God set upon another company of souldiers whose hearts were so taken from them that they presently fled One of the Waldenses a very young man carried a greate staff in his hand with which he laid so lustily at his enemies that he brake his staff and slew many of them he also brake four of their own swords in pursuing of them Also a boy of eighteen years old slew the Lord of Monteil Master of the Camp which much dismaid the enemies Another threw down Charles Truchet and then leaped upon him and slew him with his own sword upon which all the rest fled and were pursued till night hindred The Minister seeing the great effusion of bloud and the enemies flying cried to the people that it was enough and so exhorted them to praise God They that heard him obeyed and fell to prayer In this battell they gat much armour which was a great advantage to them afterwards Thanks were returned unto God in every place every one saying Who sees not evidently that God fighteth for us Presently after the Lord of Trinity returned to burn the Villages but especially to pursue the poor people in the mountains And one company with many horsemen ascended the mountain of Comb by an unsuspected way where were no Warders but they which were next seeing them called upon God for aid and though they were but thirty in number yet they valiantly beat them back twice many of the enemies were slain and not one of the Waldenses Trinity seeing his men thus beaten back sent out most of his Army to assist them which were about one thousand five hundred men And there came about a hundred to help the Warders The combat was very cruel at last the poor men were fain to retreat with the losse of two of their men at this the enemies exceedingly rejoyced blowing their trumpets and triumphing but the people crying all together to the Lord returned again with greater violence assaulting them with their slings So that the enemies being weary rested themselves and the while the Waldenses betook themselves to prayer which more affrighted their enemies then any thing else Then did the souldiers charge again furiously but by the hands of a few they were driven back yea little children fervently calling upon God threw stones at their enemies as also did the women Such as were unfit for war kneeled on the ground with their faces towards heaven crying Lord help us Then came one running that brought word that the Angrognians were coming to help them which the enemies hearing presently retreated Another party of the Army of an hundred and fourty went another way but by seven men they were strongly resisted and driven back A third party was met by the Angrognians and driven back The Lord of Trinity intending to be revenged upon them in the meddow of Tour assembled all the Gentlemen of the country and an Army of about seven thousand and when the poor people saw them coming glittering in their harnesse and so many in number they were at first astonished but pouring out their prayers unto God to succour them and to have regard to the glory of his Name c. They marched to encounter with their enemies and seasonably by the way they met with some aid that was coming to them from Luserne so that uniting themselves they soon discomfited their enemies The Captain of the enemies had in the morning promised to do great matters that day but in the evening he was carried back weak and wounded and not like to live Whereupon a Papist said to him Monsieur there religion is beter then ours Another part of the Army set upon an house in a passe wherein were but five men yet they lustily defended it drave out their enemies that had entred and kept the place till some of their friends came to relieve them Another half of the Army assaulted another Bulwork on the side of the mountaine And they within suffered them to come very near but then with slings and guns they slew many of them others rouled down great stones which killed divers so that when they had attempted all waies to take it they were forced to retire the Lord of Trinity weeping to see his men slain so fast and at last having lost very many of his men he was forced to retreate many of the Army crying out God fighteth for them and we do them wrong
most of the Ministers were turned out of their places so that they durst not preach nor pray but in private And a certaine Noble man having apprehended six of the Brethren cast them into prison and when they were brought forth to be burnt they went chearfully to the fire and when the chief officer taking affection to one of them offered him his life if he would recant his error profering him withall to give him a years time to consider of it he pawsed a while but by and by answered It is too much by such a delay to lose my Brethrens company and so going along with them they were burned together Shortly after the Chancellor that had procured the passing of the Edict against the Brethren as he returned from the Parliament visiting a certaine Noble man by the way he with great pleasure reported to him what was agreed upon against the brethren The Noble man having a servant by that was much edicted to the discipline of the Brethren asked him how he liked it the servant answered that all were not agreed The Chancellor suspecting some new conspiracy asked him who durst oppose the States of the Kingdom c the servant said In heaven there is one who if he were not present at your counsels you have consulted in vain The Chancellor replied Thou knave thou shalt finde that as well as the rest And rising up in fury immediately a Carbuncle rose upon his foot which turned to a disease called Ignis sacer whereof he died miserably Another of the great sticklers in this businesse returning homewards as he was a lighting out of his Chariot to make water he struck his member on a sharp nail that was in the boot whereby he drew out his entrails with him and not long after he gave up the ghost Also D· Augustine who by slanderous libels had endeavoured to stirre up the King against the Brethren died suddenly as he was at supper Another Noble man of these persecutors as he was hunting his horse threw him and his arrow ran into his thigh and came out at his loins whereby he died a most paineful death Many others of them felt the like judgements of God so that it grew into a proverbe amongst them If you be weary of your life attempt something against the Piccards and you shall not escape a year to an end About this time God stirred up in Germany undaunted Luther the thunderbolt against the Pope which occasioned many of the Calixtines to resolve to embrace the purer Doctrine of the Gospel and to seek for the Ordination of their Ministers from Wittenberg rather then from Rome But amongst these there was one Zahere an Apostate who to ingratiate himselfe with the King and Pope would enforce the Pastors and Citizens of Prague to subscribe to sundry Articles or else they must be proscribed And first of all six Pastors were banished then sixty five of the chiefest Citizens Then to colour greater cruelty a rumour was spread abroad of a conspiracy made by the Brethren against the Calixtines and to extort a confession hereof three Citizens were brought to the rack who rather chose to suffer all torments then falsly to accuse the innocent Yet divers were persecuted Amongst others a Cutler that had found an Orthodox Book about the Sacraments was whipped openly in the market-place and banished Another was branded in the forehead a third was thrust into prison and there murthered Then in the Assembly of Estates it was decreed that the Mandate of the King should be put in execution against the Piccards Whereupon a new persecution was raised against the Brethren their Churches being shut up and their Exercises forbidden Anno 1526. A godly and learned man together with his Hostesse with whom he lodged a widow of sixty years old were both burnt in the fire for Picardism together with the books that were found about them Another godly woman being brought before the Magistrate made a hold profession of her faith and then being required to prepare her garments to be burnt in she answered They are ready leade me away when you please The Crier declaring openly that she had blaâ—phâ—med she with a loud voice denied it saying It is false I am condemned because I deny the Reall presence of Christ in the Sacrament give no credit to these Priests they are dissembling Hypâ—crites Adulterers Sodomites Epicures c. Being commanded to pray to the Crucifix she turned her back to it and lifting up her eyes to heaven she said There is our God thither we must look and so chearfully mounting the pile she was burned Anno Christi 1527. The year after two German tradesmen were caught at Prague accused by the Monks of Lutheranism and condemned to be burnt As they went to execution such gracious words proceeded out of their mouths as drew tears from the spectators eyes When they came to the pile they exceedingly encouraged one another onâ— of them saying Since our Lord Christ hath suffered such grievous things for us let us chearfully suffer for him and rejoyce that we have found so much favour with him that we are counted worthy to die for the Law of God The other said I in the day of my marriage found not so much inward joy as I do now When fire was put to them with a loud voice they said Lord Jesus thou in thy sufferings prayedst for thine enemies therefore we also do the like Forgive the King the men of Prague and the Clergy for they know not what they do and their hands are full of bloud and so they slept in the Lord. But one of their chief persecutors who wished that all the Piccards were hanged beheaded or burnt by his own hands had all these befall himself by Gods just judgement For being much in debt he hanged himself and when his friends had privately buried him the common people hearing of it digged up his carcasse and cast it away which by the Magistrates command was ordered to be burnt but when the woodstack was consumed and the carcasse only scorched his head was stricken off Zahera the Apostate when under colour of an Inquisition against the Piccards he raised up civil commotions was by the King banished where he died miserably The like befell another of those cruel persecutors Anno 1535. Ferdinand the first succeeding in the Kingdom the Popish party cunningly stirred up the Calixtines to persecute the Brethren Whereupon they suffering many grievous things sent a petition together with a confession of their Faith to Ferdinand at Vienna subscribed by twelve Barons and thirty three Knights complaining how unjustly they were accused by their enemies and that the Priests ordinarily cried out that the Piccards might be slain without controul and that a lesse sin was thereby committed than if one killed a dog Ferdinand returned answer that he had not leisure to consider of their Papers yet promised
and where as some were allured to deny the truth that they might be eased of taxes and quarterings of souldiers this was not performed whereupon they complained that promise was broken with them but the Jesuits answered them that they had no cause to complain for they had provided for their souls and therefore they ought cheerfully to help the King by contributions and quarterings of souldiers and that Hereticks must be dealt with as mad men and children from whom â—f you desire to get a knife you must shew them something else though you never intend to give it them Thus the Kingdom being emptied of gold and silver counterfeit and adulterate money was coined in great abundance that so the common people might rejoyce in their plenty but in the mean time the souldiers would recâ—ive none but good money Gold and silver also was raised to ten times the price of it and on a sudden the Emperour diminished the value making every piece of money to be worth but the tenth part whereby the Bohemians were more impoverished suddenly then if they had lain under the burden of an Army ten years Then was it ordered that the creditor should lose all the money that he had lent in the time of the rebellion as they called it And thus they were first impoverished after which the enemies insulted over them by infamous books insolent pictures and proud words Then did they send abroad their Commissioners of Reformation who in every Town and Village endeavored to bring Protestantism into disgrace and highly to magnifie and set abroad their owne cause The most eminent men for honour and estates are invited to Apostasie the inferiour sort are either fooled by their examples or compelled by threâ—tnings Then was there an High-Court of reformers set up from which there was no appeal In the next place the souldiers exercised barbarous Tyranny against the Ministers of Jesus Christ. One aged minister lying sick in his bed they shot him to death as he lay The next day they robbed and murthered another Another as he was preaching to his people they came into the Church and shot him to death Another Nobleman and a Minister hearing of souldiers that were coming that way conveighed themselves away into a place of safety the souldiers when they came caught a Schoolmaster and binding him in cords examined him where the Lord of that place and the Minister were and where they had hid their treasure he professed that he knew neither the one nor the other whereupon they beat him first with their fists then with cudgels then stripping him naked they so extreamly singed him with fire that at last he promised to bring them where the treasure was shewing them a ditch full of stones which for greediness of gold they emptied but finding nothing they beat him afresh and when he professed that he knew of no treasure though through pain he had said so much they cudgelled him and with clods beat him into the ditch and buried him under the stones Presently after they lighted on another godly Minister whom they so miserably tortured that he â—ied within five daies shamefully abusing his daughters also whom they led away with them Another godly Minister for a moneth together they excruciated with new invented mockeries they spit in his face buffeted him with their fists exposed him to be beaten by every vile rascall They with a knotâ—y cord twisten about his forehead with a stick so strained his head that his very eyes were ready to start out Then they let loose a wilde horse upon him which yet leaped quite over him and did him no harm at last with much adoe he redeemed himself with five hundred Florences Another Pastor they lighted on and because he had a better estate then the former they tormented him more sometimes covering him over with hot burning coals sometimes with Ice till they had forced him to pay a thousand five hundred Florences for his ransome though shortly after through extremity of the pain he died Another Minister they fetched from his house and miserably tortured him by twisting a cord about his head then tied they his hands behinde him and his legs with a small cord intending the next morning to torture him with fire but in the night time as he was earnest at his prayers repeating those words In thee O Lord is my trust he perceived his hands and feet miraculously to be loosned Whereupon getting up he went to the gate where were three Watchmen one of them standing with his hand on his sword yet he passed by them undiscovered When he came to the Town-gate he was known by the Souldier that stood Sentinell but he being a Bohemian was overcome by entreaty and let him passe over the bridge whereby he escaped Another Minister together with his wife they cruelly burnt Another was hanged upon a crosse-beam and making a fire under him they broiled him to death Another they cut into small peeces Another Minister they sought for but he being escaped they took a young man in his house laid him on his back filled his mouth with gunpowder which setting fire to they miserably tore his jaws in pieces and then killed him When some souldiers came to the house of another he entertained them courteously and made good provision for them but when they knew he was a Minister they first beat him cruelly then killed him stripped and plundered his house they also burnt his Library and would not suffer his body to be buried for seven weeks during their abode there Another aged Minister and his wife were so sorely burned by a souldier that demanded money of them that presently after they died Another was hung up by the privy members being seventy years old and his own books burnt under him and at last was shot through and slain Another was first assessed at seven hundred florences then had his house plundred and lastly himself was murthered Another they caught and wounded cutting his neck half through but being afterwards carried by some friends to a Chirurgion he lived about two years but in much pain and torment Another being above seventy years old they carried into the market-place where laying him upon a fire they burnt him to death Another was beaten so that he died three daies after The Jesuites laid wait for one Pescinus a man eminent for learning and piety at last they suborned an Apostate to betray him who discovering him as he rode in a Coach with a Nobleman fourty horsemen came suddenly and took him away but by the importunity of some Noblemen he was ransomed for four thousand Florences and ended his life in banishment Another being bound to a Tree was made a mark for the Musquetiers to shoot at and though they did not hit him yet by reason of the affrightment he died within three daies Another being met by a
notable Papist was ran thorow with a spear But all this was done through military licentiousnesse Now we come to what was acted by processe of Law Anno 1621. Six Articles were exhibited to the Protestant Congregations in Prague 1. That they should lend some thousands of pounds to Caesar for the paiment of his Army 2. That they should publickly renounce the coming in of Frederick 3. That they should bring into the Church the Popish Rites and Ceremonies 4. That their Ministers should be ordained anew 5. That the Ministers should leave their wives or get a dispensation from the Archbishop 6. That such as would renounce their Ecclesiasticall functions should have publick promotions and the favour of Caesar. But they answered unanimously that they would doe nothing against their consciences Then came forth an Edict wherein the blame of all the former rebellion as they called it was laid upon the Ministers of Prague because they had stired up by their seditious and lying Sermons as they pleased to stile them and by their writings not only the common people but the Nobles also against Caesar and that they were the authors of the choice of Frederick and that they still laboured to stirre up in the people an hatred against Caesar. Thereupon all the Ministers within Prague were required within three daies to depart out of Prague and within eight daies to depart out of all the Kingdom and the Provinces belonging thereto and never to return again and if any under what pretence soever should stay or returne again or if any should presume to harbour or conceal any of them that both the one and the other should suffer death this was Anno 1621. Then were their Churches in Prague given to the Jesuits It can not be expressed what lamentations and mournings there were amongst the people when thus they must leave their Pastors and that for ever Yet the German Ministers whereof there were two were suffered to continue in favour to the Duke of Saxony Then did as many as understood Dutch flock to their Congregations which so vexed the Jesuits that they obtained not a banishment but a gracious dismission of them as they would have it called Multitudes of people followed them with great lamentations and tears and in the field they heard their farewell sermon The next design was to remove the Ministers out of other free Cities and the Commissioners of Reformation were imployed herein One of them with a Troop of horse coming to Slana and going to Church the Minister a godly and learned man was reading the Gospel The Commissioner sent a souldiers to him to bid him give over but the Minister still going on himself went to him with his sword drawn crying out Thou foolish Preacher leave off thy babling and withall he dashed the Bible out of his hand with his sword The Minister with eies hands and voice lift up to heaven repeated often Woe woe unto you you enter not into heaven your selves and forbid them that would Woe woe woe unto you But they mocking at these words presently laid hands on him justling him to and fro whereupon he said I for the name of my Lord Jesus Christ am ready to suffer all this and what else you shall impose The people were much affrighted but the chief Magistrates and many good women interceding for him he was at last dismissed provided that he should depart the City within three daies and thus was this faithfull shepherd not without the greate lamentations of his people banished where about three years after he died In a neighbouring City the Minister for fear of these barbarous proceedings went a way of himself yet the Commissioners extorted a great summe of money from his Church and banished him in his absence In another place they commanded the Minister to depart from his Parish within three daies and from the City within eight daies he modestly asking the reason of his banishment they told him Caesar by conquest was Master of all the Churches and that therefore he would put into them whom he pleased But into the rooms of these godly Preachers were put in unclean men wicked blasphemers and men illiterate and of no worth and yet they could not provide for all places so that one of their hirelings supplied divers Churches and in stead of the wholesome food of Gods Word he fed them with poison Then brought the ignorant Monks out of Poland unprofitable burthens to the earth yet fit enough to be scourges to unprofitable and common Gospellers Then a Commissioner with some Troops of horse entring into Ctutenburg a place famous for maintaining the Orthodox Faith cals before him the Ministers casts them out of their places and puts Jesuits into their Churches And these Jesuits urging it the Ministers were commanded to depart out of the City gates before break of day and out of the Kingdom within eight daies Hereby were twenty one Ministers driven away many Citizens accompanying them One of them at the parting preached upon that Text They shall cast you out of the Synagogues exhorting them to perseverance All the multitude much bewailed their losse and with great lamentations wailing and kissing each other they recommended themselves to the blessing and protection of the Almighty In every place the Ministers were cast out of their livings some imprisonned and after a while dismissed and all commanded to depart the Kingdom upon pain of death Some were stifled with stink whilest they lay in prison At last Anno 1624. an other Decree came forth from the King whereby all the Ministers of the Gospel were commanded to depart the Kingdom by a peremptory day prefixed because as was alledged they were seditious men and seducers of the people Yet herein they used this Artifice that in most places this Edict was concealed till the time was almost or altogether elapsed so that by this means the Ministers not having time to communicate their counsels together went into severall Provinces and some were faigne to hide themselves in caves dens and those either returned privately and visited their auditors or comforted such as came to them in the mountains and woods preaching and administring the Sacraments to them But as soon as the enemies understood it they presently published a new decree wherein a punishment was preposed to those that should conceal the Ministers and a rewarde to such as should betray them Whereupon some of the Ministers were taken and cast into prison Then by the Jesuits were they by all waies sollicited to Apostacy and fear of death hunger cold the stink of the prison c. prevailed with some to renounce their Ministery But most bore up couragiously against all storms and at last some by paying great fines others by giving it under their hands that they would never returne into Bohemia were dismissed One godly Minister was examined by tortures when where and to whom he had administred
trust in my God that he will graciously accept my contrite spirit When upon the Scaffold the Jesuites exhorted him he listned not to them but turned from the Crucifix and falling down on his knees he prayed softly Then looking up towards heaven he cried They can take away the body but they cannot take away the soul O Lord Jesus I commend that unto thee and so he ended his life being fifty six years old The next was an aged man about seventy years old that had been long lame his crime was that he had assisted Frederick with his counsel and wealth at the time of his death he said O Lord Jesus who being innocent didst undergo death grant that I may die the death of the righteous and receive my soul into thy hands The next was the Lord of Rugenia a man of excellent parts and full of zeal for God when he was iudged to die he said that it was more welcome to him then if the Emperour had given him life and restored him to his estate with addition of more afterwards he said to the Minister God is our witnesse that we fought for nothing but the Liberty of Religion and in that we are overcome and condemned to die we acknowledge and finde that God will not have his truth defended by our swords but by our bloud c. When he saw divers called out before him he said What is the matter my God thou knowest that I resign my self wholly unto thee Ah do not despise thy servant but make haste to take me away and when the Sheriff came for him he rejoyced and said Praised be my God that I shall now be taken out of the world that I may be with Christ and so he went to meet him On the Scaffold he comforted himself with that promise Father I will that where I am my servants may also be to behold that glory which thou gavest me Therefore said he I make haste to die that I may be with Christ and see his glory and so he suffered Martyrdom couragiously The next was Valentine Cockan of about sixty years old During his imprisonment he was full of heavenly discourse and at the Scaffold he said Grant me O God to passe through this valley of death that I may presently see thee for thou knowest my God that I have loved thy word bring me O God through the paths of life that I may see fulnesse of joy in thy presence and kneeling down he said into thy hands O Lord I commend my spirit and so holily ended his life The next was Toby Steffick a man of a composed temper and sincere in Religion he spent most of the time of his imprisonment in silent sighs and tears Before his Execution he said I have received many good things of the Lord all my life long shall I not therefore receive this cup of affliction I imbrace the will of God who by this ignominious death makes me conformable to his son and by a narrow way brings me to his heavenly Kingdom I praise God who hath joyned me undeservedly to these excellent men that I might receive with them the crown of martyrdom When he was called to die he said My Saviour being about to die said Father not as I will but as thou wilt thy will be done Shall I therefore who am but a worm yea dust and a shadow contradict his will far be it from me yea I come willingly my God only have mercy on me and cleanse me from my sins that no spot or rinckle may appear in me but that I may appear pure in thy sight and so he lifted up himself full of sighs yet full of hope and as he was praying he rendered up his spirit unto God Then was Jessenius a Doctor of Phisick called forth a man famous for piety and learning all over Europe Having hard his sentence he said You use us too cruelly and disgracefully but know that our heads shall be buried which you ignominiously expose for a spectacle which afterwards came to passe Anno 1631. when the King of Sweden with his Army took prague and caused the Martyrs heads to be taken from the Tower and solemnly and honourably buried When the Hangman required his tongue to cut it off he willingly put it out and falling upon his knees as he was praying his head was cut off his body quartered and set upon four stakes The next was Christopher Chober who much encouraged his fellow-Martyrs and then cited the words of Ignatius I am Gods corn and shall be ground with the teeth of wilde beasts So we saith he are Gods corn sown in the field of the Church and that we may be for our Masters use we are now to be torn by beasts but be of good chear the Church is founded in bloud and hath ever encreased by bloud God is able to raise up a thousand worshippers of himself out of every drop of our bloud for though truth now suffers violence yet Christ reigns and no man shall throw him from his Throne Being called to execution he said I come in the name of my God neither am I ashamed to suffer these things for his glory for I know whom I have beleeved I have fought the good fight of faith and finished my course c. then praying into thy hands Lord I commend my spirit he received the Crown of Martyrdom John Shultis was next who on the Scaffold said Why art thou so sad O my soul Hope thou in God for thou shalt yet praise him c. The righteous seem to die in the eyes of fools but indeed they go to their rest Lord Jesus thou hast promised that whoso comes to thee thou willt not cast off Behold I now come look on me pity me pardon my sins and receive my soul to thy self then kneeling down he said Come come Lord Jesus and doe not tarry and so he was he headed The next was Maximillian Hostialick a learned and pious man after his condemnation he was sadder then the rest and being asked by the Minister the reason of it he said The sins of my youth doe now come into my minde for though I know that nothing remains to condemn them which are in Christ Jesus yet I know that God exerciseth justice as well as mercy towards his own Being called to death he said Look upon me O Lord my God and lighten mine eyes lest I sleep the sleep of death and lest mine enemies say We have prevailed Afterward repeating the words of Simeon Now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace for mine eyes have seen thy salvation he was beheaded The next was John Kutnaur who when the Jesuites began to speak to them said Pray you trouble not our consciences we are sufficiently furnished against the fear of death we need none of your help and when they would have proceeded
their sentence which is pronounced upon such as are to be burned they use this abominable hypocrisie They bequeath him to the secular power with this humble request to them to shew the Prisoner as much favour as may be and neither to break any bone nor pierce the skin of his body This shews their great impudence that having already given sentence on him to be burned they yet should pretend such mercy and clemency towards him whom all along themselves have used with such extream cruelty They use also this trick further that in reading the crimes for which he is condemned they do not only misreport such things as he confessed upon his examination but they devilishly father upon him such things as he never spake or thought of in all his life and this they do to disgrace him and to make him and his opinions more abhorred of all men and to encrease their own estimation and credit as being necessary officers to rid the world of such pestilent persons and all this while the Prisoners tongue hath a cleft piece of wood upon it to his intolerable pain and grief that he cannot answer for himself nor gainsay that they charge him with All these things being finished the Magistrate takes them into his hand and conveys them presently to the place of execution with divers instruments of Satan about them calling and crying to them to forsake the truth and when they cannot prevail after the Prisoner is tied to the stake they break his neck in a trice and then they report amongst the common people that they recanted their heresies at the last houre and so came home to the Church of Rome and therefore they felt no pain in the fire at all which made them take it so patiently Such as are not condemned to die are carried back to prison and the next day brought out to be whipt after which some of them are sent to the Gallies others kept in prison all their life time but all have this special charge given them that they never speak of any thing that they have heard seen or felt during their imprisonment in the Inquisition for if the contrary be ever proved against them and that they utter any of their secrets they shall be taken for persons relapsed and be punished with greatest severity their judgement being death without Redemption and hereby they keep in all their Knavery and Tyranny close and secret to themselves And if any of them be released because their faults were but small they are yet so careful lest their cruelty should come to light that they inhibit them the company or conference with any other than such as they shall appoint and allow them neither will they suffer them to write to any friend except they first have the perusing of their letters Sometimes also after they have imprisoned men in such a miserable state for a year or two and can extort nothing out of them by their torments nor prove any thing against them by witnesse so that they must necessarily dismisse them they then call them into the Court and begin to flatter them and tell them what a good opinion they have of them and that they are resolved to send them home for the which fatherly favour extended towards them in saving their lives goods they are to account themselves much beholding to their Lordships c. And so at last they dismisse him with special charge of silence and when he is gone they have special Spies abroad to see how he takes the matter and if they find that he complains of his punishments or discloses their secrets they presently commence a new suit against him On a time the Inquisitors at Sivill apprehended a noble Lady the cause was for that a Sister of hers a very vertuous Virgin who was afterwards burned for Religion had confessed in the extremity of her torments that she had sometimes had conference with this her sister about matters of Religion This Lady when she was first apprehended was gone with child about six months in respect whereof they did not shut her up so close at first nor deal so severely with her as they did with others But within foure dayes after she was brought to bed they took the child from her and the seventh day â—fter they shut her up in close prison and used her in all things as they did other Prisoners the only worldly comfort that she had in her misery was that they lodged her with a vertuous maiden that was her fellow-Prisoner for a time but afterwards burned at the stake This maid whilst they were together was carried to the rack and so sore strained and torn thereon that she was almost pulled in pieces then was she brought back and thrown upon a bed of flags that served them both to lie on the good Lady was not able to help her yet shewed singular tokens of love and compassion towards her The maid was scarce recovered when the Lady was carried out to be served with the same sauce and was so terribly tormented in the trough that by reason of the strait straining of the strings piercing to the very bones of her armes thighs and shins she was brought back half dead to her prison the blood gushing out of her mouth abundantly which shewed that something was broken within her but after eight dayes the Lord delivered her from these cruel Tygers by taking her mercifully to himself Upon one of their dayes of triumph there was brought out one John Pontio of a noble Family a zealous Professor of the truth and one of an holy and blamelesse life and well learned he was eminent also in works of charity in which he had spent a great part of his estate Being apprehended for the Profession of the Gospel he was cast into Prison where he manfully maintained the truth in the midst of all their cruel dealings with him At last they cast into prison to him one of their flyes who by his subtilty and craft so wrought upon him that he drew from him a promise to yield obedience to the Romish Church But though God suffered him to fall a while to shew him his frailty yet afterwards in much mercy he raised him up again with double strength to that which he had before and before his execution he manfully defended the truth against a subtil Friar The things which he was condemned for were these That he should say that from his heart he abhorred the idolatry which was committed in worshipping the Host That he removed his houshold from place to place that he might shun coming to the Masse That the Justification of a Christian resteth only in the merits of Jesus Christ apprehended by faith c. That there was no Purgatory That the Popes pardons were of no value c. And for my self saith he I am not only willing but desirous to die and ready to suffer any
punishment for the truth which I have professed I esteem not of this world nor the treasures of it more than for my necessary uses and the rest to bestow in the propagation and maintenance of the Gospel And I beseech God daily upon my knees for my wife and children that they may all continue in this quarrel even to the death And when he came to his execution he patiently and comfortably slept in the Lord. At the same time there was also brought forth one John Gonsalvo formerly a Priest but by his diligent study of the Scripture it pleased God to reveal his truth to him so that he became a zealous Preacher of it labouring in all his Sermons to beat into mens minds the true way and means of our Justification to consist in Christ alone and in stedfast faith in him for which he was apprehended and cast into prison where he endured all their cruely with a Christian courage At last with two of his Sisters he was condemned His mother and one of his brothers were also imprisoned with him for the truth and executed shortly after When he with his sisters went out at the Castle gate having his tongue at liberty he began to sing the 106. Psalm before all the People who had oft heard him make many godly Sermons He also condemned all hypocrites as the worst sort of People Whereupon they stocked his tongue Upon the stage he never changed countenance nor was at all daunted When they all came to the stake they had their tongues loosed and were commanded to say their Creed which they did chearfully when they came to those words The holy Catholick Church They were commanded to adde Of Rome but that they all refused whereupon their necks were broken in a trice and then 't was noised abroad that they had added those words and died confessing the Church of Rome to be the true Catholick Church There was in Sivil a private Congregation of Gods people most of which the Inquisitors consumed in the fire as they could discover any of them amongst others that were apprehended they took four women famous above the rest for their holy and godly conversation but especially the youngest of them who was not above one and twenty years old who by her diligent and frequent reading of the Scriptures and by conference with godly and learned men had attained to a very great measure of knowledge so that whilst she was in Prison she non-plus'd and put to shame many of those Friars that came to seduce her Another of these women was a grave Matron whose house was a School of vertue and a place where the Saints used to meet serve God day and night but the time being come wherein they were ripe for God they together with other of their neighbours were apprehended and cast into prison where they were kept in dark dungeons and forced to endure all the cruel and extream torments which are before mentioned At last they were condemned and brought forth to the scaffold amongst other Prisoners The young maid especially came with a merry and cheerful countenance as it were triumphing over the Inquisitors and having her tongue at liberty she began to sing Psalms to God whereupon the Inquisitors caused her tongue to be nipped by setting a Barnacle upon it After sentence read they were carried to the place of execution where with much constancy and courage they ended their lives Yet the Inquisitors not satisfied herewith caused the house of the Matron where the Church used to meet to be pulled down and the ground to be laid waste and a pillar to be erected upon it with an inscription shewing the cause There was also apprehended another worthy member of the same Congregation called Ferdinando he was of a fervent spirit and very zealous in doing good A young man but for integrity of life very famous He had spent eight years in educating of youth and had endeavoured to sow the seeds of Piety in the hearts of his Scholars as much as lay in him to do in a time of so great persecution and tyranny being at the last apprehended for a Lutheran he was cast into prison and terribly tormented upon the Jeobit and in the Trough whereby he was so shaken in every joynt that when he was taken down he was not able to move any part of his body yet did those cruel tormentors draw him by the heels into his prison as if he had been a dead dog But notwithstanding all his torments he answered the Inquisitors very stoutly and would not yield to them one jot During his imprisonment God used him as an instrument to recal and confirme a Monk who had been cast into prison for confessing the Gospel openly But by means of the Inquisitors flatteries and fair promises he had somewhat relented Gods Providence so ordering it that Ferdinando was cast into the same prison and finding the Monk wavering he rebuked him sharply and afterwards having drawn him to a sight of and sorrow for his sinne he at last strengthned him in the promises of free grace and mercy Hereupon the Monk desired a day of hearing where before the Inquisitors he solemnly renounced his recantation desiring that his former confession might stand whereupon the sentence of death passed against them both after which the Inquisitors asked Ferdinando whether he would revoke his former heresies to which he answered That he had professed nothing but what was agreeable to the pure and perfect Word of God and ought to be the profession of every Christian man and therefore he would stick to it to the death Then did they clap a Barnacle upon his tongue and so they were burned together There was also one Juliano called The little because he was of a small and weak body who going into Germany was there conversant with divers learned and godly men by which means he attained to the knowledge of the truth and became a zealous Professor of it and earnestly longing after the salvation of his Countreymen he undertook a very dangerous work which was to convey two great dry Fat 's full of Bibles printed in Spanish into his own Countrey In this attempt he had much cause of fear the Inquisitors had so stopped every Port and kept such strict watch to prevent the coming in of all such commodities but through Gods mighty protection he brought his burden safely thither and which was almost miraculous he conveyed them safe into Sivil notwithstanding the busie searchers and catch-poles that watched in every corner These Bibles being dispersed were most joyfully and thankfully received and through Gods blessing wrought wonderfully amongst Gods people to ripen them against the time of harvest But at last the matter broke out by the means of a false brother who going to the Inquisitors played the Judas and betrayed the whole Church to them So that there
condemned to be burnt but he told his Judges that his time was not yet come and so it fell out for shortly after he was removed to Ferrara where he continued in prison two years Then was he again condemned by the Popes Inquisitors and yet his time being not come he remained a good while after in prison in which time many godly people came to visit him which caused the Pope to commâ—â—d him to be kept more strictly Then was he kept close Prisoner for eighteen moneths wherein he endured many and great torments After this he was brought into another prison where were many Nobles great Lords and Captains for stirring up sedition who when they first heard him speak set him at naught and derided him and some of the gravest of them supposing it to be but a melancholy humour exhorted him to leave his opinion c. Faninus gave them thanks for their friendly good will but withal modestly and plainly he declared to them that the doctrine which he professed was no humour nor opinion of mans braine but the pure truth of God held forth in his Word which truth he was fully resolved never to deny c. With which instructions they were through the mercy of God clean altered in their carriage and judgement highly admiring and honouring him now whom a little before they derided and contemned Then did he proceed still to impart the Word of grace to them declaring that though he knew himself to be a miserable sinner yet through faith in Jesus Christ and his grace he was fully perswaded that his sins were forgiven assuring them likewise that if they did repent and believe on our Lord Jesus Christ they also should have their sinnes remitted unto them There were in that prison also some that having formerly lived very delicately could not now endure the hardship of prison to whom he administred much comfort in this their distresse insomuch as they rejoyced in â—hese their sufferings by which they had learned a better kind of liberty than ever they had before His Kinsfolk hearing of his imprisonment his wife and sister came to him pitifully weeping and intreating him to consider and remember his poor family c. To whom he answered that his Lord and Master had commanded him not to deny his truth for his families sake and that it was too much that once for their sakes he had fallen into that Cowardise which they knew of Therefore he desired them to leave him and not to solicit him any further in that kind for he knew that his end now drew near and so he commended them to the Lord. Presently after the Pope sent a command that Faninus should be executed whereof when an officer brought him word he much rejoyced at it thanking the Messenger Then did he begin to make a long exhortation to his fellow-prisoners about the felicity of the life to come He had life proffered him if he would recant and he was put in mind what a sad condition he would leave his wife and children in whereupon he answered that he had committed them to an Overseer that would sufficiently care for them and being asked who that was he answered Even the Lord Jesus Christ a faithful Keeper of all that are committed to him the next day he was removed into the common Prison and delivered to the secular Magistrate In all his words gestures and countenance he shewed such modesty constancy and tranquillity of mind that they which before extreamly hated him and thought that he had a devil began now favourably to hearken to him and to commend him yea with such grace and sweetnesse he spake of the Word of God that many of the Magistrates wives which heard him could not abstain from weeping yea the Executioner himself wept As he was going to execution one that saw him so merry and chearful asked him what was the reason of it whereas Christ before his death sweat blood and water To whom he answered that Christ sustained all the sorrows and conflicts with hell and death that were due to us that by his sufferings we might be freed from the sorrow and fear of them all At the place of execution after he had made his most earnest prayers to the Lord he meekly and patiently went to the stake where he was first strangled and afterwards burned And during the time of his burning there came a most fragrant and oderiferous smell to the Spectators the sweetnesse whereof did so delight and refresh their senses as his words would have done if they had heard him speak There was also one Dominicus sometimes a souldier under Charles the fifth in Germany where he received the first taste of the Gospel of Jesus Christ after which by his confâ—rence with learned men he much increased in knowledge insomuch as he was able to instruct others whereupon he returned into Italy and in the City of Naples he taught the Word of God to many Anno 1550. From thence he went to Placentia where he instructed the People also in many of the fundamentals of Religion promising that he would next speak to them of Antichrist whom he would paint out in his colours but when he came the next day he was apprehended by the Magistrate whom he readily obeyed saying that he wondered the devil had let him alone so long and being asked whether he would renounce his doctrine he answered that he maintained no doctrine of his own but the doctrine of Christ which also he was ready to seal with his blood giving hearty thanks to God for accounting him worthy to suffer for his name Then was he committed to a filthy and stinking prison where he remained some moneths and was often solicited to revoke his opinions or else he must suffer death but through Gods mercy nothing could remove him from his constancy being therefore condemned to death he was brought forth into the market-place where he most heartily prayed for his enemies instructed the People and then was hanged resting in peace in the Lord. In Saint Angelo there was an house of Augustine Friars to whom there often resorted a Friar from the City of Pavia who was a man very expert in the Scriptures and of godly conversation by whose labours not only divers of the Friars but other Townsmen were brought to the knowledge and love of Gods Word and amongst the rest one Galeacius Trecius a Gentleman of good quality very wealthy and bountiful to the poor was wrought upon to embrace the truth and was afterward much confirmed and strengthened by Caelius Secundus who being persecuted from Pavia came to this place After some time Galeacius having much profited in knowledge was inflamed with a godly zeal to promote and propagate the knowledge of the truth unto others But a light shining in such darknesse could not be long hid Insomuch as Anno 1551. he was apprehended and carried before the Bishop
vice and wickedness you never said word to me but now for savouring and favouring the Word of God you seek my blood Then did they examine him about sundry Articles of Religion to which whilst he was making a full answer they cut him off bidding him answer in two words Yea or No Whereupon he said If you will not give me leave to answer fully to things of such importance send me again to my dungeon amongst the Toads and Frogs who will not interrupt me whilst I talk with my Lord my God Shortly after he was condemned to be burned and having a bag of powder hung about his neck when the fire came to it it gave a crack whereupon the Friars told the People that the Divel came out of him and carried away his soul to hell A tyrannous Prince in Germany apprehended a godly Minister and for his constancy in the truth put out both his eyes and kept him a long time in prison afflicting him with divers kinds of torments Then did he cause him to be degraded shaving the skin off his head and rubbing it with salt till the blood ran down his shoulders and paring off the ends of his fingers so that four days after he patiently yielded up the Ghost Not long after there was a godly Minister in Antwerp called Christopher Fabri that was betrayed by a woman who pretended a great zeal to Religion and was cast into prison where he lay for a long time and endured much misery at last he was brought forth and condemned to be burnt alive And when the Margrave brought him forth to execution the people having first sung Psalmes fell to casting of stones against the Executioner so as the poor Prisoner being bound and fire set to him the Margrave durst stay no longer but ran away and so did the executioner but before he fled by the command of the Margrave he took a hammer and beat out Fabrie's brains and stabbed him into the back with a dagger so that the people running to save him from the fire found him dead after which by the command of the Margrave he had a great stone tied about his neck and was thrown into the river Anno 1549. One Nicholas and Barbara his wife and one Austin and Marrian his wife Germans by birth went to Geneva where they lived for a space then returning through Germany they intended to go into England but having passed through Dornick they were discovered to the Lieutenant thereof who speedily pursuing them overtook them yet at that time God delivered Austin out of their hands but Nicholas and the two women were apprehended and carried back by the souldiers Coming to an Inne by the way at table Nicholas gave thanks whereat the wicked Captain swearing grievously said Let us see thou lewd Heretick if thy God can deliver thee out of my hand Nicholas replyed Hath Christ ever offended you that by your blasphemous swearing you thus tear him in pieces Pray you if you have any thing against Christ rather wreak your anger upon this poor body of mine and let the Lord alone Then did he bind them hands and feet and carried them to Burges and cast them into the dungeon Divers Friers coming to them Nicholas in disputing with them so confounded them that they went away ashamed saying that he had a divel crying To the fire with the Lutherane Afterwards the Magistrate sought to pump out of Nicholas what acquaintance he had in that City but not prevailing with him he went to his wife and by flattering speeches and fair promises he wrought so upon her weaknesse that he gat out all that she knew whereupon ensued a great persecution Shortly after Nicholas was condemned to be burned at the hearing of which sentence he blessed the Lord who had counted him worthy to be a witnesse in the cause of his dear and wel-beloved Son Jesus Christ At the place of execution hew a commanded not to speak to the People for if he did he should have a woodden ball thrust into his mouth yet as he was binding to the stake forgetting the command he cryed out O Charles Charles how long shall thy heart be hardned With that one of the Souldiers gave him a great blow Then he said Ah miserable People who are not worthy that the Word should be preached to you The Friars crying out that he had a Divel he answered them in the words of David Depart from me all ye wicked for the Lord hath heard the voice of my weeping and so commending his spirit into the hands of God he ended his life in the midst of the flames Marrian was condemned to be buried quick and when some earth was thrown upon her the hangman stamped upon her with his feet till she died Afterwards Austin that had before escaped was apprehended and being examined though by nature he was a very timorous and weak man yet did he stand to the defence of the truth valiantly and answered his adversaries very boldly Being condemned to be burnt as he was going to execution a Gentleman drank to him in a cup of wine exhorting him to pity himself at least not to destroy his soule Austin thanked him saying What care I have of my soule you may see by this in that I had rather give my body to be burned then to sin against my conscience Being tyed to the stake and fire set to him he heartily prayed to the Lord and so patiently departed Anno 1551. The Emperour Chales the fifth having obtruded the Interim upon Germany many godly Ministers were persecuted and driven from their places for opposing the same as may be seen in my first part of Lives The city of Magdenburg also for refusing it had an army sent against it which besieged it for a whole year together whereby many of the godly Citizens lost their lives and others endured great miseries But at last Gods providence so ordering of it warre arose betwixt the Emperour and the King of France whereupon peace was granted unto Magdenburg upon good terms and the inhabitants enjoyed their former Religion quietly Anno 1555. There was one Hostius born at Gaunt who for some time was a member of the French Church here in London in King Edwards days but in the beginning of Queen Maries reign he went vvith his family to Norden in Frizeland and aftervvards having some businesse to Gaunt he went thither where he instructed many of his friends in the truth and hearing that a Friar used to preach good doctrine he went to hear him but the Friar that day defended transubstantiation which so grieved him that he could scarce refrain from speaking till the Sermon was ended When the Friar was come down from the Pulpit he charged him for preaching false doctrine perswading the people by the Scripture that the bread was but the Sacrament of the
cast into several prisons yet remained chearfull praising God for accounting them worthy to suffer for his truth and after a few dayes they were all brought forth before the Magistrates who speaking to Robert Oguire said We hear that you never come to Masse That you disswade others from it That you keep Conventicles in your house where erroneous doctrine is preached c. Robert answered I indeed refuse to go to Mass because the death and precious blood of Christ is utterly abolished there and troden under foot c. And I cannot deny but there have met together in my house honest people fearing God Not with intention to harm any I assure you but for the advancement of Gods glory and the good of many c. Then one demanded what they did when they met together To which Baudizon ansvvered When vve meet together in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ to hear the Word of God vve first falling on our knees before God in the humility of our spirits do make confession of our sins before his Divine Majesty then we pray that the Word of God may be rightly divided and purely preached then we pray for our Soveraign Lord the Emperour that the Common-wealth may be peaceably governed to the glory of God yea we forget not you whom we acknowledge our Superiours intreating our good God that you may maintain this City in tranquillity c. Thus you hear what we do in our Assemblies and if you will not be offended to hear the summe of our prayers I am ready to recite the same unto you One of the Magistrates wished him to go on whereupon kneeling down he prayed before them all with such fervency of affection and ardency of zeal that it forced the Magistrates to break forth into tears Baudizon rising up said Your Masterships may hereby take a scantling how we are imployed in our meetings Being further examined every one of them made an open Confession of his faith and so were returned to prison again And not long after they were tortured upon the Rack to make them confesse who they were that met at their house but they would discover none but such as they knew were at that time out of their reach Four or five dayes after the men were again convented before the Magistrates who asked them if they would submit themselves to the will of the Magistrates Robert and Baudizon said they would but Martin the younger sonne said he would not submit thereto but would accompany his Mother and so he was sent back to prison and the Father with his eldest son were presently adjudged to be burnt alive Sentence being pronounced one of the Judges said This day shall you go to dwell with all the Divels in hell fire Then were they returned to prison praising God and by their patience and constancy conquerred the rage and fury of their enemies In prison there came some Friars to them telling them that the hour was come wherein they must finish their dayes They answered Blessed be the Lord our God who now delivering our bodies out of this vile prison will receive our souls into his glorious and heavenly Kingdom Then said one of the Friars Father Robert thou art an old man I intreat thee in this thy last hour think of saving thy soule and if thou wilt give ear to me I le warrant thee thou shalt do well Robert answered Poor man how darest thou assume that to thy self which belongs to God alone and so rob him of his honour c. Another wishing him to pity his soul he said Dost thou not see what pity I have on it when for the name of Christ I am willing to give my body to the fire hoping to day to be with him in Paradise c. Then said a Friar Out Dog thou art not worthy the name of a Christian thou and thy sonne are resolved to damne your soules with all the Divels in hell Then would they have severed the Father from his son which Baudizon perceiving said Pray you let my Father alone he is an old man hinder him not from receiving the Crown of Martyrdome Another Friar said Away Varlet thou art the cause of thy Fathers perdition Whilst Baudizon was stripping and fitting himself to be sacrificed some of the Friars had fastned a Crucifix in the old mans hands perswading him that it would please the People and that for all that he might lift up his heart to God c. But so soon as Baudizon saw it he said Alasse Father what do you now will you play the Idolater at your last hour and so pulling the Idol out of his hand he threw it away At the place of execution they were set upon a Scaffold and Baudizon desired leave to make a Confession of his faith answer was made that he might confess himself to a Friar if he would which he refusing was readily haled to the stake where he began to sing the 16. Psalm then said a Friar Do you not hear what wicked errors these Hereticks sing to beguile the people withall Baudizon hearing him replyed Thou simple Idiot callest thou the Psalms of David errours but no marvel for thus are ye wont to blaspheme against the Spirit of God Then seeing them about to chain his Father to the stake he said to him Be of good courage Father the worst will be past by and by Then did he often breath forth Oh God Father everlasting accept the sacrifice of our bodies for thy well-beloved Son Jesus Christ his sake A Friar cryed Out Heretick thou liest God is none of thy Father the Divel is thy Father Baudizon fixing his eys upon heaven said to his Father Behold I see the heavens open and millions of Angels ready to receive us and rejoycing to see us thus bearing witness to the truth in the view of the world Father let us rejoyce and be glad for the joys of heaven are opened to us Then said a Friar I see Hell open and millions of Divels are ready to carry you thither A poor man in the croud cryed out Be of good comfort Baudizon stand to it thou fightest in a good quarrel I am on thy side which words so soon as he had spoken he departed and so hastened himself from danger The fire being kindled Baudizon oft said to his Father Yet a very little while and we shall enter into the heavenly mansions the fire encreasing the last words which they spake were Jesus Christ thou Sonne of God into thy hands we commend our spirits and so they sweetly slept in the Lord. After the death of these worthy champions of Christ many of the Popish rabble were sent if possible to seduce the Mother and son remaining in prison and coming to them the first subtilty they used was to separate them asunder then they set upon the woman as the weaker vessel and so wrought upon her
that she began to waver and let go her first faith this the adversaries much rejoyced in and the poor flock of Christ in that place hearing of it were as much afflicted with the news but God left them not in this mournful condition long For a Monk one day going to her perswaded her to draw her sonne Martin to the same recantation with her self which she promised to do but when they came together Martin perceiving the grievous Apostacy of his Mother bewailed it with many tears saying to her Oh Mother what have you done have you denied him that redeemed you Alas what injury hath he done you that you should requite him with so great an injury and dishonour Now am I plunged into that woe which I most feared Ah good God that I should live to see this which pierceth me to the very heart His mother hearing his pittiful complaints and seeing him drowned in tears for her sake began again to renew her strength in the Lord and with tears cryed out Oh Father of mercies be merciful to me miserable sinner and cover my transgression under the righteousnesse of thy blessed Son Lord enable me with strength from above to stand to my first confession and make me to abide stedfast therein even to my last breath Presently in came the seducers hoping to finde her in the same minde that they left her but she no sooner saw them but cryed Avoid Satan get thee behind me for henceforth thou hast nether part nor portion in me I will by the help of God stand to my first Confession and if I may not sign it with ink I will seal it with my blood and so after this time through Gods gracious assistance she grew stronger and stronger Then were they both condemned to be burnt alive and their ashes to be sprinkled in the aire When the sentence was passed as they returned to prison they said Now blessed be God who causeth us thus to triumph over our enemies This is the wished hour our gladsome day is come let us not therefore forget to be thankfull for that honour that God doth us in thus conforming us to the image of his Sonne Let us remember those that have troden this path before us for this is the high-way to the Kingdom of heaven c. Hereupon some of the Friars being ready to burst for anger said unto Martin that was most valiant We see now Heretick that thou art wholly possest body and soul with a Divel as were thy father and brother who are now in hell Martin answered As for your railings and cursings God will this day turn them into blessings in the sight of himself and all his holy Angels When they came into prison there came to them two persons of great quality of whom one of them said to Martin Young man I have compassion on thee if thou wilt be ruled by me and return to the Church of Rome thou shalt not only be freed from this shameful death but I will also give thee an hundred pounds Martin presently replyed Sir you present before me many temporal commodities But alas do you think me so simple as to forsake an eternal Kingdome for the enjoyment of a short temporal life No Sir it s now too late to speak to me of worldly commodities I will hearken to no other speech but of those spiritual commodities which I shall enjoy this day in Gods Kingdome c. Soon after Martin and his mother were carried to the place of their Martyrdome and being bound to the stake the woman said We are Christians and that which we now suffer is not for murther nor theft but because we will believe no more than the Word of God teacheth us The fire being kindled the heat of it did nothing abate the fervency of their seal but they continued crying Lord Jesus into thy hands we commend our spirits and so they blessedly slept in the Lord. A Friar at Gaunt called Charles Coninck being through Gods mercy converted to the truth left his Friars weed and joyned himself to the brethren for which he was apprehended and remaining constant was condemned then came a special friend perswading him to recant and he would procure him a Cannonship To whom Charles answered Sir I thank you for your good will and kind offer but I cannot accept them without offending God and that rest is no true rest and quietnesse which is obtained against the peace of a good conscience Shortly after his death one of his adversaries which had the greatest hand in procuring of it fell into grievous terrour and horrour of conscience whereof within a few dayes he died The Persecution of the Duke de Alva in the Netherlands WHen the light of the Gospel was much spread abroad in the Netherlands King Philip of Spaine sent the Duke de Alva with a great Army to root out the Professors of it who exercised unparalell'd cruelty against all sorts of persons both of the Nobility and Commons permitting his souldiers to ravish honest Matrons and Virgins many times causing their husbands and Parents to stand by and behold it This Duke on a time boasted at his own table that he had been diligent to root out heresie for that beside those which he had slain in war in the space of six years he had put into the hands of the common hangman above eighteen thousand persons His sonne also Don Frederick being sent by him to Zutphen was re-received by the Bourgers without any opposition yet was he no sooner entred but he fell to murther hang and drown a number of the inhabitants with infinite cruelties shewed upon wives and virgins yea not sparing the very infants From thence marching to Naerden in Holland the inhabitants made an agreement with him and he entred the town peaceably but never did Turks or Scythians or the most barbarous and inhumane Nations in the world commit more abominable cruelties than Don Frederick did in this town for when the Bourgers had given the best entertainment that they could to him and his souldiers he caused it to be proclaimed that they should all assemble themselves together in the Chappel of the Hospital where they should be made acquainted with such Laws according to which they should hereafter govern themselves but when these poor people were thus assembled he commanded his souldiers to murther them all without sparing any one the men were massacred the women were first ravished and then murthered most cruelly the children and infants had their throats cut and in some houses they tied the inhabitants to posts and then set fire on the houses and burnt them alive so that in the whole town neither man wife maid nor child old nor young were spared and then the town was wholly razed to the ground without pity or mercy After this Don Frederick besieged Harlem which held out against him for a long time
would come into contempt caused him to be apprehended and cast into a deep and dark hole where he remained bearing his affliction patiently and calling upon God night and day praising him for accounting him worthy to suffer for his names sake Whilst he lay there many good people came to visit him receiving such instructions and consolation from him that they could not be drawn to leave him till necessity enforced neither then could they depart without abundance of tears The Priests and Friars sought by all means to draw him to a recantation but to no purpose for he still kept himself close to the Word of God which so vexed them that at last they procured his condemnation to be hanged The Spanish souldiers which carried him to execution would needs have him burned binding and straining him exceedingly with cords and in the way abused him shamefully with mocks and scoffs thrusting him forwards and striking him the Captain also gave him a blow on the face with his Gantlet which much disfigured him yea they used him worse then a dog being the more enraged against him because of his patient and meek carriage At last they thrust him into a little Cabin piled with Fagots and so burnt him continually calling upon God till he resigned up his Spirit to him Anno 1568. There was a Goldsmith dwelling in Breda who had long been a Deacon of the Church in that place his name was Peter Coulogue in his house the Church often met for the service of God the Popish adversaries being much enraged hereby cast him into prison which the faithful much grieved at and endeavoured to visit and comfort him This the enemies taking notice of removed him into the Castle during his abode there though all others were excluded from him yet his Maid-servant brought him his food daily never ceasing to confirm and comfort him out of the Word of God as well as she was able for which at length they imprisoned her also This she was right glad of thinking her self happy to suffer for righteousness sake Not long after Peter was put to the torment which he endured patiently then did they fetch Betkin also to it whereupon she said My Masters wherefore will you put me to this torture seeing I have no way offended you if it be for my faiths sake you need not torment me fos as I was never ashamed to make a confession thereof no more will I now be at this present before you but will if you please freely shew you my mind therein Yet for all this they would have her to the Rack whereupon she again said If I must needs suffer this pain I pray you give me leave to call upon my God first This they consented to and whilst she was fervently pouring out her prayers unto God one of the Commissioners was surprised with such a fear and terrour that he fell into a swoon and could not be recovered again by which means the poor maid escaped Racking Shortly after these two innocent persons were condemned to be burned and as they were led to execution there was much lamentation amongst the people Peter and Betkin prayed earnestly unto God to strengthen them and perfect the good work that he had begun in them and to assist them till they had finished their course The courage and constancy of the maid did so work upon many of the people godly men and women that not considering the danger they brake through the multitude embracing the Prisoners and praising God for their constancy saying to them Fight manfully for the Crown is prepared for you At the place of execution Betkin with a chearful and amiable countenance spake thus to the people Dear brethren and sisters be alwayes obedient to the Word of God and fear not them that can kill the body but have no power over the soul as for me I am now going to meet my glorious Spouse the Lord Jesus Christ Then falling upon their knees they prayed to the Lord with great devotion And the executioner fastening them to the stake strangled Peter Betkin encouraging him till he yielded up the Ghost and till the fire had taken hold of her self and in the flames she was heard to magnifie the Lord till she yielded up her spirit into his hands About this time multitudes of persons were murthered in Flanders by the bloody Inquisition whose dead bodies were cast out to be gazed upon in every place and multitudes of believers both men and women were cast into prisons where they languished till many of them died In the City of Valence there were executed fifty seven persons most of them Burgesses only because they clave to the true faith of Jesus Christ. The Martyrdom of William of Nassaw Prince of Orange THe Estates of the United Provinces having declared the King of Spaine to be fallen from the Government of of those Countries they chose William of Nassaw Prince of Orange to be their Captain General whereupon he was proscribed by the King of Spain and a great summe of mony promised to him that should slay him Not long after a desperate villain called Joanville was suborned to do the feat for which end he was directed to charge his Pistol with two bullets and to shoot him behind in the head the day appointed for this execution was March 18. 1582. upon which day the Prince was to be at a great feast at the Duke of Anjous Court but the presse being great there Joanville chose rather to do it at the Prince of Oranges own house as he was at dinner the Villain being thus desperately resolved a Jacobin Friar came to confess him fortifying him in his resolution with many sweet words perswading him that he should go invisible for which end he gave him some characters in paper and little Frogs bones and other conjurations Being thus assured he drunk a cup or two of Malmsey and so accomxanied with his Ghostly father he went to the Princes Court at the stair-foot the Friar gave him his blessing encouraged him and so left him The Prince of Orange was set at dinner with the Earles of Laval Hohenlo and many other Noblemen Joanville came into the dining-room attired like a Frenchman so that he was taken for a servant to some of those French Noblemen He thrust forward twice or thrice to come behind the Prince to shoot him in the head as he was directed but was still repulsed by the Princes Gentlemen that stood about him Dinner being done the Prince was going to his retiring chamber whereupon this Villain gat before a window in the Hall close by the door of that room into which the Prince was to go As the Prince passed towards it he was shewing the Earle of Laval the cruelties that the Spaniards had exercised in the Low-Countries which were wrought in the hangings and having his face turned this murtherer discharged his Pistol at him
against him against whom he made many exceptions but they would not be admitted Nine moneths he remained in prison suffering great misery much bewailing his former course of life though yet it had been such as none could charge him with any crime Then the Judges proceeded to his condemnation and he had greater fetters put upon him he was also examined with torments which he endured two or three hours though but of a weakly body comforting himself thus This body must once die but the spirit shall live the Kingdome of God abideth for ever During his torments he swowned and when he came to himself again he said O Lord Lord why hast thou forsaken me Nay said the President wicked Lutheran Thou hast forsaken God Aymund replied Alas good Masters why do you thus miserably torment me O Lord I beseech thee forgive them for they know not what they do See said the President this Caitiffe how he prayeth for us Shortly after he was condemned and when the Friars came to confesse him he bade them depart from him for he would confesse his sins to the Lord. He went to the place of execution with much joy exhorting the people all the way at the place of execution they tumbled him out of the Cart and when he was upon the stage he said O Lord make haste to help me tarry not despise not the work of thy hands and seeing some Scholars he said to them My brethren I exhort you to study and learn the Gospel for the Word of God abideth for ever Labour to know the Will of God and fear not them that kill the body but have no power over your souls Afterwards he said My flesh doth wonderfully resist the spirit but presently I shall cast it away At the stake he often repeated Oh Lord my God into thy hands I commend my soul and so he was first strangled by the hangman and then burned Francis Bribard Secretary to the Cardinal of Bellay being convicted for adhering to the truth had first his tongue cut out and then was burnt Anno 1544. About the same time William Husson an Apothecary came from Bloys to Roan and in the Palace where the Counsel sate he scattered sundry books concerning Christian doctrine and against mens traditions and presently taking horse rode away The books being found the Counsel made diligent search for the Author and at last heard that probably this Husson had scattered them there whereupon Posts were sent out every way to apprehend him and by some of them he was taken riding towards Deep and brought back to Roan who being examined professed his faith boldly and that he had scattered those books and that he was going to Deep to do the like there For this he was condemned to be burnt alive and as he was carried to execution because he refused to worship an Image his tongue was cut out afterwards his hands and feet beeing bound behind him he was pulled up with a Pully and so let down into the fire in which he with a chearful countenance held up his head and fixed his eyes upon heaven till he yielded up his spirit unto God Anno 1545. James Cobard a Schoolmaster in the City of Saint Michael declared and proved that the Masse neither profited the quick nor dead c. for which he was burned Also at Melda fourteen godly persons were cast into prison where they were cruelly racked to make them confesse their fellows which they stoutly refused to do and at last were condemned to the fire seven of them had their tongues cut out and so all of them were burned together their wives being compelled to stand by to see their torments many others were scourged and banished Anno 1546. There was one Peter Chapot who having been a while at Geneva out of a zeal to do good to the Church of Christ carried divers Bibles into France and dispersed them amongst the faithful at last he was apprehended and carried to Paris there he readily rendred an account of his faith exhorting the Judges to do their office uprightly Three Doctors of Sorbone were appointed to dispute with him but he made them all to go away ashamed then was he condemned to be burnt At the stake one of the Doctors pressed him sorely to pray to our Lady which he refused crying only O Jesus Sonne of David have mercy on me The Doctor bade him say only Jesus Maria and he should not be burnt alive but he for a while refused yet at last through his importunity he said Jesus Maria but presently checking himself he said Oh God what have I done pardon me O Lord for against thee only have I sinned and so he was presently strangled and then burned but upon the complaint of the Doctor the Court made a Decree that all which were to be burned unlesse they recanted at the stake should have their tongues cut out which was diligently afterwards observed There was living at Meaux a lame Creeple to whom God was pleased to reveal his truth and after a time he was apprehended and examined at which time he confessed more than they desired to hear Then did they ask him whether he would stand to that which he had said To whom he answered and I ask you again Dare you be so bold as to deny that which is so plain and evident in the holy Scriptures being advised to take care of his life he said to the Judges for Gods sake take care of your own lives and souls and consider how much innocent blood you spill daily in fighting against Jesus Christ and his Gospel At last he was carried to Paris where he endured many sorts of torments and lastly was burned At Fera one Stephen Polliot was apprehended carried to Paris and there cast into a foul and dark dungeon where he lay long in bonds and fetters At last he was brought forth and condemned to have his tongue cut out and to be burned with his sachel of books hanging about his neck which was accordingly executed Anno 1547. There was one John English condemned by the Court of Paris for confessing the truths of God and so sent to Sens in Burgundy where he was burned Also Michael Michelote being apprehended for professing the Gospel was put to his choise either to recant and be beheaded or to persevere and be burned he answered that he trusted that he which had given him grace not to deny the truth would also give him patience to abide the fire and so he was burned Another being betrayed by false brethren was burned at Bar in Burgundy Five men and two women were condemned to the fire at Langres for adhering to the truth one of the women being the youngest was reserved to be burned at last and in the mean time she much encouraged them all saying This day we shall be married to the Lord Jesus
to the Castle for more powder and more combustible matter which being at last kindled with a loud voice he cryed Lord Jesus receive my spirit how long shall darknesse overwhelme this Realme and how long wilt thou suffer the tyranny of these men The fire was slow and therefore put him to the greater torment but that which most grieved him was the clamour of some wicked men set on by the Friars who continually cryed Turn thou Heretick call upon our Lady say Salve Regina c. To whom he answered Depart from me and trouble me not thou messenger of Satan And speaking to one Campbel a Friar that was the Ringleader who still roared on him with great vehemency he said to him Wicked man thou knowest the contrary and hast confessed the contrary to me I appeale thee before the Tribunal seat of Jesus Christ after which words he resigned up his spirit unto God Anno Christi 1527. And within few dayes after the said Friar died in a phrensie and as one that despaired Anno 1534. The said Arch-bishop of Saint Andrews convented before him David Straton a Gentleman and Master Norman Gourlay The first of these having a Fisher-boat that went to sea the Bishop of Murray demanded tithe fish of him to whom he answered that if they would have tithe of that which his servants caught in the sea they should take it in the place where it was caught and so caused his servants to throw the tenth fish into the sea again All this while he had nothing in him for Religion But when hereupon he was summoned to answer for Herâ—sie it troubled him exceedingly and then he began to frequent the company of such as were godly and there appeared a wonderful change in him so that whereas before he despised the word of God now all his delight was in hearing of it read to him and he was a vehement exhorter of all men to peace and concord and contempt of the world He much frequented the company of the Laird of Dun Areskin whom God in those dayes had marvellously illuminated hearing the text read for he could not read himself He that denieth me before men or is ashamed of me in the midst of this wicked generation I will deny him before my Father and his holy Angels At those words being suddenly as one revived he fell upon his knees and stedfastly lifting up his eyes and hands to heaven at length he burst forth into these words O Lord I have been wicked and justly mayst thou withdraw thy grace from me but Lord for thy mercy sake let me never deny thee nor thy truth for fear of death or any corporal paine Being afterwards together with Master Norman brought to judgement in holy Rood-house the King himself being present much means was used to draw this David Straton to make a recantation but he persevered in his constancy still denying that he had offended and so they were both condemned to the fire and after dinner Anno 1534. they were both first hanged and afterwards burnt Not long after the burning of these two holy men There was one Deane Thomas Forret who used to preach every Lords day to his Parishoners out of the Epistles and Gospels as they fell in order This was counted a great novelty for none used to preach but the Friars and therefore they envying him accused him to the Bishop of Dunkelden for an Heretick and one that shewed the mysteries of Scripture to the vulgar people The Bishop instigated by the complaint of the Friars called the said Deane Thomas before him to whom he said My joy Deane Thomas I love you well and therefore I must give you counsel how to govern your self The Deane thanked him and then he proceeded My joy Deane Thomas I am informed that you preach the Epistle and Gospel every Sunday to your people and that you take not your dues from them which is very prejudicial to the Churchmen and therefore my joy Deane Thomas I would have you take your dues or else it s too much to preach every sunday for by so doing you make the people think that we should do so also It s enough for you when you find a good Epistle or Gospel to set forth and preach the liberty of holy Church and let the rest alone Thomas answered My Lord I presume none of my Parishoners complaine for my not taking my dues and whereas you say it s too much to preach every Sunday I think it is too little and wish that your Lordship would do the like Nay nay Deane Thomas said the Bishop let that be for we 〈◊〉 not ordained to preach Then said Thomas whereas you bid me preach when I meet with a good Epistle and Gospel I have read them all over and I know 〈◊〉 â—ad ones amongst them but when your Lordship shews me such I will passe by them Then said the Bishop I thank God I never knew what the Old and New Testament was and Deane Thomas I will know nothing but my Portuise and Pontifical Go your wayes and let all these fancies be for if you persevere herein you will repent you when t is too late I trust said Thomas my cause is good and just in the presence of God and therefore I care not what follows thereupon and so he went his way But shortly after he was summoned to appear before the Cardinal by whom he was condemned and burned for a chief Heretick and teacher of Heresies But notwithstanding all their bloody tyranny the knowledge of God did wonderfully encrease in that Kingdom partly by reading partly by brotherly conference which in those dangerous days was much used to the comfort of many which so enraged the Popish party that Anno 1538. there were burned in one fire foure persons of good quality The year after there were apprehended Jerome Russel a man of a meek and quiet naturâ— and Alexander Kennedy of about eighteen years old these two poor servants of Jesus Christ being brought before the Arch-bishop and his Associates to judgement Kennedy at first was faint and would faine have recanted but when all place of repentance was denied him the Spirit of God which seasonably comes in with comfort began to refresh him yea the inward comfort began to burst forth as well in his visage as in tongue and words for with a chearful countenance and joyful voice falling on his knees he said O eternal God how wonderful is that love and mercy that thou bearest unto mankind and to me a vile Caitiffe and miserable wretch above all others for even now when I would have denied thee and thy Sonne our Lord Jesus Christ my only Saviour and so have cast my self into everlasting damnation thou by thine own hand hast pulled me from the very bottome of Hell and made me to feele that heavenly comfort which takes from me that ungodly feare wherewith before
Grzymaltowsky with many of the Nobility to the same Gate and when the aforesaid Kolechen with another in his company had gone out to them and scarcely perswaded them that the City was forsaken and that there was no treachery they went in and when they were disposed into the next fair houses they were entertained with a noble supper which was prepared to sweeten them a little if it might be and had plenty of Wine out of Dlugosses Cellar who was a rich Senator At last when they were half Drunk they set upon Kolechen with threats and would have made him their Prisoner but that he escaped wonderfully out of their hands and saved himself by flight But they durst not stay all night in the City for fear the Swedes and Citizens should set upon them unawares out of some Ambuscado and so they returned to their own company and in the morning with many hundred Waggons they came back killing all they met and setting themselves to plunder the City Here then you might have seen strange examples of barbarous cruelty on the one side and blockish folly on the other For though no man made resistance yet like Mad Dogs they flew upon all that either came out or were drawn out of the holes wherein they had hid themselves Of some they pulled out their eyes Of some they cut off their Noses and Tongues Of others they cut off their Hands and Feet others they stabbed and slashed and so butchered them with innumerable wounds that it could not be known who they were And which was more they spared not his Highness Prince Frederick Landgrave of Hassia though dead whom they had slain half a year before at Costena and who was decently Embalmed by the Lessians and kept laid up in the Chappel of the New-Church upon a Scaffold till he might be transported to his own Country They first rifled his Coffin which was handsomely adorned taking away his silver and guilt keyes and all the silk that was about it then they set upon the Princes corps and took away his silk robe lined with Ermines and so left him once again naked and lying on the ground But after the burning of the City his body being found in the same place untouched by the fire he was cloathed again by the ancient Lesnians and put up in his Coffin and buried in a certain place where he is still honourably kept But that mad rabble shewed abundance of folly in this that whereas they might have made Lesna their nest the Swedes having Garrisoned themselves in the strongest places of the Province or at least might have gathered together the richest of the plunder for there was such abundance of victuals wares housholdstuff of all sorts and treasure that was brought hither from other places as to a place of safety that a thousand Waggons could scarce have carried it away in many dayes yet such was their over-eager desire of their destroying this hated City that the very same day yea before noon they set fire to the City and Suburbs in every street for the Waggons which they brought with them were not empty but loaded with Torches Pitch Straw and such other combustible matter and so cruelly destroyed that most pleasant City together with all that abundance of all sorts of things that was in it This fire lasted three whole dayes and there were those that took care that nothing should scape it for when the New-buildings of the New-churches did not easily take fire they brought Straw Pitch and dry wood and put under the roofs and the in-side of the steeples and so forced them to take fire And they came again upon the third day 1. May and whatsoever was left they set fire to again They burnt also the very Wind-mills whereof there were seventy about the City and a very pleasant Park of the Countesses which lay close by the Castle that every place might be filled with spectacles of cruelty and at length it might come to be said En cineres ubi Lesna fuit Where fairest Lesna stood of old Now nought but Ashes we behold The Citizens sadly beholding these flames some miles off ran thither next day by Troops whether out of a desire of quenching the fire if it were possible or else to save something out of the flames for most through fear had gone away empty handed but the Enemy came upon them and although they stoutly defended themselves and slew many of their Enemies yet many of themselves were slain and many others also on the dayes following when some Villages that belonged to the County of Lesna and were inhabited by professors of the Gospel were in like manner burnt down There perished in these flames many aged and sick people that could not get away besides such abundance of houses houshold-stuff of all sorts precious wares corn many thousand bushels whereof were brought hither libraries and other things that the loss would amount to many Tuns of gold and many thousands were thereby reduced to meer beggery But that which was saddest of all was that the Church of the faithful that was here gathered together out of divers places and Countryes to enjoy the pure worship of God was so utterly overthrown that it cannot but cry out with Sion of old when it was rased by the Babylonians Lament 1. and 3. O all ye that pass by behold and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow wherewith the Lord hath afflicted me in the day of his fierce anger For he hath sent a fire into my bones and it prevaileth against me he hath made me a desolation so that I am not able to rise up my children are desolate because the Enemy prevailed Sion spreadeth forth her hands and there is none to comfort her I called for my lovers but they deceived me Mine Enemies chased me sore like a Bird without cause They have cut off my life in the Dungeon Thou drewest near in the day that I called upon thee Thou saidst Fear not It is of the Lords mercies that we are not consumed because his compassions fail not It must not be concealed what wonder hapned the first day of the burning of the City about evening at Czirna which is the first Town of Silesia next to Lesna about two miles distant Some of the Lesnians went out to look upon the sad smoke of their Country and as they were looking there fell from the clouds which carried the smoke over Silesia together with the soot a leaf of burnt paper which when they took up they found to be a leaf of the Bohemian Bible containing the 6 th and part of the 7 th chapters of Matthew where those words of Christ came first to sight With what measure ye meet it shall be measured to you again with many other of Christs exhortations to trust in the fatherly Providence of God This leaf was presented to the Lord of the place and a Lesnian Physitian who was there by chance that read and
interpreted it and divers others can bear witness to the truth hereof and the Lord of the place laid it up among his rarities What now should Sion do but cry out under the cruel oppression of the Enemy Render unto them a recompence O Lord according to the works of their hands Lament 3.64 And indeed God began to revenge his peoples wrongs the fourth day after when they furiously assaulted Costena a Town four miles from Lesna where they were often repulsed stoutly by the Swedish Garrison and having suffered a great slaughter about five hundred of them being wanting they were forced to retire in great confusion The like also they met withall at Kalissia and other places being slain and put to flight by the Swedes Herein it hapned unto them much after the same manner as it did to Tilly formerly when he had ruined Magdeburg the God of vengeance manifesting himself the avenger of his people And now they begin to acknowledge and upbraid one another with their folly the Nobles in that they have spoiled their mart and treasury and the Clergy in that it is hapned otherwise than they intended For their purpose was utterly to ruine the Hereticks as they term them with their nest but now that they see the nest spoiled and the birds saved it is much more matter of grief and vexation than of joy to them For here God performed what he promised of old to Baruch I will give thee in the midst of thy Countryes ruines thy life for a prey Jer. 45.5 So God gave to thousands of his worshippers who were snatched out of the midst of those ruines their life for a prey having set bounds to the fury of the Devil which he could not pass as he did of old when he gave Job into his hands as to all that he had but so that he should spare his life Blessed be the name of the Lord. Truly we have cause to say with David Psalm 124. If it had not been the Lord who was on our side when men rose up against us then they had swallowed us up quick when their wrath was kindled against us then the waters had overwhelmed us the stream had gone over our soul then the proud waters had gone over our soul Blessed be the Lord who hath not given us a prey to their teeth Our soul is escaped as a Bird out of the snare of the Fowlers the snare is broken and we are escaped our help is in the Name of the Lord who made Heaven and Earth Oh the wonderfull providence of our God! which then saves when he seems to have forsaken and then makes alive where he seems to have killed We had been undone if we had not been undone We had been undone in our lives those furies gathering together soon after in far greater troops if we had not been undone in our estates which were left to them for a prey by our flight which the fatherly providence of God fore-seeing greater evils procured by sending that fright among us Blessed be the Name of the Lord again and again We notwithstanding with other afflicted ones in what Nation soever whom that proudest Babylonian flood of waters seeks to swallow up will not cease to cry How long O Lord wilt thou be angry with thy people How long shall thy jealousie burn like fire O remember not against us former iniquities let thy tender mercies speedily prevent us c. Psalm 79. And with the souls of those that were slain for the word of God that lie under the Altar of Christs merits for whose faith we are killed How long O Lord holy and true dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth Rev. 6.9 10. The Delegates of these poor persecuted Protestant Churches coming over into England to move for a Contribution towards the relief of their distressed Brethren Published this ensuing Narrative The utmost Fury of Antichrist against the Protestants or Reformed Church of the Bohemian Confession in Poland set down in a brief but faithful Narrative and according to the truth of the matter THe Spouse of Jesus Christ she who in the Cradle was besprinkled with the blood of a Protomartyr hath alwayes brought forth into the world men like Abel or Stephen that so there might never be wanting to cry from the earth unto God and that the wounds of that Rose which lies among the Thorns of Persecution might not be concealed Every age and every year in each age and every moneth and day in each year hath produced new inundations of blood unto this day and yet the little flock of the Lord hath alwayes encreased under persecutions one while here another there shifting their seats and habitations While it pleased God by the means of Wicklef to kindle the light of the Gospel in Great Britain John Huss asserted the truth of Jesus Christ in the midst of thick darknesse of Popery in Bohemia many thousands being stirred up by God to receive it who despising all the cruelty of Tyrants received it with joy untill by Gods assistance they took rooting in the Kingdom and grew up into flourishing Churches In a short time after Antichrist breathing out his fury the Truth was banished out of Bohemia and the Confessors being driven out transplanted the Gospel into Poland where being favourably entertained by King Sigismond they in a short time encreased to so great a number that being little inferiour to the Papists they were able to boast of an equal authority and priviledges with them Hence it came to passe that the Kings at their Coronations were wont not only to promise but solemnly to swear protection to such as disagreed from the Roman Religion and therefore they proceeded not to open persecutions save only in those Cities where the Jesuits had seated themselves in power to wit Cracovia Posen Lublin Vilna c. where by their disciples and by stirring up the common people to fury the Churches of the Reformed Professors were a good while ago demolished and divers Ministers cruelly massacred Neverthelesse the malice of the Enemies being no whit allayed they were many ways afflicted first indirectly afterwards by pretences under colour of Law until those Churches being worn out by degrees and overthrown were not many years ago reduced to a very inconsiderable number especially when as in the Reign of the late King the Enemies being confident they might do any thing brought things to this passe at length that there were no more than twenty one Congregations remaining in the Greater Poland and those also ready to perish But among these twenty one remaining Churches the chief and as it were the Mother of them all was that of Lesna which was divided into three Congregations the Bohemian the Polonian and the German each of which had their own Pastors but the Communicants joyntly were about two thousand Therefore it was that this Church was in the first place exposed to the Enemies malice and of late designed