MarginaliaA letter of W. Tims sent to his sister.¶ Grace, mercy, and peace frō God the father, through our Lord and sauiour Iesus, be vnto you my dere Syster both now and euer more. Amen.
MY moste derely beloued sister, I thank my good God with all remembraunce of you alwaies in my prayers for you, and praye with gladnes because my good god hath geuen you so earnest a spririt in his cause, the which I besech hym for hys mercyes sake to continue in you to the ende, both the wil which he hath begon, and also power to performe the same in dede, to the glory of God and your euerlasting comforte in Christ. And my dearely beloued, take good heade and beware of false perswasion. For that is the thing, that the deuil doth in these dayes most preuail wyth. For fyrst he wil perswade you that you may go to the Idoles temple with a safe conscience. But answer hym and saye as Syrache sayth: hee that toucheth pich shalbe defiled therwith: and so saye you he that is companion among Idolatrers, wher they worship their false gods, must nedes be partaker of theyr wickednes. therfore say vnto them that S. Paule commaundeth me to come out from among them, & to touche no vncleane thing. yet some of thē wyl say, I pray you how say you vnto S. Paule, where he sayth: there is no Idole vnto him, in al the whole world? it is very true: ther was none to hym in dede, & yet there were as many almost I thinke as ther be now. But he neuer came where they were, but alwayes he preached agaynst them: and so answere them & say, and you go to the Idoles temple to rebuke them of their Idolatry, then I allowe your going & I wyl go with you to here you: but and you go thether to serue the lawe fashioning your selfe like vnto thē, because you would not beare the crosse, & so to flatter both with God and the world, for sauegard of your life, then say that Christ saith: he that saueth his lyfe shal loose it, and he that looseth his lyfe, for my sake shal find it. And therfore tell hym I know (say you) that my lyfe is in the handes of God, and not in the handes of men: and he him selfe saith in the Gospel that al the heares of my head be numbred, ye & sayth there shall not one of them fall to the ground except it be his good wil. Then seing that he is so louing a god vnto vs as he hath bene from the beginning, fyrst cōsider that he made vs like vnto his own image and then consider through the transgression of our first father Adam, we had al lost the ioies of heauē, & by our own synne made the firebrands of hell: yet here marke the great loue of god to vs ward: heauen was soughte, the earthe was sought, to see & if any creature could be founde, that was able to pacify the wrath of god towardes mā. But ther was neither man, neither Angel that could do it: then he like a most louinge Lord, spared not his onely & most derely beloued sonne, so that if he had had a more precious iewel, as he had none, he would haue geuen it, for the redemption of mā. So that he sent hym down to take our nature in the wombe of the blessed virgin Mary, &c. and last of all to suffer the most shameful death vpon the crosse euen for our sinnes and so by hys death hath purchased pardō for al our sinnes, & not so leuing vs, but hath also by that death and precious bloud sheding purchased vs euerlastinge ioye in the Kingdom of heuen. Al these thinges wel considered, me think should cause vs to say with S. Paule. who shall seperate vs from the loue of
[Back to Top]God? shal trbulacion, or anguish, or persecutiō ether hūger, ether nakednes, ether peril, ether sword, as it is written: for thy sake are we killed al the day long, and ar counted as shepe appointed to bee slayne: yet neuer the lesse in all thinges we ouercome stronglye throughe hys helpe that loued vs: yea, & Iam sure that neither death, neither life, neither Angels, neither rule, neyther power, neither thynges present, neither thinges to come, neither high, neyther low, neither any other creature shall be able to departe vs from the loue of God, shewed in Christe Iesus our Lorde: yea, and all the afore sayd loue of our God were of vs so well considered, as it was of Sainte Paule, it then would cause vs to say as he sayd, and rather desyre to be absent from this enemy of ours, this our vile bodye, and to bee at home with our so deare friend our lord and sauiour Iesus christ, the which desire God graunt vs, and also power to fulfyll the same, if we bee called thereto euen by fyre, and so through fyre into the kingdome that our Lord and sauiour Iesus Christ both God and man purchased wyth his precious bloud. To that kyngdome I beseche hym to bryng you and your deare husband, with all the rest of your family, Amen. My deare syster I pray you grete my sister Glascocke, and one of you comfort another in Christe.
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Continue in prayer, aske in fayth, and
obtayne your desyre.
By me Wylliam Tyms, thys. 7. of September,
praying for you, accordyng to my bounden du
ty, especiallye for my sonne Amos,
Amos was William Tyms' only child, born while Tyms was in prison. Tyms is thanking the recipient of this letter for taking care of his son.
I.e., Rochford, Essex.
All the 1563 edition does is to state that Hullier was burned in Cambridge about 2 April 1556. This brief introduction to Hullier's letters shows that by the time the 1570 edition was being printed, Foxe had acquired no firther information on Hullier's life and death. Eventually he would acquire such information, which came from witnesses to Hullier's execution (see 1570, pp. 2196-7; 1576, and 1583, p. 2004).
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Marginalia
April 2.
Ihon Hullier.ABout this time, after the burning of these 6. aboue named, was burned one Ihon Hullier a minister, who for the professing of Christes Gospell suffered at Cambridge, vnder Thurlbey Byshop of Ely and his Chancelor: about the second of Aprill he suffered martirdom, of whom a letter only and a praier came to oure handes, the copye whereof here followeth.
Iohn Hullyer, beyng of long time prisoner, and now openly iudged to dye for the testimony of the Lord Iesu, wysheth hartely to the whole congregation of God, the strength of his holy spirit, to their euerlasting helth, both of body & soule.
This letter was first printed in Rerum, pp. 538-40. It was reprinted in 1563, Letters of the Martyrs (pp. 523-26) and all subsequent editions of the Acts and Monuments. Several copies of thisletter survive in Foxe's papers: BL, Harley 416, fos. 17v-18v and ECL 262, fos. 111r-113r.