[62] Louis du Tillet, curé of Claix in Poitou, canon and archdeacon
of Angoulême. He was the brother of John du Tillet, the celebrated
registrar of the Parliament of Paris, and of that other Du Tillet
who became Bishop of Sainte-Brieuc and of Meaux. Having devoted
himself to an ecclesiastical career, his first leanings inclined
him towards the Reformed. With Calvin he became acquainted at
the University of Paris, formed a friendship with him, shared
his perils, and received him in 1534 at Angoulême in his own
house. United thenceforth to the young Reformer by a like faith,
he resigned his curacy of Claix to follow him, under the name of
Hautmont, to Strasbourg, to Basle, and into Italy. In August 1536
he was at Geneva, when Calvin was there retained by the earnest
entreaties of Farel. But the struggles to which the Reformer
was thenceforward condemned, were little suited to the mild and
contemplative disposition of Louis du Tillet. A prey to indecision,
he secretly left Geneva and went to Strasbourg, where his anxieties
were only put an end to by his return to the Roman Catholic faith.
He wrote to Calvin to inform him of this change, and to submit to
him his scruples regarding the lawfulness of the ministry in the
Reformed Churches. Calvin replied; and that controversy, free,
sincere, but tempered by respect, marked the later relations between
these two men, at first united and too soon separated by the
religious revolution of the sixteenth century.
Departure of Louis du Tillet from Geneva--regret of
Calvin--controversy between the two friends regarding the
character of the Church of Jesus Christ.