Page:Letters of John Huss Written During His Exile and Imprisonment.djvu/142

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LETTER XIX.

Seignior Wenceslaus, and my other protectors, be present, if you can, and hear the words that Jesus Christ, my procurator, shall put in my mouth, that whether I live or die, you may be unto me true witnesses, that impostors may not say that I abjured the truth which I preached.

Know, that in presence of witnesses and notaries, I demanded, in my prison, from the commissioners, that they would send me an advocate and procurator; they promised to do so, and afterwards refused them to me. I then confided myself to the Lord Jesus, that he may enlighten, plead, and judge my cause. I do not think that there are other subjects of accusation against me than these: First, The obstacle I raised against the publication of the bull of the Crusades: they are in possession of my treatise; they have read it to me, and I have acknowledged it. Secondly, They accuse me of having officiated when under excommunication. Thirdly, My appeal to the Pope is imputed to me as a crime: they read this appeal in my presence, and, before all, I joyfully exclaimed that this appeal should be mine. Lastly, in the fourth place, I am accused of having left behind me at Prague a writing which my enemies have interpreted against me, and in which I said—“I quit the city without a safe-conduct.” You will answer this by saying, when I left Prague, I had no safe-conduct from the Pope; and, in fact, I had none; and I was not aware,