Marginalia1555. Iuly.let him be your patron to worke by: let him be your ensample to folow: MarginaliaChrist onely must haue both hart and hand.geue him as your hart so your hand, as your mind so your toung, as your fayth so your feete, and let his worde be your candle to go before you in all matters of Religion. Blessed is he that walketh not to these Popish prayers, nor standeth at them nor sitteth at them:MarginaliaPsal. 1. 2. Cor. 6. glorifie God in both soule and body. He that gathereth not with Christ, scattereth abroad. Vse prayer, looke for Gods helpe, which is at hād to them that aske and hope thereafter assuredly. In which prayer I hartly desire your Lordship to remember vs, who as we are goyng with you right gladly (God therfore be praysed) so we looke to go before you, hopyng that you will folow, if God so will, accordyng to your dayly prayer: Thy will be done on earth. &c. The good spirite of God alwayes guide your Lordship vnto the end, Amen.

Your Lordships owne for euer,
Iohn Bradford.

MarginaliaA pithy and effectuall letter of Maister Bradford to Maister Warcup.THe same peace our Sauior CHRIST left with his people, which is not without warre with the world, almighty God worke plentifully in your hartes now and for euer, Amen.

The time I perceiue is come, wherein the Lordes ground wil be kowen, I meane it will now shortly appeare who haue receiued Gods Gospel into their harts in deede, to the taking of good roote therein, for such wil not for a little heate or sunburning, wyther, but stiffely will stand & grow on maugre the malice of all burning showers and tempestes. And for as much as (my beloued in the Lord) I am perswaded of you, that ye bee in deede the children of God, Gods good ground, which groweth and will grow on (by Gods grace) bringing forth fruit to Gods glory after your vocations, as occasion shall be offered (burne the sunne neuer so hote) therfore I cā not but so signifie vnto you, & hartely pray you and euery one of you, accordingly to go on forwards after your Maister CHRIST, not sticking at þ^e foule way & stormy weather, which you are come into and are like so to do, of this being most certaine, that the ende of your iourney shall be pleasant and ioyfull in such a perpetual rest and blissefulnes as can not but swallow vp the showers that ye now feele & are soussed in, if ye often set it before your eyes after Paules counsell in the later end of the. 4. and beginning of the. 5. chap. of the second Epistle to the Corinthians. Reade it I pray you, and remember it often, as a Restoratiue to refreshe you, lest ye faint in the way.

And besides this, set before you also, that though the weather be foule and stormes growe apace, yet go not ye alone, but other your brothers & sisters pad the same path, as S. Peter telleth vs, and therfore company should cause you to be the more couragious and chereful. But if ye had no company at all to goe presently with you, I pray you tell me, if euen from the begynning the best of Gods frendes haue found MarginaliaFoule way and foule weather to the kingdome of heauen.any fayrer weather and way to the place whether ye are going (I meane heauen) thē ye now finde and are like to do, except ye wyll with the worldlings, which haue their portion in this lyfe, tarye still by the way till the stormes be ouerpast, and then eyther night will so approch that ye can not trauail, eyther the doores wyll bee sparred before ye come, and so ye shall lodge without in wonderfull euil lodgings. Reade Apoca. 22. Begin at Abell, and come from him to Noe, Abraham, Isaac, Iacob, Ioseph, the Patriarches, Moses, Dauid, Daniel, and all the Saintes in the old testament, and tell me whether euer any of them found any fairer way then ye now finde.

MarginaliaThe passage of all Gods Saintes both in the old and new testament, hath bene thorough affliction.If the old Testament wil not serue, I pray you come to the new, and begyn with Mary and Ioseph, and come from them to Zacharie, Elizabeth, Iohn Baptist, and euery one of the Apostels and Euangelistes, and search whether they all found any other way into the City we trauell towards, then by many tribulations. Besides these, if ye should call to remembraunce MarginaliaRead the story of the primitiue church aboue described.the primatiue church, Lord God, ye should see many to haue geuen cherefully their bodies to most greuous torments, rather then they would bee stopped in their iourney, that there is no day in the yeare, but (I dare say) a thousand was the fewest that with great ioy lost their homes here, but in the City they went vnto, haue found other maner of homes then mans minde is able to conceiue. But if none of all these were, if ye had no company now to go with you, as ye

haue me your poore brother and bondman of the Lord, with many other, I trust in God: if ye had none other of the Fathers, Patriarches, Kings, Prophets, Apostels Euangelistes, Martyrs & other holy Saintes and children of God, that in their iourney to heauenward, found as ye now finde and are like to finde if ye go on forward as I trust ye will: yet ye haue MarginaliaChrist Iesus the ringleader of all Gods children afflicted.your Maister and your Captain IESVS CHRIST, the deare dearling & only begotten and beloued sonne of God, in whom was all the fathers pleasure, ioy, and delectation, ye haue him to go before you, no fayrer way but much fouler, into this our City of Ierusalem. I neede not (I trust) to rehearse what maner of way he found. Begyn at his birth, and till ye come at his buriall, ye shall finde that euery foote and stride of his iourney, was no better, but much worse then yours is now.

Wherefore (my dearely beloued in the Lord) be not so deintie as to looke for that at Gods hands your deare father, which the Fathers, Patriarckes, Prophets, Apostels, Euangelistes, Martyrs, Saintes, and hys owne Sōne IESVS CHRIST did not find. MarginaliaWe must not be so daintie to looke for fairer weather, then Christ him selfe went through.Hetherto we haue had fayre way (I trow) and fayre weather also: nowe because we haue loitered by the way, and not made the speede we should haue done, our louing Lord and swete father hath ouercast the weather, and styrred vp stormes and tempestes, that we might with more hast runne out our race before night come, and the doores bee sparred. The Deuil stādeth now at euery Inne doore in his City and coūtrey of this world, crying vnto vs to tary and lodge in this or that place till the stormes bee ouerpast: not that he would not haue vs wet to the skyn, but that the tyme myght ouerpasse vs to our vtter destruction. Therefore beware of his entisements.MarginaliaPhil. 3. The deuils entisments not to be trusted. Cast not your eyes on things that be present, how this man doth, and how that man doth: but cast your eyes on the gleue ye runne at, or els ye will loose the game. Ye know that he which runneth at the gleue, doth not looke on other that stand by, and go this way or that way, but altogether he looketh on the gleue, and on them that run with hym, that those which be behinde ouertake him not, and that he may ouertake them which be before: euen so shoulde we do, leaue of looking on those which will not run the race to heauens blisse by the path of persecutiō wyth vs, and cast our eyes on the ende of our race, and on them that go before vs, that we maye ouertake them, and on them which come after vs, that wee may prouoke them to come the faster after.

He that shooteth, wil not cast his eyes in his shooting on them that stand by or ride by the wayes (I trow) MarginaliaTo looke to the marke.but rather on the marke he shooteth at, for els he were lyke to wyn the wrong way: Euen so my dearelye beloued, let your eyes be set on þ^e marke ye shoote at, euē CHRIST IESVS, who for the ioy he set before him, did ioyfully cary his crosse, contemning the shame, and therefore he now sitteth on the ryght hand of the throne of God. Let vs follow him, for this did he that we should not be fayntharted. MarginaliaHebr. 12. Rom. 8. 2. Tim. 3. Math. 12.For wee may bee most assured, that if we suffer with him, we shall vndoubtedly raigne with him, but if we deny him, surely he will deny vs: for he that is ashamed of me (saith CHRIST) & of my gospel, in this faithles generation, I wil be ashamed of him before the Aungels of God in heauen. Oh how heauy a sentence is this to all such as know the Masse to be an abominable idol, MarginaliaWhat danger it is to go to the blasphemous Masse.full of idolatry, blasphemy and sacriledge against God and his CHRIST (as vndoubtedly it is) and yet for feare of men, for losse of life or goods, yea some for aduauntage & gaine, wil honest it with their presence, dissembling both with God and man, as their owne hart and conscience doth accuse them? Better it were that such had neuer knowen the truth, then thus wittingly, and for the feare or fauour of man MarginaliaEsay. 2. 2. Pet. 2.whose breath is in his nosethrels, to dissemble it, or rather (as in deede it is) to deny it. The ende of such is like to be worse then their beginning. Such had nede to take heede of the two terrible places to the Hebrewes in the. vj. and x. Chapters,MarginaliaHeb. 6. 10. lest by so doing they fall therein. Let them beware they playe not wily beguile them selues, as some do, I feare me, which go to Masse, and because they worship not, nor kneele not, nor knock not as others do, but sit stil in their pues, therefore they thinke they rather do good to others then hurt.

But (alas) if these men would looke into their owne consciences, there should they see that they are very dissemblers,MarginaliaDissembling Gospellers. and in seeking to deceaue others (for by thys meanes the Magistrates thinke them of their sorte) they deceyue them selues. They thinke at the eleuation time