1845.]

Characteristics when a Child.

333

fessor of theology at Wittenberg. This child was baptized in the church of St. Godebert, and early exhibited the effects of his careful training and a natural susceptibility to religious impres sions. It is related that he was accustomed when a mere child to pray in the open air, and his vivid feeling of the presence of God in after life is traced to this practice. He also exhibited great horror of vice, and censured the faults of his companions with severity.2 These indications of the disposition of the child influenced his father to destine him at an early age to the study of theology.3 In the epistle prefatory to Calvin's Commentary upon the Psalms, we have an expression of the feeling of the man as he looked back upon his childhood and traced the dealings of God with him. He exults, and praises God that he who exalted David from the fold of his flock, had counted himself, also of humble origin, worthy of the high office of preaching the Gospel.4

Calvin's early days were passed with the children of the noble family of Mommor. Mindful of this favor, he subsequently dedicated his first work, the Commentary upon Seneca, as the "firstlings of his fruit" to one of these early associates, Claude Hangest, abbot of St. Eloi. He received the same discipline and in struction as these children, and is said to have excelled all his fellow pupils in acuteness of mind and power of memory 5 The germs of his future greatness were discovered and cherished by his noble patrons.

Of his personal appearance when young, little can be said. The wood-cuts of him prefixed to the oldest editions of his works, exhibit noble and very characteristic lineaments of countenance,

1 Drelincourt's Défense de Calvin, p. 158. The same author also says, that John Calvin was born at the place where now stands the house of the Stag, and that he was reported to have been one of the singing boys of the choir. Desmay and Levasseur give similar accounts from the archives of Noyon. See Henry, das Leben J. Calvins, Bd. 1. S. 31, and also Beitrage 2.

2 See Vies de Calvin et Bèze, p. 6, and Beza's Life of Calvin (Opp. Omn. Tom. I.), where the biographer says that he received this account of him from credible witnesses among the Catholics, after Calvin had become distinguished. 3 Theologiae me pater tenellum adhuc puerum destinaverat, Opp. Omn. Tom. III. p. 2.

Sicuti ille [David] à caulis ovium ad summam imperii dignitatem evectus est, ita me Deus ab obscuris tenuibusque principiis extractum, hoc tam honorifico munere dignitatus est, ut Evangelii praeco essem ac minister.-Opera, Tom. III. P. 2.

* Beza says: Calvinus aequales acumine ingenii ac tenacis memoriae beneficio superavit. Cal. Vita, Opp. Omn. Tom. 1.

but they bear the marks of toil, struggling and pain, forming a very striking contrast to the round, full, happy face of Martin Luther. But Calvin must have been more comely in appearance earlier in life, than these portraits would seem to indicate. "His father, it is said, was well formed and his mother was called beautiful," and some of his features even when old, though marred by time and suffering, were fine. Beza has, perhaps, given the best description of his personal appearance: "He was in stature of medium size, and of a dark and pale complexion; his bright and expressive eyes indicated the penetration and activity of his mind even until his last days. In his dress he was neat but plain, in accordance with the simplicity of his character."1 In some of the editions of his works, printed while he was alive, he is represented with a small cap on his head, and a pointed beard, having his eyes directed upward and with the motto: Prompte et sincere, beneath.

As Gerhard Calvin had devoted his son to the church, and his means of preparing him for his station were not abundant, he procured for him, when twelve years of age (1521), a small benefice, the chapel La Gesine, in the cathedral of his native city Noyon. His father also sent him, at his own expense, with the young Mommors to Paris, to receive instruction at the College de la Marche. Here he was under the care of M. Cordier, Regent of the college, a man illustrious for his learning and piety, who afterwards renounced popery, went to Geneva as a teacher in the gymnasium, and died there at the age of eighty-five, the same year with Calvin, his pupil. It was under this instructor, that Calvin laid the foundation, which afterwards enabled him to excel his own countrymen, if he did not equal the Italian scholars of the age, in the elegance and ease of his Latin style. From the College de la Marche, he was transferred to the college of Montaigu, where his preceptor, a learned Spaniard, taught him the scholastic philosophy. The uncommon endowments of the youth here also exhibited themselves. His mind was so active and his diligence so great, that he soon surpassed his fellow pupils, and was advanced from the course of languages to that of dialectics and the higher branches of education.2

We have but slight hints of the developments of the young scholar during the years of his course preparatory to the university, 1525-1527. It is the more to be regretted in consequence

1 Vita Cal., Opp. Omn. Tom. I.

Beza's Vita Cal.

1845.]

Ecclesiastical Preferments.

335

of the troubled and confused condition both of the church and State at that time. The war between the emperor and Francis I. was raging at the beginning of 1525. Francis was taken prisoner at the battle of Pavia, Feb. 24, in which ten thousand men, including many of the nobility of France were slain. The next year the emperor turned his arms against the pope (Clement VII), in order to punish him for absolving Francis from his obligation to observe the treaty of Madrid, by which he was released from captivity, and also for uniting in a league with Francis and some of the Italian princes against himself. The result of this war, the plundering of the Vatican, St. Peter's, the houses of the pope's ministers, and in fine the whole city of Rome in a more barbarous manner by the subjects of a Christian monarch than it had ever before been by Hun, Vandal or Goth, the imprisonment of the pope and the attempt to compel him to purchase his liberty by a large sum of money, filled all Christendom with horror. It would be pleasant to know the impression made by such events as these upon the thoughtful youth of sixteen, as he looked out from his retirement upon the confusion and wrong which everywhere met the view. But, says Mr. Henry, not even the letters that he wrote home, in which his youthful anger at these events, was certainly poured out, have been preserved.' It is still more to be regretted, that we know no more of the studies, the social enjoyments, and the mental struggles, by which the youth was gradually fitted for the important station which he was afterwards to occupy, but the waves of time have rolled over the record of these things and left few traces visible.

In his eighteenth year (1527) Calvin received the rectory of Martville. This was given him contrary to rule, since he had received no ordination except that of the tonsure,' and indeed no evidence can be found that any other ordination was ever conferred upon him.2 He soon after, instead of this living," received," says Desmay, a Catholic and Sorbonnist, "the parochial benefice of Pont l'Evêque, where his grandfather dwelt and his father was baptized. Thus was the flock given in charge to the wolf." He was presented to this place by Messire Claude Han

This first part of the ceremony of ordination in the Romish Church, may be received after the age of seven years. It seems to have been not unfrequent. ly followed by ecclesiastical preferment as a special favor, though not according to the Canons. Compare Roscoe's Life of Leo X. Vol. I. 12 sq. For the ceremony of the Tonsure see Hurd's Rites and Ceremonies, p. 282.

* See Bayle, Art. Calvin, also Beza, Vita Cal.

3 Quoted by Henry, Das Leben d. Cal. Bd. I. S. 34.

gest, abbot of St. Eloi. This promotion seems to have awakened in him a youthful vanity, for he says: "A single disputation made me rector." His want of ordination did not prevent him from preaching several times to the people of the village Pont l'Evêque.

er.

In reviewing the few notices, which are all that now remain of the early life of Calvin, and comparing his training and developments with those of Luther, we are impressed with the evidence of the guiding hand of God in preparing both of them for the respective parts they were to take, in rescuing the Christian world from the power and influence of the Romish hierarchy. It has been said that neither of them was fitted by nature to be a reformCalvin complained often that he was "by nature of a timid,' soft and shrinking mind," and a lover of seclusion; and Luther was melancholy and ascetic in his temperament. Yet they had qualities which, with the discipline they received, seemed to peculiarly fit them each for his own station. Luther, naturally of a more imaginative turn, and inclined to enthusiasm, was best qualified to influence the masses, the lower ranks of society; while the repose and earnestness of mind which Calvin ever exhibited, enabled him to reach the thoughtful and cultivated man.

Luther was " born poor and brought up poor, one of the poorest of men." He was a man of the people. Until he was noticed by his patroness, he was obliged to beg, singing under the windows of the rich for "alms and bread." Hardship and stern necessity were his; even the air he breathed, he was compelled to struggle for. In the school of suffering, resistance, and privation he learned to say and to feel too, that: Were there as many devils in Worms as roof-tiles, he would on.' Calvin's early associations were with the educated and refined. He was cradled in the lap of nobility. He knew no distinction between himself and the best blood in the province. Hence in his subsequent life, we see him stand by the side of princes, and counsel kings, with a dignity befitting the servant of the Most High. There is in him none of that cringing and fawning before royalty, or insult, and contumely towards the rich and noble when addressing the common people, which was too prevalent among the early reformers. The court of Margaret of Navarre, or the more polished one of Ferrara were honored by Calvin's

In preface to the Psalms he says: Ego qui natura timido, molli et pusillo animo me esse fateor; and often during his life, and on his death-bed, repeats the same thing.

1845.]

Change in his Studies.

337

presence, while Luther's favorite resort was the "Black Eagle” tavern, where much of his " table talk" was taken down by eager listeners.

Calvin as Student at Law-Change in religious views, etc.

1528-1532.

The preferments which Calvin had received, did not blind his eyes to the errors of the Catholic church. It does not, however, certainly appear whether his growing dissatisfaction with it was the primary cause of the change made in his course of study when he was about eighteen years old. He says that his father, who perhaps foresaw the troubles which impended over the church, coveted for him the opulence and distinction, which was acquired by the practice of law, and transferred him from the study of philosophy to jurisprudence. But it seems altogether probable that the father did not make this change without observing a disrelish in the son to the course which he had marked out for him. Be this as it may, however, it is certain from Calvin's subsequent life, that his university years were not spent in vain. He made good use of his legal studies, especially when called to aid in forming a new State, and was by them made worthy of the appellation of " Legislator of the Reformation."

It must have been at some time near the commencement of his university life, that Calvin first became acquainted with the Bible. He had not yet learned Greek or Hebrew, and this Bible was probably the Latin translation of Faber Stapulensis, or the manuscript French translation of his kinsman Robert Olivetan,3 made in 1520.4 From this man, with whom Calvin now formed an acquaintance, he also received much religious instruction and perhaps his first decided interest in the pure doctrines of the Gospel was awakened through Olivetan's instrumentality.

1 Cum videret legum scientiam passim augere suos cultores opibus, spes illa repente eum impulit ad mutandum consilium.-Pr. ad Ps.

? It seems to have been no unusual thing at that time, for even those devoted to religion to be unacquainted with this book. Luther first saw a Latin Bible in the Augustinian Cloister at Erfurth, when he was twenty years old, and this it seems was seldom shown even to visitors. Luther himself says: "The Bible was a book but rarely found in the hands of the religious, who knew much more of St. Thomas than of St. Paul."-Audin's Life of Luther, p. 13, 26.

3 A native of one of the valleys of Piedmont.

See Browning's Hist. of the Huguenots, p. 6.