§ 13. ZWINGLI DURING THE PESTILENCE. 43
his influence against him in Zurich ; and the magistracy, and even the bishop of Constance (who preferred to sell indulgences himself) supported the opposition. Samson was obliged to return to Italy with his "heavy, three-horse wagon of gold." Rome had learned a lesson of wisdom from Luther's Theses, and behaved in the case of Samson with more prudence and deference to the sentiment of the enlightened class of Catholics. Leo X., in a brief of April, 1519, expressed his willingness to recall and to punish him if he had transgressed his authority.^
The opposition to the sale of indulgences is the opening chapter in the history of the German Reformation, but a mere episode in the Swiss Reformation. That battle had been fought out victoriously by Luther. Zwingli came in no conflict with Rome on this question, and was even approved for his conduct by Dr. Faber, the general vicar of the diocese of Constance, who was then his friend, but became afterwards his enemy.
§ 13. Zwingli during the Pestilence.
Li the summer of 1519 Zwingli went to the famous bath of Pfiiffers at Ragatz to gather strength for his prospectively onerous duties at Zurich, in view of the danger of the approach of the plague from Basle. As soon as he learned, in August, that the plague had broken out in Zurich, he hastened back without stopping to visit his relations on the way. For several weeks he devoted himself, like a faithful shepherd, day after day, to the care of the sick, until he fell sick himself at the end of September. His life was in great danger, as he had worn himself out. The papal legate sent his own physician to his aid. The pestilence destroyed twenty-five hundred lives ; that is, more than one-third of the population of Zurich. Zwingli recovered, but felt the effects on his brain and memory, and a lassitude in all his
^ Morikofer, I. 65 sqq.
44 THE SWISS REFORMATION.
limbs till the end of the year. His friends at home and abroad, including Faber, Pirkheimer, and Dlirer at Niirnberg, congratulated him on his recovery.
The experience during this season of public distress and private affliction must have exerted a good influence upon his spiritual life.^ We may gather this from the tliree poems, which he composed and set to music soon afterwards, on his sickness and recovery. They consist each of twenty-six rhymed iambic verses, and betray great skill in versification. They breathe a spirit of pious resignation to the will of God, and give us an insight into his religious life at that time."^ He wrote another poem in 1529, and versified the Sixty-ninth Psalm.^
Zavingli's Poems during the Pestilence, with a Free Condensed Translation.
I. Im Anfang der Krankheit.
Hilf, Herr Gott, hilf Def mich verwundt,
In dieser Noth ; Nit lass ein Stund
Ich raein', der Tod Mich haben weder Riiw " noch Rast !
Syg* an der Thiir. Willt du dann glych*
Stand, Christe, fiir ; Todt haben mich
Denn du ihn iiberwunden hast ! Inmitts der Tagen min,
Zu dir ich gilf : ^ So soil es willig syn.
1st es din Will, Thu, wie du willt,
Zuch us den Pfyl,^ Mich niit befilt.9
1 Merle d'Aubigne' overrates the influence of this sickness by dating from it Zwingli's conversion and entire consecration to God. There was no sudden change in his life, as in Paul or Luther: he developed gradually.
2 The original is given in WerJce, II. 269-274, with a good modern reproduction by Fulda; also by Morikofer, I. 72-74; and Hagenbach, 218 (5th ed. by Nippold). Abridged translations in the English editions of Merle d'Aubigne's History of the Reformation, Bk. VIII. ch. 8 (" Lo ! at my door gaunt death I spy," etc.), and in Miss Moore's translation of Hagenbach's Histon/ of the Reformation (Edinb., 1878, vol. I. 274). The structure of the poems is very artificial and difficult to reproduce.
3 These poems passed into the oldest Zurich hymn and tune books of 1560 and 1570, and are printed together by Wackernagel, Das Deutsche Kirchenlied, vol. III. 500-503.
■» Sei. 5 flehe, schreie. ^ pfeii_ : RuJ, s joch. » fehlt.