Calvin

“ Calvin has a correct, penetrating, and sure eye, and his glance takes in a wide horizon. He resists not only the chief enemy, popery, but generously opposes those who seem to be on his side and pretend to support him: there is no acceptance of persons with him. He discerns manifold and grave errors hidden under the cloak of reform—errors which would destroy from its foundation the edifice to whose building, those who teach them, pretend to give their help. ”

“ If Calvin had lived in the nineteenth century I am inclined to believe that his clear and vigorous intellect would have preserved him from falling into this error of attributing universal infallibility to every word contained in the Bible, and that he would have recognised the aim and the true tendency of those Divine revelations of which the Bible is so noble a monument. ”

“ Calvin is here at once a jurist and a scholar, but amid his grammatical, literary, and historical discussions-every phrase and idea interpreted being illustrated from classical authorities- he speaks his mind with astonishing courage concerning the qualities and faults of kings and judges, States and societies. He bids monarchs remember that their best guardians are not armies or treasuries, but the fidelity of friends and the love of subjects. Arrogance may be natural in a prince, but it does not therefore cease to be an evil. ”

“ To Calvin therefore, as to the Puritans, the belief in a personal God was everything; not a compulsory belief in the general existence of a deity who, united with Nature, reveals himself to our consciousness; not the God of the pantheist, visible in all the wonders of Nature; not the God of the rationalist, who retires from the universe which he has made, leaving it to the operation of certain unchanging and universal laws: but the God whom Abraham and Moses and the prophets saw and recognized, and who by his special providence rules the destinies of men. ”

“ Now Calvin was imbued with the lofty spirit of the Fathers of the Church and the more religious and contemplative of the schoolmen and the saints of the Middle Ages, when he attached but little dignity to man unaided by divine grace, and was absorbed with the idea of the sovereignty of God, in whose hands man is like clay in the hands of the potter. ”

“ Both show themselves, in fact, just what they are, they and their followers: the cardinal is old, and Calvin is young;—one is timid, the other bold;—one tries to arrest a great movement in the human soul and human society which alarms and exhausts him;—the other throws himself into the movement with all confidence, and strives to help on the human soul and human society in the path which they have just entered. ”

“ Where did Calvin find this doctrine? As I observe, he did not learn it in the schools, nor in any book, nor in his own family, nor in the temple of God; the innovation was universally opposed; a million voices remonstrated against his impiety. What right had he to be believed? He proposed only the interpretation which he gave to the words of Jesus Christ, This is my body. He supported his opinion in no other way, he proved it by no miracles, and therefore did not deserve belief, since he gave no proofs of a divine mission. ”

“ Although Calvin gave the first place in his heart and thoughts to theology, he was not exclusively engrossed by it. He knew too much of human nature and human society not to give great consideration to their different claims and wants. Moreover, he entertained great respect for the human intellect, and looked upon its full development as essential to the accomplishment of the destiny of man and the glory of God. Literature and social science, all great intellectual labour and all large utterance of thought, had great value in his eyes, and attracted him powerfully. ”

“ Being a great admirer of that philosopher, he was annoyed that the world had not given him the place he deserved, and spoke of him to all his friends. If one of them entered his little room and expressed surprise at seeing him take such pains to make the writings of a pagan philosopher better known, Calvin, who thought he had discovered a vein of Gospel gold in Seneca's iron ore, would answer: 'Did he not write against superstition? Has he not said of the Jews, that the conquered give laws to their conquerors? When he exclaims: "We have all sinned, we shall all sin unto the end!" ”

“ No man who knows anything will ever sneer at Calvin. He is not to be measured by common standards. He was universally regarded as the greatest light of the theological world. When we remember his transcendent abilities, his matchless labors, his unrivalled influence, his unblemished morality, his lofty piety, and soaring soul, all flippant criticism is contemptible and mean. He ranks with immortal benefactors, and needs least of all any apologies for his defects. ”

“ It must be admitted, too, that the Calvinism of those days had a powerful influence in enabling men and women to endure, although I object to giving the name of Calvin to a philosophy which is a necessity in all ages. “Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father.” This is the last word which can be said. Nothing can go beyond it, and at times it is the only ground which we feel does not shake under our feet. All life is summed up, and due account is taken of it, according to its degree. ”

“ A work so rich in thought is calculated to call into vigorous exercise the intellect of the reader; and, what is the best and highest use of reading, to compel him to think for himself. It is like seed-corn, the parent of the harvest.
It has been objected against Calvin by Bishop Horsley, -- no mean authority in Biblical criticism, -- that "by his want of taste, and by the poverty of his imagination, he was a most wretched Expositor of the Prophecies, -- just as he would have been a wretched expositor of any secular poet." ”

“ Even the churches which trace their descent from Calvin’s work and faith no longer hold in their entirety his views on the magistrate as the preserver of church purity, the utter depravity of human nature, the non-human character of the Bible, the dealing of God with man. But his system had an immense value in the history of Christian thought. It appealed to and evoked a high order of intelligence, and its insistence on personal individual salvation has borne worthy fruit. ”

“ Calvin and his sect, we know, set little store by works of charity and mercy. ‘All that men do,’ proceeds our letter-writer, ‘you say is done in sin and is mixed with dregs that stink before God, and merit nothing but eternal death. But therein you blaspheme. Stripping us of all possible goodness you do violence to the teaching of Christ and his Apostles, who ascribe perfection or the power of being perfect to us: “Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father in heaven is perfect.” ”

“ But are we not to leave father and mother and children and wife for the sacred cause of Calvinism, and to suffer all things?—Oh, Christophe, Calvin, the great Calvin, the whole party, the whole world, the future counts on your courage and your greatness of soul! We want your life. ”

“ Of all things in this wicked and perplexing world the science of theology should be the most cheerful and inspiring, for it involves inquiries on the loftiest subjects which can interest a thoughtful mind.
But whatever defects the system of doctrines which Calvin elaborated with such transcendent ability may have, there is no question as to its vast influence on the thinking of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The schools of France and Holland and Scotland and England and America were animated by his genius and authority. ”

“ The pale face and attenuated figure of the great Reformer, whose life was a long disease, yet whose indomitable will sustained him amid bodily infirmities, present a striking contrast to the sanguine health and overflowing animal spirits of the good physician who reckoned laughter among the means of grace. Yet Calvin was not merely a Reformer: he was also a humanist, who, in his own way, made a profound study of man, and who applied the learning of a master to the determination of dogma. ”

“ Calvin, like Zwingli, was a humanist before he became a Reformer, and what he was at first he never ceased to be. On the intellectual side, as a scholar and thinker, his affinities were with Erasmus, though on the religious side they were rather with Luther; indeed, Calvin can hardly be better described than by saying that his mind was the mind of Erasmus, though his faith and conscience were those of Luther. ”

“ When he ascended the pulpit on Sundays and lecture days, he carried thither not only the wisdom of his beloved master Calvin but the whole Puritan theology to buttress his theses. Good men were drawn to him irresistibly by his sweetness of temper, and evil men were overawed by his venerable aspect. ”

“ The controversy concerning the eucharist still raged as fiercely as ever between the two schools, but Calvin's feelings had evidently undergone a change. 'I implore you,' he wrote to Bullinger, who was a Zwinglian, 'never to forget how great a man Luther is. Think with what courage, what constancy, what power he has devoted himself to spreading the doctrine of salvation far and near. As for me, I have often said, and I say it again, though he should call me devil, I would still give him due honour, and recognise him as a mighty servant of the Lord.' A little later Calvin went beyond even this. ”

“ Calvin, when he attempts to reconcile the idea of a Trinity of persons co-existing with an unity of Being, and does not use language that contradicts itself, speaks no otherwise than Servetus, and arrives in fine at the same interpretation of the Trinitarian Dogma: the persons are dispositions to the one, properties to the other! ”

“ While Calvin is living at Basle, a perfect stranger, a work is published bearing his name on the title-page. Every one is in raptures with it; all are loud in Calvin's praise. Calvin maintains his incognito. He sees the popularity of his work, and doubtless rejoices in it, but he never opens his mouth to say to any one, "I am Calvin." Assuming these to be the facts, was it any thing more than a simple unvarnished statement of the truth when Calvin said, "Personal fame could not be my object in the publication. ”

“ All men must admire the candid and liberal spirit which breathes in the subjoined high but just eulogium on Calvin, from the pen of the same amiable Archbishop: “Calvin himself was both a wise and a good man; inferior to none of his contemporaries in general ability, and superior to almost all in the art, as well as elegance, of composition, in the perspicuity and arrangement of his ideas, the structure of his periods, and the Latinity of his diction. ”

“ Seldom has there been a man {459} who, like Calvin, was placed in the influential position he was to occupy all his life, not only without his concurrence but even against his will. 'Stay with me,' said Farel, 'and help me. There is work to be done in this city.' Calvin replied with astonishment: 'Excuse me, I cannot stop here more than one night.'—'Why do you seek elsewhere for what is now offered you?' replied Farel; 'why refuse to edify the Church of Geneva by your faith, zeal, and knowledge?' The appeal was fruitless: to undertake so great a task seemed to Calvin impossible. ”

“ It is not uncommon, among persons of a certain class, to represent the leading principles of Calvin as unfavourable to practical religion, and to that kind of preaching which is adapted to affect the hearts and consciences of the hearers. A reference to the most able and intelligent theologians and preachers who have held those principles, and upon whom they may reasonably be concluded to have exerted their genuine and fullest influence, will amply evince the inaccuracy of this representation. ”

“ Nobody was more opposed than Calvin to that moral and social anarchy which threatened the sixteenth century, and which ruins every epoch unable to keep it under control. This bold struggle of Calvin’s is one of the greatest services he has done to liberty, which has no enemies more dangerous than immorality and disorder. ”

“ Calvin apologizes for silence, and enjoins him to use his influence with the King for the advancement of the Gospel in England. Geneva, 13th Feb. 1553.
I have hitherto avoided writing you, most distinguished sir, lest I should perhaps seem anxious to obtain what my own inclinations did not prompt. For as the friendships of the world are hollow, and ambition and deception everywhere prevail, so that those who cultivate sincerity are exceedingly few, it is absolutely necessary for us almost to regard all with suspicion whose uprightness of character we have not thoroughly tested. ”

“ They who seek for the flowers of poesy must go to some other master; they who would acquire habits of sustained intellectual exercise may spend their days and nights over the pages of Calvin.
But that which gives the greatest charm to these noble compositions is, the genuine spirit of piety which breathes through them. The mind of the writer turns with ease and with obvious delight to the spiritual application of his subject. Hence the heart of the reader is often imperceptibly raised to high and heavenly things. ”

“ At Basel Calvin found a valued friend, Grynæus. Already during the stay of the two reformers at Berne he had written to them—‘I hope that by your Christian meekness and your humility you will overcome all your adversaries, and take away from the enemies of the Gospel every occasion of calumniating you. Oh, that the eyes now sparkling with the fire of Satan may be cast down, and that the passion with which men are inflamed against your ministry may be quenched! ”