07056.2 - John Calvin. Life & Character - 2
§56.2. John Calvin. His Life and Character -Part 2.
CALVIN’S PERSONAL CHARACTER.
Calvin was of middle, or rather small stature (like David and Paul), of feeble health, courteous, kind, grave and dignified in deportment. He had a meagre and emaciated frame, a thin, pale, finely chiseled face, a well-formed mouth, a long, pointed beard, black hair, a prominent nose, a lofty forehead, and flaming eyes. He was modest, plain, and scrupulously neat in dress, orderly and methodical in all his habits, temperate and even abstemious, allowing himself scarcely nourishment and sleep enough for vigorous work. His physical tent barely covered the mighty spirit within. Conscience and logic, a commanding mind and will, shone through the thin veil of mortality. [See
How different Luther and Zwingli, with their strong animal foundation, and their abundance of flesh and blood! Calvin seemed to be all bone and nerve. Beza says he looked in death almost the same as alive in sleep. [See
He surpassed all other Reformers (except Beza) in classical culture and social refinement. He was a patrician by education and taste, and felt more at ease among scholars and men of high rank than among the common people. Yet he was quite free from aristocratic pride, despised all ostentation and display, and esteemed every man according to his real worth.
History furnishes, perhaps, no example of a man who with so little personal popularity had such influence upon the people, and who with such natural timidity and bashfulness combined such strength and control over his age and future generations. Constitutionally a retiring scholar and a man of thought, he became providentially a mighty man of action and an organizer of churches. His moral and religious character is impressed with a certain majesty which keeps the admirer at a respectful distance. [See
It must be admitted that this kind of greatness, while it commands our admiration and respect, does not of itself secure our affection and love. There is a censoriousness and austerity about Calvin and his creed which repelled many good men, even among his contemporaries. [See
Yet even this must be qualified. He sympathized with the spirit of David and Paul as much as with the spirit of Moses and Elijah, and had the strongest sense of the freedom of the gospel salvation. Moreover, behind his cold marble frame there was beating a noble, loving, and faithful heart, which attracted and retained to the last the friendship of such eminent servants of God as Farel, Viret, Beza, Bucer, Bullinger, Knox, and Melanchthon. ’He obtained,’ says Guizot, ’the devoted affection of the best men and the esteem of all, without ever seeking to please them.’ [See
He lacked the good-nature, the genial humor, the German Gemüthlichkeit, the overflowing humanity of Luther, who for this reason will always be more popular with the masses; but he surpassed him in culture, refinement, consistency, and moral self-control. Both were equally unselfish and unworldly. Both were headstrong and will-strong; but Calvin was more open to argument and less obstinate. Both had, like St. Paul, a fiery and violent temper, which was the propelling force in their hard work, and in fierce battles with the pope and the devil. Hegel says somewhere that ’nothing great can be done without passion.’ [See
It may be found strange that Calvin never alludes to the paradise of nature by which he was surrounded on the lovely shores of Lake Leman, in sight of the lofty Alps that pierce the skies in silent adoration of their Maker. But we look in vain for descriptions of natural scenery in the whole literature of the sixteenth century; and the proper appreciation of the beauties of Switzerland, as well as of other countries, is of more recent date. Calvin had no special organ nor time for the enjoyment of the beautiful either in nature or in art, but he appreciated poetry and music. [See
’I greet thee, who my sure Redeemer art, My only trust, and Saviour of my heart! Who so much toil and woe And pain didst undergo, For my poor, worthless sake:
We pray thee, from our hearts, All idle griefs and smarts And foolish cares to take.
’Thou art the true and perfect gentleness, No harshness hast thou, and no bitterness:
Make us to taste and prove, Make us adore and love, The sweet grace found in thee; With longing to abide Ever at thy dear side, In thy sweet unity.
’Poor, banished exiles, wretched sons of Eve, Full of all sorrows, unto thee we grieve; To thee we bring our sighs, Our groanings, and our cries:
Thy pity, Lord, we crave;
We take the sinner’s place, And pray thee, of thy grace, To pardon and to save.’
TRIBUTES TO CALVIN.
I add some estimates of Calvin’s character, which represent very different stand-points. [See
’Having been an observer of Calvin’s life for sixteen years, I may with perfect right testify that we have in this man a most beautiful example of a truly Christian life and death, which it is easy to calumniate but difficult to imitate.’ [See
’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 all the glory to God; nothing indicates that he was ever tempted to appropriate to himself the smallest portion of it. Luther, in many a passage, complacently dwells on the thought that a petty monk, as he says, has so well made the Pope to tremble, and so well stirred the whole world. Calvin will never say any such thing; he never even seems to say it, even in the deepest recesses of his heart: every where you perceive the man, who applies to all things-to the smallest as to the greatest-the idea that it is God who does all and is all. Read again, from this point of view, the very pages in which he appeared to you the haughtiest and most despotic, and see if, even there, he is any thing other than the workman referring all, and in all sincerity, to his Master. . . . But the man, in spite of all his faults, has not the less remained one of the fairest types of faith, of earnest piety, of devotedness, and of courage. Amid modern laxity, there is no character of whom 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. "’
Jules Michelet, the French historian, remarks: [See
’Among the martyrs, with whom Calvin constantly conversed in spirit, he became a martyr himself; he felt and lived like a man before whom the whole earth disappears, and who tunes his last Psalm, his whole eye fixed upon the eye of God, because he knows that on the following morning he may have to ascend the stake.’
Ernest Renan, once educated for the Romish priesthood, then a skeptic, with all his abhorrence of Calvin’s creed, pays the following striking tribute to his character: [See
Calvin was one of those absolute men, cast complete in one mould, who is taken in wholly at a single glance: one letter, one action suffices for a judgment of him. There were no folds in that inflexible soul, which never knew doubt or hesitation. . . . Careless of wealth, of titles, of honors, indifferent to pomp, modest in his life, apparently humble, sacrificing every thing to the desire of making others like himself, I hardly know of a man, save Ignatius Loyola, who could match him in these terrible transports. . . . It is surprising that a man who appears to us in his life and writings so unsympathetic should have been the centre of an immense movement in his generation, and that this harsh and severe tone should have exerted so great an influence on the minds of his contemporaries. How was it, for example, that one of the most distinguished women of her time, Renée of France, in her court at Ferrara, surrounded by the flower of European wits, was captivated by that stern master, and by him drawn into a course that must have been so thickly strewn with thorns? This kind of austere seduction is exercised by those only who work with real conviction. Lacking that vivid, deep, sympathetic ardor which was one of the secrets of Luther’s success, lacking the charm, the perilous, languishing tenderness of Francis of Sales, Calvin succeeded, in an age and in a country which called for a reaction towards Christianity, simply because he was the most christian man of his generation. ’
Guizot, a very competent judge of historical and moral greatness, thus concludes his biography: [See
’Calvin is great by reason of his marvelous powers, his lasting labors, and the moral height and purity of his character. . . . Earnest in faith, pure in motive, austere in his life, and mighty in his works, Calvin is one of those who deserve their great fame. Three centuries separate us from him, but it is impossible to examine his character and history without feeling, if not affection and sympathy, at least profound respect and admiration for one of the great Reformers of Europe and of the great Christians of France.’
Prof. Kahnis, of Leipzig, whose personal and theological sympathies are with Luther, nevertheless asserts the moral superiority of Calvin above the other Reformers: [See
’The fear of God was the soul of his piety, the rock-like certainty of his election before the foundation of the world was his power, and the doing of the will of God his single aim, which he pursued with trembling and fear. . . . No other Reformer has so well demonstrated the truth of Christ’s word that, in the kingdom of God, dominion is service. No other had such an energy of self-sacrifice, such an irrefragable conscientiousness in the greatest as well as the smallest things, such a disciplined power. This man, whose dying body was only held together by the will flaming from his eyes, had a majesty of character which commanded the veneration of his contemporaries.’
Prof. Dorner, of Berlin, the first among the theologians of the age, distinguished by profound learning, penetrating thought, rare catholicity of spirit, and nice sense of justice and discrimination, says:
’Calvin was equally great in intellect and character, lovely in social life, full of tender sympathy and faithfulness to friends, yielding and forgiving towards personal offenses, but inexorably severe when he saw the honor of God obstinately and malignantly attacked. He combined French fire and practical good sense with German depth and soberness. He moved as freely in the world of ideas as in the business of Church government. He was an architectonic genius in science and practical life, always with an eye to the holiness and majesty of God.’ [See
Prof. Gr. T. Fisher, of Yale College, New Haven, gives the following fair and impartial estimate of Calvin: [See
’When we look at his extraordinary intellect, at his culture-which opponents, like Bossuet, have been forced to commend-at the invincible energy which made him endure with more than stoical fortitude infirmities of body under which most men would have sank, and to perform, in the midst of them, an incredible amount of mental labor; when we see him, a scholar naturally fond of seclusion, physically timid, and recoiling from notoriety and strife, abjuring the career that was most to his taste, and plunging, with a single-hearted, disinterested zeal and an indomitable will, into a hard, protracted contest; and when we follow his steps, and see what things he effected, we can not deny him the attributes of greatness. . . . His last days were of a piece with his life. His whole course has been compared by Vinet to the growth of one rind of a tree from another, or to a chain of logical sequences, He was endued with a marvelous power of understanding, although the imagination and sentiments were less roundly developed. His systematic spirit fitted him to be the founder of an enduring school of thought. In this characteristic he may be compared with Aquinas. He has been appropriately styled the Aristotle of the Reformation. He was a perfectly honest man. He subjected his will to the eternal rule of right, as far as he could discover it. His motives were pure. He felt that God was near him, and sacrificed every thing to obey the direction of Providence. The fear of God ruled in his soul; not a slavish fear, but a principle such as animated the prophets of the Old Covenant. The combination of his qualities was such that he could not fail to attract profound admiration and reverence from one class of minds, and excite intense antipathy in another. There is no one of the Reformers who is spoken of, at this late day, with so much personal feeling, either of regard or aversion. But whoever studies his life and writings, especially the few passages in which he lets us into his confidence and appears to invite our sympathy, will acquire a growing sense of his intellectual and moral greatness, and a tender consideration for his errors.’
Note #790 The Latinized form of the French Chauvin or Cauvin. He sunk, even in name, his nationality in his catholicity.
Note #791
Guizot (pp. 153, 155): ’Evidently Charles Calvin lived and died a dissolute man and an unbeliever, and at the same time remained chaplain of the Catholic church of his native town. The sixteenth century abounds in similar instances. . . . The same thing was going on every where; unbelievers and fervent Christians, libertines and men of the most austere lives, were springing up and living side by side. Two contrary winds were blowing over Europe at that period, one carrying with it skepticism and licentiousness, while the other breathed only Christian faith and the severest morality. One of these arose chiefly from the revival of the ancient literature and philosophy of Greece and Rome; the other sprang from the struggles made in the Church itself, and in its councils, to arrive at a reform which was at the same time greatly desired and fiercely opposed. . . . It was, in short, the age which produced Erasmus and Luther in Germany, and Montaigne and Calvin in France.’ Merle d’Aubigné (Vol. V. p. 455) conjectures that Charles Calvin became a convert to Protestantism on his death-bed, for which the infuriated priests had him buried by night between the four pillars of a gibbet.
Note #792 Kampschulte, Vol. 1. p. 223.
Note #793
It seems (according to Jacques Le Vasseur, 1.c. 1153 sqq., as quoted by Kampschulte, Vol. 1. p. 226) that Gerard Chauvin became involved in difficulty with his ecclesiastical superiors, and was even excommunicated. Kampschulte conjectures that this was probably the reason why he ordered his son to exchange the study of theology for that of law. But Calvin himself (in his Commentary on the Psalms) assigns a different motive: ’Mon père m’avoit destiné à la Théologie; mais puis après, d’autant qu’il considéroit que la science des Loix communément enrichit ceux qui la suyvent, ceste espérance luy fait incontinent changer d’avis.’ The study of the law was of great use to Calvin in the organization and control of Church and State in Geneva.
Note #794 A notice of Jacques Le Vasseur, which agrees with Beza’s statement that he was ’tenera ætate mirum in modum religiosus ’ and ’severus omnium in suis sodalibus vitiorum censor. ’
Note #795
According to Beza and Stähelin (Vol. 1. p. 88), Calvin took part even in the first edition of Olivétan’s French New Testament (1534). But this seems to be an error; see Reuss, Révue de Theologie, 1866, No. III. p. 318, and Kampschulte, p. 247. He revised, however, the second edition, which included the Old Testament (1535), and wrote the preface (see Stähelin, pp.89 sq.).
Note #796
’L. Annei Se- | necæ, Romani Senato- | ris, ac philosophi clarissi- | mi, libri duo de Clementia, ad Ne- | ronem Cæsarem: | Joannis Calvini Noviodunæi commentariis illustrati. | Parisiis . . . 1532.’ Reprinted from the ed. princeps in the new edition of the Opera, Vol. V. (1866), pp. 6-162. The commentary is preceded by a dedicatory epistle, and a sketch of the life of Seneca.
Note #797 As is asserted by Henry, Herzog, Dorner (p. 375), and also by Guizot (p. 162), but justly denied by Stähelin (Vol. 1. pp. 14 sqq.) and Kampschulte (p. 238). The work is not dedicated to Francis I., but to Claude de Hangest, the Abbot of St. Eloy (Eligius), afterwards Bishop of Noyon, his former schoolmate; and the implied comparison of the French king with Nero, and the incidental mention of the Neronian persecution (’quum Nero diris suppliciis impotenter sæviret in Christianos, ’ Opera, Vol. V. p. 10), would have been fatal to such an apologetic aim. Calvin sent a copy to ’Erasmus, and called him ’the honor and the chief delight of the world of letters’-literarum alterum decus ac primæ deliciæ (see his letter to Claude de Hangest, April 4, 1532, in Herminjard, Tom. II. p. 411).
Note #798
They were recently brought to light by Jules Bonnet and Herminjard. They are chiefly addressed to his fellow-student, Francis Daniel, an advocate of Orleans, who acknowledged the necessity of the Reformation, but remained in the Church of Rome. See the Edinburgh edition of Calvin’s Letters, by Bonnet, Vol. 1. p. 3; Herminjard, Vol. II. pp. 278 sqq.; and Opera, Vol. X. Pt. II. pp. 3 sqq. His first letter to Daniel is dated ’Melliani (i.e. Meillant, south of Bourges, not Meaux, as the Edinburgh edition misunderstands it), 8 Idus Septembr., ’ and is put by Herminjard and the Strasburg editors in the year 1530 (not 1529).
Note #799
Stähelin puts his conversion in the year 1533 (Vol. 1. p. 21). But we have a familiar letter from Calvin to Martin Bucer, dated Noyon, ’pridie nonas Septembres, ’ probably of the year 1532, in which he recommends a French refugee, falsely accused of holding the opinions of the Anabaptists, and says: ’I entreat of you, Master Bucer, if my prayers, if my tears are of any avail, that you would compassionate and help him in his wretchedness. The poor is left in a special manner to your care-you are the helper of the orphan. . . . Most learned Sir, farewell; Thine from my heart (Tuus ex animo ): Calvin’ (J. Bonnet’s Letters, Vol. 1. pp. 9-11; the Latin in Opera, Vol. X. Pt. II. p. 24). Kampschulte (Vol. 1. p. 231) infers even an earlier acquaintance of Calvin with Bucer, from a letter of Bucer to Farel, May 1, 1528, in which he mentions a juvenis Noviodunensis studying Greek and Hebrew in Strasburg (Herminjard, Vol. II. p. 131, and Opera, Vol. X. Pt. II. p. 1); but this youth was probably his relative Olivétan, who was likewise a native of Noyon (Herminjard, Vol. II. p. 451). Besides, there were several places in France of the name Noviodunum. In a letter of Oct., 1533, to Francis Daniel (Bonnet, Vol. 1. p. 12, and Opera, Vol. X. Pt. II. p. 27), Calvin first speaks openly of the Reformation in Paris, the rage of the Sorbonne, and the satirical comedy against the Queen of Navarre.
Note #800
He alludes to his conversion only twice, and briefly, namely, in the remarkable Preface to his Commentary on the Psalms, and in his answer to Cardinal Sadolet (Opera, Vol. V. pp. 389-411 sq.). In the latter he describes his mental conflicts and terrors of conscience.
Note #801
He says (Ad Sadoleti Epistolam, Opera, Vol. V. p. 389) that if he had consulted his personal interest he would never have left the Roman Church, where the way to honor would have been very easy to him. Audin, in tracing Calvin’s conversion to wounded ambition, exposes (as Kampschulte justly observes, p. 242) his utter ignorance of Calvin’s character, whose only ambition was to serve God most faithfully.
Note #802 Bulæus, Historia universitatis Parisiensis, Vol. VI. p. 238; Kampschulte, Vol. 1. p. 243.
Note #803 The incomplete draft of this address has recently been discovered by J. Bonnet among the manuscripts of the Geneva library. In it Calvin explains the great difference between the law and the gospel, and charged the Sophists, as he called the scholastic theologians, Nihil de fide, nihil de amore Dei, nihil de remissione peccatorum, nihil de gratia, nihil de justificatione, nihil de veris operibus disserunt; aut si certe disserunt, omnia calumniantur, omnia labefactant, omnia suis legibus, hoc est sophisticis coërcent. Vos rogo, quotquot hic adestis, ut has hæreses, has in Deum contumelias numquam æquo animo feratis. ’ See Kampschulte, p. 244.
Note #804 This is recorded with some satisfaction by a Catholic writer in the Journal du Bourgeois de Paris, quoted by Guizot, p. 168. That Francis 1. was present at these horrible executions is denied by Michelet, Martin, and Guizot.
Note #805
Psychopannychia, in Opera, Vol. V. pp. 165-232. The Preface is dated ’Aureliæ, 1534.’ The second edition appeared in Basle, 1535. This work forms a contrast to his commentary on Seneca as great as exists between the classics and the Bible. In matters relating to the future world. Calvin allows no weight to reason and philosophy, but only to the Word of God. On the merits of this book, see Stähelin, Vol. 1. pp. 36 sqq.
Note #806
Guizot, speaking at some length of this correspondence, makes the remark (p. 207): ’I do not hesitate to affirm that the great Catholic bishops, who in the seventeenth century directed the consciences of the mightiest men in France, did not fulfill the difficult task with more Christian firmness, intelligent justice, and knowledge of the world than Calvin displayed in his intercourse with the Duchess of Ferrara. And the Duchess was not the only person towards whom he fulfilled this duty of a Christian pastor. His correspondence shows that he exercised a similar influence, in a spirit equally lofty and judicious, over the consciences of many Protestants.’
Note #807
He took the route of Aosta and the Great St. Bernard. His short labors and persecution in Aosta were, five years later (1541), commemorated by a monumental cross and inscription-’Calvini fuga ’-which was restored in 1741, and again in 1841, and stands to this day. See Gaberel, Vol. 1. p. 100; Stähelin, Vol. 1. p. 110; Guizot, p. 209: and Merle d’Aubigné, Vol. V. p. 454.
Note #808
According to Beza (Vita ), Farel used these words: ’At ego tibi studia, prætexenti denuntio, omnipotentis Dei nomine, futurum, ut, nisi in opus istud Domini nobiscum incumbas, tibi non tam Christum quam te ipsum quærenti Dominus maledicat. ’ Beza adds that Calvin was ’territus hac terribili denuntiatione. ’ Merle d’Aubigné gives a very dramatic account of this scene, Vol. V. pp. 456 sqq.
Note #809
Guizot, p. 210.
Note #810
Mémoire de Calvin et Farel sur l’organisation de l’église, de Genève, recently brought to light by Gaberel (Hist. de l’église de Genève, 1858, Tom. 1. p. 102), and in the Strasburg edition of the Opera, Vol. X. Pt. 1. pp. 5-14. See a summary in Kampschulte, Vol. 1. pp. 287 sqq.
Note #811
Guizot says fifteen hundred. On Calvin’s life and labors in Strasburg, see especially the full accounts of Stähelin, Vol. 1. pp. 168-318, and Kampschulte, Vol. 1. pp. 320-368.
Note #812
Luther wrote to Bucer: ’Greet Calvin, whose little works I have read with remarkable pleasure;’ and Melanchthon wrote: ’Calvin is in high favor here (magnam gratiam iniit ).’ See. Calvin to Farel, Dec. 12, 1539; Stähelin, Vol. 1. p. 226; and De Wette’s edition of Luther’s Letters, Vol. V. p. 210. Calvin wrote to Bullinger, when the latter was provoked by the last rude assault of Luther upon the Zwinglians (1544): ’I implore you never to forget how great a man Luther is, and by what extraordinary gifts he excels. Think with what courage, what constancy, what power and success he has devoted himself to this day to the overthrow of the reign of Antichrist and the spreading of the doctrine of salvation far and near. As for me, I have often said, and I say it again, though he should call me a devil, I would still give him due honor, and recognize him, in spite of the great faults which obscure his extraordinary virtues, as a mighty servant of the Lord.’ See Henry, Vol. II. p. 351; Stähelin, Vol. 1. p. 204; Guizot, p. 243; Opera, Vol. XI. p. 774.
Note #813
Comp. the beautiful tribute to Idelette de Buren, by Jules Bonnet, in the fourth volume of the Bulletin pour l’histoire du protestantisme français (1860), and Stähelin, Vol. 1. pp. 274-283.
Note #814 This passage occurs on the first page of his book against the fanatical Lutheran, Heshusius (Opera, Vol. IX. p. 461):’O Philippe Melanchthon! Te enim appello, qui apud Deum cum Christo vivis, nosque illic expectas, donec tecum in beatam quietem colligamur. Dixisti centies, quum fessus laboribus et molestiis oppressus caput familiariter in sinum meum deponeres: Utinam, utinam moriar in hoc sinu. Ego vero millies postea optavi nobis contingere, ut simul essemus. Certe animosior fuisses ad obeunda certamina, et ad spernendam invidiam, falsasque criminationes pro nihilo ducendas fortior.Hoc quoque modo cohibita fuisset multorum improbitas, quibus ex tua mollitie, quam vocabant, crevit insultandi audacia.’ Comp. on the relation of Calvin to Melanchthon, the full discussion of Stähelin, Vol. 1. pp. 230-254; also Guizot, p. 246.
Note #815 The date is variously given-Sept. 10 by Roget, Sept. 12 by Guizot, Sept. 13 by Kampschulte (following Beza).
Note #816
’Worth about 3600 francs, or £150 at the present time.’-Guizot, p. 257. A syndic received only one fifth of this sum; but Calvin’s house was a home for poor refugees of faith from France and other lands, the widows and orphans of martyrs, so that he had often not a penny left. See Stähelin, Vol. II. p. 391, and Hagenbach, Kirchengesch. Vol. III. p. 581.
Note #817
Well says Kampschulte (Vol. 1. pp. 385 sq.):’Genf war im Herbst 1541 den geistlichen Tendenzen Calvins dienstbar geworden, es war an den Siegeswagen des Reformators gefesselt und musste ihm folgen trotz allen Sträubens, trotz aller Auflehnungsversuche, die später nicht ausgeblieben sind. Nicht anders fasste Calvin selbst seine Stellung von vorne herein auf. Für ihn ergab sich sein Herrscherrecht über Genf aus dem wunderbaren Gange der letzten Ereignisse mit der Zweifellosigkeit eines von Gott selbst erklärten Glaubenssatzes. Schimpflich vor drei Jahren vertrieben, sah er sich mit den grössten Ehren auf den Schauplatz zurückgeführt, den ihm Farel einst in ernster Stunde "im Namen des allmächtigen Gottes" angewiesen: mit Jubel wurde er von demselben Volke begrüsst, das ihm unversöhnlichen Hass geschworen! . . . Calvin fühlte sich fast nur noch als Werkzeug in der Hand Gottes, durch den ewigen göttlichen Rathschluss, ohne jedes persönliche Zuthun, für Genf bestimmt, um des Herrn Willen, wie er ihn erkannt, auf diesem wichtigen Fleck der Erde ohne Furcht und Scheu zu verkündigen, jenes Programm, welches er in der christlichen Institution niedergelegt, hier zur Ausführung zu bringen, dem Herrn hier ein christliches Geschlecht zu sammeln, das der übrigen Welt als Leuchte diene. ’
Note #818 This fact is related by Drelincourt in his Defense de Calvin (1667), and Bungener (p. 503), and is believed in Geneva, but doubted by Guizot, p. 237, for chronological reasons which are not conclusive (Sadolet died 1549). ’Se non e vero, e ben trovato. ’
Note #819
Beza: ’Per decem minimum annos prandio abstinuit, ut nullum omnino cibum extra statam cœnæ horam sumeret. ’Sometimes he abstained for thirty-six hours from all food.
Note #820 See his testament in Beza’s Vita.
Note #821 Quoted by Guizot, p. 361.
Note #822 ’Somni pene nullius, ’ says Beza in his closing remarks.
Note #823 With Beza’s account of his parting addresses (in the French and Latin edition of the Vita ) should be compared the official copy, which Bonnet published in the Appendix to the French Letters, Tom. II. p. 573, and the Strasburg editors at the close of the 9th vol. of the Opera (Discours d’adieu aux membres du Petit Conseil, pp. 887-890, and Discours d’adieu aux ministres, pp. 891-894). Comp. also Stähelin. Vol. II. pp. 462-468.
Note #824 Hornung’s picture of Calvin on his death-bed.
Note #825
Beza, however, wrote a suitable poem, in Latin and French, which might have been inscribed on the tomb. See his Vita, at the close, and Opera, Vol. V. pp. 26. sqq. (with three other French sonnets); a German translation in Stähelin, Vol. II. p.470.
Note #826
See different portraits of Calvin-in Henry (small biography), in first volume of the Opera, in Stähelin, in first volume of Merle d’Aubigné; also Hornung’s Calvin on his death-bed, and the medallion portrait made at the festival of the Geneva Reformation. [In technical disregard of Calvin’s wish the large mural monument was erected in Geneva, 1917, commemorating the Reformation and containing figures of Calvin, Luther, etc.. ]
Note #827
Beza thus tersely describes him (at the close of the Vita ): ’Statura fuit mediocri, colore subpallido et nigricante, oculis ad mortem usque limpidis, quique ingenii sagacitatem testarentur: cultu corporis neque culto neque sordido, sed qui singularem modestiam deceret: victu sic temperato, ut a sordibus et ab omni luxu longissime abesset: cibi parcissimi, ut qui multos annos semel quotidie cibum sumpserit, vintriculi imbecillitatem causatus: somni pæne nullius: memoriæ incredibilis, ut quos semel aspexisset multis post annis statim agnosceret, et inter dictandum sæpe aliquot horas interturbatus statim ad dictata nullo commonefaciente rediret, et eorum, quæ ipsum nosse muneris sui causa interesset, quantumvis multiplicibus et infinitis negotiis oppressus, nunquam tamen oblivisceretur.Judicii, quibuscunque de rebus consuleretur, tam puri et exacti, ut pæne vaticinari sæpe sit visus, nec aberasse meminerim, qui consilium ipsius esset sequutus. Facundiæ contemptor et verborum parcus, sed minime ineptus scriptor, et quo nullus ad hunc diem theologus (absit verbo invidia) purius, gravius, judiciosius denique scripsit, quum tamen tam multa scripserit, quam nemo vel nostra vel patrum memoria.’
Note #828 Who would substitute respublica forecclesia, genius for angelus, lotio for baptismus, etc.
Note #829 Fisher, The Reformation, p. 198.
Note #830 This was the judgment of the magistrate of Geneva, expressed in these words (June 8, 1564): ’Dieu, lui avait imprimé un charactère d’une si grande majesté. ’
Note #831
’Cor meum velut mactatum Domino in sacrificium offero. ’ Subscribed below his autograph in the frontispiece of Henry’s smaller biography.
Note #832 His ungrateful enemy, Balduin, started the saying among the Genevese, ’Rather with Beza in hell than with Calvin in heaven.’ And yet they obeyed and revered him. Beza, it should be remembered, was the perfection of a French gentleman; yet his theological system was even more severe than that of Calvin, and he carried the dogma of predestination to the extreme of supralapsarianism. I have met with not a few French, Scotch, and American Christians who, in the combination of severity and purity, gravity and kindliness of character, reminded me strongly of Calvin and Beza. I may mention Gaussen, Malan, Merle d’Aubigné,
Note #833
Page 362.
Note #834 ’Nichts Grosses geschieht ohne Leidenschaft. ’
Note #835 The strongest terms of Calvin against ferocious enemies are canes, porci, bestial, nebulones (with reference, no doubt, to Scripture usage- Isaiah 56:10;Matthew 7:6;Php 3:2;Revelation 22:15); but they are mild compared to the coarse and vulgar epithets with which Luther overwhelmed his opponents, without expressing any regret afterwards, except in the case of Henry VIII., where it was least needed, and made the matter worse.
Note #836
Calvin, though fully aware of the defects of Luther, often expressed his admiration for him (see p. 430), and in January, 1545 (a year before Luther’s death), he sent him a letter (which Melanchthon was afraid to hand to the old lion on account of his excited state of feeling against the Swiss), closing with these touching words: ’If I could only fly to you and enjoy your society, even for a few hours! . . . But since this privilege is not granted to me on earth, I hope I may soon enjoy it in the kingdom above. Farewell, most illustrious man, most excellent minister of Christ and father [pater, al. frater ], forever venerable to me. May the Lord continue to guide you by his Spirit to the end for the common good of his Church.’ Opera, Vol. XII. p. 8.
Note #837
Guizot says (p. 164): ’Although Calvin was devoted to the severe simplicity of evangelical worship, he did not overlook the inherent love of mankind for poetry and art. He himself had a taste for music, and knew its power. He feared that, in a religious service limited to preaching and prayer only, the congregation, having nothing else to do than to play the part of audience, would remain cold and inattentive. For this reason he attached great importance to the introduction and promotion of the practice of Psalm-singing in public worship. "If the singing," he said, "is such as befits the reverence which we ought to feel when we sing before God and the angels, it is an ornament which bestows grace and dignity upon our worship; and it is an excellent method of kindling the heart, and making it burn with great ardor in prayer. But we must at all times take heed lest the ear should be more attentive to the harmony of the sound than the soul to the hidden meaning of the words" (Instit. Ch. XX.). With this pious warning, he strongly urged the study of singing, and its adaptation to public worship.’ Comp. Gaberel, Vol. 1. p. 353.
Note #838
These poetic pieces were recently discovered, and published in the sixth volume of the new edition of his 0pera (1867), pp. 212-224. His Salutation à Jésus-Christ was translated into German by Stähelin, and into English by Mrs. Smith, of New York, for Schaff’s Christ in Song, London edition, p. 549. His Epinicion Christo cantatum is a polemic poem in Latin hexameters and pentameters, composed during the Conference at Worms, 1541, in which he describes the Romish polemics Eck, Cochlæus, Nausea, and Pelargus as dragged after the chariot of the victorious Redeemer. Opera. Vol. V. pp. 417-428.
Note #839
We omit Henry and Stähelin, from whom it would he difficult to select passages in praise of Calvin. See especially the entire Seventh Book of Stähelin, Vol. II., pp. 365-393: Calvin als Mensch und als Christ.
Note #840
’Ego historiam vitæ et obitus ipsius, cujus spectator sedecim annos fui, bona fide persequutus testari mihi optimo jure posse videor, longe pulcherrimum vere Christianæ tum vitæ tum mortis exemplum in hoc homine cunctis propositum fuisse, quod tam facile sit calumniari, quam difficile fuerit æmulari. ’
Note #841 Calvin, etc. English translation, pp. 338, 349.
Note #842 In his Histoire de France au seizième siècle, quoted by Stähelin, Vol. 1. p. 276.
Note #843 In his article on Jean Calvin, above quoted, pp. 286, etc. The translation is by O. B. Frothingham, a radical Unitarian in New York.
Note #844 St. Louis and Calvin, pp. 361 and 362.
Note #845 Die Lutherische Dogmatik, Vol. II. pp. 490, 491.
Note #846
Geschichte der Protest. Theologie,pp. 374 and 376. I add his considerate judgment of Calvin in full: ’Die nach Zwingli’s and Œcolampad’s Tode verwaiste reformirte Kirche erhielt am Johann Calvin , gleich gross an Geist und Character, einen festen Mittelpunkt und eine ordnende Seele für Lehre und Kirchenverfassung. Durch ihn wurde Genf statt Zürichs die neue reformirte Metropole; und dieses Gemeinwesen bewies eine wunderbare, weithin erobernde Kraft. . . . Calvin’s persönliche Erscheinung war die eines altrömischen Censors; er war von feinem Wuchs, blass, hager, mit dem Ausdruck tiefen Ernstes und einschneidender Schärfe. Der Senat von Genf sagte nach seinem Tode, er sei ein majestätischer Charakter gewesen. Liebenswürdig im socialen Leben, voll zarter Theilnahme und Freundestreue, nachsichtig und versöhnlich bei persönlichen Beleidigungen, war er unerbittlich streng, wo er Gottes Ehre in Hartnäckigkeit oder Bosheit angegriffen sah. Unter seinen Collegen hatte er keine Neider, aber viele begeisterte Verehrer. Französisches Feuer und praktischer Verstand schienen mit deutscher Tiefe und Besonnenheit einen Bund geschlossen zu haben. War er auch nicht spekulativen oder intuitiven Geistes, so war dagegen sein Verstand und sein Urtheil um so eindringender und schärfer, sein Gedächtniss umfassend; und er bewegte sich ebenso leicht in der Welt der Ideen und der Wissenschaft, wie in den Geschäften des Kirchenregiments. Zwar ist er nicht ein Mann des Volkes, wie Luther, sondern in seiner Sprache mehr der Gelehrte, und seine Wirksamkeit als Prediger und Seelsorger kann daher mit der Luthers nicht verglichen werden. Dagegen ist er mehr ein architektonischer Geist und zwar sowohl im Gebiete der Wissenschaft als des Lebens. Beide sind ihm in ihrer Wurzel eins, und seine dogmatischen Constructionen, so kühn sie in der Folgerichtigkeit ihrer Gedanken sind, behalten ihm doch immer zugleich erbaulichen Charakter. Auch wo er verwegen in die göttlichen Geheimnisse der Prädestination einzudringen sucht, immer leitet ihn der praktische Trieb, der Heiligkeit und Majestät Gottes zu dienen, für das Gemüth aber den ewigen Ankergrund zu finden, darin es im Bewusstsein der Erwählung durch freie Gnade sicher ruhen könne. ’
Note #847 The Reformation, pp. 206 and 238.