ANOTHER CONFESSION OF REYTSE AYSESS, MADE BEFORE AN ARROGANT PRIEST; TOGETHER WITH AN EPISTLE OR EXHORTATION TO THE FRIENDS.

Shortly after there came a priest, who was very arrogant; he asked me what I had determined with regard to the letter which the bishop had sent me. Reytse. “I have determined even as I said to you the last time. For by what he writes I have not been made weaker, but stronger, he foolishly writes that no sin hinders or prevents a man, and that we may observe the Supper with whores and rogues, and that also no sin is so great that it can prevent a man; all of which he wants to prove with the eighth chapter of Mark, where the Lord fed the great multitude.” Priest. “What do you want to prove thereby? O how blind you are!” He became angry, and would not understand Scripture, but blasphemed and spoke very ugly, and said that I contemned and rejected the Lord’s death with my second baptism. But I said that I did not contemn the Lord’s death, but deemed it good; “for, if I should confess this as you say, woe would be to me; for I do not recognize your baptism as a baptism, since there is no Scripture for it. But with your infant baptism, you reject Christ’s sufferings and death, for Christ has redeemed us; but you say that the children are damned, which you cannot prove with Scripture. But those who live in sin, who, the Lord says shall not enter into the kingdom of God, these you say are saved; drunkards, covetous, and fornicators, and whatever sins they may do, who the Lord says shall not inherit the kingdom of God, these you say are saved. But the poor children, who are already saved, as the Lord has said, these you say are damned. Is it not a lamentable matter that you are so blinded? Hence wake up once, I pray you, for it will ruin you.” He said that I had a faith like a Turk. I said: “What is the Turk’s faith?” He said: “The Turk believes in a piece of wood, or in whatever suits him.” I said that they [the papists] believed in a piece of bread, which they held up as God, worshiping it, and falling upon their knees before it, and regarding it as God. Likewise, the idolatrous infant baptism, is that any better than the Turk’s faith? He became angry, and reviled us much, and did not think that we were the right people, I said: “If I should tell you what I consider you to be, you would not like it.” He said tell it. Reytse. “Well then I shall tell you; I consider you the vile world, the congregation of the dead, and heathen and Turks according to the spirit, and that you are alienated from the life of God (Prov. 21:16; Eph. 4:18); and as is written concerning you in Daniel 12, and in Revelation, so it shall be found in the day of the Lord. Repent therefore, and come out from her, that ye be not partakers of her sins.” (Rev. 18:4.)

Then he arose and hastened away, but I overtook him in another room, where we conversed for a little while about infant baptism and other things. Finally he said that he could not remain any longer, since he was to stand godfather to a child, I begged him not to do it; “for” said I, “The child is as good as you can make it.” He said that he would do it, nevertheless. He also spoke much about the war, and about the Gueux,337 that their cause was a bad one, and that we aided them with money and property. I told him what he said was not true; for we did not want in 950any wise to defend them with money or blood, “for I think nothing of the Gueux, neither of you, for you cannot stand before God, miserably as you are betraying and slaying one another. However, the Gueux are not as bloodthirsty as you are, for if they had apprehended me, they would let me go, but you want to shed my blood.” He became angry and said: “You desperate miscreant, should we not kill you? we should not be able to answer before God, [if we should allow to live] such a heretic as you are; for we do so much running on your account that no money could hire us to do it; hence you shall here receive the temporal fire, and hereafter the eternal, because you will not suffer yourself to be instructed, as much as we have done for you.”

I talked to him very gently, but he said that I had the devil in me, and that he transformed himself into an angel of light, and had seduced me, that I could not remain in the true way. Reytse. “I have no devil, but I speak with a free and glad heart.” He reviled much; adducing no Scriptures but only saying that they had done much for me, and were always on the run to win my soul and save my life, and now there was no prospect that I would renounce my heresy; hence the bishop had to cut me off, as was right. Reytse. “I never desired that you should come to me, and you may stay at home for I do not wish to hear you, nor to believe you, and you might have saved all your running, for the reward which you earned by me will not be great.”