Letters of John Calvin, Volume II. Calvin Jean
letters of the Cantons to the King, in favour of the Vaudois of Provence, only served to irritate that monarch. He passionately replied, – "The Vaudois have but received the just punishment of their crimes. Besides, the Swiss have no more right to busy themselves with what passes in my kingdom, than I have to make inquiry into what they do at home." – Histoire de la Confédération Suisse, vol. xi. p. 289. The failure of those proceedings redounded to the discredit of Calvin with the people, as he had been the instigator of them. His adversaries went about reiterating everywhere that he had compromised the most valued interests of the Cantons, by drawing upon them the enmity of the King of France.
2
Letter without date, written at the same time as the following, (September 1545.) Summoned in the name of the Emperor to leave Strasbourg and return to Brabant, M. de Fala
1
The letters of the Cantons to the King, in favour of the Vaudois of Provence, only served to irritate that monarch. He passionately replied, – "The Vaudois have but received the just punishment of their crimes. Besides, the Swiss have no more right to busy themselves with what passes in my kingdom, than I have to make inquiry into what they do at home." –
2
Letter without date, written at the same time as the following, (September 1545.) Summoned in the name of the Emperor to leave Strasbourg and return to Brabant, M. de Falais had not obeyed that command. This refusal, in stirring up the imperial displeasure against him, had exposed him, without defence, to the interested denunciations of his enemies. The butt of most calumnious accusations, he saw his character misunderstood, his name outraged, his property put under sequestration, while he pined away himself – a prey to sickness and discouragement.
3
This letter, without date, seems to have been written at the same epoch, and under the same circumstances as the two preceding letters.
4
Letter without date, and without conclusion, written during the attack of the plague, under which the minister Geniston succumbed, that is to say, in September 1545.
5
Gautier Farel, brother to the Reformer. He was very soon afterwards restored to liberty, contrary to all expectation.
6
The minister, Louis de Geniston, following the noble example of Pierre Blanchet, cut off by the plague in 1543, had, of his own accord, offered himself for the service of the hospital set apart for those afflicted with the plague. He fell under it, a victim of his devotedness, in September 1545. His wife and two of his children were carried off a few days afterwards by the scourge, which almost wholly depopulated several quarters of the city.
7
There exists (Imp. Lib.
8
The plague had dispersed the regents and students of the College of Geneva, and Calvin was labouring at the re-organization of that establishment. He had already proposed to the Council, in March 1545, to call to Geneva the celebrated Maturin Cordier,
9
Farel was then at strife with the Seigneury of Neuchatel, on the subject of the administration of ecclesiastical property.
10
Rebuked on the ground of his morals, this minister had been banished to a country parish, and having refused to submit to the entire Consistory, he had received his dismissal.
11
Minister of the Church of Geneva; deposed, a few years afterwards, on account of the irregularities of his life.
12
Alarmed at the first movements of the Council of Trent, and the perils to which the good understanding between the Pope and the Emperor might subject the Reformation, the Deputies of the League of Smalkald had reassembled at Frankfort. But their union was not so solid as the gravity of the occasion demanded. The Elector of Saxe and the Landgrave of Hesse were influenced by different political views; but they were both alike disposed to seek the alliance of the Kings of France and England, as well as of the Protestant Cantons of Switzerland, that they might withstand the storm that menaced them. – Sleidan, l. xvi., and Robertson, vol. iv. B. vii. p. 234. London, 1851.
13
"Upon the intelligence that the Duke of Savoy has retaken two strongholds in Piedmont, and that he is collecting a body of troops, resolved to continue to work at the fortifications." –
14
"Oath exacted of all private individuals, of fidelity to the Seigneury, and of their readiness to live and die for liberty." –
15
The Seigneurs of Berne, eagerly seeking every opportunity of establishing their influence at Geneva, had offered to guard the city, and to protect it against all foreign attacks. This proposal was discarded, as tending to compromise the independence of the Republic. –
16
We read, in the
17
Calvin had just dedicated to M. de Falais his Commentary on the First Epistle of St. Paul to the Corinthians. The epistle dedicatory is of the 22d January 1546. The name of M. de Falais – sad example of the fragile nature of human affections! – was effaced ten years afterwards from the preface of this Commentary, and replaced by the name of the Marquis of Vico.
18
19
Printer in Strasbourg.
20
The French were then besieging the town of Boulogne, occupied by the English. The peace between the two rival monarchs of France and England, was signed the year following. – De Thou, lib. i. ii.
21
The following is the address of this letter, taken from the original in the archives of the old Archbishopric of Vienne, and first published by the Abbé d'Artigny, –