"In the following February the duke of Guise, the lieutenant general of the kingdom, was assassinated before Orleans. When the assassin was seized, he accused Beza, among other leading Huguenots, as having been privy to his design. Beza declared that, notwithstanding the great and general indignation aroused against the duke of Guise on account of the massacre at Vassy, he had never entertained an opin- ion that he should be proceeded against otherwise than by the methods of ordinary justice. He admitted that since the duke had commenced the war, he had exhort- ed the Protestants, both by letters and sermons, to use their arms, but he had at the same time inculcated the utmost possible moderation, and had instructed them to seek peace above all things next to the honor of God."
After the peace of 15G3, Beza returned to Geneva, and in 1564, upon the death of Calvin, was called to succeed to all his offices. Beza did not return to France till 1568, when he repaired to Vezelai on somo family business. He visited his native country again to attend and preside over a Huguenot synod which assembled at La Rochelle in 1571. Never had any Huguenot ecclesiastical meeting been attended by so many distinguished personages as graced this synod. "There were present," says the report of its acts, "Joane, by the grace of God, queen of Navarre ; the high and mighty prince Henry, prince of Navarre; the high and mighty prince Henry de Bourbon, prince of Conde ; the most illustrious prince Louis, count of Nassau ; Sir Caspar, count de Coligni ; the admiral of France, and divers other lords and gentlemen, besides the deputies who were members of the Church of God." At this assembly the Huguenot confession of faith was confirmed, and two copies of it were taken, one of which was deposited at Rochelie, the other in the ar- chives of Geneva. After the execrable massacre of St. Bartholomew's Eve, Beza honorably exerted him-
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self to support those of the French whom the fear of death drove from their native land; he interested in their behalf the princes of Germany. He also found- ed a French hospital at Geneva.
In 1572 he assisted at an assembly of the Huguenots at Nismes, where he opposed John Morel, who de- sired to introduce a new discipline. The prince of Condo caused him to come to him at Strasburg in the year 1571, to send him to prince John Casimir, admin- istrator of the palatinate. In 1586 he was employed in the conference of Montbeliard against John An- dreas, a divine of Tubingen. He died at the age of eighty-six, October 13th, 1605. Among his numerous works may be specified — 1. Confessio Christiana' ftdei (1560): — 2. Histoire Ecdmastique desEglises Reformees tin rovaume de France, from 1521 to 1563 (1580, 3 vols. 8vo): — 3. Icones vlrorum illustrium (1580, 4to) : — 4. TractaLio d> rejmdiis et divortiis, acadit iractahis de p tlygamia (Geneva, 1590, 8vo) : — 5. Novum D. N. Jesu ( 'hristi Testamentum (often reprinted) : — 6. A nnotationcs ad Novum Testamentum (best edition that of Cambridge, 1642, fol.). Beza was a man of extraordinary quick- ness and fertility of intellect, as well as of profound and varied learning. His life has been often written, e. g. by Bolzec (Paris, 1577); Taillepied (Paris, 1577) ; Zeigenbein (Hamb. 1789); Schlosser (Heidelb. 1809) ; the latest and most elaborate is Theodor Beza nach n utiifihrifliiihiii and andercn gleichzeitigen Quelh-n, by Professor Baum, of Strasburg (1843-1851, 2 vols.), but it only extends to 1563. See also Haag, La France Protestante, ii, 259-284. Perhaps no one of the reform- ers has been more foully and constantly calumniated by the Romanists than Beza.
Beza took a lively interest in the affairs of the Church of England, and his letters were (and still are) very unpalatable to the High-Church party there. Dr. Hook quotes largely from his letters to Bullinger and Grindal to prove that Beza "regarded the Church of England in Elizabeth's time as Popish." In his let- ter to Grindal, dated June 27, 1566, he complains that he has heard of "divers ministers discharged their p Irishes by the queen, the bishops consenting, because they refused to subscribe to certain new rites; and that the sum of the queen's commands were, to admit again not only those garments, the signs of Baal's priests in popery, but also certain rites, which also were degenerated into the worst superstitions — as the signing with the cross, kneeling in the communion, and such like ; and, which was still worse, that women should baptize, and that the queen should have a power of superintending other rites, and that all power should lie given to the bishop alone in ordering the matters of the Church; and no power, not so much as that of complaining, to remain to the pastor of each church ; that the queen's majesty, and many of the learned and religious bishops, had promised far better things ; and that a great many of those matters were, at Least as it seemed to him, feigned by some evil- meaning men, and wrested some other way; but withal be beseeched the bishop that they two might confer a little together concerning these things. He knew, as lie wont on, there was a twofold opinion con- cerning the restoration of the Church: first, of some who thought nothing ought to be added to the apostol- ical simplicity; and so that, without exception, what- soever the apostles did ought to be done by us; and whatsoever the Church thai succeeded the apostles added to the first rites were to be abolished at once; that, on the other side, there were some who were of opinion that certain ancient rites besides ought to lie retained, partly as profitable and necessary, partly, if not necessary, yet to be tolerated for concord sake; that he himself was of opinion with the former sort; and. in line, that he had not yet Learned by what right (whether one looks into God's Word or' the ancient canons) either the civil magistral ■ of himself might superinduce any new rites upon the churches already