sitteth
he; the gnathonic parasite sweareth to all that his benefactor holdeth;
the mercenary pensioner will bow before he break; he who only studieth to
have the praise of some witty invention, cannot strike upon another anvil;
the silly idiot (with Absolom's two hundred, 2 Sam. xv. 11,) goeth, in the
simplicity of his heart, after his perverse leaders; the lapped Nicodemite
holds it enough to yield some secret assent to the truth, though neither
his profession nor his practice testify so much; he whose mind is
possessed with prejudicate opinions against the truth, when convincing
light is holden forth to him, looketh asquint, and therefore goeth awry;
the pragmatical adiaphorist, with his span-broad faith and ell-broad
conscience, doth no small harm--the poor pandect of his plagiary profession
in matters of faith reckoneth little for all, and in matters of practice
all for little. Shortly, if an expurgatory index were compiled of those,
and all other sorts of men, who either through their careless and neutral
on looking, make no help to the troubled and disquieted church of Christ,
or through their nocent accession and overthwart intermeddling, work out
her greater harm, alas! how few feeling members were there to be found
behind who truly lay to heart her estate and condition? Nevertheless, in
the worst times, either of raging persecution or prevailing defection, as
God Almighty hath ever hitherto, so both now, and to the end, he will
reserve to himself a remnant according to the election of grace, who
cleave to his blessed truth and to the purity of his holy worship, and are
grieved for the affliction of Joseph, as being themselves also in the
body, in confidence whereof I take boldness to stir you up at this time,
by putting you in remembrance. If you would be rightly informed of the
present estate of the reformed churches, you must not acquiesce in the
pargetting verdict of those who are wealthy and well at ease, and mounted
aloft upon the uncogged wheels of prosperous fortune (as they call it).
Those whom the love of the world hath not enhanced to the serving of the
time can give you the soundest judgment. It is noted of Dionysius
Hallicarnasseus(10) (who was never advanced to magistracy in the Roman
republic) that he hath written far more truly of the Romans than Fabius,
Salustius, or Cato, who flourished among them with riches and honours.

After that it pleased God, by the light of his glorious gospel, to dispel