Note 262 — CCLIII.—To Viret.

This is the first time the name of Beza is found mentioned in the correspondence of Calvin. Born on the 24th of June 1519, at Vezelay, in Burgundy, he had left Paris after a brilliant and dissipated youth, to retire to Geneva.—Registers of the Council, 3d May 1549. "Eight French gentlemen, among whom is Theodore Beza, arrive here and obtain permission to remain." Beza was a short time afterwards, made Professor of Greek in the Academy of Lausanne, from which place he wrote to Bullinger:—"The Lord has shewn me this, in the first place, for which may I be able to make my boast in him continually,—that I must prefer the cross to my country, and to all changes of fortune. In the next place, I have received the friendship of Calvin, Viret, Musculus, and Haller; kind Heaven, the friendship of such men! When I think that these are my friends, so far from feeling any inconvenience from exile, I may adopt the saying of Themistocles,—'Perieram nisi periissem.'"—MSS. of Archives of Zurich, Gest. vi. p. 139.