Mary Dyer's Letter to the General Court in Boston (August 28, 1659)
(written the day after her reprieve on the gallows tree)
The 28th of the 8th Month, 1659.
Once more to the General Court, Assembled in Boston, speaks Mary Dyar, even as before: My Life is not accepted, neither availeth me, in Comparison of the Lives and Liberty of the Truth and Servants of the living God, for which in the Bowels of Love and Meekness I sought you; yet nevertheless, with wicked Hands have you put two of them to Death, which makes me to feel, that the Mercies of the Wicked is Cruelty; I rather chuse to Dye than to Live, as from you, as Guilty of their innocent Blood: Therefore, seeing my Request is hindred, I leave you to the Righteous Judge, and Searcher of all Hearts, who, with the pure measure of Light he hath given to every Man to profit withal, will in his due time let you see whose Servants you are, and of whom you have taken Counsel, which I desire you to search into: But all his Counsel hath been slighted, and you would none of his Reproofs. Read your Portion, Prov. 1:24, to 32. For verily the Night cometh on you apace, wherein no Man can Work, in which you shall assuredly fall to your own Master, in Obedience to the Lord, whom I serve with my Spirit, and pity to your Souls, which you neither know nor pity: I can do no less than once more to warn you, to put away the Evil of your Doings, and Kiss the Son, the Light in you, before his Wrath be kindled in you; for where it is, nothing without you can help or deliver you out of his Hand at all; and if these things be not so, then say, There hath been no Prophet from the Lord sent amongst you; though we be nothing, yet it is his Pleasure, by Things that are not, to bring to nought Things that are.
When I heard your last Order read, it was a disturbance unto me, that was so freely Offering up my Life to him that gave it me, and sent me hither so to do, which Obedience being his own Work, he gloriously accompanied with his Presence, and Peace, and Love in me, in which I rested from my labour, till by your Order, and the People, I was so far disturbed, that I could not retain any more the words thereof, than that I should return to Prison, and there remain Forty and Eight Hours; to which I submitted, finding nothing from the Lord to the contrary, that I may know what his Pleasure and Counsel is concerning me, on whom I wait therefore, for he is my Life, and the length of my Days; and as I said before, I came at his Command, and go at his Command.
MARY DYAR.