public, but with domestic and many other foreign cares. For the Lord so blessed his ministry that he had visitors from every quarter to solicit his counsel in matters of religion, as an oracle of the Christian world; and so numerous were his hearers, that we have seen an Italian, English, and even Spanish church at Geneva, which seemed not sufficiently large to contain so many strangers.

Although his friendship was much cultivated in Geneva by the good, while he was regarded with terror by the wicked, and affairs were in the best state of arrangement, yet many opponents were still raised up to keep him actively employed. We will unfold his contests separately, that posterity may be presented with a singular example of fortitude, which is calculated to excite their most strenuous imitation.

To resume his history,-on his return to the city, keeping in mind that sentence of our Saviour, "Seek ye first the kingdom of God, and all other things will be added unto you." (Matt. vi. 33,) he considered nothing so important as to prescribe laws of ecclesiastical polity consistant with the word of God, and sanctioned by the consent of the senate, from which neither citizens nor ministers would be allowed afterwards to depart. And this, which had been so much approved before, gradually excited the dislike of some of the common people, and of the chief citizens, who had indeed put off the pope, and put on Christ, but only in name. Some also of those ministers, who had remained on the expulsion of their pious brethren, (the most influential however, after being accused of profligate conduct, deserted their station in disgrace,) although convicted by the testimony of their conscience, they wanted courage to make an open resistance, still continued to pursue a system of secret opposition, and did not easily permit themselves to be forced to adopt the established discipline. Nor did they want a pretext for this their wicked conduct, namely, the example of other churches, which had not adopted excommunication. Some also cried out, that the tyranny of popery was thus re

called. But these difficulties were overcome by the constancy and remarkable moderation of Calvin, who proved that we ought to seek for the reason of ecclesiastical discipline, as well as of doctrine, from the Scriptures, and adduced in his support the opinions of the most learned men of that age, Ecolampadius, Zwinglius, Zuichius, Melancthon, Bucer, Capito, and Myconius, to whose writings he appealed. Nor did he assert that those churches ought to be therefore condemned as unchristian, which had not proceeded to the same extent, nor those shepherds to be opposed to their Lord, who considered the same curb and restraint not to be wanted by their own flocks.

Finally, he proved the difference between popish tyranny and the yoke of the Saviour, and thus easily succeeded in inducing the people to receive, with unanimous consent, the same laws of ecclesiastical polity yet used by the church of Geneva, and which were written, read, and approved by the suffrages of the people on the 20th of November.

Although Calvin had thus made a successful commencement, yet he knew that such plans could not in reality be carried into effect without difficulty; and, on this account, was very desirous to have Viret, whom the people of Berne had allowed only for a certain period, and Farel, who had been received on his expulsion from Geneva at Neuchatel, to be appointed his perpetual colleagues. In this attempt he was unsuccessful, for Viret returned soon after to Lausanne, and Farel remained at Neuchatel, so that he enjoyed almost the whole praise of restoring the church by his own unassisted efforts.

Many things occupied Calvin the ensuing year; for to omit various domestic affairs which pressed upon his attention, the inflamed fury of the foreign enemies of the gospel banished numbers from France and Italy to Geneva, a neighbouring and now distinguished city. Calvin's zeal in comforting and refreshing those refugees by every kind of dutiful solicitude is very surprising. I omit mentioning the consolation, which he afforded to those who were placed in the yawning jaws of

the lion, by the various letters which he wrote them under their trials.

Another very great and two-fold evil occurred this year; namely, dearness of provisions, and famine, its general attendant. It was even then a custom at Geneva to have a separate hospital out of the city for such as suffered from the plague. Since the attendance of a constant and active pastor was required, most of them dreaded the danger of contagion, and three only offered themselves-Calvin, Sebastian Castellio, (of whom we shall mention more circumstances in the following part of this narrative,) and Peter Blanchet. The lot, for this was the method of their appointment, fell on Castellio, who changed his mind, and impudently refused to undertake the burthen. The senate would not allow the lots to be taken a second time, contrary to Calvin's inclination, and Blanchet himself, therefore, undertook the whole charge. Other weighty affairs also occurred at that time for the controversy concerning the Lord's Supper engaged the attention of Peter Tossanus, pastor of Montbelliard; and some at Basle, Myconius opposing without effect, were desirous to overturn the foundations of church discipline, which had scarcely yet been firmly laid, and held two conferences with Calvin. Farel had been invited to preach at Metz, with great success, but very much hinderance was given to the work of the Lord, partly by the apostate P. Caroli already mentioned. The various labours in which Calvin was thus involved by writing, admonishing, and exhorting, and by other methods of affording assistance, are clearly proved by the great number of his published letters, and the testimony of many survivors.

But the Sorbonne, increasing in boldness, supported by P. Liser, first president of the parliament of Paris, whose memory is universally detested, had the courage to attempt a measure, which, to the astonishment of every one, was endured by the bishops, and even by the pope. These last,

being constantly employed, like robbers, in dividing the wealth of the church among themselves, voluntarily resigned their own proper duties of distributing the word of life to such of their brethren as they denominated good doctors, provided these last suffered themselves to be treated like dogs, which gnaw the bones that their masters, after repeated nibbling, have left. The Sorbonne had the audacity, unsupported either by human or divine authority, to prescribe such articles of Christian faith, as both by their falsehood, and their very trifling character, so commonly to be met with among this body of divines, deservedly lessened their authority in the opinion of all those, who were not wholly devoid of judgment. Some had subscribed these articles through fear, and others from ignorance, on which account Calvin answered them in such a manner as to refute, with great learning and by solid reasoning, the errors they contained, and he exposed their folly by a beautiful vein of irony, to the amusing derision of all men of common discernment.

The following year experienced equally destructive ravages from the dearness of provisions, and from the plague which infested Savoy. Calvin was constantly employed in strengthening his own flock at Geneva, and in boldly repressing the enemies of the church abroad, particularly by publishing four books on free will, dedicated to Melancthon, in answer to Albert Pighius, a Dutchman, and the most skilled sophist of the age, who had selected Calvin as an adversary, expecting that he would obtain a cardinal's hat as the reward of the distinguished victory he hoped to gain. He was, however, disappointed in his expectations, and reaped, what the enemies of the truth justly deserve, the contempt of all learned and sensible men, while he was deceived by Satan himself. Melancthon testified by his letters the esteem in which he held these works of Calvin, and we considered it right to publish their correspondence, that posterity may have a certain and clear testimony against the calumniators of such distinguished men.

A letter written this same year to the church of Montbelliard affords a sufficient answer to such as complain of his too great severity in the exercise of ecclesiastical discipline.

Calvin in the following year, 1544, stated his opinion concerning the plan which the church of Neuchatel should adopt in their ecclesiastical censures. Sebastian Castellio, in Geneva, whose fickleness we have already noticed, concealing under an apparent modesty a foolish kind of ambition, and evidently belonging to that class of men, which the Greeks call self-opiniative, became irritated with Calvin because he disapproved of his conceits in a French version of the New Testament; who carried his indignation to such a height, that not satisfied with maintaining some erroneous opinions, he even ordered, in a public manner, the Song of Solomon to be erased from the canon, as an impure and obscene song, and reviled with very violent reproaches the ministers of Geneva by whom he was opposed. They justly thought that it was not their duty patiently to endure such conduct, and summoned him before the senate, where, after a very patient hearing, on the last day of May, and a calm examination of the charges brought against him, he was condemned for calumny, and ordered to leave the city. He afterwards settled in Basle, and his conduct there will be considered in another part of our narrative.

Charles 5th, in the year 1543, advancing with all his strength against Francis 1st, had taken care to secure for the two great religious parties in Germany the enjoyment of equal rights, until the meeting of a council which he promised to convene. Pope Paul III., feeling very indignant at such a proceeding, published a very grave admonition to Charles for his having thus placed the heretics on a level with the Catholics, and for putting his scythe into a crop which belonged to another. Charles returned what he considered a fair answer. Calvin repressed the audacity of the pontiff for the severity with which he had attacked in these letters the truth of the gospel, and the moral conduct of the reformers.