J. H. Merle D'Aubigné - History of the Reformation in Europe in the Time of Calvin (Vol. 1-8)

But the reproduction of contemporary documents is not the only business of the historian. He must do more than exhume from the sepulchre in which they are sleeping the relics of men and things of times past, that he may exhibit them in the light of day. We value highly such a work and those who perform it, for it is a necessary one; and yet we do not think it sufficient. Dry bones do not faithfully represent the men of other days. They did not live as skeletons, but as beings full of life and activity. The historian is not simply a resurrectionist: he needs—strange but necessary ambition—a power that can restore the dead to life.

Certain modern historians have successfully accomplished this task. The author, unable to follow them, and compelled to present his readers with a simple and unassuming chronicle, feels bound to express his admiration for those who have thus been able to revive the buried past. He firmly believes that, if a history should have truth, it should also have life. The events of past times did not resemble, in the days when they occurred, those grand museums of Rome, Naples, Paris, and London, in whose galleries we behold long rows of marble statues, mummies, and tombs. There were then living beings who thought, felt, spoke, acted, and struggled. The picture, whatever history may be able to do, will always have less of life than the reality.

When an historian comes across a speech of one of the actors in the great drama of human affairs, he ought to lay hold of it, as if it were a pearl, and weave it into his tapestry, in order to relieve the duller colours and give more solidity and brilliancy. Whether the speech be met with in the letters or writings of the actor himself, or in those of the chroniclers, is a matter of no importance: he should take it wherever he finds it. The history which exhibits men thinking, feeling, and acting as they did in their lifetime, is of far higher value than those purely intellectual compositions in which the actors are deprived of speech and even of life.

The author, having given his opinion in favour of this better and higher historical method, is compelled to express a regret: Le précepte est aisé, mais l’art est difficile. And as he looks at his work, he has to repeat with sorrow the confession of the poet of antiquity: Deteriora sequor!

This work is not a biography of Calvin, as some may imagine. The name of that great reformer appears, indeed, on the title-page, and we shall feel a pleasure, whenever the opportunity occurs, in endeavouring to restore the true colours to that figure so strangely misunderstood in our days. We know that, in so doing, we shall shock certain deeply-rooted prejudices, and shall offend those who accept without examination, in this respect, the fables of Romish writers. Tacitus indeed assures us that malignity has a false show of liberty: Malignitati falsa species libertatis inest ; that history is listened to with more favour when she slanders and disparages: Obtrectatio et livor pronis auribus accipiuntur . But what historian could entertain the culpable ambition of pleasing at the expense of truth? Moreover, we believe that, if our age still labours under great errors with respect to many men and things, it is more competent than those which went before to hear the truth, to examine, appreciate, and accept it.

We repeat, however, that it is not a history of Calvin, but of the Reformation in Europe in the time of that reformer which we desire to narrate. Other volumes are already far advanced, and we hope to publish two more in the ensuing year. But may we be permitted, in conclusion, to transcribe here a passage of Holy Scripture that has often occurred to our mind in executing a new work? It is this:

Ye know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away. For that ye ought to say, If the Lord will, we shall live and do this or that. 2

Eaux Vives, Geneva.

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

Facts alone do not constitute the whole of history, any more than the members of the body form the complete man. There is a soul in history as well as in the body, and it is this which generates, vivifies, and links the facts together, so that they all combine to the same end.

The instant we begin to treat of Geneva, which, through the ministry of Calvin, was to become the most powerful centre of Reform in the sixteenth century, one question starts up before us.

What was the soul of the Reformation of Geneva? Truly, salvation by faith in Christ, who died to save—truly, the renewal of the heart by the word and the Spirit of God. But side by side with these supreme elements, that are found in all the Reformations, we meet with secondary elements that have existed in one country and not in another. What we discover at Geneva may possibly deserve to fix the attention of men in our own days: the characteristic element of the Genevese Reform is liberty.

Three great movements were carried out in this city during the first half of the sixteenth century. The first was the conquest of independence; the second, the conquest of faith; the third, the renovation and organisation of the Church. Berthelier, Farel, and Calvin are the three heroes of these three epics.

Each of these different movements was necessary. The bishop of Geneva was a temporal prince like the bishop of Rome; it was difficult to deprive the bishop of his pastoral staff unless he were first deprived of his sword. The necessity of liberty for the Gospel and of the Gospel for liberty is now acknowledged by all thoughtful men; but it was proclaimed by the history of Geneva three centuries ago.

But it may be said, a history of the Reformation has no concern with the secular, political, and social element. I have been reproached with not putting this sufficiently forward in the history of the Reformation of Germany, where it had relatively but little importance. I may perhaps be reproached with dwelling on it too much in the Reformation of Geneva, where it holds a prominent place. It is a hard matter to please all tastes: the safest course is to be guided by the truth of principles and not by the exigencies of individuals. Is it my fault if an epoch possesses its characteristic features? if it is impossible to keep back the secular, without wronging the spiritual, element? To cut history in two is to distort it. In the Reform of Geneva, and especially in the constitution of its church, the element of liberty predominates more than in the Reforms of other countries. We cannot know the reason of this unless we study the movement which gave birth to that Reform. The history of the political emancipation of Geneva is interesting of itself; liberty, it has been said, 3has never been common in the world; it has not flourished in all countries or in all climates, and the periods when a people struggles justly for liberty are the privileged epochs of history. One such epoch occurred at the commencement of modern times; but strange to say, it is almost in Geneva alone that the struggles for liberty make the earlier decades of the sixteenth century a privileged time.

It is in this small republic that we find men remarkable for their devotion to liberty, for their attachment to law, for the boldness of their thoughts, the firmness of their character, and the strength of their energy. In the sixteenth century, after a repose of some hundreds of years, humanity having recovered its powers, like a field that had long lain fallow, displayed almost everywhere the marvels of the most luxuriant vegetation. Geneva is indeed the smallest theatre of this extraordinary fermentation; but it was not the least in heroism and grandeur, and on that ground alone it deserves attention.