The letters of John Hus/Letter 24, To the People of Prague
XXIV. To the Same
(Without date: January (?) 1413)
Master John Hus, an unprofitable servant of God, to all the elect and to those who are zealous for the Lord Jesus Christ and His word, dwelling in the city of Prague: grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, our Saviour.
Dear friends, I greatly rejoice in this, that you constantly attend the preaching of God’s word, and that the merciful Saviour is granting to you leaders powerful in the truth. May it therefore please the Almighty to bestow upon you grace, mercy, and peace through our Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ; grace for your good, that you may make good progress in that same grace, in like manner as you have begun, and come to a profitable issue therein: mercy to be kept in your remembrance and gratefully received, seeing that the Eternal God, the supreme Goodness, for us sinners deigned to become man, afflicted, spat upon, shamefully entreated, condemned of His own, vilely rejected in such wise that the common people, led away by the counsel of the priests and having to choose between two, chose, instead of Jesus the innocent Saviour, a robber and villainous homicide, and placed the Saviour in such derision and shame that He uttered a lamentation in the words of Jeremiah: Hear, I pray you, all ye people and see my sorrow. And again: O all ye that pass by the way, attend and see if there be any sorrow like to my sorrow.[1] Also He cried to His Father saying: O God, why hast thou forsaken me?[2] Such was indeed His cry, as He hung on the cruel and shameful cross and suffered the blasphemy of the priests, who surrounded the cross and shouted and hissed out the mocking words: He trusted in God: let him now deliver him.[3] Vah,[4] thou that deetroyest the temple of God . . . come down from the cross![5] But His cry was: O God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me? It is that cry that calls upon us to mark His boundless mercy, to suffer blasphemy in the spirit of love along with Him, and to be thankful for the mercy wherewith He redeemed us from everlasting damnation.
Such, then, is the mercy that comes to you from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ our Saviour, Who grants you also peace. Our Master, the Peacemaker, taught His disciples to be peacemakers, so that, in whatsoever house they entered, they were to say: Peace be to you.[6] When He rose from the dead and entered into the midst of them, He said: Peace be to you.[7] When, too, He was minded to depart from them to His death, He said: Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you.[8] After His manner, therefore, I desire peace for you also, dear friends—peace to you from Him, that you may live virtuous lives and overcome the devil, the world, and the flesh—peace to you from Him, that you may love one another, ay, and your enemies[9]—peace to you, that that you may peaceably hear His word—peace to you, that you may speak with discretion—peace to you, that you may know how how to be silent with advantage. For he that hears in a humble spirit, doth not contend in a cause with malice; he that speaks with discretion, overcomes the contentious; he that keeps silence to good purpose, doth not quickly wound his conscience. For these reasons peace be unto you, grace and mercy—grace that preserves from sin; mercy that delivers from eternal fire and the peace of eternal repose in the eternal joy, which comes to all the faithful after this paltry life—from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, our Saviour, to whom be praise for ever and ever.[10] Amen.