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LEFEVRE AND FAREL PERSECUTED.

*389

ing the ground. We have already seen him pass through Geneva, Lausanne, Berne, and Zurich.* In the beginning of 1523, he was at Wittemberg, and embraced Luther. But let us return to France and to the Church of Meaux.

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CHAPTER VIII.

Lefevre and Farel persecuted-Difference between the Lutheran and Reformed Churches-Leclerc posts up his Placards-Leclerc branded --Berquin's Zeal-Berquin before the Parliament - Rescued by Francis I.-Mazurier's Apostacy-Fall and Remorse of PavanneMetz-Chatelain-Peter Toussaint becomes attentive-Leclerc breaks the Images - Leclerc's Condemnation and Torture - Martyrdom of Chatelain-Flight.

LEFEVRE intimidated, Briçonnet drawing back, Farel compelled to fly-here was a beginning of victory. They already imagined at the Sorbonne that they had mastered the movement; the doctors and monks congratulated each other on their triumphs. But this was not enough; blood had not flowed. They set to work again; and blood, since it must be so, was erelong to gratify the fanaticism of Rome.

The evangelical Christians of Meaux, seeing their leaders. dispersed, sought to edify one another. The wool-carder, John Leclerc, whom the lessons of the doctors, the reading of the Bible, and some tracts, had instructed in the christian doctrine,† signalized himself by his zeal and facility in expounding Scripture. He was one of those men whom the Spirit of God fills with courage, and soon places at the head of a religious movement. It was not long before the Church of Meaux regarded him as its minister.

The idea of a universal priesthood, such a living principle among the first Christians, had been re-established by Luther

* Vol. II. p. 381.

+Aliis pauculis libellis diligenter lectis. Beza Icones.
Animosæ fidei plenus. Ibid.

890

THE LUTHERAN AND REFORMED CHURCHES.

in the sixteenth century.*

But this idea seems then to have existed only in theory in the Lutheran church, and to have been really acted upon solely among the reformed Christians. The Lutheran Churches (and here they agree with the Anglican Church) perhaps took a middle course between the Romish and the Reformed Churches. Among the Lutherans, everything proceeded from the pastor or the priest; and nothing was counted valid in the Church that did not flow regularly through its chiefs. But the Reformed Churches, while they maintained the Divine appointment of the ministry, which some sects deny, approached nearer to the primitive condition of the apostolical communities. From the times of which we are speaking, they recognised and proclaimed that the christian flocks ought not simply to receive what the pastor gives; that the members of the Church, as well as its leaders, possess the key of that treasure whence the latter derive their instruction, for the Bible is in the hands of all; that the graces of God, the spirit of faith, of wisdom, of consolation, of light, are not bestowed on the pastor only; that every man is called upon to employ the gift he has received for the good of all; and that a certain gift, necessary to the edification of the Church, may be refused to a minister, and yet granted to one of his flock. Thus the passive state of the Church was then changed into a state of general activity; and in France, especially, this revolution was accomplished. In other countries, the reformers were almost exclusively pastors and doctors; but in France men of learning had from the very beginning pious men of the people for their allies. In that country God selected for his first workmen a doctor of the Sorbonne and a wool-comber.

The wool-comber Leclerc began to visit from house to house, confirming the disciples. But not stopping short at these ordinary cares, he would fain have seen the edifice of popery overthrown, and France, from the midst of these ruins, turning with a cry of joy towards the Gospel. His unguarded zeal may remind us of that of Hottinger at Zurich, and of Carlstadt at Wittemberg. He wrote a proclamation against

• See Vol. II. p. 97.

LECLERC S PLACARDS—THE BRANDING.

891

the Antichrist of Rome, announcing that the Lord was about to destroy it by the breath of his mouth. He then boldly posted his "placards" on the gates of the cathedral* Presently all was in confusion around that ancient edifice. The faithful were amazed; the priests exasperated. What! a fellow whose employment is wool-combing dares measure himself with the pope! The Franciscans were outrageous, and demanded that this once at least a terrible example should be made. Leclerc was thrown into prison.

His trial was finished in a few days, under the eyes of Briçonnet himself, who was now to witness and tolerate all that was done. The carder was condemned to be whipped three days successively through the city, and on the third to be branded on the forehead. This sad spectacle soon began. Leclerc was led through the streets with his hands bound, his back bare, and the executioners inflicted on him the blows he had drawn upon himself by rising up against the Bishop of Rome. An immense crowd followed in the track marked by the martyr's blood. Some yelled with rage against the heretic; others by their silence gave him no unequivocal marks of their tender compassion. One woman encouraged the unhappy man by her looks and words: she was his mother.

At last, on the third day, when the blood-stained proces-. sion was ended, they halted with Leclerc at the usual place of execution. The hangman prepared the fire, heated the iron that was to stamp its burning mark on the evangelist, and approaching him, branded him on the forehead as a heretic. A shriek was heard, but it did not proceed from the martyr. His mother, a spectator of the dreadful scene, and wrung with anguish, endured a bitter strife: it was the enthusiasm of faith struggling in her heart with maternal love; faith prevailed at last, and she exclaimed with a voice that made the adversaries tremble: "Glory to Jesus Christ and to his witnesses!" Thus did that Frenchwoman of the

Cet hérétique écrivit des pancartes qu'il áttacha aux portes de la grande église de Meaux (MS, de Meaux). See also Bezæ Icones; Crespin Actes des Martyrs, &c.

+ Hist. Eccles. de Th. de Bèze, p. 4. Hist. des Martyrs de Crespin,

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A MOTHER'S CRY-MEETINGS OF BELIEVERS.

sixteenth century fulfil the commandment of the Son of God: "He that loveth his son more than me is not worthy of me.” Such boldness, and at such a moment, merited signal punishment; but this christian mother had appalled the hearts both of priests and soldiers. All their fury was controlled by a stronger arm than theirs. The crowd, respectfully making way, allowed the martyr's mother slowly to regain her humble dwelling. The monks, and even the town-sergeants, gazed on her without moving. "Not one of her enemies dared lay hands upon her," said Theodore Beza. After this execution, Leclerc, being set at liberty, retired to Rosay in Brie, a small town about six leagues from Meaux, and subsequently to Metz, where we shall meet with him again.

The Cordeliers having

The adversaries were triumphant. re-captured the pulpits, propagated their lies and trumpery as usual."* But the poor workmen of the city, prevented from hearing the Word in regular assemblies, "began to meet in secret," says our chronicler, "after the manner of the sons of the prophets in the time of Ahab, and of the Christians of the primitive Church; and, as opportunity offered, they assembled at one time in a house, at another in some cave, sometimes also in a vineyard or in a wood. There, he amongst them who was most versed in the Holy Scriptures exhorted the rest; and this done, they all prayed together with great courage, supporting each other by the hope that the Gospel would be revived in France, and that the tyranny of Antichrist would come to an end." There is no power that can arrest the progress of truth.

But one victim only was not enough; and if the first against whom the persecution was let loose was a woolcomber, the second was a gentleman of the court. It was necessary to frighten the nobles as well as the people. Their reverences of the Sorbonne of Paris could not think of being outstripped by the Franciscans of Meaux. Berquin, "the most learned of the nobles," had derived fresh courage from the Holy Scriptures, and after having attacked "the

* Actes des Martyrs, p. 183.

+ Ibid.

BERQUIN'S ZEAL-A DOMICILIARY VISIT.

393

hornets of the Sorbonne" in certain epigrams, had openly accused them of impiety.*.

Beda and Duchesne, who had not ventured to reply in their usual manner to the witticisms of the king's gentleman, changed their mind, as soon as they discovered serious convictions latent behind these attacks. Berquin had become a Christian: his ruin was determined on. Beda and Duchesne, having seized some of his translations, found in them matter to burn more heretics than one. "He maintains," said they, "that it is wrong to invoke the Virgin Mary in place of the Holy Ghost, and to call her the source of all grace.+ He inveighs against the practice of calling her our hope, our life, and says that these titles belong only to the Son of God." There were other matters besides these. Berquin's study was like a bookseller's shop, whence works of corruption were circulated through the whole kingdom. The Commonplaces of Melancthon, in particular, served, by the elegance of their style, to shake the faith of the literary men in France. This pious noble, living only amidst his folios and his tracts, had become, out of christian charity, translator, corrector, printer, and bookseller..............It was essential to check this formidable torrent at its very source.

One day, as Berquin was quietly seated at his studies, among his beloved books, his house was suddenly surrounded by the sergeants-at-arms, who knocked violently at the door. They were the Sorbonne and its agents, who, furnished with authority from the parliament, were making a domiciliary visit. Beda, the formidable syndic, was at their head, and never did inquisitor perform his duty better; accompanied by his satellites, he entered Berquin's library, told him his business, ordered a watchful eye to be kept upon him, and began his search. Not a book escaped his piercing glance, and an exact inventory of the whole was drawn up by his orders. Here was a treatise by Melancthon, there a book by Carlstadt; farther on, a work of Luther's. Here were heretical books translated from Latin into French by Berquin

* Impietatis etiam accusatos, tum voce, tum scriptis. Beza Icones. + Incongrue beatam Virginem invocari pro Spiritu Sancto. Erasm. Epp. 1279.

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