‘If ministers are given to the churches who nourish the people with sound doctrine, who walk before them as examples, who watch diligently over the safety of the church, remembering that they are fathers and shepherds and must not cherish any other ambition than that of bringing the people into obedience to one master alone, that is Christ; if they govern their families with prudence, bring up their children in the fear of God, and honor the married state by virtuous and chaste living—then this is not only a monster, it is more monstrous than a monster! But if the pope, that Romish idol, as God sitteth in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God; if he claim to hold the whole world in the most miserable bondage; if his satellites have no care to publish the Word of God, but persecute it as much as they can with fire and sword; if, while they pour contempt on marriage, they not only seek to invade the nuptial bed, but also defile the land with their obscenities; this is perfectly endurable and has nothing monstrous in it!
‘If one venture to open one’s mouth in favor of a proper application of the wealth of the church; if one attempt to repress the pillage of these thieves, and to get that property expended for the uses to which it was destined; this is a frightful monster. But of these vast resources of the church let there be no portion for the maintenance of faithful ministers, nothing for the schools, nothing for the poor, to whom they ought to belong; let insatiable gulfs absorb and waste them in luxury, licentiousness, play, poisonings and murders; all this is very far from being a monster! What shall I say? At this day there is nothing monstrous in a world in which every thing is notoriously out of order, crazy, profligate, perverted, deformed, twisted, confused, in ruins, dissipated and mutilated. Nothing monstrous, except the moving of a little finger to apply a remedy to such vast evils. Monsters! That must be transported to the end of the earth!‘
The Pope. ‘It is necessary to oppose all these particular assemblies in which matters in controversy are discussed, and to convoke a council. Then the Protestants will either submit to its decrees or will persist in their own views. In the latter case, the Emperor and the King of France, between whom negotiations are now going on, will take advantage of their alliance to correct and to recall them to better thoughts.’
Calvin. ‘So then, in case the Protestants are not willing to place themselves and every thing belonging to them in the hands of the Roman pontiff, they are to be subdued by arms; so long as a single man remains who shall dare to open his lips against the abominable supremacy of the Roman see, there shall be no end and no limit to the shedding of blood. Such is the shepherd’s crook of which he will make use to drive the sheep into the fold. But the prophet says, Take counsel together and it shall come to nought; associate yourselves, O ye people, and ye shall be broken in pieces.[[67]] There are men, grievous to tell! traitors, enemies of their country, who are everywhere scattering the seeds of intestine war; who, as soon as they think that men’s minds are quite prepared, brandish their torches and kindle a fire; who, the moment they see a spark, make haste to throw dry wood on it and raise a flame with their poisonous breath, until at last the whole of Germany shall be nothing but one vast conflagration.’[[68]]
If Calvin is rather sharp in his reply, the pope, it must be owned, had not infused into his attack much mildness or fairness. ‘It is not easy to decide, to speak in a Christian manner,’ he had said, ‘which are the worst enemies of Jesus Christ, the Protestants or the Turks. For the latter kill only the body, but the former destroy the soul.’ This saying shocked even the judicious and impartial Sleidan. ‘Have not the Turks,’ said he, ‘spread their religion everywhere by arms? And who among us have shown more zeal to exalt the grace and the virtue of Jesus Christ than the Protestants, who have in this respect surpassed the Catholics themselves?’ The pope even did not shrink from having recourse to the same methods as the Turks. He had sent to the emperor his own nephew to scheme the destruction of the Reformation and to extinguish it, if need be, in the blood of the Evangelicals; while no one more earnestly than Calvin stigmatized beforehand that fratricidal war, to which the desire to crush the Reformation afterwards gave rise. The blow having been violent, the return blow was energetic. Calvin was wrong, however, in one respect—in that he did not fully and publicly acknowledge that there were honorable exceptions to the licentiousness of priests and to the other evils of the papacy. But he has elsewhere exhibited this fairness; for he distinguishes among the Catholics two classes—those in whom malice predominates, and those who are deluded by a false appearance of truth.[[69]]
Calvin At Ratisbon.
This work bears the date of March, 1541. Calvin arrived at Ratisbon at the beginning of March, and remained there about four months. The emperor was there longer still. It may be supposed that a work so remarkable, written as a reply to the discourse addressed by the pope to Charles V., was read at the time by the emperor’s ministers, perhaps even by the emperor himself. Calvin did not put his name to it, probably in order that attention might be paid to the considerations which are put forward in it, without regard to their authorship; perhaps also in order not to implicate the town of Strasburg which showed him such noble hospitality and of which he was the deputy. But his name is read, so to speak, in every line of this eloquent memoir. Sleidan positively names Calvin as its author.[[70]]
Calvin’s part at Ratisbon it is not difficult to recognize. It was such as Luther’s would have been, had he been present. He firmly believed that the Protestants, and even his dear Melanchthon, under the influence of their desire to reconcile the two parties, were inclined to make too many concessions. This tendency must be resisted. Seeing how the waters were rushing along and threatening to carry every thing before them, he felt it his duty to stand in their way like a rock to arrest the disaster. ‘Believe me,’ he wrote from Ratisbon to Farel, May 11, ‘in actions of this kind brave souls are wanted who may strengthen others.[[71]] Pray then all of you with earnestness to the Lord that he may fortify us with his spirit of boldness.’ The next day he wrote to him, ‘So far as I can understand, if we are willing to be satisfied with a half-Christ, we shall easily be able to come to an agreement.’[[72]] Did Calvin, allured by the position which he felt bound to take, go too far? The footing was slippery. He did perhaps go too far in words, but not in deeds.
The legate Contarini had declared to the emperor that, as the Protestants deviate in various articles from the common consent of the Catholic Church, it would be better, all things considered, to refer the whole matter to the pope and to the next council. ‘What can be hoped for from such a gathering?’ said Calvin. ‘There will not be one in a hundred willing and able to understand what is for the glory of God and for the good of the Church. It is notorious what sort of theology is held at Rome, principally in the consistory. Its first principle is that there is no God; its second, that Christianity is nothing but foolishness.’[[73]] Calvin does not mean that this is the doctrine which Rome professes, but only that the papacy behaves as if it were so. Having neither the true God nor true Christianity, it is in the Reformer’s sight without God and without faith. He continues—‘Suppose, then, that we have a council, the pope will be its president, the bishops and prelates will be judges in it.... They will come to it in the most deliberate manner to gainsay and to resist every thing which would infringe on their avarice and ambition, and on that tyrannical supremacy in the exercise of which they have no greater enemy than Jesus Christ. When the council is held, it will contribute rather to destroy than to put things again into a right state.’
Contarini had recommended to the bishops various reforms; such as to be watchful over their dioceses lest the religion of the Protestants should propagate itself in them; and to establish schools in order that people might not send their children to those of the Evangelicals. ‘He had indeed many other evils to deal with,’ said Calvin, ‘if he had a wish to give good medicine. The world is full of the worship of idols, in the shape of relics and images, to such an extent that there could hardly be more of it among the pagans. Every one makes gods for himself after his fancy (à sa poste), out of saints, male and female. The virtue of Christ is as good as buried, and his honor virtually annihilated. The light of truth is almost extinct; hardly any sparks of it remain.’[[74]]