LXXIV. To the Faithful Bohemians[1]
(June 24, 1415)
Master John Hus, a servant of God in hope, to all the faithful who love and will love God and His law, praying that they may dwell in the truth, grow in the divine grace, and bravely persevere even unto death.
Beloved, I exhort you not to be terrified, neither shaken with fear, because they (my enemies) have ordered my books to be burnt. Remember that the prophecies of the holy Jeremiah, which he wrote at God's command, were burnt, and yet the Jews did not escape the fate he had foretold; for after that they had been burnt, God bade him write the same words, and add to them besides many like words. Which he did: for he dictated them as he lay in prison, and the holy Baruch, who was his scribe, wrote them in a book. You will find it written in Jeremiah the 35th or 46th chapter.[2] In the books of the Maccabees also it is written that sacred writings were burnt, and those who had them in their possession suffered torture.[3] Afterwards, in the times of the New Testament, holy men were burnt, together with the books of God’s law. Cardinals, moreover, condemned and burnt the books of St. Gregory entitled the Morals, and would have destroyed them all had not God preserved them by means of Gregory’s only loyal disciple, Peter.[4]
