From Rise of Protestantism in France to Publication of the Institutes - James Aitken Wylie

martyr-piles into one blazing torch, and holding it
aloft, made the splendor of their cause and of their
names to shine from the east even unto the west of
Christendom.
The publication of the Institutes placed Calvin
in the van of the Reformed hosts, he was
henceforward the recognised chief of the
Reformation. His retreat was now known, and this
city on the edge of the Black Forest, on the banks
of the Rhine, could no longer afford him the
privacy he sought. Men from every country were
beginning to seek him out, and gather round him.
Rising up, he hastily quitted Basle, and crossing
"Italy's snowy wall" (by what route is not known),
and holding on his way across the plain of
Lombardy till he reached the banks of the Po, he
found an asylum at the court of Renee, daughter of
Louis XII. of France, and Duchess of Ferrara, who,
like Margaret of Valois, had opened her heart to
the doctrines of the Reformation. Calvin disappears
for awhile from the scene.
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