willing to permit any minister to occupy one
of their pulpits whom they have reason to suspect of skeptical opinions.
The infidel Rumpf was excluded in 1858 from the list of candidates for
the ministry, and all his subsequent efforts for restoration have failed
in the chief council. A similar occurrence took place in Berne in 1847,
upon the calling of Zeller to the theological professorship.

We now turn to a less evangelical part of Switzerland. Zuerich is one of
the acknowledged centres of European Rationalism. Its spiritual decline
has been rapid during the last twenty-five years. In 1839, Strauss, the
author of the _Life of Jesus_, was invited by the chief council to take
a theological chair in the seminary. But the people arising as one man
against the measure, the appointment failed, the council was overthrown
by a popular revolution, and the city still pays a pension to the
disappointed aspirant. But in lamentable contrast with that event is one
of more recent occurrence. As late as 1864, when the little town of
Uster was about to elect a pastor, the candidate declared himself "a
friend of progress and light." Some religious men, unwilling to see
their children placed under the instruction of a skeptic, took upon
themselves the task of showing in what the "progress" consisted. They
accordingly published a notice to their fellow citizens in which they
set forth the avowed opinions of their candidate. The document asserted
that he believed the Bible to be a tissue of fictions and fables; Jesus
a sinful man like others, neither risen from the dead, nor sitting in
the glory of his Father; no one can assert with positiveness a life
beyond the grave; and the opinion that we are reconciled to God by Jesus
Christ, merely a superstition and a day-dream. The authors of the
circular besought the ecclesiastical council to deliver them and their
children from the promulgation of such doctrines, and further reminded
them that every pastor on entering upon his functions must swear to
preach faithfully the word of God, both law and gospel, according to the
fundamental principles of the evangelical Reformed church. The council
took no notice of the remonstrance, though the candidate did not deny
the charges. He was elected by eight hundred and sixty-five votes
against one hundred and forty-five. In the church, where the result was
proclaimed, the acclamations were so loud that they "shook the windows."
In the evening there was a s