VIRET, PIERRE. - The "reformer" of French-speaking Switzerland, b. at Orbe (Vaud) on 4 May 1511, d. at Orthez on 4 April 1571.
In 1527 he was in Paris as a student; he adhered to Lutheranism and was forced to flee from Paris, returning to Orbe; the Bernese, lords of the country, received William Farel, who charged V. with preaching in his native city; he delivered his first sermon on 6 May 1531, not yet twenty years old. He attacked Catholics violently at Orbe, then at Grandson and Payerne, and finally at Geneva, first with Farel, then with Calvin; afterward he carried on religious activity at Lausanne for 23 years and took part in the creation of the city's Protestant Academy. Deprived of his office by Bern, following the conflict over excommunication, he moved in 1559 to Geneva, but, for reasons of health, he had to emigrate to the south of France: he exercised considerable influence in the region of Nîmes and Tarascon, where he attracted numerous Catholics to Calvinism: laymen, priests and religious. He is found at Lyon in 1562, at Orange in 1565, and finally at Orthez, in Béarn, near Jeanne d'Albret. On 5 May 1875 a monument was erected to him at Orbe.
His works, preserved in the Libraries of Bern, Lausanne, Neuchâtel and Geneva, are numerous. The principal one is: Instruction chrétienne en la doctrine de la Loi et de l'Évangile (Geneva 1564), in the form of a dialogue.
Bibliography4 works
Leone Cristiani