But how does this work, accomplished out of man, act in man?... Such is the great question the Reformer sets himself. Divine faith which lays hold of the righteousness of Christ upon the cross gives birth at the same moment to the holiness of Christ in the heart. 'Man has no sooner embraced the atonement with a faith full of confidence,' he says, 'than he experiences an unalterable peace in his conscience. He possesses a spirit of adoption, which makes him call God my Father! and which procures him a sweet and joyful communion with the heavenly Father. Immediately the least drop of faith is put into our souls we begin to contemplate the face of God, kind and favourable to us. True, we see it from afar, but it is with an undoubting eye, and we know that there is no deception.'
A new question is here started. The young doctor is asked: Is man saved by charity or without it? He makes answer: 'There is no other faith which justifies save that which is united with charity; but it is not from charity that it derives the power to justify. Faith justifies only because it puts us in communication with the righteousness of Christ. Whosoever confounds the two righteousnesses (that of man and that of God) hinders poor souls from reposing on the sole and pure mercy of God, plaits a crown of thorns for Jesus Christ, and turns his sacrifice to ridicule.'
Here Calvin puts forward the grand idea which characterises the Reformation effected by his teaching; namely, that it is only the new man which we should value. After insisting as much as any doctor on the work that Christ does without us, he insists more than any on the work Christ must do within us. 'I exalt to the highest degree,' he says, 'the conjunction that we have with our Chief,—the dwelling he makes in our hearts by faith,—the sacred union by which we enjoy him. It is necessary that we should perceive in our lives a melody and harmony between the righteousness of God and the obedience of our souls.'
But Calvin observed that many humble, timid christians were distressed because they experienced only a weak faith. These he consoles, and the images he employs are picturesque: 'If any one, shut up in a deep dungeon,' he says, 'received the light of the sun obliquely and partially, through a high and narrow window, he would not certainly have a sight of the full sun, yet he would not fail to receive a certain quantity of light and to enjoy its use. In the same way, though we are shut up in the prison of this earthly body, where much obscurity surrounds us on every side, if we have the least spark of God's light, we are sufficiently illuminated and may have a firm assurance.'
May not that flame be extinguished, ask christians hesitatingly. 'No,' said Calvin, 'the light of faith is never so extinct that there does not remain some glimmer. The root of faith is never so torn from the heart, that it does not remain fastened there, although it seems to lean to this side or that.' 'Faith,' he exclaimed (and he had often felt it), 'faith is an armed man within us to resist the attacks of the evil one.... If we put faith in the front, she receives the blows and wards them off. She may indeed be shaken, as a stalworth soldier may be compelled by a violent blow to step backwards. Her shield may receive damage so as to lose its shape, but not be penetrated; and even in this extremity the shield deadens the blow, and the weapon does not pierce to the heart.'
After consoling the timid and uplifting the wounded, this extraordinary man, who speaks with the firmness of one of the captains of the army of God, exhorts the soldiers of Christ to be brave: 'When St. John promises the victory to our faith, he does not mean simply that it will be victorious in one battle, or in ten, but in all. Be full of courage then. To fluctuate, to vary, to be tossed to and fro; to doubt, to vacillate, to be kept in suspense, and finally to despair ... that is not having confidence. We must have a solid support on which we can rest. God has said it, that is enough. Being under the safeguard of Christ, we are in no danger of perishing.'[351]
Calvin turning to Rome seeks for the origin of its errors and superstitions, and finds it in the pelagianism with which it is tainted. Grace in all its fulness,—grace from the first movement of regeneration until the final accomplishment of salvation, was the keynote of all Calvin's theology; and it is also the powerful artillery with which he batters the Roman fortress. Like St. Paul in the first century, like St. Augustine in the fifth, Calvin is the Doctor of grace in the sixteenth. This is one of his essential features. 'The will of man,' he said, 'cannot of itself incline to good. Such a movement, which is the beginning of our conversion to God, Scripture entirely attributes to the Holy Ghost. A doctrine not only useful, but sweet and savoury through the fruit it bears; for those who do not know themselves to be members of the peculiar people of God, are in a continual trembling.... No doubt the wicked find in it a matter to accuse and cavil at, to disparage and ridicule ... but if we fear their petulance, we must keep silence as to our faith, for there is not a single article which they do not contaminate with their blasphemies. Christ (he continues) wishing to deliver us from all fear in the midst of so many deadly assaults, has promised that those who have been given him by his Father to keep, shall not perish.'[352]
At this period Calvin hears a clamour raised against him. He is accused of maintaining that God predestines the wicked to evil, and he replies at once by reprobating such an impious doctrine. 'These mockers jabber against God,' he says, 'alleging that the wicked are unjustly condemned, since they execute only what God has determined.... Not so,' he exclaims; 'far from having obeyed God's command, the wicked by their lusts rebel against it as far as in them lies. There must be no fencing with God; there must be no saying, with Agamemnon in Homer, speaking of evil: It is not I who am the cause, but Jupiter and Fate.'[353]
Calvin next hastens to show the fruits of faith: 'We have given the first rank to doctrine,' he said, 'but to be useful to us, it must penetrate into the soul, pass into the manners and regulate the actions of our life.... Since the Holy Ghost consecrates us to be temples of God, we must take pains that the glory of God fills the temple.... We know those babblers who are content with having the gospel on their lips, whilst it ought to sink to the bottom of the soul, and we detest their babbling.'