ed well
in his age, and that it is our business now to describe. The republican
feeling of equality gave him, moreover courage to face every opponent
with boldness, yet always with argument. He honored the old families,
when they practised the old virtues. The man of rank, who sinned
against his country, was in his eyes more worthy of punishment than a
common person. Meanwhile these views found too much sympathy in the
free Canton of Glarus, to allow his enemies to attack him, except in an
indirect way. They harped, therefore, so much the more on the third
charge, that he even, the fault-finder himself, was not innocent.
"Why," say they, "does he rail out continually against French intrigue?
Only because he has sold himself to the Papal interest. Is he not in
close league with Cardinal Schinner? Is he not his spy, his minion,
commissioned by him to distribute the presents of the Pope? Does he not
receive letters, testimonials of honor, from the Nuncio? Yes, he--even
he who calls us takers of bribes, draws a yearly pension from the
Pope."

And certainly it was so, but with this difference--an honorable
intention on his part, and a base one on theirs. The scientific and
practical qualifications of Schinner and his clear insight into the
relations of life were highly esteemed by Zwingli, who looked on him as
a strong champion in the contest against French corruption. And in
truth this son of a poor shepherd in Valais was no common man. By
talent and industry he had raised himself to the bishopric of that
Canton. Defeated by an opposing party he had to flee, but was already
known to the Pope, from whom he received a Cardinal's hat. Of course he
now labored to advance the interests of Rome and the Empire among the
Confederates, but at the time when Zwingli became acquainted with him,
not by such disreputable means, as afterwards. Any separation from the
church was as yet far from the thoughts of the Reformer, although he
already desired the correction of existing abuses. What was more
natural for him than to seek to win over to his assistance those, who
could exert a direct influence in Rome, the Cardinal and the Nuncio?
And indeed, a few years later, when he came out manfully against the
politics of Rome, he yet distinguished between the person of the
Cardinal and his cause, and true to earlier feelings of friendship,
defended the former, as long as it was possible. "They,"--wrote he to
Myconius--"who blame me for yielding