Note 34 — CLVII.—To Viret.[34]

Viret was at that time plunged into the deepest affliction. He had just lost, after a long illness, his wife, Elizabeth Turtaz, of Orbe, with whom he had lived for many years in a godly union. The grief which he felt on that occasion is expressed, in a very touching manner, in a letter written many years afterwards to Calvin:—"I was so completely dispirited and prostrated by that arrow of affliction, that the whole world appeared to me nothing but a burden. There was nothing pleasant, nothing that could mitigate my grief of mind."—Calv. Epist. et Resp., p. 53. The friends of Viret, and especially Farel and Calvin, lavished upon him, during that trial, marks of the tenderest and most brotherly affection. The familiar correspondence of Calvin furnishes us with precious revelations in this respect.