To the pious and learned man Dominus Christopher Goodman the Englishman, most faithful minister of the word of God at Geneva.

I send greetings. For the fact that you wrote to me, most beloved in Christ, I am very grateful. For you know, if you think over to yourself all that concerns us, how dear and delightful you have always been to me. Therefore the memory of you cannot but be most pleasant to me. But if spatial distance and the different nature of our callings stood in the way of our living together, nevertheless love for you has never been lessened in my mind, nor, as I trust, will it decrease in any way.

But the matter about which you now write is like this. My Julius gave me some report about your little book. But before I had leisure to study the matter, I heard that some sort of dispute had sprung up about this whole business. Therefore I decided not to get involved. For in resolving quarrels I am not very fortunate as an arbiter. I know you have not forgotten what occurred in my experience when I was at Argentina [ = Strasbourg] and you were setting out from me there for Frankfort. My conscience is my witness before God, how close to me I had previously considered you and my Whittingham. For I well know that I owe a very great deal to each of you, and as long as I live I will never forget it. And nonetheless I there felt that, unwillingly in a way and [p. 63] in a way even fighting against it, I was dragged along by our Englishmen to declare my opinion in that case which was then being dealt with and that I ran into some sort of resentment. Now is not the time to attempt to show how ever afterwards I wished that resentment to be obliterated and extinguished.

Accordingly, do not be surprised – I ask you – if now I give neither answer nor definite determination about the matters you propounded. It is my intention to avoid disputes and quarrels as far as it is possible to do so. None have come here. But if they should come to put questions to me, I will deal with them in the same way that I dealt with you. And you can make this promise to yourself about me – that it will never happen that I harm you by word or deed – indeed, apart from quarrels and disputes of this sort I will help you vigorously in any matter whatsoever in which I can.

Perhaps I will seem cowardly or weak. Let others think what they will: that is the way I am. And – to confess the truth – I am not sorry. When there is a dispute among friends, the arbiter is scarcely able to avoid emerging as the enemy of one side or the other. Against papists and against flesh-eaters¹Sarkophagous, in Greek characters. The word means ‘cannibal’ and is, I presume, used here against Catholic or Lutheran upholders of a real presence in the eucharist. I will never fail in my duty to the camp of the evangelicals. I am totally on fire against their fraudulent claims and lies. But from ruptures among the brethren I have decided to absent myself as far as it can be done and as far as it will be permitted to me. Nor on that account – as I persuade myself – will the truth be sacrificed.

You [plural] have there the incomparable man Calvin, whose judgement, most grave and most learned, you [plural] are easily able to consult and to whose verdict I give the greatest weight and wonder at in every way.

All my people greet you [singular] with one voice. I likewise desire that you extend greetings in my name to Whittingham together with his wife. And say that I congratulate him wonderfully on his new marriage.

11 June 1558. At Tigurum [ = Zürich].

Your Peter Martyr

Pio ac erudito viro Domino Christophoro Gudmanno Anglo / ministro verbi dei fidelissimo / Genevae.

S[alutem] D[ico] Quod ad me scripseris dilectissime in Christo frater magnas tibi gratias ago; / scis enim si tecum omnia nostra reputes quam fueris mihi perpetuo charus et amabilis. quare / non potest mihi tua memoria non esse iucundissima. Quod si distantia locorum et diversa / ratio vocationum obstitit quo minus una viveremus, charitas attamen erga te nunquam / in animo meo est imminuta, neque uti confido ulla ex parte decrescet. Res vero de qua nunc / scribis ita se habet. Julius de tuo libello mihi aliquid retulit. sed priusquam vacarit / mihi causam cognoscere, audivi nescio quid subortum de tota ea re controversiae. qua-/re decrevi non me admiscere. sum enim in litibus componendis parum faelix arbiter. / Scio te non oblitum quid usu venerit cum essem Argentinae, tuque a me inde proficis-/cereris Francfordiam. Te atque meum Vithingamum quam antea[?] coniunctos mecum ha-/buerim conscientia mea coram deo testis est. nam utrique vestrum probe novi me pluri-/ma debere. nec quoad vixero unquam obliviscar: et nihilominus ibi me sensi nolentem / quodammodo et / [p. 63] quodammodo et reluctantem a nostris Anglis pertractum ut in ea causa quae tunc / agebatur meam sententiam dicerem, in nescio quam offensionem incurrisse. quam / ut semper cupiverim postea et abolitam et extinctam non est quod nunc ostendere / aggrediar. Proinde si nunc de iis quae proposuisti neque respondeo neque definio quaeso / ne mireris. In animo est contentiones et lites quoad fieri potest evitare. Huc nulli / venerunt, quod si venerint me sciscitatum idem cum illis agam atque tecum. idque / tibi de me potes polliceri, nunquam fore ut lingua seu facto te laedam, imo extra / huiusmodi lites aut contentiones quacunque in re potero enixe te iuvabo. Videbor / fortassis ignavus aut mollis. existiment alii quod volunt, ego ita sum factus. neque ut verum fatear me paenitet. Controversia dum est inter amicos aegre potest ar-/biter evitare, quin alterius partis inimicus evada[??] [doesn’t look like evadat]. Ego in Papistas et in sarkofá-/gouj [in Greek characters] evangelicorum castris nunquam deero. in eorum imposturas et mendacia / totus ardeo. a fratrum vero dissidiis quantum fieri potest et mihi licuerit abes-/se statui. Neque propterea ut mihi persuadeo veritatis iactura fiet. Habetis isthic / virum incomparabilem Calvinum, cuius iudicium et gravissimum et doctissimum / facile potestis consulere, cuius ego calculum et plurimi facio et omnibus modis / admiror. Mei te omnes ad unum salutant. cupio item ego ut Vithingamum una / cum sua meo nomine saluere iubeas. dicasque me illi mirifice gratulari novum / matrimonium. 11° Junii 1558. Tiguri. / Tuus /

Petrus Martyr.