The Bernese magistrates, in order to establish an outward unity, to which they attached great importance, as politicians generally do, determined to convoke a synod at Lausanne, and they wrote on the subject, March 10, to the magistrates of Geneva. The Council of the Two Hundred were quite inclined to adopt the usages of Berne as far as regarded ceremonies. Calvin and Farel having expressed to the council a desire to attend the proposed assembly, it was decided to send them, but at the same time to associate with them the councillor Jean Philippe.
The synod met at Lausanne, March 31. The temper of the Bernese was more dictatorial than conciliatory. The lords of Berne had indeed requested that Calvin and Farel should go to Lausanne; but instead of expecting of the assembly a work of conciliation, they had positively stipulated, in a letter to the council of Geneva, that the Genevese preachers must pledge themselves beforehand to adopt the order of worship established at Berne; and that on this condition only would they be allowed to take part in the deliberations of the synod. If their adhesion were not given before the meeting, they should be heard afterwards and should be separately treated with. The Genevese reformers, therefore, were invited neither to a free assembly nor a free discussion. No other right was conceded to them but that of submission. The Bernese added that the motive of this strange proceeding was to avoid giving their neighbors an opportunity of slandering the reformed religion, and to promote the union of the Churches. But the latter object, and through it the former, too, would probably have been more promptly attained by treating the ministers of Geneva in a brotherly and not in a despotic spirit. ‘The Bernese,’ according to Rozet, ‘inquired in a friendly way of Farel and Calvin on their arrival, whether they accepted their ceremonial.’ The reformers replied ‘that the subject was well deserving of discussion.’ Discussion was refused to them.[591]
The Bernese senate had named Kunz one of the presidents of the synod. Associated with him were the ministers of Erasmus Ritter, and two members of the great council, Huber and Amman. Kunz was one of those overbearing characters which inspire awe in other men, and whose influence is almost irresistible. His colleagues, moreover, were in agreement with him. The affair did not encounter any difficulty. The synod, which opened on March 31, unanimously accepted the usages of Berne,—the baptisteries, the unleavened bread at the supper, and the festivals, including that of the Annunciation of the Virgin.
Did Calvin and Farel attend the synod or not? It seems hardly probable that they would be willing by their presence to give a kind of sanction to an assembly from which they were virtually excluded. The letter of Berne to Geneva seems, moreover, to indicate clearly that unless they humbly received the ecclesiastical decisions of the magistrates and councils of Berne, they would only have a hearing apart. A highly partial biographer[592] states that they were seen in the town and even that they ‘went outside of it for pleasure.’ There would have been no great harm in their taking walks on the surrounding hills and on the banks of the Aar, enjoying the beauties of Swiss scenery, while they waited till it should please the lords of Berne to permit them to speak. But they would have been open to blame for not attending the synod if the order of Berne had not absolutely prohibited them. History therefore has been guilty of an error in that, while she mentions their absence from the synod, she has not reported the fact which justifies it; that is to say, the strange requirement of Berne,—a grave omission, which we would fain think was unintentional.[593]
ABSENCE OF CALVIN AND FAREL.
The conference between Calvin and Farel and the delegates of Berne took place. The ministers of Geneva, while they objected to the use of baptisteries and unleavened bread, had no intention of causing division on account of such things. They adhered more firmly to their views respecting festivals. ‘On what ground,’ said Calvin, ‘will you honor the day of the circumcision more than that of the death of the Redeemer?’ In fact, Good Friday was not celebrated at Berne. Kunz was silent.[594] Calvin and Farel wished that questions of this kind should be settled, not by delegates of the government but by the Church in its assemblies. They demanded therefore that the decision should be referred to a synod of the whole Reformed Church of Switzerland, which was to be held without delay at Zurich. All appearance of compulsion would thus be avoided; liberty and order would be equally respected, and the Church would be spared much grievous dissension. ‘There was an excellent remedy,’ Calvin wrote afterwards to the Zurichers, ‘by means of which danger might have been obviated; it was that we should be invited to your synod. But this we could not obtain.’[595]
When the lords of Berne found that their delegates had failed in their conference with the Genevese ministers, they resolved to write, on the same day, April 15, two letters: one to Calvin and Farel, the other to the council of Geneva, having no doubt that this clever contrivance would succeed. Their two missives were very nearly alike. They urged the ministers to accept the decision of the synod, without waiting for the assembly at Zurich, in order that the two Churches, united in the fundamentals of the faith, might likewise be in conformity in matters of ceremonial. And to the council they addressed entreaties to accept the same decision, ‘in the hope that Masters Farel and Calvin, although they had raised some difficulties, would advise for the best.’[596]
CHAPTER X.
THE COUNTER-REFORMATION PREVAILS.—CALVIN AND FAREL REFUSE TO GIVE THE LORD’S SUPPER.—THE PULPIT IS CLOSED TO THEM.