Note 235 — CCXLII.—To Henry Bullinger.[235]

The new King of France, Henry II., sought an alliance with the Swiss with extreme eagerness. His envoys, Boisrigault, Liancourt, Lavan, and Menage overran the Cantons, scattering everywhere proofs of his liberality, to obtain a renewal of the ancient treaties. Everywhere, says the Swiss historian, their proposals were welcomed, except at Berne and at Zurich. In the latter town, Bullinger rose with great energy against this negotiating with a man who was converting a loyal and Christian people into a nation of hired murderers. He called to their recollection the persecutions of which France had been the theatre, and adjured his fellow-citizens to avoid all terms with a persecuting monarch, who was covered with the blood of their brethren. Better aware than Bullinger of the dangers which the supremacy of the Emperor was spreading over the various states of Europe, and over the Reformed Churches of Germany and Switzerland, and hoping, perhaps, to obtain by a treaty some relief to the faithful of France, Calvin was in favour of the French alliance, and in this remarkable letter attempted to vindicate its legitimacy by examples borrowed from the Old Testament.—Histoire de la Suisse, tom. xi. p. 306, et suiv.