CATHOLICISM AT GENEVA.--MARRIAGE OF CALVIN AT STRASBURG.
(END OF 1539-1540.)
[Sidenote: RESULTS OF CALVIN’S LETTER.]
The results of Calvin’s letter to Cardinal Sadoleto, and perhaps to
some extent of his relations with Caroli, were not slow to appear.
Henceforward the Catholics had little hope of regaining the ascendency
at Geneva. Some of them had previously dreamed of this. ‘At this
time,’ says the chronicler Rozet, ‘the priests _lifted up the horn_,
talking about the mass.’[806] It was believed that some priests who
had retired to the convents of Savoy had received orders to return
into the territory of the republic, for the purpose of re-establishing
the Romish worship. It may have been so; but all that appears from the
statement of Rozet is that certain priests, who had dwelt either in the
town or in the country, began at this time to defy the prohibitions of
the council and to say mass. The magistrate resolved to oppose this
recrudescence of Catholicism, and it is probable that this was partly
in consequence of Calvin’s letter. The priests who were really taking
active steps were doubtless few in number; but the council adopted
a general measure, and ordered that all the Catholic ecclesiastics
who were on their territory should appear before them on December 23
(1539). It was further ordered that all those who alleged that the
mass is good, and should not be able to maintain this assertion after
conference with the pastors, should be sent away to the place where
mass is sung (_là où on la chante_). ‘The tranquillity and security of
the state,’ says an historian, ‘did not permit them to tolerate any
other religion than that which had been established by the evangelical
Reformation.’[807] Thirty-three priests made their appearance, in
great alarm, at the Hôtel de Ville, and they did little honor to their
doctrine. The thought that if they declared that the mass was good they
would be banished, doubtless contributed to disincline them to it.
Each of them was interrogated, and the following are their answers.
‘Thomas Genoud!’ cried the secretary. The priest replied, ‘_The mass is
wicked_.’ Eight of his associates made the same answer pure and simple.
Others declared themselves likewise against this act of worship, but
added a few words. Ami Messier being called, said, ‘I wish to live and
die with Messieurs’ (members of the council); ‘I have not studied, but
I believe the mass to be wicked.’ Jean Cottand: ‘It is of no value.’
Guillaume Vellès: ‘I never believed in it.’ Don Propositi (Prevost):
‘It is good if Messieurs think it good; bad if Messieurs think it bad.
For the rest I am not a clerk, and finally ... it is wicked.’ Higher
respect for the magistrate it was not possible to show. Don Amici
and his brother: ‘At the good pleasure of Messieurs.’ The spirit of
accommodation could go no further. The priest Ramel: ‘It is wicked;
otherwise I should not have married.’ Claude de Lolme: ‘Wicked.’ Jean
Hugonier: ‘I should not have married if I believed it good.’ Guillaume
Marchand and Maurice de la Rue: ‘The mass is nothing worth, nor those
who wish to uphold it.’ Louis Bernard and Th. Collier: ‘Wicked.’ Some
of them emphasized their condemnation more strongly. Jacques l’Hoste:
‘The devil take it, for that’s all it’s fit for.’ Jean Louis Nicolas:
‘It is abominable.’ Jean Sorel: ‘It is the abhorrence of all the world,
and wicked.’
[Sidenote: THE PRIESTS BEFORE THE COUNCIL.]
Others were not so flippant, nor so ready to denounce their former
faith without embarrassment or constraint. Guillaume Maniglier said,
‘Neither good nor bad.’ Rodet Villanel said, ‘On my conscience, I could
not swear; but I esteem it as Messieurs do.’ Jean Volland: ‘I am an
inexperienced person, and ignorant of the matter. Since the learned are
at variance about it, I can not judge.’ Thomas Vandel: ‘I do not know.’
Pierre Bothy: ‘Alas! I could not say whether it is good or wicked; but
I have not said mass since it was prohibited.’ Antoine Alliod made his
reservations, and they were not bad: ‘I renounce it, saving the _Pater_
and the _Credo_, the Epistle and the Gospel.’ Etienne de la Maisonneuve
alone uttered a Christian sentiment: ‘The mass must be wicked, for
Jesus Christ has made the true redemption.’ Only one of them entirely
declined to condemn the mass, and still he did it prudently. Pierre
Papaz said, ‘I never called it wicked.’[808]
These were strange declarations, and the council, who expected to find
the clerks refractory, were extraordinarily surprised to hear them. It
was a complete breakdown. Compare all these priests, without faith and
without principle, with the reformers, men so noble and so courageous,
and it is easy to see to which side victory ought to belong. There was
barely one of the clerks, Papaz, who could be suspected of having a
wish to re-establish Catholicism. It is true that ten of those who had
been summoned did not present themselves; probably those who had been
the cause of the summons by the council. These men doubtless quitted
the territory without delay, and without waiting for an order to do so.
There was, however, one man who exhibited a character rather more
honorable, but he was a layman. On the very benches of the council, of
which he was a member, sat at that time ‘a papist of great influence
and reputation,’ says Rozet. This was the former syndic Balard. The
president, wishing to show no respect of persons, invited him likewise
to declare whether the mass was good or bad. ‘If I, Balard,’ replied
he, ‘knew certainly that the mass was good or bad, I should need no
pressing to say so, but as I do not know with certainty I ought not to
judge rashly, and you ought not to advise me to do so. I am resolved
heartily to believe all the articles of our faith, just as the town
believes them. I wish my body to be united with the body of the
city,[809] as becomes a loyal citizen. You ask me whether the mass is
good or bad; I reply that I believe in the Holy Spirit, in the holy
universal Church, and as they believe it I believe it.’
[Sidenote: EX-SYNDIC BALARD.]
This answer, which Balard gave in writing, did not satisfy the council,
which requested him again to say if the mass was bad, yes or no. ‘I
mean to live according to the gospel,’ replied he, ‘and to believe
in the Holy Spirit and the Church universal, and I cannot answer as
to what I do not know.’ This reply caused a great commotion. The
councillors were shocked and indignant that one of their members
should obstinately refuse to make the declaration which some priests
themselves had made, and should doubt of that which the council
asserted. It was resolved that Balard should be expelled the council,
and that he and his family should be compelled to leave the town and
its territories in ten days. The usher carried this decree to him.
Balard appeared the next day before the Council of the Two Hundred, the
decree needing confirmation by this body. The sentence had produced
some effect on him. He said, ‘Since it is the wish of the two councils
that I should say that the mass is bad, I say that the mass is bad.’
Then, as if to satisfy his conscience, he added, ‘And as for me, I am
worse still to judge rashly of that which I do not know. So I cry to
God for mercy, and I renounce Satan and all his works.’ At bottom the
second speech of Balard was a retractation of the first, since he added
that he did not know what he had just asserted. The reply was somewhat
ambiguous. But who could hear without emotion the cry ‘God have mercy
on me!’ which the honest syndic immediately uttered?
The next day (December 26) Balard had to appear once more. He now laid
down his arms, and said simply and categorically that the mass was bad.
After this he resumed his seat in the council. He did therefore as the
priests had done, only after having several times repeated previously
that he could not assert what he did now assert. The excuse offered for
him is doubtless that political interests demanded this declaration.
But the truth is too precious to be made a sacrifice to political
interests.
If the cause of Catholicism was declining, that of the reformer was
rising. In the course of March 1540 his friends wrote to him that he
might now return to Geneva. But he trembled at the thought of again
embarking on that troubled sea. ‘I had rather die a hundred times
elsewhere,’ he wrote to Farel, ‘than place myself on that cross on
which I should have to bear death a thousand times a day.[810] Oppose
with all your power the projects of those who will strive to get me
back to Geneva.’ Two months later, Viret, who ardently desired to see
Calvin resume a task of which he felt the importance, put forward a
pretext to draw him back to Geneva, and, expressing anxiety about the
health of his friend, who was really suffering from severe pains in the
head, conjured him to come to Geneva, as the air of the place would be
likely to strengthen him. ‘I could not refrain from smiling,’ Calvin
replied to him, ‘on reading that passage of thy letter. Thou wishest me
to go to Geneva for the sake of being in good health; why not rather
say, Hang thyself on the gallows? Better perish once for all than
be again in that place where I should be put to the torture without
ceasing.[811] If thou wishest well to me, my dear Viret, pray do not
make this proposal again.’
[Sidenote: CALVIN’S HOUSEHOLD TROUBLES.]
It must be told that at this period Calvin was taken up with a quite
different matter. He was now nine-and-twenty, and was thinking of
marriage. His home left much to be wished for. His servant was a
foolish, hotheaded woman, quick to utter insults, and sparing neither
her master nor those who came to see him. One day she spoke to Calvin’s
brother with so much impertinence that Anthony, unable to endure it,
went quietly out of the house, without anger; but declared that he
would not enter it again so long as that woman was in it. Calvin was
much grieved about it, and the servant-mistress, observing him, said,
‘Well, I’m going too,’ and quitted him.[812] It has been supposed
that Calvin’s nature drew him rather towards relations of friendship
with the brethren, the learned, and colleagues such as Farel, Viret,
Grynæus, Beza, and others, than to married life. If he had contended
against celibacy, he had not been in a hurry to escape from it; nay,
he even made a boast of it, saying, ‘People will not charge me with
having assailed Rome, as the Greeks besieged Troy, for the sake of a
woman.’ Doubtless, in wishing to marry he had above all before him
these words of the first pages of the Bible: _It is not good for the
man to be alone; I will make him an help meet for him_. He wished,
as he said himself, to be freed from the petty worries of life, to
the end that he might be able the better to apply himself to the
service of the Lord.[813] His friends seem to have been at this time
busying themselves more than he did about finding him a partner, and
their object seems to have been to rid him thus of the irksomeness of
housekeeping, for which he had little relish. But all that we know of
Calvin’s sentiments, and of his life with his wife, makes it plain
that he saw in marriage something far higher than the management of
a household. ‘It is a thing against nature,’ he said, ‘that anyone
should not love his wife, for God has ordained marriage in order that
of two there may be made one, one person; a result which, certainly,
no other alliance can bring about. When Moses says that a man shall
leave father and mother and cleave unto his wife, he shows that a man
ought to prefer marriage to every other union, as being the holiest of
all.’[814] It has been said that Calvin made a _mariage de raison_.
This seems to me doubtful, and every thing indicates at least that when
once married he had a genuine affection for his wife. There was in him
a lofty intellect, a sublime genius, but also that love of kindred,
those affections of the heart, which complete the great man.
As early as February 1539, Calvin’s friends at Strasburg wished him to
marry. He wrote himself to Farel that the lady would arrive shortly
after Easter, and expressed a wish to see him present to bless the
union. This marriage did not take place. Could it be because Calvin did
not find in that unknown lady the qualities which he sought for? This
appears probable from the circumstance that two or three months later
the ardent and energetic Farel, still unmarried though much older than
his friend, having made him another overture, the young doctor stated
to him what virtues he wished to find in a wife. ‘I am not,’ said he,
‘one of that mad kind of lovers who, when once they are smitten with
the beauty of a woman, are ready at the same time to dote foolishly
on her faults.[815] The only beauty which charms me in a woman is
chastity, modesty, submission, economy, patience, and the inclination
to be careful for the health of her husband. If then thou thinkest that
she of whom thou speakest possesses these qualities, follow up the
matter; but if thou dost not think so, say no more of it.’ In fact,
nothing more was said of it. Farel had not been fortunate.
[Sidenote: MARRIAGE PROJECTS.]
Among the connections of Calvin at Strasburg there was a German
patrician or noble, a very pious man, who felt the warmest affection
for Calvin and recognized him as a great man. The thought occurred to
him of marrying Calvin to his sister; and his wife, who likewise had
the highest opinion of the reformer, supported her husband with all
her influence. The young lady, Calvin said himself, was above him in
rank, and few men would have rejected so flattering a proposal. But the
rich dower did not allure the reformer, poor as he was. It was indeed
the very brilliancy of the match that made him hesitate. The young
maiden, who was probably not pious like her brother, was more struck
with Calvin’s mean appearance than with his high qualities, and was by
no means eager to yield to her brother’s wishes. Calvin perceived this.
He was afraid that the noble maiden would not easily forget her rank
and her education. He was also very sensitive on another point. The
wealthy young lady did not understand French. In this circumstance he
saw a way of escape without offence to the brother and sister-in-law,
and he told her brother, who appeared inclined to press him unduly
in the matter, that he required above all that the young lady should
undertake to learn the French language. She asked for time to consider
of it. The scheme failed, and Calvin, anxious to put an end to the
solicitations of the brother, thought of another person who was highly
spoken of, but whose qualifications seem not to have answered to her
high reputation. Calvin certainly wished to marry, but it must be with
a Christian woman. He thought of it frequently. During one of the
journeys which he made into Germany on religious affairs, sitting one
day at table with a few friends, one of whom was Melanchthon, the young
French doctor was dreamy and absent. ‘Our theologian,’ said the friend
of Luther, ‘is evidently thinking of marrying.’[816] The difficulty
that he experienced in finding such a wife as he wished for speaks in
his favor, and shows how much he thought of moral qualities. He was,
however, saddened and distressed about it. He questioned with himself
whether it would not be better to give up all thought of marrying. This
man, to whom it is the fashion to attribute a heart so dry, so hard,
shows us by his very sufferings, which were soon succeeded by great
joy, what wealth of true feeling and of tender affection lay in his
heart. But it was precisely at the time when he nearly despaired that
he found what he was longing for.
[Sidenote: IDELETTE DE BURE.]
There was at that time at Strasburg a pious, grave, and virtuous woman,
living in retirement, esteemed by all who knew her, and particularly
by Bucer; a most choice woman, says Theodore Beza.[817] She came from
Liége and her name was Idelette de Bure. Lambert de Bure, probably one
of her kinsfolk, had been banished from Liége in 1533, with six other
citizens, because they professed the Gospel.[818] It is known that
Liége was among those cities of the Netherlands in which the awakening
had been most remarkable. Idelette was a widow. Her husband, Jean
Storder, had been amongst the number of those who called themselves
Spirituals. Bucer, it appears, had introduced Calvin to the family, in
the hope, doubtless, of enlightening Storder. Calvin had held private
conversations with him, and the Belgian had been converted to the true
Gospel by the ministry of the reformer. Idelette had probably also
been converted at the same period. The like change was wrought in
many of their fellow-religionists. ‘He had the happiness of bringing
to the faith _a very large number who were directed to him from all
quarters_,’[819] and amongst others an ex-abbé named Paul Volse, to
whom Erasmus had dedicated, in 1518, his _Chevalier Chrétien_, and who
was a minister at Strasburg. Idelette paid to her children all the
attention of the tenderest mother, and at the same time administered
consolation to those who were in affliction. Calvin had observed
in her a deep-seated faith, an affection full of devotedness, and a
Christian courage which enabled her to face all the perils to which the
confession of Jesus Christ at that time exposed her. This distinguished
woman, as Theodore Beza calls her, was exactly such a one as Calvin
wanted. Unfortunately there was one thing which was wanting to her, as
also to Calvin--good health. But the soul of Idelette was prospering;
and the reformer asked for her hand.
The nuptials were celebrated about the end of August 1540, with a
certain solemnity. Calvin’s friends, and they were many, testified
their sympathy with him. Some deputies even came from Neuchâtel to
attend the marriage. The friends of the bridegroom in France likewise
took part on the occasion. ‘The tidings of thy marriage,’ wrote one
of his old fellow students at the university of Bourges, ‘was very
pleasant to us. As thou hast found according to thy wish an upright
and faithful wife, endowed with the virtues to which thou attachest so
much value, we hope that this union will be a source of happiness to
thee.’ It was so. From the beginning of his married life Calvin felt
happy in having a faithful companion who served the Lord with him, who
loved her husband, and sought to make life peaceful and sweet to him.
The happiness which Calvin enjoyed at this time Idelette gave him to
the last. He prized ever more and more highly the treasure which God
had intrusted to him. He called Idelette ‘the excellent companion of my
life,[820] the ever-faithful assistant of my ministry.’ ‘Never,’ adds
he, ‘did she throw the least hindrance in my way.’ Her greatness of
soul filled him with admiration.[821] He understood well that saying
of the Bible, that a wise woman is a crown to her husband, and that
_whoso findeth a wife findeth a good thing and obtaineth favor of the
Lord_.
Catherine von Bora and Idelette de Bure, the wives of the two great
reformers, eminent women, whose surnames are nearly alike, were not
alike in person or in character. There was also a marked difference in
the way in which their husbands spoke of them. Catherine is frequently
mentioned in Luther’s letters to his friends, often, it is true, with
a touch of archness. Sometimes he calls her _Herr Kathe_. Calvin, on
the contrary, seldom speaks of Idelette. We may say indeed that Calvin
in his letters, as in his life, was always swayed by one sovereign
thought, to which all others had to yield: the work of God, the glory
of Jesus Christ, this was the aim of his life. All that concerned his
mere personal existence and his domestic circumstances was eclipsed
by Jesus Christ, that sun of righteousness which he delighted to
contemplate and exalt. There is however another explanation of the
fact. What Calvin most highly prized in Idelette was ‘the _hidden man_
of the heart, the incorruptibility of a meek and quiet spirit,’ her
modesty. ‘Nothing is more becoming to women than a meek and peaceful
spirit,’ he said; ‘we know what kind of creature a bold and obstinate
woman is, who, from pride, vanity, and wantonness, is fond of showing
herself off. Happy is the woman whose style of dress is modest, who
does not go gadding about the streets, but keeps the house because of
her love to her husband and her children.’ Calvin being happy, and
feeling respect for the modesty and humility that he found in Idelette,
no more thought of speaking of her in his letters than of seeing her
gadding about the streets.
[Sidenote: ASSEMBLY AT HAGENAU.]
Happy both in this Christian union and in the sphere of action which
opened before him at Strasburg and in Germany, Calvin thought less
than ever of returning to Geneva. In fact his intercourse with Germany
became more frequent. In June 1540, in accordance with the decision
come to at Frankfort, a new assembly was held at Hagenau in Alsace,
at which the doctors of the two parties were to seek a good basis of
agreement. The Protestant princes, summoned too late, were not present,
but their envoys and theologians came. Calvin went, ‘by way of rest,’
he says, as if for relaxation. He was rejoiced to see the Protestant
doctors ‘thoroughly united together.’ They held several consultations
among themselves on the way to establish discipline in the Church. This
was doubtless at Calvin’s instigation. ‘This will be,’ said he, ‘the
most weighty subject for our consideration.’ As Luther, Melanchthon,
and other doctors were absent as well as the princes, nothing was
done; ‘but each one promised to exert himself to the end that at some
meeting attention should be paid to it.’ Cruciger, a colleague of
Luther and Melanchthon, who was present at Hagenau, was astonished
at the knowledge and activity of Calvin. In fact, nothing that
concerned the evangelical cause escaped him. He perceived distinctly
the contrivances of politicians. ‘Our adversaries,’ he said, ‘wish
to extend their league and to weaken ours, but God will avert that
misfortune. Our friends seek the enlargement of the kingdom of Christ,
and will not give way. Some Catholics desire nothing but war, and the
pope has caused 300,000 ducats to be offered to begin it. The emperor,’
he thinks, ‘would like nothing better than to crush the forces of
Germany, in order to subdue it with greater ease. But on the one side
the emperor is so involved that he dare not undertake a war, and on the
other all the electors wish to have things quietly settled.’ If Calvin
were not particularly pleased with the pope, he was pleased with the
archbishops. The following passage is striking enough for quotation:
‘The Archbishops of Mayence and Treves love peace and the liberties
of the country, and they think that they would be lost if the emperor
had subdued us.’ This shows in Calvin a fair temper, a man free from
prejudice.[822] ‘The Archbishop of Cologne is not among the worst,’
says he, ‘for he knows that the Church ought to be reformed, and sees
clearly that we are superior in respect of truth.’