MarginaliaAn. 1555. December.did Abraham and Tobias vnto a straunge land: God geue you health both of body and soule, that ye may go from vertue to vertue, and grow from strength to strēgth, vntill ye may see face to face the God of Sion in his holy hil, with the innumerable company of his blessed Martyrs & Saintes. Let there be continuall ascensions vnto heauen in your hartes. Let there be no decrease of any vertue, which is already planted in you. Be as the light of the iust, such as Salomon saith increaseth to the perfect day of the Lord. Let the strength of God be commended in your weake vessels, as it is. MarginaliaWholsome & godly precepts of life.Be examples of fayth and sobrietie to all that ye shal come in company withall. Let your godly conuersation speake where your toung may not, in the congregation. Be swift to heare and slow to speake, after the coūsell of S. Iames. Be not curious about other mens doynges, but be occupied in prayer and continuall meditation, with reuerent talkyng of the word of God, without cōtention amongest þ^e Saintes. Let your faith shine in a straunge coūtrey, as it hath done in your owne, that your father which is in heauen may be glorified by you to the end.

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This farewell I send you, not as a thyng nedefull, (which know already what your duety is, and be desirous to performe the same) but as one that would haue you vnderstand that he is myndfull of your godly conuersation, wherof he hath had good experience, and therfore writeth this to be as a perpetuall memoriall betwixt you and him vntill our metyng together before GOD, where we shall ioy that we haue here louyngly put one an other in memory of our duety to performe it.

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Farewell agayne, myne owne bowels in CHRIST, and take me with you where soeuer you go, and leaue your selues with me, that in spirite we may be presēt one with an other. Commend me to the whole congregation of CHRIST, willyng them not to leaue their countrey without witnes of the Gospell, after that we all be slayne, which already be staulled vp & appointed to the slaughter, and in the meane season to pray earnestly for our cōstancy, that CHRIST may be glorified in vs and in them both by life and death. Farewell in the Lord.

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Yours for euer, Iohn Philpot.

MarginaliaAn other letter of M. Philpot to his owne Sister, full of fruitfull exhortation.GOd the eternall father, who hath iustified you by the bloud of his sonne IESVS CHRIST, and called you to hallow his name thorough a good cōuersation and profession of lyfe, he sanctifie you with dayly encrease of vertue and faith by his holy spirite, that you may appeare a vessell of sanctification in the middest of this wicked and peruerse generation, to the laude and prayse of the Gospell, Amen.

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I haue occasion (myne owne deare sister) to prayse God in you for two causes: the one, that to your hability you are ready to shew your selfe a naturall louyng sister vnto me your poore afflicted brother, as by your gentle tokens you haue eftsoones  

testified beyng absent, as also presently visityng me: which well declareth that you be a very natural sister in dede, and to be praysed in this behalfe. But in the other, that you be also a sister to me in faith after CHRISTES Gospell, I am occasioned to thanke God so much the more, how much the one excelleth the other, MarginaliaSpirituall consanguinitie and naturall, compared.and the spirituall consanguinitie is more perdurable   then that which is of flesh and bloud, and is a worker of that which is by nature: for commonly such as be vngodly, be vnnatural and onely louers of them selues, as dayly experiēce teacheth vs. The lyuyng Lord, which through the incorruptible seede of his word hath begotten you to be my liege   sister, geue you grace so to grow in that generatiō, that you may encrease to a perfect age in the Lord to bee my sister with CHRIST for euer.

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Looke therfore that you continue a faithfull sister as you are called and are godly entered, not onely to me but to all the church of CHRIST, yea to CHRIST him selfe, who voucheth you in this your vnfained faith, worthy to be his sister. Consider this dignitie to surmount all the vayne dignities of the world, & let it accordingly preuayle more with you, then all earthly delightes: for therby you are called to an equall portion of the euerlastyng inheritaunce of CHRIST, if now in no wise you do shewe your selfe an vnnaturall sister to him in forsakyng hym in trouble, which I trust you wil neuer for no kynde of wordly respect do. You are vnder daungerous temptations to be turned from that naturall loue you owe vn-

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to CHRIST, and you shalbe tryed with Gods people thorough a sieue of great affliction:MarginaliaThe sieue of afflictions. for so Sathan desireth vs to be sifted, MarginaliaLuke. 22.that through feare of sharpe troubles we might fall from the stablenes of our faith, and so be depriued of that honour, ioy, and reward, which is prepared for such as continue faithfull brothers and sisters in the Lordes conenant to the end. Therfore the wise man in the booke of Ecclesiasticus,MarginaliaEccle. 2. byddeth them that come to the seruice of the Lord, To prepare thē selues to suffer temptations.

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Since then that for the glory of God and our faith, we are called now to abide the brunte of them, and that whē our aduersary hath done all that he can, yet we may be stable and stand: this CHRIST our first begotten brotherMarginaliaChrist our first borne brother. looketh for at our hādes, and all our brethren and sisters in heauen desire to see our faith through afflictions to be perfect, that we might fulfill their nūber: and the vniuersall Church here militant, reioyceth at our constancy, whom all by the contrary we should make sory, to the daunger of the losse both of body and soule. Feare not therfore, what soeuer be threatned of the wicked world: prepare your backe, MarginaliaA Christian mās back should alwayes be ready to beare Christes crosse.and see it be ready to cary CHRISTES crosse. And if you see any vntowardnes in you (as the flesh is continually repugnant to the will of God) aske with faithfull prayer that the good spirite of God may lead your sinnefull flesh whether it would not: for if we will dwell in the flesh and folow the counsell therof, we shall neuer do the will of God, neither worke that tendeth to our saluation.

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You are at this present in the confines and borders of Babilon, where you are in daunger to drinke of the whores cup, vnlesse you be vigilāt in praier. Take heede the Serpent seduce you not from the simplicity of your fayth, as he dyd our first mother Eue. MarginaliaVngodly fellowship to be eschewed.Let no worldly felowshyp make you partaker of iniquitie. He that toucheth tarre can not but be defyled thereby. With such as be peruerse, a man shall soone be peruerted: with the holy you shalbe holy. Therfore say continually with the Prophet Dauid: MarginaliaPsal. 15.Vnto the Sainctes that bee on the earth, all my will is on them. You haue bene sanctified and made pure through the truth: take heede you be not vnholyed and defiled, lest the last be worse then the first. I write not this because I stand in any doubt of your sincere continuance (of the which I haue had so good experience): but because the dayes be euill, and in the same it is the duty of euery one of vs to exhort an other.

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I am bold to put you (my good sister) in remēbraunce of that which doth not a litle comfort me to remēber, in my troubles and dayly temptations. Wherfore I doubt not, you will take that in good part which commeth frō your brother both in spirit and body, who tendreth your saluation as earnestly as his own, that we might ioy together eternally with such ioy as the world shall neuer be able to take from vs. Thankes bee vnto God, you haue begon to runne a good and great tyme well in the wayes of the Lord: run out of the trace to the end which you haue begon, and then shall you receiue the crowne of glory. Marginalia2. Tim. 2.None shalbe crowned but such as lawfully striueth. Be not ouercome of euill, but ouercome euill with good, MarginaliaApoc. 4.and the Lord shall make you one of those faithfull virgins that shall folow the Lambe where soeuer hee goeth: the which CHRIST graunt both you & me, Amen.

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Commend me to all them that loue me in the Lord vnfainedly. God encrease our faith and geue vs neuer to bee ashamed of his Gospell. That same request which I haue made to my brother Thomas, I make also to you, desiryng you by all meanes you can to accomplish my request, that my suretiesMarginaliaThis was for the first fruits of his Archdeaconry whereof all the time of his imprisonment he had no commodity, & yet his sureties were compelled to pay the same. might be satisfied with that is mine owne, to the contentation of my minde, which cannot be quyet vntill they be discharged:  

therefore I pray you helpe to purchase quyetnes that I might depart out of this world in peace. My dissolution I looke for dayly, but the Lord knoweth how vnworthy I am of so hygh an honour, as to dye for the testimony of hys truth. Pray that God would vouchsafe to make mee worthy, as hee hath done of long imprisonment, for the which his name be praysed for euer. Pray and looke for the comming of the Lord, whose wrath is great ouer vs, and I wil pray for you as long as I liue. The. ix. of Iuly in the kynges Bench.

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Your owne louing brother as well in fayth
as in body, Iohn Philpot.

MarginaliaAn other letter of I. Philpot conteining godly exhortations.THe grace of God the father, and the peace of our Sauiour IESVS CHRIST his eternall sonne, and the con-