itself in his heart, that even the Pope and papal church _were not so
papal as he_. The man who came to him with the Pope's endorsement
appeared to him like a god, while he would gladly have overwhelmed in
ruin the sacrilegious wretch that dared to say a word against the Roman
pontiff and his authority.[133]

[Sidenote: Lefevre's commentary on the Pauline Epistles.]

But the enthusiastic devotion of Lefevre and his more impetuous disciple
to the tenets of the Roman church was to be shaken by a closer study of
the Scriptures. In 1508 Lefevre completed a Latin commentary upon the
Psalms.[134] In 1512 he published a commentary in the same language on
the Pauline Epistles--a work which may indeed fall short of the standard
of criticism established by a subsequent age, but yet contains a clear
enunciation of the doctrine of justification by faith, the cardinal
doctrine of the Reformation.[135]

[Sidenote: Foresees the coming reformation.]

Thus, five years before Luther posted his theses on the doors of the
church at Wittemberg, Jacques Lefevre had proclaimed, in no equivocal
terms, his belief in the same great principles. But Lefevre's lectures
in the college and his written commentary were addressed to the learned.
Consequently they produced no such immediate and startling effect as the
ninety-five propositions of the Saxon monk. Lefevre was not himself to
be an active instrument in the French reformation. His office was rather
to prepare the way for others--not, perhaps, more sincere, but certainly
more courageous--to enter upon the hazardous undertaking of attempting
to renovate the church. His faithful disciple, indeed, has preserved for
us a remarkable prophecy, uttered by Lefevre at the very time when he
was still assiduous in his devotion to the Virgin Mary and the saints.
Grasping Farel by the hand, the venerable doctor more than once
addressed to him the significant words, which made a deep impression on
the hearer's mind: "Guillaume, the world is going to be renewed, and you
will behold it!"[136]

[Sidenote: Controversy with Beda.]

[Sidenote: The Sorbonne's declaration.]

Lefevre did not intermit his biblical studies. In 1518 he published a
short treatise on "the three Marys," to prove that Mary the sister of
Lazarus, Mary Magdalene, and "the woman which was a sinner," were not
one and the same person, according to the common belief of the time.
Unfortunately, the Roman church, by the lessons set down for