386 THE EEFOKIVIATION IN FRENCH SWITZERLAND.
Melanchthon was twelve years older than Cahdn, as Luther was thirteen years older than Melanchthon. Calvin, therefore, might have sustained to Melanchthon the relation of a pupil to a teacher. He sought his friendship, and he always treated him with reverential affection.^ In the dedication of his commentary on Daniel, he describes Melanchthon as " a man who, on account of his incomparable skill in the most excellent branches of knowledge, his piety, and other virtues, is worthy of the admiration of all ages." But while Melanchthon was under the overawing influence of the personality of Luther, the Reformer of Geneva was quite independent of Melanchthon, and so far could meet him on equal terms. Melanchthon, in sincere humility and utter freedom from jealousy, even acknowledged the superiority of his younger friend as a theologian and disciplinarian, and called Jiim emphatically " the theologian."
They had many points of contact. Both were men of uncommon precocity; both excelled, above their contemporaries, in humanistic culture and polished style; both devoted all their learning to the renovation of the Church; they were equally conscientious and unselfish ; they agreed in the root of their piety, and in all essential doctrines ; the}" deplored the divisions in the Protestant ranks, and heartily desired unity and harmony consistent with truth.
But they were differently constituted. Melanchthon was modest, gentle, sensitive, feminine, irenic, elastic, temporizing, always open to new light ; Calvin, though by nature as modest, bashful, and irritable, was in principle and conviction firm, unyielding, fearless of consequences, and opposed to all compromises. They differed also on minor points of doctrine and discipline. Melanchthon, from a conscientious love of truth and peace, and from regard for the demands of
1 In a letter of 11 Cal. Maii, 1544 {Opera, XI. 698), he addresses him as " ornatissime vir, fidelissime Christi minister, et amice mihi semper hovorande. Dominus te semper spiritu suo regut, diuque nobis et ecclesicn suce incolumem conservet."
§ 90. CALVIN AND MELANCHTHON. 387
practical common sense, had independently changed his views on two important doctrines. He abandoned the Lutheran dogma of a corporal 9,nd ubiquitous presence in the eucharist, and approached the theory of Calvin ; and he substituted for his earlier fatalistic view of a divine foreordination of evil as well as good the synergistic scheme which ascribes conversion to the co-operation of three causes : the Spirit of God, the Word of God, and the will of man. He conceded to man the freedom of either accepting or rejecting the Gospel salvation, yet without giving any merit to him for accepting the free gift ; and on this point he dissented from Calvin's more rigorous and logical system.^
The sincere and lasting friendship of these two great and good men is therefore all the more remarkable and valuable as a testimony that a deep spiritual union and harmony may co-exist with theological differences.^
Calvin and Melanchthon met at Frankfurt, Worms, and Regensburg under trying circumstances. Melanchthon felt discouraged about the prospects of Protestantism. He deplored the confusion which followed the abolition of the episcopal supervision, the want of discipline, the rapacity of the princes, the bigotry of the theologians. He had allowed himself, wdth Luther and Bucer, to give his concUtional assent to the scandalous bigam}' of Philip of Hesse (May, 1540), which was the darkest blot in the history of the German Reformation, and worse than the successive polygamy of Henry VHI. His conscience was so much troubled about his own weakness that, at Weimar, on his way to the Colloquies at Hagenau and Worms, he was brought to the brink
1 On these changes see the biographies of Melanchthon by Galle, Carl Schmidt, and Herrlinger; Gieseler's Church History; and Schaff's Creeds of Christendom, I. 261 sqq.
2 Merle d'Aubigne (VII. 19) thinks that " esteem was uppermost in Melanchthon, and affection in Calvin"; that "on the one side the friendship was foundefl more on reflection (r^fl^chi), on the other it was more spontaneous"; but "on both sides it was the product of their noble and beautiful qualities."