Let all therefore, whether priests or preachers, have respect to the great shepherd Jesus Christ, who gave his body and his blood for the poor people. Let us prefer to be nothing, if only the poor sheep, gone so far astray, may find the right way, may come to Jesus and give themselves to God. That will be better than if we should gain all the world and lose those for whom Jesus died. If any man will exalt himself against Jesus, if any man will fight against the faith, it would be better for him if he had never been born. Let us not despise our neighbor. Let us not mock him. Let us not shut the door of the kingdom of heaven and take away the key of knowledge. Let us be free from all hatred and rancour. Let us love all men, pray for all men, do good to all men. Let us visit the poor and the afflicted, that is the true pilgrimage. Those little ones are the images of God, and it is to those images that we ought to resort, to them that we should carry food and candles…

-William Farel

William Farel (1489 – 1565 AD) was a French evangelist, and a founder of the Reformed Church in the cantons of Neuchâtel, Berne, Geneva, and Vaud in Switzerland. He is most often remembered for having persuaded John Calvin to remain in Geneva and for persuading him to return there in 1541, after their expulsion in 1538. They influenced the government of Geneva to the point that it became the “Protestant Rome”, where Protestants took refuge. Together with Calvin, Farel worked to train missionary preachers who spread the Protestant cause to other countries, and especially to France.