Renée, whose compassionate heart had been so often touched by the recital of the terrible punishments and victorious faith which animated the evangelicals, could not look upon one of them who had escaped a dungeon and the scaffold, without experiencing towards him the feelings of a mother and a sister. 'She was struck with Calvin's fine genius,' says a catholic historian,[767] and the perfection with which he spoke and wrote the French language. She presented her two countrymen to the duke, as men of letters who had come to visit the brilliant Italy: this was a better claim to the favor of the grandson of Pope Alexander VI. than their condition as reformers.
Ferrara presented many subjects of interest to Calvin. The duke of Este liked to play the Medici: Bernard Tasso, a poet not without imagination, was secretary to the duchess; and his son, the illustrious author of the 'Jerusalem Delivered,' was soon to fill the court of Ferrara with his genius, his sorrows, his despair and folly, caused (it is supposed) by his unhappy passion for the beautiful Leonora, daughter of Renée, and even to expiate by a seven years' captivity in a madhouse the crime of having loved a granddaughter of Louis XII. and Lucrezia Borgia. Celio Calcagnini, canon, poet, orator, mathematician, and antiquary, who guided in the land of the Muses the footsteps of the youthful Anne of Este, who afterwards became duchess of Guise, and her friend Olympia Morata, was then also at the court of Este. A year sooner, the author of 'The Institutes of the Christian Religion' might have met the author of the 'Orlando Furioso;' but the somewhat discordant individualities of Calvin and Ariosto were not destined to be found side by side.
It was not the men of learning, however, whom the young theologian had come to see: it was the duchess herself. That princess, who had already received in France a few rays of evangelical light, did not yet possess a sufficient knowledge of Christian truth: she felt this, and was determined to seek above all things peace with God. She therefore had frequent interviews with Calvin. Holy Scripture was the subject of their conversation; the reformer explained to Renée one passage by another, and the light of heaven beaming from all these passages of Holy Writ, carried brightness and warmth into the princess's heart. The young doctor spoke with simplicity and modesty, but at the same time with affection and decision. 'If I address you, madam,' he said, 'it is not from rashness or presumption, but pure and true affection to make you prevail in the Lord. When I consider the pre-eminence in which He has placed you, I think that, as a person of princely rank, you can advance the kingdom of Jesus Christ.' But even this consideration was not necessary to arouse the zeal of the evangelist of Noyon. The princess's noble character and her love for the Gospel touched him deeply. 'I observe in you,' he added, 'such fear of God, and such a real desire to obey Him, that I should consider myself a castaway if I neglected the opportunity of being useful to you.'[768] Calvin was the most profound and most earnest commentator of Holy Scripture; and Renée embraced with her whole heart the truths that he proclaimed, so that the reformer was able to say to her some time later: 'It has pleased God, madam, to enlighten you with the truth of His holy Gospel. Let us now confess that if God has withdrawn us from the depths of darkness, it is in order that we should follow the light straightforwardly, turning neither to this side nor to that.'[769] The duchess profited by this advice. 'Calvin,' says Muratori, 'so infected Renée with his errors that it was never possible to extract from her heart the poison she had drunk.'[770]
=A CHRISTIAN WALK.=
An open Christian walk was difficult at a court where popery and worldliness ruled together. Hence Renée felt keenly the need of directions in harmony with the Word of God; and in her difficulties and agonies, at the times when she was about to faint, 'as if she was sunk in water almost over her head,' she had recourse to the evangelical theologian. Calvin then invited her always to walk 'forwards, in order that the gifts of God might increase in her.' 'The main point,' as he wrote to her some time after, 'is that the holy doctrine of our Master should so transform us in mind and heart, that His glory may shine forth in us by innocence, integrity, and holiness.'[771]
Some of the most illustrious divines of Roman-catholicism have been, in France and other countries, the directors of princes; but there was a great difference between them and the reformer. That practical evangelist, whom Romish controversialists and others have reproached with speaking of nothing but doctrines, urged the daughter of Louis XII. to 'seek after innocence, integrity, and holiness.'
The relations of Calvin with the duchess lasted all his life, and they were always marked with frankness and respect. Touched with a zeal so Christian and so pure, she loved and honored him, 'as long as he lived,' says Theodore Beza, 'as an excellent instrument of the Lord.'[772] Even when he could no longer hold a pen on account of his extreme weakness, Calvin, borrowing the hand of his brother, wrote to her; and to her were addressed the last three French epistles of the reformer.[773]
=THE COUNTESS OF MARENNES.=
The duchess of Ferrara was not the only person whom Calvin called at that time to a Christian life. 'Many others, especially among those about her person, were seduced,' says Muratori; that is to say, brought over to evangelical truth.[774] These conversions, probably, must not be ascribed solely to Calvin: some, like Renée, had already enjoyed a certain knowledge of the Gospel; others were afterwards strengthened in their faith; but all received something from the young reformer. Soon after his arrival at the court of Ferrara, Calvin had remarked a lady of great intelligence and learning, who was one of its principal ornaments. This was Anne de Parthenay, first lady of honor to the duchess, and wife of Antoine de Pons, count of Marennes, first gentleman to the duke. The countess of Marennes was a great musician, and often sang in the duchess's apartments, where she was admired for the beauty of her voice.[775] But Anne busied herself with more serious labors. Not satisfied with studying the Latin authors, she had a taste for Greek, and 'intrepidly' translated the poets and prose writers.[776] That eminent woman did more: she read books of divinity, and even took a particular pleasure in 'discussing almost every day with the theologians the matters of which they treated.'[777] She therefore talked with Calvin on these subjects, and before long the pure and living faith of the reformer gave a new direction to her soul. Hitherto she had been somewhat of a 'blue-stocking,' but now she 'ceased to have any confidence in herself,' and sought in the holy books and in her Saviour the means of quenching the thirst for knowledge and the divine life which tormented her. From that hour she became a new creature and a 'good huguenot.' She even won over her husband to the convictions that were dear to herself, and, so long as the countess lived, the latter showed himself a great lover of virtue and of truth.[778]
Adjoining the hall of Aurora, where Renée and her court usually assembled, was a chapel adorned by the pencil of Titian. Until now Calvin had only spoken in the duchess's apartments, and respect naturally prevented the servants (according to the historians of the Roman church) 'from inquiring too curiously into what occurred there.'[779] But ere long Renée began to think that she ought not to keep for herself only and a few court favorites the words of life and light which fell from the lips of the French divine. While listening to them, she had felt the bitterness of sin and the fear of God's judgments; but she had at the same time tasted the sweets of pardon and eternal life. Ought not others to enjoy them also? Should she prevent those from entering who desired to enter?