Volume I Part 22 (1/2)
[Footnote 362: ”Et le tres-crestien et bon roy Francois premier du nom, _a la priere du pape_, pardonna a tous, excepte a ceulx qui avoient touche a l'honneur du saint sacrement de l'autel.” Soissons MS., Bulletin, xi. 254. Sturm to Melanchthon, July 6, 1535, says: ”Pontificem etiam aiunt aequiorem esse, et haud paulo meliorem quam fuerunt caeteri.
Omnino improbat illam suppliciorum crudelitatem, et _de hac re dicitur misisse [literas ad Regem]_.” Herminjard, iii. 311. Cf. Erasmus Op., 1513.]
[Footnote 363: ”Sapendo, _come sua Maesta m'ha detto_, che Cesare in Fiandra aveva sospeso ogni esecuzione di morte contro questi eretici, ha anche egli concesso che contra ogni sorte di eretici si proceda come avanti, ma _citra mortem_, eccetto i sacramentarii.” Relazione del clarissimo Marino Giustiniano (1535), Relaz. Venete, i. 155.]
[Footnote 364: Francis I. to the German Princes, February 1, 1535, Bretschneider, Corpus Reform., ii. 828, etc.]
[Footnote 365: Sturm to Melanchthon, March 4, 1535, Bretschneider, Corpus Reform., ii. 855, etc.]
[Footnote 366: A letter of Vore is found in Bretschneider, _ubi supra_, ii, 859.]
[Footnote 367: Melanchthon to Sturm, May 5, 1535, ibid., ii. 873.]
[Footnote 368: Ibid., ii. 879. The address was, ”Dilecto nostro Philippo Melanchthoni.”]
[Footnote 369: ”Nihil est quod de vestro congressu non sperem,” are Cardinal du Bellay's words, June 27th. Ibid., ii. 880, 881.]
[Footnote 370: Ibid., ii. 904, 905. The university had been temporarily removed from Wittemberg to Jena, on account of the prevalence of the plague.]
[Footnote 371: Luther to the Elector of Saxony, Aug. 17, 1535, Works (Ed. Dr. J. K. Innischer), lv. 103.]
[Footnote 372: August 28, 1535. The reasons alleged to Francis were, the injurious rumors the mission might give rise to, and the damage to the university from Melanchthon's absence. At some future time, the elector said, he would permit Melanchthon to visit the French king, should his Majesty still desire him to do so, and present hinderances be removed.]
[Footnote 373: ”Subindignabundus hinc discessit.” Luther to Justus Jonas, Aug. 19.]
[Footnote 374: ”Daneben was eurer Person halb, dessgleichen auch in Sachen des Evangelii fur Trost, Hoffnung oder Zuversicht zu dem Franzosen zu haben, ist wohl zu bedenken, dieweil vormals wenig Treue oder Glaube von ihm gehalten, wie solches die offentliche Geschicht anzeigen.” Letter of Aug. 24, 1535. The elector expressed himself at greater length to his chancellor, Dr. Bruck (Ponta.n.u.s). Such a mission would appear suspicious when the elector was on the point of having a conference with the King of Hungary and Bohemia. Melanchthon might make concessions that Dr. Martin (Luther) and others could not agree to, and the scandal of division might arise. Besides, he could not believe the French in earnest; they doubtless only intended to take advantage of Melanchthon's indecision. For it was to be presumed that those most active in promoting the affair were ”more Erasmian than evangelical (_mehr Erasmisch denn Evangelisch_).” Bretschneider, ii. 909, etc.]
[Footnote 375: See the three letters, and other interesting correspondence, Bretschneider, ii. 913, etc. However it may have been with M., _Luther's_ regret at the elector's refusal was of brief duration. As early as Sept. 1st he wrote characteristically to Justus Jonas: ”Respecting the French envoys, so general a rumor is now in circulation, originating with most worthy men, that I have ceased to wish that Philip should go with them. It is suspected that the true envoys _were murdered on the way, and others sent in their place_(!) with letters by the papists, to entice Philip out. You know that the Bishops of Maintz, Luttich, and others, are the worst tools of the Devil; wherefore I am rather anxious for Philip. I have therefore written carefully to him. The World is the Devil, and the Devil is the World.” Luther's Works (Ed. Walch), xxi. 1426.]
[Footnote 376: That is, including the apocryphal books.]
[Footnote 377: ”Qui est, Sire,” they observe with evident amazement at the bare suggestion, ”demander de nous retirer a eux, plus qu'eux se convertir a l'eglise.” The _articles_ having been submitted through Du Bellay, August 7, 1535, the Faculty's answer was returned on the 30th of the same month, accompanied by a more elaborate _Instructio_, the former in French, the latter in Latin. Both are printed among the _Monumenta_ of Gerdes, 75-78, and 78-86.]
[Footnote 378: Florimond de Raemond (l. vii. c. 4), and others writers copying from him, represent Tournon as purposely putting himself in the king's way with an open volume of St. Irenaeus in his hands. Obtaining in this way his coveted opportunity of portraying the perils arising from intercourse with heretics, the prelate enforced his precepts by reading a pretended story related by St. Polycarp, that the Apostle John had on one occasion hastily left the public bath on perceiving the heretic Cerinthus within. Soldan (Gesch. des Prot. in Frankreich, i. 163) sensibly remarks that little account ought to be made of the statements of a writer who a.s.sociates Louise de Savoie--in her later days a notorious enemy of the Reformation, _who had at this time been four years dead_--- with her daughter Margaret, in ”importuning” the king to invite Melanchthon.]
[Footnote 379: Some years earlier, Du Bellay had, while on an emba.s.sy, set forth his royal master's pretended convictions in favor of the Reformation with so much verisimilitude as to alarm the papal nuncio, who dreaded the effect of his speeches upon the Protestants. ”Non e piccola murmoration qu en Corte, ch'l Orator Francese _facea piu che l'officio suo richiede in animar Lutherani_.” Aleander to Sanga, Ratisbon, July 2, 1532, Vatican MSS., Laemmer, 141.]
[Footnote 380: Sleidan, De statu rel. et reipubl., lib. ix., ad annum 1535. The Jesuit Maimbourg rejects the secret conference of Du Bellay as apocryphal, in view of Francis's persecution of the Protestants at Paris, and his declaration of January 21st. But Sleidan's statement is fully substantiated by an extant memorandum by Spalatin, who was present on the occasion (printed in Seckendorff, Gerdes, iv. 68-73 Doc., and Bretschneider, ii. 1014). It receives additional confirmation from a letter of the Nuncio Morone to Pope Paul III., Vienna, Dec. 26, 1536 (Vatican MSS., Laemmer, 178). Morone received from Doctor Matthias, Vice-Chancellor of the Empire, an account of Francis's recent offer to the German Protestants ”_di condescendere nelle loro opinioni,_” on condition of their renouncing obedience to the emperor. He reserved only two points of doctrine as requiring discussion: the sacrifice of the ma.s.s, and the authority and primacy of the Pope. The Protestants rejected the interested proposal of the royal convert.]
[Footnote 381: The authors.h.i.+p of this interesting doc.u.ment, and the way it reached its destination, are equally unknown. It is published--for the first time, I believe--in Baum, Cunitz, and Reuss, Opera Calvini (1872), x. part ii. 55, 56.]
[Footnote 382: Senatus Argentoratensis Francisco Regi, July 3, 1536, ibid., x. 57-61.]
[Footnote 383: Senatus Turicensis Francisco Regi, July 13, 1536, ibid., x. 61.]
[Footnote 384: Edict of Lyons, May 31, 1536, Herminjard, iv. 192.]
[Footnote 385: Francois I^er aux Conseils de Zurich, Berne, Bale et Strasbourg, Compiegne, Feb. 20, and Feb. 23, 1537, Basle MSS., ibid., iv. 191-193. Cf. the doc.u.ments, mostly inedited, iv. 70, 96, 150.]
[Footnote 386: Le Conseil de Berne au Conseil de Bale, March 15, 1537, ibid., iv. 202, 203, Sleidan (Strasb. ed. of 1555), lib x. fol. 163 _verso_. It must, however, be remarked that the ”evangelical cities”