Meanwhile a similar movement was going on in Switzerland under the leadership of Ulrich Zwingli. He was a humanist and a great admirer of Erasmus. • His study of the Bible led him to question some of the teachings of the Church and while preaching at the cathe dral at Zurich he presented his new views. To settle the kind of preaching which should be allowed at Zurich a public disputation was held and the city government decided in favor of the Reformation. Similar action was taken by other cities of German Switzerland. The Lutheran and Swiss reformatory views were much alike, but with some striking differences. In order that there might be united and har monious action by the two, a conference was arranged between the leaders of the two divi sions at Marburg in 1529. They could agree on all points except on the Lord's Supper, the fol lowers of Zwingli looking upon it as a me morial, while the Lutherans insisted upon the literal sense of the words, This is my body," holding to the actual presence of the body and blood of Christ in the bread and wine but not to the change of the elements into the body and blood. All later attempts to bring about an agreement between the Swiss or Reformed branch and the Lutherans failed. The Swiss forest cantons remained Catholic while the city cantons accepted the Reformation. There were other disagreements of a political nature so that war broke out and Zwingli was killed at the battle of Cappel in 1531. Zurich continued to be important as a centre for the propagation of the Reformation, but the leadership of the Reformed Church passed to Geneva.
There were many who believed that the Lutherans and Reformed did not go far enough in their rejettion of error, and dependence upon the New Testament. These radical reformers were known as Anabaptists, because most of them rejected infant baptism and held that be lievers only should be baptized. They varied in life and belief from the learned and saintly humanist, Hubmaier, to the fanatic, John of Ley den. They were persecuted by Protestants and Catholics and many of them died as m The worst side of the movement the city of Munster, where an Anabapist dom was established and polygamy was intro duced. The large majority of the Anabaptists were sincere Christians, intent upon following the simple teaching of the Bible. They are the spiritual ancestors of millions of our present day Christians.
In France there was no leading figure in the ear? days of the Reformation correspohy to Luther and Zwingli. The nearest a to this was Jean Jacques Lefevre, perhaps by his Latinized name, Faber Stapulen sis, who was the leading humanist of his day in France. He came to a belief in justification by faith rather than by works before Luther did, and his translation of the New Testament into French greatly aided the Reformation. One of his pupils was Briconnet, bishop of Meaux, who undertook reformatory work in his own diocese and invited preachers of Re formed views to assist. He never went so far as to break with Roman Catholicism and when protests were made against the preachers he had brought in he ordered them to withdraw. But the work which had been begun went on in secret in Meaux and in other parts of France.
Faber never withdrew from the Roman Catho lic Church.
The attitude of the French king, Francis I, varied from time to time according to politi cal exigencies, but became more hostile to Protestantism as time went on. He was greatly disturbed by the Peasant Revolt in Germany, fearing that the spread of the new faith m' t bring anarchy into his own country. In • closing years the laws against heresy were rigidly enforced but Protestantism continued to spread. The great growth of Protestantism in France came after the Frenchman, John Calvin, became master of Geneva and made that city the centre of the Reformed branch of Protestantism. Frenchmen went to Geneva and returned to their homeland to distribute copes of the New Testament and to preach, when they knew that they risked their lives by so doing. The persecuted Christians were organized into churches under the direction of Calvin. The Presbyterian system was established and even in the days of persecution a national organiza tion was effected. The French Protestants were called Huguenots and became a political as well as religious party. As in so many other nations of Europe, war broke out between the followers of the two faiths. These wars suc ceeded each other rapidly for a period of half a century with varying results. Finally Henry of Navarre became Icing. He was a Protestant, but to put an end to the civil wars he became a Roman Catholic. In 1598 he published the Edict of Nantes which gave a limited tolera tion to the Huguenots and under which they increased in numbers for nearly a century.
A second and more important branch of the French Reformation was that which had Geneva as its centre. Geneva had accepted the Reformation principally through the efforts of French evangelists of whom William Farel was the leader. He attempted to make the people of Geneva live up to their professions but was unable to do so. The work which he began was carried on by John Calvin in such a way that Geneva became the model city of Protes tant Christendom. John Calvin was famous before his coming to Geneva as the author of the (Institutes,) a book which more than any other became the textbook of the Reformed Church. Calvin fled from France because of the persecution and hoped to find some city where he could spend his life in scholarly work for the Reformation. On his he chanced to come to Geneva to pass the night. Farel was trying to organize the Church and he persuaded Calvin to assist him. After a pro longed, conflict Calvin gained control of the city. He reorganized the Church under the eldership system by which ministers and lay elders had control of the spiritual affairs of the city. He established theological lectureships, thus making possible an edutated ministry. Geneva became the educational centre of the Reformed Church and large numbers of men, fleeing from persecution in England, the Nether lands, France and other parts of Europe, came to Geneva, studied under Calvin and carried his theology and form of Church organization back to their home lands.