Letter to the True Professors of Christs Gospel

The grace and favor of God / our heavenly father / pourchased unto us / by the blody death of Christ our Savior / befelte and increased in all your consciences / too your everlasting consolation.

T He violence of this age doth not suffer me / my most loving brethren / to come (as I would do) unto you / and by talk & brotherly cōferringe / to put you in mind of the Gospel of Jesus Christ / which amongst woothers far more worthy / even I by God's grace preached among you. I therefore have thought nedeful by these letters / now to do the same / now I say / when though the perverse frowardness of men / the true preaching of Christ's Gospel is bannished and man's doctrine is taught with lies & fables: And though some perchance will think that this longeth not to me / but too him that is youre Pastore to do / yet for as much as once I was your pastore / I cā not but testefye / that some piece of pastoral cure doth yet rest in my heart towards you. The which in deed doth much persuade me / as the present necessity also seemeth no les to require / to make a longe & a large treatise / by which ye might have an whole armor against all the assaults off false Prophets. But whē I consider / how truly / and that with much diligence ye have ben taught / and therewith thinkinge / that ye are not forgetful hearers of the word / I think that among you it shall suffice / if I do but name those greatest euelles / which now are poured forth out of pulpittes among you / and therewith put you in mind of the truth / contrary to these lies / which once you both heard and recyeued / desiring you to abide in the same. This will I do shortly / as I have but littell / and the same vnapte time to do it / yet truly I trust to do it / as let God's word therein try it. If first ye will suffer me to tell you / that through these falls Prophets / the castle of youre health / the salvation of your souls is assalted / whom if ye suffer too be with you if ye yield up yourselves to the beleuinge & following of their doctrine / then know ye that as by blind lears ye be led / so you with them then being blinded / shall with them fall in to the pit of pardiciō / which is prepared as well for the falsely seduced / as for the false seducer. Of this I could be content to speak the less / but that I se that whilst of to many / and that Londyners / these beasts befolowed. Ye have even drawn and pulled upon your heads those abominations / which if but reason had ruled / should not have been admitted before that by laws they had ben thrust unto you / that I speak not / what true Christianity should have moved you too have done.

Oh London / London / is this the Gospelling fruit / to be the first / that without a law shouldest bannish true preaching out of the / too be the first that against laws shalt admit that massinge Idolatry / to be the first that shall give the example of stōbling to all England / which shouldest yet have been the first in constancy / in humble / saying for the continuinge of the truth in the / in quiet and paciente suffringe for the truths sake even death / if by the rulers it had been offered the. That ground art thou / which not in persecucion / but before persecuciō cometh dost go back / a ground thou art reserved for the Lord's woeful cures / to whose judgment London I leave the.

Seeing in Lōdō these euels are received / as it is now meet for vigilante Pastors too watch over their flock / to chase the wolf away / les at the Lord's hand they do hear the name of hierlinges / so now is it high time for you my loving brethrē / and all them that he the chyldrē of God / to take heed whose voice ye do hear / too beware of the leaven of papistical Pharisees / and to keep yourselves undefiled from all their abominations. The greatest of which now I will resite amongst all their abominations / one of the principal is their doctrine of transsubstanciatiō / the very pride of papistry / and the horrible offense / even of the Turckes and Heathen. That a popish priest / by his hussing and bussinge / and mumblinge up of the words of Christ / more like a Coniuror then a Christian / should work that miraculous alteracion and chaunginge of the substance of bread and wyne / into the substance of the body and blood of Christ / which then is to be taken / as Christ him self God and man / & so to be adored. But you know my dere brethren / that there is no such miracle too be believed without the certain doctrine of God's word to warrant the same / which the papists can never show / & therefore their miracle is not to be believed / Christ in Instituting the Supper / ment not to leave there his body and blood really and substancially as the papists do teache: For Christ in the substance of his body / was then to be crucified / he was to die / he was to rise again / he was to ascend / and he was / and in the same yet now is / to appear before the glorious God / our Bishop / advocate / & mediator / there so to remain until the last day / as the schriptures do teache. In the Supper he instituted a commemoration of the breaking of his body / and sheddinge of his blood / to be done and made of them that do eat that bread / and drink of that cup / according to his institution: which he called his body and blood / for that it is to the receauers a seal and confirmation of Christ's body brokē / and Christ's blood shed for them / that the profit and commodity thereof is theirs / which there do partake by faith. And so these words: This is my body, and this is my blood, are to be understand / and not as the transsubstāciators / literally enforce them. For their understanding / them is both contrary to Christus meaning / and also to the office of his body / besides that it is against the nature of his very body. And that the same phrase of speaking is thus to be understanded / as I have said: The like phrases in like matters in the scriptures doth sufficiently teche us. As whereof circumcision / the LORD doth say: This is my covenant, where it was but the seal of the couenaūt / as Paul calleth it. In the same sort it is said: This is the pasouer. This cup is the New Testament in my blood. Christ is the rock. And in like manner are these to be understanded. So that if the adversaries will give the / give the holy Ghoste leave to expound him self / then these words. Thys is my body? Thys is my blood? are figuratively to be understanded. As the leke Pharisees are / and so serve they not all for their monstruus transsubstanciation. The second abomination is their sacrifice of the mass. In which (too let many things pass / as the straungenes of the tongue / the Iewesh apparel / the fond noddes / crosses / beckes & duckes.) Thre euels moste notable and to a Christian conscience intolerable are there. Firste their wicked sacrifice / which their masseboke testefieth / to be Propiciatorie / to take away the sins of all those / be they dead or living / for whom thei do say mass: Yea / profitable and available for wars / peace / wether / sickness / for murrain of beasts / and for whatsoever ye lust to bye their appliecacion. Oh shameful blasphemy. As concerning the sacrifice Propiciatorie for sin / ye must hold the anker of your faith that this sacrifice Christ himself once offered for all in his own bloody death. He was the priest & the sacrifice / the offerer and the thing offered / & by his own bloody offering purified he in the shedding of his blood all his frō sin. By it purchased he eternal sanctificacion & salvation for thē that shall be saved: & by it finished he forever / the full propiciacion for sins: for saying these words it is fynished or consummate / he yielded up the ghost. Detestable therefore is the papistical sacrifice & ingerous to the bloody death of Christ.

Christ instituted this supper to be a sacrament to us / and not that of it a priest should make a propiciatory sacrifice for sin: In the eating & drinking of it / that we should declare the Lord's death / offering the sacrifice of thanks therefore (and therefore is it called of the fathers a sacrifice of thanks) and not leauinge anymore sacrifice propyciatorie for sin too any priest too offer: That we eating and drinking / according too his institution / should by faith apply unto our consciences / the benefit of his death and passion / and not giving power too any priest by messing too apply the benefit of his death / to whom and to what he lysteth.

Christ ordained his Supper neither for the dead / which have no use of eating and drinking with us in the congregation: nor yet for beasts / wether / nor war / for which Christ did not dre: but for his church living upon this earth / that needeth his word / & needeth his Sacraments / for the cōfirminge of their faith.

Thus plainly / ye se one mischievous misuse in this mass. The seconde evil is / that the bread and cup (which the Lord instituted too be received of the faithful with thanks giving) In their mass they do abuse / and make of it an Idol / holding it up for the people / not only to gaze upon / but to give unto it that honor / which is dew unto God alone: And so both make of it an Idol / and of the people gross Idolaters / and transgressors of God's commandment. The fylthines of which Idolatry / I know you do se so plain / that I need not with many words to impugum it / for a Christian conscience cannot but abhor it. The third evil is that in their mass / that that is eaten and drounken is done & devoured of the priest all alone / with quartering and soppinge / with lickinge and suppinge / with wasshing and wiping / and such pretty tricks of their own inventing. Christ in his institution apoynteth this supper too he celebrate of the whole cōgregaciō. Take ye, and drynk ye all of this saith he: This do ye in remembrance of me. For so oft as ye eat this bread / and drink of this cup ye show the Lord's death till he cometh. Christ and Paul speaketh not to the priest alone / but too the whole congregation / too observe this ordinance of eating and drinkinge at the Lord's supper: Whereby ye may plainly se how contrary this doing of our popish massers is in this also to the Institucion of Christ. And too be short in this their whole mass is naught / else but an horrible prophanaciō of the Lord's supper: Wherefore as a moste iniurius blasphemy / too the blood of Christ / as a moste gross Idolatry / as a moste wicked prophanacion of Christ's institution / of all Christians is this mass to be eschewed and abhorred.

Out of his mischievous Idol the mass / form they unto the people / a new found sacrament of their own inuentinge: delivering to the people (as they say) through the miracle of their transsubstanciatiō a body / in which body / because also there is blood therefore / they do not minister their consecrated cup accordingly / for fear of spilling and yet they give drink too their houseled to wash down the cromes withal. Oh thieves where learn ye too minister such a sacrament. Where have ye your ground in the scripture for this / your vnholsome housel. Who can with a good consciīce receive such a new found Popish sacrament at a papists hand / seeing also it is thereto off them used / to put Christ's true institution out of his true use. Whose appointed ordinance is that the bread of thanksgiving / and the cup of thanksgiving should be eaten and droncken of the congregation / as before I said.

Thys their new found Sacrament they hange up in the pix / they carrye abroad in processions to be adored / with many such mischiefs of their own inuentinge / which to reken up / all were an endless labor. I leave them therefore ever listeninge when I may hear them defend these their abominations by the written word off God / but this as they never yet could do / so shall they never be able to do it / and therefore of all Christians are they wish their euasyons to be forsaken.

In the doctrine of Iustificacion they wander enwrapped in laberin these inextricable. They err in extenuating sin both original and actual / in not vnderstādinge the law / the force of it (I mean) nor the ende of it / in making a Justification / partly of Christ's grace / partelye of man's free will / good mocyons and good works / and herein they so enwrappe them selves with their terms of the first grace / the seconde grace / grace presidente / grace concomitatinge / grace following / with merit of congruence / and merit of condignity / that neither understand thee true justification / neither can other men understand what they do mean by their Iustificatiō: But their doctrine is too bring men into a continual doubtynge of salvation / and leadeth them clean from that free Iustificacion / which we have in Jesus Christ. But you my brethren have out of the scriptures received / and I trust by the practyses of youre own conscyences have tasted.

That by nature ye are the children of wrath of your selfs: as of your selfs that ye are but such a lompe of sin / that in you dwelleth no good thing. For which the law iustely condempneth you as gilty of God's curse and wrath / and so dryueth you too Christ. By whose grace ye be freely justified.

By whose bloudde sheddynge / only and alone / the attonemente is now made made between God and you / which you believing are made the heirs of blessing / of which your consciences by faith being assured by the work of God's spirit / ye be at peace with God / because ye do feale even in your hearts by lively persuasion off faith / that Christ hath loved you / and given him self for you / for whose only sake ye are iustefied and saved: Which you thus felinge / are led by the same spirit that worketh this in you too render unto God the sacrifice of your body / in living & doing those works / which in his sight are acceptable / and that in a freedom and liberty off the spirit / I mean no fleshely liberty / but that liberty of the spiritie / by which we dare draw nye unto the seat of God's grace / calling him: Abba father / that liberty that subdueth the liberty of the flesh / and maketh it captive & bond too serve the spirit. In which you also walkinge / when ye have done all that ye can do / if ye could do all that is commanded you too do / yet seeing all man's righteousness is but as a defiled clothe / ye seek not thereby the perimplishment of your Iustificacion. Which is all ready fully given you in Christ's Jesus / ye loke not to the merit of your good works: but on your part knowing your own want and imperfection / yea / and sin evē in the best ye do / ye say: we are unprofitable servants commending all your doings to the grace of God thorough Christ / that by him they may be made pure: on God's parte considering / that the good ye do / is the work of his spirit in you / which worketh in all men / both to will & to do / ye do give unto him the glory / seeing by his grace only / ye are that good that ye are. Neuertheles / yet this also ye know that the Lord / which through Christ hath accepted you unto his grace / doth of the same grace in Christ / accept these youre works into his favor / as just perfect and good. Which though they be the works of his spirit in you / yet is he content to have thē called and esteemed as yours / and as yours doth he of his own free grace reward thē both in this life / and in the life to come. In this that I have thus spoken / you se the force of sin original and actual / the force and ende of the law / the power of man's free will / the true justification / mans regeneracion / and the life / fruictes & perfection of God's regenerate child: By which ye may the more easily perceive how far the papists wander from the truth of justification / by which they draw men into a desperate doubting of salvation / which who so liketh / let them taste thereof. Here is occasion also given me to warn you of all those means that they have taught too be meritorius to deserve God's grace / as works of superrogaciō / works done of a good intent / fish fasts / vows / pylgrimages / pardons / and such like Popish trashe / which though as yet perchaūce they dare not teathe / yet have they taught / and will hereafter teache it. But against all such / I account you sufficiently armed / if ye hold fast this that our only merit a valiable before god / is the merit of Christ / which he freely giveth / and God for his only sake freely imputeth to all true believers / which is unto them full perfyt / and sufficient merit / righteousness / sanctification / & salvation. They teache also inuocacion of saints / to make them mediators / if not too God for us / yet unto Christ to speak the better for us.

The scripture teacheth plain / that between God and man / there is but one mediator / the man Jesus Christ / who therefore became man / that for men he alone should make intercessiō / as for man's redēpcion he alone did die. Wherefore even he also teacheth mē to call vpō the father in his name / promising to such that they shall be hard.

Prayer abuse they not only in a strange tongue / contrary to the doctrine of Paul / which will have all things done in the cōgregacion / to the edifyeng thereof: in superstitious numbering of a certain number of Psalms / or Pater nosters / of which because the people shall be sure / they teache thē the use of beads / contrary unto which Christ our Savior taught / condemninge it as a phariseicall superstition / when for their much clatering sake / they think them selves to be hard: But also they teache and defend prayeng for the dead / to be charitable and propiciatory.

Whereas yet the scripture teacheth / that they that die in the Lord / are insolace and blessedness. As then they need not our prayers / so our prayers can add nought unto their blessedness: And on the contrary parte they that die wickedlye / have no remedy everlastingly: So that on all partes / this kind of prayer is in vain. The wother being in moste blessed safety / and with these the time of health & grace being past / their curious charity therefore / and their peuishe propiciatorye prayer hath no ground in the scriptures. But through this they have picked the purse of many a poor man / for on this vnhappye ground build they chantries / trentalles vniuersaries / diriges / purgatory / pardons for souls departed / and a piece of their expiatory sacrifice / with many such proper devises.

Auriculer confessiō they teache / in which they enforce a numbering of sins / which is naught / else but the tyranny of their kingdom / and as they use it a killing of Christiā consciences / and hath no ground of the scriptures. In an anguish and dute of conscience it is both good / necessary / and comfortable / for a man to counsel with sum such learned elder / in whose lips doth lie the law of truth. Agayne / if the true ecclesiastical discipline were used / a piece of it ought too be / that the man restored / should of his faulie make an open confession before the congregation / to declare publicquely his repentance. Yea / and a minister may upon just ground examine any / of whom he hath cure / of such a faute / as he seeth him worth to be reproved for: But this is so far frō their eareshrifte / that a man moste blind / may easily judge thereof. But the rabble of their errors are to many now to recite / as of the authority of the church / of the not erring of the church / of discipline / of their five new enuented sacrament / of voues / of ckoyse of meats / of images / and such like. Against all / which that ye may be armed my dear brethren / I require you not only to call to mind the doctrine of the truth received. But also that for the trial of thē ye do abide in the word of the truth / God's word I mean. And because / here they have also an error / I will but recite it / and so make an ende.

Their error is / that God's writ̄ word is not a sufficient doctrine unto salvation / but (say they) the voice of the church / traditions / and counsayles are to be hard of necessity. As for traditions / there is no tradicion of any matter of faith to be received / other then is in the scriptures expressed. Likewise doctors and counsailles / with the consent and custom of the church / are so far to be hard in matters of faith / as they do agre with the written scripture: for it is the touche stone to try them all by / & that in such sort / that if they say not / according to this word / then as there is no light in them / so are they not to be followed. As for traditions / customs / and by and for the order of the church ceremonies received and used / which be no matters of faith / they may be admitted and altered at the discrecion of them that have the rule of the church under Christ / according to the necessity of the time / and the disposition of the people / so that in them be nothing elles but true edifying to unfeigned Godliness. And such are of the people with humblines too be received. But for the full trial of such / • ea / and for the full and perfect institution of all men / in such things as concerning salvation / God hath left unto his church and people his written word. In which though all things that God might have caused to be written / be not writ̄. Yet in it so much is written / as sufficeth to teache us that Jesus Christ is the son of God / and also that we believing / might have life everlasting / as John doth witness / by which we learn / that the written word of God. is a sufficient doctrine to instruct us in that faith / which bringeth to life everlasting. It is that sufficient doctrine that can alone make men learned unto salvation / by the faith which is in Christ Jesus / it alone sufficeth to make the mā of God perfectly enstructed too all that is good / as witnesseth Paul. Therefore unto the scriptures do Christ send the Pharisees / Abraham too Moses and the Prophets / Peter also to the same word of the Prophets / as to the doctrine that sufficeth to enstructe us too salvation. The knowledge of which word whosoever goeth about to take from the people by putting it into a strange langage to the ende that the more safely / our popish marchaūtes may keep their marte of falshead and Popery / he robbeth the people of their mean to salvation / he openith a door for thieves and murderers / to devour the flock of Christ / and if at the worlds hand / he sustayneth not the judgment of a thief / yet at God's hand shall he be sure to have the judgment of a soul murderer.

Thus briefly I have put you in mind my dear brethren of the principal errors of the adversaries / and of the truth contrary to them / not so copiously as the matter deserveth / but shortly measuring the neade of your knowledge / for I have not to do now with the ignorant / but with you / of whom by the time and kind of your teaching / I judge that ye be able not only too judge off the truth / but too be brotherly enstruetors of other in the same. And thus I have done furst to exorte you constantly to abide in the truth received. Call to youre mind that God of his great mercy and goodness hath long ben in planting / sowing / and watering of you / as it were to make you a garden off pleasure unto him self. These sedes of life the deuel by his doctors will now go about to pick out of your hearts. But if in this Gospelling adge / ye have been worthy hearers of the Gospel / if with the word heard with youre ears / the Lord's sprite hath touched your hearts to believe the word of truth preached / as he hath done to so many as have unfeignedly desired it / if ye be the sheep / which have rightely heard the shepeherdes voice / then surely the strangers supplanting voice shall ye not hear / but ye shall flee from such hurelinges / as from thieves / robbers and murderers. Hereby verily shall ye be known what ground ye are / fruteful / or vnfruteful constant / or seruers of the time: Good Gospel hearers be not such as will be tost about with every wind / they be no such ground as will be dried up with every blast of bourning heat / but they abide in God's truth / serchinge and learning the same in his holy scriptures / and that with such faithful diligence and constante obedience / that if an angel from heaven shall preach another Gospel / they hold him accursed: Yea / and though there be many counterfaicie Christians / that fall away from the Lord's truth / yet abide they with Christ and say: Thou hafte the words of everlasting life: Consider my dear brethren / that not too hear alone / but to keep Christ's word maketh a man happy. And in kepinge the principal parte is too persevere in the doctrine off truth / this maketh Christ's disciples / this maketh you free / yea / this is it / that maketh a man safe / for he that perseuereth too the ende / shall be saved.

Thys also have I written too exorte you / to keep yourselves undefiled from all Popish leaven / if ye do fall from the Gospel / and embrace Popery / ye fall from truth to lies / from the word of light and life / to darkness and death / from salvation to damnation / from God too the devil. Ye are then they / into whom the evil spirit reentreth with seuē worse then him self / ye are then the foolish buylders which suffer the irrecoverable ruin. And as then with that filth that is in Popery / ye be defiled with it: so of the damnation which is due to such abomination / ye shall be partakers of it. But if ye think that ye can both embrace Popery and the Gospel / ye do disceaue yourselves / for you cannot both hold the taste off Christ's death in your consciences / and alowe also that mass / which is the defacer of Christ's death / you cannot embrace the righte use of the Lord's supper / and also use and partake the horrible prophanacion of the same: Ye cannot by faith apprehend free justification / and yet seek by your righteousness and merits too be saved: you cannot accept God's written word / as the sufficient doctrine of salvation: and alsoo take man's doctrine and traditions / as necessary to the same / and so forth of the rest. This can ye not do both / they are so contrary.

But if ye could do it / yet may ye not do it / for God will none of your mangeled service / for as there is no cōueniēce between Christ and Belial / so men must not halte on both sydes in God's service / but either say that God is God / or else that Baal is god. God never allowed that service of the Samaritaines / which both served their Idols / and worshipped the living God. But if ye be turned to the Lord / then all strange God's must ye clean forsake. The Lord is God alone / alone therefore according to his word will he be served. God is over mā a gelious God / wherefore he will have whole man wholly to be his alone / as our first commandment teacheth us. Agayne / if you think that in your hearts ye will serve the Lord / but yet ye will be and may be present in parson at their Idolatry. For your heart shall be in heavē. This is but a fleshly policy / which faileth as many as trust unto it. How can you / too whom Christ's death is deer: abide to se that whorish thief / that stealeth from Christ the glory of his death. Howe can ye / which have ben and are ready to receive with thankfulness the Lord's supper according to Christ's institution / abide to se the horrible prophanacion thereof? And so forth of the rest. But if your conscience were such that ye could thus do / yet know ye this / that it is against your Christian profession. For we are taught / that too believe with the heart / & to confess with the mouth maketh a man safe. Bothe hearts belief / & mouths confessiō must go together / which doth not so in you / when inwardly ye are Gospelers / & outwardly dessemblers with papists. Ye are bought with a price (saith Paul) glorify now God in your body and in your sprite / which are God's. Seinge both body an sprite are God's / not only by creation / but bought also by redempciō / even in the price of Christ's blood / ye cannot with a dissembling pretence / couple your bodies with papists / for then ye do not glorify God in your bodies. We rede not that any child of God / used ever justly any such dissimulacion. Daniel used none such and therefore was he sone accused of not adoring the king / Bel and the Dragon. The three children / whether they came by compulsion / or came of their own mind / where the Idol was / dissembled not / for forth with they were accused as transgressors of the kings commandment. Eleazarus would not dissemble / eating even of lawful flesh. These men glorified God in body & sprite / these men believed in heart / & confessed with the mouth / & so must you do / without any other muysinge / if ye will do the office off Christians. And this to do not only the profession of Christianity enforceth / but Christian cheritie also. Our doings must be without offense giving: But by this dissembling a double stomble block is givē which even in things indifferent is to be avoided. For what though a Christian may eat freely of meats offered unto Idols / yet if thereby an Idolater / whose conscience in his superstition / should be confirmed thereby / it were better never to eat flesh. And what though all things be clean to the clean to be eaten on all days with thanks giving / yet better it is not to eat flesh / nor to drink wyne: then too offend thereby thy weak brother: If this be to be observed in things indifferente / howe much more in things which are absolutely evil / must ye take heed that neither ye give occasion off concerning the conscience of an Idolatry / nor yet of offending the week to draw them to the leeke evil with you: both which ye do / when both a papist and a week brother seeth you as mingrels myngling your selfs with the Papists in their Idolatry. As much might I speak / howe that all things that ye do in the congregation must be done to edifyeng. But of this to have full instruccion. I refer you to the mind off master Calvin / lately translated & printed in English. Thus now I ende wishing you all well in the Lord. Abide in his truth / keep yourselves undefiled. Offer youre selves humbly to suffer all violence of blouddye laws for the truths sake / keep safe your consciences / though the sword taketh your lives from you / suffer & bear withal humbleness and quiet obedience. Humble yourselves in unfeigned repentance before the Lord / in the horrible plague of Popery / that of his mercy he may be moved to ende these days of delusion / and let your prayers always ascend up before the Lord / begginge of him such things as ye need. In which I beseech you to pray also for me.