The delegation set out, and was joined by Viret at Lausanne. Meanwhile it had become known at Geneva that Calvin and Farel were returning, under the conduct and the patronage of delegates from the state of Berne. This news created much astonishment. What! these two ministers were banished for having refused to adopt the ritual of Berne, and now Berne takes them into her favor and brings them back! Berne appreciated the grandeur of the Reformation and the worth of the reformers. But there were some of the Genevese who could not see beyond their own walls, and who seemed to have no apprehension whatever of the great change which was renewing all Christendom, and of which Calvin and Farel were two of the most illustrious agents. The confirmation of the tidings caused a great stir in men’s minds. The council determined to refuse the reformers permission to enter the town, and the most violent of their adversaries resolved to oppose their return by force. An ambush was laid at some distance from the ramparts, and twenty gladiators, as Calvin calls them, were posted in arms at the very gate of the city, as if the repulse of a hostile force were intended.[696] The deputation was not more than a mile from Geneva when a messenger of the council met them.[697] He handed to the Bernese ambassadors a dispatch from the council, in which it was written, ‘To prevent a scandal, do not bring back Farel and Calvin, for it would be in violation of the decree passed by the community, and of the will of the same.’[698] But their conscience bore them witness that their cause was good, and they desired to get this acknowledged on the part of those whom God had committed to their care. They were therefore willing to pursue their journey, not suspecting what awaited them. But the Bernese delegates, who had doubtless been informed by the messenger of the excited state of the people, strongly urged them to give it up. ‘We should have gone on our way calmly,’ said Calvin to his friends, when he had heard of the violent measures taken to stop them, ‘if the delegates had not forcibly resisted our intention; and this saved our lives.’ The fact that their lives were in danger, attested by Calvin in a letter addressed to Bullinger a few days after the event, cannot be called in question. True, it is easy to invent, more than three centuries later, contrary hypotheses; but the state of agitation prevailing in Geneva, far from invalidating the testimony of the reformers, confirms it. [Sidenote: THE BERNESE EMBASSY.]