History of the Reformation in Europe in the Time of Calvin, Vol. 6 (of 8)

by J. H. Merle d'Aubigné

Voulaient du Dieu vivant braver la majesté.

DISTURBANCE AT ST. GERVAIS.

He therefore went on. His popular eloquence, his animated movements, his imagery so well adapted to make his ideas more lively and more obvious, his energetic gestures, his voice like thunder, the resounding of which, according to Theodore Beza, made his hearers tremble, made him the most captivating of the orators of France and Switzerland. Farel, who generally spoke extempore, could not but be struck at the spectacle which presented itself to him, for the congregation in such circumstances always reacts on the preacher. He was standing in the presence of a stormy sea, the surging waves of which appeared about to engulf him. But he felt that he stood on a rock, and he had learnt long ago to brave the tempest. He then courageously unfolded the act of accusation. He set forth those things which would profane the supper. He enumerated ‘those divisions, those bands, those blasphemies, those profligacies which were multiplying, and which made it impossible for the ministers to administer it.’[634] For a long time people could not listen to him without being charmed, but it was quite otherwise at this moment. Men’s minds were more and more agitated, hearts were rebellious, the opposition burst forth, voices changed by passion were heard, and the disturbance of which the chronicler tells filled the church of St. Gervais. Farel, however, kept the upper hand. His character and his action awed the rebels. His friends protected his departure, and he succeeded in reaching his own house unharmed.

Meanwhile Calvin was preaching at St. Peter’s. What was passing there?

CALVIN’S MORNING SERMON.

The worship appears to have been quiet and dignified; the scenes of St. Gervais, at any rate, were not repeated here. The quarter in which the cathedral stood, its imposing and solemn aspect, the composition of the congregation, the magistrates, who doubtless were present in large numbers, the grave countenance of the reformer, partly explain this decorum. But the character of his speech, calm, simple, rich in thought, luminous, and illuminating all the subjects of which he treated, concise, awe-inspiring, and convincing, without the vivid and popular flashes of Farel, doubtless contributed thereto to a great extent. Nevertheless Calvin kept back nothing. ‘We protest before you all,’ he said, ‘that we are not obstinate on the question about bread, leavened or unleavened; that is a matter of indifference which is left to the discretion of the Church. If we decline to administer the supper, it is because we are in a great difficulty which prompts us to this course.’ Then he spoke of the divisions, the bands of men, the blasphemies, the profligacies, disorders, abominations, mockery of God and his Gospel, the troubles and the sects which prevailed in the town. ‘For,’ he said, ‘in public, and without any kind of punishment being inflicted for it, a thousand derisive speeches have been uttered against the Word of God and likewise against the supper.’[635] He then stated unreservedly the motives which deterred him from celebrating the communion. But he does not appear to have gone further. He had doubtless more than once in his discourses transgressed the limits of moderation; but it seems that the solemnity of the occasion and the dignity of the pulpit led him to suppress those violent phrases with which his speech sometimes bristled. He had a difficult task to accomplish. He was bound to make these people understand the obligations imposed on them by the profession of Christianity. Every member of a society has, in fact, certain duties to discharge, which are essential to the very existence of the community; in the same way, every member of the Church owes to it an edifying and blameless life. Christians form but one body, and it is a matter of concern to each of its members that God should be honored in them all. Evident hypocrisy and shameless depravity, in any man making profession of being a Christian, are an injury to the whole Christian society. Union with God is incompatible with a state of sin; vice and virtue are two things which never go together. To regard as a trifle and a matter of indifference the implacable opposition which exists between truth and falsehood, between holiness and licentiousness, so that the one or the other may be pursued without any ground for preference, is the degradation of humanity and the scandal of scandals. If this mode of thought prevail, the Christian Church is in a state of suffering; it must be defended, it must be saved; and a Church unwilling to be defended would be in a very unhealthy condition. More than that, and Calvin frequently called it to mind, to maintain the necessity of a life conformed to the Word of God is of importance even to the man whose conduct is in opposition to his commandments. This necessity is insisted on not to destroy but to save him. ‘It is maintained in such a manner,’ said Calvin, ‘as to bring him back into the way of salvation, and the Church is quite ready to receive him as a friend. She must not exercise a too rigorous severity; she must not proceed strictly to extremities and show herself inexorable, but must rather come forward with gentleness. If this moderation be not carefully adhered to, there is danger that from correctors we should become executioners.’[636]

These were Calvin’s principles. His discourse has not been handed down to us, but it is impossible to suppose that he did not speak according to his deepest convictions; and if he did so, that would partly account for the calmness with which he was listened to. He was, however, mistaken on one point, and this we cannot too fully acknowledge. At that time the Church and the state were everywhere almost confounded, so that ‘the state did not hesitate to intermeddle in many subjects which were within the province of the Church.’[637] This was particularly the case at Geneva. Of all the reformers, Calvin was the one who had it most at heart to establish the autonomy of the Church, and thereby a certain independence of the two societies. But, like his contemporaries, he adhered to the opinions of his own age and of those which had preceded it. The elements of Judaic discipline had, from the first century, trenched on the ground of Christian discipline. The Reformation doubtless effected everywhere a great change in this state of things; but still the state was seen, even at Geneva, thrusting its iron arm into the midst of the Christian societies for the purpose of striking the guilty. That is a coarse and fatal error, one which every true Christian must energetically cast from him. Fortunately there could be no question on this point in the great conflict of Easter 1538. The state was then for the moment separated from the Church, and the reformers did not and would not make use of any other weapons than those of the Spirit.

HIS EVENING SERMON.

If the reformer had been able to preach with tranquillity in the morning, it was to be otherwise in the evening. The most furious of his adversaries thought that they owed him something, and in their wrath meant to discharge the debt. So long as they had had to do only with the good-natured Farel, matters had gone on pretty well, notwithstanding his lively sallies; but this young man from Noyon was a spirit of a different stamp, and since he came to Geneva everything had changed. He had a methodical intellect and the faculty for organization. Had he not prepared a fundamental law of the Church, to which they had been obliged to take the oath at St. Peter’s? He wanted to regulate everything, and this was not convenient. Since Farel had been attacked, it was not fair to let Calvin escape. An uproar had been made in the morning at St. Gervais; another shall be made in the evening at the church of St. Francis at Rive. It was in that convent that Farel had for the first time appeared in the pulpit, March 1, 1534; and there Calvin was to preach, April 21, 1538. The quarter in which this convent stood was situated in the lower part of the town, not far from the shores of the lake, and it was probably less quiet than the neighborhood of the cathedral. The church was speedily filled, and Calvin arrived. He began his sermon. Knowing that Farel had been treated worse than himself, it is possible that, to leave no ground for reproaching himself, he might think it his duty to put a stronger emphasis on his words, and to lay stress on certain things, in order to make them observed and felt. For the rest, had he spoken like an angel, he would not have escaped the tumult. Men’s minds were irritated; the thought of resisting this inflexible man had seized on many, and made them frantic; they had even taken their swords, and had come to church as to a military parade. Violence often remains at first smouldering, silent, and makes no sign. It appears to have been so in this case; but at some word uttered by the preacher, it revealed itself in a sudden explosion. One would have said that a stormy wind passed over that crowd, and impressed on it a passionate movement. In the church of Rive there were violent speeches and threatening gestures. This was not all. In sight of that orator, whose dignity and power irritated them, the most furious drew their swords, and the flash of steel was seen in the sanctuary of peace. No one, it is true, directed the fatal edge at the throat of the orator. It appears, however, that a struggle took place between the friends and the enemies of the Reformation, and that arms were crossed; for the great magistrate of Geneva in the sixteenth century, Michel Rozet, felt bound to say in his chronicle that the affair passed off without bloodshed.[638] The syndic Gautier, too, looks on this fortunate circumstance as a kind of miracle. Thus, after having heard the firing of arquebuses, fifty or sixty times in the course of the evening, against his own house, the reformer at this hour saw glittering swords brandished against him in the very house of God. Luther and other reformers were also tried by such tribulations, but in their case they came from the pope and his adherents, not from people of their own Church. Was Calvin agitated, or did he remain calm in the presence of this outbreak? We do not know. It is probable that, while inwardly agitated, he preserved an outward calmness. While some of his friends gathered around the pulpit to defend him, there were happily found a few moderate men, belonging to both sides, who exerted themselves to restore peace, to check the outbursts of passion, and to bring to reason those excited men who were dishonoring by their violence the temple of the Lord. Gradually feeling calmed down, speech became less violent, swords were returned to their scabbards, and the storm was laid. The friends of Calvin accompanied and conducted him safe and sound to his abode, which was not far off. ‘And in the evening, at Rive,’ says the syndic Rozet, ‘a disturbance broke out against Calvin. Swords were drawn; but it was all quelled.’

DISTURBANCE AT RIVE.