Greek that he might "learn the teaching of Christ from the original sources," and gave some attention to Hebrew. He read also the older Church Fathers and soon won for himself fame as a student, whilst his skill in the classics led his friends to hail him as "the undoubted Cicero of our age." He had an unbounded admiration for Erasmus, with whom he entered into correspondence, and from whom he received a somewhat chilling patronage; whilst the brilliant humanist, Pico della Mirandola (1463-1494), taught him to criticize, in a rationalizing way, the medieval doctrines of Rome. His first publications, which appeared as rhymed allegories, were political rather than religious, being aimed at what he deemed the degrading Swiss practice of hiring out mercenaries in the European wars. His convictions on this matter were so much intensified by his later experiences as army chaplain that in 1521 he prevailed upon the authorities of the canton of Zürich to renounce the practice altogether. Especially did he oppose alliances with France; but the French party in Glarus was strong, and it retaliated so fiercely that in 1516 Zwingli was glad to accept the post of people's priest at Einsiedeln. He always in later days dated his arrival at evangelical truth from the three years (1516-19) which he spent in this place. There he studied the New Testament in the editions of Erasmus and began to found his preaching on "the Gospel," which he declared to be simple and easy to understand. He held that the Bible was the sufficient revelation of the will of God, and he threw away the philosophy and theology of the later Roman Church, whereas he declared that the early Church Fathers were helpful, though still fallible, interpreters of the Word. In his definite recognition of the theological place of Scripture he showed, says Dr T. M. Lindsay (History of the Reformation), clearer insight than the Lutherans, and Zwingli rather than Luther was in this matter Calvin's guide, and the guide of the reformed churches of Switzerland, France, England and the Netherlands. All these set forth in their symbolical books the supreme place of Scripture, accepting the position which Zwingli laid down in 1536 in The First Helvetic Confession, namely, that "Canonic Scripture, the Word of God, given by the Holy Spirit and set forth to the world by the Prophets and Apostles, the most perfect and ancient of all philosophies, alone contains perfectly all piety and the whole rule of life."
Zwingli began to preach "the Gospel" in 1516, but a contemporary says that he did it so cunningly (listiglich) that none could suspect his drift. He still, to use his own words, hung his new exposition on to "the old doctrines, however much they at times pained me, rather than on to the purer and clearer"; for he hoped that the reformation of the Church would proceed quietly and from within. The papal curia had no wish to bring things to a quarrel with him. The Swiss, who furnished them with troops, were to be treated with consideration; and the pope sought to silence the reformer by offers of promotion, which he refused. He held himself, as did the Swiss in general, very free of papal control. They had long been used, in their orderly democratic life, to manage their own ecclesiastical affairs. Church property paid its share of the communal taxes, and religious houses were subject to civil inspection. Zwingli looked rather to the City Fathers than to the pope, and as long as he had them with him he moved confidently and laboured for reforms which were as much political and moral in character as religious. He had none of Luther's distrust of "the common man" and fear of popular government, and this fact won for his teaching the favour of the towns of South Germany not less than of Switzerland.
As yet he had preached his Gospel without saying much about corruptions in the Roman Church, and it was his political denunciation of the fratricidal wars into which the pope, not less than others, was drawing his fellow-countrymen, that first led to rupture with the papal see. Three visits which he had paid to Italy in his capacity of army chaplain had done much to open his eyes to the worldly character of the papal rule, and it was not long before he began to attack at Einsiedeln the superstitions which attended the great pilgrimages made to that place. Zwingli denounced the publication of plenary indulgence to all visitors to the shrine, and his sermons in the Swiss vernacular drew great crowds and attracted the attention of Rome. His quarrel was turned more immediately against the pope himself when in August 1518 the Franciscan monk Bernardin Samson, a pardon-seller like Johann Tetzel, made his appearance in Switzerland as the papally commissioned seller of indulgences. Zwingli prevailed on the council to forbid his entrance into Zürich; and even then the pope argued that, so long as the preacher was still receiving a papal pension, he could not be a formidable adversary, and he gave him a further sop in the form of an acolyte chaplaincy.
Zwingli had never meant to remain at Einsiedeln long, and he now threw himself into a competition for the place of people's priest at the Great Minster of Zürich, and obtained it (1518) after some opposition. He stipulated that his liberty to preach the truth should be respected. In the beginning of 1519 he began a series of discourses on St Matthew's Gospel, the Acts of the Apostles, and the Pauline epistles; and with these it may be said that the Reformation was fairly begun in Zürich. He had made a copy of St Paul's epistles and committed them to memory, and from this arsenal of Scripture he attacked the unrighteousness of the state no less than the superstition of the Church. His correspondence of this year shows him jealous of the growing influence of Luther. It was his claim that he had discovered the Gospel before ever Luther was heard of in Switzerland, and he was as anxious as Erasmus to make it clear that he was not Luther's disciple. Towards the end of September he fell a victim to the plague which was ravaging the land, and his illness sobered his spirit and brought into his message a deeper note than that merely moral and common-sense one with which, as a polite humanist, he had hitherto been content. He began to preach against fasting, saint worship and the celibacy of priests; and some of his hearers began to put his teachings into practice. The monasteries raised an outcry when people were found eating flesh in Lent, and the bishop of Constance accused them before the council of Zürich. Zwingli was heard in their defence and the accusation was abandoned. His first Reformation tract, April 1522, dealt with this subject: "Von Erkiesen und Fryheit der Spysen." The matter of the celibacy of the clergy was more serious. Zwingli had joined in an address to the bishop of Constance calling on him no longer to endure the scandal of harlotry, but to allow the priests to marry wives, or, at least, to wink at their marriages. He and his co-signatories confessed that they had lived unchastely, but argued that priests could not be expected to do otherwise, seeing that God had not seen fit to give the gift of continence. Pope Adrian VI. interfered and asked the Zürichers to abandon Zwingli, but the reformer persuaded the council to allow a public disputation (1523), when he produced sixty-seven theses[1] and vindicated his position so strongly that the council decided to uphold their preacher and to separate the canton from the bishopric of Constance. Thus legal sanction was given in Zürich to the Reformation. In 1522 Zwingli produced his first considerable writing, the Architeles, "the beginning and the end," in which he sought by a single blow to win his spiritual freedom from the control of the bishops, and in a sermon of that year he contended that only the Holy Spirit is requisite to make the Word intelligible, and that there is no need of Church, council, or pope in the matter.
The progress of the Reformation attracted the attention of all Switzerland, but there was a strong opposition to it, especially in the five Forest Cantons: Lucerne, Zug, Schwyz, Uri and Unterwalden; and the Zürichers felt it necessary to form a league in its defence. They were especially anxious to gain Bern, and Zwingli challenged the Romanists to a public disputation in that city. No less than 350 ecclesiastics came to Bern from the various cantons to hear the pleadings, which began on the 2nd of January 1523 and lasted nineteen days. Zwingli
- ↑ Cf. P. Schaff, Creeds of the Evangelical Protestant Churches, p. 197.
