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

Having thus found a few moments of relief, he applied again to his studies; he was absorbed in his books; he grew pale over Scotus and Thomas Aquinas; but in the midst of his labours a sudden trouble took possession of his mind, and pushing away from him the volumes that lay before him, he exclaimed: ‘Alas! my conscience is still very far from true tranquillity.’ 583His heart was troubled, his imagination excited, he saw nothing but abysses on every side, and with a cry of alarm he said: ‘Every time that I descend into the depths of my heart; every time, O God, that I lift up my soul to thy throne, extreme terror comes over me. 584... I see that no purification, no satisfaction can heal my disease. 585My conscience is pierced with sharp stings.’ 586

Thus step by step did Calvin descend to the lowest depths of despair; and quite heartbroken, and looking like one dead, he resolved to take no further pains about his salvation. He lived more with his fellow-pupils, he even shared in their amusements; he visited his friends in the city, sought such conversation as would divert his thoughts, and desired, with the Athenians of old, either to tell or to hear some new thing. Will the work of God, begun in his heart, remain unperfected?

This year an event took place which could not fail to stir the depths of Calvin’s soul.

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The kingdom of Christ is strengthened and established more by the blood of martyrs than by force of arms,’ said the doctor of Noyon one day. 587At this period he had occasion to experience the truth of the statement.

One day in the year 1527, a man thirty-six years old, of good family—he was related to M. de Lude—of ecclesiastical rank, prothonotary, and holding several benefices, Nicholas Doullon by name, having been accused of heresy, stood in front of the cathedral of Notre Dame, while an immense crowd of citizens, priests, and common people were looking on. The executioner had gone in the morning to the prison, stripped the prothonotary of his official robes, and having passed a rope round his neck and put a taper in his hand, had conducted him in this guise to the front of the church of the Virgin. The poor fellow had seen better days: he had often gone to the palaces of the Louvre, St. Germain, and Fontainebleau, and mingled with the nobles, in the presence of the king, his mother, and his sister; he had also been one of the officers of Clement VII. The good folks of Paris, whom this execution had drawn together, said to one another as they witnessed the sad spectacle: ‘He frequented the king’s court, and has lived at Rome in the pope’s service.’ 588

Doullon was accused of having uttered a great blasphemy against the glorious mother of our Lord and against our Lord himself: he had denied that the host was very Christ. The clergy had taken advantage of the king’s absence, and had used unprecedented haste in the trial. ‘He was taken the Thursday before,’ and four days later was standing bareheaded and barefooted, with the rope about his neck, in front of the metropolitan church of Paris. Everybody was listening to hear the apology he would make to the Virgin; but they listened in vain: Doullon remained firm in his faith to the last. Accordingly, the hangman again laid hands on him, and the prothonotary, guarded by the sergeants, and preceded and followed by the crowd, was led to the Grève, where he was fastened to the stake and burnt alive. 589The execution of a priest of some dignity in the Church made a sensation in Paris, especially in the schools and among the disciples of the Reform. ‘Ah!’ said Calvin subsequently, ‘the torments of the saints whom the hand of the Lord makes invincible, should give us boldness; for thus we have beforehand the pledge of our victory in the persons of our brethren.’

While death was thinning the ranks of the evangelical army, new soldiers were taking the place of those who had disappeared. Calvin had been wandering for some time in darkness, despairing of salvation by the path of the pope, and not knowing that of Jesus Christ. One day (we cannot say when) he saw light breaking through the obscurity, and a consoling thought suddenly entered his heart. ‘A new form of doctrine has risen up,’ he said. 590‘If I have been mistaken ... if Olivétan, if my other friends, if those who give their lives to preserve their faith are right ... if they have found in that path the peace which the doctrines of the priests refuse me?’ ... He began to pay attention to the things that were told him; he began to examine into the state of his soul. A ray of light shone into it and exposed his sin. His heart was troubled: it seemed to him that every word of God he found in Scripture tore off the veil and reproached him with his trespasses. He shed floods of tears. ‘Of a surety,’ he said, ‘these new preachers know how to prick the conscience. 591Now that I am prepared to be really attentive, I begin to see, thanks to the light that has been brought me, in what a slough of error I have hitherto been wallowing; 592with how many stains I am disfigured ... and above all, what is the eternal death that threatens me.’ 593A great trembling came over him; he paced his room as Luther had once paced his cell at Erfurth. He uttered (he tells us) deep groans and shed floods of tears. 594He was crushed beneath the weight of his sin. Terrified at the divine holiness, like a leaf tossed by the wind, like a man frightened by a violent thunderstorm, he exclaimed: ‘O God! thou keepest me bowed down, as if thy bolts were falling on my head.’ 595... Then he fell at the feet of the Almighty, exclaiming: ‘I condemn with tears my past manner of life, and transfer myself to thine. Poor and wretched, I throw myself on the mercy which thou hast shown us in Jesus Christ: I enter that only harbour of salvation. 596... O God, reckon not up against me that terrible desertion and disgust of thy Word, from which thy marvellous bounty has rescued me.’ 597

Following Olivétan’s advice, Calvin applied to the study of Scripture, and everywhere he found Christ. ‘O Father!’ he said, ‘his sacrifice has appeased thy wrath; his blood has washed away my impurities; his cross has borne my curse; his death has atoned for me 598.... We had devised for ourselves many useless follies 599... but thou hast placed thy Word before me like a torch, and thou hast touched my heart, in order that I should hold in abomination all other merits save that of Jesus.’ 600

Calvin had, however, the final struggle to go through. To him, as to Luther, the great objection was the question of the Church. He had always respected the authority of a Church which he believed to have been founded by the apostles and commissioned to gather mankind round Jesus Christ; and these thoughts often disturbed him. ‘There is one thing,’ he told the evangelicals, ‘which prevents my believing you: that is, the respect due to the Church. 601The majesty of the Church must not be diminished. 602... I cannot separate from it.’

Calvin’s friends at Paris, and afterwards perhaps Wolmar and others at Orleans and Bourges, did not hesitate to reply to him. 603‘There is a great difference between separating from the Church and trying to correct the vices with which it is stained. 604... How many antichrists have held the place in its bosom which belongs to the pastors only!’

Calvin understood at last that the unity of the Church cannot and ought not to exist except in the truth. His friends, perceiving this, spoke openly to him against the Pope of Rome.—‘Men take him for Christ’s vicar, Peter’s successor, and the head of the Church.... But these titles are empty scarecrows. 605Far from permitting themselves to be dazzled by these big words, the faithful ought to discriminate the matter truly. If the pope has risen to such height and magnificence, it is because the world was plunged in ignorance and smitten with blindness. 606Neither by the voice of God, nor by a lawful call of the Church, has the pope been constituted its prince and head; it is by his own authority and by his own will alone.... He elected himself. 607In order that the kingdom of Christ may stand, the tyranny with which the pope oppresses the nations must come to an end.’ 608Calvin’s friends, as he tells us, ‘demolished by the Word of God the princedom of the pope and his exceeding elevation.’ 609