If Calvin was evidently more decided than he had hitherto been, the cause was not only what was taking place in Germany, but also what was passing at Geneva. To put the matter into legal shape, to set in broad daylight the feelings of respect for the reformer which now animated the people, and thus to deprive Calvin of every pretext for declining the call which was sent to him, the general Council had been assembled on May 1, and ‘had revoked the edict of expulsion of the ministers passed in 1538, and declared that they esteemed them servants of God, so that for the future Farel and Calvin, Saunier and the others might go in and out at Geneva at their pleasure.’[[80]]
Calvin’s Return To Geneva.
This measure of the people of Geneva was a large one, but the Council did not stop there. Fearing, with good reason, that Strasburg would wish to keep to herself the great man whom Geneva had banished, they addressed two distinct letters to the ministers and the magistrates of Zurich and Basel, begging them to support their request at Strasburg. They wrote also to the Council and the ministers of the latter town. As these letters are important and very little known, it may be proper to give some passages from them.
‘You are not ignorant,’ said the Genevese syndics and senate in their letter to the pastors, ‘that our ministers have been unjustly driven from our town, not in the regular course of justice, but rather as the result of much injustice, tumult, and conspiracy; and you know the troubles and horrible scandals in which we have been thereby plunged.[[81]] For an evil so dangerous there is no remedy but the presence of able, prudent, and God-fearing pastors, qualified to repair this disaster. We, therefore, have recourse to you who have given us abundant evidence of your tender solicitude for our Church, endeavoring to persuade our magistrate to reinstate in the ministry our faithful ministers Farel, Calvin, and Courault. This could not be effected at the time because of the harshness and obstinacy of the perpetrators of the disturbances; and thus a great multitude of just and pious men were plunged in distress and tears.[[82]] But now our most merciful Father having visited us in his goodness, we beg you to use your endeavors to restore to us our faithful pastors, who were rejected by men that were seeking the gratification of their own evil desires rather than the will of God.’[[83]] In such terms did the syndics and the Council of Geneva request the ministers of the towns to which they applied to aid them in recovering their pastors.
The letter of the syndics and the Council of Geneva to the Councils of Zurich and Basel was no less emphatic. They said to them ‘that although for twenty years their town had been kept in agitation by violent storms, it has known no tumults, no seditions, no dangers, to compare with those with which the anger of God has visited us, since by the craft and contrivances of factious and seditious men,[[84]] the faithful pastors, by whom their church had been founded and maintained, to the great edification and consolation of all, have been unjustly driven away by the blackest ingratitude—the benefits, assuredly no ordinary ones, which the Lord had conferred by their ministry, being entirely forgotten.’ The Genevese added ‘that from the hour of that exile Geneva had known nothing but troubles, enmities, strifes, contentions, breaking up of social bonds, seditions, factions and homicides.[[85]] The city would, consequently, have been almost wholly destroyed, if the Lord in his great compassion had not looked upon it with love and sent Viret to gather together the wretched flock, which was at that time reduced to such a pitch of confusion that it was scarcely, if at all, possible to recognize in it any of the features of a church: and that there was nothing which the Genevese desired more ardently or with more unanimity than to see their ministers restored to the former position in which God had placed them. And, therefore,’ they continued, ‘we pray you in the name of Christ, most honorable lords, to entreat the illustrious senators of Strasburg not only to give back to us our brother Calvin, of whom we have the most urgent need, and who is so eagerly looked for by our people, but further persuade him to come to Geneva as soon as possible. Learned and pious pastors, such as he is, are most necessary for us, because Geneva is, as it were, the gate of France and Italy;[[86]] because day by day many people resort to it from these lands and from other neighboring countries; and because it will be a great consolation and edification to them to find in our town pastors competent to meet their wants.’
A letter of like character was sent to Strasburg. All the letters were subscribed, ‘The Syndics and the Senate of the city of Geneva’ (Syndici et Senatus Genevensis civitatis).
Rudeness Of Phrase.
Men’s minds were at that time in a state of great agitation. Hostile opinions were not expressed in mawkish phraseology; and the Council, as it was bent on having Calvin at any cost, conveyed its meaning unmistakably. There might be, perhaps, some rudeness of expression; the writing was forcible rather than refined; but we certainly possess in these letters the views of the Genevese magistrates and people, especially of the best among them, respecting Calvin, the authors of his banishment, and the condition of Geneva after his departure. The latitudinarian and often unbelieving spirit of our days would fain reconstruct this history after the fashion of the nineteenth century; but in these documents we have assuredly the impress of the olden time. The chief magistrates of the republic could not possibly have expressed themselves as they did if their statement of facts could have been contradicted by the people, their contemporaries, as they have been several centuries afterwards. The syndics who signed these letters were not upstarts raised to office by a party. They had long been in the Council, and all of them had previously been syndics, one in 1540, two of the others in 1537, and one of these two as early as 1534, and the fourth in 1535.[[87]] It is not to be doubted that the view taken at this epoch by the chiefs of the Genevese nation will be likewise the view of impartial and enlightened men of every age. It has been said that the faction which expelled Calvin does not deserve the grave reproaches which have been cast upon it by modern historians. The syndics and councils of 1541 can hardly be placed in the ranks of modern historians.
These letters were everywhere well received. The pastors of Zurich wrote word to the Council of Geneva that their Council, eager to give them pleasure, had written to the Council and the ministers of Strasburg, and likewise to Calvin at Ratisbon, begging the former to press Calvin, and requesting the latter to comply with the call from Geneva.[[88]]
This testimony, borne by the leading men in the State and in the Church at Zurich, Basel, and Strasburg, after they had received the letters of which we have just given some account, is a confirmation of their contents, and shows that the view set forth in them was the opinion of European Protestantism, ever ready to do homage to the greatest theologian, who was, at the same time, one of the greatest men and greatest writers of the age.