times in his last letters from prison. In a Bohemian letter, dated June 27, Hus writes with touching humility: “I will tell you that the Lord God knows why He defers my death and that of my dear brother, master Jerome; with regard to him, I hope that he will die holily and guiltlessly, and that he will bear himself and suffer more bravely than I, faint-hearted sinner that I am.”[1]
Hus was too holy and too saintly a man to be a good judge of character. Jerome at first indeed displayed great fortitude, but after the martyrdom of Hus his courage entirely failed him. Hoping to save his life and regain his liberty, he solemnly recanted all his former so-called heretical views. He did not even hesitate to blame severely his master Hus. He expressed his altered views in a memorable letter addressed to the Bohemian nobleman, Lacko of Kravar. The letter,[2] little known except in Bohemia, deserves translation here, as it throws a strong and strange light on the character of Jerome of Prague. The letter, dated September 12, 1415, runs thus: “My services to you, first of all, dear noble lord, and my particular benefactor. I bring to the knowledge of your lordship that I am alive and in good health at Constance. I hear that there is much excitement in Bohemia and Moravia because of the death of Master Hus, as if he had been unjustly condemned and brutally burnt. Therefore I write this of my own free will to you as to my lord, that you may know what you should do. Therefore I beg you through this letter, maintain nowise that wrong was done to him (Hus). According to my belief, that was done to him which had to be done. Do not believe, my lord, that I write this forced by necessity, nor that I deserted him through fear. I was long kept in prison and many great scholars endeavoured to lead me to other views,
- ↑ Printed by Mares, Listy Husovy (Letters of Hus), p. 228.
- ↑ This letter written in Bohemian, was first printed by Dobrovsky in his Geschichte der böhmischen Sprache und Literatur. It was subsequently reprinted in the collection entitled Vybor z Literatury ceske (Selections from Bohemian Literature), and in Palacky, Documenta.
