YALE
DIVINITY SCHOOL
LIBRARY

Gift of
JOHN R. MOTT

C AL YIN:

HIS LIFE,
HIS LABOURS, AND HIS WRITINGS.

TRANSLATED PROM THE FRENCH OF
FELIX BUNGENER,
AUTHOR OF "HISTORY OF THE COUNCIL OF TRENT."

EDINBURGH:
T. & T. CLARK, 38 GEORGE STREET;
LONDON : HAMILTON, ADAMS, & CO. ;
DUBLIN: J. ROBERTSON & CO.

MDCCCLXIII.

EDINBURGH: TURNBULL AND SPEARS, PRINTERS,

BOOK THE FIRST.
(1509—1536.)

BOOK THE FIBST.

SUMMARY.

Introduction — Calvin in the presence of history,
I. His childhood — His father — His mother — Early successes — A chaplain of
twelve years' old.
II. The plague at Noyon— Departure for Paris— Calumnies on this subject.
III. Paris— Mathurin Cordier, tutor of the college — What, at that time, was
the position of the scholar and the master? — Few details preserved — Luther ;
Calvin — First severities against the Protestants of Prance — What did he
think of those severities ?
IV. Moral development — Literary development^Calvin and the French tongue
— Journey to Noyon — Return to Paris.
V. He forsakes divinity for law — Orleans — Success in his new careei- — Bourges
— Alciatus and Roman law — Calvin attracted and subdued.
VI. Returns to theology — Wolmar — How the Bible was then a novelty to all —
Luther and Calvin again — Comparative study of their progress towards the
Gospel, and of the heart work which made them what they were.
VII. Calvin would fain keep silence yet awhile, but they come to him from all
parts — His preaching at Paris.
VIII. He starts as author by a commentary on Seneca— Astonishment— Had
he a hidden motive ? — Toleration is a modern notion then unknown — The
book is one of mere erudition — Calvin's tribute and farewell to the taste
of the times — Success and little money — He sells his patrimony and gives
up his benefices.
IX. Fresh severities in France — Calvin and the Paris prisoners — Gradual con
quests — Nicholas Cope, the rector — His speech the work of Calvin— The
Sorbonne — Calvin at Nerac — Marguerite of Valois — The illusions of Lefevre
and the scruples of Roussel.
X. The same indecision in many others — Calvin at Angouliane — Du Tillet —
Calvin tempted to confine himself to his studies — First connexion with
Servetus at Paris.
XI. The affair of the placards — Francis I. — The Reformed faith had attracted
him by its novelty, but repelled him by its seriousness — His irritation excited
against it — His speech at the procession of 1535 — Atrocious execution —
Impressions of a contemporary historian.

4 SUMMARY.
XII. Calvin decides on quitting France— His preaching at Poitiers— The grotto
— First administration of the sacrament — The elements of his future great
ness — Calvin " the most Christian man" of his age — His Psychopannychia —
Subject of the book— Its tone — Strasburg — Basle— What was heard from
Basle.
XIII. A great cause to be pleaded — The genius which begins, and the genius
which methodizes— The "Christian Institutes" — History of the book —
What it was in 1536 — It answered to a general want — How that want had
been created.
XIV. Successive augmentations — Final arrangement — That book is Calvin him
self.
XV. Design and plan : First Joo£— God, the Bible, the Trinity, the creation,
man, Providence ; Second book — Sin, redemption — The law — The two cove
nants — Jesus Christ the author of salvation ; Third book — Salvation by
faith — The Holy Ghost, the agent in the work of salvation — Repentance —
The Christian life — Prayer.
XVI. Predestination— How Calvin is led to it— Let us not impose our logic
upon God— Other remarks — Augustine — What this doctrine was in fact for
Calvin — What it produced — Geneva and " the rock of predestination."
XVII. Fovrth book — The Church and all that relates to it — How Calvin un
derstands controversy—Want of consistency in his tone — It would be
unjust to judge by our impressions — Numerous beauties — Judgments upon
Calvin's style.
XVIII. The preface addressed to the king— Apology for the Protestants of
France — Apology for their faith — What their adversaries are worth — Ob
jections refuted — The Fathers — Where is the true Church? — Patience and
charity of the oppressed Protestants.
XIX. The " Institutes" alarm a few timid ones, but confirm very many.
/ - XX. Renee of France, Duchess of Ferrara — Her youth— Her court, the refuge
of the persecuted — Calvin at Ferrara — Calvin and Italy — Marot — What
Calvin meant to require from all.
XXI. He is forced to leave Ferrara — His correspondence with the Duchess —
Quotations — He directs, fortifies, and consoles her — The trials which harass
her — Her strength fails her — Severity of Calvin — 'She rises to fall no more
— Perdam Babylonis nomen — Her zeal and piety — Her death.
XXII. How Calvin led small and great — Du Tillet relapses into Romanism —
Grief and moderation of Calvin — Du Tillet would fain persuade him to go
and do likewise — 'Calvin's answers.
XXIII. Return from Ferrara— What Muratori relates — Modena; Saluzzo —
Dangers confronted — Religious state of the Val d'Aoste — Calvin preaches
there — Flight — Return to Switzerland across the mountains — 1541 and
1841.
XXIV. Last journey to Noyon — Arrival at Geneva.

History must not merely plead ; as soon as it seems to
do so it excites mistrust. It is a thankless task, there
fore, to narrate the life of a man whose lofty qualities have
been often misunderstood, whose faults have often been
exaggerated, and whose story, moreover, is allied to that
of a cause which we at once defend and love. How shall
the writer appear impartial 1 how even promise to be so
at all times and in all things \
We hope, however, to have been so. If this work
is a plea, it is only as a conscientious work on a subject
long disfigured by ignorance or falsehood must ever be
such. It is not our fault if it is become almost impos
sible to write about Calvin without appearing to be his
advocate. But let no one expect to find here an apotheosis.
" There is none good but one, that is God." We know
this, and will never forget it.
But if Calvin was a man, he was none the less a great
man, or still better, a great servant of God ; and we shall
protest against the strange eagerness with which, at the
present day, he is abandoned, or denied by so many whom
simple justice, not to say gratitude, should range among
his friends. Between the apotheosis, which we want for
none, and an abandonment so ready and complete, there
is room at least for a serious study, worthy of the
cause and of the man.
It is this study which we have undertaken. We ad
dress it to all the friends of Calvin, including such as are
not yet, but who might and ought to be his friends ; we
address it equally to all those of his enemies who have not
yet become so hostile as not to wish to know him, whom
they have been taught to hate.

CALVIN S BIRTH AND FAMILY.

' John Calvin was born at Noyon, in Picardy, the 10th
of July 1509. His grandfather, who was a cooper, was
still living in the small town of Pont l'Eveque, whence
the family derived its origin. His father, Gerard Chauvin,1
'settled at Noyon, had become apostolic notary, fiscal
attorney of the county, proctor of the chapter, and secre
tary of the bishop, functions which were all more honour
able, it appears, than lucrative, especially for a man
burdened with a numerous family. Gerard was favourably
regarded by the nobility, by the clergy, and above all by
the bishop, Charles de Hangest.
His wife, Jeanne Lefranc, of Cambray, early accustomed
her son to all the exercises of Eomish piety, for he was
destined for the Church. The tokens of a serious vocation
, became apparent in him. His father, who had thought,
perhaps, rather of temporal advantages than of inward
meetness, was at least desirous that on the side of learn
ing, nothing should be wanting to the future priest, and, who
knows 1 — the future bishop or cardinal. The precocious
success of the child justified those ambitious dreams of the
father. Placed at the college of the Capettes, he showed
that he was " of good talent, of a natural quickness of
perception, and a genius for the study of literature."2
But the college was not sufficient ; Gerard wished for
his son a more careful, or, as would be said at the pre
sent day, a more aristocratic education. Accordingly, he
asked M. de Mommor, a noble who was related to the
1 Or Cauvin. Calvin is the Latin Calvinus, the translation of Chauvin. The
habit was speedily acquired of giving to the Reformer, even in French, only the
name under which he had published his first work, written in Latin. Often
too, either for his own safety, or not to compromise his friends, he had to con
ceal himself under other names — Alcuin, the anagram of Calvin ; Lucianus, the
anagram of Calvinus ; Charles d'Espeville, Jean de Bonneville, &c.
2 Desmay, doctor of the Sorbonne ; the author of " Remarks on the Life of
Calvin."

EARLY EDUCATION. 7
bishop, the favour to have part in the lessons which an
able tutor gave to the sons of that gentleman. This
favour was granted, and Calvin, in token of gratitude,
afterwards dedicated his first work to one of his noble
fellow pupils, Claude, the abbot of St. Eloi. The dedi
cation shows us that he cherished with delight the remem
brance of the care and consideration of which he had
been the object. His natural gravity preserved him from
the dangers to which many others might have been ex
posed by a residence in a wealthy family. His father's
strictness also contributed to keep him rather timid and
fearful ; but this constraint, though fatal to some minds,
is useful to others, and, to such, abounds in the elements
of daring and energy.
Calvin was therefore brought up in the society of the
children of the house of Mommor, but at his father's cost.1
Now his father found the expense heavy, and he requested
of the bishop for the child of twelve years old a small
office which happened to be vacant, — that of- chaplain to
the chapel called the Gesine.
A request of this kind was not anything unusual then ;
scruples had long ceased to exist about conferring even the
highest offices of the Church on young men, and even upon
children. Several councils had ineffectually condemned
this abuse ; the Council of Trent was going to attempt it
anew, and, thanks to the Eeformation, with better if not
yet with complete success. But at the beginning of the
sixteenth century the abuse was reigning in all its force.
In France there was to be seen a cardinal of sixteen, —
Odet de Chatillon.2 In Portugal there was one of twelve
years old ; and Leo X., who nominated him, had himself
been created Archbishop of Aix at five years of age.
The bishop of Noyon then, received favourably the re
quest, which was moreover justified by the services which
1 Beza. Life of Calvin.
' Brother of Admiral de CoMgny. He embraced the Reformation in 1561.

8 THE YOUNG CHAPLAIN.
would undoubtedly be rendered to the Church by one so
well endowed. The enemies of Calvin have not failed, in
regard to this, to accuse him of ingratitude. To abandon
and condemn the Church ! was this not to lacerate the
bosom which had nurtured him 1 Vain declamation ! To
wish that the conscience and reason of a man should be
for ever fettered by a benefit received at twelve years old,
is to deny reason, and conscience, or to demand, under
the name of gratitude, endless hypocrisy. Besides, when
once resolved to leave the Eomish Church, Calvin volun
tarily gave up all he had received from it. What more
can be required ?
A few days after his nomination (May 1521), the young
chaplain received the tonsure. He received it with
emotion and with faith, and, though this ceremony did
not constitute an irrevocable engagement, in his heart the
engagement was complete. He returned to study with .
redoubled ardour. For two years he continued to make
great progress, and, his father only desired one thing,
which was to send him to some university where he might
find masters worthy of himself.

II.
Meanwhile Noyon was afflicted with the plague; Gerard
thought with consternation of the risk which might be
incurred by this son, the hope of his life. Hearing,
moreover, that the young Mommors were about to start
for Paris to continue their studies there, he hastened to
request of the chapter permission for the young chaplain
"to go where he should think fit during the plague," with
out giving up the small revenue from the chapel. The
authorisation was granted. This was in August 1523.
Why must we encounter, here again, accusations which
it is impossible to pass over in silence?
Calvin has been represented as afraid of the plague

FALSE ACCUSATIONS. 9
and basely fleeing from his duties as chaplain. This
chaplain was a child of fourteen, upon whom his title
neither did nor could impose any duties or functions what
soever. That was not misrepresentation enough; it has been
asserted that the true cause of Calvin's departure was a
shameful condemnation, the chastisement of infamous and
abominable vices. But for the bishop's intervention, it
is said, he would have been burned alive. Death at
the stake was commuted for scourging and branding.
If there were nothing against this tradition but its im
probability, that would be sufficient cause for its rejection.
Where was a vicious lad of fourteen ever punished after
such a fashion? And if Calvin were this vicious lad, why
wait till after his death to make it known ? Many of his
relations at Noyon changed their name that they might
have nought in common with the heresiarch; and some say
that the house in which he was born was razed to the ground,
and a man hanged for wishing to rebuild it.1 Would such
hatred have kept silence about this shameful feature of his
youth, and would there not have been, through all Europe,
lips to expose it? Would not the bare suspicion have
sufficed to render impotent and impossible the part of
moral lawgiver so boldly claimed by Calvin at Geneva?
That is what might be said; but it were superfluous.
The key to the whole affair is in a book published as early
as 1 633 — the Annals of the Church of Noyon, by Jacques
Le Vasseur, a canon of that church. An ardent enemy
of Calvin, his calumniator in many a passage, but all the
more worthy of belief here, it is he who informs us that these
scandalous details concern another Jean Cauvin, also a chap
lain, but "who died, he says, " a good Catholic," after having
been curate in different parishes, and, finally, at Trachy-
le-Val. Thus the basis falls to the ground, and instead
of improbability we have unmitigated falsehood. We
' Varillas. History of France.

10 • GOES TO PARIS.
refer for the details to the Vindication of Calvin, by Dre-
lincourt ; we also refer to that work for all the calumnies
on which we shall not think fit to dwell.

III.
Calvin was, then, at his departure from Noyon, the
child we have portrayed ; the gravity of his father and his
mother's piety formed the basis of that character, some
what tending to sadness, but vigorously tempered, which
he was about to bring into the midst of the noisy schools
of Paris.
He first went to his uncle, Eichard Cauvin, a lock
smith ; and a few days after he entered at the college of
La Marche. There was one man professor there towards
whom he immediately felt attracted, the regent Cordier,
who was subsequently to be called by his pupil of 1523
to direct the college of Geneva.1 Cordier was one of those
rare men whose vast erudition does not prevent them
from loving children and being loved in return. Besides,
the system of teaching had not then that modern regu
larity which makes of each class a step of the scholastic
ladder, and keeps each professor within his exact limits.
They said everything about everything, a method often
troublesome but sometimes not unsuccessful. Cordier
excelled in taking advantage of elementary instruction,
in order to initiate his pupils in Hterary, philosophical
and historical questions. His elevation of soul and
uprightness of heart made themselves felt as well as
his science. Accordingly, Calvin ever took delight in
recognising what he owed to his old college tutor at
La Marche. In dedicating to him his Commentary on
the First Epistle to the Thessalonians, he attributes to the
lessons of Cordier, all the progress he had made in higher
1 Regent was the title formerly given in France to those who taught in a col
lege. It is still used in the communal colleges or schools.

HIDDEN LIFE. 1 1
branches of study; and, if posterity, he says, derives any
fruit from his works, he would have it known that it is
indebted for it, in part at least, to Cordier.
Did Cordier exercise any direct influence upon the
religious ideas of the Noyon scholar ? To answer this
question, it would be necessary to know how far ad
vanced Cordier was himself, and that is what we do not
know. A zealous Protestant in 1538, it is scarcely pro
bable that he had remained a stranger till 1523 or 1524
to a movement already powerful, and till then powerful
especially in the world of intelligence and literature.
Perhaps he himself was scarcely more aware of what was
passing in his head and heart, than his pupil was of the
germs of latent power deposited in his own head and
heart by the words of his master. Engaged shortly after
in the most fearful struggles, the men of that period had
neither leisure nor inclination for solitary grappling with
their own history ; at least, it did not occur to them that
this close self-study might ultimately be of some interest ;
and if they did enter upon it in any measure, they kept it
to themselves. Luther only is more explicit, though it does
not occur to him either to give us an exact and complete
analysis of what took place within him, his ingenuous
and loquacious vivacity made him scatter here and there
-"the traits which, methodically arranged, have finally given
us a complete portraiture of his youth, struggles, and
transformations. Such anecdotes are rare in the writings
of Calvin ; even in the famous preface to his commentary
on the Psalms, in which he sums up his life, he contents
himself with saying, that he was at first " more obsti
nately attached than any one to papal superstitions,"
and that, by God's grace, he had been detached from
them. No dates, no details, and everywhere else still
less ; there is nothing to show that he began by being one
of those whom he now attacks. Invested with authority,
he speaks as though he had always been the same ; he

12 THE MARTYRS.
seems to think that he always was, and perhaps such is
his belief, for he needs to believe it : the thought that a
change had been necessary for him to possess gospel
truth, would, it seems, trouble and humble him. This
feeHng is one of the secrets of his strength. Luther
draws you on as a man, and because you as a man re
cognise yourself in him ; Calvin draws you on as a
master, and because he has none of your weakness, or, at
least, shows none.
We should also Hke to know something of the impres
sion produced upon Calvin by the severity already exer
cised at Paris upon the Lutherans, for as yet that was
the only designation employed. He might have seen
burned on the Place de Greve young Jacques Pavanne,
a Protestant at Meaux, but a Eomanist afterwards,
through weakness, in the prisons of Paris. Brought back
by remorse to the gospel faith; happy to confess it and
happy to die for it, he became the proto-martyr of the
Eeformation at Paris. He might have seen burned be
fore Notre-Dame the poor hermit whom the gospel had
sought and found in the forest of Livry, and who had
unconsciously become a Protestant, a heretic to be
burned, whilst he only thought he had become more
charitable and Christian. What did Calvin think of
these executions ? Alas ! time was to show only too
well that they did not inspire him with the horror of
such cruelties. But one fact remains, and it is the only
one at present noteworthy. Calvin saw these tortures,
and, shortly afterwards, Calvin went out to face them ;
it was by the light of those flames that he resolutely
entered upon the path in which, at every step, such fires
might be kindled for him. When we judge the man,
let us not forget the terrible and pitiless education which
the age had given him.

MORAL AND LITERARY PROGRESS. 13

IV.
But whilst Eomish intolerance, terrible against heresy,
left in ' peace aU the scandals of the Church and Court,
severity of morals in Calvin was a prelude to severity of
doctrine ; the scholar of sixteen aHeady announced the
man who would always begin by exacting of himself what
he required of others. The pastimes of his fellow-students
had no attractions for him ; their levities or their folHes
alike met in him with a stern censor, so much so that, if
the author of the Annals of Noyon is to be believed, they
had surnamed him the A causative. But nothing indicates
that they intended it as a reproach ; they avenged them
selves, schoolboy-Hke, by a jest ; but it was only another
homage to the ascendant of their grave school-feHow,
whose pale face and stern and piercing look, were more
imposing to them than their master's gown. Let us Hsten
once more to one of his enemies: "Under a lean and at
tenuated body, he displayed already a lively and vigor
ous spirit, prompt at repartee, bold to attack ; a great
faster, either on account of his health and to stop the fumes
of the headache which assaulted him continually, or to have
his mind more free for writing, studying, and improving
his memory. He spoke but Httle; but his words were
always full of gravity, and never missed their aim ; he
was never to be seen in company, but always in retire
ment."1 AH this we own has not the charm of the ad
venturous and poetic youth of Luther. Is there, how
ever, but one style of poetry? And is there no poetry in
that steady pursuit of the good and true all through the
age of pleasure, illusion, and disorder ?
He also pursued the beautiful— not in the arts, it is true,
but in ancient literature, and already, it would seem, with
a clear perception of the use he should one day have to
1 Florimond de Raymond. "History of the Rise, Progress, and Decline of the
Heresy of this Age."

1 4 LATIN AND FRENCH.
make of it. Cicero was his favourite, and whfle intending
to be one day more nervous than he, he felt that he was
the most French of the ancients, the best master to be
foHowed by one who would make himself heard in France.
Montaigne had also the same feeling, but at a later period;
and he found the French tongue already endowed by Calvin
with all that Calvin had borrowed from Cicero — correct
ness and precision, harmony for the ear, and harmony for
the mind. The scholar of sixteen probably asked no more
of Cicero than the elegant Latinity that was admired in
his first works, but it would soon be perceived that to
study Latin thus was to study, or rather to create, French.
When a language has reached the point which the French
had then attained, every man of genius, whether he per
ceives it or not, is enlisted among the workmen employed
upon it. Calvin was the great workman of that half of the
century, and it is a glory, the possession of which Bossuet
has been pleased to ratify. " Luther," says he, " triumphed
oraHy, but the pen of Calvin was more correct. Both
exceHed in speaking the language of their country." The
sixteenth century had already rendered him fuU justice in
this respect, even by the lips of his enemies. " Calvin," says
Etienne Pasquier, "was a man who wrote weH .... to
whom our tongue is greatly indebted." " No one of those
who preceded him," says Bsemond, " exceHed him in
writing well, and few since have approached him in
beauty and felicity of language." But more of this hereafter.
The college of Montaigu, which he entered afterwards,
offered him very different lessons. A Spaniard invincibly
attached to Aristotle, and, through him, to Eomanism,
such as Aristotle had made it, was professor there in bad
scholastic Latin. But if the faith and Latin of the master
were not pleasing to the new scholar, the dialectics must
have been grateful to his stern intellect, and he made great
progress. Meanwhile, the Chapter of Noyon had more than once

CHANGES AND PROGRESS. 1 5
summoned the young chaplain to return and occupy his
place, — summonses which were a mere form, for nothing
was more common then than to study at the universities, as
he was doing, whfle enjoying the revenues of a benefice.
Accordingly, on the report of his success, his father had no
difficulty in obtaining for him the cure of MarteviHe,
which he exchanged two years afterwards for that of Pont-
l'Eveque, the cradle of the famHy as we have already
said. "Thus were the sheep committed to the wolf's
keeping," says Desmay. This was in 1529. Beza affirms
that Calvin, before leaving France, preached sometimes
atTont-l'Ev^que ; and it was the only clerical function he
could perform, having as yet only received the tonsure.
Beza, however, does not give the precise date, and we
have in all that period of Calvin's Hfe few dates of any
certainty. A letter of his to his friend Du Chemin, of
Orleans, informs us that he took a journey to Noyon in
May 1528, to see for the last time his father, who was seri
ously ill. Hs says, in this letter, that the malady is pro
tracted, but that there is no hope of a cure; we know not,
however, whether Gerard Cauvin died then, or whether
his life, as some have thought, was prolonged for two or
three years more. At any rate, Calvin was not present at
his last breath, for Beza informs us that the news of his
death reached his son at Bourges. This occasioned another
journey to Noyon, and it was then, perhaps, that Calvin's
parishioners saw him in the pulpit for the first time.
His mother had died before, but we know not exactly when
her death took place. What did he preach to the people
of Pont-1'Eveque ? How far advanced at this period
was the great inward movement which was accompHsh-
ing itself in him ? Let us retrace our steps a little, and
endeavour to form some conception of it.

1 6 DIVINITY RENOUNCED FOR LAW.

V.
r He was peaceably prosecuting at Paris his studies in
i divinity, when he received from his father the order to
discontinue them. "My father," he tells us,1 "considermg
that the science of the law commonly enriches those who
pursue it, this hope made him change his mind. This
was the cause of his withdrawing me from the study of
, phHosophy, and of my being put to learn the law ; on
which, to obey my father, I endeavoured faithfully to
occupy myself, nevertheless God, by His secret provi
dence, turned me in another direction." This rapid
statement needs to be completed by some detafls. It
! appears that, at first, Calvin was not sorry at having to
give up divinity, such at least as was then taught in
the schools, and it has been thought that this change of
taste might be attributed to the connexion he had per
haps formed, about this time, with Eobert Olivetan, his
countryman and relative. OHvetan, who was to have
the honour of being one of the first to preach the Ee-
formed faith at Geneva, was also, it appears, one of the
first by whom Calvin heard it openly preached.
But Calvin was not one whose enthusiasm would
kindle at the first touch ; the new idea must be slowly
elaborated in his mind, which was at once so prompt, and
yet so controUed by the imperative need of a logical con
viction which was logicaUy immoveable. Calvin could not
acquiesce in the overthrow of Eomanism before he felt
himself in possession of a complete doctrinal system,
ready to replace the other. To waver was contrary
to his nature, and we wHlingly admit that he would
prefer giving up divinity to remaining a divine with
doubts and blanks.
So he started for Orleans. A clever and acute juris-
1 Preface of " Commentary on the Psalms."

CALVIN AT ORLEANS. 1 7
Consult was professor there — Pierre de l'Etoile, who became
afterwards the president of the parliament of Paris. The
success of Calvin in his new career is attested, as well
as his success as a scholar, by Eaemond. That historian
teHs us that he distinguished himself by "an active mind
and a strong memory, with great dexterity and prompti
tude in gathering up the lessons and sayings which feU
from his master's lips, noting them down afterwards with
marvellous facility and beauty of language, everywhere
exhibiting many sallies and flashes of refined wit." "At the
expiration of a year, he was no longer considered," says
Beza, " as a schojar, but as a teacher." In fact, he was
more than once caUed upon to supply the master's place,
and his position seemed marked out amongst the highest
dignitaries of the law. God had otherwise decided.
We know not what progress he made towards gospel
truth during his sojourn at Orleans. According to
Desmay, who is evidently mistaken, it was in that
city that he was " first perverted from the faith by an
apostate Jacobin, a German by birth." According to
Baemond, it was at Bourges and later, that " he afterwards
acquired a taste for heresy." The taste for heresy was
everywhere, that is, there were everywhere aspirations
towards the gospel, everywhere men in whom these aspi
rations were beginning to assume a definite form. Did
Calvin meet with some one at Orleans who helped him in
the formation of his views ? It is possible ; but only at
Bourges did there elsewhere await him a man who was
definitively to open up for him the way.
It was not, however, to go in quest of that man that
he went to Bourges ; he was attracted thither by the cele
brated Milanese jurist, Alciati, probably one of those in
Gerard Cauvin's mind when he spoke of the riches and
glory to be acquired by the law. Summoned by Francis I.,
Alciati, thenceforward caHed Alciat, he had been received
with honours all but royal. Twelve hundred golden

1 S CALVIN AT BOURGES.
crowns, an enormous sum for the times, were his salary*
at Bourges, and in a letter to the ChanceUor Duprat,
the sheriffs of the city say, "The King has weH spent
the twelve hundred crowns which he grants to Mesire
Alciat, for never was the city so brilliant and pros
perous." Such was the man whom Calvin went to
seek, and his expectations were surpassed. Alciat knew
the Eoman law, as perhaps no Eoman had known it,
and more than that, as a child of the Itafian revival, he
brought into the arid field of law the poetical enthusiasm
in which he had been nurtured by his country. Calvin,
upon whom poetry alone would probably have had no
effect, was subjugated by this singular blending of law
and poetry. He became an enthusiast both for the pro
fessor and for the science, but an enthusiast in his own
pecuHar way, consuming in toil aH the ardour kindled in
his soul! He protracted his vigils, Beza tells us, till
midnight, an hour extraordinarily late in those times of
early habits, and in the morning, "after awaking, he
would remain some time in bed, recalHng to memory and
ruminating over what he had learned the evening before."
Alciat remarked, at the foot of his chair, that profound
look fixed upon him, that smile which admiration only
could extort from the serious youth, and, as at Orleans,
Calvin may have been deemed irrevocably won over to
the science which had so great a charm for him.

VI.

But Calvin, for a moment drawn aside, had begun
anew to sigh after a science more serious than even that of
human laws, and that other science had, at Bourges, an
eminent representative. MelchiorWolmar, also summoned
by Francis I., ostensibly taught the Greek of Homer, De
mosthenes, or Sophocles, but less publicly, though with

THE BIBLE REVEALED. 19
smaH attempts at concealment, the Greek of another book,
far mightier and more important. He had known this book
in Germany ; and in Luther's hands he had seen it change
the faith of that country. There, he said, was the answer
to every problem, the remedy for every abuse; and the
rest of every heavy laden soul, whether erudite or ignorant.
At the present day, there are those who deny that, at
that epoch, the Bible could be so great a novelty. They
show that it existed in print before the Eeformation, both
in Germany and in France; and they think thereby to
refute aU that Protestants say as to the oblivion to which
it had been consigned, and the care which the Church
had taken to conceal it.
The proofs they bring, were they aU strictly correct,
must all give way before the incontestable fact, that
teachers and peoples were afike surprised, profoundly
surprised, when they opened the Bible, and began to study
its pages. That some, like Luther, should never before
have read it or seen it, and that others, like Calvin,
should perhaps have had occasion to see and read it,
was of no account. Both, under the influence of the
same inward movement, felt themselves, with that book,
in a new world, and each, according to his genius, began
to search among treasures so long unknown. Luther, the
warm-hearted and imaginative, utters a cry at each dis
covery, and each cry is repeated by millions of voices;
Calvin, more calm, will speak to the world only when he :
has discovered aU, and classified every discovery. Luther
fervently presses the Bible to his Hps at every response it
gives to the questions of his soul; Calvin demands of it
a system, and. the more clearly the system rises before
him, the more clearly is the Bible to him the word of God,
the Truth, and the source of aU truth. He will not, like |
Luther, attack Eomanism, first at one point and then at
another, by degrees, as his studies offer him the oppor
tunity ; he wiU overthrow the edifice only when he has at

20 THE BIBLE STUDIED.
his command, ready hewn and numbered, aU the stones
of the future bunding. But for him, as for Luther, and
for aU who, in that country, had opened or were to open
the Bible, the Bible was as completely a revelation as
though the earth then saw it for the first time.
This was the revelation, of which his soul had had the
presentiment, and after which his spirit had sought, and
the question now was, to take possession of it. Calvin,
therefore, set to work with aU the ardour demanded by
/Such a task. His other studies leaving him but little time,
/ he stole from his slumbers wherewithal to read the Scrip-
! tures. Now he inquired their meaning of the commenta
tors of every age ; now setting aside the works of man, he
stood face to face with the pages of Inspiration, and, in all
probability, it was not then that he experienced the most
difficulty in penetrating their sense. But he was filled with
awe at these soHtary communings with the Divine thought,
and, more than once, Hke Luther, he heard the inward voice
which whispered to the German reformer, " Art thou the
only wise ? the 'only intelligent ? Canst thou reasonably
imagine that the Church is mistaken, and that it is thou
who seest clearly ?" Other voices also made themselves
heard : indolence and timidity suggested, " Would it not
be better to renounce these investigations and remain in
the old stream of thought, beHeving or seeming to befieve
what others do ? Wherefore cast myself into this agony
at the risk of gaining nought save persecution ?" Calvin
was not one of those for whom danger has charms, and who
see in it an argument in favour of a cause to be embraced.
That chivalrous idea was at no time his. Not only was
he too much of a logician to allow any external or acces
sory circumstance to dictate to him as to the substance of
things, but, he teHs us, he was by nature "timid and lax
an danger"1 — a sad confession had it been penned by one
who yielded to constitutional weakness; a noble con-
1 Preface to " Commentary on the Psalms."

WHAT IS TRUTH? 21
fession from one who never faltered. Calvin, therefore,
did not heed the voice which counseHed sflence and re
pose ; and if he entered upon his career only after examina
tion, from duty, reason, and conscience, his progress was not
less steady than if he had been impeUed onward by enthu
siasm. As to the other voice which endeavoured to alarm
him at his audacity, he heeded it even less. The errors
of Eomanism were in his eyes too patent for him to fear
seriously, lest he should be rash in the sight of God in strik
ing a blow at them in the name of the gospel. As to man'8
judgment, he cared but little for that. The one thing
alone to be respected in this world was, in his eyes, truth.
No respect, no consideration of any kind was thought due
by him to what was not truth. Other maxims obtain at the
present day, and these maxims are certainly not devoid of
good ; they are connected with incontestable progress in
charity, and in a just and Christian mistrust of self. But
they are connected also, and too often, with weaknesses
and meannesses such as Calvin never knew. Did he know
those secret conflicts of which Luther's soul had been the
scene ?
What brought Luther to doubt in Eomanism was the
feeHng of sin, the impossibHity of finding peace in the ex
piations indicated to him by the Church. He sought, and
was in torment till he found, peace, and that was for him
the surpassing revelation, the sublime gush of light which
rendered aH the gospel luminous. Calvin, in this respect,
had not to seek ; Olivetan, perhaps, and Wolmar certainly,
told him what Luther had found, and justification by
faith was early pointed out as the solution of the grand
problem. But to know the solution was a smaH thing ;
it was requisite that it should become true for him, for
his own soul; that he should understand and accept it, as
a matter of faith must be understood and accepted, under
penalty of never being aught save a matter of form, a
mere formula. It was on this ground that the conflict

22 SOUL-WORK.
took place, and to it apparently the Eeformer aUuded
in the somewhat vague details he gave as to the state of
his soul at that epoch. "I was very far," he says, "from
having a conscience perfectly tranquil. Every time I
went down into myself or raised my heart to God, so
extreme a horror feU upon me that no purifications, no
satisfactions, could cure me of it. And the more closely I
considered myseHthe sharper were the goads which pressed
my conscience, so that there remained to me no other
comfort than to deceive myself by forgetting myself."
But God had mercy on him. " Though I was so obsti
nately addicted to the Papal superstitions, that it was
very hard to draw me out of that deep slough, God sub
dued and gave my heart docHity by a sudden conver
sion." That docility, according to the preceding details,
was evidently the final renunciation of the Eomish idea of
salvation by works and reHgious practices, — a notion
always dear to the old man, and the final acceptance, —
always painful to the old man, of salvation by faith in
Jesus Christ. The gospel appeared to him in aU its clear
ness and grandeur, and his vocation was decided ; the
theologian took final precedence of the lawyer. " Having,
therefore, acquired some taste and knowledge of true piety,
T was immediately inflamed with so great a desire to profit,
that, albeit I did not wholly abandon other studies, I
somewhat relaxed in my zeal for them."

VII.

But his friends had not waited for the end of this long
heart- work to compel him to preach to them the things
which he was yet studying in fear and trembling. They
had an instinctive confidence in him, and in his genius,
and just as, when a simple student at Orleans, he had
been sometimes called upon to ascend the chair of juris-

COMING TO THE LIGHT. 23
prudence, so now, in despite of himself, he was compelled
to teach that science whose field is heaven, the human
soul, and eternity. " Before the year was past," he tells
us, "all who shewed any desire for the pure doctrine
came towards me to learn, though I was but myself a
learner." He was quite amazed at it, the more so, he
adds, " that being by nature somewhat unsocial and
shame-faced, I have always loved repose and tranquillity.
I began therefore to seek some hiding place and means of
withdrawing myself from the people ; but so far was I
from succeeding in my desire, that all retreats and isolated
places were for me like pubHc schools." And he then
relates how, in spite of aU his desire to be unknown, God
had so " led him and whirled him about," as to leave him
no repose " in any place whatever," tiU, notwithstanding
his very different inclination by nature, "He had brought
him to the Hght and into action."
These detaUs belong either to the close of his stay at
Bourges, or to his stay at Paris, whither he subsequently
repaired. Here again it is impossible to give precise
dates. A letter written by him from Paris, bears the date
of July, 1529. It is stiU at Paris that we see him in 1 532,
and aH seems to indicate that he passed there, if not the
whole, at least the best part of those three years. At this
period, we find him lodging with a tradesman, Etienne de
la Forge, " whose memory ought to be blessed among be
lievers as a holy martyr for Christ."1 Etienne de la Forge,
in fact, perished in 1535, the victim of his zeal for the
Eeformation, and probably also of his friendship for the
reformer. It was at his house that Calvin began to hold
assemblies, at first in secret, and afterwards almost in
public. People of every rank gradually enlarged his little
church which might, in one day, be drowned in blood by
persecution. As for himself, he had at length accepted
his task, and appeared to be entirely devoted to its..
accomplishment. 1 Calvin. " Against the Libertines."— ch. iv.

24 COMMENTARY ON SENECA.

VIII.

It was not therefore without exciting some surprise
that in that same year 1532, Calvin pubHshed a book
altogether foreign to the burning questions of the day —
his Commentary on the De dementia of Seneca.
Several of his historians have not been able to reconcile
themselves to this seeming parenthesis ; they contend
that the hidden motive of the work was to induce Francis
I. to manifest less severity towards the Protestants, and
great efforts have been made to find in the book traces of
such an intention. Now the author, in his most confi
dential letters, says nothing of the kind ; nor is there
anything in his later works, in which he might so often
have found an opportunity of recalling the true intention
of this. Besides, had he entertained such an idea, it is not
under that form that he would have insinuated it. In fact,
the idea attributed to him does not belong to his age, and
is one from which no man was further than he. To
ask clemency of a king for the friends of the Eeformed
Faith would, in his eyes, have been to ask clemency and
compassion for truth, — for the Gospel, and to ascribe to
that king authority over God Himself. The men of the
sixteenth century never asked for toleration in the more
modern sense of the word, a fact too much forgotten
when they are so loudly accused of not having granted it
themselves while the power was in their hands. Never
did they say to the mighty : " Tolerate us : considering us,
if you think proper, as having gone astray, and leaving
us, indulgently, in peace." They said : " We are the re
presentatives of truth ; we are the truth." Their rights
were to them, those of truth itself, and toleration is not
asked for truth. AU this was not very philosophical,
assuredly, and far from humble ; but it was, at least,
courageous, and the humHity which they lacked is too
often only that of the men of little faith. The Eeformed

WHV CALVIN UNDERTOOK IT. 25
religion, in one word, had only learned to offer the mighty
these two alternatives, — to submit to her, or to crush her.
The Commentary on Seneca is therefore a book of pure!
erudition, but one of the best of the epoch, rather heavy]
as to its matter, but elegant and noble as to its form.
Calvin is wise enough not to imitate Seneca, though he
follows him step by step, and whHe he praises his style as
a writer of a declining period, he himself continues to be
inspired by those of the Golden Age. Great praise was
given to his Latinity ; and his science was admired. This
science, however, was rather that of the departing genera
tion, a borrowed science, wealthier in quotations than in
experiments, and more proud of collecting than of creating.
The future innovator it would seem, wiU, as yet, only con
tribute his quota in the somewhat decayed society of the
Literati of the renaissance, the old Eomans and Greeks,
who issued for a moment from the tomb to see the birth
of a new world. True, the author chosen by him is the
austere Seneca; " Seneca, whose vigorous sentiments," Beza
teHs us, " bore some resemblance to the manners of Calvin,
who always read him with pleasure." But if the selection
is that of the stoic, the Commentary is none the less that
of the man of letters, — serious, yet florid ; and learned,
but with that learning the vanity of which Calvin, more
than any other was about to make men feel. Be that as
it may, this book was not to be lost as regards the future
work of Calvin. The reputation of the man of letters
was to pave the way for the Eeformer.
But the book, meanwhde, procured him more of glory
than of profit ; his letters at that period reveal to us the
difficulty he had experienced in finding the means to
have it printed, and then, his anxiety as to its sale.
" The die is cast," he writes to one of his friends, Francis
Daniel. My Commentary has made its appearance, but
at my own expense, and it has cost me more money than
thou wouldst imagine." He hopes to cover this outlay ;

26 GIVES UP HIS BENEFICES.
but his aspirations go no farther. Were they satisfied ? We
know not. This alone is certain, that, in spite of the ex
tensive circulation which his works eventuaUy obtained,
they did not enrich him. At his death he left three
hundred crowns, — one fourth of what the King of France
gave yearly to Alciat.
It was, however, whfle thus straitened, that he resolved
to give up the curacy and chaplaincy which were his
means of subsistence. His enemies never could and never
did say that he had been forced to do so : it was of his
own free wHl that he refused to be supported by the
Church which he would no longer serve. Is he to be re
proached for not having done so earfier ? This would be
to judge the facts of that time by posterior facts, and
to regard the situation as far more clearly defined than
it could yet be. The men who led the movement did not
think of quitting the Church, but of transforming her ; they
did not feel bound in conscience, therefore, at the outset,
to give up the position they occupied in her bosom;*}
Why should Calvin, from the very beginning, have re
nounced the idea of preaching one day, as curate, in his
parish of Pont-1'Eveque, what he preached at Paris with
out an official title ? For had not curates in Germany
and Switzerland remained as ministers in their converted
parishes ?
Meanwhfle, Calvin had sold his share of the paternal
inheritance, either to pay his printer, or to be master of
his slender fortune, when the storms should come which
he too clearly foresaw.

IX.
The storm was in fact becoming more and more
threatening, and Calvin was defying it more and more
openly. The man of action had succeeded to the man

SLOW BUT SURE. 27
of study, but without the abdication of the latter; it
was " among his books," Pasquier teHs us, " that Calvin
showed himself most active for the progress of his
sect." A bond ever stronger linked him with those
whom his word had gained. " We saw sometimes,"
adds Pasquier, " our prisons overflowing with poor de
ceived people, whom without ceasing, he exhorted, com
forted, and strengthened by his letters, and he was never
lacking in messengers to whom the doors were opened,
in spite of all the care of the gaolers to prevent it. It
is by such proceedings that inch by inch he gained a part
of our France." In an enemy's mouth, this is no mean
praise. Calvin has not, like Luther, the glorious lot of
setting in motion vast countries by one blow ; it is inch by
inch that he conquers part of France; and part of Paris to
begin with. Because the great remained as yet unmoved,
he devotes himself to the smaH. It has often been said that
the movement in France originated in the upper ranks,
and was not popular, at least not at the outset. That is
incorrect. A certain movement originated indeed in the
upper ranks, witness Marguerite of Valois, the king's sister ;
but it was met by another movement from below, to for
tify and direct which, Calvin was then labouring at Paris.
He had weH understood that every Church, like every State,
which wHl live, must be founded upon the people. Hence
his unseen and indefatigable devotedness, supported by
success and sanctified by peril.
But he had not renounced conquests more splendid; and
amongst the people who were deceived by his word, as
Pasquier says, was the rector of the university, Nicolas
Cop. Cop had, according to custom, to deliver a speech
on the octave of Martinmas; he begged Calvin to write
it for him ; and Calvin "framed for him," says Beza, "an
oration very different from what was customary." Very
different, indeed, for the merit of works was roughly
handled, and justification by faith was distinctly preached.

28 MARGUERITE OF VALOIS.
The Sorbonne was in commotion ; the parfiament took
the matter in hand; and Cop, learning that he was going
to be arrested, fled to Basle. But the true author
of the harangue was known, or, at least, suspected, and
the parliament was glad of the opportunity which at last
offered for arresting him. Warned in time, " he escaped,"
as Desmay relates, " by a window, and ran to the St
Victor suburb, to a vinedresser's, and changed his clothes
there." MeanwhHe, the famous criminal Heutenaidft..
Jean Morin, was searching his papers, which betrayelf
the names of several of his adherents. The greater part
of them, like himself, were obfiged to flee.
He withdrew at first to the castle of the lord of Haze-
vflle, near Mantes, then to Saintonge, into the house of a
canon of Angouleme, Louis du Tillet, a secret partisan of
the Eeformation. At last, he went where many of those
whom persecution had chased from Paris, Orleans, and
Meaux, had taken refuge. Marguerite, the Queen of Na
varre, held her court at Nerac, and it was there she gave
them an asylum.
Marguerite of Valois, the sister of Francis I., is one of
the most interesting personages of that century. The
daughter of a shameless mother, and the wife of a profligate :
husband, she preserved herself pure and respected in the
midst of a corrupt court, and the first rumours of the
Eeformation had found her ready to seek earnestly after
truth. As early as 1521, she read the Bible and had it
explained to her by the pious Le Fevre. Scarcely was
she converted to evangefical truth than her sole desire
was that her brother should also be converted. The King
consented to be present at the private assemblies, presided
over by Michel d'Arande, in her residence, and seemed^
to be affected. With what joy did she write to Bri-
qonnet, the Bishop of Meaux, who had sent her Michel
1 A magistrate of the old Parisian court of justice, the Chatclet. His office
was to take cognisance of criminal cases. — Tr.

LE FEVRE. 29
d'Arande ! With what happiness did she state that even
the queen-mother, Louise of Savoy, appeared to incline
towards the Eeformation! During the whole of 1522
these feelings of the king and queen continued to gain
strength. But the queen's ambition was too worldly, and
the king's levity too inveterate. Then came the battle of
Pa via, lost by the cowardice of the duke of Alen9on, who
died of shame shortly after. Left a chHdless widow,
Marguerite was almost on the point of marrying Charles V.,
and who can say what might not have been her influence
on that arch-enemy of the Eeformation ! The king re
fused the alliance; and in 1527 gave his sister to Henri
dAlbret, the king of Navarre. But in vain did she ex
pect results from the favourable dispositions which she
had flattered herself she had seen in her brother ; if he did
not go so far as to persecute, he allowed persecution in
his own name, and the most he granted to Marguerite's
entreaties was an order that some whom the Church
would fain have smitten, should remain in peace. The
Church, however, might again clutch her prey, and there
was no security save in the States of the princess at Nerac.
Among those who were there at that time, was the aged
Le Fevre, he who had been the first to see clearly what
Providence was preparing, and who one day, at the very
outset, seizing Farel's hand, had said to him, " My dear
GuHlaume, God will renew the face of the world, and you
wHl see it !" But Farel had had to leave France, and Le
Fevre asked himself, not without discouragement, who
then would inherit the part which had been taken from
his friend, tiU then the most eloquent and able of the
apostles of the Eeformation. But when he saw Calvin,
he soon perceived that a greater than Farel was there,
and one who excelled all the others; and Beza teHs us
that he looked with "a favourable eye upon the young
man, as if presaging that he was one day to effect the
restoration of the Church in France." Le Fevre still

30 GERARD ROUSSEL.
believed, or wished to believe, in the possibility of the rege
neration of the Church by the Church — by a reconstruction
without a previous demoHtion. It was he who, in his
lectures on faith at the Sorbonne — which were at first but
little noticed — had discerned, ten years before Luther,
the hidden organic defect of Eomanism, and the secret
of the regeneration sought after ; but he stiU retained,
fifteen years after Luther, the reverence and illusions which
had at first held back the arm of the German monk. Cal
vin proved to him that nothing would be obtained by that
course. It is said, that what the sight of so many events
had failed to do, Calvin did, and that the old man suf
fered himself to be convinced that there was no accom
modation possible between the Gospel and Eome — that
the axe must be laid to the foot of the tree.
Calvin was less successful with Gerard Eoussel, the
queen's almoner or chaplain. Eoussel is one of those
men whom it is difficult to judge; ardent at first, pru
dent afterwards, but of such a prudence that it is not
easy to say whether it is prudence or cowardice, charity
or weakness, Christian concession or calculation. Eoussel
said mass, and Marguerite heard it. A strange mass, it is
true, with bread instead of the host, and wine for aU the
communicants ; no elevation or adoration of the host
(which was equivalent to the abandonment of the real
presence) ; and no mention of the Virgin and the saints.
This mass was, as it were, the symbol of Eoussel's Chris
tianity — evangelical in substance, but Eomish in form;
and therefore powerless and barren. Nothing authorises
the idea that Eoussel was not sincere ; but Calvin vainly
attempted to give him clearer views. When he was
made a bishop, not long after, there seemed ground for
thinking that his strong recommendation "to cleanse
the house of God rather than to destroy," proceeded
chiefly from his desire to keep a good place for himself
in that house. Calvin made him pay dearly for it,

THE " NICODEMITES." 31
by addressing to him his treatise "against the Nico-
demites" — who go to the Lord by night, and by day
remain Pharisees. We shall have to speak of this treatise.

X.
At this time, — about 1530 or 1532, it was not only the
covetous or weak Nicodemites who acted like Eoussel.
We have mentioned the scruples and iUusions of Le
Fevre ; and we might name other men in whom it was
rather the absence of clear notions respecting an unprece
dented state of affairs. Many evidently did not know
where to find the precise line between Eomanism and
heresy. Even to its doctors, Eomanism was far from
standing out, with the distinctness which the CouncH of
Trent was about to give to aH its parts. Many, there
fore, at the outset, had aHowed themselves to be carried
on very far without suspecting that they had passed the
bounds ; many, even at the period in question, had gone
beyond, without deeming themselves heretics, and with
out thinking of ever becoming such. Besides ; what they
were told, was taught by the gospel, and it did not occur
to, them that it could be the contrary of what the
Church taught ; at most they supposed that it had been
left in the background, to be brought forward when asked
for. If, moreover, some went so far as to own to them
selves that the Church positively taught errors, the dogma
of infaHibuity was then sufficiently vague not to absolutely
exclude the idea of a few corrections to be accepted, yea,
voted, by herself at the request of a few pious doctors.
Many priests, and some of the best, were in that position.
The more they loved and venerated the Church, the less,
they thought, did they depart from her true spirit by
welcoming so much as seemed to be good in the new ideas.
A curious fact may be thus explained — the reception
given by the clergy at Angouleme to Calvin, when driven

32 CALVIN AND DU TILLET.
from Paris. They knew him to be under sentence of
imprisonment for the rash things sown broadcast in the
rector's address, but stiH they trusted him three times to
pronounce that which it was customary to deHver in the
church of St. Peter at the synodal assemblies. Bsemond,
who relates the fact, does not teU us what these discourses
were, nor are we better informed as to what was contained
in those models of sermons and " Christian remonstrances"
which Du Tfllet asked of him for the neighbouring curates;
but we learn from other details that he was less than ever
disposed to dissemble. Numerous conversions, decidedly
evangelical, sufficiently show that he was the same as he
had been at Paris.
As we have already said, he resided with Du Tillet, a
canon of the cathedral, and in the vfllage of Claix, of which
Du TiHet was the curate. This ecclesiastic had travelled
much ; three or four thousand volumes, an enormous
number for the times, composed his library. No one was
better fitted than Calvin to appreciate such treasures, and
he enjoyed them so much as to make his friend both
happy and proud. Calvin acknowledged his hospitality
by teaching him Greek, — another way of teaching him
the gospel. According to Eaemond, it was in the canon's
fibrary that Calvin, "in order to entrap Christendom,
first wove the web of his 'Christian Institutes,' which we
may call the Koran, or rather the Talmud of heresy."
The fact is not proved. The Eeformer may have even
before conceived the idea of his book; it does not ap
pear that he was employed upon it at that period.
Esemond adds that "he was held in good esteem and
reputation, and loved by aU who loved letters." The man
of letters and the man of learning decidedly experienced
some difficulty in suffering an ecHpse in order that there
after the preacher and Eeformer only might appear. In
the library of the canon he probably had more than once
sighed after the repose which it might have afforded him;

PARIS AND SERVETUS. 33
more than once was he tempted no longer to lend an ear to
appeals from without, and above aU to hear no longer that
which resounded in his conscience. Another journey to
Noyon must find its place in this period. The documents
coUected by Le Vasseur show us Calvin signing, on the
4th of May 1534, his definitive renunciation of his two
benefices, one of which he resigned in favour of Antoine
de la Marliere, the other in favour of a relative. It is
unnecessary to remark here how completely this public
return to his native town, and especiaUy his free and
public renunciation of his two offices, as recorded by Le
Vasseur, might serve to deprive of every shadow of pro-
babflity and plausibleness the shameful motives which
some have dared to ascribe to his first departure.
Shortly after, we find him again at Paris. Queen Mar
guerite had obtained of the king, her brother, that the
affair of the address should be aHowed to drop ; she had
also obtained that the obscure Lutherans, the poor de
ceived people of Pasquier, should be left a little more
tranquil. But a vigHant eye was kept over them; per
secution was only waiting, as was presently seen, for an
opportunity, and Jean Morin was burning for revenge.
It was at Paris, on the same journey, that Calvin first
met with a man whom, unhappily, he was to meet for the
second time at Geneva — Michael Servetus, the Spaniard,
the adventurous theologian who seemed in quest of the
stake. His book upon the Trinity, which had just ap
peared at Hagenau, might have passed for a philosophi
cal speculation only, far from orthodox, assuredly, but
lost in scholastic mists. The Church had long been gene
rally very indulgent to opinions which did not encroach
upon its power. But the author made it a point that
there should be no mistake as to the tendency of his
book. He repaired to Basle, and sustained his thesis
against GScolampadius. He repaired to Paris, and there
he declared that he would sustain it against Calvin.

34 INDISCREET ZEAL.
This was tantamount to saying that he intended to go
beyond the boldest, and that, if the Eeformers attacked
the Church only on certain dogmas of the Church, he
aimed at the very heart and soul of the Christian system.
Calvin accepted the chaUenge. The dispute was to take
place in a house in the suburb of St. Antoine ; but Ser-
vetus, it was never known why, did not appear. No
matter ; we shaH not forget, when the time comes, the
position into which the Spanish theologian had just thrust
the leaders of the Eeformation, and Calvin in particular.
By selecting him for his adversary on the question of
the Trinity, upon which no variance existed between
Eomanism and the Eeformation, he, in a measure, con
stituted him the guardian of that doctrine, and rendered
him responsible for it before all Christendom. It was
this responsibflity which, nineteen years afterwards, kin
dled the pfle of Servetus.

XI.
Meanwhfle, however, many other faggots were to be
Hghted. The reformed, as we have said, had been left
for some time in peace, but on condition that they should
become invisible — a condition scarcely acceptable in times
of fervour and expansion. Speech being nearly inter
dicted, they wrote; and every morning Paris beheld fittle
tracts in the form of handbiHs, posted up' in the streets, on
the doors of the churches, and even on the doors of the
Sorbonne. Some of them were very gentle appeals to
the gospel; others very violent, though it would be un
fair to judge them by our more polished habits. Beza,:
in his " Ecclesiastical History," expressed his lively regret
for such imprudence; but there is great reason to doubt
if he was right when he adds: "It appeareth that, little
by Httle, the king himself had begun to relish some por-,

THE " PLACARDS." 35
tions of the truth." The king had had time to taste, not
only "some portions," but the whole of the truth, and, if
he had not done so, it was because there was in him
that which has ever been the most difficult for truth to
subdue — levity, which cares not for it, and vice, which
repels it. A wit, and a brilfiant representative of the
Vainer aspects of his age, he might find a certain inteUec-
tual and phHosophical pleasure in hearing new things pro
pounded and old things demolished, but if those old things
had lost their hold on his mind, they were still rooted in
his heart, which was too corrupt to receive an efficacious
and regenerating doctrine. The clergy, whom he had
taken pleasure in alarming by humming Marot's Psalms,
and by talking of sending for Melanchthon — the Church,
whom he had frequently shown how little he esteemed
either her or her ministers, was needed by him that he
might continue to slumber on the piHow of easy piety
and cheap pardons. Hence his hatred of those who had
removed the novelty out of the regions of wit and fancy,
receiving and preaching it as a serious, living, and potent
reality. He might, indeed, still Hsten to the intercession
of a beloved sister; but pitiless counseUors soon renewed
their attack, and the royal wit was again a persecutor.
They experienced no difficulty, therefore, in irritating
him against the placards, so multiplied that the name
of year of the placards long designated that year. These
penetrated even into the king's palace, and to the very
door of his cabinet, placed there, perhaps, by a hand
which was hostile to the reformers ; and the king took
this bravado very ilL At last, one day, the 18th of
October 1534, Paris awoke inundated with "True articles
on , the horrible and great abuses of the Papal mass."
They were only the ordinary objections against the real
presence, but expressed in terms which it was easy to
represent to the king as so many blasphemies. The
author, who has never been known, had freely used

36 THE STORM ARISES.
those lively phrases, the effect of which can only be
to irritate those whom they fad to convince. His princi
pal thesis is, that the true profaners of the body of Jesus
Christ, those who ought to be burned, are those who
place that body in a bit of dough, the food, perhaps,
"of spiders and of mice." Some reflections followed,
not less blunt, but very just, upon " the fruit of the mass"
—that is to say, upon the pernicious results of that con
centration of Christianity into a single act, which was an
inexhaustible round of ceremonies, and a perpetual encou
ragement to formality. It was, therefore, the Church
herself who, by giving to the mass such immense promi
nence, drew upon it the principal attacks; but that im
mense and consecrated prominence, on the other hand,
facilitated and justified the accusation of sacrilege brought
against all those who dared to disapprove.
The king might therefore think, with some fairness,
that the Divine Majesty had to be defended and avenged.
From the Divine to the royal majesty, the passage, as
always happens, had been easy, and his counsellors had
not wanted reasons. How should he, a mere long, a
mere man, pretend to be still respected, if he aUowed the
King of kings to be outraged ? The vengeance of the
King of kings was assigned to Jean Morin. All who
were suspected of any ardour for the new ideas were
arrested, and in a few days the prisons were overflowing.
But a solemn expiation was also required, and the king
was persuaded into presiding over it.
On the 29th of January 1535, a splendid procession
issued from the church of St. Germain l'Auxerrois. That
host which the Eeformers outraged by persisting in call
ing it bread, was carried under a canopy, borne by the
four chief dignitaries of the realm, the Dauphin, and
the Dukes of Orleans, Vendome and Angouleme. The
king walked behind, bareheaded, with a torch in his
hand, as if to make expiation for the kingdom. After

FRANCIS PERSECUTES. 37
mass, which was magnificently celebrated at St. Gene
vieve's, the king repaired to the episcopal palace, seated
himself upon a throne prepared in the great haU, and,
surrounded by the clergy, and the nobHity and parlia
ment in their red robes, declared his intention of granting
neither peace nor truce to him who should separate from
the religion of the State. He had seen, he said, "the
offence committed against the King of kings by the
pestilent wickedness of those who would molest and
destroy the French monarchy." He was above aU indig
nant that his good city of Paris, " from time immemorial
the head and pattern of aH good Christians," had not
been sheltered from that pestilence, and, said he, "it
would be very absurd in us if we did not confound
¦and extirpate these malignants, as far as in us lies."
He enjoined upon aU to denounce whoever should be
long to the malignants, even though a relative or a
brother. FinaHy : " As for me who am your king, if I
knew that one of my members was tainted or infected
with this detestable error, not only would I give it you
to lop it off, but if I were to perceive one of my children
infected, I would sacrifice him myself." — Philip II., there
fore, who later on was to say as much, did but repeat
Francis I. And the same day, by way of beginning, six
fires, in six different parts of the town, consumed six men
taken almost indiscriminately from amongst those whom
the king had just devoted to death. One only was
decidedly more guflty than the rest, Antoine de la Forge,
the host and friend of Calvin. But the stake was not
enough — must not the punishment, like the solemnity,
be novel and extraordinary ? The condemned, fastened
to a long swinging beam, were to be plunged into
the flames, then withdrawn, then plunged again, and then
withdrawn once more. The King of France, Hke the
ferocious Eoman Emperor, had wished that his victims
should feel themselves die, and, moreover, he had deter-

38 MARTYRS AND TRIUMPHS.
mined to behold their tortures with his own eyes. As
he returned to the Louvre, he passed the six fires in
succession. Six times he saw the abominable swing at
work, but he did not succeed in detecting any weakness
or regret in the martyrs.
Thus that gloomy period was opened in which, by the
arm of a king sunk in debauchery, the Church was about
to wreak her vengeance. WhHst you read these atrocious
details, you have difficulty in befieving yourself in France
or in Europe ; you ask yourself if history has not Hed
in placing in that same century, and at that same epoch,
a revival of learning, and a rejuvenescence of civilization.
See what the sight of these cruelties extorted from an
enemy of the Eeformation, the same Esemond from
whose works so many have learned to detest it : — " The
fires were Hghted everywhere, and as, on the one hand, the
just severity of the law restrained the people within their
duty, on the other, the obstinate resolution of those who
were dragged to the gibbet astonished many. For they
saw weak and deficate women seeking for torments in
order to prove their faith, and on their way to death ex
claiming, 'only Christ, the Saviour,' and singing some
psalm ; young maidens, walking more gaHy to execution
than to the bridal-chamber ; men rejoicing to behold the
terrible preparations and instruments of death, and, half-
burnt and roasted, remaining Hke rocks against the waves
of pain. These sad and constant sights excited some
perturbation, not only in the souls of the simple but of
the great, who were not able to persuade themselves that
truth was not on the side of such as maintained it with
so much resolution at the cost of their life. Others had
compassion on them, being grieved to see them thus per
secuted; and contemplating in the pubHc places their
grimy corses hanging in the air by shameful chains, the
relics of tortures,— they could not refrain from tears ; and
their hearts wept as weH as their eyes."

CALVIN S FIRST SACRAMENT. 39

XII.

Calvin, who was forced to keep sHence before this dread
ful onslaught, resolved to seek an asylum where he might
at least enHghten and strengthen from afar those whom
he could not aid when nigh. He repaired, however, again
to Angouleme to take leave of Du Tillet, and Du TiHet
determined to accompany him.
They stopped at Poitiers, and scarcely was the presence
of Calvin known than he saw " flocking to him," as at
Bourges, all "who manifested any desire for pure doctrine,"
and Poitiers counted many such. Near the town is a
grotto, which to this day bears the name of Calvin's grotto.
There, the tradition is, he assembled his friends, and
Esemond relates that he often interrupted himself, to kneel
down and implore the Divine blessing on them, on him,
and on France. It is pleasant to mention these impulses,
of too rare occurrence in his life, and to see him figure
with more emotion than usual, in those scenes which so
vividly recaH the first ages, the holy beginnings of Chris
tianity and the Church. This grotto witnessed the cele
bration of the first evangelical communion. A fragment
of rock served for a table. Almost aU the communicants
were eventually to be eminent preachers of the Eeformed
faith. Vernou, at Poitiers; Babinot, at Toulouse; Veron
in Saintonge, were the first to take the field, and others
soon followed. Thus in obscurity were laid the founda
tions of that immense influence which Calvin was soon
to exert. The most illustrious labourers in the French
Eeformation gloried in proceeding from him, and some
who had not been converted by his presence and his word,
were converted after his departure by the distant fascina
tion of his renown. But in France, and everywhere else,
his reputation was going to be stHl more that of the great
Christian than that of the man. "Calvin succeeded," M.

40 THE " PSYCHOPANNYCHIA."
f Eenan says, "because he was the most Christian man of his
age." Though from a pen far from Calvinistic, not to say
far from Christian, this explanation appears to us pro
foundly just. Calvin's contemporaries may have equaHed
or surpassed him in piety and in devotedness ; but none,
not even Luther, equaHed him as the complete, and, in a
measure, the official representative of evangelical Chris
tianity. . The mysteries of the grotto had at length transpired,
and Calvin was warned that he was no longer safe at
Poitiers. He therefore set out again, but stopped at
Orleans to publish a book, his Psychopannychia, which
afterwards appeared in French, under the title of: "A
Treatise by which it is proved that souls are awake after
they leave the body, against the error of some ignorant men
who think that they sleep till the Judgment Day." Some
ignorant men ! This is the tone which too often spoils
Calvin's finest passages. When he refutes, there is always
a little anger, a little contempt, and sometimes a great deal;
always that assurance which will not aUow him to admit
it possible for one to differ from him without being a dolt, a
dunce, or a traitor. The ignorant here are not the Anabap
tists only, though speciaUy intended by Calvin, but several
of the Fathers* Origen, amongst others, who admitted the
hypothesis of a sleep between death and the resurrection.
The hypothesis may be of no value, but the names of those
Who framed it deserved more consideration. For the rest,
Calvin owns that there are in this treatise " some things
rather sharply, or even harshly, said," but great qualities are
there also, richness, strength, originality, a tone which is
Serious and full of conviction. As for the motives of that
pubHcation, they are scarcely more apparent than those of
the Commentary on Seneca. Why this new treatise, which
ignores the questions of the times ? Would the author
deceive his enemies by seeming occupied with anything

TO STRASBURG AND BASLE. 41
rather than anti-papal controversy? We do not pause
to discuss the point.
Calvin and Du Tillet set out for Strasburg accompanied
by two servants, one of whom absconded near Metz with
a horse and the baggage. They reached Strasburg, pos
sessed of only ten crowns. But Strasburg was the haven.
There, for the first time, Calvin breathed a friendly at
mosphere. Strasburg had now for thirteen years belonged
to the Eeformed Faith. Drawn in at first by the great
Lutheran movement, but, at some distance from the centre,
and exposed to divers influences, it had passed through
hard times. Bucer was labouring zealously to give it a re
gular church, wisely and prudently active. Calvin, who had
long been in correspondence with Bucer, met in his house
with a hospitality full of charms. The future framer of
the Eepublic of Geneva probably gave Bucer much good
counsel, not without profiting in turn by Bucer's experi
ence. Not, however, that he entertained as yet the remotest
thought of ever acting such a part. He was sighing after
rest, and hoping to find it more easdy at Basle than at
Strasburg, he started for Basle. There OScolampadius had
just expired; there Capito and Simon Grynseus were la
bouring in peace ; and there Erasmus was growing old.
Erasmus was a man for rest at any price, but Calvin never
sacrificed to repose either principle or duty.
At Basle, as everywhere, fearful tidings were arriving
from the country which he had left. He heard, on the
side of France, what seemed to be a ceaseless din of
groans and cries. " An echo from Germany taught him
what evangelical France now expected from him.
Francis I. was in need of the Protestants of Germany,
like himself, in arms against Charles V. Ever ready to lie
when it suited his interests, he endeavoured to persuade
the Lutheran Princes that those he was having burned in
France were Anabaptists, — just such as Germany had been

42 THE WORK AND THE MAN.
obHged to get rid of by fire and sword. What he, the
king, punished in them was not their refigious opinions,
but their social doctrines, their revolt against aU order and
authority. This calumny was also propagated in France by " cer
tain wretched little books full of fies,"1 fabricated by the
clergy who were protected by the king.

XIII.
A great cause was therefore to be pleaded before Europe,
and Calvin felt himself caUed of God to undertake it.
There were two ways of doing this, — by a simple apo
logy for the Protestants of France, or by an exposition of
their doctrines. The first might lead more speedHy to
the desired end, the second might achieve a more impor
tant and a nobler result, — the justification — not of the Ee
formed alone, but of the Eeformation, the construction
and consofidation of the edifice of which the materials only
were as yet prepared.
Calvin chose the second task, and it is from that moment
that the Calvin of history, the Eeformer, stands out weU-
defined before us.
The man of genius, in fact, is not always the man who
begins the work; it is sometimes he who continues and
methodises it. It might even be said that it is always the
latter ; for, in fact, if you examine well, you wiH find out
predecessors even of those who seem to have first discovered
and entered upon the way. Luther, with his vigorous
power to initiate, was, nevertheless, but the continuator
of the obscure labour which had long been carried on in
men's minds and consciences. His genius seized it as a
whole, and it is his glory to have given it shape. The
glory of Calvin is not, therefore, so different as even his
1 Calvin. Preface to the " Commentary on the Psalms."

THE "CHRISTIAN INSTITUTES." 43
•
friends have sometimes thought; the difference Hes at
bottom but in the diverse nature of the two movements they
personified — the German movement in Luther, and the
French movement in Calvin. For the rest, whether
we be friends or foes of these two men, we aU recognize
it by always connecting their two names. Even those
Eomanists of our own day, who, in order to depreciate
the French Eeformer^ go so far as to pretend affection for
the German Eeformer, do not and wdl not any the less
continue to speak with the multitude, and to say,
" Luther and Calvin, — Calvin and Luther."
The monument which Calvin was about to erect, and
on which his name was to shine for ever, is his Institutes
of the Christian religion, commonly caUed the Christian
Institutes. The "Ghristian Institutes," published at first at Basle,
in 1535 or 1536, was to be work for Calvin's whole life,
for he never ceased revising and completing it. During
twenty-four years, the book increased in every edition, not
as an edifice to which additions are made, but as a tree
which developes itseH freely, naturaUy, and without the
compromise of its unity for a moment The early history
of this book is not free from obscurity. The French pre
face, addressed to Francis I., is dated the 1st August 1535,
and yet the first edition known is that of 1536, and in
Latin. Hence the much debated question : — Is the edition
of 1536 the first, or had there been a French edition the
year before ? Although the latter, if ever it existed, has
totaUy disappeared, its publication is now generaUy ad
mitted. The first French edition with a date is of 1540 ;
but at that period the work was already much augmented.
What was then the Christian Institutes in 1536 1 It
was, as the author wHl himself say later;1 "not the present
thick and elaborate work, but only a brief manual in
1 Preface to the " Commentary on the Psalms."

44 ITS FIRST FORMS.
which was attested the faith of those whom I beheld de
famed." This brief manual was an 8vo. volume of about 500
pages. It contained only six chapters, entitled as fol
lows : —
I. Of the Law (the explanation of the Decalogue).
II. Of Faith (the explanation of the Apostles' creeds.
III. Of Prayer (the explanation of the Lord's Prayer). .
IV Of the Sacraments (Baptism and the Lord's Sup
per).
V. Of the Sacraments (the falsity of the five which
the Eomish Church has added).
VI. Of Christian Liberty (ecclesiastical power, civil ad
ministration, &c).
It was, therefore, after aU, but a catechism ; but that
catechism contained aU the elements of the important
part which the Christian Institutes was to play in the
Church. In the first place, it supplied a general want.
The idea of such a book seems so simple now, that
people are astonished that it had to be written, and
that Luther especiaUy had not undertaken the task.
The Loci Communes of Melanchthon, published in 1521,
.and afterward translated into French by Calvin himself,
stiH belong to the schools; the new life is fundamentally
there, indeed, but the method is essentiaUy mediaeval, and
scarcely modified by the piety and unction of the author.
The book of Zwingle, his Commentarius de vera et
falsa Religione, had appeared in 1525, and though freed
from the method of the Loci, the author is still far from
a complete system of dogmatic divinity, at once precis©
and fiving. No one, however, had thought of reproach
ing him with it, any more than Melanchthon or Luther.
It was necessary that the need of such a system should
first be felt in men's hearts and minds; then they would
ask for it, and would go forth with joy to meet him
who should be the donor.

ITS POPULARITY AND POWER. 45
This movement had progressed more rapidly in France
than in Germany. Whether calumniated or not, whether
called or not to say what they beHeved, the Eeformed of
France wished to be able to say it to themselves, not
only article by article, which many could have done,
but under the more satisfactory and soHd form of a
system, and as a whole. Not one of them had yet done
or been able to do" this. The success of the Institutes in
every Protestant country soon showed that the same need
was felt everywhere, even where the faith was already
officiaHy settled. They wanted something more and some- ;
thing better than a Confession of Faith. They expected a
book which should be a Confession, but be accompanied by
aU that would be necessary to understand and defend it.
The Institutes was that book. It gave to the new Church
the definitive feeling of its lawfulness, its rights, and
its strength. By that clear and concise exposition of
apostolic Christianity, that vigorous appeal to Scripture,
and that haughty firmness in tracing the limits between
human traditions and revealed truths, Calvin, in some sort,
sealed with God's seal aH that the Eeformed faith had
done, and started it in its new confidence towards the
conquests which offered themselves to its zeal.
We do not judge, we narrate. If we judged, remarks
might have to be made on the sovereign authority arro
gated by the Eeformer. But he was the man required ;
and when we see the Eeformation adopt and admire
him, is it for us, three centuries after, to come and
coldly calculate if she was right or wrong in giving up
all for a time in his hands? The correspondence of
the period would furnish many a proof of the universal
favour which greeted the Institutes, and which, in despite
of the dryness of the book, soon kindled into enthusiasm.
Listen, in 1537, to the professor of Poitiers, Charles de
Sainte-Marthe, who. deplores "that the voice of Calvin,
the Institutes" cannot freely resound in the kingdom.

46 ITS DEVELOPMENTS
"Happy Germany," adds he, "to possess the treasure
which is refused to us!" Hear the magistrate of the
Paris Parfiament, a man who is to perish in the St. Bar
tholomew massacre, Pierre de la Place : " There is no
one in the world," he writes to Calvin, " to whom I owe
more than to thee, and I see not how I should repay thee
in this mortal Hfe for the immortafity which I have
found in thy book."

XIV.
The first edition, then, contained six chapters only; the
second Latin edition, published at Strasburg in 1539,
numbered seventeen ; that of 1543, again revised, has
twenty-one ; that of 1559, the last and final revision,
as many as eighty-four. As to the intermediate editions,
their number is unknown. Although Latin was still
received everywhere as the language of theology, it was,
during this same period, translated into every European
tongue. The French editions had foHowed the Latin
editions step by step; and the definitive French text
belongs, like the Latin, to 1559. A short preface, dated
the 1st of August, as in that of 1535, initiates us into this
persevering elaboration. After having observed how in
considerable the book was at first, and how it had been
successively augmented, he says : " Though I had no
cause to be displeased with my labour in the matter,
nevertheless I do confess that I had no satisfaction in it
tiH I had digested it in its present order, which I hope
you wiU approve." Having been menaced with death
the winter before, he adds, " I spared myself aU the less
tiH I had completed the book, which, surviving after my
death, might show how desirous I was to satisfy those
who had already found profit in it  I had wished
to do it sooner; but it will be soon enough if well enough;

AND COMPLETION. 47
and, for myself, it wiU suffice me that it hath borne fruit
to the Church of God." '
A complete analysis of this book would carry us too
far ; it would be a book in itself. We must, however,
give more than the few detaus which precede, some
quite general, and others purely bibfiographical. The
Christian Institutes is more than a book ; it is an im
portant part of Calvin's life, or, still better, a part, if
not the whole, of Calvin himself. Let us therefore endea
vour to give at least an idea of the work.

XV.

The design of the book, or the problem to be solved
was this : — " Eegularly to apply to dogmatic theology
the principle of justification by faith, brought anew to
Hght by Luther, and recognized as the sole true and pos
sible basis of a reformation of the Church, in the largest
sense of the word."
This solution Calvin has sought and found in a com
plete development of the doctrine of salvation, from the
stand-point of the human conscience placed in the pre
sence of each of the four divine manifestations which are
to act upon it, revelation in the Father, in the Son, in the
Holy Ghost, and in the Communion of the Churchy
Hence there are four parts which were confused in the
first editions, but which became more and more distinct,
and ended by forming the four boohs of the work : — The
knowledge of God and of his creative work; of Jesus
Christ and of his redeeming work ; of the Holy Ghost and
of his regenerating work ; and, finaUy, of the Church, the
Body of Christ, as the Apostle says, the depositary of the
means of grace and salvation, but not so that she can save
any one unless there be the new heart, regeneration by
the Holy Ghost.

48 ITS ANALYSIS.
The first book treats therefore of the knowledge of God
" in his title and quality of Creator and sovereign Ruler
of the world." But from the very first fines the author
places himseH and us under the eye of conscience. The
summary of true religious science is, " that in knowing
God, each of us knows himseH also," and no one, on the
other hand, will know himseH tiH he has contemplated
the face of God, and, from regarding .that, descends to
regard himself." But what is it to know God? It is not
to fathom his nature ; but to adore, love, and fear him.
The Hght of nature would have sufficed for this, but sin has
extinguished it. A revelation was therefore necessary ; a
book contains it, for it was also necessary that God "should
have His authentic registers to write in them His truth,
in order that it should not perish." What testimony will
these registers have of their divine origin ? The Church ?
No, but the Holy Ghost Himself bearing witness in each of
us to the truth of His work. " There is no true faith but
that which the Holy Ghost seals in our hearts." Such is
the basis of Calvin's dogmatic theology.
Seven chapters are devoted to these preliminaries. In
the eighth the apologetic proofs of the truth of the Bible
are placed, and in those which follow, the questions of the
spirituality of God, of worship in the Spirit, of the Trinity,
of the creation in general, of the creation of man, of his
original faculties, and of his primitive state. Three chap
ters upon Providence terminate this first book, and lay, as
they proceed, the foundations of the doctrine of election
such as it wHl be developed in the second book.
The title of the second book is : Of the Knowledge of
God, in so far as He has showed Himself a Redeemer in
Jesus Christ.
Five chapters on sin hold the first place, for in Christian
theology aU depends upon the manner in which that
question is considered. Calvin teaches the absolute in
capacity of man to do of himseH any good thine* ; but he

SALVATION IN CHRIST ALONE. 49
. teaches us, at the same time, not to draw the consequences
which a selfish logic might infer therefrom. Incapable of
raising himself up, man possesses in Jesus Christ an admir
able means of restoration and salvation. It is to prepare
him to accept this means that God gives him a moral law,
a law which he will never observe so weH that it wiH
not convince him of sin. The design of this law, the expo
sition of the commandments which it contains, the con
nexion of the two covenants, their " simflitude " and their
differences, occupy five chapters. The, five. fo11nwiri(r_g.T-P
a complete Christology, Jesus, very man, very God,
prop:fe*rp¥iest and king, has accomplished by His death
the work of our salvation. The last chapter gathers
together aU the scriptural declarations which assert and
guarantee the accompHshment of that work.
Salvation is now accomplished, but out of us ; hitherto
it is but an historical though divine fact, and a fact to
which we might remain indefinitely strangers. How is
it to be accomplished in each of us ? This forms the
subject of the third book, entitled : Of the means of
participating in the grace of Jesus Christ ; of the fruits
which accrue to us therefrom ; and of the effects which
follow thereupon.
This "means" is faith. But if Calvin stopped there,
the question would only be thrown back : — Does there
exist a real and efficient connexion between faith and the
work of salvation performed by Jesus Christ externaUy
to us ? No. There must be an agent to bring the two
into contact ; that agent is the Holy Ghost. It is there
fore his part to create in us the abHity to acquire some
thing very different from the abstract and historical notion
of salvation; and thus the soul is brought into connexion
and contact, or rather into fellowship of life, with Jesus
himseH, the Author of salvation. Thus the soul appro
priates to itself, not the idea, but the very substance of
salvation. D

50 DOCTRINE OF PREDESTINATION.
Behold then at once both theory and precept. Sal
vation is Hfe in Christ; and there is no salvation for
him who does not five in Christ. But if faith, without
the operation of the Holy Ghost, leads to nothing, it is
nevertheless necessary to the work of the Holy Spirit in
us, that faith should prevent, or meet, that almighty
acting, or rather that the Holy Ghost should transform
that faith into a force and a Hfe. It is only then that
it is truly faith; tiH then it is merely a belief.
It is by the same working of the Holy Ghost that re
pentance brings forth fruit. Without this, it would be
compunction only ; a merely human affection : it must
become regeneration ; a thing divine.
From faith and repentance thus rendered fruitful, the
Christian Hfe results. How does it develope itseH?
Calvin shows this in five chapters, which would suffice to
prove how true and how deep this Hfe was in him, in
spite of the seeming aridity of his theology and of his
heart. This being said, and so weH said, the doctrine of justifi
cation by faith is fuHy laid down, and Calvin has only
to explain it. He does so in eight chapters, not without
showing, when required by his subject, how his theory
answers by anticipation every objection. He goes over
it again with reference to prayer, which is one of the
principal manHestations of Christian Hfe. This chapter
is one of the richest, and is sealed with the clearest
impress of Christian experience.

XVI.
At length comes the tremendous doctrine which was
about to faU like a veil, and, in the eyes of many at the
present day, almost like a shroud, upon the whole Calvin
istic theology — the doctrine of predestination.

LOGICAL DEDUCTIONS. 51

The existence of evil; the salvation of some, the cont
demnation of others; the circumstances which place on<
in the way to salvation, and another on the road tc
condemnation — these are facts which have ever been a
problem. How shall the prescience of a just God bt
conciliated with the responsibility of a being whom tha
God knew would sin and be lost, and whom He conse
quently might either not have created, or might hav
created without the possibHity of sinning ? Eeason can
reply nought; the Scriptures, according as you press more
or less some or others of their declarations, wiU make you
lean more or less towards divine sovereignty, or towards
free will, the only logical source of responsibility. Most
theologians admitted an election of grace, which it was
difficult not to see clearly taught in many of these
declarations ; but the greater part did not deem that
this election of grace, the free and special manifesta
tion of the divine goodness, impfied election of death for
those who were not its objects. They resigned them
selves, therefore, to seek no farther, and left with God
the eventual conciliation of all things.
According to Calvin, that concdiation is neither to b<
sought nor to be found, for it does not exist, nor ever
exist, and it is an attack on divine sovereignty to sujl^
pose God occupying HimseH about it. God, in the fu
ness of His sovereignty, by "His eternal and immu
table counsel," has decreed some to salvation, others to
damnation, and as He owed nothing to either, the
elect have to bless Him everlastingly, and the reprobate
have no right to complain. Calvin acknowledges, or
nearly so, that there is no explicit statement to that
effect in Holy Writ : it is sufficient for him that it is a
logical deduction. " Those whom God in election passes
over," he will say, "God reprobates." To admit the
election of grace, and reject the election of death, is
"puerile," is "stupid folly." Human ideas, human justice,

52 FALSE ACCUSATIONS.
and human pity, must be banished from these questions.
"The honour of God" demands it.
Calvin forgets one thing only, which is, that logic
is also human. Logic is reason, and even reason arro
gating to itseH the right of judging alone, supremely, and
without appeal. " The honour of God," therefore, impera
tively demands, also, that we should at times sHence it,
and that we should not presume to impose upon God our
conclusions, however unanswerable, however clear they
may seem to our inteHect. When Calvin deems that
predestination is proved by the sole fact of there being
no other logical solution, his method, at bottom, is only
that of the infidel establishing logically the impossibility
of a supernatural revelation, or of the Eomanist estab
lishing, not less logically, that, a revelation being granted,
God must have instituted a visible authority entrusted
with its interpretation. AH this supposes that God can
not find any solutions but such as appear, to us, the
only possible ones : all this logic, consequently, is illogical,
when the question relates to God, His designs, His wis
dom, His goodness, and His power.
But having frankly made these observations, there are
others which we have now the right to offer.
It has been customary to aUow aU the dislike which
attaches to this doctrine to weigh upon Calvin : An error
and an act of injustice, The first who positively taught
predestination was Augustine. It may seem to be mflder
in his writings, but there it is, and in its plenitude.
It has also become customary to condemn it in Calvin,
by isolating it from aU with which he surrounded it; and
by representing it as the Alpha and Omega of his system.
— Another error and act of injustice. What is true, and
only true, is that the Eeformer seems, on the contrary, to
have exhausted his logic in setting forth the idea, so that
none remains for the development of consequences. There
is not a trace either in his theology, his ethics, or his lHe,

POWER OP CALVINISM. 53
of that practical fatalism which ought logically to result
from the terrible dogma he taught. Never did a man more
energetically preach reaponsibHity, activity, duty, and
Christian progress — never did a man more sternly preach
all these things to himseH. What we say of him we could
say of his disciples. To them, as to himseH, the doctrine
of predestination remained a dead letter. It is contended
that the Calvinist must necessarily have said : " Either I
am one of the elect, and, if so, I shaU be saved, do what I
may ; or, I am not one of the elect, and if so, do what I
may, I am lost." Logic stiH; but when and where, in fact,
did Calvin's error produce such fruits ? And H it never
has produced them, is it not a proof that it was not reaUy
what it appears to be in our day ? It is for history, there
fore, to judge it, rather than for reason,- for sentiment, or for
theology. It must be considered not in itself, but along
with the whole work of Calvin, whether in his fifetime or
after his death. .Instead of being a basis, as it might
unhappHy have been, it has never been other than an
appendix ; and instead of destroying activity, courage,
morality, and hope, it seems, on the contrary, to have
given the soul a more vigorous temper, and to have made
it face more boldly the severest duties and trials. All the
martyrs who went to the stake, encouraged and comforted
by some pious epistle from him who had taught them,
beHeved in predestination. Neither disciples nor master,
therefore, thought of doubting that the incorruptible crown
was for every one who died with courage and with joy.
A writer, who certainly is no Calvinist, nor unhappily
even a believer, is struck like ourselves by this moral,
heroic aspect of the question. " Geneva," says Michelet,
" endured by its moral strength. It had no territory, no
army, — nothing for space, time, or matter; it was the city
of the mind, built of Stoicism on the rock of predestination.
Against the immense and gloomy net into which, when
abandoned by France, Europe fell, nothing less was neces-

54 THE CHURCH.
sary than that heroic seminary. To every people in peril
Sparta, for an army, sent a Spartan. It was thus with
Geneva . . . and now the combat commences ! Below,
let Loyola excavate his mines ; above, let the gold of
Spain, and the sword of the Guises, dazzle or pervert!
In that narrow enclosure, the gloomy garden of God,
blood-red roses bloom under Calvin's hand for the preser
vation of the liberties of the soul. If in any part of Europe
blood and tortures are required, a man to be burnt, or to be
broken on the wheel, that man is at Geneva, ready to de
part, giving thanks to God and singing psalms to Him."

XVII.
The subject of the fourth and last book is the Church.
Of the twenty chapters which it contains, the author de
votes twelve to the question of the Church itseH (its con
stitution, administration, discipline, &c.,) one to monastic
vows, six to the Sacraments, and one to civil govern
ment, considered in its connection with the Church and
Church government. We could only analyse this book in
detaH ; besides, we shaH have to resume several of the
questions it broaches. The legislator of Geneva did but
throw into the form of laws the ideas which are developed
in this part of the work.
We have not spoken of polemics. They are every
where, but always in their place, for they always foUow
upon direct teaching, and are called forth and justified
by all that precedes. Calvin does not demolish for the
sake of demoHshing; he does not even demofish in order
to buHd up on the same spot; he begins by buHding, tra
cing his fines, digging his foundation, raising, in short, aU
the time, the whole edifice of the teaching which occupies
him, without caring for what he destroys or subverts. It
is only after its completion that he retraces his steps, show-

UNDUE SEVERITY OF TONE. 55
ing that what has faUen required to fall, and that what has
not yet faUen must faU in like manner. It is easy to un
derstand the authority which this gives him. His cause
is almost always gained before hand. Every one of his
ideas, before entering upon the conflict with those which
are adverse to them, is become in some sort a fact achieved,
admitted, and invulnerable. There is abdity in this,
doubtless, but there is also something more and better.
Calvin is scarcely ever subtle, which is great praise for a
theologian brought up amid the subtleties of old scholas
ticism ; if he binds his opponents, it is with mighty cords,
and never with the miserable threads which the schools
had so long gloried in weaving. His ability, in a word,
is that of genius, and his strength is that of faith. Armed
with the Bible, he does not admit that he can be van
quished ; accordingly, even when he employs the divine
weapon amiss, we are obfiged to aHow that never man
employed it with firmer conviction or with more profound
respect. Yet there is too frequently one thing which mars the
enjoyment of all these lofty quafities. We have said else
where that it is the tone which the author assumes towards
those whom he deems it his duty to combat. AH the
impatience and all the indignation which can be inspired
by a false idea, Calvin thinks himself entitled to pour out
upon aH who teach or even accept that idea. Though it
is not in the "Christian Institutes" that he has the oftenest
and the most fully merited this reproach, it is there, above
aH, that we regret to have to blame him. We would fain
give ourselves up unreservedly to him ; and it is painful
to see him suddenly turn from the most pious thoughts, and
the noblest forms of expression, to hurl at the prostrate foe
some epithet not only abusive, but trivial and perhaps piti
fully facetious. You ask yourself how he came not to
understand that, in default of charity, the very interest
and dignity of his cause forbade him to defend it thus.

56 INFLUENCE ON LANGUAGE.
The answer to this question is, in a certain measure,
however, contained in the question itseH, and in the pain
ful astonishment which calls it forth in our day. Calvin
wrote for his own age not for ours. He was to blame, it
is true ; for a great author ought to write for every age ;
but he was writing for his own, and H he was absolved
by it, or rather H it did not even occur to it that ab
solution was needed, so natural then did harsh polemics
appear, — why, we must either also absolve him, or keep
our reproaches for those who absolved, approved, en
couraged and admired him. Let us wonder, H we will
that those blemishes did not endanger the success of
the Institutes; but if the author in so many successive
editions did not make them disappear, it evidently is
because they had excited no animadversion. Let us regret
them, but on our own account : to visit upon Calvin all
the annoyance which they inflict upon us, would be to
be guHty of injustice to him Hke that for which We blame
him, for we also should then magnify into serious faults
What are such only from our point of view, and according
to our impressions.
And besides, how many beauties there are in the book
to make you forget the blemishes ! How many pages in
which there is nothing to find fault with, and in which
the author is not only free from the coarseness of his age,
but almost in full possession of all the qualities which the
French language was to assume after the progress of an
other hundred years ! He knows and observes rules in
grammar which as yet had not been framed ; his genius
discerns them in the genius of the tongue, and when at
a later day they are fixed, it wiU only be the sanction of his
work. Yet what he does is purely instinctive; there is not
a trace of solicitude about grammar, not a trace of care
taken with the style or with the form of his matter. His
thought moves freely and at large — phrases and periods ar-
rangethemselves without his seeming to think aboutit — and

TESTIMONIES. 57
certainly without his thinking about it — and you feel that
it would be almost wronging him to study separately his
style, art, and caUing. The writer and the Eeformer are
but one. Whether pen in hand, or labouring otherwise at
his work, he is always the man for his work, always Calvin,
aU Calvin, and never was style more truly the man, and
the whole of the man.
" Calvin's style is simple, correct, elegant, clear, ingeni
ous, animated, and varied Hi form and tone. Less learned,
elaborate, and ornate than that of Eabelais, but more
ready, flexible, and skilful in expressing all the shades
of thought and feeHng. Less ingenious, agreeable, and
rich than that of Amyot, but keener and more imposing.
Less highly-coloured and engaging than that of Montaigne,
but more concise and serious, and more French."1 " The
Christian Institutes is the first work in the French tongue
which offers a methodical plan, weH arranged matter, and
exact composition. Calvin not only perfected the language
in general by enriching it, he created a peculiar form of
language, of which the elements have been very diversely
applied, but have not ceased to be the best, because they
were from the beginning the most conformable to the
genius of our country. It is the style of serious discus
sion, more habituaHy nervous than highly coloured. The
formidable instrument by which French society was about
to effect one advance after another. Calvin treats every
question of Christian phHosophy as a great writer. He
equals the most sublime in his grand thoughts upon God,
the expression of which was equaHed but not surpassed
by Bossuet."2
We have said enough upon this book, and we were not
able to say less of it. The chronological order has been
rather disturbed, for we were only in 1535, and the book
then was scarcely more than a sketch of the one which we
1 Paul Lacroix (the Bibliophile Jacob).
2 Nisard. " History of French Literature."

58 THE PREFACE
have been analysing. Yet, as we have already said, this
sketch was the whole book; aU that Calvin was going to
put into it during twenty-four years, was already in his
mind, and would be reproduced by him in all his teach
ing and in aH his acts. There has been, therefore, no real
anachronism in what we have just been saying of it.
The definitive Institutes of 1559 and the primitive Insti
tutes of 1535 are, under two forms, one and the same,
the programme of the fife which we have undertaken to
narrate.

XVIII.
The preface of the book was, as it were, the first great
public act of that life. Boldly addressed to the sorry
prince whose follies and frenzies we have seen, it was an
eloquent demand that he should at least hear before he
struck. "It hath seemed to me expedient," says the author,
" to make this present book serve both for instruction to
those whom I had designed to teach, and for a confession
of faith to you, whereby you may know what the doc
trine is against which they are enflamed with so much
rage, who trouble your kingdom with fire and sword.
.... 1 know well with what terrible reports they have
fiUed your ears and heart .... namely, that it tends
only to the destruction of all rule and policy, the disturb
ance of peace, and the abolition of law. ... I do not ask
without reason, therefore, that you should please to take
entire cognisance of this cause. . . . And think not that
I essay here to treat my private defence with a view to
obtain my return to the land of my bfrth. ... I under
take the common cause of all the faithful, and even that
of Christ, the which is now so utterly rent and trodden
under foot in your kingdom, that its case appears to be

TO THE INSTITUTES. 59
desperate. For the might of God's adversaries hath
obtained that the truth of Christ should .... be hidden
and buried as a shameful thing; and that the poor
Church should be either consumed by cruel death, or
expelled by banishments, or so confounded by menaces
and terrors that she dare not utter a word. . . . And yet,
no one cometh forth to oppose himseH against such fury.
And if there be some who would seem very much to
favour the truth, they say that the imprudence and igno
rance of simple people must be pardoned. For it is
thus they speak, calling the very certain truth of God
imprudence and ignorance."
Observe what we have abeady pointed out. The
poor crushed Church asks for no toleration; she wHl not
live by the favour of a pity which would entreat indul
gence for the ignorance or imprudence of the simple people
who belong to her. Those simple people, by the mouth
of Calvin, speak in the name of the truth of God ; they
caU upon the king to hear them, not that he may pardon
them, but be himseH converted to that truth which cannot
but become clear to him who listens to it. If he does not
listen, woe unto him, for " a man deceiveth himseH H he
expects long prosperity in a reign which is not governed
by the sceptre of God, that is, by His holy Word. WHl
the King reject it because they who preach it to him are
poor and despised ?" Poor they are, indeed, and miser
able, but it is before God, as all men and sinners are;
and it is on this account that they cling to the doctrine
which is their strength, their riches, and their joy — salva
tion by faith ; a doctrine, adds Calvin, which "is not ours,
but is that of the living God and of His Christ."
A rapid exposition of the Eeformed and only Chris
tian doctrine follows. It is summed up, he says,' in one
single point: Salvation by Jesus, and Jesus alone. The
Eeformed have rejected only that which could not agree
with this great dogma, and it is not their fault if, in the

60 THE REFORMERS ACCUSED.
process of sorting, they have had to set aside so many
thmgs. After aU, therefore, the only crime of a people
so crueUy treated, is their sincere return to the funda
mental idea of Christianity and the Church.
And who are they who accuse them? Who are those
who urge the King to exterminate them? Hitherto,
Calvin has restrained himseH; but here he breaks out.
The clergy, so ardent in soficiting tortures, are animated
and excused by no true zeal ; then* interests and autho
rity are indeed their gods. The most flagrant immorality
moves them but Httle; but they are moved by the slightest
attack upon the rubbish on which they Hve, and which
" makes their kitchen fat." The words are coarse ; but
the thing was only too real ; and, wlfile we grant that
Calvin would have done better to allow a few exceptions^
it must be owned that exceptions were rare. Few, very-
few, amongst the principal enemies of the Eeformation
deserved that respect which cannot be refused even
to an enemy with strong convictions, true piety, and
purity of Hfe. Calvin, before he was their adversary,
had been their colleague, and was naturally indignant at
seeing them display for the persecution of the Eeformed
faith, a zeal which they, had been so far from showing
for the weHare of the Church by the discharge of their
duty. As yet, the Eeformation had produced in the
Eomish clergy none of the improvement for which they
had eventuaUy to thank her; on the contrary, she had
deprived them of many of their most learned and pious
members, and it was with aH their vices and ignorance
that they were advancing to crush her.
After having shewn what his adversaries are, Calvin
passes in review what they say.
They say that the doctrine is new. Yes, for those to
whom the gospel is new.
They say that it rests upon nothing. Yes, if the gos
pel is nothing.

THEIR PRINCIPLES DEFENDED. 61
They ask by what miracles it is authorised. Why! by
all which in times past served to confirm the divinity of
the gospel. If the Eomish Church cares to be able to
quote others, it is because she needs them to support her
novelties. We do not feel that need. Besides, it is well
known what Popish miracles and miracle-mongers are
worth. They say that we despise the Fathers. They respect
them, forsooth, after a singular fashion. "Either they
do "not perceive, or they dissemble, or they pervert" what
the Fathers have said in conformity with the gospel;
and what the Fathers have said contrary to the gos
pel, they "adore," as "good sons," and make the most
of it, finding authority in the smaUest error arrogantly
to teach the greatest. But it is false that we despise
the Fathers. Despise them! They are our best friends!
And Calvin enumerates aU the points in which the Ee
formation has everything to gain by invoking the Fathers.
"He was a Father who said that it was an abomination to
see an image in Christian temples. . . . He was a Father
who denied that the body of Christ was concealed under
the bread in the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper. . . .
He was a Father who maintains that Christian people
must not be denied the blood of their Lord, to confess
whom they are to shed their blood. ... He was a
Father who affirmed that it is presumptuous to decide
anything obscure without the clear and evident testi
mony of Scripture. . . . He was a Father who main
tained that marriage ought not to be forbidden to the
ministers of the Church. He was a Father, and one
of the oldest, who wrote that one Christ alone must
be listened to, and that no heed should be paid to what
others have said or done before us, but only to what
Christ the first of aU has commanded." The names
come thronging into the marginal notes ; and Calvin
leaves off by saying, that "months and years would be

62 SOPHISMS REFUTED.
taken up with the repetition," H he were to " enumerate"
how often the authority of the Fathers is boldly rejected,
in fact, by their pretended "obedient chHdren."
Then comes the great question of the Church, which it
was so important to explain to the king. Had he not
been armed against the Eeformation by being shown in
every religious revolt a pofitical one ? Calvin, therefore,
lays down, as a principle, that an accusation of revolt can
only come after a clear demonstration of the rights of the
authority attacked. Theywould make us own, he says,
either that we attack the Church, the true and legitimate
Church, or that this Church had disappeared tiH we came,
which would be contrary to the formal promises of our
Saviour. " Certainly," he replies, " the Church of Christ
has Hved, and wHl five, so long as Christ reigneth at the
right hand of His Father." But has it been, and wHl it
always be visible and recognisable by the number of its
adherents, and the strength of its organisation? "This
is the point in dispute." Our adversaries " are not satis
fied H the Church cannot always be pointed out. But
how often did it happen that she was so deformed among
the Jews that no appearance of her remained ? How often
since the advent of Christ has she been hidden and without
form ? How often hath she been so oppressed by wars,
seditions, and heresies, as to be visible nowhere ?" And
he quotes numberless occasions in which the true Church
was only, as we should now say, an insignificant minor
ity. " You stop at the waUs, seeking the Church of God
in the beauty of the edifice. . . . The mountains
and woods, and lakes, and prisons, and deserts, and
caverns are to me more safe and trustworthy." Then
follows another picture of what, under the great parade
of hierarchy and unity, the representatives of the Eomish
Church reaUy are. The king knows then: morals ; will
he persist in believing them to be the representatives of
the gospel? WHl he persist in not choosing to learn

CONDUCT JUSTIFIED. 63
what they are and teach, against whom these excite
him? They reproach the Eeformed with the troubles of which
their doctrine has been the occasion; but "it is peculiar
to God's. Word that it never comes forth but Satan
awakes and opposes." It is even a certain mark by
which to discern it from false and lying doctrines,
"which are wHHngly received by all, and satisfy every- -
body." The prophets and apostles were subjected to the
same accusation ; and Jesus was crucified for sedition.
It is true that seditions have arisen out of the Eeforma
tion in some countries; but the Eeformation condemned
them from the first, and is not more responsible for them
than Christianity is for aU the folfies committed Hi its
name. See even under the apostles how many errors pre
tended to be authorised by the gospel. They also ought,
therefore, "to have renounced that gospel, which they
saw to be the seed of so much strife, and the occasion of
so much offence." It was as St. Paul says; they knew it
to be " the savour of death Hi them that perish," whHe it
was "the savour of fife Hi them that are saved," and
" armed with this confidence, they boldly passed on, and
walked through aH the dangers of tumults and offences."
This is the confidence of the Eeformers. They wHl be no
more be shaken by the extravagances of the Anabaptists,
for instance, than by the fury of then: enemies.
" But," continues Calvin, " I return to you, Sire. You
ought not to be moved by those false reports. ... Is it
probable that we, from whom a seditious word was never
heard when we lived under you, should plot the subver
sion of kingdoms ? And, what is more, who now, after
being expeUed from our houses, cease not, nevertheless, to
pray to God for your prosperity and that of your king
dom .... And stiH more, thanks be to God, we have
not profited so little by the Gospel, that our Hfe cannot
be to our detractors an example of chastity, liberality.

64 GREAT SUCCESS.
mercy, temperance, patience, modesty, and every other
vfitue. . . . And the very mouth of the envious has been
constrained to bear witness to the innocence, before men,
of some of us who were put to death on that account alone."
.... Let the king, then, deign at least to read the book
which the author presents to him, and his wrath wiU sub
side. "But if, on the contrary, the detractions of the
malignant do so stop your ears that the accused have no
means of defending themselves ; and if those impetuous
furies, without your preventing it, stiH practise cruelties by
prisons and scourges, by racking and cutting, and burning,
we certainly, like sheep devoted to slaughter, shaU be re
duced to the last extremity, nevertheless, in our patience,
wHl we possess our souls, and wait for the arm of the Lord,
which wiH doubtless be revealed in due season, and appear
to defiver the poor in their affliction, and to punish the
despisers who now so boldly rejoice. The Lord, the King
of kings, establish your throne in righteousness, and your
seat in equity!"

XIX.
Such is this famous preface, which, it is thought,
Francis I. did not even take the trouble to read, but which
was read everywhere, and revealed Hi Calvin the Luther
of France. It has often been quoted as the first piece of
Hterary eloquence possessed by the French tongue ; but
to the Eeformed, it was not only the most eloquent plead
ing tiH then written in their behalf, it was the model, and,
as it were, the programme of aU the apologies they would
have to write, and, in fact, even at the present day, the
order followed by Calvin is that to which recourse is con
stantly had.
The author's name was soon in every mouth, and unani
mous testimonies of gratitude and admiration sought him

DUCHESS OF FERRARA. 65
out in his retreat at Basle. The Institutes had the suc
cess of every book caHed forth by serious aspHations, giving
a local habitation and a name to the thoughts which
people the aH, saying what everybody thinks ; such a
book is everybody's work, and everybody is ready to
praise it as his own. Many, nevertheless, were alarmed at
having thought all this, and at being in thefr consciences
accountable for a revolution so radically complete. Logi-
caUy, they could object nothing; it was what indeed
flowed from principle, and no one could think of re
sisting the indomitable reasoner. But, and that is what
was done by some timid ones, they could abandon the
principle itself, they could proclaim themselves enlight
ened by the enormity of the consequences, and returned
corrected into the old Eomish track. But if the Institutes
had this result in some, they became to many others the
torch which came to illumine thefr thick darkness, the
banner under which they were about to march, blessing
God for having at last granted them to know where they
were, and whither they were going.

XX.

Amongst those who joyfuHy gave themselves up to this
last impression, we find the duchess of Ferrara, Een6e
of France.
The daughter of Louis XII. who left no son, Een6e,
but for the Safic law, would have been Queen of France,
and i£ the Queen of France had had the sentiments of the
duchess of Ferrara, what a change might there not have
been in the destinies of the realm! But let us leave
the notes of interrogation which, in spite of us, range
themselves by the side of an irrevocable past. It is to
interrogate God ; it is almost to reproach Him with not
having arranged all as we could have wished.
E

6G REFORMERS AT FERRARA.
She who failed to be a queen, almost became an em
press; she was not three years of age when she was
betrothed to Charles of Austria, the future Charles V.
Politics broke off the match. Subsequently betrothed
to Henry VIII., and then to the marquis of Brandenburg,
Francis I. at last bestowed her on a petty Italian prince,
Hercules d'Este, the duke of Ferrara, and son of Lucretia
Borgia. Eenee was seventeen years of age, and though but little
favoured as to personal charms, she was otherwise admir
ably gifted. She had learned Latin, Greek, and mathe
matics ; but the pedantry which might, in a female, have
easily resulted from studies of such a nature, was effaced
by her perfect gracefulness. She was, says Brantome, a
" very good and clever princess, for her mind was one of
the best and most acute that could be." As a child of
the Eenaissance, the love of the arts occupied a large
place in her heart.
Her tastes happened to be those of her husband. Like
her, he loved the arts, and letters; but he was a total stranger
to the more serious aspect of the modern movement. As
for her, she had Hved with Marguerite of Valois, and arrived
imbued with the new ideas, already matured in her heart
under the influence of a pure life and true piety. The
duke might think at first that she would not step beyond
that purely inteUectual and poetical atmosphere, which,
in Italy, cHcumscribed the new religious wants of some
superior minds. He aUowed her to correspond with
them, and even to attract them to his court. He saw her
without too much apprehension welcome the poet Marot,
banished from France after the aflair of the " placards,"
but too volatile, apparently at least, to be considered as
anything but a wit and rhymer. Other Frenchmen, more
openly Protestants; and who, like him, had sought an
asylum at Ferrara, compelled the duke to see more clearly
what his wife's sentiments were. At last, one day, Charles

CALVIN AT FERRARA. 67
d'EspevHle arrived, and the duke was doubtless not una
ware that Charles d'EspeviUe was John Calvin of Noyon,
the author of the Christian Institutes, in all probabHity
invited by the princess.
Unhappily we possess but few details about this part of
his life, which, though less important, since it was to leave
no trace, was certainly not uninteresting. What were
Calvin's impressions at the sight of Italy, of its religion,
and worship, its clergy, and monks, its skies, and its
arts ? Some have regretted as respects the latter, that
Calvin's sojourn Hi Italy was not longer. Italy, they say,
would have given flexibility to his soul and quickened
his imagination ; he would no longer have been that gloomy
genius, as Bossuet terms him, disdaining aU that is not
reason and doctrine, austere and rigid truth. It may
be so, but would he have retained his strength ? Would
Calvin, as a chfid of Italy, have still been Calvin ? Let
us not amuse ourselves with remaking great men, by modi
fying on paper the elements of theH greatness ; the pro
bability always wfil be, that they were what they were
to be, and that modified, they would have been lesser
men. Moreover, although Calvin was only twenty-seven
years of age, his education was at an end. He had not
come into Italy, like Luther, to see, to gain information,
or to seek the solution of certain doubts ; and by the way,
the solution which Luther took home was very different
from what he had expected ; Calvin knew aHeady what to
think of Eomanism and of the Church, and of popes, both
as to form and substance. Italy could neither send him
back, like Luther, less Eomish, since he had whoHy ceased
to be such ; nor, stiH less, win him back to Eomanism.
It was not seeing the papacy more closely which could
make him regret his condemnation of it ; nor could the
splendid puerilities of Italian worship make him fear that
he had gone too far in proscribing images, ceremonies,
and practices.

68 MAROT.
It is probable, on the contrary, that what he saw appeared
to him to be the best commentary on his book, as it stiH is,
and wiU be, so long as Italy does not return to the Gospel.
With the help of this commentary, he had Httle difficulty
in winning to the Eeformed Faith several persons as yet
but partiaUy shaken. Hi theH old convictions, and who,
like the duchess, awaited his victorious impulse. Madame
de Soubise, formerly the governess of the duchess, Jean de
Parthenay, Lord of Soubise, Anne de Parthenay, his wHe,
Antoine de Pons, and the Baron de MHambeau, are
specially named. And what did he do with Marot ? It
is impossible to say exactly ; but it appears that, in spite
of his poetry and levity, he too was captivated by his
severe eloquence, or at least, he did not repel its influ
ence. It was shortly after having met with Calvin,
that he addressed the King of France a decidedly
courageous epistle, the tone of which is in some parts very
different from mere wit. "The ignorant Sorbonne," he
says, " would do me harm. . . ."
" Their court and they, absent or to my face,
'Gainst me have often time used sore menace,
Of which the mildest was as felon wight
To slay me. O that please the Lord it might,
For His most desolated people's good,
To glut their savage longings for my blood,
If but each foul abuse and wicked deed
Were thus made clear and punishment decreed !
O four, nay five times blessed were that death,
How cruelly soe'er it stopped my breath,
By which alone a million lives should be
From such abuses set for ever free !''
Martyrdom ! that was saying a great deal, and we may
doubt whether Marot would reaUy have braved it ; but
a breath of Hfe has passed over these lines, and that
breath is Calvin's. Besides, we should never accept too
hastily doubts of such a nature. There are times in which
martyrs are recruited with a facility which runs the risk
of being deemed fabulous by other times ; the poet would
perhaps have kept his word, as well as some others who

CALVIN AND MAROT. 69
might also have seemed incapable of keeping it, but
who, when the hour was come, knew how to die. It is
not true, to begin with, that Marot purchased his return
to France by abjuring the Eeformed Faith at Lyons ; this
is an invention of his enemies, but one which proves that
he was looked upon then as won over by the Eeformer.
When banished anew, seven years later, he took refuge
at Geneva. Calvin welcomed him as a friend, and Cal
vin was not one to welcome from mere policy, a refugee
whom he did not know to be a brother, stiH less would he
have patronized and recommended by a preface the fifty
Psalms which Marot then coHected and published. Only,
as Beza relates, " having always been trained in a very bad
school, and not being able to subject his Hfe to the refor
mation of the Gospel," he left Geneva shortly after. A
whole romance of accusations has been constructed upon
this, representing Marot as having led a scandalous life
.at Geneva. Not a trace of any such narration is to be
found Hi the registers of the CouncH or of the Consistory ;
one fact alone is true, — the poet of the Valois could not
conform to the Calvinistic discipline. The Protestant was
little or nothing to Calvin ; he would have the convert, in
the strict sense of the word, — the Christian, the new and
regenerate man. But the new man, is one whom man
cannot create in us, it is the work of God.

XXI.
What, we may ask, was at this period the position of
her who had welcomed both Marot and Calvin ?
We have conjectures only, but they are supported by
very significant facts. Marot, in some verses addressed to
the Queen of Navarre, relates the vexations heaped upon
Eenee of France.

70 DUKE OF FERRARA.
" Seeing her handled in that way,
From France she's banish'd, I should say,
As much as I. . . ."
Her husband, in fact, wished to compel her to dismiss
aH who surrounded her, mcluding Madame de Soubise,
whom she loved as a daughter ; and after much resistance,
she was obliged to yield. Politics, it is true, had contributed
to alarm Hercules d'Este. He had just thrown himseH
into Charles V.'s arms, and he feared lest the presence of
so many French at Ferrara should disturb the King of
France's enemy, and aU the more so that Benee had re
ceived some mHitary men, the wreck of the French army
in Italy. On the first reproaches which were addressed to
her, "How can I help it?" she said; "they are poor
people of my nation, who, H God had given me a beard,
would have now been my subjects, and even as it is, they
would have been, but for that bad Salic law." But the duke
was urgent. To the fear of offending Charles V. was added
that of offending the Pope, who might take Ferrara from
him, and whose eyes were never off that nest of French
men and of heretics. AU had to depart. Marot withdrew
to Venice, Calvin returned to Basle, and till his death
bed, we find him corresponding with the princess. To her
he addressed the last letter we have of him in French,
dated the 4th of April 1564. "Madam," he writes to
her, " I pray you wiH pardon me if I write by my brother's
hand, on account of the weak state I am in, and the pains
which I suffer. ... I pray you also to excuse me if
this letter is short compared with yours. . . ." He
then exculpates himseH from having placed amongst the
reprobate the duke of Guise, the son-in-law of the princess ;
he has, he says, declared, on the contrary, that " those are
too bold, who declare men damned, because such is theH
opinion," and he adds, " so far from hating and abhorring
you as the mother-in-law of the late Monsieur de Guise,
good men have the more loved and honoured you, seeing
that it did not deter you from making a straight-forward

THE DUKE OF GUISE. 71
profession of Christianity, not with your lips only, but
by deeds most notable. . . ." He then congratulates
her that the duchess of Savoy, her niece, " is so well
disposed as to have decided on declaring herself frankly."
But the young princess " has always been timid, so much
so that it is to be feared lest her good inclination should
remain hanging as it were on the hook, unless she be
entreated. Now, Madam, I deem that there is not a
creature in this world who hath more authority over
her than yourself ; therefore I would beg you in the name
of God not to spare lively and pressing exhortations that
you may encourage her to take further steps. And in this,
I feel assured that you wHl do aU your duty according to
the zeal you have that God should be honoured and
served more and more." And he concludes by commend
ing himself to the kind remembrance of the princess, sup
plicating " our heavenly Father to keep you in His pro
tection, to rule you alway by His SpHit, and to maintain
you in prosperity."
This letter is not only interesting for its date; it helps us
to understand the sentiments and the position of a woman
thrown into the midst of so many complications, and is, in
that respect, a curious page of the history of French Pro
testantism, as weH as of Calvin's Hfe. Long a Protestant,
the Duchess of Ferrara had been induced to give her
daughter to the Duke of Guise, the head of the Eomish
party. Guise, after having done the greatest harm to
the Protestants, was killed ; but Guise was her daugh
ter's husband, and she could not endure the thought that
Calvin should think him damned. Yet it was that same
Guise, who, two years before, had signified to her in the
king's name that she must be converted with all speed,
under penalty of being shut up in a convent, and it
was he, who seeing her immovable, had sent troops
against her castle of Montargis. She declared that she
would mount the breach to see if they dare kiH the

72 TEMPTATIONS OF THE DUCHESS.
daughter of Louis XII. ; but, in the meantime, Poltrot's
buHet defivered her from the son-in-law to whom she
now hoped that God had shown mercy.
Thus had passed, or nearly so, her whole fife, the unity
of which appears less in her, strong and courageous woman
as she was, and exposed to the most fearful trials, than in
him who guided her from afar through so many shoals
and storms. It is sometimes astonishing to learn of what
instructions and exhortations she was still in need.
Thus, Hi 1541, five years after his journey to Ferrara,
Calvin was obliged to speak to her about the mass,
one of her chaplains having succeeded in persuading her
that she might be present at it without sHming, or
lying to her conscience. Evidently the poor woman
had been happy to give way on this point to her hus
band's solicitations, and the exigencies of her official po
sition in a Eomish town. But one of her maids of honour
had been firmer; she had resisted Master Francois, and that
resistance had made the princess reflect. Calvin, who is in
formed of it by Madame de Pons, the daughter of Madame
de Soubise, takes up his pen. He begins by excusing
himseH for writing without having been requested ; but
soon, forgetting oratorical precaution, he declares that the
higher people are placed Hi this world, the greater right a
minister of the gospel has to call them back to theH duty;
"so much so that I should deem myself accursed H I
were to let slip opportunities of serving you, and of berno1
profitable unto you." Then foUows a portrait, by no means
flattering, of Master Francois, who was always oscfilating
between Eomanism and the Eeformed faith, always seek
ing accommodations, always the first to make use of
them on his own account. Now, continues Calvin, "I
make no such war upon any as upon those who, under
the shadow of refigion, make a show of devotion towards
princes, keeping them always enveloped in some cloud
without leading them straight to the goal." He there-

HER WEAKNESS. 73
fore wishes to conduct her thither, and, leaving persons,
comes to facts. If the princess believes truly in the sacri
fice of Jesus Christ, the one perfect sacrifice, as the apostle
says, how can she doubt whether the mass is a sacrifice
which the priest pretends to offer up anew ? How
would she persuade herself that to kneel before the host
is not completely idolatrous ? For in idolatry there
are no degrees. But, says the complaisant chaplain, to
refuse to hear mass is to offend " the weak " who can
not give it up. Calvin replies by setting out a whole
system of " offences," complete, yet brief, and, above all,
true. He shows how many cowardly fears would shelter
themselves behind fear ; he adjures the princess to do
nothing to prolong, even by a day, the reign of error;
and he concludes by commending her to Him who alone
can give perseverance and courage.
She was soon to need them greatly. The duke con
tinued to importune her, now entreating, and now menac
ing her. Himself menaced by the pope, he ended by
appeafing to the king of France, Henry II., and requesting
him, as King of France and head of the royal house, to
exercise his authority over the princess, without pityj
though she was no longer French. Henry confided the
matter to the famous inquisitor Oritz, who was skilful in
seducing and pitiless in punishing. The instructions which
he received on his departure for Italy, have been found.
He was to begin^with exhortations and remonstrances. If
the princess showed herself " headstrong and pertinacious,"
persisting in her " accursed and damnable errors," the duke
was to be begged to deprive her of her children and to
shut her up in a convent.
Eenee was "headstrong and pertinacious," and the
sentence was executed ; only, instead of a convent, the
old castle of Este became her prison. The education of
her children had been her sole consolation, and her sole joy.
She saw them no more, and, to the grief of not seeing them,

74 HER MONITOR.
was added that of leaving them to those who would teach
them to hate her and the faith which she had taught them.
She resisted long; but at length she yielded. We know
neither how nor how far; but in November 1554, Calvin
wrote sadly to Farel: "It is but too certain that the
duchess has succumbed, overcome by menaces and vio
lence. What shall I say to this, if not that fortitude is
a thing rare amongst the great ?" But he wrote shortly
after to the duchess herself. A delicate kindness made
him vefi the reproaches which wHl only be the more
penetrating, and the exhortations which wHl only be the
more powerful. He knows nothing, he says, but he can
not help guessing. " It is a bad sign, madam, that those
who made so harassing a war against you to turn you
away from God's service, now leave you in peace. The
devH has so triumphed because of it, that we have -been
constrained to groan, and hang down our heads, without
inquHmg farther." But H he wiU not inquire what has
taken place, neither will he inquke as to the present state
of the feelings of the princess, for he does not admit that
she can do otherwise than weep for having yielded. He
does not stay, therefore, to preach repentance ; he does not
even mention it. She has sinned ; therefore she repents,
and only needs to be comforted. " As the good Lord is
always ready to receive us favourably, and, when we have
fallen, holdeth out His hand to us, I pray you wiU take
courage. . . . When you reflect, Madam, that God,
who humbles His people, would not have them confounded
always, it wiU revive your hope in Him, that you may
bestir yourself the more in future. . . . CaU upon
Him, therefore, in the confidence that He is sufficient to
succour our frailties. . . ."
But in proportion to his indulgence for a passing weak
ness, wHl be his severity when the princess appears to
him to have entered voluntarily upon a course of relaxa
tion and feebleness.

SHE COMES TO HERSELF. 75
Left a widow, she was, in 1560, preparing to return to
France, where her son-in-law, the Duke of Guise, offered
her a share in the government. Again Calvin had no
difficulty in guessing that these offers must have been
accompanied by certain conditions. What conditions?
He knows not ; but the princess has evidently consented
to sacrifice, more or less, all that might displease the
Guises, and nothing is, of course, more displeasing to
them than her evangelical opinions. Calvin goes straight
to the fact. However hard, he says, her captivity at
Ferrara may have been, liberty to humble herself to such
accommodations and weaknesses would only be to fall
from one abyss into a worse and lower. The Guises care
little, very little, for the good which she might do by
aiding them with her counsel ; they only want to shelter
themselves under her name, " in order to cherish the evil
which can no longer be endured." " To thrust oneself,"
therefore, "into such confusion, is to tempt God. If worldly
height and grandeur," he continues, "prevent you from
coming to God, I should be a traitor to you, to per
suade you that black is white. If you were resolved
to behave frankly, and with more magnanimity than
hitherto, I would pray Him to advance you very soon
to a greater administration than is offered to you; but
if it is to say amen to all that is condemned by God and
man, I know not what to say, except that you take care
lest a worse evil befall you." Is she then not to profit
by the liberty which her husband's death has restored
her ? Yes ; but let it be " to serve God in good earnest,
and aim at the right mark. Be that as it may, it is to
linger on too long, madam ; and, if you do not take pity on
yourself, it is to be feared that you wiU seek too late the
remedy for your ill. Beside what God hath long shown
to you by His word, advancing age warns you to reflect
that your inheritance is not here below, and Jesus Christ
might well make you forget both France and Ferrara."

76 " PERDAM BABYLONIS NOMEN."
These words were not thrown away. She returned to
France, but very different from what the Guises had ex
pected, and it was from this epoch that she pressed de
cidedly toward "the right mark." In 1561, she asked of
Geneva a minister, and Francois Morel was sent her. In
1562, she was besieged, as we have seen, at Montargis.
In January 1564, three months before this last letter,
we find from Calvin's austere pen a few lines almost
verging upon pleasantry : " I wiU speak, madam, of some
thing else. I have long cherished a strong desHe to make
you a present of a piece of gold. Tell me H I am ven
turesome. ... I have given it to the bearer in order
that he may show it you, and H it be a new thing to
you, may it please you to keep it. It is the hand
somest new year's gift which I can offer you." That new
year's gift was the gold medal which Louis XII., the
princess's father, had had struck when he was at variance
with the pope. Good Eomanist as he was, Eome had
forced him to revolt, like so many others, against her
tyrannical exactions, and the medal threatened nothing
less than the destruction of a power, which had become
odious to good princes as well as to bad. Perdam Baby-
lonis nomen,1 said the inscription. Eenee received with
joy this seemingly poHtical and religious testament of the
king, her father. " As for the present and new year's gHt
which you have sent me, I assure you that I saw and ac
cepted itwillingly, and never had its like ; and I praised God
that the late king, my father, had taken such a motto.
If God did not grant him grace to carry it out, perhaps
He reserveth some one of his descendants to accom-
pfish it."
She survived Calvin, and was more and more faithful to
his exhortations. Montargis was one of the citadels of
French Protestantism, a refuge for all the persecuted, and
Calvin, in 1563, could aHeady write to the lady of the
1 I will destroy the name of Babylon.

CANON DU TILLET. 77
castle : " I weH know that a princess, who should consider
the world only, would be ashamed, and almost take it as
an affront, that her castle should be caHed an hospital.1
But I cannot do you a greater honour than to speak thus
. . . and I have often thought, Madam, that God hath
reserved for you such trials in your old age to pay to Him
self the arrears which you owed Him on account of your
timidity in times past." In a journey she took to the
south of France, she visited the churches of Dauphiny and
Languedoc, assembling the clergy together and encourag
ing them. She was at Paris on St. Bartholomew's day
(1572). She witnessed the massacre, and went away
broken-hearted to open her castle, Hi spite of the menaces
of the court, to those who escaped that fatal day. She
died there three years after, and her last wHl is one of the
finest pages which can be quoted in the history of Protes
tant piety.

XXII.
We are now very far from 1536, and from the
Charles d'EspeviUe of twenty-seven years of age, who
came to Ferrara or went back to Basle. If we have
followed Eenee of France to the close of her correspondence
with Calvin, it has been much less from the desHe not to
have to recur to it, than to give, with some unity, from
the very beginning, an idea of the manner in which Cal
vin dealt with the great. It seems to us that it would be
difficult to unite more of firmness with greater respect for
propriety. Calvin knows what is due to the great, and
he knows also how to stop just at the point where com
plaisance would begin ; he knows how to have consider
ation for the difficulties of their position, and yet, after
aH, he excuses nothing. He does not drive them along,
1 ¦' Hotel-Dieu."

78 DU TILLET APOSTATIZES.
but he leads them, and is not that the true duty of the
minister of the gospel, both towards small and great ?
We ought also, perhaps, to finish the very different
story of his connexion with Canon du TiUet who followed
him out of France.
Du THlet had thought himself a convert to the gospel,
and it appears that he was, except in one point. He would
gladly foUow Jesus Christ, but not bear His cross. In
such a convert, scruples speedily arise — those convenient
scruples, we mean, which colour and shelter a retreat.
Du THlet did not believe any more than Calvin in the
teachings of Eomanism, but he began to think about the
Church, and to ask himseH if the Church, though erring
and corrupt, was not still the Church, the mother of the
faithful, and the spouse of Christ. After aU, did she prevent
him from being pious ? Would she, if he returned to the
great external unity, prevent him from keeping in his
heart the evangelical opinions upon which he had fed
with Calvin? Calvin — when at Geneva, in the course
of 1537, gradually perceived that Du Tillet was no
longer the same. He was sad ; he was doubtless sighing
after his native land, his comfortable parsonage of Claix,
and his beloved library. Calvin, who had left behind
him nothing of the kind, and who, if he had left far more
would not have allowed a thought of it to soften his
heart, repeated to him, rather harshly, perhaps, the severe
words of our Saviour, " No man, having put his hand to
the plough, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of
God." One day, in fact, Du Tillet disappeared, and,
shortly after, a letter from him informed Calvin that he
had returned to Eomanism.
Calvin answered, but without any bitterness. One
thing only tormented him, he said, which was, that per
haps he had contributed to Du Tillet's resolve, by some
want of consideration, and if so, he entreated his forgive
ness. As for the reasons which Du Tillet brought forward

CALVIN REMONSTRATES. 79
upon the vague ground of the notion of a Church, Calvin
declared that he would answer only one word — the
Eomish Church execrates himself, with whom Du THlet
was, and stiH is, fully one in sentiment upon so many
points. How does Du TiUet reconcile this in his mind
and heart ? Was he sure that in these scruples, which
arise after the lapse of three years, no human element, no
calculation, voluntary or involuntary, creeps in ? Let him
look weH to it ! " The wet sackcloth with which we cover
ourselves befpre men will not endure the heat of God's
judgment." The canon, in his answer, does not approach the ques
tion, although the only important one ; he only speaks of
the anguish of mind he felt till he had put an end to its
cause. Calvin answers again, but to say that he abides
by his former letter ; and, as H forgetting that Du TiUet
is no longer, as before, his friend, he relates to him his
sorrows at Geneva, his exile at Basle and at Strasburg, where,
he says, he is waiting to see what the Lord will do with
him. With awkward charity Du TiUet lays hold of
these disclosures, and says that, since Calvin's affairs pros
per so ill, is it not haply a providential chastisement
destined to bring him back ? "I think you have to
consider, on your part, whether our Lord would not
thereby warn you to reflect whether there has been nothing
to blame in your administration, and to humble yourself
before Him, that, by this means, the great gifts and
graces which our Lord hath bestowed upon you may
be employed aright for His glory and the salvation of
His elect." Calvin's answer is humble and firm. Dis
tinguishing between the reformer and the man, he begins
by declaring that the man has long since examined him
seH before God, acknowledging his faults, beseeching
God to grant him an ever clearer view of them, and an
ever truer repentance. But the reformer has an entire,
immoveable faith in his mission and in his work. Ob-

80 CALVIN LEAVES FERRARA.
stacks and reverses have not induced in him a moment's
hesitation, and if he has faded to repress the bad pas
sions which finaUy drove him from Geneva, it is only
one proof among a thousand, that there is enmity be
tween the world and the gospel, H the gospel is faith
fully preached. " I think you have considered our afflic
tion sufficient to cast me into extreme perplexity. . . .
It is true that I have been greatly afflicted, but not so
as to say, ' I know not where the ways of the Lord are.' "
"For the rest," he continues, "God wiU judge. One of
my companions1 is now before God to render an account
of the cause which he had Hi common with us. ... It
is to Him that I appeal from the sentence of aU wise
men." Du THlet remained among the wise men, Calvin per
sisted in the glorious foofishness of those who see, in this
world, none but their duty and their God.

XXIII.
We left Calvin as he went from Ferrara. Policy drove
him thence as a Frenchman; the Church, as a heretic.
Muratori affirms that the Church did more; that the
Eeformer was seized in his dweHing by the side of the
ducal palace, and that he had been already conducted
to Bologna, where his case was to be heard, when he was
carried off, like Luther, by a masked horseman, and re
stored to liberty. Is it a fact ? Muratori declares that
it was told him by one who said he had read the reports
of the Inquisition. If new researches should adduce new
proofs there wHl be reason to admHe once more the
reserve of the man who kept sHence respecting details
of his life so important and so dramatic.
1 The minister Corault, banished from Geneva with Calvin. He had just
died at Orbe.

THE VAL D A0STE. 81
Other details, also, of which he never spoke, have been
collected concerning this journey, some of which are cer
tainly authentic, others less so.1 It is supposed that at
Modena he visited the Castelvetro family, whom Geneva
was eventually to receive. The demolition of their ancient
vHla, near Modena, has recently brought to light a closet
concealed in the wall, and containing several of his works.
Arrived in Piedmont, he found there numerous friends of
the Eeformed faith, and we see him preaching in the valley
of Grana, near Coni. Some women of Caragliano, stirred
up by the priests, drove him away with stones. He
was as unsuccessful at Saluzzo. Hunted from place
to place, he was obliged to have a double share of courage,
for Du TiUet, as may be readily imagined, had no taste
for this rough apostleship. Thus they reach Pignerol.
Why did not Calvin go and see the Waldenses? His
passage through theH vaUeys would have become one of the
great facts treasured in their memories, and an important
page in their venerable history. They had joined them
selves to the great movement of the age. TheH Synod of
Angrogna had received with delight Farel and Saunier,
the delegates of evangelical Switzerland ; they expected,
perhaps, him whose name, aHeady greater, had surely
reached them. But whether he was in haste to return to
Switzerland, or whether he had learned on his way what
was passing in the Val d'Aoste, it was thitherwards he
suddenly bent his steps.
The Val d'Aoste was, in fact, deeply agitated by the
Eeformed faith. The despatches of Ami Parral, the
Genevese ambassador at Berne, certify it. " The duke,"
he wrote in 1535, "has much to do beyond the moun
tains, partly on account of the gospel, for the gospel is
spreading aU over the country. It must needs be that it
should go forward in spite of princes, since it is of God."
And in another despatch, written in the month of De-
1 See the Essay of M. Jules Bonnet : " Calvin in the Val d'Aoste."
F

82 MOVEMENTS AT AOSTE.
cember — "The Aostans," he said, "are at variance with
theH bishop, on account of the excommunications, which
they cannot abide." Serious tidings had lately come to
encourage them in that course. The Bernese, marching
to the refief of Geneva, had conquered, on theH way,
Vaud, Gex, and the Chablais; and aU these districts, which
were ripe for the Eeformed faith, had joyfuUy surrendered
to the victors, who brought it to them.
Hence the ardent hopes of aU those who, Hi the Val
d'Aoste, had opened theH eyes to the gospel, and hence
theH joy at Calvin's arrival. He did not enter the town,
which was too weU guarded ; he went to a farm close by,
and to this day known by the name of Calvin's .Farm,where
the noble famHy of Vaudan offered him an asylum. He
was to see once more verified there, what we have aHeady
heard him say, — that every retreat was to him as the
"pubfie schools." People came thronging to him ; they
spoke of nothing less than of appealing to the powerful
repubfie which had defivered Geneva, and of asking from
it a Hke defiverance. It was poHtical as weU as religious
revolt; but, after aH, whose was the. fault ? Was it not
Hi that same city of Aoste that the duke, when soficited
the year before by the Bernese ambassador to permit the
Genevese to "keep the gospel," had answered, that he
never would ? There was no hope, therefore, of ever pro
fessing evangefieal Christianity so long as they remained
his subjects.
But Eomanism had in the bishop of Aoste, Peter
Gazzini, a feared and formidable defender. AHeady in
1528, twelve nobles of the land had been denounced by
him as Lutherans and decapitated ; and shortly after, four
colporteurs who came from Geneva had been tortured
and then executed. Powerfully seconded by the count
de Chalans, the marshal of Aoste, he established Hi the
city a refigious pofice, to which nothing was wanting but
the name of Inquisition; and when, in February 1536,

CALVIN AT NOYON AGAIN. 83
the assembly of the Provincial States was opened, every
measure was taken to crush the bold minority which had
hoped to proclaim there the principles of the Eeforma
tion. It is not known whether this minority had the
courage or the power to make its wishes heard ; but CaL
vin remained at his post tiU aU hope was lost. Warned,
at length, that he was about to be arrested, he fled, the
8th of March, with those of his adherents who were most
compromised, ecclesiastics and laymen. But the St. Ber
nard was guarded. They had to take by-paths, to cross
torrents, and to scale precipices ; but even there they
were stiU Hi danger, for " the count of Chalans," says an
old narrative, "gave chase to Calvin and pursued him
with a drawn sword to the very bottom of the mountains."
But Calvin and his companions at length get beyond the
defile of the Duranda, one of the lofty entrances of the
Valais, and stiU designated by the name of Calvin's
Window. The prison and the stake made short work with the
adherents of the Eeformation who remained in the country,
and in 1541 there was engraved on the pedestal of a com
memorative cross, erected in the centre of the city, an
inscription recording the flight of Calvin and the deli
verance of Aoste. This inscription, effaced by time, was
replaced in 1841 upon the restored monument, by those
who wished the country to bless for ever the day which
thrust it back beneath the yoke of Borne, and plunged it
once more into darkness.

XXIII.
Shortly after, Calvin was again at Noyon. His jour
ney is a positive fact, but many points requHe elucida
tion, and we have no clue to the missing explanation.
How could Calvin return in 1536 to France whence he

84 GOES TO GENEVA.
had been obliged to flee towards the close of 1534, and
before he had pubHshed the " Christian Institutes ?" We
have seen him in his preface, considering himseH as finally
banished — not, indeed, by any sentence pronounced, but
by the evident force of cHcumstances ; ckcumstances
not having changed, how could he return ; and how,
if he returned, could he remain unmolested? Nothing
indicates that he even had to conceal himseH. He com
pleted his domestic arrangements, and gamed some new
adherents — in particular, a judge, M. de Normandie, whom
we shaU meet with again at Geneva. He then started for
Basle with his sister, Marie, and his only remaining
brother, Antoine. Antoine was to be the obscure,
but devoted companion of his whole Hfe. He too
renounced the pleasant quietude which the Church would
have offered him, for he had succeeded his brother as
chaplain of the Gesine, and the Church would not have
failed to recompense largely the loyalty of a brother of
the heresiarch. He never even sought compensation by
seeking to become in some degree conspicuous. He would
jocularly boast that he worked on all his brother's writ
ings ; he spoke truly, for he had turned bookbinder. It
was he who wrote, as we have seen, at Calvin's dictation,
the letter to the duchess of Ferrara.
They left Noyon in August 1536. TheH intention had
been to visit Basle by way of Germany, but war had
just broken out again between Francis I. and Charles V,
and there was no passing through Lorraine, which was
full of soldiers. Calvin, therefore, retraced his steps
through France, and arrived at Geneva on one of the
last days of the month.

BOOK THE SECOND.
(1536—1541.)

BOOK THE SECOND.

STJMMAEY.

I. God in history.
II. Episcopal Geneva/ — Ardutius — Fabri — The bishops of the house of Savoy-
Despotism — Scandals.
III. Diverse causes of the Reformation — Internal and purely intellectual causes
— Luther — Mixed causes — Geneva.
IV. Farel and Viret — They endeavour to make the religious element predomi
nate — Obstacles — Immorality; its causes— Infidelity ; its causes — They
make the people swear to take the Gospel for their sole rule of conduct,
and of faith — Many break their promise — Farel in the pulpit ; his eloquence
and courage — He begins to despair.
V. He learns that Calvin is at Geneva — He goes to seek him, and adjures him
in God's name, to stay — Calvin resists, then yields — What the remembrance
of that scene always was to him.
VI. Calvin at Geneva — God gave her to him, but she had to be conquered —
Simple lectures, at first, upon the Scriptures — Success and a crowd — Mur
murs — The people will not understand that reformation of manners must
follow that of faith — They think they have done everything by devoting
themselves for their country.
VII. Confession of faith of 1536 — Analysis — Everywhere practice goes along
with doctrine — With this confession the laws requisite to secure its dominion
are in principle voted.
VIII. The Christian state — Discussion of the principle — How we blame Calvin,
and how he might blame us — What must not be lost sight of in judging
Calvin's laws — Laws upon games, dances, &c. — Sumptuary laws — Laws of
religious police.
IX. First application of the ordinances — Divers chastisements — Public teaching
remodelled and rendered obligatory — Activity communicated to men's
minds by the Reformation — Calvin's catechism — An idea of his method —
Analysis of the four parts of the book.
X. Growing opposition — Two Anabaptists received out of hatred to Farel and
Calvin — Corault — The Libertines — They understand nought of the new
destinies of Geneva — The Government paralysed — The opposition triumphs.
XI. Disorder first diminishes and then increases — The reformers attack it
from the pulpit — Exile of Corault — The unleavened bread question — The

88 SUMMARY.
Libertines emplov it against Farel and Calvin— The Synod of Lausanne—
The reformers persist— Legal question ; moral question— Scandalous con
duct before Easter— Farel and Calvin refuse to give the Communion— They
are banished — Bonivard and his predictions.
XII. Calvin and the Reformed of France— Letter to Roussel, who has become
a bishop.
XIH. Calvin and Farel at Berne — Berne demands their recall ; the Libertiaes
refuse — Farel called to Neuchatel, and Calvin to Strasburg— Their corres
pondence; their unalterable friendship — Calvin, pastor of the French
Church — Destitution and disinterestedness — His position improves — Re
nown and tranquillity .
XIV. He still looks towards Geneva— Letter to the believers of Geneva— Perse
verance and charity counselled.
XV. Disorganization of Church and school — On the way through disorder to the
yoke of Rome.
XVI. Hope and joy of Popery — The Lyons committee — Cardinal Sadolet — His
character — His letter to the Genevese — Flatteries — Sophistries — Unskilful
skill — Words and deeds — Impression produced at Geneva — Fear because
Sadolet had thought matters so far advanced — Who shall answer? — All think
of Calvin — His letter to Sadolet — Personal apology — Apology for the Re
formation — Rapid review of all the Romish errors — Lofty eloquence.
XVII. Joy at Geneva — Treason and death of Jean Philippe, the chief of Cal
vin's enemies— Viret called — The recall of the two exiles begins to be
talked of— First overtures.
XVIII. His life at Strasburg — His travels in Germany — His Hymn to Christ the
Congueroi — It is to be wished that he had seen Luther — His esteem and
friendship for Melanchthon — He wished to see him bolder and more firm —
His Treatise on the Lord's Supper — He pursues, by means of Melanchthon,
the idea of accommodation with Luther — His admiration for the leader
of the German Reform — Letter which he writes, and which Melanchthon
dare not send.
XIX. His Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans — His version of the Bible
— Divers struggles — Qualities and defects which become marked in him.
XX. His friends seek to have him married — His honorable and Christian diffi
culties — Idelette de Bure — Marriage.
XXI. Negotiations with the Council of Geneva — Hesitations and fears of Calvin
— His friends use their influence — He yields — His return — He goes to
Neuchatel to re-establish peace — His ideas respecting the fraternal autho
rity of each Church in relation to the rest — The Company of Pastors.
XXII. Arrival at Geneva — Reorganization of the Church — The Consistory.
XXIII. The position made for Calvin — His place of residence— Calvin and
nature— A walk with Viret— Idelette at Geneva— The Christian wife and
mother— Three children removed in infancy—" Have I not tens of thousands
of children in the Christian world ? "—Laughter and tears— Calvin the man
for his task and for the Christian world.

1.

In history, the finger of God is everywhere ; everywhere
does He reveal it to him who has eyes to see. But there
are passages in history in which it is so evident that, un
less a man be blind, he must see it; the following is one
of those passages : —
That stranger and exile who has no other design than
to rest a day or two from the fatigues of a long journey,
is to be for nearly thHty years the lawgiver and master
of the city, whither nothing has called him, and where,
it seems to him, nothing can detain him. Not only wiH that
city own him for its master, but he wHl make it the
capital of one of the greatest empHes under the sun; the
metropolis of an idea, as an historian has said. He has
that idea in his head, and has aHeady filled a book with
it; but whatever trust or faith he may repose in it, he
suspects not as yet what it wHl achieve through him, as
the generative idea of a people, of a church, and of an
age. He is Hi haste to be again with his books Hi his
old and studious Basle. If he has thrown himseH here
and there into the thick of the fight, and H he has been
courageous, it has been unconsciously : the idea that he
has such a part to play has not suggested itseH. That
he may be clearly revealed to be what God has made
him, unknown to himself, he must first be revealed
to himseH by the force of events. But the revelation
once made, the tardier he has been to understand how
and in what he was to be mighty, the mightier he will
be. The ambitious man builds to himself a lofty pedestal
in vain ; he knows that he erected it, and therefore he

90 GENEVAN HISTORY.
mistrusts it. Calvin achieved greatness without having
sought, and without having wished to be great. The
pedestal was at Geneva, but it was raised before him, and
without him, and by the hand of God.
The history of Geneva is therefore henceforth to be
closely finked with that of Calvin; for nearly thHty years
the records wiU form but one, and that of the Eeformer
wHl continue in that of Geneva when he is dead. We
must therefore rapidly sketch events farther back, assem
bling and grouping aU that we may afterwards need, Hi
order to be well understood.

II.

Eefigion, or, to speak more correctly, the Church, had
at aU times played an important part at Geneva. An im
perial city, the dissolution of the empire of Charlemagne had
left it Hi an isolation of which its bishops took advantage
to seize upon the temporal power, which, however, still
remained partly Hi the hands of the people. One of them,
Ardutius, the contemporary and friend of St. Bernard,
obtained from Frederic Barbarossa the regular confirmation
of this state of things, and Geneva, menaced by the counts
of Savoy, gladly accepted the solution, and for a long time
blessed Ardutius as the true founder of its independence.
Several of his successors walked in his steps. Ad-
hemar Fabri, bishop in 1385, wishing farther to consoli
date the happy compromise between the rights of the
bishop and those of the city, had a code drawn up which
took the name of Franchises. He swore solemnly to ob
serve it, and recognised the right of the citizens to exact
the same oath from his successors. Eomish historians
have exaggerated, especially in our day, the bearing of
these facts. They have represented Geneva as indebted
for aH its Hberties to the power which it afterwards pro-

BISHOPS AND PRINCES. 91
scribed ; inasmuch as its bishops, made the concession of
the "Franchises" as a gift. Even had this been the case,
we might still ask whence they had derived the power of
granting them a right, which evidently, could only be
explained by some preceding usurpation. But the trans
action had not been understood in this way in the time
of Ardutius and Fabri. They only recognised with praise
worthy uprightness, Hberties which had been long estab
lished, and rights which were older than theH own.
For the rest, if some of the bishops deserved the grati
tude of Geneva, others were to come who deserved it
little enough.
The counts, subsequently dukes, of Savoy, had not
ceased to claim Geneva as a part of theH inheritance, and
many a time it had been necessary to recognise Hi them,
vHtuaUy, at least, a certain authority. Hence perpetual
conflicts between the prince and the bishop, or the prince
and the city, the latter often obliged to grant the bishop,
in order to be secure from the prince, a power which
always endangered the " Franchises." In the beginning
of the fifteenth century, Eome found out how to ter
minate these conflicts, which often were very embarrassing
to her. She seized the right of electing the bishop which
belonged to the clergy and was to be confirmed by the
people ; and the diocese of Geneva was made a sort of
heirloom for the younger sons of the house of Savoy. This
was to decree that the bishop should henceforward only
be the duke's representative, and the duke the sole and
true sovereign.
No trouble was taken to save appearances. In 1451,
Amadeus VIII. caused the see to be given to prince Pierre,
his grandson, who was ten years of age. Pierre's vicegerent,
Thomas de Sur, openly violated the "Franchises," and would
have dismissed the syndics, the lay chiefs of the city, but for
the most energetic resistance. The young bishop died, and
was succeeded by another prince of Savoy, twelve years of

92 RELIGIOUS DISORDERS.
age. In 1 4 8 4, Frangois of Savoy held it ; in 1 4 9 5, PhUippe
of Savoy ; and in 1 5 1 3, Jean of Savoy, the worst of aU, who
ceded his temporal jurisdiction to the duke, opened to him
the gates of Geneva, and helped him to drown in the blood
of the citizens the remains of the Franchises sworn to by
his predecessors. Then died, amongst others, that great
despiser of death, as Bonivard says in his chronicles, Phifi-
bert Berthefier. Then also died Levrier, for having said in
the councU that the duke was not the sovereign of Geneva.
Then was immured in the castle of La Grolee in Bugey,
that same Bonivard, who was later on to pass six years, and
for the same cause, in the underground dungeons of ChH-
lon. This is what the episcopate had become, politicaUy,
to Geneva and the Genevese.
Eeligiously it was still worse, for violence comes to an
end, but corruption abides. Geneva, Hke aH countries
with an ecclesiastical government, had witnessed an extra
ordinary development of all the abuses and vices with
which the clergy were then reproached. Some pious
bishops had endeavoured to stem the torrent ; the ordin
ances of Antoine Champion, in 1493, shew us a man
who loved what was good, but, at the same time, reveal
to us the incredible height to which the evH had risen.
Those ordinances, like so many other attempts at reforma
tion in the Church, had no result; the episcopate of
Champion was only a parenthesis of five years Hi a
series of prelates who set an example in every kind of
disorder. With such superiors, what could be expected
of a numerous, idle, rich, and ignorant clergy ? Accord
ingly, long before there was any talk either of a Ee
formed faith or of reformers, the people complained of
the corruption of the priests, and the magistrates, at
theH request, endeavoured to obtain. at least some modi
fication of theH scandalous conduct. The magisterial
registers have preserved details which one would refuse to
admit, if theH authenticity were in the smallest degree

CAUSES OF REFORM. 93
doubtful ; it would seem impossible that depravity could
ever have dared to shew itself so unblushingly. Tho
roughly despised, even by those who were nearly as bad
as themselves, the clergy in Geneva had no roots which
could resist the first breath of new ideas.

III.

We are not called to relate minutely how and under what
form these ideas entered the ancient episcopal city.
Moreover, it would not be easy to assign a date to the
first beginning ; several of the facts mentioned as having
marked at Geneva the rise of the Eeformation, presuppose
an anterior movement, a dawn aHeady far advanced.
The state of the country, its struggles against episcopal
power, the natural activity of the Genevese mind, and the
connexion of Geneva with Germany, have induced the
belief that from the very beginning the Eeformed faith
found an echo on the shores of the Leman.
But an idea necessarily becomes impregnated with the
atmosphere in which it is developed, and, according to the
locality, it may appear more or less different from itself.
What then did the idea of the Eeformation become at
Geneva in the atmosphere which we have described ?
Superficial historians, whether Eomanists or Protestants,
have seen the whole reformation in a single cause, the indig
nation excited by scandals and abuses. They are mistaken.
Not only was that not the sole cause, but in several
countries, it was only the apparent cause, or the occasion.
The deeper the research, in our day, into the history of
the times anterior to the Eeformation, the stronger the
conviction that the inward and first cause was a religious
work slowly accomplished in men's minds and consciences.
If you would have a living and complete representation of
that work of several centuries, take the youth of Luther.

94 PRELIMINARY WORK.
Long before the dispute on indulgences, you behold him
agitated and tormented ; he would shudder at the thought
of abandoning Eomanism, or, to speak more correctly, such
a thought does not, and cannot, occur to him ; and yet he
feels that Eomanism no longer satisfies him, that it no
longer can, and never wiU satisfy him. His soul darts
through the thick darkness into the presence of the light
of which he has a presentiment rather than a glimpse.
The indulgences wiU only open his eyes, and fix the
dHection of his hitherto uncertain gaze. Thus it was in
France, and in England too, with several of the first
preachers of the Eeformed faith. Abuses and scandals
only furnished them with the opportunity of accounting
to themselves for the evH, and then of speaking out and
preaching that which meditation, inward anguish, and
above aU the Bible, had aHeady accompfished in theH souls.
But that preliminary work had not been equally deep
everywhere, — the history of episcopal Geneva offers but few
traces of it. If some men of those times knew the anguish
of a Luther and the vaguer aspHations of some of his
forerunners, they either held their peace or were sUenced.
A monk, named Baptiste, who had dared to lift up his
voice, was defivered to the bishop by the duke, who came
for that purpose to Geneva, and the stake awarded his de
serts to the forerunner of Savonarola. This was about
1430. The Church was sufficiently powerful to stifle any
show of resistance, and moreover so corrupt, that no
evangefical idea, no need of a Christian Hfe and a pure
faith could be felt in her bosom at Geneva. This is why,
when the Church was attacked in earnest, it was less upon
religious grounds than upon that of abuses and corrup
tions ; of matters, in a word, about which men can be
very indignant without being themselves godly or caring
to be so.
Add, in fine, the political elements, which, at Geneva,
necessarily complicated the question. How could men in

VIRET AND FAREL. 95
their attacks separate the temporal prince from the spHi-
tual prince ? How could they faU to use temporal attacks
against the spiritual oppressor, or spHitual attacks against
the temporal oppressor ? It may doubtless be regretted
that the movement should not have been, as in some other
countries, purely religious ; but it would be unjust not to
acknowledge that under a bishop-prince, matters could
not at the outset take another course. It would be equally
unjust to generalize too much what we have just said.
If some of the Genevese saw mainly a question of pofitics
in the Eeformation; others immediately recognized and joy
fully embraced its religious aspect, and were living proofs
that God can educe good from any beginning whatever.
But the first made more noise, demolished more publicly
the old form of worship, and that which happens in every
revolution took place in this : — history has spoken much of
the violent, little of the others, though the latter were the
representatives, the true, and serious representatives of the
idea which was carried out.

IV.

It is important to note aU these facts in order to deter
mine aright what part the reformers would have to play
and did play at Geneva.
We say reformers; for VHet and Farel, on Calvin's
arrival, had aHeady entered upon the course Hi which he
was to encounter so many obstacles and gain so many
victories. We know Farel ; we have aHeady seen him display, as
Le Fevre's disciple, equal eloquence and zeal, and, shortly
after, when speciaUy marked out for persecution, take leave
of France. That was in 1523. Scarcely arrived at Basle,
he solicits a public conference with the priests; and although
the victor, he is driven from the city, not without carrying

96 TOILS AND TRIUMPHS.
away the assurance that Basle is won over to the Eefor
mation. The following year he conquers the principality of
Montbefiard ; then we see him successively at Berne, at
Lausanne, at Morat, and at Orbe, where he converts VHet ;
at Neuchatel, moreover, which he attacks several times, and
which he finaUy snatches, by superhuman exertions, from
the papal dominion. No less strength and courage were
requisite for him at Geneva, and without him the great
act of 1535 might have been long delayed.
VHet had experienced some difficulty in turning to the
gospel, but, once decided, it was soon seen that his hesi
tation had proceeded neither from indifference nor fear.
Orbe, Granson, and Payerne, heard him preach ; and his
life was endangered by a blow from a sword. After he
was come to Geneva with Farel, a dose of poison showed
him death stiH nearer. He none the less remained, like
Farel, in the thickest of the fight, and the victory belonged
to him as well as to his friend.
But the victory had now to be organised and discip
lined ; this was a second victory, and one yet more
difficult to gain. They had, therefore, immediately
proclaimed two things — one, that the Eeformation was
above all to be a matter of religion ; the other, that it
never would be real, or deserving of its name, if there
were not a moral as well as a doctrinal reformation.
This was cutting short all misunderstandings and iUu-
sions; it was taking aU excuse from those who, volun
tarily or Hivoluntarily, might cherish those illusions, or
take pleasure in those misunderstandings. Now, such
men were numerous ; and such men, let us add, need not
be in a majority, — evil in this sad world always con
trives to be mighty.
Geneva, then, was legally and officiaUy of the Eeformed
faith from the month of August 1535, but it had yet far
to go before so being of it as Farel understood the word ;
and, unhappily, many others understood not that she

FRUITS OF ROMANISM. 97
would so enter it. The fall of Eomanism had put an end
to certain evUs, but, at the same time, had been the
beginning or aggravation of certain others.
Immorafity, in the first place.
That of the clergy, though profound, had not so de
stroyed the moral authority of the Church that this
authority was not stiH some sort of restraint ; but when
that was removed, those who had not immediately im
posed upon themselves another — that of the gospel, could
only become worse. For such, the abolition of the con
fessional had been the abolition of all control ; the exfie
of the priests had only freed them from the official
representatives, — bad, no doubt, yet stiU official, and the
only ones they knew, — of order, rule, and duty. It is.
the inevitable effect of the Eomish system. All is calcu
lated so that men should not be able to do without it.
Instead of forming your conscience, it teaches you to
deposit it out of yourself, and in a man who is to be to
you the incarnation of the divine law, so that, when you
deny that man, there is always great danger lest the law
itself should be found Hi fact exHed and denied with him.
And thus it was with numbers at Geneva.
To immorafity was joined infidelity.
For exactly the same reason. When faith, ceasing to
be a personal matter, is embodied for you in certain men,
a rupture with these men wHl always run the risk of being
a rupture with faith. Eomanism, moreover, provides in
fidelity with many means of hiding itself, and not only
of hiding, but of ignoring itseH; the faU of Eomanism,
therefore, only brings it to fight.
Such was the case at Geneva with a certain num
ber. Nay, infidelity was carried in some to a degree
which is not generaUy thought to have been attained at
that period. The coarsest, and most brutish materialism
was paraded in theH speech as weU as in their conduct.
We shaU have abundant proofs of this when we relate the
G

98 LAW AND PRACTICE.
last struggles of Calvin with the last representatives of
these deplorable tendencies.
Farel and his coHeague, then, had courageously put
their hand to the plough, and, H history had preserved
for us only the laws which they carried, we might
fancy that, from the very first the Genevan republic
was truly regenerated in the Christian sense of the
word. It was a grand and beautiful sight when, on the
21st of May 1536, in the church of St. Peter, the
assembled citizens swore to take the gospel for theH
sole rule of Hfe, as they had aHeady sworn to take it
for their sole rule of faith. This solemn vow included
aH the laws made, or to be made, as emanating from the
Christian law. But laws prove little ; indeed, it has often
happened that they are voted with the greater eager
ness the less intention there is to submit to them : men
think that theH debt is paid by homage to the principle,
and they trample under foot, without scruple, the obliga
tions which result from it. Had not the same clergy,
whose vices had just facilitated the subversion of its
Church, been seen many a time proclaiming, Ha its coun
cils, the wisest, the severest laws ?
Many of those who had shown so much indignation
against it were willing to do thus. But Farel intended
that what had been voted should not prove a dead letter.
Now, speaking to the people, he charges them to obey;
and anon, speaking to the magistrates, he charges them to
exact complete obedience, menacing them with aU the
wrath of God if they aUow any infraction of the laws
which are, at bottom, but the law of God. The magis
trates, generaUy weU disposed, do their best ; they publish
some additional regulations, and inflict some exemplary
chastisements. Amongst the people, those who are good
support Farel, and others not so good, in the end also
support him ; but the bad, in proportion as theH num
bers diminish, become worse and worse.

FAREL AND HIS TASK. 99
What further complicated his task was the heroic
unanimity of aU, good or bad, in making the sacrifices
required for theH country's defence.
The proclamation of the Eeformed faith had been in
stantly foUowed by the resumption of hostilities against
the city. As early as the 24th of September 1535, an
attack by night had almost succeeded in placing it in the
hands of the duke and the bishop. At the end of No
vember, closely beleaguered on aU sides, Geneva beheld
famine advancing ; and her three suburbs, which had been
destroyed to facifitate her defence, gave her five or
six thousand more mouths to feed. In December, a
French envoy made his appearance. The king offered his
protection to the Genevese, but on condition that they
should give to him the temporal jurisdiction of the
expeUed bishop. One of the Syndics conducted the am
bassador round the fortifications, at which men, women,
and children were working in spite of the -snow, and
asked him if they seemed like a people disposed to accept
his offer. The 13th of January, a new attack was made
on four several points at once. The 24th, there was a
battle at a quarter of a league from the town. In
February the Bernese army arrived, and some prospect
of security appeared.
Such was the city, or rather the camp, which Farel
wished to subject to all the strictness of gospel moraHty.
Obstacles multiplied ; but Farel did not lose courage ; he felt
himself bound to struggle on to the last, and if the work
of God was to go down at Geneva before the obstinacy of
man, it was the duty of the minister of God to uphold it
until the very last moment. SmaU of stature and in aspect
mean, — contemptible, as St. Paul said of himself, — before
the rebels he rose to the height of indignation and faith.
TheH eyes were abased before him ; and though murmurs
attended him, it was from afar, and they were to be hushed
again the moment he turned round. In the pulpit he

100 CALVIN COMES.
was unsparing. His word rolled like thunder ; and his
invectives were showered down upon those who despised
the gospel. He was rich in those expressions which would
now be called scarcely evangelical, but which we might
more justly caU simply unpofished, for nothing is more
evangelical at bottom than the indignation that armed
him. But he felt his strength diminishing, and he was begin
ning to ask himself if Geneva was decidedly going to be
unworthy of the part which he had hoped for her.

At last — we have said that it was in 1536, towards
the end of August — he learned one day that the author
of the Christian Institutes had alighted at a hostelry, but
was to start again the morrow. Was not this the man
whom he was expecting ? For Farel, alike humble and
courageous, had often asked himself if another would not
succeed better than he, and a sort of presentiment had
bidden him wait in hope of such a man.
So he hastened to the hostelry. What was his first
impression on seeing Calvin ? Did he persist in thinking
that this was the man he expected, or was he for a moment
disconcerted by the pallor, meagreness, and sickly mien
of him to whom he had come to offer such a burden ? We
know not ; but the offer was made to Calvin, who at first
rejected it. He was not made, he said, for such an office.
He was willing to be a labourer in the great harvest which
was ripening, or to be a soldier of the Lord, if needful, in
the great battle, as he had already been many a time ; but
to clear a portion of the field, to accept the guardianship
of a fixed post, — this he is convinced is not his task. If
he had already rendered some service, it was by means of
a book, the fruit of silence and of study. Let him go,

HE IS PERSUADED TO STAY. 101
then, where he might write others. Farel is urgent. The
book is written ; and no other book could equal the com
mentary which the author might add to it by embodying
it in a Church, on which the eyes of the world should be
fastened. And, moreover, when the trumpet sounds on
every side, who has the right to say that he is not a
man of action, that his task is to study and to write ? The
proof that God expected other things from Calvin was,
that here was Farel in his path, asking his co-operation in
the name of God. Calvin adduced fresh reasons, and it
seemed as though he wanted to deter Farel by exhibiting
to him the defects of his future colleague. He knew
himseH, he said; he was tenacious and obstinate. Once
more he asked that he might go and busy himseH in
studies; for it was only thus that he could be of any
value. Then Farel broke out : " Thy studies," exclaimed
he, " are a pretext ! I teU thee, that if thou refusest to
associate thyseH with my work, God wiU curse thee for
having sought thyself and not Christ."1
Calvin yielded, but as a man of his stamp would yield,
with the profound conviction that he was yielding to God
and not to man. But the man ever remained dear and
venerable in his eyes. He loved to recaU that scene,
" that fearful adjuration," he would say, " as if God from
on high had stretched out His hand to stop me."2 He
recaUed it in woe, taking courage from the thought of
that hand "stretched out from on high" to lay hold of
and support him; he recaUed it in weal, to thank God
for having chosen and sustained him; he recaUed it,
doubtless, when the aged Farel came for the last time to
see him — who, though younger by so many years, was
worn out before his time. Farel did not come that day
"to stop him," but to envy him the Happiness of his final
departure, and the bliss of his final repose.
Baza's " Life of Calvin." 2 Preface to the " Commentary on the Psalms."

102 CALVIN S POSITION.

VI.

From this time, then, Calvin belonged to Geneva, and
Geneva to Calvin. God indeed knows how to make use of
aU things and of aU men! It was the future apostate from
the Eeformed faith, Du Tillet, who had informed Farel
of Calvin's presence, and had advised him to go and
see him.
God, we have said, had given Geneva to him, but had
given it to him to conquer. It is that conquest which
we have now to relate.
Calvin did not assume the attitude of a conqueror.
He could not if he had wished ; for the official conquest
had aHeady been made, and he found the other, the true
and inner one, begun in every direction by Farel. Far
from wishing to step into the place of the latter, he would
not be, at first, even his colleague in the pastoral min
istry; his office, which was not weU defined, was for a
time something between a professorship and preaching.
It appears that he had not even a fixed salary, for we
read in the councH-registers, under date February 13th,
1537, " Six gold crowns are given to Cauvin, or Calvin,
seeing that he has hitherto scarcely received anything."
The 5th of September of the preceding year he was called
"that Frenchman." It is the first mention which is
made of him in the registers.
That Frenchman then had only engaged to give lectures
on the Scriptures; but those lectures were given in the
cathedral, and, considermg the place and the multitudes,
they could not but look very much like sermons. The
Genevese had much to learn in the way of religious
instruction ; but they were even stiU more deficient as
respects religious education, and the preacher consequently
never left a subject without having amply developed it
in view of its practical and moral application. Like

WHAT MEN SAID OF HIM. 103
Farel, he would only call that Eeformation which lived
and grew upon the religious soH; like Farel, too, he aimed
at nothing less than causing a revolution, commingled
with so many impure elements, to bring forth the fruits of
Christianity. Farel's adversaries soon had cause to per
ceive that Calvin was only a Farel, younger, abler, and
more learned, — less ardent outwardly, but in reality far
stronger and mightier. It was not long, therefore, before
complaints were heard. With a simplicity which showed
what certain people stiU were, some of them complained
that Calvin was wanting in his duty. " His office," they
said, " is to expound the Scriptures; by what right does
he set himseH to do anything else, — to speak of manners
and to censure ? He had to show that we did well to
put down mass, pope, confessional, and the rest; by what
right would he restore authority which has been over
thrown, in order to become, as it were, city confessor,
and penitentiary ?" Let us not ridicule these men; they
only said what many others, who are more Christian, are
often tempted to say, or at least to think. Men like to
hear religion spoken of; but do not care to hear those
inferences deduced from it, which impose constraint upon
the old man, and urge to regeneration.
Political circumstances also kept up this feeling. The
men whom Calvin, who had come to Farel's aid, wished to
subject to such a yoke, were those who had so patrioticaUy
fought for their country's freedom ; and as the refigious
struggle was closely connected with the political one,
they almost thought that they had amply rendered be
fore hand aU that could reasonably be demanded of them
by God and' religion. Had they not poured forth theH
blood to conquer the right of hearing the gospel which
was preached to them 1 If necessary, they could show
theH scars ; could the preachers do as much ? AU
danger, moreover, had now ceased; a proud security had
succeeded those days of distress, when, in default of true

104 THE CONFESSION OF FAITH :
piety, perH turned every heart more or less towards God.
Vaud and Chablais, which had been conquered and Pro
testantised by the Bernese, surrounded Geneva with a
rampart that seemed impregnable to every foe. After so
many troublous years, triumph and prosperity had come,
and prosperity, as usual, hardened all their hearts.

VII.

Calvin, however, within less than three months after
his arrival at Geneva, obtained, or caused Farel to obtain,
a great and encouraging success.
They had drawn up a confession of faith, in which was
clearly defined, article by article, the intimate connexion
which they were endeavouring to establish between
faith and conduct. It summed up admirably both gospel
doctrine and the errors which had been overthrown in
its name, together with the moral consequences resulting
either from the overthrow of these errors, or from the
doctrine itself restored to its primitive purity.
We could have wished to reproduce it at length,, but
shall content ourselves with a rapid analysis.
I. The Bible, the sole " rule to be followed, without
any admixture, without adding to it or taking away
from it."
II. One God only. God is a spirit, therefore worship must
be in spirit. No " ceremonies and carnal observances, as
though He took pleasure in such things." No " trust in
any creature." No images in churches, whether repre
senting creatures, or pretending to represent God.
III. The Law of God, one law for all. Here aHeady
begins the moral appfication. " As He is the one
Lord and Master, we confess that our whole life must be
regulated by the commandments of His holy law, and
that we ought to have no other rule of holy livino-, nor to

ITS ANALYSIS. 105
invent other good works to please Him but those which
are contained in it." Then comes the Decalogue.
... IV. Man by nature. Blind, "with a darkened under
standing," corrupt, and " perverse of heart," of himself he
cannot attain to the true knowledge of God, nor "give
himseH to good works." He, therefore, needs to be " en
lightened of God," and " restored to the obedience of the
righteousness of God."
V. Man in himself condemned. The consequence of
what precedes. Therefore man must " seek out of him
seH the means of his salvation."
VI. Salvation in Jesus. Jesus is He " who hath been
given us by the Father, in order that we may recover Hi
Him aU that we lack in ourselves." Now, what He has
done and suffered, we find summed up " in the creed which
is said in church." The apostles' creed foUows.
VII. Righteousness in Jesus. It is by Him that we
are "reconciled and restored to favour;" it is by His
bloodshedding that " we are cleansed" from all our filthi-
ness. VIII. Regeneration in Jesus. This is the work of His
Spirit. Our " wiU is rendered conformable to that of
God." We are " deHvered from the bondage of sin," and
thus only " are we made capable of good works."
IX. The remission of sins always necessary. Notwith
standing regeneration, much evH and imperfection remain.
Therefore " we have always need Of God's mercy," and we
must always " seek our righteousness in Jesus Christ, as
cribing nought to our works."
X. All our goodness lies in the grace of God — that is to
say, that all the above mentioned benefits are granted to
us " by His sole clemency and mercy, Hrespective of any
merit in our works." Yet the works, " which we do in
faith," are "pleasing and acceptable" to Him, because,
not imputing to us " the imperfection which is in them,"
He sees in them only what proceeds from His SpHit."

106 THE CONFESSION OF FAITH :
XI. Faith. Faith is "the entrance" to all these
"riches." It consists in befieving "in the gospel pro
mises," and in receiving Jesus Christ " as He is described
in the Word of God."
XII. The invocation of God alone, and the intercession
of Christ. All comes to us from God through Jesus
Christ ; all other invocation is, therefore, superfluous or
criminal. XIII. Prayer with understanding. The worthlessness
of aU prayer which does not spring from " the affection of
the heart." The Lord's Prayer is our model.
XIV. The Sacraments. They are " exercises of faith,"
as weU to strengthen it in us as to be " its witness be
fore men." There are two, Baptism and the Supper of
the Lord. As for " what is held in the pope's domain,
about seven sacraments, we condemn it as a fable and a
falsehood." XV. Baptism. An outward sign by which " God
witnesseth that He is wHling to receive us as His chHdren."
And since our chHdren " belong to such a covenant," it is
lawful and right that " the outward sign is communicated
to them."
XVI. The Supper of the Lord. A representation of
"the true spHitual communion which we have Hi the
body and blood of Christ."
XVII. Human traditions. No lawful ordinances but
those which are founded upon God's Word ; therefore no
pUgrimages, monasticism, differences of meats, prohibi
tions of marriage, confessions, and such Hke."
XVIII. The Church. Several churches in the world,
and yet but one Church, the whole body of true be-
lievers a Church " whose true mark is when the Word
of God is purely preached, published, listened to, and
kept." XIX. Excommunication. As there are always "de-
spisers of God and of His Word," excommunication is "a

INVOLVES A PRINCIPLE. 107
holy and wholesome thing." It is, therefore, " expedient
that aU mamfest idolaters, blasphemers, murderers, thieves,
seditious persons, strikers and drunkards, after they have
been duly admonished, H they amend not, should be
separated from the communion of the faithful, tiU their
repentance has become apparent."
XX. Ministers of the Word. None are lawful pastors
but " the faithful ministers of the Word of God," who feed
the sheep of Jesus Christ " by instructions, admonitions,
consolations, and exhortations." There is no authority in
themselves, they are nothing but by the Word of God " by
which they have power to command, forbid, promise, and
threaten ; and without which they neither can nor ought
to attempt anything."
XXI. Magistrates. Civil authority is " an ordin
ance of God." It must therefore be exercised in the
name of God and according to His commandments ; it
must be respected " in aU ordinances which do not con
travene the commandments of God."
Such was the confession of faith which was pre
sented, in November, to the CouncH of Two Hundred, or
Great Council. It made a part of a body of "Articles
concerning Church government," as the register states ;
and these articles were adopted. It was not a complete
code; the moral regulations added to the confession of
faith were designed rather to consecrate the principle, and
did not yet aim at following it out Hi all its applications.
But the principle was voted, and this was what the
Eeformers had wished. The government was invested
by the Great CouncH with the right to search out and
punish any infraction of the Christian law ; the pastors
were invested with the right of urging such regulations
as they should think necessary, of informing the magis
trates of delinquencies, and promoting theH chastisement.
The representatives of the people had just abdicated in
the name of the people in favour of the heads of the

108 THE CHRISTIAN STATE :
Church, who were henceforward legaUy and with aU the
authority of the Gospel, and, for its support, made but
one with the temporal rulers.

VIII.
It is scarcely necessary to say that we do not unre
servedly approve the state of things which was then
inaugurated at Geneva ; stiU less do we present it as an
ideal towards which our legislation should tend.
The ideal which Calvin was soon to foUow out to its
extremest applications, was that of the Christian state ; —
Christian in the detaHs, as well as in the general spHit of
its laws, and considering itself responsible before God for
all the actions of the citizens.
Thus understood, the Christian state necessarily becomes
the Church-State. It rules as a sovereign faith, which is
the foundation of the edifice ; it rules as a sovereign aU that
is to be reared upon that foundation — aU without exception,
for there is nothing, Christianly speaking, which is not con
nected with faith, and which has not to be decided by faith.
Faith then wHl occupy in the State, the place which we are
aU agreed in assigning it in the individual ; the State will
force the individual to do in virtue of the common faith
aU that the same individual, supposing him to be a true
Christian, would do in virtue of his individual faith.
Here Hes the error. Faith, even when common to aU the
members of a regularly constituted society, is always indi
vidual in its essence ; community of faith is an external
fact whence nothing can logically result, save external
consequences; community of worship, ecclesiastical organi
zation, &c. Thus, even when fixed under the form of a
confession, faith must stiH be left, in its special conse
quences, to each man's own conscience. To awaken and
vivify Hi aU men, a sense of responsibility before God

HOW TO BE REGARDED. 109
and men, is the task of the preachers of the Gospel, —
a task which the civil power may and should facilitate ;
but let us leave that responsibUity in its integrity to
every man, and let neither State nor Church presume to
take the place of conscience.
Such in our judgment is the right course. Observe, how
ever, that this system, although we think it conformable
to the spirit of Christianity and the true nature of faith,
sends us like that of Calvin, in pursuit of an ideal, and that
Calvin might triumphantly ask us now, what such an ideal,
considered wiser than his, becomes in practice. " As for
the consciences," he would say, " to which you leave the
right of deciding for themselves what the law of God per
mits or forbids, how many amongst them regulate them
selves reaUy and sincerely by the law of God ? You
reproach me with having faUen into an extreme ; but
are you not in the opposite extreme, you whose laws only
strike that which offends them, and permit all that which
offends only God ? You have not solved the problem ;
you have only passed by its side, whilst I have resolutely
confronted it. Faith being granted; I demand aU the
consequences of faith. I want them in the State as weU
as in the Church ; in each of the citizens as well as in the
State. I have been logical and I would have every body
else logical too."
We have said elsewhere that logic may be in the wrong,
and we are not more disposed to think here that it is in
the right. But we could not omit altogether what was
to be said in favour of the laws of Calvin, and what he
might have said against ours.
Let us beware, however, in reading his laws, not to
be too much influenced by the true or false indignation
which certain details have excited in the mind of some
of his historians.
In the first place, it has been proved that on many
points, they only restored ordinances which were anterior

110 GENEVAN LAWS.
to the Eeformation. We know of four (1503, 1506, 1510,
1511), against games of chance; and four (1484, 1487,
1492, 1516) against dancing. Debauchery, drunkenness,
and blasphemy, had also called forth ordinances, very
badly kept, it is true, but severe, and we often find
Calvin and his coUeagues, when accused of exacting too
much, asking whether what was forbidden under a cor
rupt Church was to be tolerated under the Gospel.
And then it must not be forgotten what, at that period,
certain things were which the refinement of manners has
more or less modified. Every custom, and therefore much
more every kind of disorder, retained the impress of
preceding centuries; hence the passions easily degenerated
into a brutish and uncouth cynicism. Drunkenness and
revelling are now among the very lowest of the inferior
classes just what they were then to many of the higher
ranks. There were scarcely any innocent pleasures. The
dances, for instance, — do those who reproach Calvin for
having so strictly forbidden them, know what they were ?
They may learn it from these same registers which shew
us that the said dances were forbidden long before Cal
vin's time ; they may learn it also from the registers of our
courts of justice, for they not seldom degenerated into
outrages on decency which no respectable government
will ever tolerate.
Nor were the sumptuary laws at aU extravagant for those
times ; and they must not be judged either by our usages,
or by the complaints of those whom they interfered with.
We may smile at certain details, especially at the anti
quated names of fashions, stuffs or jewels, which were
permitted or forbidden: but the principle was universaUy
admitted, and we see edicts of that kind in France, as
late as Henry IV, forty years after Calvin's death. Why
should it be thought strange that what that immoral
prince thought it advisable to regulate in his kingdom,
Calvin should have wished to be regulated in a repubfic ?

HOW EXECUTED. Ill
As for the religious regulations, they emanated imme
diately from the principle adopted, and aU that we have
yet seen might be said in favour of the 'principle, might be
said in favour of the regulations. Here again let us mis
trust the impression which may be produced upon us by
certain detaHs foreign to the manners of our day ; let us
remember, on the other hand, how Eomanism had accus
tomed the people to see religion regulated. A Eomish
historian looks as though he thought it monstrous that
Calvin had ordained that the sick were never to keep
theH bed for three days without sending for a pastor.
Now, at Eome, not in the sixteenth century, but in the
nineteenth, and very recently (in January 1860) aU inn
keepers were enjoined, under penalty of a hundred crowns,
never to wait more than three days without sending for a
confessor, if any one had faUen sick in theH house. If,
then, we think Calvin to be blamed for such injunctions,
let it be at least in the name of Christian liberty, and not
on the credit of angry accusations and fictitious indigna
tion, like that which is for the most part levelled at him
in our day.

IX.

When these ordinances were made — or rather sketched,
for they were as yet far from being what they eventuaUy
became — it remained to carry them into execution, and
it was soon seen what can be done by a single firm,
calm, and persevering will, to inspHe with courage and
perseverance those who otherwise perhaps would have
lacked them completely. The syndics and the councH1 of
Geneva seem for a time to be new men, and Calvin's ad
versaries are obliged to acknowledge at least the perfect
1 The Lesser Council, the government, composed of twenty-five members, in
cluding the four syndics.

112 THE SCHOOL.
impartiality which presides at the infliction of the
penalties. One of the first punished is a counseUor, Ami
Curtet; another a citizen of high station, Matthieu
Manlich. An obstinate gambler is set in the stocks for
an hour, with his playing cards hung round his neck.
The author of a base masquerade is condemned to ask
pardon on his knees in the cathedral. A man guHty of
perjury was hoisted up on a ladder, and remained there
several hours, with his right hand fastened to the top.
An adulterer and his accompfice were ignominiously
paraded through the town. A woman who made head
dresses was condemned to two days' imprisonment for
having immodestly decked out a young bride. Some
parents were punished for having neglected or refused to
send their chHdren to school.
This last point is one of those which Calvin had. most
at heart. The bishops had done nothing for public in
struction ; the public school, founded in 1428 by a lay
man, Frangois de Versonay, had existed rather in spite of
the clergy than with their help ; and towards the middle
of the same century, the bishop had kept back for several
years his authorisation for rebuilding the class-rooms
which were falling to ruins. Eeorganised in 1501, but
by the government, the school had at first enjoyed a few
years of prosperity, but afterwards, either because of poli
tical troubles, or because of clerical hostUity — justified
this time by the adhesion of some of the masters to the
new religious ideas — it came at length to have neither
scholars nor masters. As early as 1535, Farel had asked
for the establishment of a " school," directed, as the regis
ter informs us, " by a man who understands it, and who
may be paid sufficient to enable him to teach the poor
without asking a fee of them ; and he also asks that
every one may be bound to send his children to school,
and to make them learn." The school had been founded,
the humble beginning of an edifice which was to occupy

THE CATECHISM. 113
so large and so fair a place in the Geneva of Calvin. He
found it already provided with two under-masters be
sides the head-master, and frequented by no inconsider
able number of scholars. Calvin the student could not
but take an interest in it ; Calvin the Eeformer had long
understood that the Eeformation must live and grow by
knowledge, and called upon aU its partisans to exercise
reaUy and sincerely the right which it conferred upon
them of knowing for and by themselves the things of
faith. Connected as it was with the great inteUectual
movement of the age, it had aHeady everywhere created
or transformed the means of instruction ; in a short time
it had everywhere prepared learned, able, and ardent
champions, who were in theH turn to prepare others;
There are moments when it seems that every faculty is
doubled, and that ripe fruit immediately succeeds the
blossoms which were its harbingers.
But Calvin could not conceive of instruction in any
degree whatever apart from religion; the chHd was to
receive, with the first rudiments of human letters, those
of that other science which henceforth belonged to all men.
Calvin had written the Institutes for divines and adults ;
and he drew up a famifiar summary of the Institutes — his
Catechism for children.
That catechism, which- was several times revised by
Calvin's pen, was destined to play an important part ; it
was long to be the true confession of faith for the Church
of Geneva, and for all the churches Hi connexion with it ;
a living, practical confession, sufficiently strict to satisfy
divines, and sufficiently simple to be understood by the
simplest. Notwithstanding its brevity, it is not dry; the
theological formula appears most frequently, only as the
result and summary of the Christian feeling, by appealing
to which the author had begun. Observe, for instance,
the beginning. Calvin does not commence by asking,
"What is religion ?" — a question which inevitably, and,
H

]14 THE CATECHISM.
do what we wHl, leads to a somewhat metaphysical reply.
He says :
Q. What is the chief end of human Hfe ?
A. It is to know God.1
Q. Why dost thou say that ?
A. Because He hath created and brought us into the
world that He may be glorified in us. And it is reason
able that we should order our fives to His glory, because
He is theH source.
Q. And what is the highest good of men ?
A. The same.
Q. Why dost thou caU it the highest good ?
A. Because without it our condition is worse than that
of brute beasts.
Q. Hereby, then, we see that there is no misfortune so
great as not to five to God ?
A. Yes.
Q. But what is the true and right knowledge of God ?
A. When He is known in order to be honoured.
Q. What is the way to honour Him aright ?
A. It is that we should put our whole trust in Him ;
that we should serve Him by obeying His wHl ; that we
should caU upon Him in all our necessities, seeking in
Him salvation and every good thing, and that we should
acknowledge, with heart and mouth, that all good pro
ceeds from Him alone.
Here we have the order and arrangement of the cate
chism : — Trust introduces aH that relates to faith ; obedi
ence, aU that relates to works ; necessities, aU that relates
to prayer ; and the fourth point all that relates to grace,
the means of grace, etc.
The great question of works serves as a transition be
tween the first and second parts. Calvin expounds it, Hi
a few answers, with perfect clearness, and every objection
is anticipated. "Faith," he concludes, "not only does
' We quote from the edition of 1553.

FRIENDS AND FOES. 115
not make us remiss in good works, but is the root from
which they spring." Of predestination there is not a
word. Here, then, the theologian somewhat condemns
himseH, for he omits here what he has taught elsewhere
as being of the highest importance. The fact is, the
Christian once more shows his sound, practical, and pious
sense. This same practical and pious good sense is not less
to be praised in the third part, which treats of prayer.
It contains eleven chapters, or eleven Sundays, for the
.book, as a whole, is a sort of Christian year, Hi which
every week has its chapter. This number of eleven, more
than a fifth of the whole, sufficiently indicates the im
portance which Calvin attached to prayer, and many pas
sages might be quoted to show how high he placed it.
Nowhere is his Christianity more spiritual and living
than in what he teaches about man's going to God in aU
his necessities of body and soul.
The fourth part treats of the Bible, the ministry, and
the sacraments. It is rather frigid towards the close, in
reference to "the order and government" to be observed
hi the administration of the Lord's Supper. But in the
question of the rite itseH, and what it is to the Christian,
the author has neither forgotten nor omitted anything.

X.

WhUst the new generation was being fashioned at
school Hi accordance with this profific conception of evan
gelical Christianity, the old generation was being divided,
with ever increasing distinctness, into friends and foes of
the gospel. The 10th of November had not kept its
promise ; H it had strengthened the weak and rallied the
undecided, it had irritated the violent. The Great Coun
cil, said the latter, had overstepped their rights in voting

116 ANABAPTISTS RECEIVED.
a new code ; the General CouncH1 ought to have been
convoked. That was true ; but it is doubtful whether a
more regular way of proceeding would have found them
more submissive. Forced to obey, they were on the
watch for every opportunity of creating a disturbance, and
prepared to make use of it for shaking off their yoke.2
Accordingly, they were delighted to receive, in Feb
ruary 1537, two of those Anabaptists, with whom Calvin
had so boldly disavowed aU connection in his epistle to
the king of France. Andre Benoit and Hermann of
Liege were superior, it seems, to many of theH brethren ;
but they were none the less professors of those doctrines
which had been seen to betray theH true character by the
most fearful disorders. The most refigious, moreover,
had often been the most dangerous. Fervent Christians
on certain points, their mystic spHituafism was strangely
associated with the grossest materiafism, with the wor
ship of brute force, and contempt for all moral and social
laws. See what was represented by the two men who
were come to plant themselves in the midst of Geneva,
which as yet had scarcely issued out of chaos, and to
defy those who had drawn it out of that chaos !
They demanded, in fact, a conference with the Ee
formers — a dispute as it was then called. The Council at
first refused, fearing lest discussion should only serve to
show how many friends these men possessed. Calvin re
quested that it might be accepted, fearing, with still
more reason, lest he should be accused of fear, and lest
such pretended alarm should help them to gain recruits.
The conference was therefore held, but before the Council
only. It lasted two days. Baptism, excommunication,
and the nature of the soul, which was considered mate
rial by the Anabaptists, were successively discussed.
1 Composed of all the citizens.
' For the description of these struggles we are much indebted to the " History
of the Church of Geneva," by M. Gaberel.

CORAULT. 117
Calvin took up the last point especiaUy; his arguments,
which were an able demonstration of the spirituafity and
immortality of the soul, were resumed and developed by
him in his Brief instruction for arming every believer
against the errors of the Anabaptists (1544). The Coun
cil rejoiced at Calvin's victory, and the two men were
expelled from the city the 19th of March; but the
Libertines, for so they began to caU the enemies of the
new order of things* did not consider that they were
beaten. They openly announced theH intention of soon
having done both with the Eeformers and their laws.
Farel and Calvin, on their side, yielded nothing. They
had gained an auxifiary in Corault, who was formerly a
monk, and afterwards one of the queen of Navarre's
preachers. He was old and blind, but full of energy, and
both supported them by his courage, and aided them by
his powerful though uncultivated eloquence. Many pre
tended that they did not consider themselves bound by
the Confession of Faith ; so the pastors demanded that it
should be printed and sent to aH the citizens, and that
every one should be asked by the tithing man1 if he in
tended to submit to it or not. This was accordingly
done, but the measure met with a kind of opposition
which had never been dreamt of — several of the malcon
tents refused to say either yes or no. According to our
modern ideas, they were in their right to refuse ; accord
ing to the ideas of that time, it was a revolt ; and, more
over, from what we know of theH tendencies, it is pro
bable that the serious religious motives which would now
be invoked in such a case, had no share in theH opposi
tion. Evidently it was not the doctrinal part of the Con
fession of Faith, but the moral part of it which excited
theH repugnance. They would willingly have signed the
doctrine, H not as the expression of theH faith, at least as
1 Dizenier, a public officer charged with the census of a quarter. Geneva
was formerly divided into twelve parishes, each of which was composed of two
'tithings, or dizaines.

118 THE LIBERTINES :
the confirmation and token of theH rupture with Eoman
ism ; but of the Christian consequences they would have
none on any terms. This is what Corault said to them,
With a harshness which soon rendered him yet more
odious to them than his coUeagues were.
The pastors and theH friends had, however, the ma
jority stiH on theH side ; but the minority was one of
those which never submit, and always end by triumph
ing, at least for a time. Having succeeded in detaching
from this minority a few citizens, the CouncH imagined
that it might resolve upon the banishment of those who
would not submit ; but this measure was not even begun
to be carried into execution, and the antagonists openly
organised themselves in prospect of the approaching
elections, which were to take place in February. Speakers
were to be heard declaiming, even in the streets, against
the ministers and their intolerable despotism ; and, in a
certain point of view, the speakers were Hi the right.
Geneva had, under the bishops, enjoyed much more liberty
in the sense dear to the lovers of pleasure and of disorderly
living, and the Libertines could harp triumphantly upon
that string. "What remained of the old franchises of
the city ? They had been preserved then Hi spite of the
duke, and in spite of the bishop, but only for the Genevese
to aUow that, in the name of reHgion, laws should be im
posed upon them of which the bishop had never dreamed,
and which the duke would not have supported ?" One
thing only was forgotten, which was, that henceforward
those laws, and the observance of those laws, would be
the best, or rather the only safeguard both against the
bishop and the duke. Before the redoubled hatred which
Geneva had just excited by breaking with her religious
past, she would need other ramparts than mere human
patriotism, as events would soon show. Liberty, thus
understood, would but have prepared the ruin of political
independence, and Eome would have again seized her

THEIR SUCCESSES. 119
prey, faUen once more into the depths of ignorance and
immorality. Geneva could only be equal to its new task
and its new perils by being also fuUy and frankly new.
Government was, therefore, paralyzed. The Libertines
had representatives Hi its bosom, who impeded every
serious attempt to seek out means by which order might
best be re-established; and supposing the means to be
found, how were they to be employed? The pastors de
manded the excommunication of some who were noto
riously immoral or impious. They probably did not
expect much from the sentence, and demanded it rather
to establish the principle of excommunication, as laid
down in the Confession of Faith, and to protest solemnly
against the henceforth certain triumph of Hcense. Go
vernment dare not comply; the Two Hundred would
not. The vote — a nearly certain sign that the majority
had changed, — encouraged the party of opposition; and
on the 3d of February 1538, the elections were Hi their
favour. They had the majority in the Council, and three
Syndics out of the four were theH adherents.

XL

See then the Eeformers in presence of a hostile govern
ment, urged on by people yet more hostile. The posses
sion of power, however, as is always the case, induced a
certain moderation in the newly-elected, who, moreover,
were not among the worst. This last point is noteworthy,
as it is important for the right understanding of later
changes. Many at this period sided with the Libertines,
and accepted power at theH hands, who were not reaUy
of theH party; but honourable men, deceived or seH-
deceivers, who were desHous of theH country's weal, and
disposed to let facts teach them. Before this result had
been attained, the magistrates of 1538, were, at least

120 EMBARRASSMENTS
soon made to wish that those they had to govern were,
H not Christians, at least governable; willingly would
they have entered into an understanding with the pastors,
if the latter would but have consented to wink at certain
matters. But Calvin, besides not being the man to yield
anything which he deemed right and needful, looked far
beyond the dangerous truce which he was asked to grant.
He beheld Geneva weakened and dishonoured; he com
prehended what an enormous breach would be made Hi
the .principle of the union between moral reform and re
ligious reform. He therefore refused to lend himseH to
any accommodation. Conqueror or conquered, he said
to himself, he would save the principle.
Everything in the city, therefore, was confusion and
menace. The Bernese had sent deputies to mediate be^
tween the parties ; but the Council hastened to get rid of
them by declaring that there had been exaggeration, and
that aU was about to be settled. The Eeformers had
hoped great things from the step ; but they were again
left alone. A few days after, they entered the Council
chamber, and once more drew a lamentable picture of the
disorder which appeared with impunity in the city. The
magistrates were obliged to promise that they would do
something. They passed a decree, in fact, against drunk
enness, debauchery, and lewd songs, and had it pro
claimed by sound of trumpet. But there they stopped,
and all went on as before.
Then the cup overflowed, and the ministers began to
speak in the pulpit, not only against profligacy, but
against the magistrates who either could not or would
not prevent it. Was this wise, prudent, and Christian
conduct on the part of the pastors? We are aware that
many will answer no, on the authority of the modern
axiom, that the religious man must in no case interfere
with the men of power. Let us leave the modern axiom
to modern men ; and before applying it to the men of the

OF THE REFORMERS. 121
sixteenth century, let us ask what Farel and Calvin were
to do. The principle of the intervention of magistrates
Hi matters moral and religious, was admitted by every
body; disorder, moreover, had attained to such a pitch
that no honourable government, even purely civH, in our
own days, could refrain from interfering. The magis
trates then were faifing, openly and scandalously, in theH
duty, and who has ever pretended that the Christian
pulpit, in such, a case, should remain always, everywhere,
and absolutely sHent? Moreover, the position of Farel
and Calvin was very different from that of mere pastors
officiating in an organized church. Everything had to
be organized and created; and so exceptional a task
necessarily involved exceptional rights.
But theH adversaries did not reason thus. Pastors,
according to them, were only men paid by the State, and
they were to keep absolute sHence on aU that concerned
the State. A resolution to this effect was notified to
them, but Corault braved the prohibition, and was sent
to prison. His coUeagues, supported by numerous ,
friends, energeticaUy demanded his fiberty. He was re
leased, but banished from the city, and we have already
seen what Calvin said of him at his death, which hap
pened in the October of the same year.
A new embarrassment had supervened to accelerate the
solution, and in such a state of things it was rather to be
desired than feared.
The Bernese Eeformation, less radical than that of
Geneva, had retained certain customs which Geneva did
not admit. Geneva communicated with common bread;
Berne, with unleavened bread. Geneva had removed the
baptismal fonts from the churches; Berne had left them.
Geneva observed the Sunday only; Berne had retained
several hofidays. The Bernese asked, therefore, that on
these points the Genevese should do as they did. Farel
and Calvin's opposition to it was quite enough to make

122 SACRAMENTAL DISCUSSIONS.
the Libertines of one mind with the Bernese. They still
intended to receive that holy sacrament unworthUy, with
theH customary sarcasms on their lips ; but they were
suddenly seized, with an ardent desHe to communicate
with unleavened bread, and this soon became the chief
thing. A Synod was convoked at Lausanne to defiberate upon
it. Farel and Calvin repaired thither. But Lausanne
belonged to the Bernese, and the Bernese exceUed Hi the
art of being masters. The Synod, as was to be expected,
voted according to theH views. The Eeformers appealed
to the approaching Synod of Zurich, in which the same
points were to be debated, and on theH return to Geneva,
begged that no innovation might take place before Whit
suntide, when the decision of Zurich would be known.
Pledging himseH to submit, H Zurich should decide the
same as Lausanne, was a great concession on the part of
Calvin, who could not understand that after breaking
with Eomanism, men should wish to retain any part of
it. Logic again! but this time, before we pronounce it
in the wrong, we must carefuUy weigh the cHcumstances.
Eomanism had so ruled by means of ceremonies and
forms, that it was scarcely possible to retain any of them,
and especiaHy to return to any of them, without seeming
to restore it more or less, and seeking to do so altogether.
Calvin, therefore, might consider that he had made a
great concession in promising to submit to the decision
of Zurich.
But this concession did not suit the Libertines ; they
wished for open resistance, in order to have an opportu
nity of crushing it. Easter was at hand.; they asked that
the communion should be administered that day accord
ing to the Bernese rite, and the CouncH ordered that it
should be so. A letter from the Bernese government
exhorted the CouncH of Geneva not to tolerate the pas
tors' resistance.

Calvin's firmness. 123
Such resistance, Hi itseH, was contrary to the principles
which the pastors had themselves laid down by getting
the Confession voted ; what one majority had done, an
other majority had incontestably the right to modify.
But here arose a second point of view which Calvin had
never separated from the first. The positive right existed,
he aUowed, but it was in connexion with the moral right ;
the absence of the second element annihHated the whole.
A Christian majority had the right to regulate the Church;
an infidel and immoral majority had not. There is much
to object against such a distinction. Who shaU judge
whether a majority is Christian or not ? Who shaU de
cide where the measure of piety and faith requisite for a
majority to have a moral right to rule the Church begins
and ends ? But these are modern difficulties, always less,
moreover, Hi practice than in theory. For Calvin, they
did not even exist. Strongly entrenched Hi his conscience,
as he had boldly encouraged the majority of 1537 to con
sider themselves entitled to vote a Confession of Faith, so
did he now declare to the majority of 1538 that they had
not the right to lay a finger upon the edifice which the
other had raised.
If, indeed, he had entertained any scruples, the Liber
tines would have removed them by theH conduct as
Easter drew near. That Bernese rite, for which they
reaUy cared as little as for any other, was demanded by
them with fury. Bands of them ran through the streets
at night vocHerating and yelling. They would stop before
the pastors' dweUings, crying out, " To the Ehone ! to the
Ehone !" and firing off theH arquebuses. Even this was
not enough. The Easter communion, which they were
profaning beforehand by absurd violence, was defiberately
profaned also by redoubled scandals, as H to state defi
nitively that the liberty they had won, was disorder and
immorality. They organized a masquerade in which
scenes from the Gospel were parodied ; dances, songs,

124 FAREL IN THE PULPIT.
excesses of every kind, yea, nothing was wantmg to those
deplorable days and shameful nights. We should pro
bably be very unjust if we were to consider the whole
party as sharing Hi these follies. Many perhaps lamented
them ; but to blame them publicly, would have looked
Hke denying the cause, and there was no other protest
than the painful sHence of the moral and Christian party.
At length the day arrived, and the bells seemed to toll
the kneU of Christian Geneva, as weU as of Protestant
Geneva ; the Eomanists, who were stiH numerous, and no
longer concealed theH joy at the sight of so many evils,
doubtless thought of the time when those same beHs would
toll anew for mass. Farel ascends the pulpit of St.
Gervais, and Calvin that of St. Peter's. Farel perceived
amongst the audience the most fiery and disreputable of
the Libertines ; they did him the honour to hate him
more than Calvin, doubtless because hitherto, he had
rendered greater services, and that they were indebted
chiefly to him for the Hberty of which they made so bad
a use. He spoke, at first, only of the feelings to be
brought to the Lord's Table ; they thought, for a moment,
perhaps, that he would stop there, and leave to each the
task of examining himseH before God. But if that is
what a minister had best do in ordinary times, can he
and should he never act otherwise ? The Libertines had
courted publicity too much for it to be a usurpation to
read their consciences. Farel declares, therefore, that he
wHl not be theH accomplice in the profanation which they
are meditating, and that the communion will not be ad
ministered. Cries of anger interrupt him ; his voice rises
above the tumult, and they are forced to hear him. He
resumes what he had said of the dispositions to be brought,
and then contrasts the shameful picture of those which
they had brought. There must be faith in order to com
municate, and you blaspheme the Gospel. There must
be charity, and you are come with swords and staves.

FAREL AND CALVIN BANISHED. 125
There must be repentance ; how did you pass the night ?
Hereupon they become agitated and clamorous, and at
last, swords are drawn, and several furious men rush
towards the pulpit. Farel holds his peace, crosses his
arms and waits. But his friends, who are also numerous,
surround him, make him come down and conduct him
home. The Hke scene took place round Calvin at St.
Peter's, though somewhat less violent. It was to be re
newed fifteen years afterwards in the same Church, against
the same man. His enemies never changed ; and he,
stiH less, and the conquered of 1538 gloriously prepared
the conqueror of 1553.
On the morrow, the Council pronounced sentence of
banishment against the two ministers, and on the Tues
day it was ratified by the General Council. One would
hke to know by what majority the decision was taken ;
the register gives no detaHs, only saying, "the greater
number." Be that as it may, the two ministers were
enjoined to leave the city within three days. " So be it !"
said Calvin, "it is better to obey God than man." A
Romish historian discovers that this answer is very old.
It is as old, in fact, as the Gospel ; but it wHl be eternally
new in the mouth of every one who has bought the right
to utter it by sacrificing self to duty.
' Bonivard had been two years out of the dungeons of
Chillon, and could see the fulfilment of what he had pre
dicted to some of those unworthy Eeformed whose exploits
we have just been narrating. " You hated the priests,"
he said to them, " because they were too much like you ;
you will hate the preachers because they are too much
UDlike you, and you wHl not keep them two years, with
out sending them away, rewarding them for theH pains
with a sound beating." For the rest, Bonivard was one
of those who are content with seeing right ; and less
grieved at evil than pleased at having foretold it, but
caring little to contend against it. He never quite for-

126 THE FRENCH PROTESTANTS.
gave the Eeformation for having deprived him of his
handsome priory of St. Victor. When Geneva, again
under the influence of Calvin, returned into the paths of
order, it often required aU the gratitude which she owed
to Bonivard, and aH the admHation which he had formerly
excited, to tolerate this perpetual grumbler, fault-finder,
sulker, and occasional intriguer. Bonivard was only a
courageous Erasmus, and courageous merely in politics ;
he knew not Christian courage, and it is on that account
that his outline, at first so marked and clear, is completely
effaced by that of Calvin.

XII.

The courage which Calvin had been shewing at Geneva,
he had been preaching to his former friends of France,
who were more persecuted than ever. Along with adnur-
able instances of devotedness, there had been some failing
hearts. Men whom he had known to be Protestants or
nearly so, had returned to Eomanism ; others, without
openly relapsing, dissembled, and were sHent. Hence,
the two Letters of Calvin, — one upon the obfigation of
avoiding any worship in which a man does not believe ;
the other upon what a priest must do H he has known
the Gospel. This second is addressed to Gerard Eoussel,
who had become a bishop. " Now, every one is saying
that thou art most happy, and, so to speak, the favourite
of fortune, on account of the dignity which has faUen to
thee ; for besides the title of prelate, it brings thee a great
revenue of money  See what men say of thee, and
perchance they make thee also to believe it. But, when I
think a little of what aU those things are worth on which
men commonly set so much store, I have great compassion
for thy calamity." Eoussel has seen and known aU the
abuses, and errors of Eomanism — Eoussel has openly and

CALVIN 'S LETTERS. 127
eloquently preached against them. What wHl he, what
can he do, as bishop, to set them right ? " The Lord de
clares that He ordains pastors in His Church, He consti
tutes them guardians and watchers for the defence of His
people. They are called the salt of the earth, the fight of
the world, the angels of God, and workers with God.
Preaching is caUed the strength and power of God.
Answer me in conscience, thou superintendent and
head of religion, with what fidelity dost thou labour to
restore that which is faUen ?" The happy, then, the truly
happy, are not the Nicodemites, even under the episcopal
mitre, but they are, as Jesus Christ said, those " who are
persecuted for righteousness' sake."
Such is the happiness which the Eeformed of France
wiU choose. " True piety," Calvin says to them in the
other letter, begets true confession, and that must not be
considered a fight and vain thing which St. Paul says —
'"For with the heart man befieveth unto righteousness ;
and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.' "
The first ages set the example ; let the long chain of
martyrs, to which aHeady new links have been so glori
ously added, be no longer interrupted whHe there are
persecutors and executioners in the world. Let them re
member, amongst a thousand others, the death of Cyprian,
related by Augustine. To escape death he would have
had but a word to say ; the proconsul was moved, and
offered to be satisfied with an abjuration as vague anrl
insignificant as possible. Cyprian persisted. Why ?
" When the torments were prepared before his eyes, and
the executioner with malignant, traitorous, and cruel looks
pressed him so closely that the edge of the sword was
aHeady on his neck, H any should marvel how that holy
person nevertheless presented himseH cheerfully to tor
ments, it was because his heart was fixed on the command
ment of God which caUed upon him to confess his religion."
Thus wHl the Eeformed do. They wHl understand that

128 CALVIN AND FAREL AT BERNE.
in these matters no accommodation is either permitted or
possible.. Then comes a rapid exposition of what those ceremo
nies and forms reaUy are which the timid pretend to think
indifferent. Not one, according to Calvin, is so ; not one
in which a man may take part without denying the
gospel, the spirit of which condemns them aU. There are
detaHs here which would not be written in our day, and
of which the jeering, timid, and even burlesque tone
strangely contrasts to us with the noble eloquence of the
rest. But, after all, these letters have been handed down
to us, as it were, signed and sealed with the blood of the
martyrs who read them, and who so often drew thence
courage and strength. If they laughed at certain jeering
phrases, elsewhere they wept, touched with holy emotion,
and finaUy marched unshrinkingly to death.

XIII.
Meanwhile Farel and Calvin, having left Geneva on
the day fixed by the sentence of banishment, set out for
Berne. Without acknowledging the refigious supremacy
which that powerful city was endeavouring to secure, they
wished that the Bernese government should understand
the true state of things. They were at first treated far.
from weH, but afterwards better.. They drew up a me
moir, in which they explained their conduct. The un
leavened bread had been a pretext only. They knew, on
good authority, that the project to get rid of them dated
far back; that the project with some of the leaders was
connected with that of restoring Eomanism, and that at
Lyons, for instance, goods had been delivered to certain
Genevese merchants, to be paid for, said the contract*
when the ministers were driven away and the old religion
re-established. They protested, finally, that they had not

SUNDRY MOVEMENTS. 129
refused the Sacrament on account of the bread-question,
but on account of the open and notorious unworthiness of
those who made it a pretext. These explanations very
much softened men's minds at Berne, and our two exiles,
setting out for Zurich, met with the most cordial recep
tion there. They, in turn, showed themselves more dis
posed to make some concession, not to the Genevese rioters
but to the Swiss Church. BuUinger, the friend of Calvin,
requested the Synod to ask the CouncH of Berne to me
diate with the CouncH of Geneva, The step was taken.
Berne was favourably disposed, and sent deputies, among
whom was VHet, who had been established at Lausanne
for the last eighteen months. He had not been mixed up
in the Geneva quarrels, and he thought that his voice,
which had long been listened to, might haply stHl be heard.
Farel and Calvin foUowed him, but without entering the
Genevese territory; they awaited on the frontier the
result of the negociations. The Council consented to con
voke, for the 26th of May, a new General-Council ; but
the assembly confirmed the decree of April, and there was
a sort of riot against the few citizens who durst vote the
contrary way. At night, bands of men ran about the city
shouting vile jests against the exiled pastors. The same
men who had so bitterly reproached them with wish
ing to embroH the republic with Berne, were careless now
about offending Berne by such a reception of her request.
The Government beheld those mamfestations with regret,
but what can a Government do against the men who
make it ?
The exHes withdrew to Basle, stiH the peaceful city
which appeared to Calvin as his refuge and his rest, and
which never was to keep him more than a few months.
Scarcely had he arrived there, when he received letters
from Bucer, strongly persuading him to return to Stras
burg. He resisted at first, but consented afterwards, and
separated himseH very sadly from Farel, whom so many

130 CALVIN AND FAREL.
common trials had rendered ever dearer to him. TheH
correspondence dates from this time. Happy or unhappy,
Calvin told his friend everything. In the midst of innu
merable occupations, he always found time to converse at
length with Farel. Protestations of friendship are rare
and brief, but they are felt to be all the more genuine,
and the commentary upon them Hes Hi the fact itseH of
so deep and permanent an intimacy. Calvin, though he
became rapidly far bis superior Hi fame, was more tempted
to think himseH the inferior of a man of so original and
strongly marked individuality. FareL on the other hand,
was never tempted to be jealous of a friend whom he
knew to be fuU of esteem for him, and devoid of every
proud thought as respected him. In 1549, Calvin dedi
cated to VHet and to Farel his Commentary on the Epistle
to Titus, and he does so, he says, because his own office at
Geneva " resembles that which St. Paul had committed to
Titus." Farel and VHet had entrusted Geneva to him, as
Paul entrusted the Cretans to his disciple. He does not
seem to suspect that, notwithstanding such was the fact,
it is rather himseH who is Paul, the head and master.
But he wishes this book to be a sort of monument of the
" friendship and holy association" of aH the three. " I
have discharged here the pastoral office with you," says
he, " and so far from there having been any appearance of
envy, it has seemed to me that you and I were one"
But it was especially with Farel that the intimacy went
on increasing. In March 1553, Calvin learned that Farel
was HI. He hastened to Neuchatel, and found him at the
last extremity — saw him Hi effect as aHeady dead. Not
without difficulty did he offer to God the painful sacrifice
which God, he thought, was about to requHe of him.
But Farel came back to Hfe. A month afterwards, Calvin
writes : " Inasmuch as my grief buried thee before thy
time, the Lord grant that thy turn may also come to bury
me, and that the Church may see thee survive me ! It is

CALVIN GOES TO STRASBURG. 131
the good of the Church which I ask in this, and also my
own advantage, for I shaU the sooner be freed from this
scene of warfare, and shaU not have to weep over thy
death." Strasburg welcomed Calvin with joy. The Town
CouncH authorised him to give pubfic lectures on Holy
Scripture, and afterwards to organise as a church the
French refugees whom persecution had thrown into
Strasburg. For the performance of religious worship
they were aUowed the use of the church of the Preaching
Friars, now the New Church. But it appears that in fur
nishing him abundantly with the means of exercising his
zeal, the councH forgot to furnish him likewise with the
means of subsistence. His letters represent him as in
actual misery, and reduced to make a little money by the
sale of his books which he had left at Geneva. Du THlet,
the wealthy canon, in the very letter in which he en
deavoured to persuade him that his misfortunes were
most probably a divine chastisement, had offered him
money. Calvin did not notice the singularity of such an
offer in such cHcumstances. He refused it, but without
choosing to see Hi it anything but a last gleam of friend
ship. " You make me," he says, " an offer, for which I
cannot sufficiently thank you, and am not so unmanly
as not to appreciate its great kindness. But I wiU ab
stain from burthening any one, and you especially, who
have been too much burthened Hi times past. At pre
sent my board costs me nothing. Other needs wHl be
supplied by the money from the books, for I hope you
wHl deign to give me others H necessary." And he re
sumes the thread of his vigorous answer to the sophistries
•of the Protestant who had again become a canon. " Du
TiUet offered me money," he wrote subsequently to Farel,
"but at too high an interest. Did he mean to convert
me?" Farel, who was settled at Neuchatel, had also
offered him aid, but Calvin had refused it also. " Thanks

132 LABOUR AND REST.
to all my brethren for their charitable offers, poor souls !
who would give alms to one more poor than they. But
I have taken an engagement with myseH to accept no
thing from thee, nor from our common friends, so long as
I am not absolutely constrained to do so. The books
which I have left at Geneva wHl pay my landlord till
next winter. The Lord wHl do the rest."1
His lHe at Strasburg was divided between pastoral
functions and theological labours. He was preparing the
second edition of the Christian Institutes. As pastor he
had to preach every evening ; as professor he gave every
morning a lecture on the gospel of St. John, and by so
doing amassed the materials for the important commen
tary which he was not to pubfish tiH 1553. The lec
tures, as at Geneva, soon attracted numbers, but they
were more accompfished, and such as could be furnished
by a town aHeady learned, whereas Geneva was to be
come so by means of Calvin. Moreover, France con
tinued to send a daily quota of fugitives, eager for the
Divine Word, and eager to see and hear the author of the
Institutes. There came some also whom nothing forced
to leave theH country, but who were attracted by the
preacher's fame ; and more than one who came out of
mere curiosity, returned home to brave the dangers
which had driven others away. The CouncH rejoiced at
the homage paid to the new professor. He was presented
with the freedom of the city, — a privHege highly prized
in old imperial Strasburg. His salary was augmented.
AU combined, it would seem, to leave him nothing either
to regret or to desHe.
1 15th of April, 1539.— The letters of Calvin toDu Tillet are in French; those
to Farel are in Latin.

GENEVA REMEMBERED. 133

XIV
And yet he stHl sighed after the hard Hfe which Geneva
had made him lead. In the midst of a quiet and studi
ous city he regretted the one which, till then,- had only
known how to wield the sword, and to carry into civH
life aU the science of war. Surrounded by the most
cordial admiration, he regretted those two years in which
he had been satiated with contradictions and vexations.
Not that he went so far as to embody in words, or even
to conceive the desire of plunging again into that chaos.
On the contrary, he speaks of it in his letters only with
consternation and horror. But is there a man breathing
who is altogether sure of his real sentiments ? Behind
those which. Calvin expressed with so much vivacity,
there was another, fuU of Hfe and deeply rooted in his
conscience, — that his task was at Geneva, his place at
Geneva. This, it has been said, was a mere instinct of
domineering. He was at Strasburg only a workman, but
at Geneva he had caught a gfimpse of the possibHity of
being master. Be it so. But in what respect would this
exclude the feeling of a great task to be fulfilled, and of
a serious and supreme responsibUity before God and
man ? There has been no great work performed in the
Church which might not also be attributed to ambitious
despotism. Besides, with Geneva as she then was, the
feelings assigned to Calvin would rather have led him to
renounce her for ever, and to seek elsewhere a people
more docile and a throne less tottering.
His looks were, therefore, still turned towards Geneva;
and as early as the 1st of October 1538, less than three
months after having left, he addressed a long and touch
ing epistle to his " weU-beloved brethren in our Lord, who
are the refics of the dispersion of the church of Geneva."
In his eyes this Church existed only in the members who

134 LETTERS TO GENEVA.
remained faithful to the spHit with which he had sought
to animate it. If " dispersed" Hke others by the blast of
persecution, she had been dispersed by the blast of revolt
and anarchy, which the Libertines had blown upon her.
The men are stiH there, but bound solely by interests and
passions ; the true bond, the only one which constitutes a
Church — operative and sanctifying faith — has been cast
off as a yoke. What wHl become of the " relics" of this
great disaster ? Calvin, Hi other letters, speaks severely
of some of the pastors who had remained at Geneva, and
who, without giving themselves up positively to the
Libertines, durst not reprimand theH disorders; but
here, speaking to the faithful, he wHl not expose the
ministry to theH contempt, and he contents himseH with
keeping silence about those who fill it without courage.
Let believers, then, seek theH strength in themselves —
that is to say, in God. In God also is the bond which
still unites them, and always wiU unite them to their
exUed pastor, for " it is not in the power of man to break
such a bond." True, it is not men who have done all
this mischief ; it is Satan " employing theH malice as the
instrument of war." And this idea, according to Calvin,
prompts a charitable counsel. " If you seek true victory,
do not combat evil by Hke evU." Do not hate the men
who are not your true enemies ; hate Satan only who
leads them astray. And why has God let loose Satan ?
To punish you for your faults, for do not think that you
were without reproach ; and to make his strength mani
fest in your weakness. Let the faithful, then, humble
themselves, and they wHl be strong. As for himseH, this
is what he has done. The more he has humbled himseH
before God in a sense of his own misery, insufficiency,
and fadings, the bolder he has felt in protesting before
men against the iniquity of theH decrees, very sure that
his innocence wHl one day appear like the star which
heralds the day.

HOW THINGS WENT ON. 135
Let the faithful of Geneva, therefore, take courage also.
The enemies of truth think themselves " at the end of
theH enterprise ;" look weU, and " you wHl evidently see
that all their ways tend to confusion." Yet a little whHe,
and God wUl resuscitate the Church ; know you not
"that he bestoweth the crown of joy upon those who are
Hi tears, that he restoreth the light to those who are in
darkness, and that he bringeth back to Hfe those who are
in the shadow of death ?" Watch and pray, then ; as for
me, I pray " the Lord of aU consolation to comfort you,
and support you in all patience."

XV

Thus did Calvin write ; and the faithful of Geneva
would "evidently" see, in fact, that the ways of their
enemies " tended to confusion."
The disorganisation of the Church brought on that of
public instruction. An attempt was made to force the
tutors to perform the- pastoral office, and to administer
the Lord's Supper according to the Bernese rite. As
friends of Calvin — one of them was Cordier, his old mas
ter — they refused, and were banished. The school was
closed. Public disorders continued. Yet very severe
ordinances had been published again, as H to show that
they could be made without Calvin ; but moral strength
had departed with the Eeformer, and the ordinances re
mained once more a dead letter. Some few condemna
tions, at wide intervals, took place, but they were insig
nificant, and served, upon the whole, only to heighten the
attractions of evU. AU was laxity, powerlessness, and
anarchy. Bepudiating vHtuaUy, therefore, aU the consequences
of the Eeformation, the Genevese were on the way to
repudiate the Eeformation itself, and this inner work was

136 PROGRESS OF EVENTS.
aHeady far advanced in several, and in some complete, as
events were soon to show.
In March 1539, some citizens went up to the town-
haU, demanding to be released from the oath they had
taken to the Confession of faith. They did not, however,
wish to return to Eomanism ; they objected only to the
moral part of the engagement contracted by them, and
having decided not to observe it Hi those points, they
wished no longer to feel themselves bound. This was
frank enough ; but this frankness enables us to indicate
exactly the state of things. The Confession of faith was
one. To deny the moral part of it was necessarily to
deny more or less that which was dogmatic.
About the same period, liberty began to return to the
priests who had remained in the city — a thing praise
worthy had it been toleration, and not mere weakness or
abandonment of the gospel. The ministers expostulated.
Some priests, who were known to have said mass, were
sent for, but were dismissed with a few words of remon
strance, and at Hberty to begin again on the morrow.
Nothing could be better, we say once more, had it been
true liberality, but it was only a shameful journeying to
wards Eome, who was more indulgent to vice, and more
habituated to lending herseH to accommodations between
earth and heaven.
This is what the Eeformer was looking at from Stras
burg, trustfuHy awaiting the time when God would educe
good from evU.

XVI.
The city, which Calvin did not lose sight of, was also
watched by two other men, one nearer than he, the other
farther off; these were Pierre de la Baume, the expeUed
bishop, and Pope Paul III.

HOPES OF THE PAPACY. 137
The bishop bewaHed his opulent see, which even princes
had been proud to caU theH own. The Pope had not,
perhaps, realised at first aU he lost in losing Geneva; but
events soon revealed to him, especiaUy during Calvin's
sojourn, what the Eeformation had gained by the pos
session of that city. The Protestants of France had be
gun to see Hi her theH religious capital, at once a citadel
and a Church, a refuge in defeat, and a basis of operation
when they should march onward.
With joy, therefore, did Eomanism learn the exile of
the leader, and the disorder to which his departure gave
free play. It eagerly foHowed the progress of the retro
grade movement which brought back to Eome some of
the Genevese, bad Eomanists, no doubt, after having been
not less bad Protestants, but Eomanists, and disposed to
re-enter the great external unity, and this was all that
was requHed of them. Eome understood, however, that
it was necessary to act with prudence, and that bad
Eomanists, H violently startled, might, after aU, become
Protestants again, perhaps more thoroughly than ever.
One, however, was aHeady completely won, as was known
later — the former syndic, Jean Phifippe, one of those who
had mainly contributed to the exile of Calvin. He went
to Lyons to treat personally with the bishop, who formed
one of a sort of committee principaUy organised with a
view to the re-conquest of Geneva. In the committee
were the Archbishops of Lyons, Besangon, Vienne, and
Turin, and the Bishops of" Lausanne, Langres, and Car-
pentras. The last named, Jacques Sadolet, was one of the best
men and one of the best informed in the Eomish Church.
As secretary of Leo X., — but of Leo X. the wit, far more
than of the Pope, — he was an enthusiast for that Hterary,
poetical, and mythological revival of which the Pope, a
true Medici, was the centre and promoter. No one had
celebrated it in better verse, no one had been more poeti-

138 JACQUES SADOLET:
caUy wroth with the absurd Eeformation that had come
to disturb the beautiful sky of the Eome of Leo X., the
Eome which was only occupied with statues, paintings,
music, and festivals. It was a sad day for the Pope's
secretary, when he was told that he must go to Carpen-
tras. He wished, at least, to be followed thither by all
that might in some measure restore to him his Italy, —
ancient manuscripts, works of art, and pictures. He em
barked them all, and all were lost at sea. His letters upon
this misfortune are touching; he does not weep for them as
treasures, but as friends, and the wound was long to bleed.
For the rest, he is a singular character to study. He
is learned, pious, and liberal; he professes true friendship
for Melanchthon; he is constantly going to and fro on the
highway of the Eeformation, and always agreeably sur
prising the Eomanists, disagreeably the Protestants, by
stiU remaining, nevertheless, a Eomanist, a bishop and a
cardinal, ready to write, if need be, against those whom
he has been seeming to approach.
He it was whom the Lyons committee appointed to
write, not against the Genevese, but to them. He was
even recommended to flatter and caress them; skiHully
to ascribe aU their misfortunes, not to themselves, but to
the Eeformation and the Eeformers, and finally to depict
Eomanism,— the Church, — as the haven, — rest and peace
in this world, — salvation in the next. This theme was
the less distasteful to Sadolet, that he had evidently long
since studied it on his own account. A mind, at once
adventurous and timid, he found it convenient to have at
his side a Church whose authority reassured him as to
his own ideas, supported him Hi his struggles with the
ideas of others, and dispensed him from forming or from
expressing an opinion on so many points more or less
caUed Hi question.
His epistle "to the Senate and people of Geneva" is
unique in its kind, in the sixteenth century. Such would

HIS EPISTLE TO GENEVA. 139
not be the case in our day. We might even say that it
has served as a model for the greater part of the Eomish
apologies which have been pubHshed during the last thHty
years. Like him, their writers have laid aside all detaHs to
preach nothing but the Church, authority, and unity; the
repose which he offered to the Genevese, they have offered
in hke manner to every nation, sheltering under that allur
ing word, another which would cause alarm — abjuration.
Sadolet, therefore, begins by flattering. " Verily," he
says, " dear friends, it is not a thing of to-day for me to
bear good wHl and affection towards you. From the time
when, by the wiU of God, I was elected Bishop of Car-
pentras, I began to prize and love the nobleness of your
city, the order and form of your republic, the exceUence
of the citizens, and especially your exquisite and praise
worthy humanity towards all men. . . ." But what is
become of aU those elements of happiness and esteem?
From the first day that Geneva seemed to lean towards
the Eeformation, he had perceived that she was condemn
ing herself to anarchy and to aU kinds of evU. His love
for the Genevese made it a duty for him to speak. He
wiU not proceed, however, by "subtle, arduous, and
crabbed disputations, which St. Paul calls vain philo
sophy." Is not Christian doctrine founded, not upon
syUogisms, but " on humility, piety, and obedience to the
Lord?" Then a beautiful panegyric on holy writ, then a
very fine passage about Jesus Christ, the sole author of
salvation, then another on justification by faith, and it is
only after having seemed to lay down as his basis, the
bases of Protestantism, that he ventures to build upon
those of the Church and the ¦ authority of the Church.
But, in fact, he does not buUd, and it is here especially
that his tactics have been foUowed Hi our day by certain
writers. He takes the edifice ready buHt, and poeticaUy
depicts its grandeur, beauty, and majestic unity, and
asks at every step how men can persist in budding for

140 ALLURING WORDS.
themselves another dwelling-place. The argument from
his pen had at least the merit of being new, though at
bottom even more worthless then than now. It required
singular hardihood or a singular power of abstraction to
come and speak poeticaUy of a Church which was deluged
with vices, and of a unity which had crumbled away at
the first shock of the Eeformation, and which, where it
stiH existed, was supported only by terror and the stake.
Above aU, it requHed singular confidence in the short
memory of the Genevese to whom that Church had
supplied, even more than to others, motives to despise and
fear her.
But Sadolet mainly reckoned on the good words which
flowed from his pen, and upon that charity which he
thought profound, and which, perhaps, reaUy was so;
for, though the whole epistle is but one long sophism,
and a perpetual subterfuge, we are loth to think its
author a hypocrite. At times, he rises to true eloquence,
as in the often-quoted passage in which he represents
two souls arriving before the tribunal of God, the supreme
Judge: one of them had followed the old way, always
safe, whHe the other had cast itseH into the way of the
Eeformers. The last pages are extremely pathetic, per
vaded, however, as in the beginning, by an insinuating
flattery, and a humifity which is decidedly too profound
— it would fain cause the priest, bishop, and cardinal to
be forgotten, but it aH the more brings them to mind.
We involuntarUy remember the servant of the servants of
God, who set his foot upon crowns, the father of the
Christians who knew so weH how to demand the exter
mination of his chHdren ; and, without going so far as
to think that cardinal Sadolet, if an opportunity had
occurred, would have been as pitiless as so many others,
we cannot but read across the fines the fearful commen
tary with which the history of the times accompanied
words so charitable, so evangelicaUy sweet, and so

THEY MISS THEIR AIM. 141
honeyed. Sadolet on this point was very unlucky. His
letter is dated the 18th of March 1539, and, Hi April,
two Genevese were burned in Savoy, — one at Annecy,
the other at Chambery. The execution of the latter,
Jean Lambert, the brother of a member of the CouncH,
was marked by the most odious circumstances. Seized
as a Genevese and as a Protestant, the priests did not
even permit the form of a trial, and the stake was imme
diately prepared. They presided at the execution, and
all that they could add to the martyr's sufferings by
their importunities and imprecations, they added with a
savage glee. Such, at a few leagues from Geneva, were
the ministers of that mild and compassionate mother
whose portrait Sadolet was sketching for the Genevese,
conjuring them to return to her arms.
He had, therefore, overshot his mark. The effect was
not that which he had hoped ; nothing, at least, in con
temporary documents, indicates that fresh activity was
eommunicated to Eomish tendencies ; on the contrary,
this period was the commencement of the Protestant re
action. AU who were not aHeady Eomish Hi theH hearts,
awoke as from a dream, and began to question themselves.
Had they then journeyed unawares so far on their way
back towards Eome, that she should imagine she had
only to invite them to re-enter ? Had the gulf between
her and them become so narrow that Sadolet might with
out difficulty throw over it a bridge hung with velvet,
and strewed with flowers ? The more serious Protestants
asked themselves H they had struggled so much, suffered
so much, on account of a mere misunderstanding, and in
order to separate from a Church with which it was so
easy to agree and five in peace ? AH felt that a great
sophism lay beneath ; all desHed for theH own instruc
tion, and for the honour of Geneva, that the sophism
should be unmasked. But to whom assign the task ?
No one in the city felt himself capable of discharging

142 WHO SHALL REPLY?
it. The pastors shrunk back like the rest. Not that
they did not see better what might be answered ; but
they also felt better the necessity of answering weU, and
they were none of them writers. One name only was
pronounced, at first in a whisper, then aloud, and the
greatest enemies of Calvin caught themselves saying, or
at least thinking, that, with him, they should have been
less embarrassed. He learned at Strasburg what was
being thought and said, and the answer to the cardinal
was not long in appearing.
Calvin, at the very beginning, shatters all the scaffold
ing. He begins by compfimenting Sadolet, but as Sado
let, the man of letters, known for his " marveUous grace
in speaking," and "held in great admHation" by the
learned. It " displeases him marveUously " to have to
" touch and wound this good fame and opinion ;" but it
would be " too great cowardice " to keep silence, and he
wHl not keep silence. Sadolet has performed the part of
" a good speaker," that is, of a skUful rhetorician ; he has
had for the Genevese only gentle words, and he has cast
all the blame upon those " by whose means they with
drew themselves from tyranny." He is one of those
men, and he will answer for them aU.
It is therefore his own apology which he at first pre
sents. Nothing can be clearer than his first pages. He
defies Sadolet to prove one of his allegations ; he harasses
him upon every point, upon every phrase, and to his last
entrenchments. Sadolet has accused him of ambition ;
but what has the Eeformation given him, what wUl it ever
give him, which would not have been " equaUed " in the
pope's realm ? Might he not have aspired to everything,
and had he not already been on the road to obtain every
thing ? Even then, he was ambitious of one thing only
— to live in peace and to study. Events, the Word of
God, and God HimseH, had thrown him into the thick of
the fight. From this general apology he passes to that

CALV EN S ANSWER. 143
of his conduct at Geneva. What has he done in that
city, which ought not to be approved by every friend of
order and morality, even though a Eomanist? And if
he has done nothing but what is good, why refuse to
know the tree by its fruits ? Why consider as a pes
tilence, that Eeformation from which he, Calvin, was
educing the salvation and fife of regenerate Geneva ?
And this leads him to the chief question. He sets
aside at the outset what Sadolet had said, and well said,
on what was undisputed, — eternal life, for instance ; evi
dently Sadolet has only sought thereby " to render himseH
more greatly esteemed and commended by making it ap
pear that all his thought was of that blessed life." Why
is he not, at least, as copious and complete, when he comes
to real difficulties? He has eluded them aU. In his theory
of the Church he very weU exhibits the Church guided
by the Spirit of God, but he is careful not to add that
she is ruled also by His Word ; and when the Word is
taken away, the Spirit of God may always remain a mere
word, which shall authorise whatever men wHl. Calvin
then passes in review aU that has been.involved in this
pregnant saying. Each point is despatched in a few
lines, but keen, nervous, and falling like a hammer. One
would prefer that he did not so pertinaciously address
himseH to Sadolet, and that he persisted with less ani-
.mosity in directing against him personaHy all his argu
ments, aU his figures, and aU his utterances. We are
somewhat pained by the perpetual tension which yields
nothing and softens nothing. But we can understand
that a person of his temperament would be peculiarly
Hritated and exasperated by the flexible polemics of the
honey-tongued cardinal. Whether the man was false or
not, his polemics were false, and Calvin was wrong only
in pouring forth too continuaUy upon Sadolet himself the
contempt and irritation which were caused by bis work.
Two points detain him longer. The one, justification

144 SADOLET REFUTED.
by faith ; and the other, the Lord's Supper. We have
seen that Sadolet, in regard to the first of these, admitted
the principle without hesitation. Calvin asks what the
Church has done with it, and what part of it can remain
among so many thmgs which all tend to make it forgot
ten, or to destroy it. Sadolet had not faded to talk very
loudly of the pretended annihdation of works, a singular
reproach to level at Calvin driven away from Geneva for
having, as respects works, been more strict and exacting
than any one else. " If thou wert to look," answers Cal
vin, " at the catechism and instruction which I have
written for those of Geneva, at the first word thou
wouldest be sUent." But as Calvin knows weU that the
objection wHl be often reproduced, he devotes to it five
or six pages, which are the best reasoned in the letter,
and, what renders them still better for us, they are
almost free from personalities. As for the Lord's Supper,
he refutes little, but seeks above aH to establish that the
spHitual presence of Christ is, in fact, for aU who have
true faith and piety, more impressive, more real than the
one so unadvisedly designated by the latter term, as if
the reality of Christ were not that of His SpHit, far more
than of His body.
Then come, finally, confession, saints, the ministry, the
papacy, tradition, and the irregularities of the Church.
This last point leads him to a glowing reproduction, Hi a
contrary sense, of Sadolet's prosopopsea. The soul which
he ushers into the presence of God is that of one of those
whom the cardinal has stigmatised as innovators and
foolhardy. He is about to plead the cause of aU who,
Hke him, have thought that the evUs of the Church
called for and justified revolt. I saw Christ cast into
oblivion, and become unprofitable ; what was I to do ?
I saw the Gospel stifled by superstition ; what was I to
do ? I saw the Divine Word voluntarily ignored and
hidden ; what was I to do ? If he is not " to be reputed

luther's opinion. 145
a traitor, who, seeing the soldiers dispersed and scattered,
raises the captain's ensign, raUies them, and restores theH
order," am I a traitor for having raised, amid the dis
banded Church, the old banner of Jesus Christ ? For it
is not a new and " strange ensign that I have unfurled)
but thy noble standard, 0 Lord ! " Moreover, have not
our adversaries abundantly justified us by theH conduct?
" Did they not most suddenly and furiously betake them
selves to the sword and to the gibbet ? Did they not
think that their sole resource was in arms and cruelty ?"
They have given us, in default of other consecration, that
of tribulation and of blood. And it is they who come
and ask of us our titles ! They justify us again by those
flattering and false pictures of the Church which we have
renounced. To defend her thus, is it not to abandon the
defence of her in her actual character ? Is it not to own
that we judged her aright ? " Go now, Sadolet, and call
us seditious!" We know what we have done, and in
whom we have beHeved, and " Heaven grant, Sadolet,
that thou and thine " may one day be able to say as
much sincerely.

XVII.
Neither reply nor attempt at reply was made, that we
know of, to this answer of Calvin's. It soon ran through
Europe. Luther enjoyed it thoroughly. He realised aU
the power and promise of a controversy conducted with so
much ease, frankness, and vivacity. " Here is a writing,"
he said, " which has hands and feet. I rejoice that God
raises up such men. They will continue what I have
begun against Antichrist, and with the help of God
they wHl finish it." When Sadolet received the epistle,
he may also have received, at the same time, some details
upon the effects it had produced at Geneva.
K

146 JEAN PHILIPPE.
In the first place, there was the satisfaction always felt
on reading a work which says precisely what a man would
have said himseH, had he known how to say it ; then
there was the joy of the victory, for the victory over
Sadolet was evident and incontestable ; and, as victory
always draws after it the undecided, it was the joy of aU,
or nearly aU. In many it was easHy transformed by
Calvin's friends into gratitude ; they dared say publicly
there was no one like him for such services. They re-
perused the eloquent apology, which he made in passing,
for his ministry at Geneva, and they aUowed themselves
to be moved by words so true and noble : " Though dis
charged for the present from the administration of the
Church of Geneva, nevertheless this cannot deprive me of
bearing towards her a paternal love and charity — towards
her, I say, over whom God once ordained me, and so has
obliged me for ever to keep faith and loyalty with her."
About the same time, events began to march precipi
tately. The chief of his enemies, Jean Philippe, was
about to perish, and his death was to give the signal for
a final reaction in favour of the Eeformer.
Jean Philippe's execution was not caused, however, either
by his treachery at Lyons, which was stiH unknown, or by
any other religious affair. Charged, with two others, to
negotiate with Berne respecting the sovereignty of the
territory conquered round Geneva, he abandoned his
country's interests completely ; and when the treaty,
which was kept secret for a time, was at length produced,
it was seen with indignation that the Genevese sovereignty
was to be confined within the walls of the city. Now, a
law of the preceding year condemned to death every
citizen convicted of diminishing the sovereignty of the
state. The General CouncH, nevertheless, showed indul
gence, and Jean Philippe and his two accomplices were
only condemned to be banished. But the next day. Jean

. SHALL CALVIN COME BACK ? 147
Philippe excited a riot. He was taken, condemned to
death, and executed. This was in 1540.
The political reaction had manHested itself, at the be
ginning of the year, Hi the choice of four honourable
syndics, in whose hands the ordinances had already re
gained some strength. The crime of Jean Philippe hav
ing led to many remarks upon the patriotism of the
Libertines, the pastors judged the moment, favourable for
obtaining the renewal of the oath to the Confession; they
asked the General Councfl "to replace things as they
were four years ago, when every one held Geneva in great
esteem, and came there to see the evangelical order which
had been established." But it was too early yet, and the
personal authority of the pastors was not such that they
might hasten the time. It rather injured them to revive
the remembrance of Calvin, though Calvin had written a
letter, in which he commended them to the affection of
theH flock. The oath was refused. Two of them left
Geneva shortly after, discouraged by the want of respect
shown to them by many. The Council wrote to VHet,
who was settled as pastor at Lausanne, to pray that he
would come and replace them, at least for a time, and
Viret replied that he would do aU he could to obtain
authorisation. But the call tp Viret was only a step to
wards a recaU, the necessity of which was now all but
acknowledged by everybody.
At last, on the 21st of September, the CouncH charged
Amied Perrin, one of its members, " to find means," says
the register, "if he could, to bring back Master Calvin."
Perrin wrote, and Farel, who was banished with Calvin,
wrote also to him from Neuchatel, to press him to ac
cept. Before the reopening door, Calvin no longer sees
anything but the formidable risks which he is asked to
run, for, as he does not admit even the thought of a mo
dification Hi his tendencies, nor a relaxing of his strictness,
so he does not understand how the men who drove him

148 ARRANGEMENTS TO BRING HIM.
away as too severe, can ever accommodate themselves to
him. They wiU be intolerable to him, he writes to Farel,
and he to them. AU wiU have to be begun again, and
that without the confidence which animated him the first
time. And yet, God preserve him from positively refus
ing ! If he can really do anything for the Church of
Geneva, his duty is to accept.
The registers of the CouncH inform us almost daHy of
the progress of what was become the absorbing idea of
the Genevese.
The 13th of October it was resolved to write a letter
" to Monsieur Calvin," to pray that " he would assist us."
The bearer of the letter is also to see the pastors of Stras
burg, praying them to act upon him in the same dHec-
tion. The 1 9th of October, in the Council of Two Hundred,
it was resolved, " in order that the honour and glory of
God may be promoted," to seek aU possible means to
have "Master Caulvin as preacher." The 20th of Octo
ber, in the General CouncH, it was ordered " to send to
Strasburg to fetch Master Jean Calvinus, who is very
learned, to be minister in this city."
The 21st it was ordered that councUlor Amied Perrin
should depart with a state herald, to go and fetch Calvin
— the Strasburghers to be written to, that they may
not oppose the Eeformer's departure. The 22d, the letter
which is to be taken to him is drawn up. " Sir, — Our
good brother and special friend, very affectionately do we
commend ourselves to you, being fully informed that your
desHe is none other than the increase and promotion of
the glory and honour of God, and of his holy Word. On
the part of our Lesser, Great, and General CouncHs,
which have much admonished us to do this, we pray you
very affectionately that you would convey yourseH to us,
and return to your pristine place and ministry ; and we
hope that, by the help of God, it will be a great good and

CALVIN AT WORMS. 149
profit to the augmentation of the holy gospel, seeing that
our people greatly desire you, and we wiU do by you in
such sort that you shaU have cause to be content."
The 8th of November,, Louis Dufour, the bearer of the
letter, wrote from Basle that Calvin was not at Stras
burg, but at Worms, where a diet was being held "for
Christian reformation."
Let us now retrace our steps a Httle, and resume our
account of Calvin's sojourn at Strasburg.

XVIII.
The diet of Worms, which Calvin attended in Novem
ber 1540, was not the first at which he had been present;
the Church of Strasburg had aHeady sent him, in 1539,
to that of Frankfort; and in the same year (1540) to
that of Hagenau. It would be too long for us to relate
the events connected with the convocation of these three
great assemblies so immediately one after another. It is
difficult in our day to have a just notion of that blending
of questions so diverse, in which disputes respecting the
Lord's Supper were entangled with political debates, and
when theologians held theH diet by the side of that of
the empire ; often so as to throw the imperial into the
shade. But a closer view dispels astonishment. The
religious question was the first everywhere, in aU, and
no one would have dreamed of considering it a usurpa
tion. And, after aU, was not this as it should be ? And
H it is now otherwise, is it not as much, or rather, is it
not more from indifference than from a juster apprehen
sion of what divides the two domains ?
One day-pit was the 1st of January 1541, and at
Worms — Calvin was resolving in his mind the cure
chances of a war so complicated, so protracted, and as yet
so far from terminated. Christ, he entertains not a

150 THE " HYMN TO CHRIST."
doubt, wHl conquer ; but when ? No one knows. But
even when conquered, is not Christ always conqueror?
Does He not triumph as gloriously Hi the contumely and
death of His people as Hi theH success among men ? The
idea lays hold of Calvin. For the first time he calls
poetry to the succour of his thoughts, and it is thus we
have his Hymn to Christ the conqueror.
A strange interest is excited by these few verses, the
only ones we have of his, and probably the only ones he
ever composed. He did not even publish them, and he
gave away only two or three copies of them ; but four
years afterwards he found them marked Hi an index of
the Toulouse inquisitors, and then it was that he pub
lished them.
Friends and foes, in judging of this piece, have, we
think, abused the idea that Calvin was not born a poet.
True, he himseH, at the close, recognises the fact. "What
nature denies," he says, " my pious zeal effects." 1 But
that pious zeal had at its service an able and prac
tised pen, and Cicero had not so made him forget VHgfl,
that the good prose writer was condemned to make bad
verses. And they are by no means bad, whatever may
have been said to the contrary. If, as a whole, there is
too much show of reasoning, the details are fuU of fife,
and reflect the original idea with aU its poetry; if some
lines are prosaic, others are very elegant, and even very
beautiful. Amongst others, observe those in which he
depicts the menaces with which Eome and the world
pursue the lovers of truth. Next observe those in which
he returns to the idea that the Christian may everywhere
and always chant the victory, thanks to his union with
Christ, the ever victorious.2 Notice again, those in which
1 Quod natura negat, studii pius efficit ardor.
2 " Sed quia mors vita est, et crux victoria Christi,
Nil dirsa impediunt gaudia nostra minse;
Ille sui similis manet seternumque manebit,
Vincere non vinci qui patiendo solet."

CALVIN: LUTHER: MELANCHTHON. 151
he portrays Christ rushing forward, sword in hand, into
the thick of the world's battle, and with this divine
sword, His word, striking the enemy, who is already
overthrown by His look. We cannot, therefore, be sorry
that the leisure of Worms procured for us this single
poetical attempt; and in reading it, we have more than
once said to ourselves, that many who have spoken of it
have not perused it.
Calvin, in these different journeys, did not once meet
with Luther. It is difficult not to regret it, and ta re
frain from speculating curiously as to what a discussion
between them would have been, and what each would
have been in the presence of the other. Which would
have gained, which would have lost by the comparison ?
Perhaps neither would have gained nor lost, for they
were too different for a comparison to be possible. It is
not probable that Calvin would have been easUy unhorsed
by Luther's impetuosity. Logic, his good sword, served
him also as buckler ; he was not a man to be impressed
by the forms, more or less Hvely, poetical or caustic,
which an argument may assume.
He could not, however, completely escape the amiable
influence of Melanchthon, who in turn accepted his, it is
true, with a readiness well calculated to remove every
barrier between them. Calvin, before starting for Frank
fort, had explained to him, in a letter, his idea on the
Lord's Supper. Melanchthon, the first time they met,
declared to him that he did not think otherwise. Now,
the question of that Lord's Supper was warmly debated at
that moment amongst the German Protestants, some
holding by Luther's opinion, which verged on Eomanism,
others leaning towards that of Calvin. Luther himself
had graduaUy so spHituaHzed His real presence, that Me
lanchthon did not think he should separate himseH from
his old friend, by drawing near to Calvin. Ulterior dis
cussions showed that the agreement was less complete

152 CALVIN AND MELANCHTHON.
than Melanchthon had beHeved it to be, or had chosen to
believe; Calvin has often also to complain of the concessions
which an excessive love of peace extorted from the pious
German. He did not spare him reproaches, which, however,
were always softened by the most respectful friendship.
" Either I understand nothing in holy things," he writes
to him in 1551, " or you ought not to have yielded thus
to the papists. . . . Verily, it is to show ourselves
avaricious of our ink H we wHl not write, upon paper,
what so many martyrs write daily with theH blood upon
the scaffold. ... I speak with aU frankness, my sole
desHe is that nought should distress the truly divine
greatness of your soul. If I appear to you vehement,
you know why it is, because I would a hundred tunes
rather die with you for the truth than see you survive
the truth betrayed by you. Is this to say that I mistrust
you ? No ; but you wiU never take sufficient precautions
that your easiness should not furnish the impious with
the opportunity which they seek of scoffing at God's
truth." TheH friendship remained, therefore, undHnHiished, and
when Luther's friend died, this is what Calvin still could
write in his book against Heshusius : " 0, Philip Melanch
thon — for it is thou whom I address, thou who now
livest at the hand of God with Christ, awaiting us on
high tiU we are gathered with thee into blessed repose —
a hundred times hast thou said to me, when wearied with
toil and vexation, thou didst lean thy head upon my
bosom, Would to God, would to God that I might die
upon that bosom ! As for me, later, a hundred times have
I wished that it had been granted us to be together. Cer
tainly thou wouldst have been bolder to face struggles,
more courageous to despise envy and calumny. Then,
also, would have been suppressed the mafignity of many
whose audacity increased in proportion to what they
caUed thy pusillanimity." Most certainly Melanchthon

" OF THE LORDS SUPPER." 153
and CalvHi, fused into one, would have formed an admir
able character ; and without going so far as to these chi
merical fusions, it is probable than an association with
Calvin would have done more than inure Melanchthon
to battle strife ; he would have been more satisfied with
himself, surer of his path, and happier.
The Swiss divines believed for a moment that Calvin,
gamed over by Melanchthon, had made some concessions
on the doctrine of the Lord's Supper. It was at once to
reassure them, and to set forth, in a complete form, his
ideas on that subject, that he wrote at Strasburg his
treatise Of the Lord's Supper. It is the most moderate
of his controversial writings ; the traces of Melanchthon
are there. But his moderation as to the form does not
make him yielding as to the point in question, and
Lutheran Consubstantiation does not appear to him
better founded on Scripture than the Transubstantiation
of Dr. Eck, the champion of Eomanism at Worms.
He had for the rest always entertained the idea of an
accommodation with Luther, and he did not cease to en
tertain it. If, in 1538, in a letter to Bucer, he complains
of the German Eeformer's pertinacity, it is with expres
sions of the highest esteem for his sincerity, piety, and
genius. Calvin wiU yield nothing of what appears to
him the truth, but he wiU foUow with his eyes, gladly
and gratefully, the slightest movements which Luther
may seem to make towards him. In 1539, he joyfuUy
registers, in a letter to Farel, the kind words which
Luther has charged Bucer to transmit to him. " Bucer,"
he says, " has received from Luther a letter, in which are
these words, Salute from me Sturm and Calvin, whose
works I have read with singular pleasure." And Calvin,
remembering that, in what Luther had read, more than
one thing might have displeased him, adds, with no less
joy, "Behold the candour of Luther! Why, then, are
there people who separate from him so obstinately?"

154 LUTHER AND CALVIN.
Melanchthon had also written to Bucer, and said that the
French theologian was in great favour at Wittemberg.
But here is what is still better. " Melanchthon," Calvin
relates, "charged the bearer of the letters to teU him this :
Some people, in order to Hritate Dr. Martin, had indicated
a passage in which, according to them, I spoke ill of him
and his. He examined the passage, and saw that in fact
I had had him in view. But after reflecting a whUe, ' I
hope,' he said, ' that Calvin wUl one day render me jus
tice ; meanwhile, something may weU be borne from so
exceUent a capacity.'" Calvin asks no more. "If such
moderation," he says, " does not break us, verily we are
rocks. As for me, I own that I am broken." But Hi
1544, Luther took up his pen anew against the Zwingfians,
and, forgetting that he had himself recognised Hi the
question of the Lord's Supper, how much Calvin had
modified Zwinglius, he attacked indiscriminately all that
was not Lutheran. Calvin keenly felt the injustice ; but
Luther was not the less Luther to him, and he would
have even those who had been the most violently attacked
be of his way of thinking. " 0 BulHnger," he writes to
the successor of Zwingfius, " I conjure thee never to for
get how eminent a man Luther is, and with what gifts
he is endowed. Think with what strength of soul, what
immoveable perseverance, what potency of doctrine, he
has devoted himseH tiH now to the overthrowing of Anti
christ, and the shedding far and near the doctrines of
salvation. ... As for me, I have often said, and I stiH
repeat it, if he were to caU me a devil, I should not cease
to hold him in great esteem, and to acknowledge in him
an iUustrious servant of God." And some months after,
writing to Luther himself : " Oh, if I could fly towards
thee, and enjoy thy society, were it but for a few hours !
. . . But since that happiness is not granted to me here,
soon, I hope, it wHl be granted to us in the kingdom of
God. Farewell, therefore, most illustrious man, eminent

COMMENTARY ON THE ROMANS, ETC, 155
minister of Christ, father for ever venerable to me. May
the Lord continue to dHect thee by his SpHit, for the
common good of his Church." Alas ! this touching letter
was not received by Luther. Another of Melanchthon's
timidities. Calvin had sent him the letter ; he durst not
give it Luther, fearing, he wrote to Calvin, lest his friend,
irritated by so many bickerings, should take it amiss,
though it did not touch upon the sacramental question.
• But other facts, about the same time, permitted Calvin
to hope for an understanding even on that question, and
after Luther's death, when the struggle recommenced, we
shaU find him convinced that the master would have been
more accommodating than the disciples.

XIX.
But let us not get beyond 1540, at Strasburg. The
same year two more works saw the light — his Commen
tary on the Epistle to the Romans, dedicated to his friend,
Simon Grynseus, of Basle, and his version of the Bible.
Though this version is only Olivetan's corrected, it is
scarcely possible not to ask ourselves how Calvin found
tune to do so much, for we left him, at the close of 1538,
retouching the Institutes, and daily discharging his office
as preacher and professor. But let us not exhaust our
wonder too soon ; we shaU hereafter have stiU better oc
casions for it.
As a pastor, Calvin had never confined himseH at Stras
burg strictly to the functions which he had to fulfil in the
French settlement or quarter ; his letters show him to us
more than once endeavouring to introduce the Church of
Strasburg into the path of religious and moral order,
which he had imagined for Geneva. In Strasburg there
was indeed none of that brutish opposition which certain
Genevese had made to the gospel ; if irregularities oc-

156 CALVIN AND BUCER.
curred, they did not present the same character of vio
lence and design. But Calvin wished for more ; he was
iU at ease in a Church whose faith and conduct were not,
in his opinion, subjected to sufficiently strict discipline.
Hence, in his sermons, there are some attacks upon such
a state of things ; hence, too, in his letters, we find
some complaints against Bucer, a learned divine, a
pastor full of zeal, and very capable of being indignant
at evil, but less inclined to seek a remedy in proper re
gulations. Bucer, on his part, also complains at times of
Calvin. He would have him more indulgent and gentle,
he does not like to see him cherish so long the indigna
tion which has been caused by a fault, or in the Hritation
excited by an error which has ventured to manHest itseH
before him. He speaks of it to him in a brotherly way,
and, as Calvin acknowledges, not without reason. "He
is made so," he says. " Of all his defects, it is the one
which he has most difficulty in combating. He does not
think that he has gained absolutely nothing ; but he feels
that he has not yet succeeded in completely taming the
beast." Now, as for the beast, which we aU bear within,
it would be almost better to let it be quite free than to
haH-tame it. You meant to be gentle, and you are only
cold ; you subdue the exterior, which is something cer
tainly, but you then run the risk of thinking that you
have done all, of being persuaded that you are acting
without anger, under the sole guidance of reason, and of
being, after aU, severer than you would have been with
more apparent warmth. Is not this the history of Cal
vin ? Less self-constrained, less master of his thoughts
and passions, he would have been less satisfied with him
seH, but, in reafity, more charitable, and doubtless also
his adversaries would have been more indulgent towards
him, both during his fifetime and afterwards.

CALVIN MARRIES. 157

XX.

An event less important to the Eeformer than to the
man, might now invite us to a farther study of his heart
and character. When the first mission arrived from
Geneva, soliciting his return, a wife had just seated her-
seH at his tUl then solitary hearth.
In general, Calvin's marriage has been spared the accu
sations and invectives lavished on that of Luther, yet he
does not escape altogether, and he is blamed for the very
absence of the passions with which others are reproached
as a crime. Never, is it said, did he experience any need
of affection. His heart was in his head.
No ; but his heart was such as must be the heart of
a man devoted to so great a task, and so accustomed to
think little of himself, of his pleasure and of his happi
ness. He therefore left to his friends the care of finding a
help-meet for him. We know not if they gave it a
thought during his sojourn at Geneva ; it is at Strasburg
that we see them occupied about it. Farel, who did not
think of marriage for himseH tiU long after, only re
motely shared in theH undertaking. Calvin, in one of
his letters (May 1539), reminds him of what he had pro
bably said more than once. " Eemember what I desHe
above aU to find in a help-meet. I am not, thou knowest,
one of those lovers who adore even the defects of the
woman of whom they are enamoured. The only beauty
that can please my heart is one that is gentle, chaste,
modest, economical, patient, and finally, careful of her
husband's health." Alas ! though not yet thirty, there
was too much necessity for that sad clause. Faculties
such as his are not possessed with impunity; racking
pains continually harassed the head aHeady worn by
thought. Another letter gives us curious details on the

158 calvin's marriage.
interference of Calvin in one of the negotiations com
menced by the solicitude of his friends. " I was offered,"
he writes to Farel, " a lady who was young, rich, of noble
bHth, and whose dower much surpassed aU that I can
desHe. Two things, however, urged me to refuse : she
does not know French, and it seems to me she must be
rather proud of her bHth and education. Her brother,
of rare piety, and bfinded by his friendship so as to forget
his own interests, pressed me to accept, and his wffe
joined her solicitations to his. What was I to do? I
should have been compeUed, H the Lord had not extri
cated me. I answer that I accept, if she wiU, on her
part, undertake to learn our tongue. She asks for time
to reflect, and I immediately commission my brother,
with one of my friends, to go and ask for me the hand
of another person, who wiU bring me, without a fortune,
a dowry good enough, if her quafities answer to what is
said of them. If, as I hope, my proposal is accepted,
the marriage wiU not be delayed beyond the 10th of
March (1540), and all my desire is that thou shouldst
come and bless our union." This project was not realised.
Some detaHs respecting his betrothed, which came to
Calvin's knowledge, obliged him to withdraw his pro
mise, and some months afterwards he seems much dis
couraged. " I have not found yet," he writes to Farel.
" Would it not be wiser to give up my search ?"
He had therefore " not found," because he had sought
as a serious and Christian man, and would not rest satis
fied with what the world deemed sufficient, and even
brilliant. He would have the virtuous woman of the
Bible, " a crown unto her husband," as the Proverbs say,
and he did not consider that riches and rank could form
that crown. Not only did he refuse the wealthy match
that was offered him, but he refused it without hesitation,
without an effort ; he sought not to bring himseH to
terms, and, by proposing immediately in another quarter,

HIS WIFE. 159
he deprived himself of the power of renewing the nego-
. tiation. Let us not forget that he had no property, and
that his humble salary was his all.
He found at last what he sought. An Anabaptist,
John Storder, who was brought back by him to the gospel,
had died shortly after, leaving a widow and orphans.
She was caUed Idelette, Idelette de Bure or van Buren, from
the name of a small town of Guelderland. Bucer knew
her; he had seen her excellent and admHahle quafities
still further developed by the burdens and responsibifities
of widowhood. He spoke of her to Calvin, and Calvin's
choice was fixed. She brought him as her dower, serious
piety, watchful tenderness, and a soul equal to every
sacrifice. The marriage took place in September. Deputies from
the Church of Neuchatel were present ; it is not known
whether Farel was of the number. Departing shortly
after for Worms, Calvin left his wife to the care of his
brother Antoine, and of a famHy of distinction named
Eichebourg, whose sons he had taught. But sad tidings
soon followed him to Worms, and then to Eatisbon,
whither the diet had been transferred. The plague was
raging at Strasburg. Young Louis de Eichebourg had
faUen a victim, and, after him, his preceptor, Claude
Ferey, the intimate friend of Calvin. Calvin trembled
lest he should receive tidings yet more dreadful. A let
ter to a Strasburg friend (April 1541), gives us a lively
idea of his anguish. "I make great efforts," he writes,
"to resist my grievous anxiety. I have recourse to
prayer and holy meditations, in order not to lose all
courage." His prayers were granted. He had the
strength to do his duty to the end, and, on his return to
Strasburg, he found her who henceforth was a part of
himself.

160 INCLINES TO REVISIT GENEVA.

XXI.
It was to Worms that the Genevese envoys went in
quest of him. He had aHeady replied, on the 23d of
October 1540, to the first overtures of the CouncH of
Geneva. " Magnificent, noble, and honourable lords," he
wrote, " I can testify to you before God that I have your
Church in such commendation that I would never be
wantmg Hi its necessity, so far as I have power to aid.
.... And, for this reason, I am Hi marveUous perplexity,
desiring to satisfy your request. . . . And, on the other
hand, I cannot lightly quit the charge to which the Lord
hath called me here, unless He deliver me by some good
and lawful means." He added that he was about to
start for Worms ; that he had communicated to his col
leagues the letter of the CouncH, and that theH opinion
had been that it would be best in the meanwhUe to caU
VHet to Geneva. We have seen that the Council had
aHeady had that idea.
The 12th of November another letter was written from
Worms. Calvin has received that of the 22d of October,
so honourable and so pressing, and he has seen those who
brought it. He does not yet pledge himself, but he very
nearly does so. " Were it only for the civility and favour
which you show me Hi every way, I could acquit myseH
of my duty only by complying with your request as far
as in me lies .... However, there is yet one reason
.... the singular love which I bear your Church.
. . . ." God had confided it to him once ; he feels there
fore " obliged for ever to seek its weHare and salvation."
But he cannot yet fix any time. After leaving Worms,
he will have to go to Eatisbon. But on his return to
Strasburg, he wUl again consult his colleagues, and they
are greatly disposed " to induce him to succour Geneva."
Yet three months after, on the eve of starting for Eatis-

HESITATIONS. 161
bon, he seemed rather less disposed to quit the Strasburg
Church. He had learned that VHet was at Geneva, of
which he expressed himself right glad, for " Master Pierre
VHet is of so much prudence and fidefity, that, having
him, you are not destitute." He seemed not to know
that VHet had been "lent" for six months only, and
without saying that he considered himself freed from his
promise, he no longer spoke positively of performing it.
" I pray you to consider all the means of constituting
your Church aright, that it may be governed according
to the Lord's order."
These words, which were almost a fareweU, were not
accepted as such. Viret's preaching, by bringing back
men's minds and hearts to the gospel more and more,
brought them also more and more back to him whose
name had become as it were the symbol of the gospel
and of order at Geneva. The insinuating charity of the
Lausanne pastor was at the same time softening poHtical
rancour ; he obtained the recaU of Jean Philippe's chil
dren, involved, according to the cruel laws then existing,
in theH father's condemnation. He was asked to use his
influence with Calvin, and Calvin, in a letter written to
him at the same time as his third to the Council of
Geneva, gives us the key to the vagueness of tone which
he had adopted in his official letter. " Thou teUest me
that if I abandon Geneva, the Church is in danger. I
can answer nought but what I have told thee, that there
is no place which alarms me so much as Geneva." Not
that I retain any hatred against them, but I see so many
difficulties, that I feel incapable of escaping from them.
Whenever I call to mind the times past, my heart freezes
with terror." But VHet knew weU that his fears would
not go so far as to prevent him from coming, if once he
clearly saw it to be a positive duty. " Master Pierre VHet,"
Says the register at the date of the 28th February, "hath
showed that it would be very meet to write again to
L

162 FINAL DECISION.
Master Caulvin. Ordered that he be written to." Let
ters to him were at the same time promised from his
friends at Basle and Zurich, and the Strasburg Council
were strongly urged, in order that by positively granting
him his dismissal, one of the motives of his hesitation
might be removed. And H Calvin could have feared
that the wishes of the magistrates were not those of the
people, a letter from the pastor Bernard would have fully
reassured him. Bernard related to him that one day in
February, being in the pulpit, he beheld the faithful
deeply moved at the thought of the destitution in which
the Church was ; he exhorted them to apply to the chief
shepherd, Jesus Christ, beseeching Him to put an end to
that sad state of things ; that aU then thought of Calvfiij
and that aU afterwards pronounced his name. " As for
me," he adds, " I blessed God that the stone disaUowed
was made the head of the corner. Come, then, venerable
father in Christ. Thou art ours, for the Lord hath given
thee to us. . . . Come: the Lord would requHe our blood
at thy hands, for it is thou whom He hath established
shepherd over the house of Israel amongst us."
Calvin repfied to all of them as he had done to .VHet
The prospect of returning to Geneva filled him with fear
and consternation, and when he finaUy said Yes, he said
it (in a letter to Farel, dated August 1541) exclaiming:
" Not what I wHl, 0 God, but what Thou wUt ! I offer
my heart a sacrifice to the Lord." Long afterwards*
relating his anguish at this epoch, he says, " at length the
sight of my duty, which I was considering with reverence
and conscientiousness, won me, and made me consent to
return towards the flock from which I had been torn
away; which I did with sorrow, tears, great anxiety and
distress, as the Lord can bear me good witness."
AU his letters at this epoch bear, in fact, the stamp of
perfect sincerity. Whether refusing or yielding, taking
courage or flinching, there is not the trace of a design to

HIS RETURN. 163
excite farther solicitations, stUl less, to oblige his former
adversaries to humble themselves before him. It was
without any request or insinuation on his part that the
General CouncH assembled on the 1st of May and solemnly
revoked the sentence of banishment pronounced Hi April
1538. The Genevese declared that they held Farel and
Calvin to be " honest and godly men." They approved
aU that the CouncH had done to get Calvin back, and all
that it might think fit to do for the future. We have
already narrated the incidents of the three months which
followed. . Calvin had then at last said, Yes. On the 1 9th of
August, it was decided to send and fetch him. On the
22d, thirty-six crowns were aUotted to "Eustache Vincent,
our mounted herald, to go and fetch Master Caulvm."
The 29th, it was resolved that he shaU be lodged " in the
house now occupied by the minister Bernard — to whom
another wiU be given." The 30th, a letter was written
to the CouncH of Neuchatel, Hi order that Farel might be
authorized to accompany his friend as far as Geneva.
The 4th of September it was resolved to lodge Calvin in
the house caUed the Chantry, before the cathedral. The
9th, there was another change : he is to have given him
"the house of the lord of FreyneviUe." Two councHlors
are commissioned to install him there, seeing that " he is
to be here this evening." At length on the 13th, " Master
Jean Calvin is arrived from Strasburg and has excused
himseH in detaU for the long tarrying which he made."
This " long tarrying" had aHeady been explained Ha a
letter written by him from Neuchatel, a week before.
"Having heard at Soleure," he wrote, "that there was
some disturbance in this Church of Neuchatel, I have been
constrained, as by the wiU of God, to turn aside and see
if I could Hi any wise remedy it." That " disturbance"
at Neuchatel, resembled in its cause, H not Hi its violence,
those which had agitated Geneva. A lady of quality,

164 THE COMPANY OF PASTORS.
whose conduct gave occasion for scandal, had been pub-
licly censured by Farel. The lady's relations accused the
minister, and raising against him aU the malcontents,
obtained of the Burghers a decree to deprive him of his
place. Calvin went therefore to defend his friend, and,
with his friend, what he considered the natural and neces
sary rights of the evangefical ministry. He could not
stay long enough to bring the matter to a successful ter
mination; accordingly, a few days after his arrival at
Geneva, he wrote a letter to the Neuchatel government.
This letter, besides the interest of the details, has an his
torical value ; it is the first, that we know of, which was
written Hi the name of the pastors of Geneva, and in
which the word company was employed in speaking of
them. "Magnificent and honourable Lords," they say,
" having heard that your Church is not yet defivered out
of the disturbances which have lately arisen, we have
thought it belonged to our duty to send some of our
company to tender theH services, so far as comports with
our calling and office, towards removing the scandal which
the devH has raised amongst you. We have therefore
determined on sending you our good brother and a former
pastor of your Church, Pierre VHet, beseeching that of
your good pleasure you would Hsten to what he wiU say
to you in the name of our assembly, in accordance with
the duty of our ministry, which obliges and constrains us
to intervene in this cause, seeing that it is ecclesiastical,1
and so touches us, inasmuch as we are members of one
body." Calvin, therefore, did not consider this step as
forming an exception; he connected it with the great
principle of the unity of the Church, which, according to
him, gave to each Church the right of intervening in a
friendly way in the affairs of aU others. It was also the idea
of the first Christian ages, — we see, Hi those times, aU the
Churches, and aU the bishops considering themselves re-
1 Concerns the Church, the whole Church.

NO TIME LOST. 165
sponsible for aU that was passing in the Christian world,
and, consequently, interfering in it without scruple. The
applications of this right gradually lessened as the Churches
received a more regular organisation, but when circum
stances more or less analogous to those of the first cen
turies recurred, the right reappeared Hi aU its integrity,
and the duty also. It was not a privilege therefore which
Calvin was claiming for the Church of Geneva ; but soon,
however, thanks to cHcumstances, thanks to him espe
cially, and to his genius, the privilege became established,
and aU the more sofidly that no hierarchical idea lay at
its basis. We shaU recur to this kind of brotherly papacy
which the Company of Geneva was to exercise in the
midst of the Protestant world, and we would here only
indicate its humble beginnings. In the hand of a great
man everything bears fruit.

XXII.
Calvin had lost not a moment in rendering the Church
of^ Geneva capable anew of acting her part in a worthy
manner. At his first audience in Council, after those
"excuses Hi detail," which the register speaks of, Calvin
"prays Messieurs that order may be established in the
Church, that that order may be committed to writing, and
that some of the Council may be chosen to confer together
about it." He meant that aU existing regulations should
be reduced to method, that such as were deemed necessary
should be added, and that the whole should form a com
plete ecclesiastical code. This proposal could raise no
debate ; it was accepted beforehand by the simple fact of
Calvin's recaU. Six councillors, four of the Lesser Coun
cil and two of the Greater, are elected " to confer with the
preachers," and to prepare the general ordinances, or what
relates to the Consistory.

166 THE CONSISTORY.
This last word appeared for the first time in tne registry,
on the 5th of AprU. It was resolved that a consistory be
formed, " either to judge matrimonial suits, or to make
remonstrances to those who five HI." Before Calvin's re
turn, then, one of the ideas which he had most at heart,
had been taken up anew. He considered that every body
of laws supposes a tribunal commissioned to punish aU
infractions of it ; but he did not wish the councH, or the
government, to continue as that tribunal, and in demand
ing a special jurisdiction, he had two things in view ; to
secure the regular repression of evU, and to separate as
much as was then possible, the religious from the political
domain. Thus the Consistory would emanate from the
State, would be the State, but the State organised in view
of a moral and religious mandate. The separation of the
two spheres would therefore be analogous to that which
is established by our modern laws, between the poHtical
power, whatever its form, and the judicial power. The
judge emanates from the sovereign, pronounces in the
sovereign's name, and yet pronounces sovereignly. He is
sovereign in the sphere assigned to him by the sovereign.
Since the month of AprU, however, nothing had been
done towards putting the idea into execution. After a
few tentatives it had been decided to wait for Calvin, and
we have just seen what took place the very first day. .

XXIII.
We have seen that before his arrival, the dwelling to
be assigned him had occupied theH attention. Other
details have been found in the registers. Thus, on the
20th of September : " Ordered, that cloth be bought to
make him a gown;" and a few days after : " The treasurer
was ordered to disburse for Master Calvin's gown, includ
ing cloth and fur, eight crowns." On the 4th of October:

CALVIN PROVIDED FOR. 167
"Salary of Master Calvin, who is a man of great learning,
and favourable to the restoration of the Christian Churches,
and is exposed to heavy expenses from strangers who
come this way.1 Whereupon it was resolved that he
should have for wages yearly, five hundred florins, twelve
measures of wheat, and two casks of wine." Five hundred
florins represented then about three thousand francs, or a
hundred arid twenty pounds at the present day.
But to return to the subject of the dwelling. Some
details on this matter, wUl perhaps not be devoid of
interest. The house of the Lord of FreyneviUe, was a house
which had been formerly sold by the State to that noble
man, who was originally from Picardy. Having left
Geneva, he was desHous of seUing it, and the CouncH had
decided on repurchasing it. Calvin, however,, for what
reasons we know not, did not enter it tiU two years after
wards, and was located during those two years, in a house
close by, formerly the property of the Abbot of Bonmont,
Aime" de Gingms. Both were Hi the Eue des Chanoines,
and corresponded, one to the present number eleven, the
other to number thirteen. SmaUer than the . houses which
have replaced them, each of them had a small garden at
the back ; on the same side, the view extended over the
terraced roofs of the city, which rose one above another,
like the steps of a ladder, and included Hi the far distance
the lake and its shores, the district of Vaud, and the
wooded slopes of the Jura.
Such was the spot where Calvin was to five ; and where,
at the end of twenty-three years, he was to breathe his
last. That lake, those mountains, the distant scenes at
once so smiling and so grand, — who is there that would
not like to know whether they charmed his eyes, or
whether at times his soul sought in them repose, and his
mind relaxation ? - Luther would not have left us in un-
J Supporte grande charge de passants.

168 CALVIN AT HOME.
certainty. The blue Leman would have been reflected in
more than one of his pages ; the Jura would have fur
nished him with more than one graceful image ; the Alps,
with more than one awful figure ; and the whole land
scape, with more than one prayer to the Author of all.
those marvels. Yet, because Calvin has said nothing, let
us not hastily conclude that he saw nothing ; on the con
trary, so far as we know him, he may have much enjoyed
it, though he said nothing of it. A letter to Monsieur de
Falais, in February 1547, is not that of a man who sets
no value on smaU gardens and fine prospects. Commis
sioned by his friend to hHe him a house at Geneva, he
describes the one which he has chosen. " You wHl have
a garden in front ; and behind, another garden. A large
chamber, with as faH a prospect as you could wish for the
summer. . . ." He says this without employing epithets,
for he cannot endure them ; but this is precisely why, a
single word, from him, is fuU of meaning. How much
there is, therefore in this other, very brief letter, which
he writes to VHet in 1550 ! He has learned that the
pastor of Lausanne intends to pay him a visit, and here
he is budding upon the tidings the whole plan of a charm-;
ing week, during which he wUl take, what seldom happens
to him, — a holiday. Viret wUl manage to be at Geneva
on Sunday. He wHl preach in the morning Hi the city ;
Calvin is to preach at Jussy, at the foot of the Mountain ;
and VHet wiU join him after dinner. They will then
walk to Monsieur de Falais at Veigy. The next day they
wHl cross the lake, and wHl go and " rusticate" tiH Thurs
day, on the smiling hills of Vaud, at the seats of the lords
of Pommier and of LTsle. On Friday there is to be an
excursion to Pregny or to BeUerive. In aU this there are
no fine phrases, but we feel, that, under these few simple
words there beats a heart which is afike open to the
charms of nature, and to the sweets of friendship.
There are many other questions that one would like to

HOUSEHOLD MATTERS. 169
put to the humble house in which John Calvin lived and
died. His wHe joined him there in October. The Council
had given orders, as early as the 16th of September, to a
messenger to go and fetch her from Strasburg, her and
" her effects ;" and the register mentions, a month later,
the twenty-two days' pay to the messenger for going and
returning ; then the sale by auction of the carriage and
three horses which the Eepublic had bought for the
journey, a long one for those times. But the " effects,"
which were of the humblest description, were insufficient
for the house, and accordingly, the very day after that on
which it had been resolved to send for them, the register
mentions " one hundred and twenty -one florins and two
sous," voted to pay for " the household furniture given to
Master Jean Calvin," of which we find an inventory, at
least so far as respects the wooden furniture, bearing date
the 12th of December 1547 ; and yet another inventory
after Calvin's death, the 25th of September 1564, the day
on which the State resumed possession. The inventory
states that, at that date, "a cupboard, without a lock,"
was wantmg, but, on the other hand, a dozen stools,
which the old inventory caHed " good as well as bad,"
are designated as new in the later one. Both mention
"a high-backed walnut chair of joiner's work," and this
chaH, long preserved in the pulpit of the Hospital Chapel,
is now in that of St. Peter's. There is, at least, no rea
son for doubting the truth of the tradition which affirms it.
But one would like to animate with living detaHs the
humble home, of which it is easy to fancy the material
aspect, especiaUy during the few years that Idelette de
Bure was its centre. Here we perceive, unhappHy, under
one of its severest forms, the contrast that constantly
strikes us between the genius of the German Eefortner
and that of the French Eeformer. "Just as Luther is
prodigal of those familiar effusions which initiate us into

170 IDELETTE.
the events, happy or unhappy, of his fife,1 whether prais
ing in merry terms his dear Ketha, weeping over his Httle
Magdalen's bier, or describing poetically to his son the
joys of Paradise, just so is Calvin restrained and quiet
upon those details of domestic Hfe which shed a gentle
radiance around the famHy hearth. His soul, absorbed
by the tragical emotions of the struggle which he had to
sustain at Geneva, and by the tods of his immense pro
paganda abroad, seems to dread effusion as a weakness,
and overflows but rarely in brief, rapid words,- and in.
flashes of sensibility which reveal unknown depths, but
without completely unveiling them. Living, so to speak,
in the shadow of the Eeformer, Idelette appears to us in
a mysterious twilight. Some traits, however, may be de
termined and assembled.
"These traits, scattered over the correspondence of
Calvin and his friends, are those of the Christian woman
devoted to aU the duties of her calling. To visit the
poor, to comfort the afflicted, to receive the strangers who
came knocking at the Eeformer's door, to watch by his
bed-side during the days of sickness, or when, 'well. dis
posed in all the rest of the body,' he was ' tormented by
a pain which suffered him to do scarcely anything,' so
that he was ' almost ashamed of living thus useless,' to
support him in the hours of discouragement and sadness,
and, finaUy, to pray aU alone in her chamber when re
volt was raging in the streets, and cries of "Death to the
ministers!" were being raised:— -such were the occupa
tions of Idelette. Her chief pleasures were to listen to
holy admonitions, to exercise Christian hospitafity to
wards Calvin's friends — Farel, VHet, Beza — to accompany
him in his rare walks to Cologny or to BeUerive, and to
visit at Lausanne, Viret's wife, the pious Elizabeth
Turtaz, whom she loved as a sister, and whose loss she
1 We borrow these lines from Monsieur Jules Bonnet, " Bulletin of the So
ciety for the History of French Protestantism."

FAMILY TRIALS. 171
had too soon to deplore. It was with her that Idelette
spent a few days in May 1545, when Calvin went to Zurich
to plead the cause of the Provengal Waldenses, and to
suspend, by the solemn intervention of the Cantons, the
frightful massacre of Cabrieres and of Merindol. She re
turned for the last time to Lausanne in June 1548,
anxious not to inconvenience her hosts, and pained at
being unable to serve them in any way in return for aU
theH kind care.
" Idelette appears to us in a yet more touching aspect
in her sorrows as a mother. In the second year of her
marriage, in July 1542, she had a son; but her child
was soon snatched from her. She was, however, sup
ported under the trial by the tokens of sympathy which
were lavished upon her by the Churches of Geneva and
Lausanne. A letter from the Eeformer to VHet initiates
us into his own and his wife's grief. 'Salute all the
brethren,' he says ; ' salute also thy wife, to whom mine
sends her thanks for the sweet and holy consolation which
she has received from her. She would wish to acknow
ledge them with her own hand, but she has not even the
strength to dictate a few words. In that He hath taken
away our son, the Lord hath stricken us right sorely; but
He is our Father — He knoweth what is meet for His
children.' Two years afterwards, the heart of Idelette
was torn by a new trial — the loss of an infant daughter
which, for a few days, had cheered her solitude. A third
babe, of which Monsieur de Falais was to be sponsor, was
also taken away. Idelette wept ; and the Eeformer, so
often smitten in his tenderest affections, could find con
solation only in the spHitual fatherhood which inspHed
him later to write this eloquent rejoinder to one of his
adversaries, Baudoin : 'The Lord gave me a son, the
Lord hath taken him away. Let my enemies see ob
loquy for me Hi the trial. Have I riot tens of thousands
of children in the Christian world ?' "

172 THE SERIOUSNESS OF CALVIN.
Here Hes the excuse, H excuse be necessary, for the ex
treme reserve of detaHs upon aU that concerns his famHy,
his affections, and himseH. He is the man of his work,
the man of the Church, the man of the Christian world ;
the time taken up in speaking of his famUy according to
the flesh, he would deem stolen from that other family
which God had given him — those "tens of thousands"
who acknowledged him as theH father. He was mis
taken, doubtless. The time thus taken up would not
have been lost either to the tens of thousands, or to his
task Hi the midst of them. Had he been more of the
man, and even weaker as man at certain times, he would
have been, Hke Luther, aU the stronger in many others.
But his error was one of seH-denial, of duty, of conscience,
and, what was better — as might be proved by many of
his letters — of deep and unalterable piety. Luther, not
less pious, and, on great occasions, not less serious, could
laugh, and loved to laugh ; the agony of his youth had
not destroyed his fund of joyous and impetuous vivacity.
Calvin suffered less Hi mind and conscience; but aH
things here below conspHed, one might say, to show him
none but theH grave aspects, and it is not easy to see
when sentiments of a different nature could have been
developed Hi him. In his whole correspondence, once
only does he speak of laughing, and then it is the more
meritorious, because he has just been obfiged to hand the
pen to his secretary, the rheumatism having " taken him
so rudely by the shoulders," that he could no longer
" make a stroke with his pen." But Monsieur de Falais,
to whom he was writing, had just received a son, and
the father's joy had poured itseH forth, it seems, Hi a
letter interspersed with pleasantries. Calvin would not
be outdone. His mHth, however, is but a flash ; the
laughter gushes forth from his gravity, and Hi an instant
all is grave again. " I pray our Lord that it may please
Him to have you in His holy keeping, and to preserve to

LAUGHTER AND TEARS. 1 73
you the blessing He hath given you tUl you see the fruit
thereof, and receive from it more ample comfort and joy.
It vexeth me that I cannot be there with you for half a
day at the least, to laugh with you tiU we make the
little babe to laugh, which cries and weeps. For this is
the first note we have to strike at the beginning of this
life, that we may laugh in good earnest when we are out
of it." According to him, then, the first note of fife, the
key-note, is weeping. Laughter is a discord, to be per
mitted, it is true, but only on condition of being promptly
resolved into the first, the normal key, which wiU not
change tiU we stand upon the threshold of eternal bHss.
Let us not wonder, therefore, if he cared so little to
preserve for us the detaHs either of his joys or of his
sorrows. Sorrows and joys before eternity are nought,
and it is in the presence of eternity and not of prosperity
that he ever places himseH. Let us not too much regret
that we have so few traits of his private life to weave
into his story ; our narrative aH the more faithfuUy re
produces his life, as he understood it with a view to the
end. If, in the preceding pages, we have gathered to
gether some such traits — encroaching, by a few years,
upon the period we have now to traverse — it has been
only in order that we might all the longer only contem
plate the Eeformer at his work, the workman at his task.
We shaU pause again but twice — the first time before the
death-bed of Idelette ; and the second at the death-bed
of Calvin.

BOOK THE THIRD.
(1541—1555.)

BOOK THE THIKD.

SUMMARY.

I. Ecclesiastical Ordinances drawn up and passed.
II. Spirit of the code — Analysis — Four orders in the Church — The pastors and
the pastoral ministry — The Consistory; its functions and its rights — Ex
communication — Matrimonial causes — Deacons — How Calvin understood
the union of Church and State.
IH Order and peace appear to be assured — The name of Christ in the arms of
the city of Geneva — The Liturgy — Preaching — Psalmody — The Psalter —
Religious instruction — Calvin is desirous that faith, as regulated by the
Church-formularies, should be, nevertheless to every one, rational, real,
and personal — Different measures to secure this — Some unworthy pastors
expelled — The work advances ; the true Reformation takes deeper root —
The syndic, Porral.
IV. State of Geneva — Geneva, in spite of her severe laws, everywhere considered
as the free city.
V. Calvin on his way to Metz — Sad state of Europe — The plague at Geneva —
Characteristics of Calvin's devotedness — His colleagues in 1542.
VI. His works during this period — Satirical writing against the Faculty of
Theology of Paris — The Exhortation to Charles V. — Of the servitude and
enfranchisement of the human will — Treatise on the divinity of Jesus Christ
— Scholia on the admonition of Paul III. to the Emperor — The Excuse to the
Nicodemites — Admonition touching relics — Several of these writings recall
the style of Luther.
VII. Publications against the Libertines who called themselves Spirituals —
Their system — The Genevese Libertines adopt this, at least in fact, and as a
weapon against the Calvinistic legislation.
VIII. The struggle begins anew — Two Genevas, that of Calvin and that of the
Libertines — One of the two must perish — What the Libertines were, and
what they were equal to.
IX. The case of Benoite Ameaux— Gruet's trial— Amied Perrin's part— First
debates on Excommunication — Perrin in open rebellion — Perrin arrested
as a traitor — Scene at the Town House — Courage of Calvin — Reconcilia-
, tion. M

178 SUMMARY.
X. New disorders— Perrin first syndic— Christian proclamation suggested by
Calvin— A short truce— Monnet's trial— Quarrel about baptismal names—
Berthelier, the leader of the Libertines— Excommunication again— The 3rd
of September 1553— Calvin thinks himself sure to be banished— His posi
tion, on the contrary, improves — Farel received with honour.
XI. A new truce — All begins again — Question of the refugees — The true Gene
vese and the true Geneva — The refugees insulted, and measures taken
against them — The Government favours them, and many are received citi
zens — The Libertines have recourse to riot — They are worsted — Execu
tions and exiles — Sad conduct of the banished Libertines.
XH. Final triumph of Calvin— What he had had to suffer during these last
struggles — Home trials — Last years and death of Idelette de Bure — Calvin's
grief.
XHI. A glance at what is to follow — The case of Castalio — Bolsec — His life-
It is only out of hatred to Calvin that interest has been taken in him — His
condemnation — His book against the Reformer.
XIV. Servetus — A few preliminary observations.
XV. Servetus at Paris, Lyons, and Vienne — His correspondence with Calvin —
His pantheistic audacity — Is it true that Calvin denounced him at Vienne ?
— Impossible for the Reformation, and for Geneva especially, to show
indulgence towards Servetus — Had she done so, what would have been
said?
XVI. The trial — Why Servetus had come to Geneva — He is imprisoned — First
interrogatories — The Libertines endeavour to save him — Berthelier ; Col-
ladon — Different phases.
XVH. Servetus believes himself on the eve of victory — His victory would
bring on the exile of Calvin, and the fall of the whole Calvinistic estab
lishment, doctrine, and discipline — Anxiety of Calvin — Farel reassures and
encourages him — Servetus demands that an accusation should be brought
against Calvin — He changes his tone — His sufferings in prison.
XVIII. The Swiss Churches are consulted, and pronounce unanimously against
Servetus — The Governments, likewise consulted, are not less unanimous —
Geneva can no longer fail to condemn him — Last efforts of the Libertines in
favour of Servetus — Condemnation — Calvin had not asked for the stake,
and he demands that the sword be substituted. for the fire.
XIX. Last interview with Servetus — Farel-— Sad details — The execution.
XX. A last glance at the whole — Various calumnies— The intolerance of Cal
vin, and Romish intolerance — His treatise, Of the punishment of Heretics —
The elevated and heroic side of severities which are revolting to us.

Behold, then, Calvin again at Geneva, and, as Beza teUs
us, " received with so extraordinary affection by that poor
people famishing to hear theH faithful pastor, that they
took no rest tiU he was fixed there for ever ;" for the
Council of Strasburg had at first refused to do more than
lend him to the Genevese. Strasburg, however, yielded
at last, but' not without difficulty, to the solicitations of
Geneva. Calvin retained his right of citizenship, but he
refused his salary as professor, which they had wished to
continue to him.
At his first audience in councH, as we have seen, he
requested that the ordinances should be drawn up with
out delay. The commission which was appointed, set to
Work on the 16th of September, and by the 28th, we find
the councH convoked to examine the draught which had
been prepared. But, says the register of that day,
"several lords-councHlors have been disobedient in not
.appearing to advise upon the ordinances touching refi-
gion." Was this aHeady a beginning of opposition?
Was it a dread of the difficulties of the work, and per
haps also of the obstacles which they would meet with in
carrying it out ? We know not. The next day, in a
session to which the absent of the preceding day were
convoked " under oath," that is to say, under pain of be
ing admonished, H they are wanting, as unfaithful to
theH oath as councillors, the examination is begun and
continues tiU the 27th of October. The project was
definitely aniended and submitted, on the 9th of Novem
ber, to the Council of the Two Hundred, and on the 20th

180 THE ORDINANCES.
to the General CouncH. Though voted, the ordinances
underwent further remodelfing, and the final vote took
place the 2d January, 1542. It is from that day that
the Calvinistic republic legally dates.

II.

In the code Calvin places himself resolutely and
absolutely on the ground of the Gospel. All that he
can borrow from the primitive Church he takes, and
whatever that Church does not afford him he creates;
but rigidly adheres to its traditions and its spHit. This
spHit he desHes to see reflected by public and private
manners, as weU as by institutions. He is convinced,
moreover, that it cannot be injured by being emphasized,
and that the most strict of the lawgivers of antiquity
may serve as guides to the Christian legislator. The
triumph of the Gospel wHl be to obtain even more than
they did ; the rights of the Christian state cannot possibly
be less than those of the Pagan state. The state, conse
quently, can and ought to make, in the name of God, all
the laws which appear to it likely to concur to the
establishment and maintenance of the kingdom of God
on earth. The temporal and spHitual wUl be sufficiently
separated in Calvin's view, by the fact that the cognisance
of offences and the application of penalties, wHl be the
work of a special body.
But this body, though an important part of the Church,
wiU not be its head. " There arc," says the ordinance,
" four orders or kinds of office instituted by our Lord for
the general government of His Church, — namely, pastors,
then doctors, then elders or presbyters,1 and fourthly,
deacons." The consistory is only the body of presbyters,
the third order, to which Calvin adds the pastors, con-
1 Anciens.

ORDERS OF THE MINISTRY. 181
sidered in this case, according to the language and custom
of the first centuries, as presbyters.
The ordinance treats first, then, of pastors, " whom the
Scripture names also sometimes overseers or bishops,
presbyters, and ministers." TheH office is to announce
the Word of God, to teach, admonish, and reprove both
in public and in private, to administer the sacraments,
and, with the presbyters, to pronounce the ecclesiastical
censures." That nothing " may be done without order Hi
the Church," every candidate for the ministry must first
be examined by the pastors, and the examination wUl
bear principally upon doctrine, " that is to say, whether
the candidate's knowledge of Scripture be good and
wholesome ; secondly, whether he be fit and sufficient to
communicate it to the people ; thirdly, whether his
morals be good, and his life Hreproachable." This done,
they lay hands on him, according to the apostolic custom,
and he can now be elected pastor. It is the Company
that elects ; but the election is immediately communi
cated to the Council, who send some of theH number to
hear the candidate "discourse upon Scripture in the
assembly of ministers." The foHowing Sunday it is
announced in all the churches "that such a one has been
elected and approved in the accustomed way," and that
H any one has observations to make, he is to communi
cate them to one of the syndics before the next Sunday.
That day come, H no valid objection has been made, the
pastor is pubficly instaUed. The officiating pastor wUl
" declare and set forth to him the office to which he is
ordained," with "prayers and supplications that the Lord
would grant him grace to acquit himself of it." Then
foUows the form of oath to be taken by him before the
Council. The ministry is now organised. The next articles
treat of the "good government" to be established for
keeping the pastors to their duty ; and as their duty is,

182 THE PASTOR'S DUTIES.
above aU things, to make steady progress in the know
ledge of Holy Writ, they wUl assemble one day Hi the
week in a church,1 to listen to a biblical exposition, to be
defivered by all in turn, " both those of the town and
those of the country." They wiU assemble afterwards in
the customary place of meeting, and deliberate on what
they have heard. " Should any difference as to doctrine.
arise," let them treat of it at first together ;" H that
suffice not, " let them call the elders ; and if that suffice
not, let the cause be brought before the magistrate to be
set right." A strange article truly ! It is probable that
Calvin, in the magistrate, saw himseH supremely influenc
ing the decision to be taken. It can, however, scarcely
be supposed that he did not see the dangers of the prin
ciple, stiU less, that he knowingly sacrificed the dignity
of the Church to the wish to display an influence which
he was not certain to possess. Let us therefore view in
it rather the necessities of the moment, the need of con
solidating at any cost an edifice that was to be assaUed
by so many storms. Perhaps also it is not just to
attribute this article to Calvin. The CouncH had at
some length re-revised the ordinances, and its registers
prove that it was not always in accordance with the views
of the pastors.
If a pastor commits a fault punishable in civU law, it
is for the civH power to judge and punish him, and every
such condemnation involves deposition. Faults, the in
vestigation of which belongs, in common law, to the con
sistory, are to be punished by the consistory ; those which
touch, more speciaHy, the ministry, are to be under the
cognizance of the Company of Pastors, which shaU not
have recourse to the consistory, tdl it has exhaused its
own means of action and correction. Before every com
munion, the pastors are "to take special heed amongst
themselves, to remedy defects by right censures." The
1 Temple.

VARIOUS REGULATIONS. 183
country churches -are to be visited every three years by
one delegate of the Company, and one delegate of the
CouncH. This is the old episcopal visitation, from time
immemorial customary in the Church.
Baptism can be administered only by a pastor. Every
god-father is to be refused who is notoriously not in a
state to promise to the Church that he wHl be spHituaUy
a father to the child.
The Lord's Supper is to be celebrated in the churches
only. It is to take place four times a year — at Easter, at
Whitsuntide, the first Sunday Hi September, and "the
Sunday nearest to Christmas-day," for the Sunday only
is of divine institution, and Calvin admits no other holy-
day, not even Christmas- day.
The singing, " both before and after the sermon," is to
be that of the Psalms.
Every chUd is regularly to attend catechising till,
when sufficiently taught, he is admitted, " in presence of
the Church, to make profession of his Christianity." It
is absolutely forbidden to approach the Lord's table be
fore this.
But many of the faithful have not passed through this
primary teaching, and aU need to be reminded of it. It
is, therefore, ordered that a yearly visitation should be
made from house to house, to examine every one simply
as to his faith, in order that no one may come to the
Lord's Supper without knowing what is the foundation
of his salvation. The visit is to be made in each parish,
before Easter, by the pastor, accompanied by an elder
and by the tithing-man of the quarter. The pastor is to
visit, aH the year through, aU the sick, Hi order " that no
one may die without admonition or instruction, which is
then more necessary than ever to a man." A weekly
visit is also to be paid to the prisoners by a pastor.
Here terminates what relates to pastors. In spite of a

184 THE CONSISTORY.
few changes, some good, others less so, this part of the
ordinances may be said to be stiH in fuU force at Geneva.
Another has ceased to be so for a considerable time —
the Consistory has scarcely anything but the name in
common with that instituted by Calvin. It is now the
administrative body of the Church ; under Calvin it was
the guardian of the Ordinances, and especiaUy a tribunal
of morals.
Calvin composes it of the pastors and twelve laymen ;
these twelve laymen are named by the CouncH upon the
recommendation of the pastors, and confirmed subse
quently by the Council of Two Hundred. TheH names
are published on a Sunday, and the people have tiH the
Thursday to communicate to a syndic the objections
that any of them might caU forth. They swear before
the CouncH that they wiU report to the Consistory all
that seems to them blameworthy ; that they wHl do it
"without hatred or favour, but only that the Church
may be maintained Hi good order, and Hi the fear of
God." The elders are elected for a year, but it wHl be
desHable to re-elect aH who appear worthy of re-election.
The Consistory assembles every Thursday to see H there
be any disorder in the Church. Now, the Church means,
and is, aU that five in the land. The Consistory may,
therefore, cite any one before it, but it has the disposal
of no power, either to constrain the people to appear, or
to carry out its sentences; it "gives notice" to the
CouncH, and the CouncH " sees to it." Every open fault
belongs by right to the jurisdiction of the Consistory ; as
to secret faults, let no one bring his neighbour before the
Consistory before he has tried, according to the command
of Jesus Christ, to bring him in secret to repentance.
If the government alone has the disposal of material
force, the Consistory alone has the right to excommuni
cate — another important point in which Calvin laid down

EXCOMMUNICATION. 185
the separation between the two powers. But we shall
shortly see to what debates this point gave rise.
He is to be excommunicated, even for a secret fault,
who obstinately refuses to own his guHt, and to amend.
He is to be excommunicated, for a longer or shorter time,
who has committed a fault involving heavy chastisement.
Every one shall be excommunicated who " shaU dogmatize
against the received doctrine," refusing " to conform." He
is to be excommunicated who, after several warnings,
persists Hi absenting himself from the religious assemblies ;
he also is to be excommunicated who voluntarily keeps
away from the Lord's Supper, or who, when requHed to
abstain for a time, shaU take no steps to be readmitted.
If he persists for six months longer, let him be banished
the country for a year. A simUar punishment is for him
who, after having promised to communicate, persists in
keeping away.
Without approving of aU these articles, we must recaU
what we have said elsewhere — they must not be read
under the impression of the odious sense which the rigour
of the Eomish Church has attached to the term excom
munication. Calvin associates with it no mystical idea
of reprobation or condemnation ; he takes it in its primi
tive and apostofic sense ; to excommunicate was to cut
off from the communion of the faithful, and, as the visible
sign of the severance, to prohibit the Lord's Supper.
Neither does Calvin add any temporal chastisement as
the result of excommunication ; if he speaks of banish
ment, it is not for the excommunicated in general, but
for those whom excommunication has failed to subdue ;
and, Hi fact, it was requisite that power should remain
with the law. In short, H the principle was once ad
mitted, it could scarcely be applied with greater modera
tion and prudence.
The Consistory was also a tribunal for matrimonial
causes, and therefore the articles which foUow form a

186 DEACONS.
code upon that subject. The paternal authority Hi mar
riage is first endorsed and then fimited ; next comes aU
that relates to age, to widowers, to widows, to the degrees
of relationship, to promises of marriage, to betrothals, to
weddings, to difficulties before or after marriage, and, at
last, to divorce — for Calvin admits of divorce, considermg
it allowed in principle in the words in which Jesus Christ
forbids it, " except it be for the cause of fornication."
But he surrounds it with aU the precautions that can se
cure the sanctity and indissolubleness of marriage ; and,
in fact, never was marriage hoHer and more indissoluble
than at Geneva under the Ordinances of Calvin.
After the elders and the Consistory, come the deacons,
" the fourth order of ecclesiastical polity. Calvin divides
these into two classes — those who are to receive and ad
minister the property of the poor, and those who are to
occupy themselves with the poor, by helping them, tend
ing them, &c. The latter are to be called Hospitalers;1
the former Providers? The ordinance confirms a measure
which had been taken immediately after the Eeformation
— a single charitable establishment — the General Hospi
tal? wUl receive aU the alms and administer aU the refief.
No poor person wUl run the risk of being abandoned, and
therefore mendicity is forbidden.
A last article orders that "these ordinances shaU be
published and read in the General Council every five
years, and that nothing therein shaU be changed by any
one, unless it has been previously proposed and agreed to
by the Lesser, Great, and General CouncHs."
The more this legislation has been studied, the more
has it been seen to contain thmgs which were then new.
and to indicate undeniable progress Hi advance of all
anterior systems of legislation. The form, sometimes, sur
prises us a little by its quaint simplicity, so remote from
the language which the law now speaks ; and by those
1 Hospitaliers. 2 Procureurs. » Hopital General.

INDEPENDENCE OF THE CHURCH. 187
petty detaHs which are mixed up with important regu
lations. These may sometimes tempt a smile, but the
grandeur of the whole is not the less evident to those who
seek it ; and this was about to manifest itself in the his
tory of the humble nation to whom this legislation was
to give so glorious a place in the intellectual, as well as
in the reHgious world.
The sequel was likewise to show how skHfully the Ee
former had guarded the independence of the Church,
though sacrificed, as it seemed, in some articles, and com
promised as a whole, by the very fact of the strict union
between Church and State. More fortunate than her
sisters of German Switzerland, who had and still have for
theH bishop the civil government, the Church of Geneva
always had her own bishop — the Company of Pastors*
Her independence was cramped, here and there it is true,
by inevitable contact with the poHtical power, but it was
ever recognized and respected in its general features as an
indestructible tradition. Neither absorbing nor degrading
the State, the Church maintained herself at its side,
always free, so far as the Eeformer had intended her to
be so.
This was, indeed, an important, an indispensable ele
ment of her influence abroad. A church visibly Hi the
power of the magistrates of so smaU a State, would have
been hearkened to by none. Eather such a Church could
not have even entertained the thought of being anything
to those who were at a distance. But the Church of
Geneva had been put into possession of a free and fiving
individuality. Henceforth, it mattered little whether
numericaUy she were smaU or great, or whether she was
at home, under the shelter of a smaU or of a mighty State.
She was the Church of Geneva, the heHess of Calvin.
None in Europe, friend or foe, thought of asking more.

188 ALL IS PEACE AT FIRST.

III.

The Eeformer had obtained what he desired ; but far
from being completed, his task was only to begin again
more seriously. All his perseverance had been requHed
to succeed, at the end of five years, in getting the instru
ment of the regeneration of Geneva placed in his hands ;
the question now was to make it act. Perseverance and
courage were shortly to be as necessary to him as ever.
At first, aH was peaceful. The reaction which had
brought back Calvin was not one of those caprices that
destroy on the morrow the favourite of the preceding day;
neither was it, as we have seen, a factitious movement,
prepared by ringleaders, and borne by a blind multitude.
The people and the magistrates had been insensibly won
back by Calvin when absent, but felt to be necessary, nay
indispensable ; hence both people and magistrates felt
themselves bound to enter firmly and honestly into his
views. The ideal of a Christian republic was beginning
to be understood, and, for those who were decidedly Hi-
capable of understanding it, the dislocation of aU thmgs
during Calvin's exUe had, at least, made them recognize
that order and strength were in him. But order and
strength proceeded, according to him, from a greater than
he. He had not waited for the ordinances to be voted,
to ask of the CouncH that the monogram of Christ, I.H.S.,
should be inscribed on the public buildings, on the com,
and on the standards. Calvin wiU not have the cross,
which has unhappily become the symbol of a Church in
which salvation by the cross is overlaid by forms and
works, and in which the sign scarcely serves but to veil
the absence of the thing signified ; he wiU have the name
of Jesus Christ, the spHitual, unalterable symbol which
perpetuaUy evokes the thought of aU that Jesus is and
must be, above aU, the Saviour of souls, but also the

HOW TO PREACH. 1 89
Saviour of nations. The Council accedes to this desire,
and the monogram of Christ will seal the forehead of the
new Eome.
Hostile as he was to aU superfluous forms in Divine
Worship, Calvin did not go so far as to reject them aU
indiscriminately ; regularity, though at the risk of leading
to formalism, appeared indispensable to him Hi order that
the public services might be worthy of God and the
Church. The regulation of the liturgies was therefore one
of his first cares. He placed under contribution those of
Strasburg, and others; the Scripture especiaUy was his
guide, both as to matter and manner. The Baptismal
service, drawn up by him at Strasburg, bore the traces of
his conflicts with the Anabaptists ; and the communion
service could scarcely have kept sUence as to Eomish
errors on that head.
Preaching also assumed more regular forms. Calvin
set the example of choosing, for each sermon, a weU-de-
fined subject ; hitherto, whether connected with the sub
ject or not, anything and everything was frequently treated
of. This was natural and right so long as the sole aim
was to move men's minds, but inimical to deeper researches.
Whilst he recommended preachers to feed upon the Scrip
ture, and to feed their sermons with it, Calvin condemned
accumulations of texts, he considered it as a disastrous step
towards leaving the spHit for the letter, and he knew,
besides, that it is often the means of making the Bible say
what we wish. He did not even approve that two texts
should be taken for the same sermon. If the two say the
same thing, why take two? If one is to modify the other,
what is to prevent its being quoted, in the course of the
sermon, by way of elucidation and commentary? Calvin's
respect for Scripture always bears the impress of this
spirit. It is not the respect of enthusiasm, which is some
times far from respectful, but that of reason and con
science.

190 SERVICE OF SONG.
Neither wUl Calvin aUow the preacher, under pretence
that his word is the Word of God, force himself for too
long a time on the attention of his congregation. "There
is one thing of which I would speak to thee," he writes
one day to Farel. " It is said that the length of the ser
mons is a subject of complaint. Thou hast told me thy
self more than once that thou wouldst take heed thereto;
forget it not, I pray thee. And since it is not for our own
edification that the Lord calls upon us to ascend the
pulpit, but for that of the people, it is incumbent on thee
to moderate thyself in such sort that the Word of God
may not have to suffer because thou hast wearied them."
The same observation is made upon the prayers, though
Farel, according to all his contemporaries, prayed admi
rably." " It is better," Calvin writes to him, " to pray at
length in private and briefly in the assemblies. If thou
expectest from aU an ardour equal to thine own, thou art
mistaken." Every preacher had at first been appointed to his own
special temple. In August 1542 Calvin decided that they
should all preach in turn, in all the city pulpits, "in
order that the people might be better edified and might
profit by aU the ministers." It was also in more strict
conformity to the great apostolic principle of the equality
of the pastors — a principle which was tenaciously held in
all things by Calvin, beginning with what concerned him
self : Neither title nor official privilege ever distinguished
him from his coUeagues.
The apostofic Church was also to be imitated in respect
to "the Service of Song."
Eome had confiscated sacred melody like everything
else; the congregation had no part to perform in the
Church service, which was exclusively reserved to eccle
siastics, priests, chanters, &c. The resurrection of the
Church as the body of befievers, would necessarily lead to
that of singing ; accordingly psalm-singing had become a

MAROT S PSALMS. 191
kind of profession of faith : psalm-singer and Reformed
were synonymous words in France. The effect was less
generaUy apparent at Geneva; Calvin had almost to create
psalm-singing, and the importance he attached to its crea
tion should, perhaps, mocfify a little what has been said
of his coldness and contempt of aU assthetic means. As
early as 1537, in a memoH on the organisation of the
Church, he says — " Certes, as we perform them, the devo
tions of befievers are so cold that it ought to be a shame
and confusion to us. Psalms might incite us to raise our
hearts to God and move us to fervour, both in caUing
upon Him and Hi exalting, by praises, the glory of His
name." Luther would not have spoken better. But how
shaU this end be attained ? " The way to proceed," con
tinued Calvin, "would be for some chHdren, who have
beforehand been made to repeat an unpretending sacred
song, to sing it in the church in a loud and distinct voice,
the people giving aU heed, and following in theH hearts
what is being sung with the lips, tUl little by little aH are
accustomed to sing Hi common."
This is the plan that was followed. Calvin had some
of Marot's psalms printed, accompanied by very simple
musical notation. A master, who was paid by the state,
gave three lessons weekly to choHs of children, and, when
a psalm was sufficiently prepared, it was performed " at
the next sermon." The Psalter was augmented in 1548,
by other psalms translated by Theodore Beza. But Cal
vin insisted upon having the exact prose translation of
the Hebrew text printed at the foot of the page ; he did
not wish to have attributed to the psalmist what resulted
perhaps from the exigencies of versification.
Eeligious instruction was very deficient; many persons,
even of those well-disposed towards the gospel, were
almost totally devoid of any positive acquaintance with
sacred history and doctrines. The people felt but little
the necessity of knowing more ; they would fain have

192 RELIGIOUS TEACHING.
had faith in the ministers as they formerly had in the
priests, leaving religion to the clergymen, and contenting
themselves with adhering, by wholesale, to official teach
ing. But Calvin knew that a change of prmciples would
involve a change Hi its consequences, and that faith, Hke
responsibUity, would be Hidividual. Not that he granted
to the individual, as the sequel showed but too weU, the
right of framing for himseH a creed which was not that
of the Church, but he wished the creed of the Church to
become individual in every man by a real acceptance,
and an intelligent and reasonable appropriation. When
in geometry, you teach the properties of the triangle or
cHcle, you do not admit that any one can understand
them otherwise than you do ; you demand, however,
that your pupU should not rest satisfied with your enun
ciation of them, and you wish each proposition to be
come, by examination, his real opinion and personal con
viction. It was thus that Calvin acted in refigion. The
right to befieve dHTerently from the Church and from
himseH he did not grant ; the right of appropriating the
common creed, after examination, he not only granted,
but he intended and demanded that it should be exer
cised by every one.
Hence resulted measures which can scarcely find
favour with our more enlarged ideas, but which, seen
from theH own point of view, may be explained, H not
justified. Calvin supposed it to be quite natural, that the
ignorant should be constrained to go to Church, as
chHdren are constrained to go to school ; the pastor, re
sponsible for theH religious knowledge, was to be em
powered to oblige them to come in quest of what they
lacked, and the Christian state might as naturaUy impose
sermons and catechizing, as the warfike state imposed
military services. There were, of course, people who
saw in this only the continuation of the Eomish system,
and a vexatious resemblance between the sermon and

CALVIN S COLLEAGUES. 1 93
the mass ; the country people, especiaUy, had some diffi
culty in understanding that when the mass was abolished,
it was stiU necessary to be assiduous in attending the
house of God. Material constraint, however, was rarely
employed. Country pastors would often go through theH
vdlages on Sunday mornings to press theH parishioners to
go to church. Calvin himself more than once did so in the
suburban localities of Eaux-Vives and Petite Sacconex.
Nothing seemed beneath him, provided that the work wa's
done, that the Christian army was recruited, and that
Geneva gradually became the citadel of which he dreamed.
Himself the slave of this glorious ideal, let us not wonder
H, when necessary, he sacrificed the liberty of others.
In this laborious production of Protestant Eome, one
of the great cares of the Eeformer was, that he had not
in all his colleagues labourers worthy of the task. Shortly
after his return, we see him congratulating himself on
two elections that have just been made ; Blanchet and
and De Geneston, he writes to Farel, promise to be ex-
ceUent pastors, and are liked by the people. Some
others, especially Cop and Des GaUars, support him with
no less zeal and success. Others, however, were incapa
ble or unworthy. From 1542 to 1546, five had to be
dismissed. Calvin had made every effort to retain VHet,
and to bring back Farel. But Farel had been forced to
remain at Neuchatel, and VHet to return to Lausanne.
It was the will of God that Calvin should have the sole
responsibility of the work.
The work was in progress. It was being carried on in
the mass and in the whole body; it was reduced to
order and shape, but was also sometimes wounded, and
sometimes quickened. It was being carried on also in
the secret recesses of conscience, which, though dis
ciplined by man, was regenerated by the SpHit of God.
" The SpHit bloweth where it fisteth," says the Scripture
It blew fuU of fife and power, through laws and means
N

1 94 AMI PORRAL.
which would, at the present day, seem rather the expe
dients of a weak, exhausted, and dying Church. Those
peasants of Gex and Chablais, who were still so far, it
would seem, like the Genevese peasantry, from the mere
comprehension of what was Hi question — persecution was
to find a few years later, immovable in theH faith, and
ready to suffer anything rather than abandon the assem
blies to which, at first, they had been conducted almost
by force. The same progress, and the same transforma
tion, took place at Geneva. Those grave and handsome
countenances are beginning to appear, which, at a later
day, were to be so numerous among the magistracy and
clergy, and all other ranks in the new city.
One of these men was especiaHy dear to Calvin, — the
syndic, Ami Porral. Converted to the gospel among the
first, in 1532, he had contributed more than any one
else to its triumph ; it was also, thanks to him in great
part, that Geneva had obtained from the Bernese, in
1536, the help which saved her independence. No one
in the repubfic had better understood than he what
Geneva might expect from the Eeformation, consistently
carried out ; and no one had better 'sustained Calvin in
his efforts to make it so understood by all. God, how
ever, did not permit him to see the fruits of his zeal ; he
died in June 1542, and Calvin relates his death: "We
spoke to him in a few words," he writes to Farel, " of the
cross, of the grace of Jesus Christ, and of Hfe eternal ;
he answered that he received the message from God with
as'touch certainty as H an angel himself appeared. Then,
havihg sent for some persons with whom he was at variance,
he stretched out his hand to them, and exhorted aH who
were present to remain united in the communion of the.
Church. At length, finding his strength failing, he said
with Simeon, ' Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart
in peace according to thy word, for mine eyes have seen
thy salvation.' And shortly afterwards he gave up his

STATE OF GENEVA. 195
holy soul to the Lord." Such friends might console Cal
vin for many cavillings ; theH moral even more than
theH magisterial authority, was a powerful weapon in
every difficulty.

IV

The period comprised between 1541 and 1546 was,
therefore, relatively peaceable. The disorders punished
were generaUy not of a serious nature, or if they were,
they did not generaUy assume the character of systematic
immorafity, or of direct and intentional opposition. Cal
vin had occasionaUy to inflict a fine or imprisonment on
the sons of magistrates, who had nobly served theH coun
try and the Eeformation ; but those magistrates knew
weU what theH religion and country stiU claimed, and
they loyaUy remained the friends of the Eeformer. To
sum up aU, there might be occasional murmurs against
the Ordinances and against Calvin, but as to revolt, no
one dreamed of it, and, besides, no one would have dared
to show that he dreamed of it, for it was impossible to
doubt that the general will was in favour of the actual
order of things. We may ask H the Consistory never
yielded to the temptation of displaying its authority, and
H Calvin always had sufficient moderation and prudence
to approve only of such severity as was strictly necessary
in view of the end proposed? We would not affirm
either. But details were lost in the general survey, and
Geneva, seen from without, was beginning to offer the
sight which might best commend her to the respect of
the Protestant world. Nor, when received within her,
did the strangers who were worthy of Geneva perceive
anything which should induce a change of opinion. One
of them, a Lyons refugee, exclaimed one day, " How de
lightful it is to see this lovely liberty in this city!"

196 THE AFFAIR OF METZ.
"Lovely liberty !" said a woman of the lower orders,
" we were obfiged formerly to go to mass, and now we
are obfiged to go to sermon." The good woman, as we
have aHeady admitted, was not altogether Hi the wrong ;
but the refugee was in the right, for he placed himseH at
the true point of view. Liberty to him, and to aU Pro
testant France, to the Germany of Luther— to aU those
millions, in short, who were more or less persecuted, was
liberty to serve God according to the gospel which had
been restored. To that Hberty he willingly sacrificed
every other, and it was not even a sacrifice, so great did
the compensation appear. Thus acted the thousands and
tens of thousands of fugitives who, like himseH, beneath
the yoke of Calvin, felt themselves free, and gave thanks
to God.

V.

On aU sides,- therefore, it was becoming the habit to
look up to the Church of Geneva, and to its head. Stras
burg had entirely given up the hope of seeing him again,
and no other church attempted, as far as we know, to
win him to her service. Calvin at Geneva, like the Pope
at Eome, was an historical fact. No one thought of
wondering, stUl less of being offended at his no longer
taking personal part in conflicts at the outposts.
Besides, there could be no doubt entertained as to his
readiness, H needs be, to return into the thick of the
fight, as was proved, Hi 1543, by the affair of Metz.
Farel, who had been invited by the Eeformed of that
city, and then expeUed with many more of them, was at
Strasburg. Calvin went to seek him there, and it was
not his doing H they did not go "straight to Metz,
though this would not have been without danger," as he
says in a letter to the Council of Geneva ; and, in fact,

CONDITION OF EUROPE. 197
such was the danger that the magistrates of Strasburg
did not permit the attempt. This letter to the Council
reveals to us, as other letters written during this journey,
Hi how troubled an atmosphere aU the affairs of Europe
were then carried on. The battle of refigion and the
battle of arms were ever more and more crossing and re-
crossing each other's path. The conflagrations of war
added theH light to that of the stake ; the Emperor and
the King of France seemed to have sworn not to ter
minate their strife tUl war had finished the work of per
secution, and made a desert of Europe. Let a truce come,
and Francis I. wUl employ, in the extermination of
Merindol and Cabrieres, the leisure granted him by
Charles V. ! Then, again, at the extremity of Europe
thus ravaged, appeared incessantly the phantom of the
Turk, who, Calvin writes in July, is descending with a
mighty power to assault Germany on three sides. It
was already a marvel that the Turks had not long since
carried out theH constant menace. They might, in a
few campaigns, have seized upon the whole of Europe,
and placed under one yoke Protestants and Eomanists,
the Emperor and the Pope, Eome and Geneva. We may
also add the terrors incessantly repeated by the plague,
which always domicHed in some of the cities, and was
always threatening aU the rest.
This scourge visited Geneva several times. It has been
said, Hi these our days, that the clergy refused to fulfil
theH duties towards those who were stricken. We are
writing the history of Calvin, and it might suffice us to
point out Calvin not refusing, any more than he had re
fused at Strasburg, during his pastorship in that city.
But it is better to teH the whole story from the be
ginning. It was Hi 1542. At the first appearance of the scourge,
the CouncH requested the Company of Pastors to appoint
a chaplain for " the plague-hospital." The pastor Blanchet

198 THE PLAGUE.
offers his services, and enters immediately upon his func
tions. Shortly after, in a letter to VHet, Calvin writes —
" The plague rages so violently, that few persons who are
stricken, escape from death. One of us having to be
chosen to attend to the sick, Blanchet has offered himseff.
If woe befaU him, I fear that I must be his substitute,
for, as thou sayest, we are aU members one of another,
and we cannot faU those who are in need of our ministry.
.... Since we have accepted this office, I see not what
motive we could aUege to withdraw ourselves from the
peril." Always the same man ! ever the law of duty, —
cold but all-powerful. He fears being caHed upon to re
place Peter Blanchet ; but, H necessary, he wUl do it : no
question as to that. The scourge ceases for a time, but
reappears ; Blanchet resumes his functions, and dies at
the expHation of a few days. The CouncH orders that
another be named, but forbids the selection of Calvin,
seeing how needful he is to the whole Church ; or, as the
register says, " for that he is needed to serve in the Church,
and answer aU passers-by, and also to give counsel." Four
of the pastors, Abel Poupin, Philippe de Ecclesia, and the
two brothers Champereau, declare that they do not feel
the courage to go and shut themselves up in the hospital ;*
but another, De Geneston comes forward, and his wHe wiU
share his peril. They shut themselves up in the hospital,
and both die there, the wHe first, the husband a few
days after.
Such is the truth respecting this affair, which has given
occasion to so much slander against the Eeformation,
against Calvin, and against Geneva. And who were those
four men whose weakness was the cause of attacks so
multipfied? One only, Poupin, remained at Geneva,
expiating by a devoted ministry, his cowardice of a day.
The three others, formerly priests, were among those
• A phrase of the register has given rise to the idea that Calvin had, at first,
joined them ; an absurd supposition in presence of all the facts.

WORKS OF CALVIN. 199
whom we have seen expeUed as unworthy, before 1546.
TheH cowardice was only the renewal of what, before the
Eeformation, Geneva had often had to reproach in their
brethren. From 1494 to 1498, the registers return eight
or ten times to the difficulty of procuring priests for the
plague-stricken, or to the Hi-conduct of those who accepted
the office ; and the priests were not six or seven, like the
pastors of 1543, but numbered, at least, three hundred.

VI.

To complete this period, it remains now that we give
the fist of the works published by Calvin during these
years. FHst of aU, there was a writing filled with the
most piquant Hony against the Faculty of Divinity at
Paris. That learned body had drawn up certain articles,
very brief and very positive, a kind of Manual against
the negations and assertions of the Eeformation. Calvin
supposes that a friend of the Faculty wishes to improve
theH work by adding to it, proofs, — and this friend turns
out to be a simpleton, who gives proofs, indeed, or rather
reasons, but such as the doctors would not have cared to
give. They aU amount on every point to one : — This is
true and divine, for the Church has need of it, for we
could not do without it, for i£ we were to lose this we should
lose that also, and that, and then aU ! The enumeration
is at times highly ludicrous ; it reveals a masterly insight
into the hidden springs of Eomanism. Every article is
foUowed by another, entitled the Antidote, a rapid but
serious condensation of what can best be said against each
of the Eomish theses enounced.
Another writing is the Humble Exhortation to the
Emperor Charles the Fifth, and to the Diet of Spires,
that they would seriously put their hands to the Restora
tion of the Church. Calvin had probably little faith in

200 POPE PAUL III.
Charles the Fifth, Httle in the Diet, and Httle in all that
could be done, even with the best intentions, so long as
there was no rupture with Eomanism ; his aim, therefore,
was far less to enlighten the emperor or the diet, than to
trace a rapid yet complete sketch of the corruptions and
errors of the Church. This work was much lauded ;
nothing so serried or so strong, says Beza, had yet been
produced Hi that age; and this praise was not exaggerated.
Let us add that this work is not less remarkable for dig
nity than for power ; Calvin is truly what an advocate of
the Gospel ought to be before such an assembly. We can
only wish that, like Luther at Worms, he had had the
honour of pleading Hi person.
We cannot bestow equal praise upon his Scholia on the
paternal admonition of Pope Paul III. to the Emperor
Charles V. It is forcible but often undignified. It is
true, that in his admonition, Paul III. laid himseH strangely
open, both as pope and man, to the recrimination of the Be-
form. At the beginning, in order to authorize himseH to
admonish Charles V, his dear son, for being too indulgent
towards heresy, he quotes the example of Eli, who was
chastised by God for having shut his eyes to the faults of
his chHdren. Now, Paul III. had sons — by no means in a
figurative sense — true sons, whom he had made princes,
and whose morals were far from edifying to theH father's
States. Calvin seizes Upon this fact, and bringing back
every question to that of the morals of the popes, he gives
way to sallies that ought to have no place in a religious
discussion. But whUst regretting that he should not
have been more sober, let us imagine what the contem
poraries of those wretched popes must have felt at seeing
them, Hi the midst of theH Hcentiousness, blow the pre
tended apostolic trumpet, and claim in the name of refi-
gion, rights so completely forfeited in the eyes of morality.
Two treatises, more especially dogmatic, saw the fight
in 1543 and 1545. One, against Albert Pighius, is the

NICODEMITES AGAIN. 201
Defence of the wholesome and orthodox doctrine on the
servitude and enfranchisement of the human will ; the
other against Pierre Caroli, attacks Arianism, and appeared
later in French under the title of A Treatise on the Divi
nity of Christ, against the Arians. Calvin dedicated the
first to Melanchthon, whose Loci Communes he translated,
about this time, under the title of The Sum of Divinity,
or the Common Places of Melanchthon.
It has been asked how Calvin was led to circulate a
book in which several doctrines, especiaUy that of election,
are presented in a somewhat different aspect from what
they were in his own. He probably was actuated only
by the desHe to keep up the idea of a fusion between the
two halves of the Eeformed, and to show himself ready,
for this end, to make every possible concession.
The question of the Nicodemites, treated in the two
epistles of 1537, furnishes him, in 1545, with matter for
a new writing, of which it appears that the second part
had been already published in French the year before. This
second part, the most recent, is the Excuse of John Cal
vin to the Nicodemites who complain of his too great
rigour. Of course, this Excuse is not one at all, and the
author only asks for mercy by striking aH the harder.
Woe therefore to those who offer to God only a timid,
cowardly heart, only a faith they dare not confess before
men ! Calvin divides them into four classes : —
I. Those who say they wiU not cause the weak to
offend ; as H it were not the greatest of aH offences to lie
to one's conscience.
II. The dainty, " weU satisfied to have the Gospel, and
to converse about it with the ladies, provided it does not
prevent them from Hying as they please."
III. The philosophers, considering and waiting ; and
this thHd class is almost entHely composed of men of
letters, "not, however, that all men of letters belong
to it."

202 RELICS EXPOSED.
IV. The merchants, the men of money, " who are com
fortable Hi their homes," and "wish not to be disquieted."
What truth there is in aU this, and how weU has the
moralist of the sixteenth century depicted the nineteenth!
Let us take note of another very curious treatise, — a
very Useful Hint of the great profit that would accrue
to Christendom if an inventory were made of all holy
bodies and relics which are in Italy, France, Germany,
Spain, and other realms and countries. This great profit
would be to make manifest the absurd frauds arising
from the worship of refics.
Calvin begins by a few observations on this worship
considered in itseH; he recognizes Hi it one of those
thmgs of which St. Paul said, that "aH wHl worship,
whatever shew of wisdom it may have, is but vanity and
foolishness." Now here the very show of wisdom has
disappeared ; and even H the foolishness were less ap
parent in the thing, it would stiU be apparent enough Hi
the abuse. The author does not stop, however, at frauds
properly so caHed : Geneva has not forgotten, amongst
other comicafities — the secret of which was discovered
when investigation was ventured upon — the famous
brain of St. Peter, which turned out to be a piece of
pumice stone ! But how many reHcs are there unex
amined as yet, and which would give rise to simHar dis
coveries ! How many others against whose authenticity
no proofs can be adduced, it is true, but in whose favour
neither do any exist, and whose spuriousness is moraUy
evident ! How many objects, found after seven or eight
centuries, of which no one had spoken tiU then ! The
haH, the teeth, and the blood of Jesus Christ ; the manger
in which he was cradled, and the swaddling-clothes in
which they wrapped him ; the water-pots of Cana, the
table of the Last Supper, the Hnen clothes from the
sepulchre, and at last the cross — the true woss — the frag
ments of which would make "a load for a very large boat,"

RELICS EXPOSED. 208
are some of the specimens given by the author. And
what relic is there that has not, like the cross, multiplied
in the priests' hands ? Of what size would be the crown
of thorns, H aU the thorns shown by the Church were put
together? Four towns possess the spear-head which
pierced the side of Christ ; three possess his robe, and
that entire. Where do we fail to meet with the head of
John the Baptist, whole or Hi parts ? Which of the
apostles would not have at least two or three bodies, if
aU the bones said to be theirs were reunited ? And what
saint is there of any renown but would offer the same
phenomenon ?
AU this Calvin accompanies with detaHs the most cir
cumstantial ; he names the towns, the churches, and the
convents. Irony streams from his pen, but never con
tinuously ; scarcely has it flowed for a fine or two, when
he is again reasoning and indignant, and wishing others
to reason and to be indignant. " Is it not too great a
cheat ? Who wiU befieve that ? Would it not be foUy
in me to beat back by argument mockery so evident?"
There are very useless repetitions of an objection which is
necessarily always the same, and one which is always
before your eyes. You would Hke to teU him so, for you
cannot understand how he came not to see that prolonged
kony would have been far more poignant and conclusive
than this alternation of Hony and inferences. But Calvin
is a man of inferences, and he cannot leave them any
length of time in suspense. This would be art or address,
and he does not wish to be clever ; it would be diverting,
and he would not excite laughter even to gam his argu
ment. Nevertheless, it would be difficult not to remark how,
during that period, his writings resemble in kind and tone
those of Luther. Had he, during his stay at Strasburg
and his journeyings in Germany, better understood how
certain classes are to be moved ? Had he inquHed of

204 STYLE OF CALVIN.
Melanchthon the secret of Luther's popularity ? It is stUl
the man of the Christian Institutes who reveals himseH to
us, but in several of his writings of this period under an
entHely new aspect. He was the doctor of divines, or at
least of the learned and serious : he seems now to wish to
become the doctor of the people and of aH. But Hi the
masses there exists a certain instinct which makes them
discern the true nature of every man who leads them :
they know how to remain constant to what is fundamental
in them, the primary element of theH genius, and they
are subject to the influence of that element, even though
for a moment subordinate. Thus, notwithstanding the
witty element infused by Calvin into these writings —
reminding us rather of Luther — it is certain that he con
tinued to be far more influential by his serious works and
the frigid element of his genius. AU felt that the true
Calvin was there, and it was the true Calvin that aU
wished to have, even in France, where a fighter cast of
writing would seemingly have better answered to certain
peculiarities of the national character. Calvin therefore
found out that he had done far better things than coming
down to the level of the mean, — he had raised them to
his own, and this was, in Calvinistic countries, one of the
characteristic features of the Eeformation.

VII.
In this aHeady long fist of his writings during these
four years, we have omitted one work which bears rather
upon the conflicts of the next period. It is time to say
of it a few words, which may serve as an introduction to
the history of those conflicts.
Calvin pubHshed, in 1544, a writing, entitled, To the
Ministers of the Church of Neuchatel, against the fanati
cal and furious Sect of the Libertines who call themselves

THE SPIRITUALS. 205
Spirituals. In an edition of the foHowing year, the
fanatical sect becomes the fantastic sect, an epithet more
exact. The spiritual Libertines proposed to themselves
an end which not only Calvin but every Christian might
deem strange and fantastic, viz. the accommodation of
materialism and the gospel. For this it was necessary
either to materiafise the gospel or to spiritualise material
ism. They had chosen the latter, and hence the name of
Spirituals assumed by them. In assuming it, did they
knowingly deceive ? Here a distinction may be drawn.
Those of Geneva evidently did nothing but seize, as a
matter of tactics, upon a doctrine which sanctioned their
disorderly practices ; nothing in them ever indicates that
they really endeavoured to reconcile the gospel, in which
they had little or no faith, with pantheistic theses, which
were too abstract for them to be at the trouble of investi
gating them philosophically. But the abstract, vague
character of these very theses is a reason for believing in
the sincerity of the leaders of the sect — Coppfil, Quintin,
Perceval, and Pocque — who were speciaHy attacked in this
first writing of Calvin's against their ideas. At bottom,
they did but give to Anabaptism a more phUosophical
form, endeavouring, at the same time, to reconnect it better
with the gospel, but a gospel phHosophized with this in
tention. Many suffered themselves to be deceived. The
queen of Navarre had received Quintin and Pocque as two
persecuted Christians ; and she thought it very wrong
that Calvin should have attacked them. " Madam," he
writes to her, " a dog barks when his master is assaUed ;
and I should be very cowardly H, when I see the truth of
God thus assailed, I was dumb and uttered not a word."
God is everywhere* therefore God is aH : such is the
starting-point of the system. God is the Great SpHit,
but he is also matter, for matter, from aU eternity, is his
envelope. AU the motions of matter are therefore in Him,
all the motions of spirits are equally in Him, for aU spirits

206 THE SPIRITUALS.
are HimseH. There is therefore Hi the world, in reafity,
neither good nor evil, neither truth nor falsehood, for aU
proceeds from the same Being : the Gospel, in this sense,
is divine, but only on the same grounds as any other
doctrine. AU, for the same reason, is common to aU ; for
all is but one body, of which all the parts belong to me,
as weU as to what is caUed another.
Such is the system in which had taken refuge those
who had begun or who began afresh to stand up against
the regimen of Calvin. Not that they had preached at
the outset aU its consequences, or that apparently they
would ever preach them. They would permit theft,
assassination, and the reign of brute force no more than
Calvin ; theH very corruption was a pledge that they did
not intend carrying things so far as to imperil theH pro
perty or theH pleasures. But this system constituted them
the sole judges of the appfications it would suit them to
make of it ; it authorized them to shake off any Hksome
law, whether refigious or civH, and, as to dogmas, to
befieve that only which could agree with such a system of
morafity. Accordingly, Calvin did not wait for great
Hregularities to resist ideas so calculated to induce them.
The writing against the Spirituals belongs to 1 5 44. From
that period, and even before, his preaching and conversa
tion were fuU of the same subject. Some he conjured to
return to sounder notions, — others, the weH-disposed, to
open theH eyes to the danger. But the contagion was
mighty, and Calvin was to have the sorrow of seeing
amongst his adversaries one of those who had most con
tributed to his return, that same Amied Perrin whom we
have seen deputed to visit him and urge his return. To
a party, a phUosophical system is always a source of
strength. Even when little understood by some, and even
repulsed, in reality, by others, it unites theH efforts, fur
nishes motives or pretexts, and justifies to the timid all
that is dared by the boldest. It is an arsenal whence the

TWO GENEVAS. 207
able draw in time of need what they have need of, blend
ing or separating, according to cHcumstances, thought,
and action, quitting the vague or sheltering behind it,
and setting up theH standard or not setting it up, — but
always forming an army.

VIII.
The struggle was therefore about to begin afresh, and
that for nine years. Luther had just faUen asleep in
peace, and Calvin remained at work, condemned to inces
sant conflicts in the very bosom of the camp, which had
been placed by his own hands Hi the centre of the univer
sal battle. Nine years he was every moment on the point
of being — not conquered, for he was not of those who can
be conquered, but — crushed : for nine years it was his to
expect every month and every week to be expeUed from
that city which he was nevertheless continuing to render
illustrious and powerful abroad ; for nine years he guided
Geneva as a vessel on fire which bums the captain's feet
and yet obeys him, and which, Hi combat, is not less for
midable and feared.
It is true that there are at bottom apparently two dis
tinct histories, connected only by the personality of the
man who played the chief part in both. The Geneva of
Calvin and the Geneva of the Libertines are not really
the same. The first was that of aU serious, moral, and
godly men, of aH the exUes who sought for shelter under
the gospel standard, and of aU those who sought for fight,
to bear it afterwards, through fetters and flames, in every
part of Europe ; the second was that of a handful of men
who understood nothing about the first, who prudently
dissembled as to their smaU number, but who did not
even seek to dissemble theH Hregularities under certain
forms of respect for religion and law.

208 TWO GENEVAS.
One day, in the large haU of the Cloisters behind the
cathedral, Calvin was giving his lecture on divinity.
Around his chair hundreds were thronging, and amongst
them numbers of future preachers and future martyrs.
Suddenly they hear outside laughter, cries, and a great
clamour. This proceeds from fifteen or twenty Liber
tines, who, out of hatred to Calvin, are giving a specimen
of theH manners, and of what they call fiberty.
Such is the picture of the two Genevas. One of the
two must of necessity perish.
The history of the one that feU would call upon us to
relate many passages of a like nature, impieties great and
small, aggravated offences against morality, and others
which, though lighter, were aggravated by theH intention;
serious revolts, puerde revolts ; all the restless mobility
of a party which is really devoid of principles, and which,
even when it might be in the right, acts so as to be in
the wrong. In our da)^, some have affected to see in
the Libertines only political Liberals, claiming civil
liberty in opposition to the government, and religious
liberty in opposition to the Consistory and to Calvin.
This is to be ignorant of all the detaHs of the struggle,
and to accord to the Libertines the ideas of the most
prudent and sincere Liberals of the nineteenth century.
It is an anachronism in the first place, for even if honest
and moderate, the Libertines could not have been such.
But were they honest and moderate ? That is the ques
tion ; and it is this which theH history wHl not permit
us to maintain.

IX.
The struggle began, in 1546, on account of Benoite
Ameaux, a woman who was cited before the Consistory
" for several monstrous propositions." These propositions,

THE "AMENDE HONORABLE.'' 209
more monstrous, indeed, in the mouth of a woman than
in another, were pure Anabaptism. She only repeated
what she had been taught by her husband, Pierre
Ameaux, a maker of playing cards, who detested Calvin,
who had prohibited cards; he detested him still more
when they condemned his wife to a few days' imprison
ment, and designated himself as the primary cause of the
offence. One evening, when heated by wine, he gave free
scope to his anger. "Calvin was but a new bishop,
worse than the former ones; the magistrates who sup
ported him were traitors. The true religion was that of
Pierre Ameaux and his friends ; that of Calvin was only
deceit and tyranny." The Consistory had him impri
soned, and the Council condemned him to appear at the
Hotel de ViUe, to ask pardon of God and of the court.
But Calvin knew that a part of the Council had wished
for greater severity, and forthwith, because he deemed
the vote of the majority a dangerous weakness, refused to
accept for refigion and the Church the imperfect satisfac
tion which was offered. If the fault of Ameaux appeared
so slight to the Council, it must be because the Council
considered that Calvin and his colleagues had preached,
as Ameaux said, a false doctrine ; it only remained, there
fore, to bring the pastors to judgment, and the pastors
declared, by Calvin's mouth, that they demanded it.
This was going very far ; it was also establishing a very
dangerous precedent. The Two Hundred, to whom the
CouncH had referred the matter, refused to adopt such a
course, and after much hesitation, condemned Pierre
Ameaux to perform the amende honorable, with a torch
in his hand. The irritation of the party was great, and,
it must be owned, not unfounded ; Calvin had evidently
constrained the Two Hundred. But the government
showed itself decided not to tolerate any Hregularities.
Some Libertines, a few days after, disturbed Calvin's
preaching by entering the church very noisUy ; so a gibbet
o

210 HERESY AND TREASON.
was raised Hi the Place St. Gervais, but happUy it did
service for no one. The warning and the firmness had
sufficed. Blood was to flow the foHowing year.
Amongst the principal Libertines, was Jacques Gruet,
formerly a canon. After having for a whUe professed
the grave and phUosophical unbelief of Quintin, he had
thrown off the mask ; his confidential converse breathed
the grossest infidefity, the most complete contempt of
Christianity, of Christ, and of every sort of faith. It had
long been known, but proofs were wantmg.
One day, in the pulpit of St. Peter's, a note was found
full of abuse against Calvin and his coUeagues. Suspi
cion feU upon Gruet, who had been seen loitering about
the cathedral. He was arrested. A domiciliary visit
led to the discovery of blasphemous writings, and, what
was more, suppfied a clue to a correspondence tending to
betray Geneva to the duke. He was tried, condemned,
and beheaded.
It is unjustly, therefore, that his condemnation has
been represented as a monstrous punishment for the note
to Calvin. The note was only the occasion, and, after
the discoveries which were made, if Gruet had not been
condemned as a blasphemer for his writings, he would
have been condemned as a traitor for his correspondence.
The sentence mentions, the two crimes, and considers
them both as worthy of death. We shaU recur, when
treating of Servetus, to this jurisprudence, the sad in
heritance of the Eomish ages ; but it is right to begin
by clearing Calvin from the unjust, absurd reproach of
having demanded the blood of a man for a petty per
sonal affront, — for a jest, — for Gruet's note, written in
the Savoyard patois, was less an affront than an un
seemly piece of nonsense.
About this time Amied Perrin, the former friend of
Calvin, began to play his pitiful part.

THE CENSORSHIP OF PUBLIC MORALS. 211
His wife was the daughter of Frangois Favre, formerly
a brave soldier and an honourable citizen, but now, says
Bonivard, " old, rich, and stupified by vice." She was
brought before the Consistory on account of a baU given
in contempt of the Ordinances, at which, however, one of
the syndics, Amblard Corne, had been present. The
syndic listened to the remonstrances of Calvin, and even
declared it to be weU that the great should be chastised
like the smaU. The woman would listen to nothing, and
poured forth a torrent of abuse. She was therefore con
demned to a few days' imprisonment. Her father, shortly
after, was also imprisoned,, but for debauchery and adul
tery. Perrin, who had Hkewise been at the baU, had left
the town Hi order not to appear before the Consistory.
Calvin wrote to him, entreating him, in the name of
theH old friendship, to sacrifice his pride to the common
weal, and to imitate the submission of the syndic.
Perrin was touched, and returned to Geneva, where he
endured without resistance a short imprisonment, and
seemed reconcHed to Calvin. This was in May 1546.
In February 1547 Favre was summoned again for
divers acts of debauchery. His friends, and aU the party,
then began to assert that the right of excommunicating
belonged to the CouncH ; the CouncH, which was dis
posed, Hke all governments, to accept every increase of
power, did not repel the idea. This was to subvert the
whole structure of Calvin, and yet it cannot be denied
that the structure itseH contained this element of ruin.
Constantly caHed upon by the Consistory to punish reli
gious misdemeanours with severity, the CouncH, in fact,
pronounced final judgment, since without it, the sentence
was a dead letter ; why not, therefore, if it thought
proper, pronounce judgment before the Consistory, with
out the Consistory ? By agitating this idea, the Liber
tines evidently designed one thing only — to take from
the Consistory the most important of its rights; they

212 PERRIN AGAIN.
yielded that right to the government, in the hope only
that it would not be made use of, and that the main
spring of the Calvinian discipline would remain indefi
nitely relaxed. Calvin, therefore, needed all his energy
to arrest the CouncH on this decfivity. He did not, how
ever, obtain a formal decision Hi favour of the Consis-
torial authority; it was recognised but indHectly, and
even under the form of a rebuke. The Consistory was
prayed, for the future, to be less hasty Hi demanding the
intervention of the CouncH. Easter was at hand, and a
reconcHiation seemed at once desHable and feasible. " It
is advised," says the register, "that the difference and
hatred which exists between the ministers and Captain
Perrin, his wife, and other relatives of the said Favre,
should be settled in an amicable manner ; nevertheless, let
the said Favre be obedient to God and the law, as the
other citizens, and lead the best life he can." The recom
mendation is amusing in its simplicity, and Calvin pro
bably had to do himseH a Httle violence to subscribe a
resolution which supposed a quarrel between equals, a
simple difference, when there had been a condemnation
by the Consistory — the constituted authority. But Cal
vin thought it right to yield; and the register proves
that the reconcHiation took place before the Consistory,
when the ministers uttered to Perrin and his friends,
" not harsh things, but good and amicable remonstrances."
In the month of June, Perrin was sent to France to
negotiate a treaty of commerce. During his absence his
wHe gave fresh cause of complaint ; and on his return in
September, he found her exUed with her father at Pregny,
close to Geneva, but on Bernese territory. Braving
alike Council and Consistory, he resolved to fetch her
back ; and, entering the Council haU in a fury, and to the
interruption of the sittings he exclaimed, that he had ren
dered services enough for them not to suffer his wife to
be punished or his relations either.

FIRMNESS OF CALVIN. 213
This was not the first time that he or his relatives had
claimed impunity, to the subversion alike of republican
and religious equafity. Calvin, in a letter to Farel, relates
to us one of these sad scenes. " If you wiH decidedly not
bear the yoke of Christ," he had said to them, " build for
yourselves somewhere a town where you may live to your
fancy ; but, so long as you are here, you wiU not escape
the laws; and if there were Hi your dwelling as many
diadems as heads, God knows how to retain the mastery."
And such, all through these wretched debates, was his
constant idea. Whether speaking face to face with the
rebels, or expressing to a friend his private thoughts, it is
always from the elevation of his faith, and a lofty sense
of his task, that he judges the men who throw obstacles in
his path. In vain are they formidable as men ; Calvin
sees them and wiU see them to the last, in aU their foolish
littleness ; and it wiU be almost with a jest, that one so
little addicted to pleasantry as he is, wiU speak of their
hatred. " They increase abroad the bickerings we have
had here. At Lyons they have given me out for dead, in
more than twenty ways. True it is that Satan has here
matches enough, but the flame goes out like that of tow.
As to Perrm's abuse, it weighs no more with me than his
personal importance, which is just a little less than a
feather." Thus he wrote about the same time to M. de
Falais. But he had another and a more elevated reason
for not complaining too much of the fife that the Liber
tines led him. He knows, he says, what is " the condition
of the servants of God," who are made for suffering : and
" we have hitherto," adds he, " had too easy a bargain."
Perrin appealed then once more to his services ; but,
besides the Ulegafity of the action, his services proved to
be at this moment rather questionable. He returned
from France with a favourable treaty ; but a rumour was
abroad of very singular parleys between him and Cardinal
Du BeUay. Nothing less had been talked of than that a

214 ANOTHER CRISIS.
troop of horse should be quartered at Geneva, under
Perrin's command, for the defence of the city, and, H need
be, of the French territory in the neighbourhood. This
was to betray Geneva to France. Perrin was therefore
arrested as a traitor. No positive proof could be found ;
and the conviction was besides entertained that he had
been less guHty than presumptuous, thoughtless, and,
above aH, Hl-advised. He was acquitted, but deprived of
his office of captain-general — an office of the greatest
trust, which gave him, in case of war, the command of
the troops for which he was no longer fit.
The Libertines were loud in theH outcries ; others, Hi
great numbers, thought the punishment too mUd. The
CouncUs were divided, and the city was a prey to the
most violent agitation. On the 12th of December the
pastors repaHed to the Hotel de VHle, to show that " a great
deal of insolence, debauchery, dissoluteness, and hatred
was prevalent, to the ruin of the State." On the 16th,
as the CouncH of Two-Hundred was beginning to sit for
the purpose of discussing the measures to be taken, a dis
pute arose between a few members, and it soon became
general, and such menaces were uttered against the pas
tors, especiaUy against Calvin, that some of their friends
ran to beg them not to come. They were at St. Peter's.
Calvin left his coUeagues and went alone to the Hotel de
ViUe, and entered the haH alone The cries were re
doubled, and swords were drawn. Calvin advances into
the midst, cool and impassive, and aH are sHent. "He
knows," he says, "that he is the primary cause of aU these
discords. If they wHl have blood, let them shed his."
The sHence increases, and he continues : "If they decidedly
wish him to be exHed, he wHl exHe himseH. If they wish
to try once more to save Geneva without the gospel, let
them try." At this chaUenge, seconded by aU the recol
lections of the disorder that had reigned during Calvin's
exHe, several of the most Hritated began to reflect. This

CAN THEY BE RECONCILED ? 215
man, whom they can break but not bend, is the centre
and nucleus of the State, at home ; and abroad he is the
State itself, which is personified in him, and great through
him. And has he not just now shown himseH greater
than ever ? Who could be ashamed of yielding to such
a man ? They relent, and oblivion of the past is voted.
Three days after, Calvin reminds them that Christmas is
drawing near, and that they Ought to be able to have
communion together. As for himself, he is desHous of
holding out his hand to Perrin. On his part, Perrin de
clares that he wishes HI to no one, and that he is ready to
live in peace. Perrin was sincere at that moment, and so
probably were many of his party. But, whUe theH prin
ciples remain antagonistic, men cannot long continue
friends.

X.

The calm was therefore only on the surface.
A year after the facts we have related, — and the whole
year, 1548, was very far from passing peaceably, — we
behold Calvin again before the CouncH. He complains
that the citizens, and, among others, Amied Perrin, ab
stain from the Sacrament ; he asks H that was what had
been promised. Is it of him that those citizens complain?
If he, in his turn, were to enumerate his grievances, of
a truth there would be no lack of them. The Libertines
load him with contumely. Some of them caU theH dogs
by his name. When he passes through the streets some
hiss, and others cry Calvin Hi such a manner as to make
it sound Hke Cain. The heads of the party do not these
things themselves, but they provoke them, and, at any
rate, they do nothing to dissuade theH friends from such
a course. He is, however, desHous of asking once more
for a reconciliation, that the Christmas Communion may

216 A NEW PROCLAMATION.
not be profaned by animosities, nor deserted on account of
grudges. The syndics thank him, and promise to do theH
best. A month afterwards, the Libertines had so weU
manoeuvred that Perrin was first-syndic.
All seemed lost ; Calvin alone understood that it was
perhaps a happy event, and, seeing his coUeagues pro
foundly discouraged, he contrived to raise them by the
voice of those very magistrates from whom, it seemed,
they had everything to fear. How did he set to work ?
Did he find means of reclaiming Perrin for a time ? Did
the Libertines, now in authority, pique themselves on
showing that they also could govern and enforce order ?
Had the majority of the CouncH, in spite of the new elec
tions, remained better disposed than was imagined ? Be
that as it may, the proclamation of the 1 8th of January
1549 is one of the most Christian — the most Christian,
perhaps — which had yet been made. Considering "the
great woes which are over all the earth, and which are
certain proofs of the wrath of God against mankind ;"
considering, on the other hand, " that we must give ac
count to him of the people he has committed to our
charge," so that their blood would be requHed of us " if
God, by our fault and negligence, were dishonoured and
His holy ordinances trampled under foot," desirous, in
short, of following the example of the good kings of the
old Church, and also of the Christian princes, lords, and
magistrates who have been guided by the Word of God,"
we declare "to aU our subjects aforesaid, that we are
greatly concerned that the holy admonitions which have
been addressed to them by the Word of God, which is daUy
preached to them, have not been better observed, as was
fitting." One of the causes of this evU is " that the
ministers of God's Word have been negligent, and have
not done their duty in admonishing and reproving." A
strange reproach ! If this proclamation, as is thought, was
the work of Calvin, it was a masterly stroke to recommend

FATAL FOLLY OF MONNET. 217
severity towards the pastors by those who had so often
reproached them for it. A long enumeration follows of
the disorders, on which the Council declares its "wiU" is
to keep a sharp look out. Let aU, therefore, whether
great or smaU, adopt a Christian way of fiving. " Let
fathers of families be diligent in watching over children
and servants ;" let " our officers be vigilant in having our
ordinances observed, without indulging either great or
smaU ; and let the preachers make it their duty to be more
careful and ardent than they have been in teaching, ad
monishing, and reproving vice properly." The reproach
is, therefore, now changed into a formal order to spare
nobody in future.
Sincere or not, the zeal of the CouncH bore fruit. The
clergy took courage. Calvin, in a letter to Viret, states
that all goes on tolerably weU in " spite," he says, " of our
adversaries' efforts." He indulged himseH, therefore, in
no Ulusion, and was perfectly sensible that the old leaven
was stUl there.
This state of comparative calm and order brought out
the more prominently the deplorable foUy of a man who
had also rendered some service formerly, and who had
even during a time of pestilence nobly devoted himseH.
Eaoul Monnet, not satisfied with leading a disorderly fife,
had drawn, or caused to be drawn, a series of licentious
prints, — scenes from Aretini, only too weU rendered, —
and Biblical scenes, basely burlesqued. He called this
coUection his New Testament, carried it everywhere with
him, and took especial pleasure in exhibiting it to young.
men. He was tried and condemned to death. The Liber
tines did not attempt to save him, whether because the
crime appeared too great for them to impficate themselves
in it, or, as Bonivard relates, because Monnet had brought
profligacy and shame into more than one of their homes.
His death was not, therefore, at least visibly, a cause of
irritation.

218 IMPROPER NAMES.
But there remained an abundance of other causes, and
the most foofish of them combined with the most serious.
The ordinances forbade the giving to chHdren, at theH
baptism, certain names to which, Hi the Eomish times, a
superstitious meaning had been attached. Claude pro
mised a long fife ; Balthazar good health, &c. Now, some
of the Libertines bore these names — Claude Geneve, for
instance, and Balthazar Sept. They persisted in giving
them to the chHdren whose sponsors they were ; the clergy
persisted in refusing, and the CouncH, unless it openly
violated the ordinance, was obfiged to decide in favour of
the clergy. Then the Libertines complained that they
were deprived of the right of sponsorship, a right which
they suddenly began to esteem infinitely precious.
It was the same with the right of taking the Sacrament;
and this leads us to one of the most serious incidents of
this long struggle.
Berthefier, the son of the glorious poHtical martyr of
1521, scarcely ever remembered his father except as a title
to impunity. Cited several times before the Consistory,
he had appeared, only to laugh or scoff ; and his ridicule
had been less that of a man than of an Hl-bred school-boy.
It was he who, in 1553, stirred up afresh the great ques
tion of excommunication, which was stUl pending, but
hushed ; he deemed it a propitious moment for inducing
the CouncH to seize upon a right which, tiH then, had been
left to the Consistory, but which, as we have seen, was
contested, and contestable, H there was the least Hl-wHl
against that body.
Berthelier, who had been excommunicated for divers
scandals a few days before the September Communion,
appealed to the CouncH ; and the Council, overruled by
the friends of Berthelier, set aside the sentence, declaring
that H, Hi his conscience, he thought he could communi
cate, he was free to do so. According to our notions at
the present day, nothing could be better : we would have

BERTHELIER AND THE SACRAMENT. 219
the sinner warned, and then leave him to judge for him
seH what he ought or ought not to do. In 1553, at
Geneva, it was a violation both of the letter and the spHit
of the Ordinances, the laws of the State ; it was, moreover,
a deplorable retrogression under the pressure of vice and
infidefity. No one could believe or make others befieve
that the question was to protect an upright conscience
against a timorous intolerance ; and the Council was
granting to the profligate, the mischief-maker, and the
seditious, an authorization to receive the Communion in
spite of the law. Calvin declared, therefore, that he should
not submit, and that whUe he Hved, Berthefier should
not receive the Sacrament. The Council, while it main
tained its decision, arranged that Berthelier should be
privately begged not to appear at church. Berthefier
made no promises, and the report was spread that he
would be at St. Peter's on the morrow, accompanied by a
crowd of friends.
On the morrow, the 3d of September, at the customary
hour, Calvin ascended the pulpit. He perceived in the
audience the insolent group of Libertines, perhaps aHeady
iU at ease because they felt themselves isolated in the
midst of the crowded congregation, and with Calvin there
before them. But he did not seem to see them. As calm
as ever, extemaUyat least, he preached, Hke Farel in 1538,
upon the state of mind with which the Lord's Table ought
to be approached. Then he added — " As for me, so long
as God shaU leave me here, since he hath given me forti
tude, and I have received it from him, I wUl employ it,
whatever betide, and I wHl guide myseH by my Master's
rule, which is to me clear and weU known  As we
are to receive the Lord's Supper, H any one to whom it
has been interdicted by the Consistory should seek to in
trude himseH at this Table, I would certainly show myself,
as long as I live, such as I ought to be."
When the Liturgies were concluded, he came down from

220 CALVIN, FAREL,
the pulpit and blessed the bread and wine. The Liber
tines rose and prepared to approach. Then, covering the
sacred symbols with his hands, he exclaimed — "You may
cut these hands and crush these limbs : my blood is yours
— shed it. But you shall never force me to give holy
things to the profane!" At this action and voice, the
profane paused. They looked at each other — they looked
around. An indignant murmur cHcidated among the
crowd, and, but for the sacredness of the spot, the murmur
would have become an outcry. The voice of the people
was for Calvin. The Libertines hesitated for a moment
longer, and then feU back. The crowd opened a passage
for their retreat, and the Sacrament was administered to
the befievers, who were still agitated, but proud of theH
pastor and rejoicing in his victory.
He expected to be banished, and openly said so in his
afternoon sermon. " It was perhaps for the last trine,"
he said, " that he was speaking to the people of Geneva.
Firmly resolved to do nothing that is not according to
the wiU of God, he wUl nevertheless stay as long as he
can make his voice heard ; but H he be compeUed to hold
his peace, he wUl depart." He had taken for his text the
fine passage of St. Paul's fareweU to the Ephesians. He
repeated, in the midst of his weeping congregation, the
apostle's words : " I commend you to God, and to the
word of his grace," and went home to await the decree of
exHe. The decree did not come, and he soon perceived that,
on the contrary, his position was improved. Men always
gain by courage, and he had besides obtained that the
Libertines should be confronted with the people — the true
people — who were already weary of theH pretensions, their
revolts, and of theH contempt for aU that was not them
selves. This separation between the Libertines and the
people was about to become rapidly more decided. It
became more and more manifest that their numbers were

AND THE LIBERTINES. 221
smaU, that they were less a party than a faction, and that,
in spite of the honoured Genevese names borne by a few,
the Genevese nation was elsewhere.
Farel also had his triumph. He had come from Neu
chatel to replace Calvin, and also, it must be said, to be
present at the death of Servetus, for the trial of Servetus,
which began in August, was mixed up with aU that we
have been narrating. In one of his sermons he did not
spare the Libertines, even calling them Atheists — whether
alluding to the Pantheism of a few, or merely to theH fife
without God and without faith. The Libertines imme
diately made an outcry, and the CouncH intimated to
Farel, who had already returned to his church, that he
must come and answer to that whereof he was accused.
The Neuchatel magistrates wished to keep him back. He
set off, however, and arrived at Geneva. Scarcely had he
entered the city when he was recognised by some of the
Libertines, who insulted him, and talked of throwing him
into the Eh6ne. "Just so," said he to them, "did the
priests and Papists clamour twenty years ago !" HappUy,
he was not the only one who remembered what he had
then done for Geneva. People came thronging to the
rescue ; the Libertines were dispersed, and a numerous
train accompanied him to Calvin's abode. The day after
the morrow — the CouncH having summoned him — great
numbers of citizens surrounded the Hotel deVille,and a few,
in the name of all, demanded an audience. They came,
we are told by the register of the Company of Pastors,
"to oppose those who had made complaint of Master
Farel." No head of a family, said they, had taken part
in those complaints, and, as for them, they esteemed Farel
a good and true servant of God. " Whereupon it was
ordered," continues the same register, " that the said
Master Farel should be acknowledged a true pastor, as he
had ever been, and it was declared that he had faithfully
preached and discharged his office. He was also caUed

222 DISORDERS.
Father by several, as having begotten them to our Lord,
and as the first who organised the Church here. AU this
was a great comfort to the chHdren of God and confusion
to the wicked." Calvin's authority increased aU the more.
Near or absent, in bad times and in good, he had never dis
tinguished his own cause from that of his old coUeague.
The Libertines had attacked him Hi Farel, and he, there
fore, having been already a conqueror Hi September,
conquered anew, Hi November, with Farel.

XI.

He could, consequently, without risk of appearing weak,
lend himself to the fresh efforts which the CouncH was
going to make to put an end to divisions. It seemed for
a moment — in January 1554 — as if this end was aHeady
attained. Berthefier and his party had apparently relented
a Httle. It was decided once more that " byegones should
be byegones,"1 and that for the future there should be "good
and firm union amongst aH." But Berthefier, when en
treated by the CouncH to recognise at least that there had
been serious causes of complaint against him, positively re
fused. Then, as at a signal given, aU began again — the up
roar, theorgies, and the Hregularities of every kind which
had become inseparably allied with the movements of
this wretched party. The leaders discussed the subject of
excommunication, and at times they might have been
taken for serious people ; the rest were in taverns singing
impious songs, — and what they sang aloud they knew was
sung softly by theH chiefs. Some of the more boisterous
were imprisoned, but theH friends obtained leave to visit
them, and the prison became the scene of scandalous re
velling. This was put a stop to. At last, Hi October,
upon new entreaties, Berthefier consented to make peace ;
1 Tout serait mis sous les pieds.

AND MURMURS. 223
and, three months afterwards, Hi January, Calvin obtained
from the Councils a declaration of the rights of the Con
sistory. But Berthefier had yielded for a moment, only the
better to conceal his projects and those of the party.
Petty revolts had come to nothing, so they determined on
getting up one on a large scale.
The pretext was ready, and even tolerably specious.
The ever-increasing majority which stood out against the
Libertines, counted in its ranks many new-comers,. French
or Itafians. The Libertines were nearly aU old Genevese.
Was it natural — was it just — that the new comers should
lay down the law to the chUdren of the land ?
Some writers of our day have put the question Hi the
same terms. Does history authorise them to do it ? We
have aHeady rectified one of theH errors — that of con
sidering the Libertines as men of principle, true patriots,
and true friends of Genevese freedom. Though the sub
ject and Hmits of this work have compeUed us to omit
many things, those which we have aHeady related suffice,
we think, abundantly to prove the contrary.
Here another error encounters us. The Libertines
were old Genevese, it is true ; but, in the first place, were
they the majority of the nation ? Everything indicates
rather that they were, especiaUy towards the end, but
few, and very few; and it is easy to understand that
theH conduct had afienated from them many who had at
first been seduced by the liberal ideas of which they pre
tended to be the apostles. The refugees came, therefore,
to the succour of a real majority, which, though consider
able, was harrassed by a turbulent and unbridled mino
rity. This is, however, a merely secondary consideration ;
the true question is now to be stated.
Geneva must necessarily either resign herseH to be
nothing, or to be — and that with ever-growing complete
ness — what the Eeformation had made her. We have

224 WHO ARE CITIZENS ?
seen this already. A Geneva given up to the Libertines,
would have been a Geneva soon reconquered by her for
mer Eomish masters, or a Geneva voluntarily led back to
Eome by corruption and anarchy. It is not without
reason that Eomish writers are so indulgent to the Liber
tines, and so indignant at the severity of Calvin. What
would they not Have said, on the other side, H Calvin had
tolerated such disorders ? What reflections would have
been made upon the Eeformation which opened the door
to every vice ! But Calvin threw himseH courageously
into the breach. Calvin saved Geneva and the Eeforma
tion, and therefore Calvin was a despot and a tyrant, and
the Libertines his victims. It is true that these same
writers do not, for aU this, abandon theH other thesis —
that the Eeformation and disorder necessarily went hand
in hand. The refugees, according to them, were the
scum of Europe ; and the indulgence that Calvin would
not show -the Libertines, he reserved for these men of
bad character who come in aid of his despotism. Some
such there were indeed, as in every emigration there wUl
be ; but how do we know the fact ? Precisely from the
complaints of Calvin, and his ardour Hi freeing Geneva
from theH presence. Never was there a man less open to
the accusation of having divers weights and divers mea
sures. If, then, the true citizen of a country is not he who is
born Hi that country, but the man who, whether a citizen
by bHth or not, understands the conditions of its national
existence and grandeur, and therefore labours and combats,
perseveres, loves, and devotes himself — certainly the re
fugees were citizens of Geneva, and Geneva had none
better. Farel was not legaUy a citizen, though the true
•representatives of Geneva, the true friends of the Church
and of the country had just saluted him with the name
of father ; neither was Calvin, the greatest of aH, for he
only received the title of citizen Ha 1559, five years before

STRANGERS AT GENEVA. 225
his death. What matter ! Before they were recognised as
such by the laws of the land, they were citizens in virtue
of another law- — the gospel, which was also the law of the
land, and the supreme law. Here was the bond of union
and the unity. History offers, perhaps, no example of so
rapid and so complete an absorption of nationalities and
of character. Men came to Geneva, not only as to a city
of refuge, but as to their native land, to which they would
do homage by aU they had endured in other countries for
the same cause.
Such were the men whom the Libertines were indig
nant to see multiplying in Geneva. They saw in them
only the agents of Calvin ; they understood nothing of
the pious heroism which had made them quit castles and
estates to become the simple subjects of a petty Bepubfic,
and to submit to those stern Ordinances which the citizens
themselves refused. They lavished upon them raillery
and insult. " They shamefuUy outrage," Calvin writes in
November 1553, "the exHes of Christ." Those who had
saved no part of their fortune, were reproached by the
Libertines for eating the bread of hospitality ; or, if they
gamed their Hvelihood by labour, the Libertines endea
voured to stir up against them the Genevese workmen
and traders. Those of them who had brought theH
money with them were represented as coming to buy
over or to betray the Eepublic. In AprU 1553, Amied
Perrin had demanded that their Weapons should be taken
away, with the exception of theH swords, which they
were not to wear in public. In July 1554, he demanded
that even their swords should be taken away. They had
formed, he said, the project of delivering Geneva up to
the King of France, and Henry II. himself had revealed
the plot in a letter to the Council of Berne. The re
fugees were stirred up. The accusation was not only
false but absurd: To deliver up Geneva to that Henry
II. who was bathing himself in the blood of their breth-
p

226 NATURALIZATIONS.
ren, and to that Queen Catherine who had brought with
her into France all the perfidy and cruelty of the courts
of her native land ! Perrin was called upon to produce
his proofs. The syndic Lambert, the brother of the mar
tyr of Chambery, reminded him, before the CouncH of
the Two Hundred, that he had been less scrupulous,
seven years before, when he had wished to lodge in the
city two hundred horsemen in the pay of the King of
France. He concluded that Geneva should continue, to
offer abundant hospitality to the exiles, and that the free
dom of the city should be granted to many more than
heretofore, since only eighty had received it within the
last five years, and Geneva had everything to gain by
enriching herself with such citizens.
About sixty were received citizens during the early
part of 1555, and, could syndic Lambert have returned
to the world a century later, he would have recognised
with joy, amongst the most iUustrious and honourable
names of Geneva, a large proportion of those sixty, or of
the preceding eighty. On the 13th of May, the Liber
tines, by the instrumentality of two of their party, com
plained of these numerous admissions, but the CouncH
did not listen to them. On the 15th and 16th there
were fresh complaints. The people, they said, might
well at last bestir themselves. The Council ordered an
inquiry. The Libertines did not await the result.
On the 1 8th of May, in the evening, Berthelier, Perrin,
and two other heads of the party, met Hi a tavern with a
certain number of " brawling companions," as Bonivard
says. " After their tongue," he continues, " had performed
its part, wine provoked their feet and hands to do theH
part. Perrin, however, had not yet made up his mind.
They excited and flattered him, saying that the people
reckoned upon him, and that it was he whom they ex-

SEDITIONS. 227
pected to see at the head of the movement. He yielded,
and started, and soon the revolt was Hi full career.
It was not for long. The insurgents found nowhere
the support which they had hoped for. In vain did they
have it proclaimed that the refugees were going to sack
the town ; the burghers stirred not ; or, if they did, it
was to join the ranks of the friends of order. There
were, however, a few murderous encounters, but nowhere
any approach to the success of the revolt. The troops
swept down aU that offered resistance, and took all that
they could take, and then aU was over.
The Libertines seemed to have endeavoured beforehand
to merit no indulgence, and they met with none. Seve
ral heads fell beneath the axe. Amongst others, that of
a brother of Berthelier. Perrin's would also have fallen,
had he not succeeded in escaping. Others also had fled,
and the rest were banished.
It is always painful to register executions ; we should
prefer having only to chronicle amnesties and pardons.
But could Geneva in 1555 realize our ideal? Even had
the laws and manners of the times permitted her to be
clement, could she have been so in this instance, without
condemning herself to pass anew through all the woes of
the last nine years ? The Libertines had done every
thing to make it irnpossible for her to do anything but
orush them, if she did not wish to perish after a long
agony, by theH system and their disorders.
For the rest, the survivors gave men but little cause
to regret the dead. Taking refuge on the Bernese terri
tory, and almost at the gates of Geneva, more than once
their vengeance fell upon some inoffensive citizen ; and
it became necessary to request that Berne should oblige
them to establish themselves farther off. They then
excited the Bernese government to solicit theH return,
and next openly to insist upon it, making itself the judge
between Geneva and the exiles. After this, the republic

228 THE BANISHED LIBERTINES.
had only to resign itseH to be the vassal and then the
subject of Berne. To avert the storm, much firmness
and also much prudence were requisite ; for Berne was
mighty, and had no affection for Geneva. It was Calvin
who conducted the negotiation. Berne gave up her
encroaching pretensions ; and the Libertines, having no
more to hope from that quarter, sought elsewhere. They
turned every thing to account against Geneva. In 1563,
the magistrates were informed that the Duke of Savoy
was preparing a sudden attack on Geneva, and there was
certain proof that it was the banished Libertines who
had counselled and arranged the business. They had
received money from the duke ; they had reserved for
themselves the piUage of a certain number of houses;
and, H the enterprize faded, as they would no longer be
able to remain upon the territory of the Bernese, — the
allies of Geneva, — they were to receive estates in Savoy.
The city was immediately put in a state of defence, and
was not attacked, and the Libertines only gained the
infamy of having sold themselves to the two great enemies
of their native land, — the Duke of Savoy and the Pope.
Calvin requested the CouncH to order a fast and thanksgiv
ing. The fast was held, and the nation was unanimous
in thanking God for this new deliverance. ThHty-nine
years later, in the famous affair of the Escalade, which
was so nearly the grave of Geneva, traces were still found
of this wretched party, which was ever ready to make
common cause with the enemies of Geneva and of the
Eeformation. We know the bitterness which, the vexa
tions of exile may produce, even in a noble soul, and in
one which has been fostered in the purest patriotism:
the Libertines woidd not have been the first whom this
bitterness had brought to hate the country once so loved.
But honestly, does the history of their former conduct
authorize us to rank them amongst the honourable
banished ? And even if theH cause had been what they

CALVIN'S BURDENS. 229
pretended, what had they done as men, which did not
show them incapable of understanding it, and unworthy
to support it ?

XII.

But to return. We must not, for the present, go be
yond the exile of the Libertines in May 1555. This
closes, in the fife of Calvin, the new period of which we
saw the commencement Hi 1546. We have gone over
the ground as respects politics ; let us now resume it as
respects religion, which, unhappUy, bordered much too
closely upon the former.
There is a remark, which it is scarcely possible not to
make at each new detaU of the protracted struggle which
we have been sketching. What must have been the
state of mind and soul of a man involved in that whHl-
wind, shattered by all those shocks, and perpetually im
plicated in the pettiest, as weU as in the greatest matters ?
This last point is especially noteworthy. In great con
tests, it is easy enough to remain calm and master of
oneseff ; — the very importance of the struggle, and the
lofty part you perform, help you to sustain yourseH with
proper dignity. But to have at once the conduct of the
war and the care of the most paltry detaHs, — to combat
the lion, and to be assailed, at the same trine, by swarms
of flies, is enough to sour and exasperate the mUdest of
men, how much more, then, one by nature irritable and
ardent. Moreover, in this world, everything has a ten
dency to wear out, even the fortitude of a Calvin. The
same man whom we saw, in the early part of the struggle,
so heartily despising the fury of his adversaries, we shall
see, a few years later, experience brief but painful mo
ments of exhaustion. " It were better for me," he wrote
to Wolff in 1555, "to be burned once for aU by the

230 TRIALS AND TOILS.
papist, than to be thus 'incessantly tortured by these
people. . . . Only one thing supports me in this
hard service ; it is that death wHl soon come and give
me my discharge." Choose, then, any one day Hi the
course of these nine years, and go to Geneva to see Cal
vin. You are come for the Eeformer, for the man whose
name fills Europe, and you wiU certainly find him ; but
do you know what you wUl also find ? A man who is
hunted by the most ignoble vexations, and whom some
annoy at their pleasure by the grossest petty insults.
Accompany him through the streets, and you wiU hear
the hisses of which he has spoken to you. The dog
which has just run between his legs is caUed back by his
master crying out, " Calvin !" The animal obeys, for
that is his name. While he is crossing the bridge, he is
almost thrown down by three worthless feUows, who pre
tend not to see him, just as Perrin's wHe, when riding
out of town on horseback yesterday, knocked down
another pastor, who narrowly escaped with his fife.
Walk some evening under his window, and it will be a
wonder if you do not meet some drunken Libertine,
bawling out some insult, or singing some infamous ditty.
Last Thursday, in the Consistory, he had to endure the
sarcasms of some youth, or man, or woman, or girl, who
wUl indeed be sent to prison, but who has sworn to do the
same again. Next Thursday he wiU hear as bad, H not
worse. And all this is but the mere accompaniment of
the most serious anxieties at home and abroad, — the
meditations of the writer, — the care of immense corre
spondence, — the fatigues of the pastor and the preacher,
— the sufferings, in short, and the agony of the sick man;
for we know what was endured physically by that head
so worn with travaH. The bare thought of it aU • brings
on a sensation of giddiness ; yet it must be thought of if
we would not be unjust towards him whose irritated
nerves caused him more than once to write or to do

SICKNESS OF IDELETTE. 231
what we should have preferred he had neither written
nor done.
Add, finaUy, the painful isolation in which he was left
by his wife's death in 154.9.
We quitted her just as she had lost the thHd and last
of the chHdren she bore him. Her health, which was
always delicate, was shattered by these repeated blows,
and her last years were passed in a state of langour and
suffering, of which the melancholy expression may be
traced in the Eeformer's letters. Now he takes leave of
Madame de Falais in the name of his wife, " who is lying
sick in bed;" now he offers her the salutations of "a
woman raised up again to life." Elsewhere, he asks for
the prayers of his friends. " Salute thy wife," he writes
to Viret, " mine is her sad companion in the langours of
sickness. I dread a fatal termination. But have we not
enough with the many evils which menace us at present ?
The Lord wUl perhaps show us a more favourable coun
tenance." The learned physician, Benoit Textor, multi
plied the counsels of his solicitude at Idelette 's bedside ;
but the succours of his art were unavailing ; and the Ee
former, who has been a witness of the care lavished by
him on his helpmate, wUl piously remember it one day,
by dedicating to Textor his Commentary on the Second
Epistle to the Thessalonians.
In the early part of April 1549, Idelette's condition
became worse. Calvin's friends, Beza, Hotman, Des
GaUars, and Laurent de Normandie, foreseeing the be
reavement at hand, hastened to him. Detached from the
world, which she had learned " to use as not abusing it,"
Idelette was no longer held to earth except by her solici
tude as to the fate of her children by her first husband.
But either because of some delicate scruple, or of her
eminent faith, she kept silence as to her maternal anxiety.
A female friend pressing her to speak on the subject to
her husband : "Why should I?" she answered. "That

232 DEATH OF IDELETTE.
which is important, is, that they should be brought up
aright. ... If they are vHtuous, they wiU find in him a
father ; and if they were not, why should I have com
mended them to him ?" In a last conversation, Calvin,
anticipating her secret thoughts, promised her to treat
them as his own chHdren. " I have already commended
them to God," she said. — " But that," he replied, " does
not prevent my taking care of them likewise." — " I know
weU," she rejoined, " that thou wUt not abandon those
whom I have confided to the Lord." Tranquil on this
subject, she beheld death approach with serenity. The
fortitude of her soul never faltered in the midst of her
sufferings, which were intermingled with continued swoons.
In default of words, her look, her gestures, and her coun
tenance expressed the faith which sustained her to the
last. On the morning of the 6th of April, the mmister
Bourgoin addressed her with pious exhortations. She
showed her interest in them by ejaculations which were
interrupted but earnest, and seemed like the anticipations
of a flight to heaven. " 0 glorious resurrection ! . . . .
0 God of Abraham and of our fathers !...." At seven
o'clock, she had another fainting fit, and feeling that her
voice was about to fad her, she said : " Pray, my friends,
pray for me !" Calvin drew near, and by her looks
she expressed her joy. With troubled accents, he spoke
to her of the grace of Christ, of the earthly pdgrimage,
and of the certainty of a blessed eternity, and ended by
a fervent prayer. She followed these words in spHit and
showed herseH attentive to the holy doctrine. Towards nine
o'clock she expired, but so peaceftdly that it was not known
at first, whether she was asleep, or had ceased to breathe.
Such is the narrative transmitted by Calvin himseH to
Farel and Viret, and terminated by a sad recurrence to
himseH, now condemned to the soHtariness of a widower's
life. " I have lost," he says to Viret, " the excellent com
panion of my life, who would never have quitted me,

ITS EFFECTS UPON CALVIN. 233
either in exile, in misery or in death. She was a pre
cious help to me, and never occupied with self. ... I
repress my grief as much as I can ; my friends do their
duty ; they and I, however, make but little way. Thou
knowest the tenderness of my heart, not to say its weak
ness. I should succumb H I did not make great efforts
to conquer my affliction." The letter to Farel is not less
touching. " Adieu, then, dear and weU-beloved brother ;
may God guide thee by his Spirit, and help me in my
trial. I should not have resisted this blow, had he not
stretched out his hand to me from heaven. It is he who
raiseth up the downcast heart, and who confirmeth the
feeble knees." Calvin, however, had the strength to fulfil
all the duties of his ministry ; and his fortitude, in the
midst of his tears, excited the admiration of his friends.
But the remembrance of her whom he had lost was never
effaced from his heart ; though stiU young, he never
formed other ties, and he never pronounced the name of
Idelette but with profound regard for her virtues, and
with tender respect for her memory.
Never was homage more legitimate — never were regrets
more deserved. In losing Idelette de Bure, Calvin not
only lost the companion of his ministry and Hfe — he also
lost a virtue. If the mission of the Christian woman is
to console and bless, to remind men of the rights of
charity' — too much neglected Ha ages of revolution — none
were worthier than Idelette to carry out this mission at
the Eeformer's side. Often sick and morose, and soured
by the resistance of men and things which bend but
slowly to the designs of genius, Calvin lost too early those
domestic affections for which he was so well calculated,
and of which he experienced the salutary influence only
for nine years. Many a time, doubtless, during those
years of heroic conflict and of secret despondency, of
which his correspondence reproduces the phases, he re
gained his calmness by the side of the courageous and

234 DISPUTES WITH CASTALIO.
gentle woman who made no compromise with duty.
Many a time, perhaps, he was tempered and softened by
one of those words which come from the heart, and of
which woman possesses the secret ! And when, at length,
in gloomier days, the controversy of opinions commingled
with the shock of parties, raised up Bolsec, Servetus, and
Gentifis, who can say how much the Eeformer was in
want of the counsels and kindly influence of Idelette de
Bure?

XIII.
It would be rash to insist too much upon this last idea,
for the blame attached to Calvin is not of a nature which
a supposition, however plausible, can suffice to efface.
Yet one thing remains — I mean that the mournful facts,
the remembrance of which is associated with the names
of Bolsec, Servetus, and Gentifis, were aU posterior to the
death of Idelette. Another name, that of Castafio, has
often been pronounced as equaUy reviving the memory of
Calvin's intolerance. Now, the disputes with Castafio took
place at two several times, once before and once after
1549, and it was Hi reafity only on the second occasion
that Calvin was harsh, violent, and unjust. In 1544, he
had only opposed the nomination of Castafio to the pas
toral office at Geneva, because he professed certain new
opinions in reference to the Canticles, Christ's descent
into heU, &c. He had even given him, in the name of
the company, a certificate attesting that they excluded
him with regret, in view of his merit, his zeal, and the
services which he had rendered to the coUege Ha his
capacity as tutor. This proceeding, which was unusuaUy
mdd for that epoch, did not prevent Castafio from bearing
a grudge against Calvin, to such an extent, indeed, that
he interrupted him one day in the midst of his sermon.

BOLSEC. 235
Calvin had him censured, and surely it was the slightest
penalty that could be inflicted upon a disturber of public
worship ; but nothing more was done. Castafio had
voluntarily laid down his tutorial functions, and he with
drew voluntarily to Basle, and it is there we shaU meet
with him again, though it was ten years later, unjustly
and violently attacked by Calvin for having protested
against the execution of Servetus.
, Let us now pass from 1544 to 1551, and come to the
banishment of Bolsec.
The more we have studied this matter, the more ap
parent to us is the true motive of the importance that
has been attached to it — it is not Bolsec himself, but his
book against Calvin that has excited so much interest on
the part of Calvin's enemies. Not that we in anywise
pretend to approve of the Eeformer's extreme harshness
towards him — we have already sufficiently explained our
way of thinking on that point, and it is not to be ex
pected that we should reiterate it at length on every
occasion. But, after aU, Bolsec was neither burned alive
nor beheaded — Bolsec was only expeUed ; and the execu
tion of Servetus, which has been made so much of, ought
at least to make the condemnation of Bolsec appear rela
tively mild. But whatever the cost, must not a pedestal
be raised for him whose slanders are repeated with so
much complacency ?
Jerome Bolsec had been a Carmefite at Paris. Having
been denounced for certain sermons which savoured of the
Reformed doctrine, he had been obliged to leave France,
and had taken refuge at Ferrara. After divers journey-
ings, he came to Geneva, not as a divine, but as a physi
cian. Soon, however, he began to occupy himself with
theology, and it became known that his opinions on some
points, especially on predestination, were not those of the
Genevan theology. The Company had him brought before
them. He, promised to keep silence, and, during several

236 BOLSEC.
months, the registers make no mention of him. On the
16 th of October, at the Thursday sermon — having heard
the Calvinistic doctrine of predestination expounded Hi
aU its severity — he spoke very warmly. It was, he said,
not merely an error, but a heresy, and he would prove it
when they liked. Calvin, with no less warmth, took up
the accusation ; and one of the witnesses of the scene —
the deputy Lieutenant of Pofice — " seeing," the register
says, " the scandal that the said Master Jerome had caused
in the Church, had him taken to prison." The pastors
assembled that very day, and decided on having a con
ference before the CouncU with Bolsec. This conference
took place. Bolsec defended himself ably, and, more than
once, it was Calvin who had to defend himseH, especiaUy
when Bolsec had developed the idea that his doctrine
tended to make God the author of evU. Calvin repro
duced with much vigour what he had aHeady often ad
vanced in reply to a reproach which was unhappUy not
unfounded. The discussion lasted two days. The CouncH was
greatly embarrassed. Not that it hesitated about pro
nouncing Calvin right, but because Bolsec's arguments
did not appear so very bad as to caU for a severe condem
nation. The Swiss Churches were therefore written to for
theH opinion. WhHst waiting for the answers, the CouncU
would have released the prisoner, upon bad, however ; and
Bolsec remained in prison only because no one came for
ward to be surety for him.
The Church of Zurich counselled severity ; Berne and
Basle, indulgence. The sentence, which was pronounced
the 18th of December, though apparently very severe, is
reaUy very mUd. Bolsec, as we have aHeady said, was
condemned to leave Geneva, never to return. Observe :
he was not even a Genevese and expeUed from his native
land, but a foreigner, who had not been settled a year in
the country. Did Calvin ask for a heavier penalty?

HIS BANISHMENT. 237
There is nothing in the trial to indicate it, and a few days
after the condemnation, in a letter to Bullinger, Calvin
exclaims : — " Calumnious people have spread the report
that we were desirous of a severer punishment, and it has
been foofishly believed." Now, Calvin never dissembled
when he was severe ; and if he declared here that he de-
sHed nothing but banishment, it is because it was true ;
and we may all the more believe him that we shall see
him at the same time, very frank in his expression of
horror at Bolsec's opinions. That was a sad letter in
which he broke off with his old friend, M. de Falais, who
was gudty of not being horrified with Bolsec in the same
degree. He would rather " a hundred times be a papist,"
he says, "than Bolsec or Castafio." This is what the
Reformer could write ; and it is an afflicting page in the
history of the human heart. But we were upon a ques
tion of fact ; let us not quit it. The name of Bolsec has
been eriiployed against the Reformer, as that of a martyr,
— and the fact is that Bolsec was simply expeUed from
Geneva. As to those who are indignant that Bolsec should
even have been banished, we know not what to say to
them, unless that they are completely ignorant how the
question stood in regard to the Eeformation and to
Geneva, — especially to Geneva. To wish that she had
opened her gates to aU the variations and daring flights
of religious thought, is to wish that that great lever, the
Reformation, had without a fulcrum IHted the world. If
Bolsec had been treated more severely, he would not have
been any the more excusable for having written the book
which has made his reputation with Calvin's enemies.
That anger should have dictated to him violent pages,
would readily have been pardoned in a man to whom
Calvin had been so imperious and bitter ; but six-and-
twenty years after the quarrel, and thirteen years after
Calvin's death, to publish that abominable libel which he
gave for the history " of the life, manners, acts, doctrine,

238 bolsec's calumnies.
and death" of the Reformer, is to go far beyond what may
be pardoned to the most righteous resentment. The
ex-monk had become a Eomanist again, and wished to
purchase a welcome amongst his former brethren ; and
nothing seemed better for this purpose than to immolate
Calvin under the basest stigmas. But there are men yet
more guHty than Bolsec, and they are those who continue
to borrow from his book, and who compel serious historians,
Eomanists as weU as Protestants, to tell them that they
lie. Already in the sixteenth century, Papyre Masson
and Eaemond, the ardent enemies of Calvin, declared
false aU that Bolsec had said of his morals. In the seven
teenth century Maimburg, in his History of Calvinism,
openly rendered the Eeformer the same homage, and the
grave Elfies Du Pin advised the Eomanists no longer to
" lacerate his person with such tales." Tales they were
in fact, in the full meaning of the word ; for Bolsec gene
rally did not take the trouble to give even the semblance
of truth to his narratives ; and sometimes it would seem
that he only sought, by way of amusement, to imitate the
liar, who is even more clumsy than bold. Who could
imagine, for instance, that he could have dreamed of re
presenting Calvin, — the " great faster," as Baeniond calls
him, — as an insatiable eater, for whom the most delicate
morsels in the market were monopolized ? All the book
is of the same calibre. It is hatred, verging, we wUl not
say upon delirium, but upon stupidity ; and we will refer
once more for the details to the writer who has had the
patience to refute them one by one, and that is Drelin-
court.

XIV.
Bolsec leads us to Servetus, but by a road very different
from that taken by the accusers of Calvin in this matter.

SERVETUS AND CALVIN. 239
In this very book, in fact, in which the Eeformer is
torn piecemeal, Bolsec, speaking of Servetus, declares that
he experienced " no regret at the death of so monstrous
a heretic." Servetus, adds he, was " unworthy to converse
with men ;" and as for himself, he would wish that " aU
his like were exterminated, and the Church of our Lord
weU purged of such vermin." Thus, we find the most
ardent of Calvin's enemies, the one who seemed to think
that Calvin would willingly have sent him to the stake,
Bolsec, in short, interrupting his calumnious pages to
declare that in his view the death of Servetus was just !
Hence comes the conclusion which we shall see arise out
of aU the facts relating to this melancholy affair, — namely,
that it is a great anachronism to charge Calvin with this
fault, as though it was his own, and one with which his
own age might have reproached him. Lament that he
had an opportunity to commit it ; blame him for having
committed it with the bitter zeal which is always and in
all things to be condemned ; but to accuse him alone of
it, when all his friends, including the mild Melanchthon ;
all his enemies, with the exception of Castafio, but includ
ing Bolsec, and the whole sixteenth century, Ha short,
approved, and, in some sort, committed it with him, — is
to sacrifice him to the ideas of the nineteenth century, as
Servetus was sacrified to the ideas of the sixteenth. But
when this sacrifice of Calvin is demanded by Eomish
writers ; when those who testify so much horror before
the stake of Servetus, are those who experience none
before the thHty or forty thousand fires which' were
kindled by the Church of Eome in the same century, — -
we will no longer say, where is justice, but the most com
mon honesty and the most ordinary decency ?

240 SERVETUS.

XV

We left Servetus at Paris, in 1534, demanding of Cal
vin a conference which did not take place, Servetus not
making his appearance.
Servetus was born in Spain in 1509 ; he was sent into
France by his father, who feared that he might incur the
severities of the Inquisition, and was converted at Toulouse
to the new ideas of which he had aHeady had a gfimpse
in Spam. He blended in his studies, law, physic, and
divinity, and brought to them all, the juvenile ardour
which may be equaUy admired as generous and courage
ous, or condemned as pride, imprudence, and rashness.
Toiling like one of the sixteenth century, and daring as
one of the eighteenth, he pried into everything. In his
first work against the Trinity, and in the fifth book, there
is a passage which was unheeded by his contemporaries,
but which contains the whole theory of the cHculation of
the blood.
Already the author of two works, we find him in 1535,
as a simple corrector for the press, but publishing with
notes, an edition of "Ptolemy's Geography." In 1537,
he taught at Paris, with success, geography, mathematics,
and even astrology, which drew upon him a denunciation
from the Sorbonne, and a sentence from the Parliament.
We find him at length settled as a medical practitioner
in the neighbourhood of Lyons, and then at Vienne in
Dauphiny. He was there when he entered into relations with Cal
vin. Hunted by the idea that the Eeformers had stopped
too soon, and that Christianity, Hi order to become true
again, needed a restoration deeper and far more complete,
he hoped to induce Calvin to place himself at the head of
the work thus resumed. This was to misunderstand the
man ; and, besides, even if he had been of a spirit more

VIEWS OF SERVETUS. 241
pliable, it was to ask much to wish from him a declara
tion, that tUl then he had only half taught a reformation.
Moreover, what Servetus asked was not merely a modifi
cation of the formula of such or such a doctrine : — ana
baptist pantheism lay at the basis, and Calvin was very
right in considermg such a basis subversive of even those
things which Servetus stiU respected. Thus, as was shown
by the trial, and as had been already shown by the writ
ings which Servetus produced during his correspondence
with Calvin, his objections against the Trinity flowed from
his pantheistic theory. If, for the general public and for
history, the dispute is concentrated upon the field of this
doctrine, it is because it is natural that a general theory
should be resumed and embodied, at each epoch, in a
special question, and that which brings most into play
the sympathies and antipathies of the moment. Panthe
ism, in our day, is often taught or combated on the
ground of social questions ; between Calvin and Servetus,
it was on the ground of dogma. Therefore, even if we
were disposed to grant dogmatically less importance than
Calvin conceded to the question of the Trinity, we must
yet admit that Calvin was right in perceiving, in the
system and method of Servetus, the subversion of Chris
tianity. No Christian, not even the most latitudinarian,
would judge otherwise H a new Servetus were to arise,
he would only need such a conversation as Calvin relates
having had, one day, before the CouncH, with the Spanish
heretic. "What!" said Calvin, "H one were to strike
this pavement with his foot, and to say that he is tramp
ling upon thy God, wouldst thou not be horrified at having
subjected the majesty of God to such opprobrium ?" —
Then Servetus said, " I have no doubt that this bench,
this cupboard and aH that can be shown me, are the sub
stance of God." — And, again, when it was objected to him
that according to him, therefore, even the devil would be

242 SERVETUS AND CALVIN.
substantially God, he replied laughing : "Do you doubt
it ? AU things are part and parcel of God."
This is what the Eeformer saw or suspected seven
years before, in the correspondence of Servetus ; and it
was this which dictated, in 1546, his celebrated letter to
Viret. " Servetus," he said, " has sent me lately a thick
manuscript of his reveries, informing me with incredible
arrogance, that I should there see astonishing things.
He offers to come here, H I please ; but I wHl not pledge
myseH to it, for, if he come, I would not suffer him, — so
far as my authority had any weight, — to leave Geneva
alive." The historians of the Eeformation have sometimes
denied the authenticity of this letter, which, in fact, was
once doubtful, but is now unquestionable. And why
seek to blot out these lines ? That Calvin should have
spoken beforehand of demanding the death of the heretic,
should the opportunity occur, is fundamentally better
than H he had acted towards him with more cHcumspec-
tion, and concealed from him what awaited him at
Geneva. This letter, moreover, has the advantage of
clearly defining how the question stood in Calvin's mind.
If, on the one hand, it is painful and grievous to us
to see him ready to ask for the death of a man who has
entered into famdiar correspondence with him, the fact
establishes, on the other hand, at least the total absence
of aU personal animosity. The menace, which was exe
cuted in 1553, belongs to a period in which the Spaniard
only showed him consideration, almost friendship. Calvin,
then, could not hate him personaUy, and he may there
fore have said, with perfect sincerity during the trial,
that he had hated, and did hate, the errors, — not the
man. One thing might seem to us to be much more sad, — it
is that Calvin should have laboured to have Servetus
condemned at Vienne. Is it true? It is possible to

SERVETUS AT VIENNE. 243
think so. Servetus had just then secretly printed in that
city his Christianismi Restitutio, which was none other,
it seems, than the thick manuscript of 1546. A first
search, upon information come from Geneva, led to no
result. Servetus had been warned Ha trine by a friend,
and had made away with all that might have proved
him to be the author of the book. A second search was
more successful, thanks to documents which also came
from Geneva, and these documents were the very letters
formerly written to Calvin by Servetus.
Appearances, therefore, are against Calvin, and we
have one thing only to oppose to them, but it is weighty.
And it is the denial of the fact by Calvin. " The report
is cHculated," he says, "that I have managed so that
Servetus should be caught on papal ground, namely, at
Vienne, and thereupon many say that I have not acted
weU in exposing him to the mortal enemies of the faith."
After a few explanatory words, he continues : " It is not
necessary to insist upon the repudiation of so frivolous a
scandal, which falls to the ground when I have said in
one word, that there is no truth in it." His enemies
admit that the business was not conducted by him, but
by a Lyonese refugee, M. de Trye, who acted as his
secretary. The question, therefore, is reduced to this,—
to know whether the secretary had orders to do what he
did. Now, we do not think that any man of good
faith, at all acquainted with Calvin, can dare to suspect
him of having said, " It is not I," if the culprit had been
his agent. But why speak of culprit ? Calvin says,
indeed, that " many " think the deed an ill one ; but he,
himself, is by no means of their opinion. " If," he says,
"it were truly objected to me,1 I would not deny it, and
I do not think it would turn to my dishonour." Two
states at war do not on that account fail to lend each
other aid in arresting a murderer : there is no shame,
1 If the accusation were true.

244 SERVETUS AND HIS OPPONENTS.
consequently, according to the notions of those times, in
helping one another for the punishment of Servetus, a
soul-murderer. Do we not see the Genevese magistrates,
shortly after, requesting the concurrence of those of
Vienne, and the Viennese magistrates granting it with
readiness. The Genevan judges will receive information
of the French proceedings : they wUl write fraternaUy to
the papists who would have burned Servetus, but who
would far more willingly have burned them. Geneva
and Eome wiU that- day take each other by the hand.
AU this is odious to Us ; but then, it was quite natural ;
and if the Eeformer, — which* is not the case, — could be
convicted of having caused Servetus to be condemned at
Vienne, his real fault in this sad business would be in no
wise augmented.
Here also should recur an observation aHeady made.
We have seen that Servetus, at Paris, by attacking Cal
vin personaUy upon a doctrine which he might have at
tacked equally in all theologians, Eomish and Protestant,
constituted him, in some sense, the guardian and cham
pion of that doctrine. The position into which Calvin
was forced, and which was fully accepted by him, soon
became that of aU the Calvinistic churches, and, above
aU, of the Church of Geneva. A doctrine of such impor
tance, and one which had remained common to all Chris
tendom, became very peculiarly important to those who
were accused of shaking the foundations of Christianity.
They were less able than any, we wiU not say to abandon
it, for no one dreamed of this, but to defend it without
energy, and to show lenity to such as denied it. When
the Vienne judges learned that the delinquent, who had
escaped from their prisons, had been arrested at Geneva,
they hastened to claim him of the Genevese magistrates.
Now, it was a public law at Geneva never to grant ex
tradition ; and two such demands, one from the King of
France, and the other from the Savoy Senate, had re-

WHY GO TO GENEVA ? 245
cently been rejected. They refused, therefore, to give up
Servetus ; but to take him away from the stake at
Vienne was, in the situation we have just indicated, to
condemn themselves to treat him no better. What would
Eomanism have said H the heretic, who had been con
demned at Vienne, had been absolved at Geneva ? Even
now those Eomish writers who affect so much pity for
Servetus, and so much horror for his adversary, would
have had enough to say if Calvin had shown indulgence.
Servetus would then be only an audacious Pantheist, sub
verting, with the Trinity, the whole of Christianity ; Cal
vin would only be an impotent or cowardly chief, autho
rising, from the outset, aU the aberrations into which the
Eeformation is accused of having led succeeding genera
tions.

XVI.
But to return to the trial. We wiU set aside aU de
taHs which are not indispensable.
Having escaped from the prisons of Vienne, and wish
ing to betake himseH to Italy, why did Servetus pass
through Geneva ? He might, at least, have avoided the
city. Above aU, why, instead of passing through with
all speed, did he stay there a month ? The trial does not
elucidate this point. It has been conjectured that he
was detained by the Libertines, who were ever on the
watch for what might be an annoyance to Calvin. It is
also possible that, seeing them so nearly on the point of
triumphHag — for it was during the syndicate of Perrin —
the idea occurred to him of keeping himself in readiness
to succeed the vanquished Eeformer. Be that as it may,
the whole of the trial does not aUow of a doubt as to an
alliance between them and him, a bond of union, at least,
and a very close one, between theH cause and his. It

246 SERVETUS ARRESTED.
matters fittie whether this bond was the result of a formal
understanding, or merely of circumstances ; it matters
little, also, whether Calvin understood from the beginning
or not aU the import of the trial. The Libertines com-
peUed him to understand it sufficiently, and the death of
Servetus became a poHtical and social, as much as a refi-
gious necessity.1
Having been informed, on the 13th of August, of his
presence in the city, Calvin demanded his arrest, and the
order for it was given by one of the syndics. But, accord
ing to Genevese law, no one could be arrested on a mere
information, unless the informer gave himseH up as a
prisoner at the same time. A young Frenchman, Nicolas
de la Fontaine, the secretary of Calvin, went through this
formality for him, and "presented, on the morrow, a com
plaint in thHty-eight articles, drawn up by the Eeformer.
The first five relate to the antecedents of Servetus ; the
others sum up, rather confusedly, his Pantheistic opinions,
his arguments against the Trinity, and his ideas on cer
tain special points — infant baptism, the age at which sin
begins, &c. Servetus was interrogated the same day upon
these thHty-eight articles, and confirmed some, but denied
others, and the Lieutenant for Criminal Cases, in trans
mitting to the CouncU a summary of the interrogatory,
concluded for his being brought up for trial. „
In consequence of this, the Council assembled on the
morrow in the Criminal Audience Chamber, which was
situated Ha the prison. Servetus was re-interrogated on
all the points, but, encouraged probably by the presence
of certain counciUors whom he knew to be hostUe to
Calvin, he no longer confined himseH to the defensive.
Let a pubfic conference be appointed, he says, and he is
ready to confound Calvin by Scripture and the fathers.
Calvin would not have refused, for he teHs us in his
1 This point of view, which most historians have hitherto ignored or neglected,
was developed for the first time in a memoir by Mr. Rilliet de Candollc.
(Geneva, 1844.)

HIS EXAMINATIONS. 247
Declaration against the Errors of Servetus, that there
was nothing he desHed more than " to bring such a cause
into the Church before the people." Thus, by the side of
his despotism, there was always the democratic idea. He
would not accept the decisions of an adverse rnajority ;
but in the sphere which he believes to be that of truth,
he wishes the people, who are the Church — the Church to
be associated as a body in aU the labours and combats of
its leaders. The CouncH did not authorise this public
conference. On the 16th of August there was another sitting, and
it was marked by a lively altercation between Berthefier,
the Assistant of the Lieutenant for Criminal Causes, and
CoUadon, a counseUor who was the accuser's advocate.
We know Berthefier. CoUadon, on the contrary, was a
type of the serious Protestant, and of the refugee who
loved his faHfi in proportion to what he had sacrificed for
it. But he was also a type of the lay-theologian, who is
often more absolute than the professed divine. For the
rest, between Berthelier and himseH, the question was less
about Servetus than Calvin ; and with Berthefier, politics
took the first place in the matter. Calvin, whose wont it
never was to conceal himself behind any one, understood
the moment was come to take the affair in hand himseH.
The very next day he declared that he would appear as
accuser ; and he was authorised to be present, accom
panied by any one he chose, at the examination of Ser
vetus. There was a very long examination the same day,
and one which often assumed the form of a debate be
tween Calvin and the accused. It was in this debate that
Servetus let faU that strange profession of his pantheistic
creed which we have related above. It seems to have
made a very disagreeable impression upon the minds of
the judges, and it greatly discouraged those who were
disposed to favour him. Calvin could write to Farel on
the 20th of August : " I hope there wHl be capital punish-

248 PROGRESS OF THE CASE.
ment ;" but, added he, " I desire that the horrible part of
the sentence may be remitted."1 Calvin wished therefore
for death by the sword, and not death by fire. Did he
afterwards change his mind? We shaU see that he did
not. Even if he had changed his mind, this movement of
compassion, at the very moment when he had been en
gaged in close and active struggles with Servetus, would
stiU prove how they are mistaken who insist upon it that
his hatred had been long fostered in prospect of a holo
caust. Then it was that they decided upon writing to Vienne
to ask for a copy of the proceedings instituted there, and
to the Swiss Churches for their opinion. Calvin did not
conceal his dislike to this step. He remembered that
Berne and Basle had counselled clemency towards Bolsec,
and he already saw them trying to save Servetus.
The case went on notwithstanding, but very soon under
a new form. The doctrinal question was exhausted, and
the matter of heresy sufficiently proved ; but as H to gain
time, a series of discussions was entered upon as to the
mischief which Servetus might have done, or wished
to do, the publicity given by him to his opinions, and his
obstinacy in maintaining them, although he knew they
were condemned by ancient councds and ancient imperial
decrees. These pitiful cavds — so strange from Protestant
lips— more than once made Servetus to say things which
were mistaken only in one point, but it was a very serious
one, and it was, that they came nearly three centuries too
soon, and were addressed to persons who could not com
prehend them. If, said he, he had not retracted, it was
simply because it would have been a lie on his part. If
he had not thought fit to keep sHence, in spite of the
imperial laws which menaced him with death, it was be
cause those laws dated from a period when Christianity
was aHeady more or less corrupted. Did the Church
* Pcenat atrocitatem remitti cupio.

DEFENCE OF SERVETUS. 249
know such legislation in apostolic times? This last argu
ment was one of those which were most offensive to the
judges.' Servetus then dared to deny even the very law
and right in virtue of which they judged him! The
ancient, imperial, and episcopal city had indeed been able
to shake off the yoke both of emperor and pope ; but her
magistrates considered they had inherited aU the laws and
rights of the Empire and the Church, and they did not
understand how any one dared to question them.

XVII.
MeanwhUe the fate of Servetus was not discussed in
court alone. We have told what struggles were inter
mingled with the proceedings : what we have just related
took place in the very week of that September Communion
in which Calvin hazarded his authority and perhaps his
life against the exasperated Libertines. He might conquer,
and, in fact, fie did conquer ; but he might also be con
quered, and his defeat would be the salvation of the pri
soners. Servetus, from the depths of his prison, foUowed
the vicissitudes of the combat ; the different phases of the
trial exhibit him at one time bolder, and at another more
humble, according as he hoped or not for succour from
external events. The written memoir on the thHty-eight
articles, which was demanded of him in the beginning of
September, is evidently drawn up under the impression
that Calvin's credit had been considerably lowered. It is
the accused who speaks loudly, and who accuses. Calvin
is not only mistaken — he has calumniated, he has lied —
and "who wHl say that a criminal accuser and a homicide
is a true minister of the Church ?" It is aU in the same
strain. " Thou knowest not what thou sayest ; thou art
a wretch if thou proceedest to condemn that which thou
dost not understand. Thinkest thou to deafen the ears

250 VARIOUS MEASURES.
of the judges by thy currish barking merely?" But
Calvin, even H he had been so near his faU as Servetus
imagined, was not the man to change his ways of proceed
ing on that account ? In his answer — which was also
written — he only descends to the level of Servetus, to
hurl back at him his abuse in the same tone, and, with his
iron hand, he has soon thrust him again into his humble
position as the accused. The unhappy man had thought
it no longer necessary to veH anything; and his bold
memoH became an act of accusation drawn up by loimself
against himseH, and accompanied by aU the proofs.
It had been decided that this memoH and the answer
should be sent to the Swiss Churches ; but, though the
two documents had been presented to the CouncU on the
5th of September, a fortnight elapsed before they were
dispatched. The CouncH hesitated to pledge itseH. If
the Swiss Churches did not judge Hke Calvin, what was
to be done ? If they did judge like Calvin, it would be
necessary to condemn Servetus ; and, amid theH other
Genevan disputes, the Council was not anxious to procure
for Calvin a victory which might lead to others. Calvin
understood this sentiment perfectly weU. His letters to
BuHinger and Farel, indicate great discouragement. The
possible absolution of Servetus appears to him the sub
version of his work — of his moral and political work, as
well as of his religious work, and the too certain indica
tion that God no longer supports it. He even goes so
far as to hint at the possibility of his abandoning it all,
and taking his departure. Here there is, consequently,
another error which has to be noticed. Calvin is supposed
to have been aU-powerful at this epoch, and he is repre
sented as dictating the sentence to a government of which
he is the soul, — and never, on the contrary, had he been
so nearly unable to do anything. BuHinger conjured him
not to give way to this feeling, and not to expose Geneva,
by his departure, to the accomplishment of her ruin by

OPINIONS OF FAREL. 251
her own hands. Farel, who was ever ardent, endeavoured
to show him, in the arrival of Servetus at Geneva, a won
derful dispensation of God. He had come that the
Government and Church might have the opportunity of
showing themselves firm and faithful. God would not
permit that this opportunity should be rejected by those
to whom he had offered it. The death of Servetus was
necessary and indispensable ; those who said the contrary
were traitors, or, at the very least, imbeciles, — absurd
imbecdes. " As for me," continued Farel, " I have always
declared that I was ready to die H I had taught that
which was contrary to sound doctrine, adding that I
should be worthy of the most fearful torments if I turned
aside any one from the faith of Christ. I cannot there
fore apply a different rule to others." Thus did these
stern men reason. The question of sincerity, or of inten
tion, they set completely aside ; or rather — they consi
dered it to be always and everywhere decided by the
nature of what had been taught. Neither good intention
nor good faith were possible in him who taught error, or
in him, at least, who persisted in teaching it. It was the
Romish idea in aU its rigidness, but without its logic ;
for it can be logical only where the HifaUibUty of the
tribunal is laid down as a principle. But the Eomish
idea was so well established, that we find it accepted at
last even by Servetus himseH. In a letter to the CouncH
he is " content to die," he says, " H he does not succeed
in confounding Calvin;" he only asks that Calvin " may be
detained a prisoner" like himself, and, once confounded,
be put to death instead of him.
Having been a month Hi prison, he was beginning not
to understand the reason of the delay. He had said his
last wOrd, and why did they delay either to condemn or
to absolve him ? On the 15th of September, — probably
on some intimation from without, — he demanded that
his cause should " be brought before the Council of the

252 the law's delay.
Two Hundred," and he represented Calvin as his sole
enemy. Three days afterwards, having received the
answer to his memoH, he sent it back, covered with notes,
and signed " Michael Servetus, alone, it is true, but hav
ing Christ as a most sure protector." On the 21st of
September the two documents, accompanied by several
others, were dispatched to the Churches of Berne, Zurich,
Basle, and. Schaffhausen. On the 22d, whether secret
information had made him consider Calvin's position as
stiH very precarious, or whether his imagination ampfified
what he knew of it, he writes to the Council formally to
demand that an accusation may be brought against Calvin,
and, Ha his turn, draws up a long fist of " Articles about
which Michael Servetus demands that Jehan Calvin
should be interrogated." The whole letters show the
feverish state into which grief, vexation, and other causes,
as we shall see, had thrown the unhappy prisoner. He
ends by saying that Calvin ought to be expelled from
Geneva " Hke a magician as he is," and adds, " his pro
perty ought to be adjudged to me, in compensation for
mine which he has caused me to lose."
Three weeks elapsed, and Servetus receiving no answer,
understood at last that he was mistaken. A humble and
sorrowful letter of the 1 Oth of October reveals to us quite
another world of sufferings. To live Hi a prison in the
sixteenth century was horrible ; humanity, which was so
little careful in the very hospitals, scarcely knew the way
to the dwellings of crime, and as to distinguishing one
criminal from another, no one dreamed of it. Servetus,
treated like a common malefactor, had aHeady, on the
15th of September, addressed to the CouncH a letter fidl
of the most lamentable detaHs. He recalls theH attention
to it on the 1 Oth of October, because it has remained un
answered. His clothes are in rags ; he is eaten up with
filth; and the first cold of autumn is a fresh torment.
Did he exaggerate? It is possible ; because it is difficult

SERVETUS MUST DIE ! 253
to believe that such was the state of a man who had in
his favour the First Syndic, several councdlors, and the
gaoler too, Claude Geneve, who was one of Perrin's con
fidants. But let us not dispute about his suffering, of
which there wiU always remain enough, and too much.
So the Council judged, for it was decided, upon his second
request, that some relief should be granted.

XVIII.
The fate of Servetus was in the meantime decided, but
out of Geneva. A messenger of state, who had been
commissioned to bring back the answers of the Churches,
transmitted them to the Council on the 1 8th of October.
Each of these answers was twofold : there was that of the
Church or of the pastors, and that of the Government.
In all, there were eight.
There was a complete and awful unanimity. Servetus
must die ! Berne and Basle, which had been so indulgent,
two years ago towards Bolsec, had for Servetus none but
expressions of horror. " We pray the Lord," say the
pastors of Berne, "that he may grant you a spirit of
prudence, of counsel, and of strength, in order that you
may shelter your Church and others from the pestilence."
The pastors of Basle rejoice to behold Servetus in the
hands of the magistrates of Geneva, Ha order that, accord
ing to theH office and the power which they hold from
God, these magistrates may so repress him " that hence
forward he may no more be able to disturb the Church of
Christ." The pastors of Zurich write : — " We think you
ought to display much faith and zeal, especially because
our Churches are in bad repute abroad for being heretical
and for favouring heresy. The providence of God offers
you an opportunity of clearing both yourselves and us
from this injurious suspicion." Schaffhausen subscribes

254 SWITZERLAND UNANIMOUS.
to these words, adding that the blasphemies of Servetus
must be cut short, for, like a gangrene, they would eat
away the body of Christ. The answers of the Govern
ment are stUl more explicit. Berne, whose advice the
Government of Geneva felt specially bound to foUow, was
not satisfied with clearly counseUing death ; it was made
known by private letters that the Bernese magistrates
had openly spoken of fire as the only punishment propor
tioned to the crimes of such a man.
Here, then, was the whole of Protestant Switzerland
formed into a jury, and unanimously pronouncing by the
voice of its magistrates and pastors the condemnation of
the accused. No mention is made of extenuating cHcum-
stances ; nor is there any solicitation, either dHect or
indirect, for pardon or indulgence, and yet all knew that
it was a question of life and death. The CouncH of Geneva
could no longer hesitate to condemn ; — indulgence would
have been an insult to the Swiss Churches, a sort of
treachery towards the whole of Protestant Christendom,
which, by their voice, had demanded the death of the
criminal, in the name of its own safety, honour, and sal
vation. This was immediately understood by several of
the counsellors who, tiU then, had only seen in this affaH
a trial between the Spaniard, in whom they felt but little
interest, and the Eeformer, whom they did not like.
Henceforward, they could yield, not to Calvin, but to four
important Churches and to the whole body of Protestantism,
— and Servetus had decidedly against him the majority
of the Council.
His friends, however, and Perrin especially, stiH endea
voured to save him. Perrin demanded, at first, absolu-
lution, pure and simple. This would have been the
exHe of Calvin, and the final triumph of the Libertines,
and it was refused. He demanded then, what had
already been asked by Servetus, that the cause should be
brought before the Council of Two Hundred. Calvin

WHAT CALVIN SAYS. 255
had many enemies there, and that Council was less
bound by the previous advice of the four Churches and
four governments. They stiU refused ; but there is no
one now who does not say, " Would to God that Perrin
had succeeded!" and we, too, say so with aU the world.
Yet it is not the less true, that H the general state of
affairs is admitted to have been such as we have described,
the efforts of Perrin were neither those of a friend of the
Reformation nor those of a wise politician ; and to regret
theH failure may certainly be humane, but it is also rather
selfish. We think of ourselves, and of the annoyance
which this affair has cost us, and we make no account of
the requirements of the moment, which were misunder
stood or betrayed by the Libertine magistrate. For the
rest, we have only to occupy ourselves here with what
concerns Calvin, and he has left us details which render
our task singularly easy. " After Servetus was convicted
of his heresies," says he, "I made no entreaties that he
might be punished with death ; and to what I say, not
only wiU all good people bear witness, but I defy even
the wicked to say the contrary."1 Calvin needed not
the testimony which he invoked ; he had given no one
the right to doubt what he said, and the work which we
quote appeared in 1554, a few months after the death of
Servetus. Much more, then, may we believe him when
he declares in a private letter, written on the eve of the
execution, that he, with his coUeagues, has made every
effort to obtain the substitution of the sword for the
stake. Observe that he was not writing to some friend
mUder than himseH, in whose eyes he might wish to
array himself, with the semblance of humanity. The
friend was Farel, who was more hostde to Servetus than
was Calvin himself; and it was to him, as we have
aHeady seen, that Calvin had declared, a month before,
1 Declaration upon the Errors of Servetus.

256 THE FATAL DAY ARRIVES.
that he would not have inflicted on Servetus the fright
ful death which he saw menacing him.
Why did the Council refuse this mitigation ? Perhaps
that they might not seem to adopt in part only the
imperial canon law, which recognises nothing but the
stake for heresy ; perhaps, also,— for we know that those
who voted for the stake were not all Calvin's friends, —
not to give the Reformer a fresh victory, by allowing
him, as it were, the right to pardon. But, finaUy, the
assertion remains, and remains indubitable. As for the
pde, which figures so much in the interested apotheosis of
the unhappy man for whom it was kindled, — for death
by the sword would have been much less canvassed ; —
the pile whose bloody smoke has cast so odious a shadow
over the whole lHe of Calvin, — Calvin did not demand it,
— Calvin did not desHe it, — Calvin wished that the
guilty man might be exempted from it.

XIX.
Shall we narrate the execution ? Farel had undertaken
to accompany the condemned man. He was with him
when, on the morning of the 27th of October, he was in
formed that that day would be his last. He was left m-
ignorance of the stake, but the thought of death sufficed
to deprive him, at first, of aU his strength and courage.
Scarcely had he recovered when he began again with Farel
the theological discussion he had so often renewed with Cal
vin. Farel was desirous that Calvin should once more
see the condemned; so Calvin came with two counciUors.
Servetus was asked by one of the two, what he wished
to say to Calvin? he replied that he only wished to
entreat his pardon. Then, said Calvin, " I protest that I
have never prosecuted thee because of any private injury."1
1 Declaration against the Errors of Servetus.

STERNNESS OF CALVIN. 257
He said the truth ; but this idea has served too often to
encourage in their severities those who have borne like
witness to themselves. Calvin then began to enumerate
aU the occasions in which he had shown his good will in
endeavouring to bring Servetus back into the right way.
This, too, is reasoning in a vicious circle. Might not
Servetus have said the same of himseH? Had he not
also, at Paris, and in his correspondence, and at Geneva,
endeavoured to lead Calvin to what he considered to be
the truth? It is painful, in the narrative of this last
interview, which is related in all its detaHs by Calvin, to
see Ha him, to the last, nothing but the theologian, —
reasonirig, discussing, and condemning. He does not
even seem to suspect, that, in spite of doctrine and
through doctrine, it would be possible to say a word of
sympathy to the unhappy man who is about to die, and
who awaits the tremendous surprise of finding the stake
where he had only expected the sword. The remark
may have been made, it is true, and not without founda
tion, that the very excess of this earnest pertinacity is at
once its explanation and its excuse ; — that Calvin, believ
ing with aU his soul in the condemnation of Servetus,
could not say to him too much about it; — and that
when we see a man on the point of rolling over into an
abyss, we think far less of showing him compassion than
of alarming him for his safety, and of holding him back,
if necessary, by violence. But the comparison is defec
tive in one point. From that abyss which Calvin beheld
yawning for Servetus, he might and ought to have
attempted to lead him gently away. This was what
Calvin did not understand. Such as he showed himself
towards Servetus under accusation, such will he show
himseH towards Servetus under condemnation. Not a
word, not a movement tending to soften him by kind
ness and compassion ! Calvin has determined to present
to him, to the last, only that idea against which, for
R

258 THE FINAL SCENE.
twenty years, he has seen him harden himself. And
Servetus stiU hardens himseH : so then Calvin obeys, he
teHs us, the command of St. Paul ; he withdraws himself
from the heretic, and leaves him to Farel.
Farel had the melancholy honour of showing himself
yet more harsh. When Servetus, who had been con
ducted to the Town Hall, learned there the way Ha which.
he was to die, and threw himself horror-struck at the
feet of the judges, and besought as a favour that he-
might be beheaded, and yet, Ha spite of his horror, refused
to save himseH by a retractation, — Farel, instead of recog
nising at least the sincerity which was thus proved by
the unhappy man, threatened not to accompany him to
the stake H he persisted in caUing himself innocent. He
held his peace ; but no trace of a struggle, nor even of
hesitation, appeared in his terror. It evidently did not
once enter his mind to save himself by a lie. Farel,
from whom we receive these details, could see in aU this
nothing but obstinacy ; and the more the doomed man,
in spite of his agony, persisted in not yielding, the more
unworthy of all pity did he become in his eyes. At the
foot of the stake, as at the Town Hall, and as before in
prison, there was not a word of Christian consolation.
Once only did Farel ask him if he would commend him
self to the prayers of the spectators. Servetus said
' Yea,' and Farel desired the multitude to pray. But
Farel himself prayed not : his sole task was to harass
Servetus, in order to extort from him some word which
might be considered as a disavowal of his errors. At
lastr the executioner performed his office ; and soon, a
few ashes were aU that remained of Servetus. Farel, not
many days after, wiU tell all this in a letter, and will
exhibit no more emotion over the dead heretic, than he
felt on the 27th of October, the day of his execution,
when at the side of the heretic while yet alive.

SLANDERS. 259

XX.

We shaU not be reproached with having softened or
veiled anything in those melancholy scenes. We have
explained how this execution was possible and might
appear necessary. We have refuted, by an appeal to
facts, some of the slanders to which it has given rise.
Many others have been uttered to which we wiU not even
pay the honour of repeating them. Calvin has even been
reproached by some on account of the green wood of
which the pde of Servetus was made, in order, they say,
that Servetus might die a lingering death. Thus, at the
very moment when Calvin was asking for a mUder form
of death for Servetus, they would represent him as em
ployed in rendering his tortures more cruel. Besides,
what are they thinking of ? Green wood was a favour,
for the victim was stifled before the flames reached him.
All this discussion, moreover, reposes historicaUy upon
nothing. The documents which deserve to be beHeved
make no mention of wood, either green or dry ; and the
whole is only one of the thousand fables which blind hate
has heaped around the name of Calvin. But it was
indispensable that something should be invented more
odious, or more seemingly odious, than the sentence at
Vienne, which bears, at full length, " To be burned alive
by a slow fire" Let us quit these details, once for aU.
In vain are the horrors of this fatal day magnified ; they
will never equal those of so many days which had been
witnessed aHeady, and which were yet to be witnessed —
we wUl not say by Spain, whose soH is made up of
human ashes — but by the Netherlands, by Austria, by
England, under her bloody Mary, and by France, under
her devout and dissolute kings. If Servetus had perished
at Vienne, who would now have spoken of him ? Who
would notice the luckless unit which is lost in the enor-

260 INCONSISTENCIES.
mous total of the victims of Eome ? What Eomanist, in
the sixteenth century, had the audacity or even the idea
of reproaching Calvin or the Genevese for the death of
Servetus ? The tardy horror with which it inspHes the
Eomanists of our day, will never, do what they wiU, be
ought else than a tribute of homage to the Eeformation,
for it is Eomanism that is attacked and condemned when
the Eeformation is condemned for having inconsistently
done once what Eomanism did every day upon principle.
The question occurs, how Calvin could overlook this
inconsistency, with his eminently logical mind ; it occurs
especiaUy on reading the book which he published the
foHowing year, and in which he erects into a system what
had been done in the case of Servetus.
In the first part he refutes the opinions of the theolo
gian; in the second he demonstrates the lawfulness of
the power of the sword as applied to the repression of
heretics. We wHl not follow his arguments in detaU;
they are all links in the chain, which forms one vicious
circle, for, as we have already remarked, where there is
no longer a tribunal reputed infallible, there can logicaUy
no longer exist penal laws against error. Calvin, it is
true, felt this difficulty in part. He speaks little of the
punishment of error as error; and, in this respect, he
separates himself almost entirely from the Eomish idea
as it was realized by the Inquisition, and even out of the
Inquisition, properly so called, by aU the tribunals which
judged under the influence of the Church. There it was
heresy — heresy in itself, which was smitten — heresy in its
obscurest adherents, just as in its most renowned apostles
— heresy, whether discovered in the depths of the con
science, or proclaimed in sermons and books. There is
nothing of this kind in Calvin. Not only would he have
the heretic punished simply as a disturber of society, but
he always supposes a case in which there has really been
a disturbance, a shaking of the foundations, and serious

HOW FAR CALVIN WENT. 261
danger resulting, both from the gravity of the error, and
the activity of the heretic. This is also the idea of Beza.
He pubHshed, in the same year, his book Of the Punish-.
ment of Heretics by the Civil Magistrate, and, like Cal
vin, it is solely against the civil offence, and against social
disturbance of a really serious nature, that he caUs for
the action of the magistrate. This distinction had been
carefully drawn by Calvin and the Council of Geneva on
the trial of Servetus. Several of the interrogatories, as
we have related, bore less upon the errors of Servetus
than upon what he had done to spread them, and upon
the evU they might have occasioned. In the sentence,
which is very long, the sentence of death is connected
with these considerations far more than with the fact of
heresy itself.
Hence' in practice an important consequence ensues ;
it is that Calvin's system respecting the punishment of
heretics did not at all extend, like that of the Eomanists,
to every heretic, and to every opinion reputed heretical,
but only to extreme cases — the preaching and diffusion
of errors considered subversive of Christianity. And
with this is connected a fact of which Eomish writers
should, at least, take some notice. Thousands were put
to death as Protestants, but Calvin never spoke of putting
to death one Eomanist as a Eomanist. Men like Gruet
and Servetus — those, in a word, whom aU Christendom
would have smitten as he did — are the men he smote.
This was stiU, in our view, to go too far; but history
must nevertheless take note of these differences. The
intolerance of Calvin could lead to the scaffold only a
very small number of victims ; but Eomish intolerance
was, at that very moment, immolating thousands.
And if we were to restrict ourselves to what was odious
and inconsistent in the intolerance of Calvin, how could
impartial history refuse to see in it that which was at the
same time daring and great ? Calvin knew very well to

262 luther's views.
whom he was about to furnish weapons. He knew that
his book would appear as an Hrefutable argument in
favour of Eomish cruelties, and that he especiaUy, in the
eyes of millions, was the chief of heretics, the most guHty
and the most dangerous ; he knew, in short, that he was
authorising Eomish Europe to drown some day, perhaps
Ha blood, that nest of heretics, the den in which he had
just preached his thesis.
Luther, not less courageous, but more a man, wUl
frankly own that such considerations are not indifferent
to him. " Thou askest me," he writes to Link, " H the
civil magistrate is permitted to slay the false prophets. I
have Httle love for condemnations to death, even when
fuUy merited. Besides, in this matter, one thing alarms
me ; it is the example we give. Look at the papists ;
and, before the time of Jesus Christ, look at the Jews.
The law commanded that false prophets should be slain,
and they ended by slaying almost none but blameless
and holy prophets. ... In nowise, therefore, can I
approve that false doctors should be put to death." But
such a fear will never make Calvin expunge or soften
one word. Let brands from the pde of Servetus one day
kindle his own — he cares fittie ; let Geneva be over
whelmed and perish, and little cares he still. She, Hke
himseH, wHl have had the glory of publishing aU she
thought true, and of doing fearlessly all she thought to
be her duty.

BOOK THE FOURTH
(1553— 15G4)

BOOK THE FOUETII.

STJMMAEY.

I. Fresh severities in France — Numerous martyrs — The five prisoners of Lyons —
Letters addressed to them by Calvin — Their Death — Dymonet — Richard
Lefevre — How Calvin was regarded by the martyrs — Morituri te salutant.
II. Calvin and England — His letter to theDuke of Somerset, the Lord-Protector —
Some details — How to preach the Gospel — How to reform abuses — How vices
are to be corrected — Zeal and piety of the Protector— His death— Edward
VI. — Calvin dedicates to him several of his works— Progress of the true
Reformation — Calvin and Cranmer — Project for a. Protestant Council —
Death of the young king — Queen Mary — Persecution — The English at
Geneva — Knox — Geneva and England— Geneva and Scotland — Geneva and
Holland.
III. Italians at Geneva— Gen tilis.
IV. Calvin's Commentaries on the New Testament — They mark a revolution in
the study of the Bible — Wisdom and perspicacity — No vain erudition —
Practical sense and Christian experience — How Calvin makes us feel at ease,
and charms us.
V. Other writings — Against the Council of Trent — Against the Interim— Logical
and moral vigour — Did Calvin break off too absolutely from Romanism ?
VI. Treatise against Judicial Astrology — Treatise, Of Scandals — Analysis and
details — Four sermons on different subjects for the times — Analysis and
quotations.
VII. Treatise on Predestination — Writings against Castalio — Against Westphal
— Discussions on the Eucharist — Calvin arranges an agreement between
Geneva and the Swiss Churches.
VIII. Glance at the next period — Calvin's activity — Peace in Geneva, but war
and ambushes all around — Geneva boldly identifies herself with the aposto-
late of Calvin — Complaints of the King of France — Calvin prepares the
reply — Missionaries and martyrs multiply around him.
IX. Calvin and France — He deprecates and blames all insurrection and violence
— His pretended letters to M. Du Poet — His Letters to the Baron des Adrets
— How he wishes possession of the Churches to be taken — How mighty the
Reformed religion would have been in France if it had listened to him —
Conspiracy of Amboise — Calvin's grief.
X. General character of his influence upon France — His epistles To the Faithful
in France.

266 SUMMARY.
XI. How he watched over the application of his principles — The forms of his
authority — His relations with the Church of Paris — Affair of the Rue St.
Jacques — His exhortations to the martyrs — Geneva sends them the pastor
Macar — Calvin draws up the Confession of Faith to be presented to Henry
II. in the name of the Protestants of France.
XII. The first national synod assembles under big influence — The Confession
of Faith — Discipline — Analysis — The question of episcopacy — What the
French Protestants desired.
XIII. Rapid progress of the Reformation in France — Coligny — Beginning of
his connexion with Calvin — His conversion — His courage at Fontainebleau
— Weakness and recovery of his brother, d'Andelet.
XIV. Colloquy of Poissy — Calvin present, though absent — Theodore Beza —
Results of the colloquy — Two thousand one hundred and fifty churches
organised — Edict of January— The king of Navarre abandons the cause.
XV. When and how the Protestants of France began to have recourse to arms
— Calvin in this new phase of the struggle — Unjust accusations — Violence
of the Parliament of Paris — Contrast between the two armies — Battle of
Dreux— On how little the fate of France then hung — France might be Pro
testant ; the French might be Calvinists — Calvin preaches submission and
hope — Edict of Amboise.
XVI. Calvin at Geneva during this period — Blandrata, Gentilis, Baudoin —
Commentaries on the Old Testament — Commentary on the Psalms — Calvin
and David — Studies of the human heart — Several series of sermons — Job
and Coligny.
XVII. Nothing beyond the reach of Calvin's activity — The jurisconsult — The
diplomatist — The man who was necessary in everything — The political
legislator.
XVIII. Foundation of the College and Academy of Geneva — Ceremony of the
5th of June 1559 — What perseverance Calvin had needed.
XIX. The College during three centuries — What memories it may suggest — The
great secret of Calvin and of all who sprang from him — Feeble means and
great results — Those results owe their importance and duration to him — In
what respects Calvin has been more powerful than Luther.
XX. Last years of Calvin — Sickness — Poverty — Disinterestedness — Sadolet
knocks at his door.
XXI. Last labours and last illness — Six weeks of agony — Patience and faith —
Calvin still at work — Last communion.
XXII. He receives on his death-bed the visit of the Council — The morrow:
visit of the Company of Pastors — Exhortations which he addresses to them
— His will.
XXIII. Last visit of Farel — What they must have said to each other — Censures
and fraternal repast — His last days — His death.
XXIV. His funeral — What his tomb says to us, though nothing authentically
marks its place.

[.

Eome had no need of the sad encouragement just given
her by Geneva. Her severity had never relaxed. Threat
ening clouds were accumulating on all sides, around the
Eeformation and its capital.
We have said to how many refugees Geneva opened her
gates ; the same gates were daily opened to let those go
forth who were returning to the battle, accompanied by
the dHections and prayers of their leader. The collection
of Calvin's letters contains one addressed, a fortnight
before the death of Servetus, "to the Faithful of the Isles,"
that is, "those of the coast of Saintonge," and the bearer
of the letter is PhilibertHamelin, the first preacher of the
Eeformed faith in those parts. Arrested at Saintes, and
condemned to death, he had succeeded in escaping to
Geneva, where he became a printer. But he could not
long endure to be inactive whUst his brethren were suffer
ing elsewhere. He set out, furnished with this precious
letter. He reached his destination, where he assembled
audiences to whom he preached, and whom he encouraged
and organised. After a four years' apostolate he was taken
anew, and burned afive at Bordeaux.
Others, nearer Geneva, had perished while the trial of
Servetus was proceeding, and they also were comforted
and strengthened by the Eeformer's voice. A letter of
the 22d of August is addressed to two men who expected
death in the prisons of Lyons, and who were burned, the
month after, with two others. AHeady, on the 7th of July,
on the news of their imprisonment, he wrote to them : —
" Though it has been a sad message according to the flesh,

268 VARIOUS MARTYRS.
— even according to the just love we bear to you in God,
— yet must we submit to that good Father and Lord.
As he has fortified you with his strength to sustain the
first assault, it remains that ye pray him to fortify you
more and more, according as you have to combat. When
He does His people the honour to employ them to main
tain His truth, and leads them to martyrdom as by the
hand, He never leaves them destitute of the arms which
are requisite  Be assured, therefore, that this good
God, who appears in time of need, wiU not forsake you
till you have wherewith mightily to magnify His name. .
.... Meditate on the glory and heavenly immortafity to
which we are invited, and are certain to attain, by the
cross, and shame and death  It is a strange thing
to human sense, that the slaves of Satan should keep us
with their feet upon our throats ; but we have wherewith
to comfort us in all our tribulation, awaiting the happy
issue which is promised us, — that God HimseH shall wipe
away aU tears from our eyes." And after many other
words, which we regret not to transcribe, he adds : " If
you can communicate with the other brethren, I pray you
to salute them also as from me." Do you know how they
held communication one with another? This is what
Louis de Marsac, who was one of them, wrote to Calvin :
" I could not tell you, sir and brother, the great comfort
I have received from the letters which you sent to my
brother, Denis Peloquin, who found means of passing them
to one of our brethren who was in an underground cell1
above me, and read them to me because I could not read
them, inasmuch as I can see nothing in my dungeon. I
pray you, therefore, to persevere Hi aiding us always with
like consolation, which invites us to weep and pray."
This is that Louis de Marsac, who was offended when they
led him to the stake, because they did not put a halter
round his neck, as they did the rest, on account of his
' Croton : another form is groton.

"THE FIVE PRISONERS OF LYONS." 269
noble birth. He asked why he was refused the collar of
that "excellent order" of martyrs. A Genevese, Peter
Berger, had shortly before had that honour, and when the
flames reached him, he had said, like Stephen, " I see the
heavens opened."
But of all the martyrs whom Calvin had to exhort at
this period, five especially — the five prisoners of Lyons, as
they were called — had to bless him in their time of trial.
They were five young Frenchmen who had studied at
Lausanne, where the ministry had just been conferred
upon them. After a few days passed at Geneva, they
returned to France, and were arrested at Lyons. The
intervention of the Bernese government, the influence
which was exerted in their behalf in high quarters, and
the interest which these young men excited in many
Romanists, aU served only to protract a painful trial, in
which the brutality of the judges was only equalled by
the constancy of the victims. In a letter, written in
June 1552, Calvin speaks to them of what has been done
to save them, and of what wUl yet be attempted ; but,
without taking all hope from them, he prepares them for
the most terrible results, and invites them to seek in God,
without delay, that courage which is found in God alone.
When condemned in effect by the Lyons judges, they
appealed to the parliament of Paris. They were, there
fore, taken to Paris, but brought back to Lyons to await
theH sentence, which they received on the 1st of March
1553 ; the sentence of death was conclusive. " We have
been," writes Calvin to them, "in greater sorrow than
ever, having heard the decision taken by the enemies of
the truth." Other attempts will yet be made ; but the
great and only one which cannot fail, wiU be to recom
mend them to Him who has already sustained them so
greatly. "We shaU herein do our duty, by praying to Him
that He may glorify Himself more and more in your
constancy; that, by the consolation of His Spirit, He

270 DEATH OF THE MARTYRS.
may soften and sweeten aU that is bitter to the flesh,
and may so carry away your senses to HimseH, that,
looking at the heavenly crown, you may be ready to
leave aU that is worldly without regret." At length, in
the beginning of May, he writes a last letter. "The
King of France hath flatly and curtly rejected the re
quests presented by the gentlemen of Berne. There is
no more expectation on that side, nor, indeed, anywhere
else that we see here below." WhUe there was still hope,
they had been enabled to look without ceasing unto God;
how should they not do it now that " necessity exhorts
them to dHect aU theH senses towards heaven?" God
has chosen them to make his strength perfect in theH
weakness, " inasmuch as He has granted you this privi
lege that your bonds have been famous, and that the
noise of them hath been spread everywhere ; your death,
in spite of Satan, must resound even yet more loudly,
that the name of the Lord may be magnified." Thus he
continues at great length ; he is moved but firm, ever
speaking in the name of duty, ever demanding such a
sacrifice as he himseH would accomplish without distrac
tion, and without asking enthusiasm to spare him any
pang or effort, but immoveable in his courage, and im
moveable in his faith.
They perished, therefore, on the 1 6th of May, animated
by this spirit, and frdl of this courage. " Being come to
the place of execution," as Crespin relates in the History
of the Martyrs, "they ascended with a joyful heart the
pile of wood, the two youngest first. The last who
ascended was Martial Alba, the eldest of the five, who
had a long time been on both his knees, praying to the
Lord. He asked Lieutenant Tignac to grant him a gHt.
The lieutenant said to him, 'What wUlest thou?' He
said to him, ' That I may kiss my brethren before I die.'
The lieutenant granted it to him. Then the said Martial
kissed the four, who were aHeady bound, saying to each

MORE MARTYRS. 271
of them, 'Adieu, adieu, my brother!' The fire was
kindled. The voices of the five confessors were heard
stiU exhorting one another: 'Courage, my brethren,
courage !' And these," continues Crespin, " were the last
words heard from the said five valiant champions and
martyrs of the Lord."
So died, two months afterwards, another martyr,
Dymonet, who had also been comforted in his prison by
a long and beautiful letter from Calvin. So also died,
the foUowing year, Richard Le Fevre, of Eouen, who had
long been in correspondence with Calvin, and who wrote
to him in the beginning of May : " This is to let you
know that I hope to go and celebrate Whitsuntide in the
kingdom of heaven, and at the marriage of the Son of
God, if I am not summoned earlier by the good Lord and
Master." Whitsuntide found him still here below ; the
stake was not ready till the 7th of July.
We could greatly lengthen this list ; but we have said
enough, and perhaps too much. Still, it is never without
difficulty that we resolve to leave out martyrs. We
reproach ourselves with frustrating them of their renown,
and we console ourselves only by the remembrance of
the glory which crowns them in the presence of God.
Those who have no personal knowledge of war, often
ask themselves what must be felt in that terrible mode of
fife, in which each day and hour may witness the fall of
so many who looked for lengthened years. How can we
but ask the same question of ourselves as we look upon
the picture of that gloomy period? What must they
have thought, what must they have felt, at Geneva when
they learned, stroke after stroke, the death of those whom
they had known and loved, and of so many others who
had never seen Geneva, but who they knew had died,
thinking of her and of her leader '? As for that -leader,
we could wish, above all, thoroughly to analyse, by means
of his works, and letters, what was passing in his heart.

272 ENGLAND.
Certain things astonish us at the outset. We should like
to find him with the martyrs, more full of feeHng, and
more expansive — more human, in short. Amongst aU
those admHable exhortations we seek for the traces of a
tear, and we find none. Let us be content with what we
find, for it is after all very grand and noble. He was
commander-in-chief, and his character and position were
in harmony. The martyrs were to him soldiers who fell
in battle ; their death was only an ordinary event, a mis
chance, to speak after the manner of men, a blessing, to
speak as Christians speak. Why should we be more HI
at ease than they themselves were ? They admHed and
loved that Calvin whom we, more sensitive but more
feeble, love so little. They understood that he was the
man whom the Church needed, the general required by
the battle, and with aH theH heart they cried out to him,
as they marched to death, Morituri te salutant ! — " they
who are going to die salute thee ! "

II.
But whilst Protestant France seemed no longer to
have anything to ask but exhortations for her martyrs,
England was opening to the Eeformation — to the true
Eeformation, which was proscribed under Henry VIII.
— and the influence of Calvin was making itself mightily
to be felt there.
Henry VIII. had died in 1547, and with him died that
religion which bad faith or ignorance alone could con
found with evangelical Protestantism. His son, Edward
VI., was only nine years old. The Duke of Somerset,
the Lord Protector, brought him up in the principles of
serious Christianity, and proclaimed them, without delay,
in the kingdom. Hence his relations with Calvin, who
dedicated to him, in June 1548, his Commentary on the

CALVIN AND ENGLAND. 273
First Epistle to Timothy. Hence, in particular, that
remarkable letter which was addressed to him by Calvin
in October of the same year, and which contains a com
plete exposition of the Eeformer's views as to the trans
formation which England must undergo.
He begins by congratulating the Eegent upon this
great work, which God has put it in his heart to do. The
depositary of the royal authority, he can " repress by the
sword" those who opposed his projects; but the great
means is to act so that the gospel may bear all its fruits
. of holiness, and that " those who profess the gospel
should be truly renewed after the image of God." For
this three things are necessary — purity of doctrine, the
extirpation of abuses, and the correction of vices.
On the first point, one principle only is reaUy fruitful,
and everything must be brought back to it — justification
by faith. But the fruitfulness of this principle depends
upon the manner Ha which it is preached; and here
comes a fine page upon what truly Christian preaching
must be, or not be. The people must be " touched to the
quick," and Calvin fears there is stiU " very little Hving
preaching" in England. Now, "you know, my Lord,
how St. Paul speaks of the^livelHaess which ought to be
in the mouth of good ministers of God, who ought not to
make a parade of rhetoric in order to show themselves
off, but the Spirit of God must resound Ha theH voice."
Let us have, then, good trumpets, which penetrate even
to the depths of the heart ; for there is danger lest you
should see no great profit of all the reformation you have
made, however good and holy it may be, unless this
power of preaching be manifested at the same time.
Upon the second point (abuses), one sole principle also
is to be laid down, and that is to return fuUy to Scrip
ture, and to true apostofical traditions. Without naming
Henry VIII., whom he could not directly caU in question
during the reign of his son, Calvin demands the proscrip-

274 CALVIN AND ENGLAND.
tion of aU that he had retained of Eomanism, and of all
the accommodations he had imagined between Eomanism
and the gospel. "Nothing is more displeasing to God
than when we, by our human prudence, would either
modify or retrench, advance or retire, against his wUl."
The Eeformation must be God's work ; and if the word
of God is not that which decides supremely what is to be
retained or abolished, the Eeformation is no longer any
thing but the work of man, fragUe and vain, Hke every
work of man.
On the thHd point (vices), there is also stiU one single
principle, and that is to repress aU that can be repressed,
and to punish aH that can be punished. The same logic
and the same error come up here, as in the laws given
by him to Geneva. The same logic : — You punish
crimes committed against men, says Calvin, can you not
punish crimes committed against God? There is the
same error and the same danger : — In punishing crimes
committed against God, you are Ha danger of usurping
His rights, and of being a tyrant, and, what is worse,
of making Him seem to be such Himself. But Calvin
can and wHl see Hi England, as at Geneva, nothing but
the necessity of reducing morals into harmony with faith :
he cannot understand a Christian who has the power,
and does not employ it, to make the gospel supreme.
This scheme was to the Lord Protector's taste, and he
did his best to carry it out. Overcome, the foUowing
year, by a coafition of political interests and refigious
animosities, imprisoned and menaced with death, he
proved by his Christian patience that Christianity was
not, with him, a means of governing only, but an inward
power and fife. Calvin congratulates him on this
account, in May 1550, far more than on a return of
fortune which partiaUy restored to him his power as pro
tector. A Christian when in disgrace, let him show him
seH such now by pardoning those on whom he might

CALVIN AND EDWARD VI. 275
take vengeance ; and let him show himself such by
courageously putting again his hand to the work of the
Lord Ha England. "Eaised from a perilous malady,
ought we not to give twofold diligence doubly to honour
the good God, as if he had bestowed upon us a second
fife ? God, in binding you to Him by new obligations,
would incite you to do better than ever." But God,
sometimes, lets his best workmen perish ; and He will
not that any man should think himself necessary to His
designs. The Duke of Somerset was overthrown a second
trine, and, shortly after, ascended the scaffold, wept over
by the young king in whose name he had been con
demned to die.
But that young king showed yet more zeal than the
duke for the final establishment of the Eeformation.
He was fourteen years old when Calvin dedicated to him
two of his works,— the Commentary on Isaiah, and the
Commentary on the Catholic Epistles. The homage of
these two books was not rendered to the king only, but
to the extraordinary chdd who was aHeady able to read
them, to judge of them, and to nourish himseH with
them. His precocious intellect and eminent faculties
had struck with astonishment, from his earliest years,
the masters who were entrusted with his education.
His fiving piety caused him to delight in every religious
study, whether edHying or controversial ; and it was
about this period that he wrote, under the form of a
discourse, a plan of reformation, based in aU probabHity
upon Calvin's letter to the Duke of Somerset. The offer
ing of these two books was a great joy to him ; and
Calvin, in a letter to Farel, relates the reception given at
London to the pastor Des GaUars, who was the bearer of
them. They were accompanied by a letter, in which
Calvin returns, but more briefly, to what must yet be
done in England to complete the work of the Eeforma
tion ; his tone, although he never forgets that he speaks

276 CALVIN AND EDWARD VI.
to a king, is that of a friend or a father. Another letter,
written the following year, is yet more paternal. Calvin
dedicates to the young king a brief exposition of Psalm
lxxxvii., " hoping," he says to him, " that you wUl take
pleasure Ha it, and that its perusal will also be profitable
to you." This idea occurred to him one day, he adds,
when he was preaching on this psalm. " The argument
seemed to me so suitable to you, that I was moved
immediately to write the sum of it." Kings are in
danger of forgetting the kingdom of heaven : now, in
this psalm, the nobleness and dignity of the Church are
spoken of, which ought so to attract to herseH great and
small, that aU the goods and honours of the earth cannot
keep them back. . . . The Church, here, is therefore the
spiritual Church, — Christendom, holy and without spot,
— the kingdom of heaven, on earth or in heaven. To be
a king is much ; but to be a Christian, a simple subject
in that other kingdom, is more, infinitely more. " It is
therefore," continues Calvin, "an inestimable privHege
which God hath granted you, that you should be a
Christian king," a king among men, but a subject of
Christ. But to this privilege great duties are attached.
The young king knows them ; it is his " to order and
maintain the kingdom of Jesus Christ in England."
The task wiU perhaps be a laborious one ; therefore, let
this psalm serve him for "strength and buckler," and
God, the King of kings, make him " prosper and flourish
to the glory of His name."
Calvin was also in correspondence with the man whom
his office and piety alike designated as the prime minister
of the pious designs of Edward VI. — Cranmer, the Pri
mate of England.
Cranmer, under the capricious and terrible hand of
Henry VIIL, had sometimes quailed ; but he was one of
those who, from the very outset, had pursued athwart the
royal reformation, the thought of a truly Christian refor-

CRANMER AND CALVIN. 277
mation, such as that of which Calvin was the representa
tive, and, as it were, the incarnation. Now, in order to
achieve this great work, he thought more union was
necessary, not in England only, but in the whole of the
reformed world. In 1552, seeing the papal army serry-
ing its ranks, he was desirous that the Eeformed faith
should do so likewise. " To unite the churches and pro
tect the flock of Christ, nothing is more potent," he writes
to the Eeformer, "than harmony of faith. I would,
therefore, that godly and learned men should assemble to
confer together upon the principal points of doctrine.
Our foes now hold their councils at Trent for the confir
mation of theH errors ; and shall we hesitate to convoke a
godly council to restore and propagate the truth ?" The
intention was good, but the idea was dangerous. A
Protestant councH would probably have only served to
bring out more prominently Ha the presence of Eome, not
only the divergencies that had already manifested them
selves, but those which were disappearing amid the perils
and heroism of the struggle. Was it not better that each
Church should remain mistress of her own faith, and
keep, against the common enemy, all the impetus of
liberty? Then, as now, Eome dexterously wielded her
argument of Protestant diversities ; and then as now the
Protestants replied by manfully fighting under the com
mon banner of Jesus Christ, and such a unity was well
worth the dubious unity which, like the Eomish Church,
they could not have obtained except by exclusiveness at first
and torpor afterwards. But Calvin was attracted by the
showy side of the idea, perhaps also by the recent success
which he had gained with the Swiss Churches, as we
shall see, and by the success which he did not yet despaH
of obtaining Ha Germany. In his answer he thanks
Cranmer warmly for not allowing the affairs of England
to prevent him from thinking of the general interests of
the Church. He thinks the project godly and wise, and

278 THE ENGLISH REFORMATION.
for his part he would gladly cross " ten seas," H necessary,
to repair to so blessed an assembly. The close of his
letter is, however, somewhat less warm, H not somewhat
embarrassed, and we should not be surprised H, without
saying so, Calvin had made some of the reflections which
we have been making. But what does not change is his
fively affection for England, and his entire confidence Ha
the virtues of the young king.
Death was about to destroy aU these hopes, aHeady
realised in part. Edward died before he was sixteen, and
after him reigned his sister, Mary, all whose cares were
immediately directed to the extirpation of the Eeformed
religion. She attempted what was impossible. The
Eeformation had struck deep root into the heart of the
English nation ; the reign of Edward VI., though very
short, had sufficed, by setting it in its right way, to
effect in England what the reign of Calvin was effecting
at Geneva. But Mary could do what may always be
done by the arm of power — she could make martyrs, and
Cranmer was one of her victims. Calvin, in 1550, had
thanked Edward VI. for the reception given by him to
French refugees, and Geneva was about to have English
refugees, who had also been expeUed by persecution. In
1555, Calvin asks for them of the Council the use of one
of the temples of the city. " Formerly," says the regis
ter, "the said English have received other nations, and
have given them a church ; but now it has pleased God
to afflict them." The Church of the Auditoire, aHeady
aUowed to the Italians, was aUowed to them. Two
ministers, named by them, were accepted by the Council,
and one of those ministers was replaced, the following
year, by John Knox, the future Eeformer of Scotland.
The death of Queen Mary and the accession of Elizabeth
recalled them to their own country in 1559, and shortly
after we find the French Church at London addressing
itself to the Company of Geneva for a pastor. The Com-

KNOX AT GENEVA. 279
pany, with the consent of the Council, lent the pastor
Des GaUars, who had been the bearer of Calvin's books to
Edward VI. Des GaUars remained three years in Lon
don, and we see him, on his return, charged to bring
back to Calvin and Geneva the most Hvely testimonies of
the gratitude of the English. . Thus there was established
between England and Geneva that close alliance which
was and still is sealed by the great name of the Eeformer.
The mighty monarchy and the little Eepublic were to be
sisters before God, sisters even before men, so much does
moral grandeur efface,. even in the eyes of the world,
every inequafity, and H one of the two had to give .up
the name of sister for that of mother, England would
give that name to the city of Calvin.
But one of the kingdoms of that powerful monarchy
was to be more specially the daughter, or the sister, of
Geneva. In Scotland certain traits of the genius and
faith of Calvin were to be graven more deeply than even
at Geneva itseH.
John Knox had remained on his three visits to Geneva
only three years altogether ; he came there, moreover,
only after having courageously passed through "his trials
as to his doctrine and his zeal. What then could the
Genevese Eeformer give him ?
Nothing it seems; and yet he gave him much, and
Knox, on leaving Geneva, felt as a new man, and Scot
land, on seeing Knox again, also felt as if he had been
breathed upon by a new breath of doctrine and of fife.
What had passed ? Let us leave to abler men to study
how the genius of Scotland, personified in Knox, entered
into communion so intimate with the genius of Calvin.
In such questions there are always elements which escape
us, things which God alone, the lord of hearts could
know. Let us simply state what was, and what is. For
three centuries Scotland has manifested it with noonday
clearness. She has been proud and happy to be con-

280 CALVIN AND THE ITALIANS.
nected, through Knox, with a greater than Knox, and
this gratitude, deeper now, perhaps, than at any other
period, is not less glorious to Scotland than to Calvin.
Great also was, and great is stiU, the gratitude of
another people, whose destiny was to be decided by the
spHit of Calvin. HoHand, no more than Scotland or
England, had received from him the first evangelical
leaven ; but she found in him what her first aspirations
had sought, and it was Hi the midst of the most tremen
dous struggles for her fiberty and her faith, that she
learned more and more to appreciate what he had im
parted to her.

III.
When speaking of the Engfish we referred to the
Italians, whose own country never recalled them, and
many of whom to this day figure in their descendants in
the hospitable city. But the history of theH colony at
Geneva would caU upon us to relate, at the outset,
sundry struggles, in which we should not always have to
praise the Eeformer. Doubtless he could not expose
himself to compromise his work by leaving to the Italians
a theological liberty which he refused to others; the
Calvinist army could keep Ha its ranks none but soldiers
equally submissive and zealous, and the Italians seemed
to believe, on the contrary, that zeal might dispense
with submission. Even if Calvin had been more disposed
to indulgence, he would scarcely have tolerated the auda
cities which some of them sometimes allowed themselves.
It is, nevertheless, painful to see Calvin so imperious, and
so harsh with men who had braved Eome to the face, and
had forsaken all for the gospel. One error, in his eyes,
radicaUy destroyed the merit of all that might have been
done or endured for the faith ; he himself, as we have

GENTILIS. 281
seen, was ready, sincerely ready, if he could be convicted
of error on one single point, to allow himseH to be con
sidered as an impostor and a wretch, and to be treated
as such. The trial of Valentin Gentifis marks the cul
minating point of these struggles with the Itafian colony.
AU that we might have had to say here upon Calvin,
either to acquit or condemn, we have aHeady said Hi the
trial of Servetus. Let us not return to that subject.
Gentifis was less courageous than the Spaniard. He
was, like him, put upon his trial for his anti-Trinitarian
opinions, but a prompt retractation saved his life at
Geneva, and led him afterwards to compass his own
death. Tormented with chagrin at having given way,
he knew no rest tUl he had restored himself in his own
eyes. He returned, therefore, not to Geneva, but to a
place at hand, upon Bernese territory, and thence he
sent a challenge to any one who would maintain against
him the Eeformer's opinion. He laid down the con
ditions of the contest. Nothing but Scripture was to be
quoted, and he who was conquered was to be put to
death. The Bernese government only accepted the con
clusion. Gentifis, who was considered as already con
quered, by the fact of his condemnation at Geneva, was
conducted to Berne, and there his head feU upon the
scaffold. His friends at Geneva were exiled, or exiled
themselves, and the Italian community, not without
secret murmurs, re-entered that unity, without which
Calvin could not understand either Geneva, the part of
Geneva, or his own part Ha that city.
But these latter events occurred after the fall of the
Libertines, and belong to a period upon which we have
not yet entered. We have placed them here only as
connected with those which precede, and in order not to
have to recur to these sad subjects.

282 calvin's commentaries.

IV.

To complete the history of the previous period, it
remains for us now to say a few words of the Eeformer's
writings during those nine years. They were the most
fruitful years of his laborious life ; and, Ha particular,
during them the Commentaries of Calvin on the New
Testament were published.
Thus, in 1546 and 1547, we have the two Epistles to the
Corinthians ; in 1548, the Epistles to the Galatians, to
the Ephesians, to the Phdippians, to the Colossians, and
the two to Timothy; in 1549, the Epistle to Titus and
that to the Hebrews; in 1550, the Epistle of St. James,
and the two to the Thessalonians ; in 1551, the Epistles
of St. John and St. Jude, and a new edition of all St.
Paul's Epistles ; in 1552, the Acts ; in 1553, St. Matthew,
St. Mark, and St. Luke, which were arranged as a
harmony, and suppfied with a parallel Commentary,
followed by a Commentary on St. John. The Old Testa
ment came afterwards, with the exception of Isaiah,
pubHshed in 1551, and Genesis in 1554.
The Commentaries of Calvin mark a revolution in the
study of the Bible, and, on that account, occupy a dis
tinguished place, not only in the history of theology, but
in that of the human mind. It is good sense dethroning
scholastic erudition ; and it is truth, sought in every
verse, and every word, by the straightest and shortest
road. Doubtless, in many passages, better elucidations
have since been found, but it is precisely because his
method has been foUowed. Biblical science owes him, in
a word, what any science owes to the man who . trans
ports it to the domain of facts, and lays as its basis,
observation and experience. Such a man may stUl make
mistakes in many details, and even on points more
important ; but he has opened the way to aU ulterior

CALVIN S COMMENTARIES. 283
progress, and, in that respect, he has a right to claim as
his own, the very corrections which others wUl subse
quently make in certain portions of his works. In read
ing Calvin, moreover, we must never be too ready to
think we have understood better or seen farther than he.
Modern exegesis has often been surprised to discover
that what it imagined to be new had been seen three
centuries before by Calvin ; often, too, after some of his
interpretations have been boldly rejected, they have been
taken up again as the best. And, indeed, even in regard
to things which he could not know ; those which have
only been elucidated since his trine by travels, by archae
ology, or other sciences, his lofty inteUect often sufficed
to give him a glimpse of the truth across aU the errors
and all the ignorance of his times.
Those times deemed themselves learned ; and in some
respects they were right in thinking so. But theH
science was chiefly erudition ; and erudition iU employed
is death to true science, and the scourge of the human
mind. Calvin, the commentator, wiU not despise it; but'
he wdl receive, and above all, wUl give, only so much of
it as is truly useful, what bears upon the point, and what
throws light upon it. He knows that it has often
been paraded only to conceal an ignorance which has
been too real. In him we never find quotations which
are not positively necessary to support or elucidate his
statement; we never find interpretations discussed for
the pleasure of discussing them ; and, above aU, we never
find anything which resembles an HateUectual exercise or
playing with Scripture. " It is audacity which neces
sarily leads to sacrilege," he will teU you,1 " to drag the
Scriptures hither and thither without any positive aim,
and to dally with them as with a thing made for pastime
only; as many have long done." Long, indeed, very
long. The mediaeval schools studied the Bible only as a
! Epistles of St. Paul— Dedication to Simon Grynasus.

284 CALVIN AS AN EXPOSITOR.
matter tor exercise, and as the aliment of scholastic
theology ; and this is one of the things which explain
why they perceived so little the disagreement between
the Bible and Eomanism. They searched for mere
searching's sake, far more than in order to find; they
ploughed and re-ploughed the soH of Scripture, but with
out requHing it to produce anything. The Eeformer, on
the contrary, wishes not to lose a stroke of his difigent
spade, and he does not mean that, in the smaUest furrow
he makes, there shaU not germinate and fructify, some
idea which has been sown there by the hand of God.
This is, therefore, another point in which the fiving
unity of his work appears. In the Institutes, which are,
as it were, its plan and programme, practice ever runs
side by side with theory, and the moral man is ever by
the side of the befieving man, or rather there is the com
plete unity of the two ; so much so that, where one of
the two is absent, Calvin wiU deny that the other exists.
In the laws of Geneva there is the poHtical and civH
consecration of this idea ; the pertinacious, and, if neces
sary, the pitdess pursuit of the same ideal. In the Com
mentaries we find, at last, an attentive and pious search
for aU that can furnish men with the means of its reafi-
sation. But that which, above all, renders these researches
profitable, is the Christian experience displayed in them
by the author. Here lies his great ability, for here he is
something better than an able man — he is a Christian —
nothing but a Christian. In vain, when commenting on
the Bible, will be the mere wish to say only what is use
ful ; what will your intention avail H, for want of experi
ence, you do not discern what is or is not useful, and
what may or may not serve to the development of the
Christian fife ? In order to this, therefore, you must have
lived that life— nay, more, you must have lived it with
self-observation, studying in your own heart the influ-

CALVIN AS AN EXPOSITOR. 285
ence, bearing, and fruitfulness of each idea. Such is the
inner work of which the results are imprinted on every
page of the Commentaries ; such is also the secret of their
power. Although without warmth, they are full of
vigorous life, and, thanks to this character of serious
truthfulness, the absence of warmth is only a fresh
element of authority and power ; you perceive the man
who wUl say that only of which he has before him and
in him some unexceptionable proof. Hence also foUows
a result which at first surprises us, when we remember
that it is Calvin — the absolute Calvin, with whom we
feel so much at ease. The Calvin of the Commentaries,
except in a few passages, is no longer the man whom we
generally picture to ourselves ; he is a friend who leads
us through the field of Scripture, relating what he has
seen, inviting us to see, allowing us to pause but little
before the flowers, and much before the fruit ; and with
serene good wiU he offers to us the fruits which have
seemed to him the most wholesome and nutritious. But
he does not content himself with simply guiding you ; he
consults you, in some sort, aiding himseH by your expe
rience, or amicably constraining you to acquHe it, if you
have none. You hold the pen with him, and feel his
superiority only by the charm which is felt at hearing
another express, wisely and clearly, what one has himseH
thought, or what he may have wished to think.

V

The publication of the Commentaries had been often
interrupted by that of other works, which were requHed
by cHcumstances at home or abroad. We will indicate
the principal of them.
In 1547, Calvin had to write to the Church of Eouen,
which was troubled by the doctrines of Libertine Pan-

286 THE COUNCIL OF TRENT.
theism, preached by an ex-monk. " I must neither dis
semble nor hold my peace," says he in the introduction
to this work, "when I hear that the name of God is
blasphemed anywhere."
It is the same idea which he expresses the foUowing
year on resuming his pen, not against an obscure monk,
but against the famous assembly of which the decrees
were to become the gospel of Borne. Nothing yet, it is
true, announced such a result. Opened, after long delays,
in 1545, the Council of Trent dragged itseH miserably
along, with a very smaU number of prelates — twenty-
five at first, but afterwards a few more, nearly aU Italians,
and visibly embarrassed by the grand name of General,
or Oecumenical, with which the CouncH had been deco
rated. The Eomish Church has succeeded so weU Ha
forgetting those clay-feet of the colossus, and in causing
them to be forgotten, that it is curious to see what a weH-
informed contemporary was able to say of it, without
fear of being contradicted. Calvin asks these few bishops,
dressed up with the name of General Council, if there is
amongst them at least some weU-known name, some theo
logian of any weight. Though unknown in their obscure
dioceses, " a change of aH" has sufficed for them to be
come the light of the world ! TheH decrees, moreover,
are not drawn up by themselves ; the true CouncU of
Trent is composed of sundry monks, whom the bishops
have brought to make them transact the business. And
even were the Council composed of a thousand bishops,
the rights which it arrogates to itseH would be no better
founded on sound doctrine and history. Who ever saw
the first CouncUs ascribing to themselves infaUibUity?
Even had they done so, the errors taught by this would
sufficiently prove them to have been Hi the wrong. Cal
vin passes under review all the decrees which were pub
lished. He shows that, after having proclaimed Scripture
and tradition as the sources of faith, the Council has

CALVIN AGAINST THE COUNCIL. 287
reaUy drawn from the second only; and has, moreover,
decreed more than one thing which even tradition does
not sanction — amongst others the canonicity of the Apo
crypha. They have fallen into errors in substance, or
vices in form, and there are contradictions, omissions,
unintentional obscurities and intentional obscurities —
those, for instance, of the decree on grace. Calvin
sees and says all this, and that, in sum, the Councd has
hitherto produced only one page reaUy true, and that is
the one which the legates of the Pope, in theH opening
instructions, devoted to the delineation of the vices of
the clergy, the evUs of the Church, and the necessity of
applying a remedy. But the decrees of the Council are
the best proof that the Eomish Church does not possess
this remedy ; and its subsequent decrees were to prove it
still better.
Calvin was mistaken, therefore, in one thing only.
He thought — what all Eomanists then thought with
him, including the members of the CouncU — that this
Council was a faUure, and that the obligation of reducing
to form so many errors tUl then floating about, was a
misfortune for Eomanism. He therefore judged the
Romish Church still too favourably, for he did not think
her. capable of holding the gospel so cheap as to accept
the work of Trent, and to find in it her unity, authority,
and strength.
The Council, moreover, had just been prorogued, and
it might be doubted whether it would ever be reassem
bled : and, in fact, it was not till more than fourteen years
after. Hence the appearance in Germany, of the famous
Interim of Charles V, a singular decree, which pretended
to decide what Protestants and Eomanists were provi
sionally to believe tiH a good and true Council, acknow
ledged by aU, should make them agree. The Interim
certainly contained good things; but, if it was sufficiently
Protestant greatly to displease the Eomanists, it was suf-

288 THE "TWO TREATISES.
ficiently Eomish to be yet more displeasing to the Pro
testants. Some, however, in Germany, appeared to be
satisfied, and endeavoured to be so. It was to them
especiaUy that he addressed his Interim adultero-Ger-
manum, which was subsequently pubHshed in French,
under the title of Two Treatises touching the Reforma
tion of the Church, and the true means of determining
her differences. This true means, according to Calvin, is
not and never wiU be that of the halfway-men, the men
of accommodations and compromises, such as those who
have drawn up the Interim or who approve it. Not
that he blames, on principle, aU concession, but he sees,
in fact, that those who begin to yield, yield too much,
and also, that for one man who yields from truly Chris
tian motives, many think only of living in peace at any
price. Away, then, with those "framers of a factitious
concord ;" away, then, with that concord the plan of
which is but a tissue of equivocations, a long to-and-fro
between the gospel and Eome, between fight and dark
ness. After having thus characterised the work in itseH,
Calvin resumes, one by one, aU its articles. Errors,
half-errors, wUes great and smaU, consequences patent,
consequences latent, he omits nothing, he pardons
nothing, and his conclusion reappears more evident each
time. The expedients of the halfway-men are nothing
worth. One means only is good, and that is frankness ;
a candid return to the gospel, the frank profession of the
gospel. This conclusion Calvin developes once more at
the close, in a passage full of fife, — an eloquent appeal to
suffer aU rather than to abandon, even in little things,
the rights and interests of truth.
This treatise is, therefore, not only a protestation against
the Interim ; it has its importance in the history of Calvin's
work. Whether the author intended it or not, it is his
answer to those who assert that the Calvinistic reform

ON REFORMATION. 289
broke off too completely from Eomanism. Was nothing,
then, to be retained ? we are asked even at the present
day. Would it not have been more to the interest of
the cause itseH, to have been more accommodating ?
" The interest of the cause " is a human thought which
Calvin despises and rejects, or rather, which it does not
occur to him to reject, because he knows nothing of it.
In nothing does he know anything but the interests of
truth ; and even H, humanly speaking, the cause must
suffer from that, it is of fittie concern to him. But, here,
he does not admit that it suffers from it : the Eeformation
has everything to gain, even humanly speaking, by
breaking with everything that i6 not the gospel. If you
wish to conquer by the Bible, — and by what else would
you dream of conquering? — you must not begin by
agreeing at its expense, even upon secondary things, with
those who have abandoned or burlesqued it. Do not
forget, moreover, that it is by secondary things, by forms,
practices, and usages, that Eome established and stiH
maintains her empHe. The fittie which you would
yield her, would become a great deal in her hands ; you
would have furnished her with the means to reconquer,
if not you at least your chHdren. This is what Calvin
had comprehended. Is the danger of acting otherwise
less now? So some think. It seems to them that a
position marked out by a struggle of three centuries can
not be compromised by allowing it to be encroached
upon Ha a few unimportant points. Such is not our
opinion ; and we think that the greater part of Calvin's
reflections on the Interim are altogether as just now as
they were in 1549.

290 " WARNING AGAINST ASTROLOGY.

VI.
The same year witnessed his Warning against that
Astrology which is called judicial, and other forms of
Curious Desire which now reign in the world. An author
of the nineteenth century could not speak more contemp
tuously than Garvin of these follies. But he would not
have men content with pitying such things ; he knows
that this is not sufficient to prevent theH constant recur
rence. " What is the remedy then," he asks, " for obviat
ing such inconveniences ? Let every one regard that to
which he is caHed, so as to apply himself to his office.
Let men of letters give themselves to things good and
useful, and not to a frivolous curiosity, which serves only
to amuse the foofish. Let great and smaU, the learned
and ignorant, think that we are not here to occupy our
selves with useless things, but that the end of aH our prac
tices ought to be the edification of ourselves and others in
the fear of God." Thus it is, always the practical fife ;
and always the banishing of evU, be it what or where it
may, by the sense of duty and the fulfilment of duty.
This is always the ruling idea of a treatise which ap
peared the year after, the Treatise of the offences which,
at the present day, prevent many from coming to the pure
doctrine of the Gospel, and draw away others. The word
offences1 is here taken in its old evangelical sense ; it
designates aH that may furnish the indifferent and the
lukewarm either with pretexts for not embracing the
Gospel or opportunities of denying it. In dedicating
this book to his friend, Laurent De Normandie, Calvin
says : " SH and beloved Brother, — Since I have long ago,
and for many reasons, vowed and dedicated to you in my
heart some one of my books, I have wished to choose this
one amongst others, because your example may serve as a
Scandales.

TREATISES OF OFFENCES." 291
great confirmation of the doctrine it contains. For since
you willingly forsook the land of your bHth and came
here to dweU as a stranger, it is true that you and I can
bear witness to the assaults which Satan has devised
against you." And, in fact, scarcely had he arrived at
Geneva, when M. De Normandie had received tidings of
the death of his father, kiUed, they said, by grief at seeing
his son a Protestant. Two months afterwards, his wife,
who had come with him, was carried off by death, and
this fresh trial, some said, was the chastisement of his
apostacy. But he, on the contrary, saw in it only an addi
tional reason forattaching himself invincibly to the Gospel.
It is this sentiment which Calvin would inculcate upon
all men. Trials, contradictions, calumnies, struggles
without, and struggles within, — offences, in short, for this
word includes them aH,— are what he reviews ; always
concluding that nothing can excuse us from enlisting
under the banner of Christ. He divides offences into
three classes. The first are those which our heart has the
unhappy talent of finding in the Gospel itseH — difficulties,
obscurities, things repugnant to our inclinations, to our
pride especiaUy, and, Ha short, the foolishness of the cross,
as the apostle caUed it. The second are not Ha the Gospel,
but, in some sort, aH around it, a kind of barrier which
the indifferent rejoice to meet with. To this class belong
religious disturbers, the Hregularities of the Church or of
her ministers, papal despotism, the errors, superstitions,
and absurdities which have been preached in the name of
Christ, and for which men make Him responsible, in
order to dispense with going to Him. The thHd class, in
fine, comprehends the disgust, opprobrium, and dangers to
which those are exposed who embrace the gospel. This
part, which is the least real now, was then most so ; but
Calvin places under this head aU commonplace objections
against the Eeformation, and, as those objections have
scarcely changed, it contains for us also many things as

292 FOUR SERMONS
actuaUy suitable as for the readers of those times. In
short, this is one of the most carefully- written and com
plete of Calvin's works.
The same ideas appear again, in a more dHectly practi
cal form, in the Four Sermons treating of matters very
useful for our times. " Though I have written before,"
he says in the preface, " two treatises ample enough to
show that it is not lawful for a Christian in Popish coun
tries to make believe Hi any wise to consent or adhere to
the abuses, superstitions, and idolatries which reign there,
nevertheless, there are people who every day are asking
my counsel afresh. There are others also who do not cease
to aUege their rejoinders and subterfuges against what I
have written on the subject." Calvin thinks therefore
that he cannot do better than pubfish a sermon which he
has preached upon it, and to this he adds three others
which wiU, he hopes, leave no point undecided.
In the first he shows the obligation to flee idolatry —
that is to say, aU outward participation in a worship
which a man does not approve Ha his heart. Nothing, in
his view, is indifferent in the matter of divine worship.
Whoever is present at the mass approves the mass, and
with the mass, all that belongs to it, and aU of which it
is become the centre. Whoever submits to one of the
Eomish forms, submits to the authority which estab-
Hshed them, and thereby •overthrows, as much as in him
lies, the authority of Jesus Christ. "Let us keep, in
short, this rule, that all human inventions devised against
the Word of God are true sacrileges. ... I know how
harsh and unbearable such strictness appears to those
who would be dealt with according to their taste . . .
What would they that I should do? I have treated
them hitherto only too gently. Whether I speak of it or
whether I forbear, we are none the less obliged to keep
this law." Woe, therefore, to those who " indHectly re
nounce theH Christianity." Woe unto those who are "so

FOR THE TIMES. 293
entangled in the world" that they cannot, they say, be
judged like others. "There is here neither exemption
nor privUege for great or small, for rich or poor. Let
aU, then, bend theH necks. Let the poor man fear, lest
H he should say, ' I know not what to do,' God should
answer him, ' Nor know I what to do with thee.' Let not
the rich be intoxicated wjtth ease and comfort, and let them
learn to count aU things dung and loss which would turn
them away from or hinder them in leading a Christian fife."
In the second sermon, Calvin exhorts to the suffering
of all things rather than not to declare openly for the
gospel. He insists especiaUy upon this idea, which is
often developed Ha his letters to the martyrs, that strength
Gomes with the trial, and in proportion to the trial. " A
young man who dwelt here with us, being taken in the
town of Tournay, was condemned to be beheaded if he
recanted, and to be burned alive H he persisted. When
he was asked which he would do, he replied simply, He
who wUl give me grace to die for His name, wdl surely
give me grace to endure the flames." But Calvin rarely
quotes the noble instances with which contemporary his
tory might have abundantly suppfied him ; one might
say he fears to diminish the glory of the martyrs before
God, by praising them before men ; or perhaps that he
fears to authorise the timid to resign to the strong the
care of the battle and the victory. Often even, as we
read, we might question whether the generation whom
he exhorts to be courageous is the same which had nur
tured, and was stiU nurturing, so many lofty souls ; one
might rather think it composed of weak men, betraying
or ready to betray their faith. It is always, then, as we
have said, the general and his army. Ten soldiers who
lose heart afflict and grieve him more than he is moved
by a thousand who die.
The third discourse aims to teach believers to appre
ciate the happiness of possessing the truth, of being truly

294 SERMONS FOR THE TIMES.
" in the Church," which, according to Calvin, exists there
only where the true faith is confessed. Those who have
had nothing to do to procure this happiness, seeing that
God "is come to visit them in theH nest," let them
tremble lest they render themselves unworthy of it by
not appreciating it. Let not those who have bought it
by sacrifices or by exHe, imagine that they have paid for
it ; and, above aU, let them not deem themselves less
guilty if they dishonour by theH fife that "house of
God" in which they are come to dweU. But because
Geneva, or any other place of refuge, is not solely peopled
with saints, may it be concluded that it is as weU to re
main in popedom or "the papacy?" Woe unto those
"proud viUains" who despise the Hberty of serving God
in spHit and in truth. Cannot a man, say they, " pray
to God by himseH?" Must they positively "trot to
Geneva?" Well, let them not come. They can do stUl
better. Where they are, in the midst of popery, let
them raise the standard raised at Geneva. But "our
closet philosophers" are too cowardly for that, "and they
understand too Httle the worth of the gHt of God." Be
it ours to understand it, and to make it understood.
In the fourth sermon, Calvin's object is to show "how
much trouble a man must take to redeem the Hberty of
serving God purely." The development is such as the
times demanded ; it is fuU of practical details, and of
special refutations and exhortations, such as were re
quHed by those who had forsaken theH country and theH
wealth. But he wUl have the sacrifice complete; he
will not aUow the exUed Christian to fancy he has a right
to claim earthly compensation, stiH less to make sure of
it before starting. Ah ! if they had " learned and re
tained the doctrine of David to prefer a Httle corner at
the threshold of the temple, before the highest places
they could elsewhere choose, they would not be so loth
to take counsel." We tell them, indeed, in the name of

OTHER WRITINGS. 295
God, what they have to do ; but they wish that there
should also be pointed out to them "the ways and
means of living." Hath God then made us stewards,1 to
secure for them a lodging, and to give to each, according
to his rank, board and wages ? Calvin knows well what
Geneva has done, and wiU always do for destitute exdes;
he knows also that their most devoted " steward" is him
self. But to promise anything would be to authorise the
exile to reckon upon men, or rather upon one man ; God
must be and remain for earth as for heaven his only hope
and his only salvation.
There are in these discourses pages of faultless elo
quence, amply compensating for the inequalities with
which they are interspersed. They give, moreover, a
tolerably exact idea of Calvin's style of preaching, and it
is that which has induced us to dweU for some moments
upon them.

VII.

Let us mention a few other works, purely theological
or purely polemical.
We shall not refer again to the book against Servetus ;
but we find,
In 1550, a treatise On the Eternal Predestination and
Providence of God, and another On the Christian Life.
In 1552, there was a new edition of the work on
Predestination, revised and augmented.
In 1554, there appeared a Brief Answer to the Calum
nies of a certain Busybody, upon the doctrine of Predes
tination. That certain busybody was Castafio, and the
term indicates but too truly the tone of the work. We
have aHeady 'said how harsh Calvin showed himself
towards his old friend. He was not less so in a second
1 Maitres d'hotel.

296 THE SACRAMENTS, ETC.
answer, pubHshed Hi 1557. When one reads now some
of the pages by which Castafio brought upon himseH
these attacks, the temptation is great to cast ail the
blame upon Calvin. Castafio was the apostle of tolera
tion, and, Ha the middle of the sixteenth century, said all
that would be spoken now by the most enlightened and
liberal Christian. But it is precisely here, H we are just,
that we shaU find the excuse for Calvin's vehemence.
We can understand how such Hberafity must have
appeared to him an abandonment of the rights of truth.
And, in fact, is it not often so? And H this incon
venience, though less in our eyes than those of intoler
ance, yet seems so serious, — could it not have alarmed
CalvHi ?
In 1555, another work appeared; — his Defence of the
sound and orthodox doctrine of the Sacraments, their
nature, their efficacy, &c. The foUowing year there
came out a second Defence, dHected against Joachim
Westphal, and, Ha 1557, a Last Warning to the same
Westphal, whose ultra-Lutheran ideas on the Eucharist
were, in fact, worthier of a doctor of the Sorbonne than
of a Eeformed divine. Here, again, charity was sadly
forgotten. We must add, however, that the pastor of
Hamburg had begun the debate, and that in terms which
were most insulting to the Church of Geneva.
Calvin had not succeeded, therefore, Hi having his
ideas on the Eucharist admitted into Germany : the
death of Luther had broken off his project of reaching
the disciples through the master ; and when the master
was dead, the disciples were even less disposed than
before to deviate from his doctrines. Calvin then
dHected aU his endeavours towards the Swiss Churches.
In 1540, we saw him reassuring them as to the progress
which he was accused of having made towards the
Lutheran doctrine.
The same fears were renewed in 1549, and he repaired

CALVIN AND THE ZW1NGLIANS. 297
to Zurich with Farel, and demanded a conference of the
clergy. He showed them that his doctrine was not sub-
stantiaUy opposed to that of Zwinglius, to which he only
added a spiritual and mystical element, which was
always, Ha fact, admitted by aU the pious Zwinglians,
theH master very certainly included. " Christ being the
truth itself," Calvin had said in his Catechism, " He does
not merely give us, in this sacred repast, a figure and
promises, but He makes us partakers of His own sub
stance, and unites us with Himself in one life. Zwing
lius, to cut short aH danger of Eomanism, had, in theory,
made of the Lord's Supper a simple memorial of the
Saviour's death ; but this memorial, said Calvin to the
pastors of Zurich, was such that it might have, in prac
tice, a more inward and more powerful efficacy. Why,
then, refuse to mention the sacred union which the
Supper establishes between the believer and his Saviour ?
A confession was therefore drawn up, which was after
wards signed by the other Churches of Switzerland.
This result greatly rejoiced Calvin in the midst of his
trials, — for it was a few weeks after his wHe's death, and
he thanked God for it, as for the most precious consola
tion that could have been granted him.

VIIL
ShaU we pause to cast another glance upon the life
and labours of Calvin during this period ?
Let our readers rather go over our record of it for
themselves, and H, at the same time, they remember that
we have omitted many things, — in particular, that we
have given no detaHs respecting the occupations of the
pastor and of the professor ; that, in short, we have said
nothing of his health, which was more wretched than
ever — they will speedily come to the conclusions which

2.98 THE COURSE OF EVENTS.
we might set down here. Faults may be recapitulated,
but we shaU bow before his indefatigable and fabulous
activity, — the perpetual triumph of faith over agony of
mind and body.
The next period, comprising also nine years, wUl take
us on to the death of Calvin. We shall have fewer facts
to relate. Not that the activity of Calvin had relaxed ;
but he was more and more acknowledged to be the
centre and head of the Eeformation in aU Western
Europe, and found himself mixed up with a great number
of events, of which the recital would rather be the history
of his age than of himseH. We shaU confine ourselves,
therefore, to what speciaUy belongs to himseH.
We have seen the Libertines dispute with him for
Geneva, and Geneva finaUy remain with him ; we shall,
therefore, have to show him completing the work of
making her his own, and what he had aspHed to make
her for the part which he wished to secure to her. This
part, we have seen, that the mere presence of Calvin
had sufficed to give to the Church of Geneva, even under
the Libertines, when the Eeformer might have been
banished any day. Europe had then not much cause for
observing the change which had come over the small
republic that had been restored to order and peace ; but
Calvin, tranquil in his citadel, could the better devote
himself to the innumerable cares that so many Churches
claimed at his hands.
This tranquillity was, indeed, but relative. Calvin
had no more to fear from within ; but the citadel might
any day be attacked and won, and Calvin knew but too
weU on whom, in that case, would fad the first fury of
the foe. We have aHeady related the attack prepared,
in 1563, at the instigation of the exiled Libertines.
Calvin had only five months more to live, and it is
doubtful whether he would have been allowed to com-

GENEVA THREATENED. 299
plete them. Three years before, the heretical city had
been more menaced than ever.
The Eomish princes demanded the reopening of the
CouncU, and the Pope, who feared it, proposed, by way
of diverting their thoughts, that they should begin by
subduing Geneva. The letters have been found which
Pius IV and Cardinal Borromeo, the future St. Charles
Borromeo, wrote on that subject to the King of France,
the King of Spain, and the Duke of Savoy. The whole
plan of the campaign is traced in them. The King of
France is to send troops through Burgundy, the King of
Spain through Franche-Comte' ; the duke is to have his
army reinforced by a troop of cavalry sent him by Pius
IV, and the papal treasury is to count him out twenty
thousand . crowns to aid in the preparations. Three
armies were therefore to rush at once upon Geneva ;
humanly speaking, nothing could save her. But H
Geneva were taken, to whom should she be given ? To
that difficulty, under God, she owed her safety, not one
of the three sovereigns caring to conquer her for another.
But she passed months in continual apprehension, and,
in truth, during the lapse of those years, she had not a
single day of fuU security. Thus did she serve, under
Calvin, her apprenticeship to that hard fife which was so
long to be hers. She was accustoming herself not to
have her existence assured for a year, not even for a
month, but without, for all that, diminishing in the least
her courage or activity.
Far, therefore, from seeking to make herseH forgotten,
— which, indeed, would have been impossible for her
whUe Calvin was there, — she identified herseH more and
more with the work and genius of him who had fashioned
her after his own image ; she accepted the responsibility
of that apostolate of which the field was continually
widening, but of which aU the perUs were threatening to
overwhelm her. In January 1561, when the fears ex-

300 CHARLES IX. AND HIS COMPLAINTS.
cited by the Pope's intrigues were at theH height, a
letter was received Ha which Charles IX. loudly com
plained of the disturbances caused in his kingdom by
preachers come from Geneva, and he calls upon the
CouncU to recaU them without delay. Great commo
tion thereupon ensued in the CouncU. That letter was,
perhaps the first act of the drama which was preparing.
What was to be done ? Calvin is charged to reply to it ;
he wHl know what is best to be said to avert the danger,
H it be possible, without disowning the courageous
preachers who have been trained in his school. Calvin,
therefore, drew up the letter. It is humble in form, but
firm in substance. The ministers of Geneva have sent no
one into France ; but aH who have appHed to them, and
in whom they have found " some wisdom and grace,"
have been exhorted "to employ themselves wherever
they went for the advancement of the gospel." The
ministers of Geneva neither could nor ever can do other
wise, for " since they are persuaded that the doctrine
which they preach is of God, tending to make known
aright the grace which He hath given us in Jesus Christ,
it cannot be that they should not desire it to be sown
everywhere." Could it be that the most Christian king
did not desHe this himseH also ? And after this almost
ironical remark, he adverts to the " troubles" for which
the king blames the preachers. Troubles, properly so
caHed, they are complete strangers to. "They have
laboured with aU theH might to prevent the occurrence
of any outbreak ; they have never advised any change in
or attempt against the state" But if men may brand as
a disturbance any emotion caused by the preaching of
the gospel, and any success obtained by those who preach
it, then the preachers are gudty, very guHty, but Geneva
wUl not forbid them to be guHty in' such a way. Such
is the conclusion of the letter— a little veded, indeed, but
clear. The letter reached the king, signed, not by Cal-

ZEAL OF THE PREACHERS. 301
vin, but by the " Syndics and Council of Geneva," accord
ing to the official formula.
The facts were in conformity with the words. A letter
from the Eeformer to BuHinger (May 1561), shows us to
what an extent, and by the simple pressure of cHcum-
stances, that active and powerful propaganda was or
ganised. " It is incredible," writes Calvin, " with what
ardour our friends devote themselves to the spread of the
gospel. As greedHy as men before the Pope solicit him
for benefices, do they ask for employment in the churches
beneath the cross. They besiege my door to obtain a
portion of the field to cultivate. Never had monarch
courtiers more eager than mine. They dispute about the
stations as H the kingdom of Jesus Christ was peaceably
established in France. Sometimes I seek to restrain
them. I show to them the atrocious edict which orders
the destruction of every house in which divine service
shaU have been celebrated; I remind them that, Hi more
than twenty towns, the faithful have been massacred by
the populace. But nothing can stop them." These fines
are one of those rare passages in which Calvin allows
himseH to be surprised into a Httle enthusiasm. He is
happy in the apostofic papacy with which he is invested
by the candidates for martyrdom ; he is proud of it — not
for himself, for there is not a word indicative of pride,
but for the noble cause of which he is the acknowledged
leader.

IX.

But enthusiasm never made him lose sight of the more
positive side of his office, and amidst that ardent and
youthful soldiery he remained the man of discipline and
order. He had not waited for the complaints of Charles
IX. to forbid the Protestants of the kingdom aU that

302 FALSE ACCUSATIONS AND
might, with justice, be called disturbance or violence.
In vain have all his letters to the churches of that coun
try been ransacked, not a word has been found in them
which could be considered as an appeal to force or re
prisals, and his enemies have been compeUed to fabricate
the two famous letters which are stiH sometimes quoted,
though theH spuriousness has been abundantly proved.
The pretended original manuscripts, preserved in the
archives of the famUy of d'Alissac, have been recently
examined. Not only are they not in Calvin's handwrit
ing, nor Ha that of any one of his known secretaries, they
are fuH of faults of spelling and style, which have been
carefuUy corrected in the printed copies. Even when
corrected Ha other respects, the style bears no resemblance
to that of Calvin. It is impossible to express more
absurdly counsels to murder and piUage, and of abject
humifity towards the Baron du Poet — a humdity never
shown by Calvin, even when writing to the greatest
princes. FinaUy, in the first, M. du Poet is caUed
General of the Religion in Dauphiny, and this letter is
dated 1547, a period Ha which the Eeformed refigion had
in Dauphiny neither a soldier nor an organised church,
and when M. du Poet was stUl a Eomanist ! In the
second letter, dated 1561, the same person is caUed the
Governor of Montelimart, and High Chamberlain of
Navarre, dignities with which he was not invested till
long after the death of Calvin.
Even H we had not these detaHs, the fraud would be
sufficiently proved by the contrast these two letters offer
when compared with others ; let us take, for instance,
only the one he wrote, in 1562, to the famous Baron des
Adrets, whose outrages dishonoured the Eeformed religion,
and who ended by relapsing into Eomanism. Having
made himseH master of Lyons, des Adrets authorised
there the Hregularities of a soldiery which had been trained
by his bad example. " It is high time," Calvin writes to

POPISH FORGERIES. 303
him, " that moderation should be shown  You must
strive to obtain it, sH, and especially to reform an abuse
which is in nowise to be tolerated ; it is this, — that the
soldiers pretend to make booty of the chafiees, reliquaries,
and such like utensds of the churches. What is worse is,
that it is reported that one of the ministers has thrust
himseH in amongst them  What a horrible offence
to disgrace the gospel, and to expose to opprobrium the
cause which in itself is so good and holy. .... We have
not hesitated, sH, to let you know privately our opinion,
and to exhort you in God's name virtuously to exert your-
seH in this matter." Thus, the bare thought of the pUlage
perpetrated at Lyons spoils all the happiness he would
feel at seeing in the hands of the Protestants a city which
had been so cruel towards them. This sentiment reap
pears in his letters on many other occasions. No success
rejoices him so much as to make him reconcUed to seeing
it accompanied or„followed by things he does not approve;
he intends that aU the champions of the Eeformation, the
bearers of the sword as weU as the bearers of the Word,
should be serious and pious men, altogether worthy of theH
cause. Several times, in particular, we see him blaming
the Protestants for having seized upon Eomish churches.
He would have them fall into theH power by the force of
events, by the conversion of whole towns or villages, as
was sometimes the case ; and tiU then, the Protestants
must assemble, it matters little where, — in houses, in
barns, or in the open aH, if needs be, and this moderation
wdl gain them many more adherents than the usurpation
of churches. But Calvin wUl not expatiate on this last
idea ; he would fear to counsel anything that savoured of
calculation, and to preach the interest of the cause. What
is wrong is wrong, and must never be permitted. This is
his morality on all occasions. But he did not content
himself with being grieved, as a Christian, by certain
details of the struggle; he took a yet higher view, and

304 CALVIN'S MODERATION.
comprehended what the Eeformation might lose, even if
victorious, by becoming in France a mifitary and political
party. The only combats and the only triumphs worthy
of her, he said repeatedly, were the sufferings of her
martyrs aHeady recompensed by so many conquests.
Scaffolds and faggots bear fruit ; wars, and even success
ful wars, are barren. So it was seen ere long. If the
Eeformed refigion could have gone on growing ten years
longer as she had grown till then, — poor, austere, strictly
confined to the religious sphere, and watered with blood
indeed, but her own blood, — she would have been mistress
of France. Events were shortly to confirm too weU the
apprehensions of Calvin. But here, again, he set aside
the question of consequences, contenting himseH with
calling evU what seemed to him to be so. Observe,
amongst others, his letter to Cofigny respecting the con-
spHacy of Amboise, that untoward commencement of
political Protestantism which henceforward was to be
associated with Christian Protestantism. He was accused
of having shared in it, and even of being its instigator, see
ing that its head, La Benaudie, had lived at Geneva a
short time before. Calvin, then, teUs the adnfiral what
had passed. " Some one," said he, " asked counsel of me
whether it would not be lawful to resist the tyranny
which was then oppressing the chHdren of God. As I
saw that several already cherished the same opinion, after
having given him a positive answer that he must abandon
it, I endeavoured to show him that there was no founda
tion for it in the wiU of God." The person who had taken
the business in hand did not consider himseH beaten. He
made " great lamentations over the inhumanity practised,
in order to abofish theH religion, and that th.ey were
hourly expecting a horrible butchery to exterminate the
poor believers." " I answered sinaply," continues Calvin,
" that it would be better we should all perish a hundred-
times than be the cause of exposing the gospel to such a

POLITICAL.. PROTESTANTISM. 305
disgrace" The conspHators persisted. " Then seeing the
matter thus going the wrong way, I lamented grievously,
and often have these words been heard from my mouth,
'Alas ! I did not think I should five to see the day when
we had lost aU credit with those who boast of being be
fievers ! Must the Church of Geneva, then, be thus de
spised by her chHdren ?'" Calvin identifies himself with
the Church of Geneva; she reproves, and wiU reprove
like him, any use of carnal weapons in the great war of
faith. This sentiment is the more remarkable, that it
seemingly agrees but little with the Calvinistic notion of
a Christian State. But Calvin carefully distinguishes
between possession and conquest. When the gospel pos^
sesses the State, let there be then a close union between
politics and the gospel ; but for the gospel to possess the
State, that is to say, — for Calvin demands always the real
and not the apparent, — to possess.it really and intimately,
it must have been conquered by the only gospel weapons
—faith, persuasion, example, and patience.

X.
This suffices, we think, to determine the character of
the influence exercised by Calvin upon the Churches of
France. He never relaxed Hi his labours to maintain
them on purely religious ground, or to bring them back
to it ; and if, Ha spite of so many very different incitements,
religious energy continued to circulate mightily in theH
bosom, and H political Protestantism did not prevent
Christian Protestantism from growing uninterruptedly in
piety, knowledge, and devotedness, it was in great part
to Calvin that they were indebted for it. There is
scarcely one of his letters in which he does not recur to
his ideal of the Church under the Cross, growing before
u

306 TO THE BELIEVERS OF FRANCE.
God in proportion to her sufferings, and desHous before
men of no other glory.
Notice, amongst others, his two beautiful epistles To
the Believers of France, in June and November 1559.
He is not addressing Ha them some smaU Church, to
which, in fact, suffering alone could be recommended, but
he is speaking to aH the Churches, to a party which, as was
shortly seen, could raise armies, take cities, and seize upon
half the kingdom. And yet, what he would say to the
smaUest Church, he says to that great party, composed of
more than two thousand churches, and he says nothing
more. To suffer, to suffer again and again, is the only combat
which he commends ; to fertUise by theH blood the field of
truth, is the only victory of which he vaunts. "Doubt not,"
he writes to them, " even H the wicked had exhausted aU
theH cruelty, that there shaU be one drop of blood which
shaU not fructify to augment the number of befievers. If
it does not seem at first that the fortitude of those who
are caHed to bear witness is profitable, nevertheless ac
quit yourselves of your duty, and refer to God the profit
which is to accrue from your life or your death, for He
wiU know when and where to reap the fruit. . . . Let
us permit this thick darkness to pass away, waiting tiU
God shaU bring forth His light to rejoice us, though we
are never destitute of it in the midst of our afflictions, H
we seek it Ha His Word, where it never ceases to shine.
Thither it is that you must dHect your eyes Ha these
great troubles, and rejoice that He honours .you in that
you are afflicted for His Word's sake, rather than chas
tised for your sins, as we should all weU deserve to be,
but for His forbearance." This is the only concession
which the austere Christian wiU make to the persecuted
Christians; he permits them to consider themselves as
suffering, not as sinners, but as soldiers of Jesus Christ.
Warlike images often recur to his pen, but always strictly
limited to theH spHitual sense. " Persecutions," he says

LETTERS TO THE CHURCHES. 307
Hi his second epistle/" are the true combats of Christians.
Assaulted, what must they do, H not run to arms ? Now,
our arms, to do battle in this position, are to fortify our
selves in that which God shows to us by His Word. . . .
And since the poor flock of the Son of God has been
scattered by the wolves, retire to Him, praying that He
would take pity on you, and that He would stretch out
His hand to shut theH bloody mouths, or turn them into
lambs." Such is the line of conduct traced out by Cal
vin for the Protestants, and that in the first days of the
reign of Francis II. — a reign which was short, but which
might have been long, and had given up France to the
Guises, who were thirsting for Protestant blood.

XI.
It would be interesting to see how Calvin watched
over and followed the carrying out of his programme in
every one of the Churches with which he had to do. We
are far from possessing all the letters he had to write to
them. Some of them were Ha constant correspondence
with him — those of Poitou, amongst others, and those of
the neighbouring districts, who looked upon him as theH
first founder. Calvin scarcely ever aUudes to this latter
cHcumstance, for, with him, the work is everything, and
the workman, even when it is himseH, is nothing ; once
only wUl he say to the believers of Poitiers : " Since it
hath pleased God to make use of our labour for your
salvation." But he usuaUy begins and ends his letters to
these Churches with the more solemn forms of apostoHc
salutation. TheH general tone is also sometimes still
more serious than in his other letters ; the father wiU be
more apparent, but the brother does not disappear, for it
is remarkable how faithful he remains to the great Cal
vinistic principle of the equality of pastors. He will,

308 THE CHURCH AT PARIS.
therefore, sign himseH "your humble brother ;" and this
term, even after some forcible admonishment, neither
shocks nor astonishes. It is impossible not to see in it at
once the expression of a true sentiment and of a just
idea. Calvin, however, loses nothing by it. The autho
rity of God and of God's Word merges Ha his own aU
the more readdy that it borrows nothing from hierarchical
pretensions or from pride. Hence also in his exhorta
tions, counsels, and rebukes, there is a perfect equality of
tone. He will no more sweU out his voice with the
smaU than with the great, with the great than with the
small ; and that voice, ever the same, wHl aU the more
be that of duty, law, and wisdom.
The Church of Paris, of which he had also been, Ha some
measure, the founder, was always peculiarly dear to him ;
its importance, besides, as the Church of the metropolis,
was a sufficient recommendation. But it was on that ac
count more recommended also to the watchfulness . and
severities of the enemies of the Eeformation : and it was
only Ha 1555 that it succeeded in estabfishing itseH. Cal
vin, Ha March, 1557, congratulates her on her onward
course "amidst the fears and assaults" to which she is
daHy exposed ; he sends her two pastors in the name of the
Church of Geneva. She had asked for more, but, for the
moment, aU are employed, "and therefore, SHs and Breth
ren, I shaU suppficate our gracious God to have you Hi
His holy keeping." Yes : God keeps his people, but not
always as they understand it. Less than six months af
ter this letter, Calvin writes to them again, but it was to
comfort them in a fearful trial. The populace had been
set on against a peaceful assembly held in the Bue St
Jacques. An infuriated mob had dragged to the Chatelet
aU that they could lay hands on, and the magistrates had
sanctioned the arrests. " Brigands and robbers were taken
out of the most noisome ditches and dungeons," Beza
relates,1 " to make way for these." The arrangements for
1 Ecclesiastical History.

PERSECUTIONS. 309
the trial were in progress, and the stake was evidently
about to be erected. It was then that Calvin wrote :
<( True it is," he says, " that the trial is great and hard to
bear, to see such dreadful tribulation, and that God de
lays to stretch out his hand, but it is not said without rea
son, that God will try our faith as gold is tried in the
furnace, and H sometimes He permits the blood of His
people to be shed, nevertheless He accounts their tears
precious." Hitherto the French martyrs have been of
obscure condition, "contemptible to the world." But now
there are some who are more elevated according to the
world, and theH sacrifice wHl be the more striking, theH
blood aU the more fruitful. In fact, amongst those who
had been thrown into the dungeons of the Chatelet, there
were several noble ladies. Three letters from Calvin, one
addressed to all the female prisoners, and the two others
to two of them, carried consolation into that abyss. The
catastrophe occurred on the 4th of September. On the
27th one of these noble ladies, Philippine de Lunz, the
widow of the lord of Graveron, mounted the pde with
two of the deacons of the Church, and bequeathed her
example to her companions. The executioners beheld her
approach with a smile of happiness on her face, and dressed
in white as for a festival. She was not four-and-twenty
years of age.
But if Calvin spoke to the surviving ladies only of the
duty of dying Hke her, he none the less exerted himseH
to save them. It was at his suggestion that the Swiss
cantons and the Protestant princes of Germany interceded
with Henry II. in theH behaH : it was he also, who, think
ing of every thing, busied himself with sending a Httle
money to the prisoners. If there is " a drop of humanity
Hi us," he writes to the Churches of Vaud, "let us succour
them Ha such need," and if it should happen, continues he,
that " money should not be promptly found there, I wdl
make such efforts, even if I have to pledge myself head

310 JEAN MACAR.
and feet, that it shaU be ready here." At the same time,
he got presented to Henry II., in the name of the Pro
testants of France, a confession of faith, designed to open
his eyes as to the new calumnies with which they were
now loaded. They were no longer accused merely of re
volts, as when Calvin addressed the Institutes to Francis I. ;
theH doctrines, theH morafity, theH assembfies everything.
in them was now fuU of nameless abominations, such as
were reported of the primitive Christians by the pagan
multitudes. Did the king give any heed to this document,
which was perfectly frank. and clear? His pofiey had
need of the German princes ; and it was to them, probably,
far more than to humanity or to Calvin, that he yielded.
Four new victims had perished, and a promise was made
that there should be no more executions. But all who
would not abjure were left Ha prison, and several died
worn out by Ul-treatment. In January 1558, Calvin
wrote again to the Church of Paris, to comfort her under
the weakness of some and the sufferings of others, and to
announce the departure of two new ministers. One of
them, Jean Macar, was pastor at Geneva; his zeal and
knowledge had endeared him to Calvin, and his eloquence,
to aU the people. It was with sorrow, but without a
moment's hesitation, that his offer was accepted of going
to throw himseH for a whde into that bloody whirlwind
at Paris. " We have been willing not to fad to help you,"
Calvin writes, " by depriving ourselves of our brother."
Arrived at Paris, Macar ventured to ask permission to
visit the prisoners, and, strange to say, it was granted
him : the judges were won over and fascinated by this
fearless courage. But Macar ventured many other things.
His letters to Calvin contained the most curious details
as to the semi-barbarous civilization which the Church
armed against the gospel. Geneva recaUed him, and,
shortly after, when the plague broke out, Macar asked
to brave death once more by consoling those who might

SYNOD AT PARIS. 311
be struck by that scourge. He was plague-stricken him
seH, and he died, " to the great regret of the whole re
public," says the registers, "and to the great loss of the
Church."

XII.
^ Such then — and we have omitted a number of detads —
were the relations between Protestant France and the
Church of Geneva. But he who had organized the latter
regretted to see the Church of France without any regular
organization, and as earnestly as he dissuaded her from
embodying herseH into a poHtical party, so earnestly did
he desHe to see her one as a Church.
¦ It was therefore under his inspHation that there met at
Paris, in May 1559, that humble assembly which the un
animous assent of the Churches was going to adorn with
the name of first National Synod. Only eleven Churches
were represented there, including that of Paris. It was
little, and it was much. The delegates staked theH lives.
. There, then, were laid the foundations of the edifice, the
materials for which had been accumulating for forty
years. There was first a confession of faith, easUy drawn up
at this moment, when no serious difference of opinion
existed Ha the churches, which were aU faithful to Calvin's
theology. There was next a system of discipline, which
was simple and brief, but which clearly traced the chief
outlines, and was in short a true constitution, quite ready
to shelter aH the laws and institutions which might after
wards derive theH inspHation from it.
The starting-point is the Church, in the apostofic sense
of the word, the local Church, the body of believers
grouped in the same locality, town, or vdlage. It is for
them to assume, as soon as they can, the form of a

312 CONSTITUTION OF THE FRENCH CHURCH.
Church, by the nomination of a consistory, the call of a
minister, and the establishment of regular worship.
Over the Church is the Conference? a group of churches.
The Conference is to assemble twice a-year ; and every
Church is to be represented therein by a minister and an
elder. It regulates aU affairs common to the Churches
Ha its cHcuit.
Over the Conference is placed the Provincial Synod,
which assembles once a-year. It is the Conference en
larged, — a group of several Conferences; and each Church
sends to it also a pastor and an elder. By it the election
of pastors must be made ; but every Church is to ratify
the choice which has been made for it
FinaUy, and above aU, comes the National Synod.
This is composed of two pastors and of two elders, dele
gated by each provincial synod; it is the ultimate judge
in all affairs, and there is no possible appeal from its
authority. This constitution had been dictated by Calvin. If,
with our modern ideas, we perceive therein some infrac
tions of the democratic principle, which was placed by
Calvin at the foundation, we can, on the other hand,
scarcely fad to recognize Ha it a remarkable adaptation to
the situation and wants of French Protestantism. It
was necessary that the basis should be at once as wide
and as popular as possible, and that the authority, at each
degree more concentrated, should be one, and powerful,
and capable of maintaining itself by the side of the royal
authority, whether friendly or hostde.
Yet Calvin did not entertain the idea of seeking this
unity and strength Ha anything which should remind us
of the episcopate. This was not because the episcopate
in itseH seemed to him condemned by the Gospel. It
cannot be said, in fact, that the Gospel forbids the
establishment in any Church of a chief pastor, or a gene-
1 Colloque.

BISHOPS. 313
ral overseer. Error and usurpation arise when men are
no longer content to consider the episcopate as an office
instituted by the Church, and when men attribute to the
bishop a divine right, a mystical and necessary superi
ority over the inferior ministers. Calvin, in the Christian
Institutes, had expressed himseH so as to leave the
Churches at fuU liberty on this point. In the lett^ to
the duke of Somerset, he speaks of " the office of bishops
and curates." In a letter to the King of Poland, Sigis-
mund II., he himseH proposes, in case Poland should
break off, as he hopes it wHl, from the Eomish Church,
the establishment of a Polish episcopate. Why wiU he
have nothing simUar in France? Probably, in the first
place, because the equality of the pastors seems to him
more certainly evangelical and primitive. In the next
place, doubtless, because the episcopate would always be
Hi danger of bringing back a part, at least, of the Eo
mish abuses in relation to that head. He accepts it in
England, but it is because it is aHeady there; and he
advises it in Poland, only because he does not think he
can do otherwise. In France, where he is not compeUed
to admit it, he wiU not admit it. Besides the above
reasons, he knows and feels that French Protestantism
must, and for a long time, be a missionary, mifitant, and
suffering Church, requHing martyrs rather than chiefs,
who might : easHy bo softened down by grandeur, and
easdy spoUed by the ambition of always rising higher.
The Eeformed Church of France wUl therefore be reaUy
and seriously a republic, and closed to aU that might
injure its form or enervate its spHit.
It was assuredly a misfortune to have to constitute the
Protestants a state within a state, and especiaUy to con
stitute a repubfic within a monarchy,— r-a great cause of
envy should they be powerful, and a great pretext for
persecutions, should their enemies have the upper hand.
But Calvin had no choice of means. For a Church as

314 PROGRESS IN FRANCE.
for a State, the question whether it is to be or not to be,
is always the first to present itseH. It was the wiU of
the Protestants of France to be, and they had paid dearly
enough for the right to wiU it. Moreover, they did not
aspHe to remain indefinitely a state within the state, but
to become the state itseH by assimdating to themselves
i#)° whole nation; and the rapidity of theH progress suf-
ficierivy authorized that hope. If royalty were once
drawn into the movement, it would be possible to confer
on establishing a more perfect harmony between the two
powers.

XIII.
The progress which was aHeady so rapid at the trine
of the first synod, became stiH more so when the scat
tered Protestants felt themselves to be members of a
great body, constituted by a formal act. Churches rose
by hundreds, and adherents came thronging to them by
thousands and tens of thousands. It was not from month
to month, nor even from week to week, but literally day
by day, that the conquests of the Eeformed refigion might
be certified. It was a strange spectacle that France then
presented. On the one hand there was royalty, in the
persons of Henry II. and Francis II., father and son,
who were seized, as it were, with a rage for executions ;
on the other hand, instead of the handful of poor crea
tures to be inferred from the tone of the edicts and the
atrocity of the measures taken, there were cities and
whole provinces ; there was a large portion of the nobH-
ity, and shortly after the majority; there was the
Duchess of Ferrara, the daughter of Louis XII. ; there
was the Queen of Navarre ; there was her husband, the
head of the house of Bourbon ; there was the Prince of
Cond6 ; and, lastly, there was Cofigny, one of the finest

COLIGNY. 315
characters of that or of any other age. Such was the
army which the man of Geneva, as he was caHed at
court, saw growing up, and of which he felt himseH to be
the head. He, moreover, constantly had his eye upon
those other heads, princes, and great lords whose presence
might do so much good, or so much harm, according as
the gospel was the one thing needful with them, or only
the second, and an accessory. How many cares did that
miserable King of Navarre cost him ? — now a zealous
Protestant, from whom, it seemed, everything might be
hoped, and now wavering, feeble, and cowardly! But
with Coligny how completely is he at his ease ! How he
feels that he is the Christian hero whom he may praise,
without reserve, in the firm assurance that theH common
Master wiU also praise him as a good and faithful ser
vant !
A first letter from Calvin to Coligny sought him out
in Flanders, where he was the prisoner of the King of
Spain, after the battle of St. Quentin. Captivity and
sickness completed his conversion to the gospel. His
memoirs represent him as meditating one day on the
mysterious chances of human destiny, and saying, " AU
the comfort I have is that which it seems to me aU
Christians ought to take — that such mysteries are not
acted without the permission and wUl of God, which is
ever good, holy, and reasonable, and does nought without
just occasions, of which however I know not the cause,
and of which I ought as little to inquHe, but rather to
humble myself before Him." The comfort which he
sought Ha the Bible came also to him in a letter from
Calvin. Calvin exhorted him to bless his captivity,
aHeady so prolific Ha the fruits of Hfe, and which, by its
prolongation, might become yet more so. " God hath, as
it were, drawn you aside. You know how difficult it is
in the midst of the honours, riches, and might of this world,
to lend Him an ear. . . ." God will speak with him alone ;

316 COLIGNY.
God has found the way both to his ear and heart.
Cofigny left his prison the foUowing year, not only with
that profound faith which was to be the soul of his Hfe,
but with the resolution of fleeing from those honours and
grandeurs, the momentary loss of which had been so
blessed to him. He made over to his brother the post of
colonel-general of the infantry, renounced that of gover
nor of Paris, requested to be replaced as governor of
Picardy, and went to seek in his manor of ChatiUon-sur-
Loing, for the continuation of the holy leisure of his
captivity. There, under the gentle influence of his wife, Charlotte de
Laval, his convictions and piety were yet more strengthened.
Calvin had prepared her for this noble part. The same
day on which he wrote to the admHal to congratulate
him on his trial, he had written to her, to congratulate
her, both on the trial and the holy task which would
afterwards be the more easy for her. On another oc
casion he warns her " to prepare herseH to hold fast," see-
Hag there would be no lack of those who, on his return,
would endeavour to bring him back into the bonds of
popery and the world. " Eeflect," said he to her, " that
your duty wiU be, by your example, to help him to take
courage." Now, on his return, the only thing which still
prevented him from declaring himseH publicly, was the
fear of exposing his wHe to trials which she might not
have the courage to endure. One day, therefore, when
urged by her, he began to depict the frightful sufferings
of the Protestants, adding, as his memoirs teU us, " that,
nevertheless, if she were disposed not to refuse the com
mon lot of aU those of the (Eeformed) religion, he, on his
part, would not be wanting in his duty." She desHed
no more, and shortly after it was known that Admiral
Cofigny had publicly received the communion from the
hands of a minister.
The year 1560 was about to realise, Hi colours yet

THE "SUPPLICATION." 317
more sombre, the picture drawn by Coligny for his
courageous wife. New edicts of extermination were pub
lished ; in every parliament a chambre ardente (burning
chamber) was established, the sole office of which was to
condemn to the flames aU who were suspected of belong
ing to the Eeformed religion. Paris, Toulouse, Dijons
Bordeaux, Lyons, Poitiers, and other cities, witnessed a
shocking series of executions. On the 21st of August, at
Fontainebleau, at the opening of the Assembly of Notables,
a man rises, approaches the throne, bows, and presents
the king with a petition, the Supplication of those
who, in divers provinces, call upon the name of God
according to the rule of piety. It is the Eeformed refi-
ligion asking, not only to live, but to live in broad day
light, under the king's protection; it is Coligny who
stakes his head by placing the request at the foot of the
throne. Accordingly, the man of Geneva will again find
for Coligny some of those words which, in his mouth, are
enthusiasm. He therefore writes to him, five months
afterwards, " We have wherewithal to praise God for the
singular courage which He hath given you to serve for
His glory, and the furtherance of the kingdom of His
Son. Even if aU the world were bfind and ungrateful,
and it should seem as though all your trouble were lost,
be content, my Lord, that God and the angels approve
you." In a letter to BuHinger he says, " The admHal is
the only man upon whom we can reckon ;" the only man,
he meant to say, among the great ; for it is in the very
same letter in which we have aHeady heard him congra
tulate himself on the progress of the Eeformed religion,
and on the fervent courage of those who were setting out
to preach it.
Perhaps also this word— "the only man," was but the
expression of the grief which some then occasioned him.
The King of Navarre, amongst others, did more .harm
than an enemy, and Calvin wrote to him, the same month

318 d'andelot.
(May 1561), a severe letter, Ha which he showed him that
his vices were the source of his cowardice. Even Cofigny 's
brother, Frangois d'Andelot, had for a moment wavered.
Confined, during several months, in the castle of Melun,
he had finaUy consented to hear mass ; but afterwards,
alarmed at his fault, he had written to Calvin to confess
it, and, H possible, Ha some degree, to justify himseH.
Calvin repfied, and with one back stroke laid low aU the
scaffolding of his excuses. Even H they were accepted by
men, " aU this can never unburden you before God." Has
he not been a scandal to befievers ? Has he not demolished
what he had raised ? Has he not furnished the enemies
of the truth wherewith " to triumph," imagining that they
have conquered Ha him the Eeformed refigion, the Gospel,
and Jesus Christ ? " It has therefore been a very bad faU
which you should remember with bitterness of heart."
The bitterness was aHeady great; and it became still
greater, — d'Andelot found no rest tUl he had expiated his
fault. " I never knew a man," wrote his illustrious
brother, "more a lover of piety towards God ; and I humbly
pray the Lord that I may depart this fife as piously as I
saw him die. God was about to grant him stUl more.
He did not die less piously than his brother, and he died
a martyr )

XIV.
Though the following years saw Calvin not less mixed
up with the affairs of French Protestantism, let us con
fine ourselves to a few leading facts.
In 1561 the famous CoUoquy of Poissy took place.
It had been convoked by the court of France in the
chimerical hope of some accommodation between Eoman
ism and the Eeformed refigion. Calvin, of whom every
one had thought at first, but whose departure the Council

A

BEZA AT P01SSY. 319
of Geneva opposed, found there a substitute in a man
who was aHeady beginning to be regarded, as his successor,
r*-Theodore Beza. We have the letter which the CouncU
wrote on that occasion to the King of Navarre, who was
Protestant enough for the moment, and took great interest
in the matter. " As to the worthy Theodore Beza, our
good pastor and minister, we are constrained to own to
you, SHe, that it is to our great regret that he has under
taken this journey, for we know what hurt both the
Church and school wiU suffer from his absence. But if
it pleases God that his labour should bring such fruit,
we know weU it is right to forget all private considera
tion .... and we pray you, SHe, that it^^v
please you to take under your protection a yifc!>$)6i
our treasures Hi the person of him whom there is no
need for us to recommend to you." These words, so
honourable for Beza, show us the position he had ac-
quHed at Geneva, where he had been only two years;
but Calvin had drawn up the letter, and consequently it
also shows us how free Calvin was from the slightest
feeling of jealousy. The most flattering sentiments
which the CouncU could have uttered respecting himseH",
Calvin puts into the mouth of the CouncU respecting a
colleague whom Poissy was to bring into such prominent
relief. The same remark applies to all his letters to Beza,
during the sojourn of Beza in France. " Thou canst not
imagine," he writes to him on one occasion, " how tor
mented the CouncU is, scarcely daring to hope that thou
wilt return." Another time he says, " So long as thou
art not restored to me, I shall feel continuaUy as if some
thing were lacking to me:"
The saying of the Cardinal of Lorraine, after the first
speech of the Protestant orator, has often been recaUed.
"Would to God that he had been dumb, or that we had
been deaf!" But it is easy to be deaf when the desire
to be so exists ; and where did it ever exist more strongly

320 RESULTS OF THE COLLOQUY.
than Ha the Cardinal of Lorraine ? The coUoquy, as was
to be expected, served only to display the guH which
separated the two Churches. But the young king,
Charles IX., or rather the Queen-mother, had shown dis
positions less hostUe — Ha fact, almost friendly ; and we
find Calvin, Hi a letter to the Admiral Cofigny, indicat
ing, as one of the results to be pursued, that the King
should agree with the Queen of England, the Princes of
Germany, and the Swiss, to protest against the CouncU
of Trent, which had long been prorogued, and was con
sidered by many Eomanists nuU and void, but which
there was some talk of reopening. The plan of Calvin
&"5^d, but another great result foUowed the coUoquy —
•feLsiew impulse given to the Eeformed religion. In
vain had the prelates at Poissy treated her as a criminal
and sat there, as they said, only as her judges ; the coun
try had viewed the matter in a very different fight, and
shortly proved it to them. A pastor of the district of
Agen wrote to Farel that three hundred parishes in those
parts had just " put down the mass." " Four thousand,
six thousand ministers," added he, "might find employ
ment Hi the kingdom." These numbers, which seem
thrown out at a venture, wiU not appear exaggerated H
we ¦remember that the admiral, when desHed by the
Queen-mother to give her the list of the Churches aHeady
organised, found two thousand one hundred and fifty.
The clergy concluded that too much mddness had been
shown, and pleaded for measures increasingly terrible.
The government, inspired by the ChanceUor de l'Hospital,
and impeded besides by the material impossibUity of
proscribing everywhere the new form of worship, was
beginning to think of admitting in principle the co-exis
tence of the two religions Ha the kingdom. Hence ap
peared, in January 1562, what is caUed the January
Edict.1 This act granted to the Protestants the right of
1 Edit de Janvier.

THE KING OF NAVARRE. 321
assembling, provided it was outside the towns — a singular
clause, since in several towns the majority was on theH
side. Beza advised them, however, to observe the edict,
which evidently led the way to greater liberty. We have
seen what Calvin's system was — to use no violence, and
to expect aU from the force of cHcumstances, without in
the meanwhile relaxing in the least, and without sparing
any toU or sacrifice.
But about the same time the King of Navarre was
completing his pitiable evolutions. Undermined by the
debauchery for which opportunities were purposely scat
tered in his path, and seduced by the promise of recover
ing his kingdom of Navarre, or of receiving an equiv- j&nt,
he ended by relapsing into Eomanism. Beza, who was
still in France, failed in all his efforts to keep him back ;
and a long and urgent letter, from Calvin met with no
more success. But the queen was firm. " The compas
sion which I have for your anguish," Calvin writes to
her, "makes me feel how great and bitter it is to you.
Yet, be that as it may, it is better far for you to be sad
for such a cause than to become indifferent to your ruin."
IU treated by her husband, she went to her states of
Beam, leaving her son, but beseeching him with tears to
hold fast to the faith of his mother. That son, alas ! was
the same who was one day to say, " Paris is equal in value
to one mass ! "1

XV
StUl, the massacre of Vassy had showed with What
degree of good faith the chiefs of the Eomish party would
carry out the edict, which had been promulgated within
less than two months. It was the signal of war. "It is
to be observed for ever," says Agrippa d'Aubigne" in his
i " Paris vaut bien une messe."
X

322 CAUSES OF CIVIL WAR.
Universal History, "that, so long as the Eeformed were
put to death under the form of justice, however iniqui
tous and cruel it might be, they held out theH throats
and had no hands. But when the magistrate, weary of
the flames, cast the knife into the hands of the people,
who could forbid unhappy men to oppose arms to arms,
and steel to steel, or to catch from unjust fury the conta
gion of righteous rage ? The insurrection, moreover, was
authorised, or nearly so, by the Queen-mother, who was
weary of the yoke of the Guises, by whom she and the
young king were almost kept prisoners, and who there
for jwrote to the Prince of Conde" a letter in which she
seen* d to place herself, the king, and the kingdom under
the protection of the Protestants. Hence they could
without scruple enter upon the path towards which they
were impeUed by the necessity of self-defence, and Calvin,
without contradicting himseH, could approve of the war,
only reserving, as we have seen, the right to condemn
every excess. When the Prince of Conde was menaced
in Orleans, and soficited succour from the Protestants of
Germany and Switzerland, Calvin energetically seconded
his request ; he supported no less energeticaUy a request
from the Protestants of Lyons, who were the masters of
the city, but were menaced by the Eomish army. Berne,
Neuchatel, and the VaUais, granted some troops, and
d'Andelot, about the same time, brought from Germany
a body of six thousand men ; we see Calvin, moreover,
writing to the Churches of the South of France to urge
them to find the money required to pay the Httle army.
The Protestants have been reproached for receiving this
aid from foreigners, and Calvin has been represented as a
Frenchman who delivered his country up to the Germans
and Swiss. Had not the Guises begun by aHying them
selves with Savoy and Spain, inviting two foreign princes
for the extermination of the Protestants who, at that
moment, spoke only of living in peace under the edict of

CIVIL WAR IN FRANCE. 323
January? Indeed, the Protestants had never spoken of
anything else ; it required all the excitement of war to
carry them sometimes beyond that which defence ren
dered lawful, and never were excesses approved, still less
commanded by theH religious leaders.
Whilst Calvin is indignant about a few thefts com
mitted at Lyons, the parliament at Paris, docde to the
inspiration of the clergy, sanctions, by a solemn decision,
all the murders which have been or are to be committed.
Every Frenchman is enjoined to " faU upon" the heretics
and kill them "as mad men, the enemies of God and
man," wherever they meet with them. The Duke of
Guise laid siege to Bouen, and here also is another con
trast between the children of the two Churches. In the
Romish army there was license and debauchery of every
kind ; but Ha the city order and seriousness, praying and
psalm singing, and calm and dignified courage. The
city when taken was given up for a week to the fury of
the soldiery, and after that came the judicial murders.
Amongst the victims was the minister Marlorat, one of
Beza's companions at Poissy. The King of Navarre had
allowed himself to be put at the head of the Romish
army. Mortally wounded during the siege, he seemed to
return, in his last hours, to the faith which he had be
trayed. On the 19th of November was fought the battle of
Dreux. The Protestants were nine thousand, the Eo
manists nearly double that number. This was not much
for either side, but there was war from one end of France
to the other, and every one had to think first of all of his
town, his vUlage, or his house. The Protestants had the
advantage at the outset, but afterwards the Duke of
Guise obtained, thanks to a body of reserve, not a victory,
for the hostile army withdrew in good order, but a most
important result — the Protestants were prevented from
marching upon Paris, which they would have occupied

324 A CRISIS IN FRENCH HISTORY.
without difficulty. Now, the occupation of Paris might
be the signal for the definite triumph of the Eeformed
refigion in France. Men were fully prepared for this, as
is proved by a saying of the Queen-mother, when a re
port was spread that the Protestants were conquerors,
"WeU, then, we shall pray to God in French !"
It has been calculated that a thousand men, and per
haps seven or eight hundred men, would have sufficed to
change once more the aspect of the fight, and, with the
aspect of the battle, that of France for centuries, for no
thing is less tenable in presence of the history of those
times, than what has been written in our days respecting
certain obstacles, internal and invincible, which victorious
Protestantism would have encountered. The French
spirit is alleged, the great guH which separated and still
separates it, we are told, from the sombre genius of Calvin,
But those Calvinists, whom France was beginning to count
by millions, were Frenchmen ; they were Frenchmen, too,
who were to remain steadfast in her bosom through two
centuries of oppression ; they were Frenchmen also who
were to flee, preferring to abandon aU rather than deny
the faith of Geneva ; and those thousands of pastors who
were going to keep invincibly, both in theH native land
and in exHe, the traditions 'of Calvinistic austerity, were
Frenchmen. Besides, the question is not what Frenchmen
were or are, but what the Eeformation made them ; and
when we behold her creating so rapidly characters so re
markable, transforming in the north, in the south, in every
part of the kingdom, considerable populations, how can it
be pretended that the rest must necessarily have escaped
her influence? One explanation alone is possible. God
did not then wUl the triumph of the Eeformation in France.
Why did He not wUl it ? Away with our questions ! His
ways are not our ways ; let us submit and be sdent !
This is what Calvin had more than once to preach after
the battle of Dreux, to all those hearts which were less

THE EDICT OF AMBOISE. 325
cast down by defeat than painfully astonished at seeing
God abandon the cause. They too said — Wherefore ?
" I abide for my sole answer to Abraham's saying, God
will provide." Thus wrote Calvin to the governor of
Lyons, M. de Soubise, his old disciple at Ferrara, who al
ways signed himself in his letters, Your obedient son and
friend. But Calvin foresaw this time that obedience
would be hard, and he insisted aU the more on its being
fuU, entire, and not paid to himseH, of whom he spoke not,
but to God. When God " takes away the sword from
those with whom He had girded it," they have but one
thing to do, — to wait till God restores it to them. Sub
mission wiU be " difficult of digestion." What matter !
" God hath given us a heavy blow : let us remain cast
down tiU He lift us up. Since God wiUs to afflict us, let
us keep quiet." And assuredly neither M. de Soubise nor
any one else imagined that this meant, " Let us hide our
selves." To keep quiet1 with Calvin and his disciples
could only be to humble themselves before God, — to be
steadfast before men, — to hope and to pray. The counsel
is as good now as it was in 1563.
The Edict of Amboise, which was published on the 19th
of March, was less favourable than the Edict of January,
but it stiU admitted the principle of the co-existence of
the two forms of worship. Violated by the Eomanists
wherever they had the power at their command, and vio
lated by the Protestants, wherever they were numerous
enough to cast off the restraints that shackled their wor
ship, the Edict of Amboise notwithstanding, brought, if
not peace, at least a truce. But it was one of those truces
in which no one seeks to conceal that his purpose in re
maining quiet is to prepare for the coming combats which
he foresees. It was in the midst of these anticipations, in
May 1564, that the important and mournful news, which
had been expected, it is true, for several months^reached
the Churches — Calvin was dead !
- ' Se tenir coi.

326 WRITINGS OF CALVIN.

XVI.

Hitherto, during this final period of his life, we have
only seen him in his action abroad ; — let us now behold
him at Geneva, and, that we may not have to recur to
them, begin with his writings.
We shall not give a complete fist of them. It is very
long, and, on quitting the foregoing recitals of wars,
troubles, and tortures, it is with a singular feeling we run
over those titles which transport us into the silent closet
of the thinker. True, many of them are stiU war-cries':
Blandrata, Daniel de Saconay, Gentifis, Baudouin, and
yet others, did not brave with impunity that pen whose
point, it could be wished, had oftener been tempered by
charity. But the rest are of a very different nature, and
theH number is considerable.
In the first place, there are the Commentaries on the
Old Testament. Isaiah had aHeady appeared in 1551,
and Genesis in 1554. Afterwards came, in 1557, the
Psalms, and, the same year, the prophet Hosea; in 1559,
the twelve minor prophets; in 1561, Daniel; in 1563,
Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, and Jeremiah;
and in 1564, Joshua. Several of those Commentaries
were not written by him, but taken down from his public
lectures by Charles de Jonvilliers, his secretary, and
Johannes Budseus.
All that we have said of his Commentaries on the New
Testament, we might say of these. Simplicity, wisdom,
practical sense and truth, not always found, but always
earnestly sought after, and by the shortest road. "I
know," he wiU say to you, " how many would find it much
more to their taste that there should be a heap of matters
accumulated, the more so that this has great splendour
and acquires renown to those who do it; but nothing
has commended itself more to me than to look to the

COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS. 327
edification of the Church. God, who has given me this
wUl, grant by His grace that the issue of it may be such!"
This " wUl " and these qualities are nowhere more re
markable than in the work of which Calvin spoke in
these lines, the Commentary on the Psalms. Here we
find the important preface which we have often quoted,
and which contains nearly all we know, from himseH, of
his history and inner life. Accustomed, as we have seen,
to carry on together the study of the sacred books and
that of his own heart, the study of the Psalms was pecu
liarly attractive and profitable to him. " If the perusal
of these my Commentaries," he says, "brings as great
advancement to the Church of God as I have found pro
fit in them to myself, I shaU have no occasion to repent
of having undertaken this labour. I am wont to
call this book an anatomy of all the parts of the soul.
The Holy SpHit has here described, Hi a lively manner,
the sorrows, sadnesses, fears, doubts, hopes, solicitudes,
and perplexities, and even the confused emotions by
which the minds of men are wont to be agitated. For
the rest, if the readers should derive any fruit or profit
from these Commentaries, I would have them to know
that the experience which I have gained from the com
bats in which the Lord has exercised me, albeit it has
not been very great, has nevertheless greatly helped me
therein." He relates to us how even the history of David
has continually made him reflect, upon his own. David,
the shepherd, and afterwards king of Israel, is to him a
figure of the dispensations of Providence towards himself,
so low at first, and become — What? You think, perhaps,
that he is about to take the humanly glorious side of the
comparison, and to see, in David's royalty, a type of his
own, as spiritual head of many more Christians than
David ever had subjects ? By no means. That high and
exceUent dignity to which he blesses God for having
raised him, is simply that of " minister and preacher of

328 SERMONS.
the Gospel." He recognizes no loftier title, and when he
speaks of " smaU and mean beginnings," he has not Ha
view the time in which he was unknown, but that Ha
which, already known, and already on the road to fame
and glory, he knew not the truth, or had scarcely began
to catch a glimpse of it. Thus, even when he seems to
bring himseH forward, it is only as a Christian placing
himseH before God, and before the Word of God, Ha order
to study human fife Hi his own life, and Ha his own heart,
the human heart. The Commentary on the Psalms is a
master-piece of moral and refigious analysis.
The same years witnessed the appearance of several
series of sermons, also taken down, for the most part, by
his friends, for he always preached extempore, but they
were published under his own eyes and probably revised
by him.
A first series, on the Epistk to the Galatians, had
aHeady appeared in 1552; the second, upon two chap
ters of the First Epistle to the Corinthians, belongs to
1558, as weH as the thHd, a coUection of discourses on
various subjects. In 1562 there appeared five series, of
which one was of sixty-five discourses on the first three
gospels. In 1563 came the last, a series on the two
Epistles to Timothy, and one on the book of Job. These
last discourses have been held in great repute, especiaUy
in the sixteenth century. Cofigny used to have them
read and re-read to him. These austere studies on mis
fortune, resignation, and providence were calculated to
please men who lived amid so many troubles. Job was
to them, even more than David — a personification of
"those sadnesses, fears, doubts, and perplexities" by
which the human heart is assaded. Job represented to
them also the Church, given up for a time to the maHce
of the great enemy of souls, but predestined to triumph
and to renew her strength, Hke the eagle, under the life-
giving eye of her God.

CALVIN TRUSTS AND WORKS. 329

XVII.

This sentiment was scarcely less necessary to the
Genevese than to the Protestants of France; for we have
seen by what ever-recurring dangers they were sur
rounded. Calvin succeeded in inspiring them with this
sentiment, and he did this better than by preaching it
eloquently. His whole Hfe was its highest and most com
plete expression. It is trust, stUl trust, always trust, and
when the danger redoubles, it is the redoubling of trust.
That frail tabernacle which might any hour be swept to
the ground, was that in which the imperturbable co
worker with God pursued his task as in an impregnable
tower : that city and that Church, which possibly had
not a week to live, was that wherein everything was de
veloped under his care, as in profound security. A letter
from an Italian refugee, Vergerio, transports us into that
solemn atmosphere in which sounds from without might
indeed at times re-echo painfuUy, but stopped no one in
his work.
The work of Calvin embraced everything. The former
disciple of Alciatus was the jurisconsult of Geneva, no
less than her divine ; the public archives contain many
files of law-papers annotated by his hand. In civil cases
his sagacity and his legal knowledge are admfiable ; Ha
criminal cases, his severity, as was to be expected, is
great, but great especially towards those who knew the
good and voluntarily chose the evU. He wishes that the
human judge, like the Supreme Judge, should require
much of him to whom much has been given. Often also
the jurisconsult had to merge into the diplomatist. Cal
vin, whom we have aHead)*- seen interfering in the critical
matter of the pretensions of Berne and of the banished
Libertines, was the soul, and sometimes the agent of all
the negociations in which Geneva had to take part. He

330 HIS PART IN PUBLIC MATTERS.
brought to them his customary penetration, his clearness
of exposition, his candour, and his uprightness ; for never
did he admit the idea that there could be two moral
codes, — one for the private individual and another for the
pofitician. But great affairs were far from being the only ones on
which the Eeformer was consulted ; detaHs, curious and
strange, have been preserved as to the services sometimes
required of him. That Eobert Stephens the printer, should
have consulted him on printing, and should even have
owed to his counsels a part of his reputation, is readdy
understood ; but H any trade somewhat novel and defi-
cate requested permission to establish itseH at Geneva,
the CouncH would send the people to speak with M. Cal
vin to shew him theH wares, and to work under his eyes,
and, according to his opinion, the authorization was
granted or refused. One day, a surgeon comes, and the
CouncU wishes Calvin to be present at the examination
he has to undergo. Another day, it is a dentist, whose
art is new, for hitherto men had only been drawers of
teeth, but he announces himself as taking care of and
repaHing them. He is sent to M. Calvin, and Calvin
receives him, puts himself into his skilful hands, and
recommends him to the magistrates. It was he who,
aHeady in 1544, had endowed Geneva with a trade of
which the profits were a great help in hard times ; —
Genevese cloths and velvets had a great sale in France
until the reign of Henry IV. SuUy is much lauded for
having established the French manufactures ; but Calvin
had done no less at Geneva.
Geneva owed also to him regulations which we should
simply rank under the head of pofice, but of which he
had understood and had made others understand the
connexion with moral order. Cleanliness was then un
known in towns ; and, at most, in times of plague a few
measures were taken, to be subsequently abandoned.

HIS IDEA OF THE STATE. 331
Calvin demanded permanent regulations; and the city
assumed an aspect which astonished travellers. The
markets were carefully watched over, and nothing damaged
or bad appeared without being immediately confiscated.
One day, when the accidents which happen to children
were spoken of before him, he began to think of the means
of preventing them, and a regulation was made in con-
. sequence. For stiU better reasons there was no civU law made
which he had not asked for or approved. Already in
1542, soon after his return, we see him entrusted with
the drawing up of the ordinances which were to fix the
political state of Geneva ; and it was no smaU thing to
reduce to order the elements of a constitution hitherto so
far from precise. Calvin was for a democracy strongly
governed, but truly and really a democracy, and he
repeUed whatever might tend to diminish or subvert that
principle, which in his view was the only true, and the
only logical one. He combated, from this point of view,
certain measures proposed in 1542, and which in spite of
him, were adopted. He announced that the danger might
possibly not appear so long as the State was threatened
from without ; but, he said, let external security come
and complaints wiU arise, and discord wUl make its
appearance. The dissensions of the eighteenth century
were to show that he had been right, but only after a
hundred, and fifty years ; accordingly, whUst we recognize
the correctness of that prevision which permitted him to
foreteU so unerringly, we might ask if the fault then com
mitted was not providentially overruled for good. If
Geneva had been more democratic, would she have been
sufficiently united to resist the assaults of every kind
which the close of the sixteenth century and the entire
seventeenth had in stoye for her ? We are told that she
would have escaped the intestine troubles of the eigh
teenth ; but it is first of all necessary to know if the

332 COLLEGE AND ACADEMY
eighteenth century would have found her stiU standing.
The same Providence which had given her Calvin, modi
fied therefore, this once, by the hand of men less wise
than he, the views of the Eeformer ; but, in aU the rest,
he was the dHect instrument of God's designs with regard
to her. Not a research has been made in the history of
those years, which has not revealed the trace of some
idea originated by him, or of some influence exercised by
him, a deep, luminous trace, and almost always prolong
ing itseH through the whole history of Geneva ; and that
is to say through the whole history of the Churches of
which Geneva was to remain the metropofis when he
was dead.

XVIII.
One idea, above aH, had long pursued him, and he
wished not to die before he had seen it realized.
The Eeformation was, humanly speaking, the daughter
of knowledge, and had every where laboured to secure
the reign of knowledge. This was to secure what was
her own, and thereby that which belonged to the Gospel.
Centres of fight had everywhere been rekindled or created ;
and Geneva, thanks to Calvin, had been resplendent
among them all. Was the torch to be extinguished
when Calvin should be no longer there to hold it ? Calvin
thought therefore of providing for such a contingency,
and, in fact, he did provide for it.
On the 5th of June 1559, eleven days after the open
ing of that first National Synod at Paris, — which, as we
have seen, was presided over by the genius of Calvin, — a
festival was celebrated at Geneva ; a festival which was
austere and yet joyous, — joyous with that joy which fol
lows the accomplishment of great works. — Let us listen
to an eye-witness, the Secretary of State, Michel Eoset.

FOUNDED AT GENEVA. 333
" On Monday, the 5th day of June 1559, according to
the decision made in the Council ; my very honourable
Lords Syndics, with several of the Lords CouncUlors, and
myself the Secretary, repaHed to the temple of St. Peter,
where the ministers of God's Word, learned doctors,
scholars, and men of letters were assembled in great num
ber. And after prayer to God was made according to the
exhortation and Christian remonstrances of the worthy
Jehan Calvin, minister of the word of God ; by the com
mand of the said Lords, the laws, order, and statutes of
the CoUege, with the form of the confession to be made
by the scholars who wish to be received into this Univer
sity and CoUege, together with the form of oath which is
to be taken by the rector, masters, and lecturers in the
same, were published with a loud voice. . . . Then was de
clared and published the election of the rector, made ac
cording to the said laws by the ministers, and corifirmed
by my very honourable Lords Syndics and Council, — the
worthy Theodore Beza, minister of the Word of God, and
burgher of this city. Who, after this declaration, made a
hortatory oration in the Latin tongue, for the happy com
mencement of the exercise of- his office. The same having
finished his speech, the aforesaid worthy Calvin rendered
thanks to God; the author of this good, and exhorted every
one, as matter of duty, to. profit by so great a benefit.
And finally, having thanked my said very honourable
Lords for their good wiU, this happy day was finished by
the thanksgivings and prayers of aU to our God and
Father, to whose honour and glory be ascribed all things."
This ceremony had its political importance. The Em
peror Charles IV, two centuries before, had offered Geneva
a university, but on condition that the Count of Savoy
should be its patron or protector. Geneva understood
what she should have to fear from new power bestowed
upon the prince whose yoke she had shaken off, and Hi
spite of all the advantages promised by such an establish-

334 THE ACADEMY:
ment, she refused. What she had refused at the hands
of a prince, she now established of her own authority, and
the institution became a distinctive monument of her in
dependence. But this, was Geneva in view of the past ; Calvin pro
bably thought far more of the present and of the future.
The present, was Geneva as the Eeformation had made
her ; the future, was Geneva continuing and consofidat-
ing the work.
Great, however, would be the error of him who should
picture to himseHCalvin organizing, at a large outlay of men
and of money, a university properly so called. Let us not
forget that Geneva was a republic of fifteen or twenty
thousand souls, that she had been long ruined by war, and
condemned afterwards during a perpetuaUy doubtful peace,
to constant mifitary expenditure, and also caHed inces
santly to maintain multitudes of exiles. Calvin had asked
of the magistrates only what he could reasonably expect :
five professors, himseH included, were to compose the
academy. Two were to teach theology, one Hebrew, one
Greek, one Philosophy, or, as was commonly said, the Arts.
As for medicine and law, Calvin announced in his dis
course of the 5th of June, that they would be provided
for afterwards. This promise was fulfilled, so far as law
was concerned, in 1565, one year after his death.
But in his mind, the Academy was only to be the top-
stone of an edifice of which aH the parts, or nearly all,
were yet to be erected. It was necessary that sound and
intelligent preparatory studies should mould generations
capable of profiting by the superior instruction which was
to be offered to them. We have seen Farel, as early as
1536,getting a coUege established, but that coUege, with its
one master, supported by two assistants, had never pros
pered. An institution without such deficiencies was re
quHed, a series of distinct classes, each under its own
tutor. Calvin asked for seven. But, a suitable buddins

ITS MEMENTOES. 335
•was also required, and here the money question asserted'
itseH unpleasantly. As early as 1552, the Council had
bought the ground, but this ground, six years afterwards,
was stUl untouched. Then Calvin took the work in hand
more directly: He set on foot, as we should say now, a
national subscription, and very soon he was in possession
of ten thousand florins, a large sum for those times. The
•Council then judged that the work might be begun. The
ground was leveUed, the foundations dug, and the walls
raised. More than once Calvin was seen, whde suffering
severely from quartan-ague, dragging himself slowly over
the works, encouraging the workmen, and contemplating
¦with joy the rapid progress of the edifice. The 5th of
June 1559, the College was ready to receive both pupils
and masters..

XIX.
There, for three centuries, the chHdren of the city of
Calvin have succeeded each other. The edifice, saving a
few modifications of detaU, has remained the same. After
their venerable cathedral no building is dearer to the
Genevese, and few days pass without some stranger bend
ing his steps thither to evoke the memories which are
equally sacred to all the children of the Eeformation. If
you go upstairs over the class-rooms, you are in the rooms
of the library full of memorials yet more living and par
ticular. There you will be shown the books of Calvin's
library, the mute witnesses of his vigils, his sufferings,
and his death ; there you WiU turn over the leaves of his
manuscripts, deciphering, not without difficulty, a few
fines of his feverish writing, rapid as his thoughts ; and,
if your imagination wiU but lend itself to the breathing
appeals of solitude and silence, there he himself is ; you
will behold him gliding among those ancient walls, pale,

336 THE ACADEMY :
but with a sparkling eye, — feeble and sickly, but strong
in that inner energy, the source of which was in his faith.
There also wiU appear to you, around him, all those of
whom he was to be the father, — divines, jurists, phUoso-
phers, scholars, statesmen, and men of war, aU filled with
that mighty life which he was to bequeathe to the Eefor
mation after having received it from her. And if you ask
the secret of his power, one of the stones of the coUege
wUl tell it you Ha a few Hebrew words which the Eeformer
had engraved upon it. Come into the court. Enter
beneath that old portico which supports the great staH-
case and you wdl read : — The fear of the Lord is the
beginning of wisdom. And it is neither on the waU nor
on one of the pillars that these words are engraved. Mark
weU : it is on the keystone. What an emblem ! and what
a lesson !
That secret, moreover, is also inscribed on aU the
pages of the rules of the constitution, promulgated at St.
Peter's, at the ceremony of the 5th of June. It is easy
to make regulations in which piety acts a part ; but it is
less easy to place it and to maintain it in the centre, so
that aU should radiate from it and return to it, and that
nothing should be done, even out of the primary cHcle,
of which piety should not stUl be the centre. This was
the problem which Calvin had to solve, and the sequel
showed that he had appfied himself to it admirably.
But after all, however excellent the regulations, it was
to be a college for a small city, and an academy with five
professors. Why was theH inauguration to mark an era,
whilst history has lost, or scarcely mentions, other dates
which seemed destined to awaken echoes more loud and
long? Two causes may be indicated : the cHcumstances and
the man. But these two causes are connected. If it may
be said that the inauguration of Geneva, as learner and
teacher, would, but for the circumstances, have been only an

GENEVA AND CALVIN. 337
insignificant fact, it must also be acknowledged that
those same circumstances owed in great part to the man,
— to Calvin, — theH long and mighty fruitfulness. During
seventeen years, Calvin alone had in himseH constituted
the whole academy of Geneva. This fact, instead of
condemning it to die with him, had prepared it, on the
contrary, to live indefinitely from his life : Calvin was
not its founder, but its father. Let us remember, too,
that the academy of Geneva was not an isolated work,
and a separate creation. The true creation of Calvin
was Geneva as a whole, and the academy was only one
of the parts of that whole so strongly and so closely
linked together. Geneva, the teacher, was none other
than religious Geneva ; religious Geneva none other than
moral and political Geneva ; and aU this was Calvin.
She was therefore to be guarded, not only within, by
her strong unity, but, without, by the perseverance of
the nations in seeking in her him whose features were
graven in their memory, and the thought of whom was,
in theH mind, identified with that of Geneva. Both
worlds, the Protestant and the Eomish, were alike to
compel her, the one by love and the other by hatred, to
remain the city of Calvin, and to be incapable of becom
ing anything else, if she did not wish to be nothing.
And here, again, is another element of the paraUel
between the French and German reformers, which, at
every step we take, developes itseH. After having freely
recognised the superiority of the latter on more points
than one, why shoidd we hesitate to say that here
Calvin seems to us decidedly the superior? He has
left — we no longer speak of Geneva, but of the whole
Calvinistic world on the two shores 'of the ocean,— a
deeper impress. Luther is surrounded by a poetic halo ;
he lived, and still lives, in millions of hearts which he
has won by bis engaging and original, individuality.
But, after all, Luther had not to create a people : he was
Y

338 rLUTHER AND CALVIN.
but the highest expression of the aspHations, ideas, and
genius of Germany ; and he had only to reveal himseH
to her for her, in some sort, to find herself aU to him and
aU in hini. Calvin not only had to conquer, but, for
conquest to be possible, he had to effect a transformation.
He wished for new men ; new, doubtless, above all, Ha
the evangelical sense of the word, but new, also, as repro
ducing his own characteristics and his own genius. He
had less power over theH hearts ; but theH souls he
marked with his seal, which can be recognised, after
three centuries, in aU those who claim to be his, and even
amongst those who deny him, or whom he would have
denied ! To conquer after this manner is to create.
But let us not give him praise which he would not
have accepted. God alone creates ; a man is great only
because God thinks fit to accomplish great things by his
instrumentality. Never did any great man understand
this better than Calvin. It cost him no effort to refer aU
the glory to God; nothing indicates that he was ever
tempted to appropriate to himself the smaUest portion of
it. Luther, in many a passage, complacently dweUs on
the thought, that a petty monk, as he says, has so weU
made the Pope to tremble, and so weU stirred the whole
world. Calvin wiU never say any such thing ; he never
even seems to say it even in the deepest recesses of
his heart : everywhere you perceive the man who appfies
to aU things, — to the smaUest as to the greatest, — the
idea that it is God who does aU and is aH. Bead again,
from this point of view, the very pages Ha which he
appeared to you the haughtiest and most despotic, — and
see if, even there, he is anything other than the workman
referring all, and in aU sincerity, to his master.

BODILY AILMENTS. 339

XX.

We are drawing near to the end of our task, for we
have aHeady related the history of the years which he
had yet to five after 1559.
Death could not seize him unawares; even had he
thought less of it as a Christian, the harsh voice of sickness
was there to warn him almost uninterruptedly. With the
assistance of his own letters and those of his friends, the
sad chronology of his aUments might be reconstructed.
Yet he scarcely ever enters into detaUs ; one single letter
is entHely devoted to the subject, but it is a sort of me
moH which his friends obliged him to write to the physi
cians of MontpeUier, whom, unknown to him, they had
consulted. Everywhere else, if he aUudes to his health, it
is cursorily ; he does not say, with the Stoic, that pain is
not an evil, but he never does it the honour to devote to
it more than a sentence or haH a sentence. When the
rupture occurred between him and M. de Falais, who had
become the friend of Bolsec, he says to him : " I write
you this present, as preparing myself to appear before God,
who afflicts me anew with a malady which is as the mirror
of death before my eyes." At other times, the registers
of the Council furnish us with occasional data. In January
1546, the Council is informed "of the sickness of M.
Calvin, who hath no resources," and aUots him ten crowns.
Calvin refuses them. The CouncUlors then decide on
buying with the ten crowns a cask of good wine to be
conveyed to his house, and express the desHe " that M.
Calvin should take it Ha good part." Calvin, not to give
offence to my Lords, accepts, but he afterwards employs
ten crowns of his. salary "for the relief of the poorest
ministers." In 1556, as he had become very sensitive to
cold, the Council sent him some firewood, which he in
sisted upon paying for, but the CouncU .would not hear

340 CALVIN'S UNSELFISHNESS.
of it. In 1560, another cask of wine was sent, seeing,
says the register, " that he has none good," and this time
Calvin accepted it. Some historians have had the heart
to reproach him because of these few presents which were
offered him during a ministry of six-and-twenty years,
and, almost aU, refused or paid for, though they were all
sufficiently justified by the deplorable state of his health.
But what has not furnished accusations against Calvin ?
It is doubtful whether one man could be named whose
fife has been more obstinately defamed in its minutest
details ; and Ha presence of the many infamous stories
cHculated as to the cause of his adments, we can under
stand that other historians have thought themselves mode
rate, H they accused him only of making use of them to
get good wine or money. He also refused during his last
illness the quarter's salary which was brought to him.
He had not earned it, he said, how could he accept it ?
This disinterestedness greatly struck his enemies, who
were then more equitable than those of the present day.
This is the characteristic which even the pope, Pius IV,
on hearing of his death, pointed out in him : " that which
made the strength of that heretic," said he, "was that
money was nothing to him." Calvin's strength had a very
different cause assuredly, and one of which his indifference
to money was only a consequence ; but it is pleasant to
prove to the end the perfect unity of his life. Evidence
was now afforded that the sick man who refused his pay,
had not the means to defray the expense of a protracted
malady ; and H death had tarried longer, he must either
have accepted the money of the repubfic, or seU his library
and furniture, the only property the Eeformer left. He
never saved, and never could have saved. Even in his
best years, he writes to Viret in 1549, he could scarcely
make both ends meet, on account of that " heavy burthen
of passers-by," to which aUusion was made by the register
when his salary, was settled. But, he adds, that for two

STRANGE VISITORS. 341
years provisions had been dear, and he had been obliged
to contract some debts. " Nevertheless, I say not this by
way of complaint : God is good to me, because I have all
that suffices for my desires." This did not prevent people
from being found, if not at Geneva yet elsewhere, who
accused him of avarice ; accordingly, he says in his pre
face to the Psalms : " If there are any whom, in my fife-
time, I cannot persuade that I am not rich and moneyed,
my death wiU show it at last." One day, a stranger
knocks at his door, and it is Calvin himseH who opens it.
The stranger can scarcely believe his eyes. He had pic
tured to himseH a sort of palace and courtier-like servants.
Calvin smUed at his surprise, and then it was his turn to
be surprised. The stranger was no other than Sadolet, the
cardinal, who had been so roughly treated by him in 1540,
and the cardinal had expected to find a cardinal's retinue,
at the very least.

XXI.
Calvin had never entHely recovered from the violent
attack of quartan ague from which we saw him suffering
in 1559 ; indeed, he had not properly attended to it, for,
Beza teUs us, when forced to suspend his preaching and
his lectures, he nevertheless " laboured at home in spite of
every remonstrance, so much so, that during this time he
began and completed his last revision of the Christian
Institutes in French and Latin." The foUowing years
therefore witnessed the increase of aH his aUments. Pains
in his head, pains in his legs, pains in his stomach, spitting
of blood, difficulty of breathing, the gout, and stone, — in
fine, nothing was wanting to his long torture, which was
scarcely interrupted by a few days less intolerable. It
was towards the middle of 1563 that the fatal issue began
to be no longer doubtful. A letter from the bishop of

342 LAST SERMON.
London, written in June, shows us how anxiously the
progress of this alarming decay was watched at a distance.
The bishop conjures Calvin to work a Httle less, and to
preserve himseH for the Church, which so greatly needs
him. Many others dady gave him the same advice. He
heeded it fittie ; work, whUe it eventuaUy aggravated his
sufferings, served powerfully to divert him from them,
and, besides, .he did not think himself at Hberty to re
fuse what was not absolutely impossible. He continued
to preach, though preaching fatigued him dreadfuUy, and
he might easUy have found a substitute in that office.
But on the 6th of February 1564, a violent fit of cough
ing stopped his utterance, and the blood gushed into his
mouth. He was obfiged to come down from the pulpit,
and his flock understood but too weU that he would never
enter it again.
The foUowing weeks were terrible. At times he re
mained for several days without taking any food, and
only swaUowing with much difficulty a little cold water.
Every day might have been his last. On the 10th of
March the Council ordered public prayers " for the health
of M. Calvin, who has been long indisposed, and is even
in danger of death." But God willed that the Christian
should show himseH as eminent as the theologian, and
Calvin was prepared for this trial of his faith. He had
never murmured at the miserable health which cut him
off in his best years, nor did he murmur during those
days of agony which were completing the destruction of
his earthly tabernacle. The critical moments Ha his dis
ease were perceived only by the increased pallor of his
features, the quivering of his clasped hands, and the words
of submission which came to his lips. This agony was to
last for nearly four months.
"Nevertheless," Beza teHs us, "he did not cease to
work. For in this last malady he translated from Latin
into French his Harmony on Moses, revised the transla-

LAST COMMUNION. 343
tion of Genesis, wrote upon the book of Joshua, and
finaUy, revised and corrected the greater part of his French
annotations on the New Testament, which others had
previously put together. Besides this, he never spared
himseH Ha the business of the churches, answering both
by word of mouth and by writing when it was necessary,
though on our part we remonstrated with him for having
so little consideration for himseH. But his ordinary-
answer was that what he did was as nothing, and that we
should suffer that God should find him watching and
working as he might, tdl his last breath."
On Easter day (2d April), he caused himself to be
carried to church. Truly it was a solemn hour when he
was seen approaching the Lord's Table. Never had his
finest sermons had half the eloquence of the spectacle
presented by that shattered frame, that look in which life
had raUied aU its energy, and that hand which was
stretched out towards the sacred symbols, not, as on a
famous day, to take them from the profane, but to receive
them humbly from the hands of a pastor and a friend,
who was more moved and trembling than himseH. That
friend and pastor was he whose words we just now quoted,
and from whom, ere we terminate, we shall have to quote
more than once.

XXII.
But the communicant of the 2d of AprU was stUl, and
could not but be till his latest day, the pastor and father
of the Church of Geneva.
He wished to speak once more to the magistrates, and
asked an audience of them. The CouncU decided on go
ing to his house, and the humble dwelling of the Eue des
Chanoines witnessed the arrival of the twenty-five lords
of the city in all the pomp of public ceremony. TheH

344 LAST INTERVIEWS.
registers have preserved the summary of Calvin's words,
which were modest and affectionate, but sound and full
of meaning, Hke aU he ever said or wrote. He reminded
them of the blessings which God had granted to Geneva,
and of the perds from which He had saved her. Other
perils might come, arid God would stiU save her, but on
condition that she remained faithful. It was for them as
magistrates to set her an example of fidefity. Geneva is
a post, of honour ; and could those who kept it dishonour
it ? In conclusion, Calvin commended them by a fervent
prayer to the Author of aU grace, and " thereupon," says
Beza, " having begged them one and all to pardon him
his faults, he held out his hand to them. I know not if
there could have been a sadder sight for these magistrates,
who aU considered him, and rightly, for his office' sake,
as the mouth of the Lord, and for his affection, as their
own father, and indeed several of them he had known
and trained up from theH youth."
On the morrow, he wished- to see the pastors, and the
Company therefore visited him in a body. He addressed
to them a discourse, says his historian, " the substance of
which was, that they should persevere in doing their duty
well after his death, and that they should not lose
courage ; that God would protect the city and Church,
although they were menaced in different quarters ; that
they should be united ; that they should recognise how
much they were indebted to the Church of Geneva, into
which God had caUed them ; that those who might wish
to leave her would indeed find excuses upon earth, but
that God would not suffer Himself to be mocked." He
then reminded them of his exile, his return, the struggles
of every kind which he had had to sustain, and how,
finaUy, he had seen the blessing of God upon his labour.
"-Let every one, therefore, be confirmed in his vocation,
and maintain good order ; let the people be weU looked
after, and kept obedient to the doctrine, for it would

LAST WILL AND TESTAMENT. 345
render us very guUty before God, if, when things have
advanced so far, they afterwards feU into disorder, owing
to our negligence." He then declared, as on the previous
day to the magistrates, that he knew well that disease had
sometimes rendered him morose, hard to please, and even
irascible ; but that he asked pardon of God in the first place,
and then of his brethren ; " and finaUy," Beza adds, " he
gave his hand to each, one after the other, which was
with such anguish and bitterness of heart in every one,
that I cannot even recaU it to mind without extreme
sadness." A few days before, he had made his will. In the first
part, he blesses God for having caUed him to know the
Gospel and to make it known, humbling himself for not
having laboured more abundantly. In the second place,
he distributes to his nephews and nieces the approxima
tive produce of the sale of his books and furniture, two
hundred and twenty-five crowns, which is " aH the pro
perty God hath given me," he says, " according as I have
been able to rate and estimate it."1 Ten crowns are to be
given to the coUege, and ten to the fund for "poor
strangers," or refugees. His brother Antoine is named
joint-executor with Laurent de Normandie, his feUow-
countryman and old friend.

XXIII.
Another friend, the oldest of all except Cordier, was
missing at his death-bed, and that was Farel. On the 2d
of May, Calvin received a letter in which Farel announced
that he wished to see him again, and that he was going
to set out. See him again ! Farel is nearly eighty years
of age, and Calvin is going to die ; can they not wait to
see each other again elsewhere ? So Calvin thought, and
1 The sale brought in three hundred crowns.

346 SEES FAREL ONCE MORE.
he dictated immediately the foUowing note ; — " May it
be weU with thee, very good and dear Brother, and since
it pleaseth God, that thou shouldst remain after me, re
member our constant union of which the fruit awaiteth
us in heaven, as it hath been profitable to the Church of
God. I wiU not that thou fatigue thyself for me. I
breathe with much difficulty, and I am expecting from
hour to hour to breathe my last. But it is enough H I
live and die in Christ, who is gain to His people both in
fife and Ha death. Once more, adieu to thee and to all
the brethren thy colleagues." But Farel was aHeady on
his way : dusty and exhausted, for he had come from
Neuchatel on foot, — Calvin saw him enter his chamber.
What did they say to each other ? We regret that the
seriousness of history wiU not aUow fancy to supply the
place of documents, for here it would be easy to invent.
AH the happiness which can be enjoyed by two veterans
in remembering theH campaigns together, we see spark
ling in the eyes of those two soldiers of the gospel. Be
fore each other, and before God, they can say with the
Apostle, "I believed, and therefore have I spoken." They
can congratulate each other upon theH speedy entrance
there where there shaU be no more sorrow, nor crying, nor
labour, nor struggle ; though they would be ready, H God
willed it, to enter the lists again, even if it were to meet
with greater trouble yet, and a very different death. How
many common friends have disappeared from this world's
stage ! How many labourers have been consumed by the
work ! But the Master is One who is able, of the very
stones, to raise up chHdren and helpers. Who then should
presume to think himseH necessary to the Lord's designs?
The greatest workman, if a Christian, wiU humble himself
in his misery, and when the hour is come for him to sleep
in the tomb, he wiU fall asleep without regret, giving back
the work to Him from whom he had received it as a
momentary trust. Farel departed comforted, strength-

MAY 27th, 1564. 347
ened, and, perhaps, for the first time, jealous of the traveller
of 1536.
But death stUl tarried. The 1 9th of May, or the Friday
before Whitsunday, brought round what were caUed the
censures, which he had instituted. The clergy assembled
on that day to admonish each other fraternaUy and after
wards partook together of a modest repast. Calvin de-
sHed that this repast should be prepared at his house,
and, when the hour was come, had himself carried into
the room. " My Brethren," he said, " I am come to see
you for the last time, for, save this once, I shaU never sit
again at table. Then he offered prayer, but not without
difficulty, and ate a little, endeavouring," says Beza, "to
enliven us." But, continues he, " before the end of the
supper, he requested to be carried back to his chamber,
which was close by, saying these words with as cheerful
a face as he could : — ' A partition between us need not
prevent my union in spHit with you.'" He spoke truly.
He sat no more at table, nor did he even rise again. The
bed to which he returned was to be his death-bed.
The foUowing days, his friend tells us, were nothing but
a perpetual prayer, He often repeated these words of
the Psalmist, — " 0 Lord, I was dumb, I opened not my
mouth ; because thou didst it," or these words of Isaiah,
"I did mourn as a dove." Gradually his "assiduous
prayers and consolations" became " rather sighs than in-
teUigible words, but they were accompanied by such an
eye that the look alone testified with what faith and hope
he was supplied." On the 27th of May, "it seemed that
he spoke more loudly and more easUy, but it was the last
effort of nature." Towards eight o'clock in the evening,
he expired, and "so it was, that on that day, at the same
moment, the sun set, and the greatest light on earth in
the Church of God was withdrawn to heaven."

348 calvin's grave.

XXIV.

And the day foUowing, at two o'clock, an immense
procession of citizens and strangers accompanied him to
the cemetery. The Church wept for her head, and the
State for her chief citizen and her surest protector after
God. His defects, which had aHeady been effaced by
his glory and his services, had completely disappeared in
the pure halo with which death encHcles the Christian's
brow; and willingly would aU those multitudes have
graven upon a magnificent monument the testimony of
their unreserved admiration, theH deep gratitude, and
their profound veneration. But he had enjoined that
everything should be done " after the customary fashion,"
and that customary fashion, which was observed almost
down to the present day, was that no monument should
be raised upon any grave, however illustrious the de
ceased might be. The earth alone, therefore, covered the
remains of Calvin, and he had no other official epitaph
than this haH fine inscribed by the side of his name in
the Consistorial register — " Went to God, Saturday the
27th." Were his bones left longer Hi peace than those of
the vulgar dead ? None can say. At aU events, for
more than two centuries that grave has been dug over
again and again like the rest 'by the sexton's spade ; and
for less than twenty years a smaU black stone has marked
the spot where Calvin perhaps reposed, for it is only a
tradition. Strangers have been seen who are indignant at that
smaU stone ; but others contemplate it with more emo
tion than would have been caUed forth by a splendid
mausoleum, even though it unquestionably pointed out
the spot. Such an abandonment of the perishable being
brings you face to face with the thinking, living, immortal
being in another world — already immortal on earth by

CALVIN NOT DEAD. 349
the profound and ineffaceable traces which God has given
him to leave upon it. You contemplate him in his work;
you follow him through the three centuries which have
seen him so mighty over so many minds and so many
souls, even of those who have been trained to hate him ;
and there you understand how the city created in his
image should have felt no more than he did the need of
marking out his last resting-place. For her as for him
the spirit was aU, and the body nought. Calvin was
not dead : Calvin was going simply to carry on, when
absent in the body, that reign which his genius and
faith had founded. Thus thought, with the Genevese, all
those who already peopled his vast empire, and aU those
who were yet to people it, and death, in causing the man
to disappear, did but exalt the Eeformer.
But the man, in spite of his faults, has not the less re
mained one of the fairest types of faith, of earnest piety,
of devotedness, and of courage. Amid modern laxity,
there is no character of which the contemplation is more
instructive ; for there is no man of whom it has been
said with greater justice, in the words of an apostle, " he
endured as seeing Him who is invisible."

THE END.

EDINBURGH: TUENBUIX AND SPEARS, FKINTEKS.

WORKS OF JOHN CALVIN,
IN 51 VOLUMES, DEMY 8vo.
Messes CLARK beg respectfully to announce that the whole Stock
and Copyrights of the WORKS OF CALVIN, published by the
Calvin Translation Society, are now their property, and that this valuable
Series will be issued by them on the following very favourable terms : 
1. Complete Sets in 51 Volumes, Nine Guineas. (Original Sub
scription price about L.13.) The "Letters," edited by Dr.
Bonnet, 2 vols., 10s. 6d. additional.
2. Complete Sets of Commentaries, 45 vols., L. 7, 17s. 6d.
3. A Selection of Six Volumes (or more at the same proportion), for
21s., with the exception of the Institutes, 3 vols.
4. The Institutes, 3 vols., 24s.
5. Any Separate Volume (except Institutes), 6s.
THE CONTENTS OF THE SERIES ARE AS FOLLOW:-
VOL.
Institutes of the Christian Eeligion,  3
Tracts on the Eeformation,  3
Commentary on Genesis,  2
Harmony of the last Pour Books of the Pentateuch, . . 4
Commentary on Joshua,  1
„ the Psalms,  5
„ Isaiah,  4
„ Jeremiah and Lamentations, .... 5
„ Ezekiel,  2
,, Daniel,  2
„ Hosea,  1
„ Joel, Amos, and Obadiah,  1
„ Jonah, Micah, and Nahum,  1
„ Habakkuk, Zephaniah, and Haggai, ... 1
,, Zechariah and Malachi,  1
Harmony of the Synoptical Evangelists,  3
Commentary on John's Gospel,  2
„ Acts of the Apostles,  2
„ Romans . . :  1
„ Corinthians,  2
„ Galatians and Ephesians,  1
„ Philippians, Oolossians, and Thessalonians, . 1
„ Timothy, Titus, and Philemon, .... 1
„ Hebrews,  1
„ Peter, John, James, and Jude, .... 1
Amongst the Theological Works which were widely circulated in
England and Scotland during the latter part of the Sixteenth century,
Translations of many of the Writings of John Calvin had a distin
guished place. Of his eminence as a Divine and Commentator on
the Holt Scriptures, it is unnecessary here to speak, though few are
now fully aware of the very high respect in which his Works were held
by all the leading English Reformers and Ecclesiastical Writers from
Cranmer to Hooker, and the extensive benefits resulting to the Church
of Christ from his literary labours. At that time, doctrines which he
never held were not attributed to him ; nor were sentiments imputed
to him which he never advocated. Bishop Horsley well advised to
ascertain what is Calvinism and what is not.
Copious Tables and Indices are appended to each of the Commen
taries, etc., to facilitate reference, and to render the whole Series more
generally useful and acceptable to every class of readers.
Edinburgh: T. & T. CLARK. London: HAMILTON, ADAMS & CO.

WORKS OF THE REV. FELIX BUNGENER.

Histoire du Concile de Trente, 2d edit., Baris, 1854. Two
vols, in 12mo.
History of the Council of Trent, 1852, complete in one
vol. Edinburgh : Thomas Constable & Co. London : Hamilton,
Adams, & Co.
Un sermon sous Louis XIV., 5th edit., Baris, 1860. One
vol. in 1 '2 mo.
The Preacher and the King, London, 1853. Triibner
and Co. T. Nelson and Sons.
Trois Sermons sous Louis XV., 4th edit., Baris, 1861.
Three vols, in 12mo.
The Priest and the Huguenot, complete in one vol.
Triibner and Co. : Nelson and Sons. In two vols. Boston, 1854.
Gould and Lincoln.
The Court and the Desert, London, 1852, in three vols.
Richard Bentley.
France before the Revolution, 1854, in two vols. Edin
burgh : Thomas Constable and Co. London : Hamilton, Adams,
and Co.
Voltaire et son Temps, 2d edit. Baris, 1851, in two vols.
Voltaire and his Times, 1854, complete in one vol.
Edinburgh : Thomas Constable and Co. London : Hamilton,
Adams, and Co.
Julien, ou la Fin d'un Si&cle, Baris, 1853, 4 vols, in 12mo.
Julian, or the close of an Era, London, 1854, in two
vols. Arthur, Hall, Virtue, and Co.
Calvin, sa Vie, son CEuvre et ses Ecrits, Baris, 1862. One
volume.
Calvin, His Life, Labours, and Writings, Edinburgh,
1863, T. & T. Clark. 1 volume.
Rome et la Bible, Manuel du Controversiste evangelique.
2d edit. Paris, 1860. One vol.
Rome et le Cceur humain, etudes sur le Catholicisme.
Paris, 1860. One vol.
Christ et le Silcle, Discours preches en France. Baris,
1856. One vol.
Ce que dit I'Arbre deNoel, quelques pages pour les enfants.
3d edit. Geneva, 1860.