Twee brieven [...] aan Everhardus vander Hooght

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whom they would not want to call as colleagues; and yet peacefully suffer that they are so of others. If that fashion once takes the upper hand, that one Consistory may write the Ministers of another from the pulpit and out of service and Church, who then shall be safe? Stand firm then, friend Haggebher a Hebrew term meaning 'the man' or 'mighty man', here used as a nickname for Everhardus vander Hooght, that is, alert man: when the circle of such circular letters shall go around, do not neglect to sound the depth well, upon which Niewendam a village in North Holland in Waterland is situated.

The following reason, which you state, was not that of the Classis: Namely, that its only objective had not yet been reached. It was reached: but the objective of the Petition-makers and circular-writers was not. For that was to keep the Church in turmoil; Bekker first, and then (that gate once opened, and that path cleared) others after that example.

That which you further write, what the Consistory decided in case the Classis might so understand it; shall soon appear from its Act to have been stated by You according to the truth. But that you call it a Domestique sake Domestic matter, namely for the Consistory: I believe that has crept in from Your Honor's own personal opinion. For I know you mean to say by that, that the Consistory must have known better than the Classis what was most useful for their Congregation. But then they should not have brought it into the Classis, and even less to the Synod as soon as they were summoned; bypassing the Classis, which is not so far removed from the domestic affairs of the city of Amsterdam (which it encompasses in its circle) as is the Synod, which consists of 6 other Classes; and who, out of ignorance of what was happening among us, first desired to hear of it in the Synod. I cannot think that this domestic is a word used by the Consistory, as far as this matter is concerned: when I remember that, in view of the well-known note which was to be read from the pulpits, they appealed to the Classis where it had been drafted, and which they could not change; despite the fact that this reading was to occur only before the Congregation of our City as a domestic matter, and no other churches belonging under the same Classis, because it was not domestic there. Unless you wish to say that the Consistory of Amsterdam has intended to be