Not one of the theologians present at the synod seems to have taken the cause of Calvin more to heart than the man who, with Melanchthon, was perhaps the most cautious of the reformers, Capito. A man of naturally gentle spirit, he had nevertheless displayed courage in recalling Luther to moderation, and in doing the same afterwards with respect to his colleague of Strasburg, Mathias Zell. He approved of the course of Farel and Calvin; he even set himself to console them. ‘There is nothing disgraceful,’ he said to them, ‘in your banishment, and we have no fear that it will prove hurtful to the Church. Your enemies themselves only reproach you with too much warmth of zeal. Unhappily, there are not wanting ministers who teach the Gospel without discipline; who prefer to hold an office which they treat as nothing more than an office that yields profit. This leads to license instead of the liberty of Christ.[679] Discipline is necessary to the Churches. Some persons fancy that what each man may do is no concern of ours; as if Christ had not said that if a man has a hundred sheep, and only one of them go astray he must go in search of it. What! because the authority of the papacy has been cast off, must the power of the Word and of the ministry be treated as likewise abolished? Some one may say, I know enough of the Gospel; I can read; what do I want with you? Preach to those who wish to hear you! Ah! discipline is a thing to which our Churches are not accustomed, a thing which flesh and blood detest. Ought we then to wonder that you have not been able, you two alone, to reform at once a town so large?’[680] The assembly therefore approved the fourteen articles presented by Calvin and Farel, and then ‘declared the causes of their banishment from Geneva to be not legitimate.’[681] In the eyes of these Swiss Christians assembled at Zurich, these two exiles were the glory of the Reformation; doctors whose praise was in all the Churches; two of the prime movers in the great transformation which was being effected in Christendom. The honor, the duty of the Christians of Switzerland, demanded that these pious and illustrious men, victims of passions hostile to the Gospel, should be restored to the position in which God had set them. The synod, therefore, wrote to Geneva, and earnestly requested measures adapted to raise the Church up again, and particularly the recall of the pastors. At the same time, it recommended the Bernese, and especially Kunz, to support this request; and Kunz accepted the charge. Zurich being desirous likewise of doing something, Bullinger wrote on the subject, May 4, to the provost de Watteville. Farel and Calvin then returned to Berne, disposed to endure with patience and meekness, but at the same time full of hope.[682]