Page:The letters of John Hus.djvu/105

by the Holy Spirit saith: Little children, let no man deceive you: he that doth justice, is just as Christ is just: but he that committeth sin, is of the devil. Afterwards he saith: In this the children of God are manifest and the children of the devil: whosoever is not just, is not of God.^[1] You see, therefore, that any one who commits a sin unto death, is of the devil and a son of the devil. Why, then, do you suffer a heresy to be preached contrary to these holy sayings of Christ? Be assured that a man who preaches thus is a servant and son of the devil and is worse than the humblest layman that is good. Nor is that priest the father of God; for God would then be the son of this priest; and yet this priest is a son of the devil. God, therefore, would be a son of the devil also! Nor, again, is a priest who preaches and holds this error a creator of the Divine Body; but he is the author of a great heresy. Granted that with the help of all his associates he procreate a nit, then I will admit that they are creators! It is an impossibility, though it were tedious to prove it in this letter. O brave Christians! are you all dead that you allow errors to be bandied about and God’s word driven into a corner? Scorn them, and let not the devil rule over you. May the Lord God herein be your Helper, who alone can be, and is, Creator. Amen.

 

Within a few weeks of writing this letter to the people of Pilsen, Hus became involved in a controversy of wider import On September 9, 1411, and again on December 2, John XXIII., in the throes of his struggle with Ladislaus, the King of Naples, and Gregory XII., issued bulls preaching a crusade against his foes. The same indulgences were offered as for a campaign in Palestine to all those who should take up arms, or who bought

 

1. John iii. 7–8 , 10, Czech.