The Zürich pastor would seem to have been the most active of all the ministers in collecting and imparting information of a kind that would lead to unanimity of conclusion among the Churches and Councils. His friend, Ambrose Blaurer, acknowledging receipt of a letter from him communicating the decision of Zürich, says that he ‘had thought the pestilent Servetus, whose book he had read twenty years ago, must long since have been dead and buried.’ But the self-righteous man must add further: ‘We are surely tried by heresies and satanic abortions of the sort, in order that they who are steadfast in the faith may be made known.’ Sulzer of Basle has also been primed by him of Zürich, for, in reply to the intimation he has received of what has been done, he says that he, Sulzer, ‘is rejoiced to have heard of the arrest of Servetus in a quarter where it seems he may be effectually kept from infecting the Church with his heretical dogmas in time to come; although I know there be some who are violently opposed to Calvin’s proceedings, and the subserviency of the Senate in the business.’ So much for the Churches and Councils of the Cantons consulted; and how little the latter were disposed to act, or, indeed, were capable of acting of themselves, and on their own appreciation of the questions submitted to them, is made manifest by the letter which Haller wrote to Bullinger at this time: I have to give you my best thanks, dear Sir and Brother, for your diligence in communicating with the Genevese [and, of course, with the Bernese also] so speedily. Our Council have been of the same mind as yours in their reply. We, _as ordered by them_, have exposed the principal errors of Servetus, article by article. When our Councillors had been made aware of their nature, they were so horror-struck, that I have no doubt, had the writer been in prison here, he would have been burned alive. But as the matters in question were very little intelligible to them, they desired that I should reply in a letter as from myself to the Council of Geneva. They added, however, from themselves, that they exhorted the Genevese so to deal with the poison that it should not, by any negligence of theirs, be suffered to spread to neighbouring districts; and, indeed, it has often happened that commotions in Geneva have extended from its walls and got footing within ours. I think I need not send you a copy of our reply, as it agrees so entirely in every respect with your own. Yours most truly, J. HALLER. Berne: October 19, 1553.