[328] The right of censure and excommunication belonging to the Consistory. It was not without much difficulty that the right of ecclesiastical censure was granted to the Consistorial Court,—a body which included at once the ministers and some members of the magistracy, chosen from the various municipal councils. This right of the Consistory was often contested, and was only definitely recognized after long resistance, of which traces are to be found in the Registers of Council, from 1542 to 1553.
[329] To the very faithful minister of Christ, D. Oswald Myconius, pastor of the Church at Basle, my much respected friend.
[330] Bucer had gone to Cologne, called thither by the Archbishop, Elector Hermann de Wied, the pious and distinguished prelate who had courageously undertaken the reformation of his diocese.
[331] Discord prevailed among the members of the League of Smalkald, one part refusing the subsidy to the Emperor for the war against the Turks, the other shewing a disposition to grant it. "It is spread abroad that there exists dissension between the Princes and the Cities concerning the money and men to be given against the Turk. I rejoice that Christ is Lord, otherwise I had altogether despaired. Himself will preserve his Church."—Oswald Myconius to Calvin, 10th February 1542.
[332] The Margrave Albert of Brandenbourg, a bold adventurer, who lent his sword in turn to all parties during the troubles of Germany.
[333] Sebastian Munster, Professor of Theology at the University of Basle, and author of the Cosmographia Universalis.
[334] Allusion to the disputes between Berne and Geneva, submitted to the arbitration of the Seigneury of Basle.
[335] On the back: Letters against the Carmelite. Without date. A Latin letter of Calvin to Farel, of the 10th May 1542, relative to the same subject, furnishes us with the date, and informs us that this white friar, who had gone over to the ranks of the Reformed, belonged to Lyons: "Venit Carmelita Lugdunensis a quo non frustra timuimus." Calvin forewarned the faithful of that town to be upon their guard against that false friar.
The Church of Lyons, one of the most glorious of the French Reformation, owed its origin to the preaching of an old Jacobin monk, Alexander Camus, surnamed Laurence de la Croix, who suffered martyrdom at Paris in 1535. The first members of that Church were merchants, "some goldsmiths and others of the town," who met together in secret. The work begun by Alexander Camus was manfully followed up by John Fabri, (or Le Fevre,) who found pious continuators in the ministers, Peter Fournelet and Claude Monnier, before the epoch of the great persecutions.—Hist. Eccl., tom. i. pp. 55, 56.
[336] That is to say, Geneva.