ABSTRACT
The incident, exposing Ferrara's ducal court as a nest of heresy, caused a hullabaloo, amidst which Calvin once more fled, stopping in Basel and then returning to France. It is possible that Farel's urgency to hold on to Calvin arose not simply from an abstract anxiety to defend the Genevan Reformation but should be read in the light of the city's chronic factionalism. It is also significant that, when Calvin was expelled from Geneva in 1538, Strassburg was where he took up residence, for it had emerged under the careful and inspired leadership of Bucer and Capito as a major urban centre of well-established Reformation. The distribution of Lutheran literature in 1532 was one factor that helped to ensure that by the time Calvin was to arrive in Geneva, its Reformation was a fait accompli and that he came in 1536 to an enlisted Protestant community.
