Jean Henri Merle d'Aubigné
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Total Pages: 3343
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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.
