Locarno is situated near the head of the lake Maggiore, in that lovely region where the Alps sink into the plains of Lombardy. Though presenting to the modern tourist the aspect of a rather sombre, deserted-looking town, it was, during the earlier half of the 16th century, the seat of a very active trade. Every second Thursday, the lake was enlivened through all its extent, with boats going to or returning from market; cargoes of planks, charcoal, and other goods, were floated down the Ticino and Po, to Pavia, Mantua, Venice; strings of pack horses went across the Alps, laden with the silks and other produce of northern Italy, and through all the markets of Switzerland, the merchants of Locarno were noted for their enterprise.

In regard to vital religion, it would have been difficult, in the worst times of Popery, to have found a region darker than Locarno and its neighbourhood. The volumes before us give lamentable details of ignorance and immorality on the part of the priesthood; while among the people, matters were, if possible, worse. Thus, in 1537, we find twelve murders, besides homicides, committed in the town-a frightful proportion of crime among a population of 300 families. In the diocese of Como, which included Locarno, we find annually about one thousand trials for witchcraft, and year after year, some three hundred victims sacrificed. Two instances, by way of illustration, will probably be enough for our readers; the one, that of the Provost of Roveredo, who was burnt to death, because eleven witnesses deponed to having seen him at a meeting of witches, dressed in a mass-robe, and leading down the dance; the other, that of a woman broken alive on the wheel in 1519, under the charge of having, by incantation, put certain individuals to death, and then having eaten their bodies. Northern Italy, with its burden of Popery, was truly one of the dark places of the earth, and full of the habitations of horrid cruelty.

How gospel light first made its way into a field so unpromising, we are not very clearly told. In 1530, when Werdmüller of Zürich came as governor, he wrote to his friend Zuingle, that amidst the almost total darkness prevailing, he had found one man acquainted with the gospel, and I have given him your book to read. This seems to have been Baldassar Fontana, a Carmelite monk, whose own affecting letter to the Swiss German Church, is partly given by Dr M'Crie.* Fainting with thirst,' so he writes from his convent, I come to the fountain of living water, like the poor Lazarus or humble woman of Canaan, who would be satisfied with the crumbs from the Lord's table.' After

* Reformation in Italy, p. 132.

asking for books through Werdmüller, he adds, there are but three of us here, but who knows whether God may not have decreed from this little spark to kindle a great flame. Let us sow, let us plant; God will give the increase. That increase, indeed, he did not live to see. Evil times came. Famine-the plagueintestine war, successively scourged and desolated the land. We lose sight of the good work for a season, yet are we well assured that the prayers which ascended in behalf of Locarno, from the cell of Fontana, were not offered in vain.

Bäldi of Glarus, governor in 1542, deserves to be noted as a Christian magistrate, who consecrated all his influence to the gospel cause. He provided from Zürich, a considerable supply of the Scriptures-Îtalian Bibles, as Meyer thinks-for distribution in the town; and most speedily was their influence perceptible, in speaking home to many hearts for Christ. Benedetto Locarnus, who preached during the summer of 1544, and Castiglione, who settled in Locarno, seem also to have been much blessed, but there was one man raised up of God, to whom, more than all others, the gospel cause was indebted.

Giovanni Beccaria, the apostle of Locarno,' after being educated for the Romish priesthood, had opened a school in his native town. He writes to Pellican of Zürich, July 1544, that at the age of twenty-eight, he had found himself ignorant of the way of salvation-that he had since been taught it, however, by the guidance of the Holy Spirit, through reading the writings of the reformers. How your words have revived my zeal! Oh, that we had the freedom which you enjoy!' And then he asks Pellican, whom he calls his father, to write him often. He was but a young soldier of the cross, new to the contest, and anxious to be guided by the reformers of Zürich.

There must have been something about this man wonderfully attractive-no great reach of mind, perhaps-no very profound acquirements, but a fearless Christian courage, and a warmhearted zeal which seems never to have faltered. He moves among his scholars as a prayerful Christian instructor, anxiously devoted to their welfare, and some of his letters regarding pupils who had left him, breathe an affection so simple and-tender, such almost maternal fondness, that we do not wonder they loved him for life, or that his school proved the very nursery of the church in Locarno.

Silently, but decisively, the work now went forward. The Scriptures were in circulation. Beccaria and Castiglione were men of zeal and prayer, and from year to year, their adherents increased. At last, in 1548, they felt it their duty to make open avowal of their faith. Beccaria assembled his fellow-believers in

one of the churches for public worship, according to the Protestant form, and thus struck a blow which not only resounded through the neighbouring Popish districts, but was destined, ere long, to shake the whole Swiss confederacy to its centre.

Before going farther, it may be necessary to remind our readers of the political connexion subsisting between Locarno and the cantons. Along with the neighbouring Italian bailiwicks, it had formed since 1512, a dependency of the Diet, somewhat resembling, on a small scale, our own colonial possessions. The supreme executive power was lodged in a Swiss governor or Vogt, whose office lasted for two years, and who was appointed by the cantons in rotation. There was a council of 21 members chosen by the Locarnese from among themselves. There was a secretary, whose appointment was permanent, and there was an annual settlement -deputies from the various cantons riding across the mountains once a year, to inspect the affairs of the bailiwicks. No complaint, a traveller quietly remarks, 'should exist among these people of a scarcity of persons to govern them.'

After the preaching of Beccaria, the magistrates and priests of Locarno roused themselves at once to violence. Restraining this first impulse, however, and deeming a pacific course the wiser, they sent to Lugano for a champion, a Dominican monk, Fra Lorenzo, to preach down the gospel. Under a penalty of 50 crowns, all the Locarnese were ordered to attend his sermons; but the unwilling audiences thus forced into church, listened, as may be supposed, in no friendly mood; and the learned Dominican was sometimes, even in the pulpit, subjected to no very courteous or palatable criticisms. Beccaria, thinking it at last time to bring the matter to an issue, challenged Lorenzo to a public discussion. The challenge was boldly accepted. Theses, embracing the more important points in question, were, after the manner of the time, publicly affixed to the door of the council chamber, and men looked eagerly forward to the 5th of August. Two additional Popish champions, the brothers Camuzzi, were engaged for the occasion.

The hall of the ancient baronial castle, the residence of the governor, was the scene of meeting, and must have presented on the appointed day, a striking spectacle. On the one side, came forth in high state, the governor Niklaus Wirz, a fierce old papist, from Unterwalden, and took his seat as president. An imposing array of officials, nobles, and priests, surrounded him. The Popish disputants were in his train. On the other side was Beccaria, attended by a few of his former pupils, more particularly by Taddeo Duno, who, after achieving high literary success in the universities of Basel and Pavia, had just returned full of

youthful fire and talent, to take his place for the gospel at his master's side.

The point first in debate, was the supremacy of the Pope; but Beccaria and his opponent had not gone far till the inferiority of the papist became obvious. Suddenly they were interrupted by Wirz, whose seat, it must be confessed, inasmuch as he knew nothing of the language in which the discussion was going forward, could not have been very comfortable. The rough soldier, however, gathered enough to show him that his own champions were being put to the worse, and like one who knew the use of the sword better than the pen, he at once ordered silence. Turning to Beccaria, he demanded authoritatively, 'Do you receive the doctrine of the Church of Rome?"

'We receive it,' was the reply, 'so far as it agrees with the Word of God.'

6

Yes or no,' harshly cried the enraged governor.'

We receive it,' again said Beccaria, in so far as it agrees with the Word of God.'

Blind with passion, Wirz, after some unfair proceedings, ordered Beccaria to prison.

That order, however, was a great deal more easily given than executed. Before the castle there had assembled a crowd eagerly awaiting the result, and when they heard how it fared with their beloved teacher, they rose at once into high excitement. The dismayed priests, looking out of the castle windows, saw men with drawn daggers evidently preparing to storm the place; and on a word from Beccaria, the deed would have been done; but he was the minister of peace, and, with the help of his father, who was among them, succeeded in allaying the hot Italian natures of his followers. The monks, meantime, wished themselves safely back in Lugano. Wirz went out to see them on the way, but he met with such a reception in the streets, more especially at the inndoor, and such remonstrances were made by the council, that, fairly frightened at the storm he had raised, he gave orders to set Beccaria free.

Foiled thus and exasperated, he took to horse, and rode across the Alps, to seek aid from the Popish cantons. Beccaria knew well it was no time to delay; and starting for Zürich, made all haste to put himself and his friends under the protection of the Swiss reformers.

Meyer at this point places vividly before us the state of parties and the public men of Zürich. Zuingle for a considerable period had been dead, but his spirit still reigned; and that city, once the cradle, was now the great bulwark of the Protestant cause. From this, perhaps the most interesting part of the volumes, we

must make room for one extract-a portrait of Bullinger, the man whom Zuingle had indicated as his own successor, and who at the age of twenty-seven, when the great Reformer lay dead in the bloody field of Cappel, had been called forward by the general voice into his vacant place. After narrating the success of his early ministry,-how aged men who had withstood all Zuingle's efforts sat melted under the preaching of Bullinger, Meyer proceeds,―

"His first care was to consolidate internally the church of Zürich. He gave it a fixed presbyterial order (synodal-ordnung). Selecting talented youths to be educated at the public expense, he laid the foundation of a class of native preachers, not only for his own district, but for the common bailiwicks. For the vacant professorships, he procured men of such eminence, that Zürich soon obtained the fame of furnishing an education hardly to be equalled in any city of Germany. The neglected public library he set in order, and enriched by the purchase of all Zuingle's books. He watched most conscientiously over the funds for public education and the support of the poor, more than once appearing before the council with earnest representations on the subject.

"And how indefatigable were his labours as a preacher! During the first seven years he daily mounted the pulpit,-sometimes twice in the day. Afterwards his efforts in this way were somewhat lessened. Within twelve years he had expounded publicly nearly the whole books of the Old and New Testaments. Simple, level to the humblest capacity,* yet attractive, his preaching was Scriptural, answering in every respect to our ideas of what preaching should be,-acute in doctrine,-mild in consolation,-vigorous in reproof. Sometimes, it is true, his brethren would have had him somewhat harder on the town council, but eagerly did the people listen to him; and it was remarked, that within ten years not ten persons had left the church before the conclusion of any of his ser

mons.

This course of action, however, was not the only, nor perhaps even the most important sphere in which this honoured man laboured for the good of Zürich. His powerful mind looked to all the separate interests of life, saw how they were connected, and sought to bring them into one harmonious whole. Even to what seemed minute and unimportant he devoted

* It is necessary to state that this is not the language of inconsiderate eulogy. To every sentence, almost to every clause, Meyer appends in his notes elaborate proof drawn from cotemporary authorities. Thus, in illustration of Bullinger's simple and clear style of preaching, we have an anecdote of a distinguished German statesman, who being in Zürich, went to hear him, expecting from so celebrated a man some elaborate or ingeniously constructed discourse. To his surprise, the sermon was powerful indeed and edifying, but quite simple, and delivered in a genuine Swiss acAt the close of the services he went up to Bullinger and expressed his astonishment that he should so let himself down. Did not your Grace,' Bullinger rejoined, look across the church, and mark the thickly crowded otter skin caps, and old wives' hoods? These are the people for whom I chiefly preach,—not for great lords or learned men.'

cent.