TO BULLINGER.
f172INTRIGUES OF VERGERIO IN GERMANY — PORTRAIT OF THE KING OF NAVARRE — PROGRESS OF THE GOSPEL — ARDOR OF THE FRENCH PROTESTANTS — POPULAR MASSACRES.
GENEVA, 24th May, 1561.
I do not deny, my dearest sir and honored brother, that my negligence is sometimes the cause why I write to you less frequently than I ought. I may assert, however, with truth, that three days never elapse without my feeling a desire to write to you about something, if an opportunity
presented itself; but during the greater part of a month no one left this for your city to whom I could safely entrust a letter. An envoy of the king, indeed, in consequence of our old friendship, liberally offered me his services. But I can hardly bring myself to trust him, unless I were pressed by a more urgent necessity; for, though he is a man of probity, the office which he discharges often compels him to forget what is due to Christ. At present, I was about to write to you at greater length by Liner, if my health had permitted; but a pain in my side was too violent to admit of my making any effort. Vergerio, from mercenary motives, has procured an embassy for his nephew, in order to throw every thing into confusion. I wish you could impartially see, as I do, the effrontery of that busybody.
Either there will be no religion solidly established in France, or the chief points of our doctrine will be maintained intact. I wish we could have as much confidence in the final regulation of the business. The King of Navarre is now as sluggish and versatile, as he has been always a liberal promiser; he lacks good faith and constancy. For though now and then he seems to show some sparks of a manly temper, and even flashes out into zeal, yet a moment after this flame becomes extinct. And when this fit comes on him, from time to time, he is as much to be feared as an advocate who betrays his cause. Add to that, he is wholly taken up with amorous intrigues, and a woman versed in these arts has found among the ladies of
the court wherewith completely to entrap him. This story has got wind, and is the theme of the conversation of all the young gallants. Respecting these things I have reproved him with as much freedom and sincerity as I would have any individual of my own flock. Beza has handled him with not more reserve. But in listening patiently to our reproaches, and without flying into a passion, he fancies he has sufficiently acquitted himself of his duty. The Admiral is the only one on whose fidelity we can count. A colleague of ours, also, is most active in stirring up his zeal. This colleague I sent to him without consulting any body, lest any part of the odium of the transaction should fall upon our senate. He preaches publicly to crowded audiences at no great distance from the palace. All our adversaries keep bawling that such audacity is not to be tolerated. The queen entreats him, coaxingly, to desist, but to no purpose. He has determined to brave every thing rather than flinch. The queen, moreover, did not hesitate to say that all remedies would be useless unless I were sent for. It is incredible with what fervent zeal our brethren are urging forward greater progress.
Pastors are everywhere asked for from among us with as much eagerness as the priestly functions are made the object of ambition among the Papists. Those who are in quest of them besiege my doors, and pay their court to me as if I held a levee. They vie with one another in pious rivalry, as if the condition of Christ’s kingdom were in a state of undisturbed tranquillity. On our part, we desire as much as it lies in our power to comply with their wishes, but our stock of preachers is almost exhausted.
We have even been obliged to sweep the workshops of the working classes to find individuals with some tincture of letters and pious doctrine to supply this necessity. Certain outbreaks displease us, which it is
extremely difficult to moderate. In many towns, as no private building was capable of containing the multitude, they have usurped the temples. And though they are everywhere preaching all over Guienne, without any public disturbance, we should have preferred nevertheless that they had followed a line of conduct that we deemed more expedient. Nor are they dismayed by those atrocious edicts in which the king commands all the edifices in which a meeting may have been held to be razed to the ground, and those who have attended it to be punished as rebels. But there is greater liberty in Guienne. The Parliament of Paris, which has extorted this last edict, fulminates against our brethren with the most frightful violence.
In twenty cities, or thereabouts, the godly have been massacred by the
instituted, except at Beauvais. At Paris, when the populace attacked tumultuously the house of a courageous nobleman, and he, by the aid of his friends, repelled that furious assault, twelve individuals were killed and forty wounded. A decree was immediately passed that he should be summoned to compear, and unless he constituted himself prisoner before the expiration of three market days, that he should be condemned by default. Now, certainly, if ever, it is the moment to implore God that he would be mindful of his unfortunate flock, and speedily come to their aid by his marvelous power to appease these storms. Perhaps ere long we shall hear of some change for the better. In the mean time, it behooves us to be prepared for enduring even worse extremities.
[Lat. Copy. — Library of Geneva. Volume 107 a.]