CALVIN CALLED AT BOURGES TO THE EVANGELICAL WORK.
(1528-1529.)
[Sidenote: CALVIN LEAVES ORLEANS.]
One day, probably at the beginning of April 1528, about the Easter
holidays, Calvin received a letter from Noyon. He opened it: it
contained sad news! his father was seriously ill. He went at once to
Duchemin in great agitation: 'I must depart,' he said. This friend, and
many others, would have wished to keep him in a place where he had
become so useful; but he did not hesitate. He must go to his father; he
would, however, only stay as long as was necessary; as soon as the sick
man was better, he would come back. 'I promise you to return shortly,'
he said to Duchemin.[57] Calvin, therefore, bade farewell to his
cherished studies, to his beloved friends, and those pious families in
which he was advancing the kingdom of God, and returned to Picardy.
We have but few particulars of his sojourn at Noyon. Assuredly his
filial piety indulged at his father's bedside in what has been termed
with reason the sweetest form of gratitude. Yet the weak condition of
the episcopal secretary was prolonged, without any appearance of
imminent danger. A question began to rise up in the young man's heart:
shall he go, or shall he stay?[58] Sometimes, when seated by the sick
man's pillow during the watches of the night, his thoughts would
transport him to Orleans, into the midst of his studies and the society
of his friends; he felt himself impelled, as by a vigorous hand, towards
the places that were so dear to him, and he made in his mind all the
arrangements necessary for his return.[59]... Suddenly his father's
disease grew worse, and the son did not quit the sufferer's bedside. The
old secretary, 'a man of sound understanding and good counsel,' says
Beza, was much respected by those around him, and love for the author of
his days was profoundly engraven in the young man's soul. 'The title of
father belongs to God,' he said; 'when God gives it to a man, he
communicates to him some sparks of his own brightness.'[60]
[Sidenote: CALVIN'S FIRST LETTER.]
Erelong a crisis appeared to take place; the doctors held out hopes: the
patient might recover his health, they said.[61] Calvin's thoughts and
desires were turned once more towards Orleans; he would have wished to
go there instantly,[62] but duty was still the strongest, and he
resolved to wait until his father's convalescence was complete. Thus one
day after another glided away.[63] Alas! the doctors were deceived.
'There is no longer any hope of a cure,' they soon told him; 'your
father's death cannot be far off.'[64] Calvin, therefore, determined
(14th of May, 1528) to write to Duchemin, which he had not yet done
since his departure. It is the first of the reformer's letters that has
been handed down to us. 'You know,' he says, 'that I am very exact in my
correspondence, and that I carry it even to importunity.[65] You will be
astonished, perhaps, that I have been wanting in my extreme punctuality;
but when you know the cause, you will restore to me your friendship,
should I perchance have forfeited it.' He then tells Duchemin of his
father's condition, and adds: 'Happen what may, I will see you
again.'[66] What did happen is not very clear. Calvin was at Noyon, as
we have seen, on the 14th of May, 1528; perhaps he remained all the
summer with the sick man. It has been concluded from this letter to
Duchemin that Gerard Calvin died shortly after the 14th of May; at that
time _the approach of death_ was certain, according to the doctors;
but doctors may be mistaken. According to Theodore Beza, he died during
his son's residence at Bourges, nine or ten months later, and a passage
from Calvin, which we shall quote further on, confirms Beza's testimony,
of itself so decisive.
One circumstance, which has some interest, seems to show that Calvin was
not at Orleans during the latter part of this year. On the 5th of
December, 1528,[67] eight months after his sudden departure, a boy eight
or nine years old arrived at Melchior Wolmar's house in that city. He
had a sickly look, but was a well-made child, playful and well-bred,
with a keen glance and lively wit. This boy, who was one day to be
Calvin's best friend, belonged to a Burgundian family. His father,
Pierre de Beza, was bailli of Vezelay, a very old town, where the child
was born on the 24th of June, 1519,[68] and received the name of
Theodore. One of his uncles, named Nicholas, seignior of Cette and of
Chalonne, and councillor of parliament, having paid the bailli a visit a
few months after the child's birth, adopted him, being an unmarried man,
and took him to Paris, although he had not been weaned.[69] Nine years
later (1528), at the recommendation of an Orleanese, who was connected
with the Bezas and a member of the royal council, the uncle sent his
nephew to Wolmar, who was described to him as very learned in Greek and
of great experience in education. Nothing in Calvin's biography written
by Beza indicates that the latter met Calvin at that time at Orleans.
When Margaret of Valois, who was Duchess of Berry, endeavoured about
this time to gather together a number of pious and learned men in her
university of Bourges, she invited Wolmar there;[70] and it was here
that young Beza saw Calvin for the first time.
[Sidenote: CALVIN GOES TO BOURGES.]
The scholar, set at liberty by the apparent restoration of his father's
health, had once more turned his thoughts towards his studies. He
desired to take advantage of the instruction of a doctor whose
reputation surpassed even that of Pierre de l'Etoile. All the learned
world was at that time talking of Alciati of Milan, whom the king had
invited to Bourges, and to attend whose brilliant lessons the academic
youth flocked from every quarter. Calvin had other motives besides this
for going to that city. Under Margaret's influence, Berry had become a
centre of evangelisation. Returning, therefore, to Orleans, he made
known his intention of going to Bourges, and the professors of the
university where he had studied, and even taught with credit,
unanimously offered him the degree of doctor. It would appear that his
modesty did not permit him to accept it.[71]
There were fewer resources at Bourges than at Orleans. 'As we cannot
live as we wish,' said the students, 'we live as we can.' Everything was
dear: board alone cost one hundred francs a year.[72] 'France is truly a
golden country,' bitterly remarked a poor scholar, 'for without gold you
can get nothing.' But the Noyon student cared little for the comforts of
life; intellectual and spiritual wealth satisfied him. He was anxious to
hear Alciati, and was surprised to find him a tall corpulent man, with
no very thoughtful look. 'He is a great eater,' said one of his
neighbours, 'and very covetous.'[73] Intelligence and imagination,
rather than sentiment, were his characteristics: he was a great jurist
and also a great poet. Mingling literature with his explanation of the
laws, and substituting an elegant style for barbarism of language, he
gave quite a new _éclat_ to the study of the law. Calvin listened
with admiration. Five years later Alciati returned to Italy, allured by
greater emoluments and greater honours.
Erelong Calvin gave himself up entirely to other thoughts. Bourges had
become, under Margaret's government, the centre of the new doctrine in
France; and he was accordingly struck by the movement of the minds
around him. There was discussing, and speaking, and assembling, wherever
the sound of the Gospel could be heard. On Sunday students and citizens
crowded the two churches where Chaponneau and Michel preached. Calvin
went with the rest, and found the christian truth pretty fairly set
forth 'considering the time.'[74] During the week, evangelical truth was
taught in the university by Gamaire, a learned priest, and by
Bournonville, prior of St. Ambrose.
[Sidenote: WOLMAR'S APPEAL TO CALVIN.]
But nothing attracted Calvin like Wolmar's house. It would appear that
this scholar had arrived at Bourges before him.[75] It was there that
Calvin met young Beza, and then began in Theodore's heart that filial
piety which continued all his life, and that admiration which he
professed afterwards in one of his Latin poems, where he calls Calvin
Romæ ruentis terror ille maximus.[76]
And truly Calvin was training for this. If Wolmar at Orleans had
confirmed the christian faith in him, Wolmar at Bourges was the first
who invited him distinctly to enter upon the career of a reformer. The
German doctor communicated to the young man the books which he received
from beyond the Rhine—the writings of Luther, Melanchthon, and other
evangelical men.[77] Wolmar, modest, gentle, and a foreigner, did not
think himself called to do in France what these illustrious servants of
God were doing in Germany: but he asked himself whether there was not
some Frenchman called by God to reform France; whether Lefèvre's young
fellow-countryman, who united a great understanding with a soul so full
of energy, might not be the man for whom this work was reserved.
Wolmar seems to have been to Calvin what Staupitz was to Luther; both
these doctors felt the need of minds of a strong temper for the great
things that were about to take place in the world. One day, therefore,
the professor invited the student to take a walk with him, and the two
friends, leaving behind them that old city, burnt down by Cæsar and
Chilperic, rebuilt by Charlemagne, and enlarged by Philip Augustus, drew
near the banks of the Auron, at its confluence with the Yèvre, and
strolled here and there among the fertile plains of Berry.[78] At last
Wolmar said to Calvin, 'What do you propose doing, my friend? Shall the
Institutes, the Novels, the Pandects absorb your life? Is not theology
the queen of all sciences, and does not God call you to explain his Holy
Scriptures?'[79] What new ideas then started up before Calvin! At Paris
he had renounced the priesthood, and at Bourges Wolmar urged him to the
ministry.... What should he do?
This was quite another calling. In the theocratic and legal Church, the
priest is the means by which man is restored to communion with God. The
special priesthood, with which he is invested, is the condition on which
depends the virtue of the sacraments and of all the means of grace.
Possessed of a magical power, he works the greatest of miracles at the
altar, and whoever does not partake in the ministrations of this
priesthood can have no share in redemption. The Reformation of the
sixteenth century, by setting aside the formal and theocratic Church of
Rome, which was shaped in the image of the Jewish theocracy, and by
substituting for it the Evangelical Church, conformably to the
principles of Christ and his apostles, transformed the ministry also.
The service of the Word became its centre—the means by which, with the
aid of the Holy Ghost, all its functions were discharged. This
evangelical ministry was to work its miracles also; but whilst those of
the legal ministry proceed from a mysterious virtue in the priesthood,
and are accomplished upon earthly elements, those of the evangelical
ministry are wrought freely by the divine Word, and by a heartfelt faith
in the great love of God, which that ministry proclaims,—strange
spiritual miracles, effected within the soul, transforming the man and
not the bread, and making him a new creature, destined to dwell
eternally with God.
[Sidenote: CALVIN HESITATES.]
Did Calvin at this time see clearly the difference between the Roman
priesthood and the Gospel ministry? We doubt it. It was not until later
that his ideas became clear upon this important point. The notion,
however, of abandoning not only the priesthood, but also the study of
the law for the Gospel, was not new to him. More than once in his
retirement, he had already asked himself: 'Shall I not preach Christ to
the world?' But he had always shrunk away humble and timid from this
ministry. 'All men are not suited for it,' he said; 'a special vocation
is necessary, and no one ought to take it upon himself rashly.'[80]
Calvin, like St. Augustin, the ancient doctor whom he most resembled
(the irregularities excepted which mark the youth of the bishop of
Hippona), feared to undertake a charge beyond his strength. He thought
also that his father would never consent to his abandoning the law and
joining the heretics. And yet he felt himself daily more inclined to
entertain the great questions of conscience and christian liberty, of
divine sovereignty and self-renunciation. 'So great a desire of
advancing in the knowledge of Christ consumed me at that time,' he said,
'that I pursued my other studies very coldly.'[81] A domestic event was
soon to give him liberty to enter upon the new career to which God and
Wolmar were calling him.[82]
Nor was this the only call he received at Bourges. Wolmar had spoken of
him, and several families invited him to their houses to edify them.
This took the young man by surprise, as it had done at Orleans; he
remained silent, lost in the multitude of his thoughts. 'I am quite
amazed,' he said, 'at seeing those who have a desire for pure doctrine
gather round me to learn, although I have only just begun to learn
myself!' He resolved, however, to continue at Bourges the evangelical
work which he had timidly commenced on the banks of the Loire; and he
brought more time and more decision to the task.
[Sidenote: THE PREACHERS IN BERRY.]
Calvin accordingly entered into relations with students and townspeople,
nobles and lawyers, priests and professors. The family of the Colladons
held at that time a considerable station in Berry. Two brothers, Leo and
Germain, and two sisters, Mary and Anne, were the first to embrace the
Gospel in Berry. Leo and Germain were advocates, and one of their
cousins, styled Germain II. in the genealogies, now eighteen years old,
afterwards became Calvin's intimate friend at Geneva. These ties of
friendship had probably begun at Bourges.[83]
The evangelist soon extended his christian activity beyond the walls of
the city. Many natives of Berry, who had heard him at Bourges, had been
charmed with his addresses. 'Come and preach these beautiful words to
us,' they said. Calvin gradually laid aside his natural timidity, and
being cheerful and fond of walking, he visited the castles and
villages.[84] He introduced himself affectionately into all the houses
at which he stopped. 'A graceful salutation,' he said in after years,
'serves as an introduction to converse with people.'[85] He delivered
several sermons in these hamlets and country-seats.
On the banks of the Arnon, ten leagues from Bourges, there stands a
little town named Lignières, at that time the seat of a considerable
lordship.[86] Every year certain monks came to preach in the parish
church, and were bountifully received at the château, where they
complained of their wretchedness in the most pitiable tone. This
offended the lord of Lignières, who was not of a superstitious
character. 'If I am not mistaken,' he said, 'it is with a view to their
own gain that these monks pretend to be such drudges.'[87] Disgusted
with their hypocrisy, M. de Lignières begged Calvin to come and preach
in their stead. The law-student spoke to an immense crowd with such
clearness, freedom, depth, and vitality, that every one was moved.[88]
'Upon my word,' said the lord to his wife, 'Master John Calvin seems to
me to preach better than the monks, and he goes heartily to work
too.'[89]
[Sidenote: RELIGIOUS MOVEMENT AT BOURGES.]
When the priests saw the young evangelist so well received, they cried
out and intrigued against him, and did all in their power to get him put
into prison.[90] It was at Bourges that Calvin began to see that
'everything among men is full of vexation.' He said: 'By the assaults
made against them, Christ sounds the trumpet to his followers, in order
that they may prepare themselves more cheerfully for battle.'[91]
In this way Calvin laboured in the town, in the villages, and in the
châteaux, conversing tenderly with children, preaching to adults, and
training heroes and martyrs. But the same circumstance which had taken
him away from Orleans, suddenly occurred at Bourges. One day he received
a letter from Noyon, written probably by his brother Anthony. Alas! his
father was dead! and he was far from him, unable to lavish upon him the
attentions of his filial piety. 'While he was at Bourges his father
died,' says Theodore Beza, 'and he was obliged to return to Noyon.'[92]
The death was very sudden.[93] Calvin did not hesitate; he bade farewell
to Berry, to those pious families which he had edified, to his studies,
and to his friends. 'You held out your hand to me,' he said to Wolmar,
'and were ready to support me from one end to the other of my course;
but my father's death takes me away from our conversations and our
lessons.'[94]
Bourges did not fall back into darkness after Calvin's departure. A
venerable doctor, named Michel Simon, perhaps that _Michel_ whom we
have already mentioned, displayed a holy boldness notwithstanding his
age. One day a Pelagian cordelier (as all the doctors of that order are)
had effrontery enough to maintain that man can be saved by his natural
strength alone. Simon confronted him, and succeeded in getting it laid
down that in the public disputations every proposition must be
established by the text of Scripture. This gave a new impulse to
theological studies.
The priests came to an understanding with one another, and made their
preparations without saying a word. On the following Sunday, Michel
Simon, having entered the pulpit, was about to begin his sermon, when
the curé, with his vicars and choristers, entered the choir, and began
to chant the office for the dead. It was impossible either to preach or
to hear. The exasperated students rushed into the choir, threw the books
about, upset the lecterns, and drove out the priests, who ran off 'in
great disorder.' Simon, who remained master of the field, delivered his
sermon, and, to the surprise of his hearers, ended by repeating the
Lord's prayer _in French_, without adding the _Ave Maria_! Whereupon a
man, sitting in one of the upper stalls (he was the king's proctor),
stood up, and with a sonorous voice began: _Ave Maria, gratia_.... He
could not complete the sentence. A universal shout interrupted him; the
women, who are easily excited, caught up their little stools, crowded
round the proctor, and shook them over his head. These people were
catholics, disgusted with the priests, not with the disciples of the
Saviour.
While the student of Noyon was devoting himself to the preaching of the
Gospel, extreme danger threatened him who had been his forerunner in
this work.
[Footnote 57: 'Quod tibi promiseram discedens me brevi adfuturum.'—
Calvinus Chemino, May 14, 1528, Berne MS.]
[Footnote 58: 'Ea me expectatio diutius suspensum habuit.'—Calvinus
Chemino.]
[Footnote 59: 'Nam dum reditum ad vos meditor.'—Ibid.]
[Footnote 60: Calvini _Opera_.]
[Footnote 61: 'Sed cum medici spem facerent posse redire in prosperam
valetudinem.'—Calvinus Chemino.]
[Footnote 62: 'Nihil aliud visum est quam tui desiderium.'—Ibid.]
[Footnote 63: 'Interim dies de die trahitur.'—Ibid.]
[Footnote 64: 'Certum mortis periculum.'—Calvinus Chemino.]
[Footnote 65: 'In litteris missitandis plus satis officiosum, ne dicam
importunum.'—Ibid.]
[Footnote 66: 'Utcunque res ceciderit, ad vos revisam.'—Ibid.]
[Footnote 67: 'Factum est ut ad te pervenirem anno Domini 1528, nonis
Decembris.'—Letter of Theodore Beza to Wolmar, Preface to the
_Confessio Fidei Christianæ_.]
[Footnote 68: 'Anno Domini 1519 die 24 junii, placuit Deo O. M. ut mundi
lucem aspicerem.'—Letter of Theodore Beza to Wolmar, Preface to the
_Confessio Fidei Christianæ_.]
[Footnote 69: 'Ut me quamvis adhuc a nutricis uberibus pendentem.'—
Ibid.]
[Footnote 70: 'Aureliæ primum, deinde Biturigibus, quum in eam urbem
regina Navarræ te evocasset.'—Ibid.]
[Footnote 71: 'Eique discedenti doctoratus insignia absque ullo pretio
offeruntur.'—Bezæ _Vita Calvini_.]
[Footnote 72: _Conrad Gessner_ von Hanhait, p. 22. _Theodor. Beza_ von
Baum, p. 12.]
[Footnote 73: 'Vir fuit corpulentus, proceræ staturæ. Auri avidus
habitus est et cibi avidior.'—Panzivole, _De claris Legum Interpret._
lib. ii.]
[Footnote 74: Théod. de Bèze, _Hist. des Eglises Réformées_, p. 6.]
[Footnote 75: Ibid.]
[Footnote 76: 'Of Rome in its decline the greatest dread.'—Bezæ
_Icones_.]
[Footnote 77: 'Libros quos e Germania acceperat, mittebat.'—Flor.
Rémond, _Hist. de l'Hérésie_, ii. liv. vii.]
[Footnote 78: 'Die quodam cum discipulo magister, animi gratia,
deambulans.'—Flor. Rémond, _Hist. de l'Hérésie_.]
[Footnote 79: 'Ut posito Justiniani codice ad Theologiæ omnium
scientiarum reginæ studium, animum applicaret.'—Flor. Rémond, _Hist. de
l'Hérésie_, liv. vii. ch. ix. Florimond Rémond was so hostile to the
Reformation which he had abjured, that he cannot be trusted when his
prejudices are concerned; but he ought to be believed when his
predilections do not mislead him. I cannot see what object he could have
had in inventing this conversation. 'The Calvinists, in order to be
avenged of this writer,' says Moreri, 'have endeavoured to traduce his
memory.' The most sensible course is to hold a just mean between the
Romish apologists and the protestant detractors.]
[Footnote 80: 'Non omnes esse Verbi ministerio idoneos ... requiritur
specialis vocatio.'—Calv. _Opera_.]
[Footnote 81: 'Tanto proficiendi studio exarsi, ut reliqua studia
quamvis non abjicerem, frigidius tamen sectarer.'—Calv. _Præf._ in
Psalm.]
[Footnote 82: 'Acriter exhortans ut de reformanda atque illustranda Dei
ecclesia cogitationem ac curam serio inciperet.'—Flor. Rémond, _Histoire
de l'Hérésie_.]
[Footnote 83: Leo Colladon died at Geneva on the 31st of August, 1552.
His son Nicholas took refuge there in 1553, and in 1556 succeeded Calvin
in the chair of divinity. Germain II., made free of the city in 1555,
was the compiler of the Genevese code. Galiffe, _Généalogie des Familles
Genevoises_. Haag, _France Protestante_, article _Colladon_.]
[Footnote 84: Théod. de Bèze, _Hist. des Eglises Réformées_, p. 7.]
[Footnote 85: Calvin, _Commentaire sur Mathieu_, ch. x.]
[Footnote 86: In the reign of Louis XIV. this lordship belonged to
Colbert.]
[Footnote 87: 'Contrefont les marmitons.']
[Footnote 88: 'Nonnullas interdum conciones in agro Biturigum, in
oppidulo quod _Linerias_ vocant.'—Bezæ _Vita Calvini_.]
[Footnote 89: Bèze, _Hist. des Eglises Réformées_, p. 7.]
[Footnote 90: 'Nisi me ab ipsis prope carceribus mors patris
revocasset.'—Calvinus Volmario, _in 2ᵃᵐ Ep. ad Corinth_.]
[Footnote 91: _Commentaire sur Mathieu_, ch. x.]
[Footnote 92: Théod. de Bèze, _Vie de Calvin_ (French text), p. 11.
'In agro Biturigum ... mors patris nuntiata in patriam vocavit.'—Ibid.
in Latin text.]
[Footnote 93: 'Repentina mors patris,' says Beza. This _sudden_ death
proves that Calvin's father did not die, as some assert, of the long
illness described in the letter to Duchemin.]
[Footnote 94: _Dédicace de la 2ᵉ aux Corinthiens._]