ship the Almighty acceptably in spite
of superstitious observances, which, while countenancing by apparent
acquiescence, they rejected in their hearts. The excellence of the
reformation already inaugurated at Strasbourg made a deep and very
favorable impression upon Roussel. He wrote to Bishop Briconnet that the
daily preaching of a pure doctrine, "without dross or leaven of the
Pharisees,"[177] the crowds of attentive hearers, the schools presided
over by men as illustrious for piety as for letters, and the careful
provision for the poor, would delight his correspondent were he to see
them. He did not dissemble his own great satisfaction that the
monasteries had been changed into educational establishments, the
pictures taken away from the churches, and every altar removed except
one, on which the communion was celebrated, as nearly as possible,
according to the plan of its institution.[178] At the same time he
renounced none of his excessive caution. His words were still those he
had uttered when urged, a twelvemonth earlier, by Farel,
Oecolampadius, and Zwingle, to strike out boldly and by an open
dispute on religion compel the attention of the thoughtless world. "The
flesh is weak! As my friends, Lefevre and others, urge, the convenient
season has not yet come, the Gospel has not yet been scattered
sufficiently far and wide. We must not assume the Lord's prerogative for
sending laborers into the harvest, but leave the work to Him whose it
is, and who can easily raise up a far richer harvest than that for whose
safety we are solicitous!"[179]

Such were the paltry evasions of cowardly souls, to excuse themselves
for the neglect of admitted duty. We cannot wonder at the burning words
of condemnation which this pusillanimity called forth from the pen of
brave Pierre Toussain. "I have spoken to Lefevre and Roussel," he wrote
some months later, "but certainly Lefevre has not a particle of courage.
May God confirm and strengthen him! Let them be as wise as they please,
let them wait, procrastinate, and dissemble; the Gospel will never be
preached without the _cross_! When I see these things, when I see the
mind of the king, the mind of the duchess [Margaret of Angouleme] as
favorable as possible to the advancement of the Gospel of Christ, and
those who ought to forward this matter, according to the grace given
them, obstructing their design, I cannot refrain from tears. They say,
indeed: 'It is not yet time, the hour has