THE SWISS REFORMATION.

CHAPTER I.

The Swiss people-Early History of Zwingle-Commencement of Reformation-Coadjutors of Zwingle.

THE history of the Lutheran or German reformation is in some degree known to every reader. Much less acquaintance with the like contemporaneous revolution in Switzerland is in general possessed. Indeed much less opportunity of acquiring information respecting it has been afforded to the English reader. Scarcely any popular writer among us has entered into any detail of it, and even the ecclesiastical authorities to which we most frequently recur have treated it only in a very cursory manner.1 Yet the latter history is scarcely less worthy of study than the former. It presents a similar developement of noble and devoted character; illustrates in a cor

A single paragraph on Zwingle's opposition to indulgences, and subsequently an account chiefly of the controversy between his followers and the Lutherans on the eucharist, is all that Mosheim furnishes concerning the history of this important event.

B

responding manner the power of true evangelical doctrine; and exhibits the same triumphant success of Christian truth and Christian liberty against that superstition and despotism over conscience, which had long held the human mind in a state of servitude and imbecility.

The Swiss are well known as a peculiar and highly interesting people, who owe much of their character to the country which they occupy. An abrupt and mountainous district naturally stimulates the imagination of its inhabitants; forms their minds to a chivalrous daring, and their bodies to hardihood and activity; and is fitted for long preserving among them the original simplicity of their manners. It also cherishes the natural love of liberty, by the facility which it affords for even a very small number of persons successfully maintaining their independence against the most numerous and powerful assailants.

. Switzerland comprises, or at least till of late comprised, thirteen cantons, with a number of other states dependent upon them or in alliance with them. The cantons are, by a common treaty, formed into one general body, of which each member, though sovereign within its own territory, is bound to support the rest against every foreign enemy. Certain members of the confederacy appear also to be more intimately bound to one another, by treaties of confraternity and co-burghership. The cantons were divided into eight ancient, Zuric, Berne, Lucerne, Uri, Schweitz, Underwalden, Zug, and Glaris, which were associated during the former half of the fourteenth century; and five new cantons, Basle, Friburg, Soleure, Schaffhausen, and Appenzel, admitted into the league in the latter part of the fifteenth, and the beginning of the sixteenth century. Five of the cantons we shall find distinguished, both in modern times, and in the times of which we have to treat, as the Roman-catholic cantons, namely, Lucerne, Uri, Schweitz, Under

walden, and Zug; and four as the reformed cantons, Zuric, Berne, Basle, and Schaffhausen. Friburg and Soleure also are Roman-catholic, but apparently with a less bigoted zeal than the five: Glaris and Appenzel are mixed in their religion. The five new cantons were also termed neutral; because, in case of a rupture between the eight ancient cantons, they were bound not to espouse either party. Of the dependencies of the cantons, some were called Common Bailliages; the sovereignty of them belonging to several cantons in common, which alternately sent a bailiff to preside over them for a limited term. The greater part of the country was anciently under the protection of the empire, till, protection being extended to dominion, and dominion converted into oppression, several of the cantons united, and asserted their independence, in the early part of the fourteenth century. Their example was followed by their neighbours, and, after a series of heroic conflicts, the liberty of the whole Helvetic Confederation was established.

It is obvious, that in such a country as this the reformation might proceed, without encountering any such powerful opponents as it had to contend with in Germany. Shut up within their own mountains, and each state free and independent within itself, the people had little to fear from either the pope or the emperor, or from any one but the members of their own union, whose powers were so equally balanced or duly checked, as to excite in them little apprehension of danger.

Of the religious condition of Switzerland, previously to the reformation, and of the necessity which existed there for that great moral revolution, a súfficiently correct judgment may be formed from the account which has been given of the state of Christendom in general at that period, in our history of the Lutheran reformation. "The church of Rome, at the commencement of the sixteenth century," says

Ruchat, in the opening of his history of the Swiss reformation, " had attained such a height of grandeur and power, that it seemed impossible that it should be disturbed. Especially in Switzerland any change of religion appeared hopeless, both on account of the strict alliance which subsisted with the pope, and of the extreme ignorance and corruption which prevailed. But it is in such circumstances,” he piously adds, "that God is pleased to work, that all the glory may be given to him. His sanctity could not permit him longer to tolerate the frightful excess of disorder which reigned in the churches of Europe, where the Creator seemed to be entirely forgotten, and creatures substituted in his place. But God," he proceeds "must have his true worshippers, who shall 'worship him in spirit and in truth:' and hence he raised up at this time, in almost all the states of Europe, (Italy itself not excepted,) pious, learned, and illustrious men, animated with a noble zeal for the glory of God and the good of his church. These great men rose up all at once, as if by concert, though actually without any previous communication, against the dominant errors; and by their constancy and resolution, accompanied by the blessing of heaven, happily succeeded in drawing forth the light of the gospel from under the vessel which had covered it, and in effecting a reformation of the church."

Zwingle, though he was the great apostle of the Swiss reformation, had some precursors, who in a measure prepared his way, like the star that is the harbinger of the rising sun. Of these, as the accounts we have of them are brief and jejune, it may suffice to mention John Geiler, surnamed, from the place where he was brought up, Cæsaremontanus, or Keiserberger, and Thomas Wyttenbach. The former was a native of Schaffhausen, born in 1445, who " sowed," we are told, "the seeds of divine truth at Strasburg, for thirty-three years together, from 1477 to 1510.”– Wyttenbach was of a noble family at Bienne, and

was born there in 1472. He was professor of divinity, first at Tübingen, and afterwards at Basle, and finally became pastor of his native town. At Basle, he had Zwingle, Leo Jude, and others who bore an important part in the work of reformation, for his pupils. Leo Jude commemorates him as a man "accomplished in all kinds of learning, as well as in the knowledge of the sacred scriptures, so that he was esteemed the phenix of his age. And from him," he says, "both Zwingle and myself derived whatever sound knowledge we have possessed." Zwingle also says, that from him he had first learned "that Jesus Christ is made of God unto us righteousness, and the satisfaction for the sins of the world." He publicly disputed in the divinity schools against indulgences, and for the liberty of marriage to the clergy; and maintained "that the death of Christ is the only ransom of our souls." But we proceed to Zwingle himself.

Ulric Zwingle was born January 1, 1484, in the county of Tockenburg, a dependency of the abbey of S. Gallen, at a place which, from its rude and mountainous situation, was called Wildenhaus. His father was of a respectable rank in life, having been chief magistrate of the district in which he lived. Our reformer is said to have been principally brought up, till he was ten years of age, with his uncle, an ecclesiastic, who held the office of a rural dean, and was a man of learning and probity. He afterwards studied successively at Basle, Berne, Vienna, and then again at Basle. His removal to Vienna is said to have been occasioned by the attempts made by the Dominicans, at Berne, to induce him to join their order; which was contrary to his father's wishes. From his earliest years he appears to have been the favourite of his masters, all of whom were captivated alike with his genius and with the promising dispositions which he shewed. After having gone through his course of theology under Wyttenbach,