Note 60 — CLXIV.—To Amy Perrin.[60]

Letter without date, of which the original French is lost. It is here reproduced from the Latin translation inserted in the collection of the published Latin letters of Calvin, with restoration of date, April 1546.

Amy Perrin, one of the earliest hearers of Farel and Froment at Geneva, contributed powerfully to the disenthralment and reformation of his native country. At one with the Reformers in the abolition of the ancient worship and in the proclamation of the new, which he regarded as the security for the independence of Geneva, he broke with them the moment they undertook to correct manners, after having reformed beliefs. He then became the head of that party of undisciplined children of Geneva, "who wished to live according to their own inclination, without suffering themselves to be restrained by the words of the preachers," and whose triumph led to the banishment of the ministers, (1538.) Commissioned, two years afterwards, to negotiate their recall, he appeared to be reconciled to Calvin, and to submit to the institutions of the Calvinistic discipline; but the submission could not be lasting, and we again find him, in 1545, along with Pierre Vandel and the two Bertheliers, at the head of the party that must needs continue to strive with the ministers, until their total defeat, (May 1555.) Of an irascible temperament, of easy and frivolous manners, Amy took pleasure in fêtes, and in appearing in public magnificently dressed. Being accused (see the preceding letter) of having taken part in unlawful dances, he refused to compear before the Consistory, incurred, with his wife, the just rigours of the Seigneury, and became the implacable enemy of Calvin, who, in a letter at once moderate and powerful, essayed in vain to bring him back to the path of obedience and duty.