In proportion as Geneva grew weaker, Savoy grew stronger. The duke, by circumstances which must have appeared to him providential, had lately seen several provinces settled on different branches of his house, reunited successively to his own states, and had thus become one of the most powerful princes of Europe. La Bresse, Bugey, the Genevois, Gex, and Vaud, replaced under his sceptre, surrounded and blockaded Geneva on all sides. The poor little city was quite lost in the midst of these wide provinces, bristling with castles; and its territory was so small that, as they said, there were more Savoyards than Genevans who heard the bells of St. Pierre. The states of Savoy enfolded Geneva as in a net, and a bold stroke of the powerful duke would, it was thought, be sufficient to crush it.
The dukes were not only around Geneva, they were within it. By means of their intrigues with the bishops, who were their fathers, sons, brothers, cousins, or subjects, they had crept into the city, and increased their influence either by flattery and bribes, or by threats and terror. The vulture had plumed the weak bird, and imagined that to devour him would now be an easy task. The duke by means of some sleight-of-hand trick, in which the prelate would be his accomplice, might in the twinkling of an eye entirely change his position--rise from the hospitable chair which My Lords of Geneva so courteously offered him, and seat himself proudly on a throne. How was the feeble city, so hunted down, gagged and fettered by its two oppressors, able to resist and achieve its glorious liberties? We shall see.
New times were beginning in Europe, God was touching society with his powerful hand; I say ‘society’ and not the State. Society is above the State; it always preserves its right of priority, and in great epochs makes its initiative felt. It is not the State that acts upon society: the movements of the latter produce the transformations of the State, just as it is the atmosphere which directs the course of a ship, and not the ship which fixes the direction of the wind. But if society is above the State, God is above both. At the beginning of the sixteenth century God was breathing upon the human race, and this divine breath worked strange revivals in religious belief, political opinions, civilisation, letters, science, morals, and industry. A great reformation was on the eve of taking place.