Page:Letters of John Huss Written During His Exile and Imprisonment.djvu/145

This page has been validated.
PETER MALDONIEWITZ TO JOHN HUSS.
111

But trouble not your head with phantoms; forget them, and think only in what manner you may reply to the objections that will be made against you. And yet the word of truth, which cannot err, forbids you to meditate too much; for it declares, that when you are brought before men, it shall be suggested to you at the moment what you ought to say.

This is the explanation of your dream:—The image of Christ, painted on the walls of the chapel, is his life, which we ought to imitate; it is the same for the holy and ineffaceable Scripture which is represented on the same place, and which, towards the evening, the enemies of the cross endeavour to rub out, the sun withdrawing itself from them on account of the iniquities of their life; all these things, then, appear forgotten in the eyes of the world; but the next day, when the sun of justice shall have risen again, the preachers of Christ’s word will renew these same images, and will retrace them in a more brilliant manner, then preaching on the house-tops what was before only whispered in the ear, and, as it were, delivered up to oblivion. The result will be a great source of joy to believers; and although the humble bird,[1] at present placed on the altar, may be delivered up to suffering in putting off a feeble body; yet our firm hope is, that hereafter awakening, after this miserable life, as from a dream, it will live with Him who is in

  1. Auca, goose, the signification of Huss in Bohemia.