although it was established before he came to the city. He undertook to
frame for the State a code of morals. He limited the freedom of the
citizens, and turned the old democratic constitution into an oligarchy.
The general assembly, which met twice a year, nominated syndics, or
judges; but nothing was proposed in the general assembly which had not
previously been considered in the council of the Two Hundred; and
nothing in the latter which had not been brought before the council of
Sixty; nor even in this, which had not been approved by the lesser
council. The four syndics, with their council of sixteen, had power of
life and death, and the whole public business of the state was in their
hands. The supreme legislation was in the council of Two Hundred; which
was much influenced by ecclesiastics, or the consistory. If a man not
forbidden to take the Sacrament neglected to receive it, he was
condemned to banishment for a year. One was condemned to do public
penance if he omitted a Sunday service. The military garrison was
summoned to prayers twice a day. The judges punished severely all
profanity, as blasphemy. A mason was put in prison three days for simply
saying, when falling from a building, that it must be the work of the
Devil. A young girl who insulted her mother was publicly punished and
kept on bread-and-water; and a peasant-boy who called his mother a devil
was publicly whipped. A child who struck his mother was beheaded;
adultery was punished with death; a woman was publicly scourged because
she sang common songs to a psalm-tune; and another because she dressed
herself, in a frolic, in man's attire. Brides were not allowed to wear
wreaths in their bonnets; gamblers were set in the pillory, and
card-playing and nine-pins were denounced as gambling. Heresy was
punished with death; and in sixty years one hundred and fifty people
were burned to death, in Geneva, for witchcraft. Legislation extended to
dress and private habits; many innocent amusements were altogether
suppressed; also holidays and theatrical exhibitions. Excommunication
was as much dreaded as in the Mediaeval church.
In regard to the worship of God, Calvin was opposed to splendid
churches, and to all ritualism. He retained psalm-singing, but abolished
the organ; he removed the altar, the crucifix, and muniments from the
churches, and closed them during the week-days, unless the minister was
present. He despised what we call art, especially artistic music; nor
did he have much respect for artificial sermons, or the art of speaking.
He himself preached _ex tempore_, nor is there evidence that he ever
wrote a sermon.
Respecting the Eucharist, Calvin took a middle course between Luther and
Zwingli,--believing neither in the actual presence of Christ in the
consecrated bread, nor regarding it as a mere symbol, but a means by
which divine grace is imparted; a mirror in which we may contemplate
Christ. Baptism he considered only as an indication of divine grace, and
not essential to salvation; thereby differing from Luther and the
Catholic church. Yet he was as strenuous in maintaining these sacraments
as a Catholic priest, and made excommunication as fearful a weapon as it
was in the Middle Ages. For admission to the Lord's Supper, and thus to
the membership of the visible Church, it would seem that his
requirements were not rigid, but rather very simple, like those of the
primitive Christians,--namely, faith in God and faith in Christ, without
any subtile and metaphysical creeds, such as one might expect from his
inexorable theological deductions. But he would resort to
excommunication as a discipline, as the only weapon which the Church
could use to bind its members together, and which had been used from the
beginning; yet he would temper severity with mildness and charity, since
only God is able to judge the heart. And herein he departed from the
customs of the Middle Ages, and did not regard the excommunicated as
lost, but to be prayed for by the faithful. No one, he maintained,
should be judged as deserving eternal death who was still in the hands
of God. He made a broad distinction between excommunication and
anathema; the latter, he maintained, should never, or very rarely, be
pronounced, since it takes away the hope of forgiveness, and consigns
one to the wrath of God and the power of Satan. He regarded the
Sacrament of the Lord's Supper as a means to help manifold
infirmities,--as a time of meditation for beholding Christ the
crucified; as confirming reconciliation with God; as a visible sign of
the body of Christ, recognizing his actual but spiritual presence.
Luther recognized the bodily presence of Christ in the Eucharist, while
he rejected transubstantiation and the idea of worshipping the
consecrated wafer as the real God. This difference in the opinion of the
reformers as to the Eucharist led to bitter quarrels and controversies,
and divided the Protestants. Calvin pursued a middle and moderate
course, and did much to harmonize the Protestant churches. He always
sought peace and moderation; and his tranquillizing measures were not
pleasant to the Catholics, who wished to see divisions among
their enemies.
Calvin had a great dislike of ceremonies, festivals, holidays, and the
like. For images he had an aversion amounting to horror. Christmas was
the only festival he retained. He was even slanderously accused of
wishing to abolish the Sabbath, the observance of which he inculcated
with the strictness of the Puritans. He introduced congregational
singing, but would not allow the ear or the eye to be distracted. The
music was simple, dispensing with organs and instruments and all
elaborate and artistic display. It is needless to say that this severe
simplicity of worship has nearly passed away, but it cannot be doubted
that the changes which the reformers made produced the deepest
impression on the people in a fervent and religious age. The psalms and
hymns of the reformers were composed in times of great religious
excitement. Calvin was far behind Luther, who did not separate the art
of music from religion; but Calvin made a divorce of art from public
worship. Indeed, the Reformation was not favorable to art in any form
except in sacred poetry; it declared those truths which save the soul,
rather than sought those arts which adorn civilization. Hence its
churches were barren of ornaments and symbols, and were cold and
repulsive when the people were not excited by religious truths. Nor did
they favor eloquence in the ordinary meaning of that word. Pulpit
eloquence was simple, direct, and without rhetorical devices; seeking
effect not in gestures and postures and modulated voice, but earnest
appeals to the heart and conscience. The great Catholic preachers of the
eighteenth century--like Bossuet and Bourdaloue and Massillon--surpassed
the Protestants as rhetoricians.
The simplicity which marked the worship of God as established by Calvin
was also a feature in his system of church government. He dispensed with
bishops, archdeacons, deans, and the like. In his eyes every man who
preached the word was a presbyter, or elder; and every presbyter was a
bishop. A deacon was an officer to take care of the poor, not to preach.
And it was necessary that a minister should have a double call,--both an
inward call and an outward one,--or an election by the people in union
with the clergy. Paul and Barnabas set forth elders, but the people
indicated their approval by lifting up their hands. In the
Presbyterianism which Calvin instituted he maintained that the Church is
represented by the laity as well as by the clergy. He therefore gave the
right of excommunication to the congregation in conjunction with the
clergy. In the Lutheran Church, as in the Catholic, the right of
excommunication was vested in the clergy alone. But Calvin gave to the
clergy alone the right to administer the sacraments; nor would he give
to the Church any other power of punishment than exclusion from the
Lord's Supper, and excommunication. His organization of the Church was
aristocratic, placing the power in the hands of a few men of approved
wisdom and piety. He had no sympathy with democracy, either civil or
religious, and he formed a close union between Church and State,--giving
to the council the right to choose elders and to confirm the election of
ministers. As already stated, he did not attempt to shield the clergy
from the civil tribunals. The consistory, which assembled once a week,
was formed of elders and preachers, and a messenger of the civil court
summoned before it the persons whose presence was required. No such
power as this would be tolerated in these times. But the consistory
could not itself inflict punishment; that was the province of the civil
government. The elders and clergy inflicted no civil penalties, but
simply determined what should be heard before the spiritual and what
before the civil tribunal. A syndic presided in the spiritual assembly
at first, but only as a church elder. The elders were chosen from the
council, and the election was confirmed by the great council, the
people, and preachers; so that the Church was really in the hands of the
State, which appointed the clergy. It would thus seem that Church and
State were very much mixed up together by Calvin, who legislated in view
of the circumstances which surrounded him, and not for other times or
nations. This subordination of the Church to the State, which was
maintained by all the reformers, was established in opposition to the
custom of the Catholic Church, which sought to make the State
subservient to the Church. And the lay government of the Church, which
entered into the system of Calvin, was owing to the fear that the
clergy, when able to stand alone, might become proud and ambitious; a
fear which was grounded on the whole history of the Church.
Although Calvin had an exalted idea of the spiritual dignity of the
Church, he allowed a very dangerous interference of the State in
ecclesiastical affairs, even while he would separate the functions of
the clergy from those of the magistrates. He allowed the State to
pronounce the final sentence on dogmatic questions, and hence the power
of the synod failed in Geneva. Moreover, the payment of ministers by the
State rather than by the people, as in this country, was against the old
Jewish custom, which Calvin so often borrowed,--for the priests among
the Jews were independent of the kings. But Calvin wished to destroy
caste among the clergy, and consequently spiritual tyranny. In his
legislation we see an intense hostility to the Roman Catholic
Church,--one of the animating principles of the Reformers; and hence the
Reformers, in their hostility to Rome, went from Sylla into Charybdis.
Calvin, like all churchmen, exalted naturally the theocratic idea of the
old Jewish and Mediaeval Church, and yet practically put the Church into
the hands of laymen. In one sense he was a spiritual dictator, and like
Luther a sort of Protestant pope; and yet he built up a system which was
fatal to spiritual power such as had existed among the Catholic
priesthood. For their sacerdotal spiritual power he would substitute a
moral power, the result of personal bearing and sanctity. It is amusing
to hear some people speak of Calvin as a ghostly spiritual father; but
no man ever fought sacerdotalism more earnestly than he. The logical
sequence of his ecclesiastical reforms was not the aristocratic and
Erastian Church of Scotland, but the Puritans in New England, who were
Independents and not Presbyterians.
Yet there is an inconsistency even in Calvin's régime; for he had the
zeal of the old Catholic Church in giving over to the civil power those
he wished to punish, as in the case of Servetus. He even intruded into
the circle of social life, and established a temporal rather than a
spiritual theocracy; and while he overthrew the episcopal element, he
made a distinction, not recognized in the primitive church, between
clergy and laity. As for religious toleration, it did not exist in any
country or in any church; there was no such thing as true evangelical
freedom. All the Reformers attempted, as well as the Catholics, a
compulsory unity of faith; and this is an impossibility. The Reformers
adopted a catechism, or a theological system, which all communicants
were required to learn and accept. This is substantially the acceptance
of what the Church ordains. Creeds are perhaps a necessity in
well-organized ecclesiastical bodies, and are not unreasonable; but it
should not be forgotten that they are formulated doctrines made by men,
on what is supposed to be the meaning of the Scriptures, and are not
consistent with the right of private judgment when pushed out to its
ultimate logical consequence. When we remember how few men are capable
of interpreting Scripture for themselves, and how few are disposed to
exercise this right, we can see why the formulated catechism proved
useful in securing unity of belief; but when Protestant divines insisted
on the acceptance of the articles of faith which they deduced from the
Scriptures, they did not differ materially from the Catholic clergy in
persisting on the acceptance of the authority of the Church as to
matters of doctrine. Probably a church organization is impossible
without a formulated creed. Such a creed has existed from the time of
the Council of Nice, and is not likely ever to be abandoned by any
Christian Church in any future age, although it may be modified and
softened with the advance of knowledge. However, it is difficult to
conceive of the unity of the Church as to faith, without a creed made
obligatory on all the members of a communion to accept, and it always
has been regarded as a useful and even necessary form of Christian
instruction for the people. Calvin himself attached great importance to
catechisms, and prepared one even for children.
He also put a great value on preaching, instead of the complicated and
imposing ritual of the Catholic service; and in most Protestant churches
from his day to ours preaching, or religious instruction, has occupied
the most prominent part of the church service; and it must be conceded
that while the Catholic service has often degenerated into mere rites
and ceremonies to aid a devotional spirit, so the Protestant service has
often become cold and rationalistic,--and it is not easy to say which
extreme is the worse.
Thus far we have viewed Calvin in the light of a reformer and
legislator, but his influence as a theologian is more remarkable. It is
for his theology that he stands out as a prominent figure in the history
of the Church. As such he showed greater genius; as such he is the most
eminent of all the reformers; as such he impressed his mind on the
thinking of his own age and of succeeding ages,--an original and
immortal man. His system of divinity embodied in his "Institutes" is
remarkable for the radiation of the general doctrines of the Church
around one central principle, which he defended with marvellous logical
power. He was not a fencer like Abélard, displaying wonderful dexterity
in the use of sophistries, overwhelming adversaries by wit and sarcasm;
arrogant and self-sufficient, and destroying rather than building up. He
did not deify the reason, like Erigina, nor throw himself on authority
like Bernard. He was not comprehensive like Augustine, nor mystical like
Bonaventura. He had the spiritual insight of Anselm, and the dialectical
acumen of Thomas Aquinas; acknowledging no master but Christ, and
implicitly receiving whatever the Scriptures declared. He takes his
original position neither from natural reason nor from the authority of
the church, but from the word of God; and from declarations of
Scripture, as he interprets them, he draws sequences and conclusions
with irresistible logic. In an important sense he is one-sided, since he
does not take cognizance of other truths equally important. He is
perfectly fearless in pushing out to its most logical consequences
whatever truth he seizes upon; and hence he appears to many gifted and
learned critics to draw conclusions from accepted premises which
apparently conflict with consciousness or natural reason; and hence
there has ever been repugnance to many of his doctrines, because it is
impossible, it is said, to believe them.
In general, Calvin does not essentially differ from the received
doctrines of the Church as defended by its greatest lights in all ages.
His peculiarity is not in making a digest of divinity,--although he
treated all the great subjects which have been discussed from Athanasius
to Aquinas. His "Institutes" may well be called an exhaustive system of
theology. There is no great doctrine which he has not presented with
singular clearness and logical force. Yet it is not for a general system
of divinity that he is famous, but for making prominent a certain class
of subjects, among which he threw the whole force of his genius. In
fact all the great lights of the Church have been distinguished for the
discussion of particular doctrines to meet the exigencies of their
times. Thus Athanasius is identified with the Trinitarian controversy,
although he was a minister of theological knowledge in general.
Augustine directed his attention more particularly to the refutation of
Pelagian heresies and human Depravity. Luther's great doctrine was
Justification by Faith, although he took the same ground as Augustine.
It was the logical result of the doctrines of Grace which he defended
which led to the overthrow, in half of Europe, of that extensive system
of penance and self-expiation which marked the Roman Catholic Church,
and on which so many glaring abuses were based. As Athanasius rendered a
great service to the Church by establishing the doctrine of the Trinity,
and Augustine a still greater service by the overthrow of Pelagianism,
so Luther undermined the papal pile of superstition by showing
eloquently,--what indeed had been shown before,--the true ground of
justification. When we speak of Calvin, the great subject of
Predestination arises before our minds, although on this subject he made
no pretention to originality. Nor did he differ materially from
Augustine, or Gottschalk, or Thomas Aquinas before him, or Pascal and
Edwards after him. But no man ever presented this complicated and
mysterious subject so ably as he.
It is not for me to discuss this great topic. I simply wish to present
the subject historically,--to give Calvin's own views, and the effect of
his deductions on the theology of his age; and in giving Calvin's views
I must shelter myself under the wings of his best biographer, Doctor
Henry of Berlin, and quote the substance of his exposition of the
peculiar doctrines of the Swiss, or rather French, theologian.
According to Henry, Calvin maintained that God, in his sovereign will
and for his own glory, elected one part of the human race to everlasting
life, and abandoned the other part to everlasting death; that man, by
the original transgression, lost the power of free-will, except to do
evil; that it is only by Divine Grace that freedom to do good is
recovered; but that this grace is bestowed only on the elect, and elect
not in consequence of the foreknowledge of God, but by his absolute
decree before the world was made.
This is the substance of those peculiar doctrines which are called
Calvinism, and by many regarded as fundamental principles of theology,
to be received with the same unhesitating faith as the declarations of
Scripture from which those doctrines are deduced. Augustine and Aquinas
accepted substantially the same doctrines, but they were not made so
prominent in their systems, nor were they so elaborately worked out.
The opponents of Calvin, including some of the brightest lights which
have shone in the English church,--such men as Jeremy Taylor, Archbishop
Whately, and Professor Mosley,--affirm that these doctrines are not only
opposed to free-will, but represent God as arbitrarily dooming a large
part of the human race to future and endless punishment, withholding
from them his grace, by which alone they can turn from their sins,
creating them only to destroy them: not as the potter moulds the clay
for vessels of honor and dishonor, but moulding the clay in order to
destroy the vessels he has made, whether good or bad; which doctrine
they affirm conflicts with the views usually held out in the Scriptures
of God as a God of love, and also conflicts with all natural justice,
and is therefore one-sided and narrow.
The premises from which this doctrine is deduced are those Scripture
texts which have the authority of the Apostle Paul, such as these:
"According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the
world;" "For whom he did foreknow he also did predestinate;" "Jacob have
I loved and Esau have I hated;" "He hath mercy on whom he will have
mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth;" "Hath not the potter power over
his clay?" No one denies that from these texts the Predestination of
Calvin as well as Augustine--for they both had similar views--is
logically drawn. It has been objected that both of these eminent
theologians overlooked other truths which go in parallel lines, and
which would modify the doctrine,--even as Scripture asserts in one place
the great fact that the will is free, and in another place that the will
is shackled. The Pelagian would push out the doctrine of free-will so as
to ignore the necessity of grace; and the Augustinian would push out the
doctrine of the servitude of the will into downright fatalism. But these
great logicians apparently shrink from the conclusions to which their
logic leads them. Both Augustine and Calvin protest against fatalism,
and both assert that the will is so far free that the sinner acts
without constraint; and consequently the blame of his sins rests upon
himself, and not upon another. The doctrines of Calvin and Augustine
logically pursued would lead to the damnation of infants; yet, as a
matter of fact, neither maintained that to which their logic led. It is
not in human nature to believe such a thing, even if it may be
dogmatically asserted.
And then, in regard to sin: no one has ever disputed the fact that sin
is rampant in this world, and is deserving of punishment. But
theologians of the school of Augustine and Calvin, in view of the fact,
have assumed the premise--which indeed cannot be disputed--that sin is
against an infinite God. Hence, that sin against an infinite God is
itself infinite; and hence that, as sin deserves punishment, an
infinite sin deserves infinite punishment,--a conclusion from which
consciousness recoils, and which is nowhere asserted in the Bible. It is
a conclusion arrived at by metaphysical reasoning, which has very little
to do with practical Christianity, and which, imposed as a dogma of
belief, to be accepted like plain declarations of Scripture, is an
insult to the human understanding. But this conclusion, involving the
belief that inherited sin _is infinite_, and deserving of infinite
punishment, appals the mind. For relief from this terrible logic, the
theologian adduces the great fact that Christ made an atonement for
sin,--another cardinal declaration of the Scripture,--and that believers
in this atonement shall be saved. This Bible doctrine is exceedingly
comforting, and accounts in a measure for the marvellous spread of
Christianity. The wretched people of the old Roman world heard the glad
tidings that Christ died for them, as an atonement for the sins of which
they were conscious, and which had chained them to despair. But another
class of theologians deduced from this premise, that, as Christ's death
was an infinite atonement for the sins of the world, so all men, and
consequently all sinners, would be saved. This was the ground of the
original Universalists, deduced from the doctrines which Augustine and
Calvin had formulated. But they overlooked the Scripture declaration
which Calvin never lost sight of, that salvation was only for those who
believed. Now inasmuch as a vast majority of the human race, including
infants, have not believed, it becomes a logical conclusion that all who
have not believed are lost. Logic and consciousness then come into
collision, and there is no relief but in consigning these discrepancies
to the realm of mystery.