began to be attributed to him. Books written by Peter Chelcicky,[1] whose views certainly in many respects resemble those of Hus, were supposed to be the work of the originator of Bohemian church-reform, and in the hymn-books of the community of the Bohemian brethren,[2] who considered themselves the truest continuators of the work of Hus, numerous hymns by other writers were attributed to the master. Later on, the greater the fame of Hus became the more devotional works were ascribed to him. When the Roman creeds had been forcibly re-established in Bohemia it was endeavoured by all means to blacken the memory of the church-reformer. For that purpose, several writings containing extreme views were wrongly attributed to him.[3]
It is a proof of the great fame of Hus that some of his writings were among the earliest of printed works. The earliest printed work of Hus of which we know the existence, though no copy has been preserved, was a small treatise entitled Gesta Christi. In 1459 two and in 1495 four of the letters from Constance were printed. The quaint Book against the Priest Kitchen-master was first printed at Litomysl in 1509. Of the last-named work a unique copy is preserved in the library of the Bohemian museum; of the others little is known except the fact that they existed. Martin Luther, who always considered the Bohemian reformer as his forerunner, in 1536 published at Wittenberg a translation of four of Hus’s Bohemian letters; among them was the famed “Letter to the Whole Bohemian Nation.” The translation was in German and Latin. A year later a larger collection of Hus’s letters was printed under the influence of Luther, who wrote an introduction.[4] The best early editions of Hus's works,
- ↑ See my History of Bohemian Literature, pp. 153–171.
- ↑ See Chapter IX.
- ↑ It is probable that this occurred even much earlier. Thus John Stokes at the Council of Constance referred to a treatise which had been shown to him at Prague as a work of Hus. Hus had no connection whatever with this treatise.
- ↑ This introduction was reprinted with the editions of the Latin works published in 1558 and 1715.
