30 THE SWISS REFORMATION.
by Ebrard, Janssen und die Reformation (1882) ; Usteri, Ulrich Zwingli (1883), 34-47 ; Alex. Schweizer, articles in the " Protest. Kirchenzeitung," Berlin, 1883, Nos. 23-27. Janssen answered Ebrard, but not Usteri and Schweizer. The main facts were correctly stated before this controversy by Morikofer, I. 49-53 and 128), and briefly also by Hagenbach, and Merle (bk. VIII. eh. 6).
§ 8. Zivingli in Einsiedeln.
In 1516 Zwingli left Glarus on account of the intrigues of the French political party, which came into power after the victory of the French at Marignano (1515), and accepted a call to Einsiedeln, but kept his charge and expected to return ; for the congregation was much attached to him, and promised to build him a new parsonage. He supplied the charge by a vicar, and drew his salary for two years, until he was called to Zurich, when he resigned.
Einsiedeln ^ is a village with a Benedictine convent in the Catholic canton Schwyz. It was then, and is to this day, a very famous resort of pilgrims to the shrine of a wonderworking black image of the Virgin Mary, which is supposed to have fallen from heaven. The number of annual pilgrims from Switzerland, Germany, France, and Italy exceeds a hundred thousand.
Here, then, was a large field of usefulness for a preacher. The convent library afforded special facilities for study.
Zwingli made considerable progress in his knowledge of the Scriptures and the Fathers. He read the annotations of Erasmus and the commentaries of Origen, Ambrose, Jerome, and Chrysostom. He made extracts on the margin of his copies of their works which are preserved in the libraries at Zurich. He seems to have esteemed Origen, Jerome, and Chrysostom more, and Augustin less, than Luther did; but he also refers frequently to Augustin in his writings.^
^ Maria-Einsiedeln, Deiparas Virginis Eremus, Eremitaruin Coenobium in Helvetiis, Notre-Dame-des-Ereraites.
- Usteri has examined the marginal annotations in Zwingli's patristic library, and gives the scanty results in his Initia Zwinglii, in " Studien und Kritiken," 1886, p. 681 sq. The Zwingli library was on exhibition at Zurich, Jan. 4-13, 1884, and a catalogue printed.
§ 8. ZWINGLI IN EINSIEDELN. 81
We have an interesting proof of his devotion to the Greek Testament in a MS. preserved in the city library at Zurich. In 1517 he copied with his own hand very neatly the Epistles of Paul and the Hebrews in a little book for constant and convenient use. The text is taken from the first edition of Erasmus, which appeared in March, 1516, and corrects some typographical errors. It is very legible and uniform, and betrays an experienced hand ; the marginal notes, in Latin, from Erasmus and patristic commentators, are very small and almost illegible. On the last page he added the following note in Greek : —
" These Epistles were written at Einsiedeln of the blessed Mother of God by Huldreich Zwingli, a Swiss of Toggenburg, in the year one thousand five hundred and seventeen of the Incarnation, in the month of June.^ Happily ended." ^
At the same time he began at Einsiedeln to attack from the pulpit certain abuses and the sale of indulgences, when Samson crossed the Alps in August, 1518. He says that he began to preach the gospel before Luther's name was known in Switzerland, adding, However, that at that time he de-
1 Skirophorion, i.e. the 12th Attic month, answering to the latter part of June and the first part of July. 'SKtpo(p6pia was the festival of Athena 'S.Kipis, celebrated in that month. The year (1517) refutes the error of several biographers, who date the MS. back to the period of Glarus. Besides, there was no printed copy of the Greek Testament before 1516.
2 The subscription (as I copied it, with its slight errors, in the Wasserkirche, Aug. 14, 1886) reads as follows : —
TavTai at 'E'>riffToXar[ai] ypacp^Tcrai
'Epr}fiov rrjs /xaKap'tas deo-
t6kov, irapa t&T 'TXSe-
pvXV ZvyyA'ici} Awy-
yiq> eA^ertoi, ^^iAio-
(XTCf) TrevraKoo'tSffTCf)
eirra Kcd SeKUTCfi
airh TTJs dioyo-
vias, /XTjvhs
(TKippOpOpL- WVOS
Etixws [€"'r,xi5s].