_Calvin._ ‘So then, in case the Protestants are not willing to place themselves and every thing belonging to them in the hands of the Roman pontiff, they are to be subdued by arms; so long as a single man remains who shall dare to open his lips against the abominable supremacy of the Roman see, there shall be no end and no limit to the shedding of blood. Such is the shepherd’s crook of which he will make use to drive the sheep into the fold. But the prophet says, _Take counsel together and it shall come to nought; associate yourselves, O ye people, and ye shall be broken in pieces_.[67] There are men, grievous to tell! traitors, enemies of their country, who are everywhere scattering the seeds of intestine war; who, as soon as they think that men’s minds are quite prepared, brandish their torches and kindle a fire; who, the moment they see a spark, make haste to throw dry wood on it and raise a flame with their poisonous breath, until at last the whole of Germany shall be nothing but one vast conflagration.’[68] If Calvin is rather sharp in his reply, the pope, it must be owned, had not infused into his attack much mildness or fairness. ‘It is not easy to decide, _to speak in a Christian manner_,’ he had said, ‘which are the worst enemies of Jesus Christ, the Protestants or the Turks. For the latter kill only the body, but the former destroy the soul.’ This saying shocked even the judicious and impartial Sleidan. ‘Have not the Turks,’ said he, ‘spread their religion everywhere by arms? And who among us have shown more zeal to exalt the grace and the virtue of Jesus Christ than the Protestants, who have in this respect surpassed the Catholics themselves?’ The pope even did not shrink from having recourse to the same methods as the Turks. He had sent to the emperor his own nephew to scheme the destruction of the Reformation and to extinguish it, if need be, in the blood of the Evangelicals; while no one more earnestly than Calvin stigmatized beforehand that fratricidal war, to which the desire to crush the Reformation afterwards gave rise. The blow having been violent, the return blow was energetic. Calvin was wrong, however, in one respect—in that he did not fully and publicly acknowledge that there were honorable exceptions to the licentiousness of priests and to the other evils of the papacy. But he has elsewhere exhibited this fairness; for he distinguishes among the Catholics two classes—those in whom _malice predominates_, and those who are deluded _by a false appearance of truth_.[69] [Sidenote: Calvin At Ratisbon.]