General
GOD AND MAN
No, I will not believe because of Tertullian or Cyprian, or Origen, or Chrysostom, or Peter Lombard, or Thomas Aquinas, not even because of Erasmus or Luther. . . . If I did so, I should be the disciple of men. . . . I will believe only Jesus Christ my Shepherd.49
ON THE NECESSARY WORK OF THE HOLY SPIRIT
Faith and religious belief cannot be forced but must proceed from a free and sincere heart. This, men cannot communicate, but it is God alone who can accomplish it. For He is the one who illuminates the heart and intelligence of such as He chooses to call by His Holy Spirit and without whom none can have true knowledge of true religion nor practice it as one should. For it is an utter waste of time to attempt to force a man to follow a religion of which he has no true understanding or to which he has not given his heart or affection […] For one does not make good Christians by the sword, by fire, or by faggots […] but by good example, good doctrine and a good life.50
THE AUTHORITY OF HOLY SCRIPTURE
For the faith of true believers is not founded on their particular opinions, nor on the opinions of men, but on the pure and explicit Word of God. And on this believers are established, not by opinion, but by certain faith, which is as different from mere opinion as the latter is from the sure knowledge of solid science.51
CHRISTIAN RESPONSE TO OPPOSITION
For true believers always are better able to gain friendship and vanquish their enemies by combating them with good doctrine, faith, charity, steadfastness, patience, prayers, and by all good works rather than by fire, swords, force and violence.52
ON ROMAN CATHOLICISM
Viret looked upon Roman Catholicism in his time as little more than an international political movement and considered the Pope to be as much a secular lord as a spiritual leader. . . . He considered the papal court the most cruel and vicious in all the world.53
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49 As quoted in J. H. Merle D’Aubigne, D.D., History of the Reformation in Europe (Sprinkle Publications, Harrisonburg, VA, 2000), page 223
50 Pierre Viret, L’Interim fait par dialogues,page 135 and 137
51 Ibid., page 247
52 As quoted in Linder, The Political Ideas of Pierre Viret, page 151
53 Ibid., page 108
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