J. H. Merle D'Aubigné - History of the Reformation in Europe in the Time of Calvin (Vol. 1-8)

754'Que qui en volisse contredire' (whatever any one may do to oppose it), he added.— Journal de Balard , p. 124.

755'Il est d'un esprit si changeant.'— Hist. de Genève , MS. of the 17th century. Bibliothèque de Berne, Hist. Helvét. v. p. 12.

756Letter from La Baume to Hugues. Galiffe, Matériaux .

757Galiffe, Matériaux , ii. pp. 424-475. Mém. d'Archéologie , ii. pp. 14, 15.

758Mignet, Réforme à Genève , p. 34.

759James Fazy, Hist. de la République de Genève , p. 158.

760 Journal de Balard , p. 127. Roset MS. Chronol. liv. ii. ch. xx. Bonivard, Chroniq. ii. p. 448. Gautier MS.

761Registres du Conseil des 24 et 29 décembre 1527. Bonivard, Chroniq. ii. pp. 473, 474. Gautier MS. Journal de Balard .

762Registres du Conseil des 15 et 17 janvier 1528. Journal de Balard , p. 146. Gautier MS.

763'Hominum anathemata a Bertholdo papa facile solvenda.'—Spanheim, Geneva Restituta , p. 35.

764Registres du Conseil du 7 février 1528. Journal de Balard , p. 147.

765Registres du Conseil du 7 février et du 3 mars 1528. Journal de Balard , pp. 147-149.

Table of Contents

=BONIVARD COMPLAINS OF GENEVA.=

THE partisans of absolutism and the papacy rose up on every side against Geneva, as if the Reformation were already established there. It was not so, however. Although Geneva had come out of Romanism, it had not yet entered Reform: it was still in those uncertain and barren places, that land of negations and disputes which lies between the two. A few persons only were beginning to see that, in order to separate really from the pope, it was necessary, as Haller and Zwingle said, to obey Jesus Christ. Bonivard, a keen critic, was indulging in his reflections, in his large arm-chair, at the priory of St. Victor, and carefully studying the singular aspect Geneva at that time presented. 'A strange spectacle,' he said; 'everybody wishes to command, and no one will obey. From tyranny we have fallen into the opposite and worse vice of anarchy.... There are as many tyrants as heads ... which engenders confusion. Everybody wishes to make his own profit or private pleasure out of the common weal; profit tends to avarice; and pleasure consists in taking vengeance on him whom you hate. Men are killed, but they are not the real enemies of Geneva.... If you wound a bear, he will not spring upon the man who wounded him, but will tear the first poles or the first tree in his way.... And this, alas! is what they are doing among us. Having groaned under a tyrannical government, we have the love of licence instead of the love of liberty. We must be apprentices before we can be masters, and break many strings before we can play upon the lute. The huguenots have driven out the tyrant, but have not driven out tyranny. It is not liberty to do whatever we desire, if we do not desire what is right. O pride! thou wilt be the ruin of Geneva! Pride has always envy for its follower; and when pride would mount too high, the old crone catches her by the tail and pulls her back, so that she falls and breaks her neck.... The huguenot leagues are not sufficient; the Gospel must advance, in order that popery may recede.' It is Bonivard himself who has transmitted these wise reflections. 766

He was not the only person who entertained such thoughts. The affairs of the alliance often attracted Bernese to Geneva; and being convinced that the Reformation alone could save that city, they continued Ab Hofen's work. Being admitted into private families, they spoke against human traditions and extolled the Scriptures. 'God speaks to us of the Redeemer,' they said, 'and not of Lent.' But the Friburgers, thrusting themselves into these evangelical conferences, exclaimed: 'Obey the Church! If you separate from the Church, we will break off the alliance!' 767

=BONIVARD'S ANSWER TO THE HUGUENOTS.=

The bishopers were with Friburg, the commoners with Berne. The latter were divided into three classes: there were politicians, to whom religion was only a means of obtaining liberty; serious and peaceful men, who called for true piety (Bonivard mentions Boutelier as one of these); and, lastly, the enemies of the priests, who saw the Reformation from a negative point of view, and regarded it essentially as a war against Roman superstitions. One day these sincere but impatient men said they could wait no longer, and went out to St. Victor to invite the prior to put himself at their head. They rang at the gate of the monastery, and the janitor went and told Bonivard, who ordered them to be admitted: 'We wish to put an end to all this papal ceremony,' they told him; 'we desire to drive out all its ministers, priests, and monks ... all that papistical rabble; and then we mean to invite the ministers of the Gospel, who will introduce a true christian reformation among us.'

The prior smiled as he heard these words: 'Gentlemen,' he said, in a sarcastic tone, 'I think your sentiments very praiseworthy, and confess that all ecclesiastics (of whom I am one) have great need to be reformed. But ought not those who wish to reform others to begin by reforming themselves? If you love the Gospel, as you say you do, you will live according to the Gospel. But if you wish to reform us without reforming yourselves, it is evident that you are not moved by love for the Gospel, but by hatred against us. And why should you hate us? It is not because our manners are contrary to yours, but because they are like them. Aristotle says in his Ethics ,' continued the learned prior, 'and experience confirms the statement, that animals which eat off the same food naturally hate each other. Two horses do not agree at the same manger, nor two dogs over the same bone. It is the same with us. We are unchaste, and so are you. We are drunkards, and so are you. We are gamblers and blasphemers, and so are you. Why then should you be so opposed to us?... We do not hinder you from indulging in your little pleasures; pray do the same by us. You desire to expel us, you say, and put Lutheran ministers in our place.... Gentlemen, think well of what you are about: you will not have had them two years before you will be sorry for it. These ministers will permit you to break the commandments of the pope, but they will forbid your breaking those of God. According to their doctrines, you must not gamble or indulge in debauchery, under severe penalty.... Ah! how that would vex you!... Therefore, gentlemen, you must do one of two things: either leave us in our present condition; or, if you wish to reform us according to the Gospel, reform yourselves first.'

These remarks were not quite so reasonable as they appeared to be. It is the sick that have need of a physician , and as these 'sons of Geneva' wished to invite the ministers of the Gospel, in order to introduce a true christian reform , Bonivard should have encouraged instead of opposing them. These worldly men might have had a real desire for the Gospel at the bottom of their hearts. Reprimanded by the prior, they withdrew. Bonivard watched them as they retired. 'They are going off with their tails between their legs. 768Certainly, I desire a reformation; but I do not like that those who are more qualified to deform than to reform should presume to be its instruments.'

=DETERMINATION TO EAT MEAT IN LENT.=

When they got home, these huguenots deliberated whether they would allow themselves to be stopped by Bonivard's irony; they resolved to follow out his precept—to reform themselves first; but, not knowing that reformation consists primarily in reestablishing faith and morality in the heart, they undertook simply to prune away certain superstitions. As the episcopal letter permitted them to take milk in Lent, De la Maison-Neuve and his friends said: 'We are permitted to take milk, why not meat?' Then repeating the lesson which the Bernese had taught them—Do not the Scriptures say, Eat of all that is sold in the shambles ?—they resolved to eat meat every day. The council saw this with uneasiness, and forbade the new practice under pain of three days' imprisonment on bread and water and a fine of five sols. 769But wishing to hold the balance even, they had hardly struck one side before they struck the other, and condemned the forty-four fugitive mamelukes to confiscation and death.