Volume I Part 23 (1/2)
[Sidenote: also at Orleans and Bourges.]
John Calvin was born on the tenth of July, 1509, at Noyon, a small but ancient city of Picardy. His family was of limited means, but of honorable extraction. Gerard Cauvin, his father, had successively held important offices in connection with the episcopal see. As a man of clear and sound judgment, he was sought for his counsel by the gentry and n.o.bility of the province--a circ.u.mstance that rendered it easy for him to give to his son a more liberal course of instruction than generally fell to the lot of commoners. It is not denied by Calvin's most bitter enemies that he early manifested striking ability. In selecting for him one of the learned professions, his father naturally preferred the church, as that in which he could most readily secure for his son speedy promotion. It may serve to ill.u.s.trate the degree of respect at this time paid to the prescriptions of canon law, to note that Charles de Hangest, Bishop of Noyon, conferred on John Calvin the _Chapelle de la Gesine_, with revenues sufficient for his maintenance, when the boy was but just twelve years of age! Such abuses as the gift of ecclesiastical benefices to beardless youths, however, were of too frequent occurrence to attract special notice or call forth unfriendly criticism. With the same easy disregard of churchly order the chapter of the cathedral of Noyon permitted Calvin, two years later, to go to Paris, for the purpose of continuing his studies, without loss of income; although, to save appearances, a pretext was found in the prevalence of some contagious disease in Picardy. Not long after, his father perceiving the singular proficiency he manifested, determined to alter his plans, and devoted his son to the more promising department of the law, a decision in which Calvin himself, already conscious of secret aversion for the superst.i.tions of the papal system, seems dutifully to have acquiesced. To a friend and near relation, Pierre Robert Oliveta.n.u.s, the future translator of the Bible, he probably owed both the first impulse toward legal studies and the enkindling of his interest in the Sacred Scriptures. Proceeding next to Orleans, in the university of which the celebrated Pierre de l'etoile, afterward President of the Parliament of Paris, was lecturing on law with great applause, Calvin in a short time achieved distinction. Marvellous stories were told of his rapid mastery of his subject. Not only did he occasionally fill the chair of an absent professor, and himself lecture, to the great admiration of the cla.s.ses, but he was offered the formal rank of the doctorate without payment of the customary fees. Declining an honorable distinction which would have interfered with his plan of perfecting himself elsewhere, he subsequently visited the University of Bourges, in order to enjoy the rare advantage of listening to Andrea Alciati, of Milan, reputed the most learned and eloquent legal instructor of the age.
[Sidenote: His studies under Wolmar.]
Meanwhile, however, Calvin's interest in biblical study had been steadily growing, and at Bourges that great intellectual and religious change appears to have been effected which was essential to his future success as a reformer. He attached himself to Melchior Wolmar, a distinguished professor of Greek, who had brought with him from Germany a fervent zeal for the Protestant doctrines. Wolmar, reading in the young law student the brilliant abilities that were one day to make his name ill.u.s.trious, prevailed upon him to devote himself to the study of the New Testament in the original. Day and night were spent in the engrossing pursuit, and here were laid the foundations of that profound biblical erudition which, at a later date, amazed the world, as well, unfortunately, as of that feeble bodily health that embittered all Calvin's subsequent life with the most severe and painful maladies, and abridged in years an existence crowded with great deeds.
[Sidenote: Translates Seneca ”De Clementia.”]
The illness and death of his father called Calvin back to Noyon,[390]
but in 1529 we find him again in Paris, where three years later he published his first literary effort. This was a commentary on the two books of Seneca, ”De Clementia,” originally addressed to the Emperor Nero. The opinion has long prevailed that it was no casual selection of a theme, but that Calvin had conceived the hope of mitigating hereby the severity of the persecution then raging. The author's own correspondence, however, betrays less anxiety for the attainment of that lofty aim, than nervous uneasiness respecting the literary success of his first venture. Indeed, this is not the only indication that, while Calvin was already, in 1532, an accomplished scholar, he was scarcely as yet a _reformer_, and that the stories of his activity before this time as a leader and religious teacher, at Paris and even at Bourges, deserve only to be cla.s.sed with the questionable myths obscuring much of his history up to the time of his appearance at Geneva.[391]
[Sidenote: Calvin's escape from Paris to Angouleme.]
The incident that occasioned Calvin's flight from Paris was narrated in a previous chapter. Escaping from the officers sent to apprehend him as the real author of the inaugural address of the rector, Nicholas Cop, Calvin found safety and scholastic leisure in the house of his friend Louis du Tillet, at Angouleme. If we could believe the accounts of later writers, we should imagine the young scholar dividing his time in this retreat between the preparation of his ”Inst.i.tutes” and systematic labors for the conversion of the inhabitants of the south-west of France. Tradition still points out the grottos in the vicinity of Poitiers, where, during a residence in that city, Calvin is said to have exclaimed, pointing to the Bible lying open before him: ”Here is my ma.s.s;” and then, with uncovered head and eyes turned toward heaven, ”Lord, if at the judgment-day thou shalt reprove me because I have abandoned the ma.s.s, I shall reply with justice, 'Lord, thou hast not commanded it. Here is thy law. Here are the Scriptures, the rule thou hast given me, wherein I have been unable to find any other sacrifice than that which was offered upon the altar of the cross!'”[392]
[Sidenote: He resigns his benefices.]
[Sidenote: He reaches Basle.]
The caverns bearing Calvin's name may never have witnessed his preaching, and the address ascribed to him rests on insufficient authority;[393] but it is certain that the future reformer about this time took his first decided step in renouncing connection with the Roman Church, by resigning his benefices, the revenues of which he had enjoyed, although precluded by his youth from receiving ordination.[394]
Not many months later, finding himself solicited on all sides to take an active part as a teacher of the little companies of Protestants arising in different cities of France, he resolved to leave France and court elsewhere obscurity and leisure to prosecute undisturbed his favorite studies.[395] Accordingly, we find him, after a brief visit to Paris and Orleans, reaching the city of Basle, apparently toward the close of the year 1534.[396]
[Sidenote: Apologetic character given to his great work.]
It was here that Calvin appears to have conceived for the first time the purpose of giving a practical aim to the great work upon the composition of which he had been some time busy. In spite of his professions of unsullied honor, Francis the First had not hesitated to disseminate, by means of his agents beyond the Rhine, the most unfounded and injurious reports respecting his Protestant subjects. It was time that these aspersions should be cleared away, and an attempt be made to touch the heart of the persecuting monarch with compa.s.sion for the unoffending objects of his blind fury. Such was the object Calvin set before himself in a preface to the first edition of the ”Inst.i.tutes,” addressed ”To the Very Christian King of France.”[397] It was a doc.u.ment of rare importance.
[Sidenote: The preface to the ”Christian Inst.i.tutes.”]
[Sidenote: Eloquent peroration.]
He briefly explained the original design of his work to be the instruction of his countrymen, whom he knew to be hungering and thirsting for the truth. But the persecutions that had arisen and that left no place for sound doctrine in France induced him to make the attempt at the same time to acquaint the king with the real character of the Protestants and their belief. He a.s.sured Francis that the book contained nothing more nor less than the creed for the profession of which so many Frenchmen were being visited with imprisonment, banishment, outlawry, and even fire, and which it was sought to exterminate from the earth. He drew a fearful picture of the calumnies laid to the charge of this devoted people, and of the wretched church of France, already half destroyed, yet still a b.u.t.t for the rage of its enemies. It was the part of a true king, as the vicegerent of G.o.d, to administer justice in a cause so worthy of his consideration. Nor ought the humble condition of the oppressed to indispose him to grant them a hearing; for the doctrine they professed was not their own, but that of the Almighty himself. He boldly contrasted the evangelical with the papal church, and refuted the objections urged against the former. He defended its doctrine from the charge of novelty, denied that miracles--especially such lying wonders as those of Rome--were necessary in confirmation of its truth, and showed that the ancient Fathers, far from countenancing, on the contrary, condemned the superst.i.tions of the day. He refuted the charge that Protestants forsook old customs when good, or abandoned the only visible church; and in a masterly manner vindicated the Reformation from the oft-repeated charge of being the cause of sedition, conflict, and confusion. He begged for a fair and impartial hearing. ”But,” he exclaimed in concluding, ”if the suggestions of the malevolent so fill your ears as to leave no room for the reply of the accused, and those importunate furies continue, with your consent, to rage with bonds and stripes, with torture, confiscation, and fire, then shall we yield ourselves up as sheep appointed for slaughter, yet so as to possess our souls in patience, and await the mighty hand of G.o.d, which will a.s.suredly be revealed in good time, and be stretched forth armed for the deliverance of the poor from their affliction, and for the punishment of the blasphemers now exulting in confidence of safety. May the Lord of Hosts, ill.u.s.trious king, establish your seat in righteousness and your throne with equity.”[398]
[Sidenote: Has no effect in allaying persecution.]
[Sidenote: Calvin achieves distinction.]
The learned theologian's eloquent appeal failed to accomplish its end.
If Francis ever received, he probably disdained to read even the dedication, cla.s.sed by competent critics among the best specimens of writing in the French language,[399] and must have regarded the volume to which it was prefixed as a bold vindication of heresy, and scarcely less insulting to his majesty than the placards themselves. Others, better capable of forming a competent judgment, or more willing to give it a dispa.s.sionate examination, applauded the success of a hazardous undertaking that might have appalled even a more experienced writer than the French exile of Noyon. The Inst.i.tutes gave to a young man, who had scarcely attained the age at which men of mark usually begin to occupy themselves with important enterprises, the reputation of being the foremost theologian of the age.
[Sidenote: He revises the Bible of Oliveta.n.u.s.]
Other studies invited Calvin's attention. Not content with perfecting himself in the original languages of the Holy Scriptures, he revised with care the French Protestant Bible, translated by his relation Oliveta.n.u.s, of which we shall have occasion to speak in another chapter.
Meanwhile, in an age of intense mental and moral awakening, no scholastic repose, such as he had pictured to himself, awaited one who had made good his right to a foremost rank among the athletes in the intellectual arena.
[Sidenote: Visits Italy.]
Before his unexpected call to a life of unremitting conflict, Calvin visited Italy. In the entire absence of any trustworthy statement of the occasion of this journey, it is almost idle to speculate on the objects he had in view.[400] Certain, however, it is that the court of the d.u.c.h.ess Renee, at Ferrara, offered to a patriotic Frenchman attractions hard to be resisted.
[Sidenote: The court of Renee de France.]