§ 59. The Condition of French Switzerland before the Reformation.
The losses of the Reformation in German Switzerland were more than made up by the gains in French Switzerland; that is, in the three Cantons, Vaud, Neuch&tel, and
232 THE FwEFORMATIOX IN FKEXCH SWITZERLAND.
Geneva.^ Protestantism moved westward. Calvin continued, improved, and completed the work of Zwingli, and gave it a wider significance. Geneva took the place of Ziirich, and surpassed in influence the city of Zwingli and the city of Luther. It became '• the Protestant Rome."' from which proceeded the ideas and impulses for the Reformed Churches of France, Holland, England, and Scotland. The city of Calvin has long since departed from his rigorous creed and theocratic discipline, and will never return to them ; but the evanorelical faith still lives there in renewed visror: and among cities of the same size there is none that occupies a more important and influential position in theological and religious activity as well as literary and social culture, and as a convenient centre for the settlement of international questions, than Geneva.
The Reformation of French Switzerland cannot be separated from that of France. The inhabitants of the two countries are of the same Celtic or Gallic stock mixed ^\-ith Germanic (Frank and Burgundian) blood. The fii-st evangelists of Western Switzerland were Frenchmen who had to flee from their native soil. They became in turn, through their pupils, the founders of the Reformed. Church of France. The Reformed Churches of the two countries are one in spirit. After the Revocation of the Edict of Xantes, many Huguenots found an asylum in Geneva, Yaud, and Xeuchatel. The French Swiss combine the best traits of the French character with Swiss solidity and love of freedom. They are ever ready to lend a helping hand to their brethren across the frontier, and they form at the same time a connecting link between them and the Protestants of the German tongue. Their excellent educational institutions atti-act students from abroad and train teachers for other countries.
^ La Suisse francaise OT la Suisse romande. Vaud has 1244 square miles; Xeuchatel, 312 ; Geneva, 109. The first numbered, in 1889, 251,000 inhabitants; the second. 109.000: the third. 107.000.
§ 59. THE CONDITION OF FRENCH SWITZERLAND. 233
The tenitory of the French Cantons, which embraces 1665 square miles, was in the sixteenth century under the protection of the Swiss Confederacy.
Vaucl was conquered Ijy Bern from the Duke of Savoy, and ruled by bailiffs till 1798.1
The principality of Xeuchatel and Valangin concluded a co-burghery with Freiburg, 1290, with Bern, 1307, and vrith Solothurn. 1324. In 1707 the principality passed to King Frederick I. of Prussia, who confirmed the rights and liberties of the country and its old alliance with Switzerland. The connection with Prussia continued till 1857. when it was dissolved by free consent.-
Geneva was originally governed by a bishop and a count, who divided the spiritual and secular government between them. Duke Charles III. of Savoy tried to subdue the city with the aid of an unworth}- and servile bishop, Pierre de la Baume, whom he had appointed from his own family with the consent of Pope Leo X.'^ But a patriotic party, under the lead of Philibert Berthelier. Besancon Hugues, and Francois Bonivard (Bp'on"s •• Prisoner of Cliillon "*) opposed the attempt and began a struggle for independence, which lasted several yeai-s, and resembles on a small scale the heroic struggle of Switzerland against foreign oppression. The patriots, on account of their alliance with the Swiss, were called Eidgenossen. — a German word for (S^viss) Confed-
1 See Yulliemin, Le canton de Vaitd, Lausanne, od ed., 1885. Verdeil, Histoire du canton de Vaiid, Lausanne, 185-i-'o7, 4 vols.
- See the historical works on Xeuchatel by Chambrier, Matile, BoTve, Majer, Benoit.
8 Pierre de la Baume was bishop of Geneva from 152.3 to 15-36, became bishop of Besancon 1-542, and died 1-544. Bonivard (as quoted by Audin, who praises the bishops of Geneva) says of him : " He was a great dissipator of goods, in all things superfluous, esteeming it a sovereign virtue in a prelate to have his table loaded with large dishes of meat and all «orts of wines ; and when there he gave himself up so completely as to exceed thirty-one courses." Audin adds (p. 116) : "This shaft would have been much more pointed, had not Bonivard often seated himself at this table and drank far otherwise than became the prior of St. Victor."