§ 104. ECCLESIASTICAL ORDINANCES. 475
all denominations are on a basis of equality before the law, and enjoy, under the protection of the government, full liberty of self-government with the corresponding duty of self-support. The condition of modern society demands a peaceful separation of Church and State, or a Free Church in a Free State.
§ 104. The Ecclesiastical Ordinances.
Conip. § 83 (:352 sqq.) and § 80 (o07 sqq.). Calvin discusses the ministerial office in the third chapter of the fourth book of his Institutes.
Having considered Calvin's general principles on Church government, we proceed to their introduction and application in the little Kepublic of Geneva.
We have seen that in his first interview with the Syndics and Council after his return, Sept. 13, 1541, he insisted on the introduction of an ecclesiastical constitution and discipline in accordance with the Word of God and the primitive Church.^ The Council complied with his wishes, and intrusted the work to the five pastors (Calvin, Viret, Jacques Bernard, Henry de la Mare, and Ayme Champereau) . and six councillors (decided Guillermins), to Avhom was added Jean Balard as advisory member. The document was prepared under his directing influence, submitted to the councils, slightly altered, and solemnly ratified by a general assembly of citizens (the Conseil r/enSral), Jan. 2, 1542, as the fundamental church law of the Republic of Geneva.2 Its essential features have passed into the constitution and discipline of most of the Reformed and Presbyterian Churches of Europe and America.
The official text of the " Ordinances " is preserved in the
1 He wrote to Farel, Sept. 16, 1541 (in Opera, XI. 281 ; Herminjard, VII. 249) : " Exposui {Senatui), non posse consistere ecclesiam, nisi certum rerjimen corisfitueretur, quale ex Verho Dei nobis pncscriptum est, et in veteri Ecclesia fuit observatum ."
- See above, p. 440.
476 THE EEFOEMATION IN FRENCH SWITZERLAND.
Registers of tlie Venerable Company, and opens with the follo^Wng introduction : —
" In the name of God Almighty, we, the Syndics, Small and Great Councils with our people assembled at the sound of the trumpet and the great clock, according to our ancient customs, have considered that the matter above all others worthy of recommendation is to preserve the doctrine of the holy gospel of our Lord in its purity, to protect the Christian Church, to instruct faithfully the youth, and to provide a hospital for the proper support of the poor, — all of which cannot be done without a definite order and rule of life, from which every estate may learn the duty of its office. For this reason we have deemed it wise to reduce the spiritual government, such as our Lord has shown us and instituted by his Word, to a good form to be introduced and observed among us. Therefore we have ordered and established to follow and to guard in our city and territory the following ecclesiastical polity, taken from the gospel of Jesus Christ." ^
The document is inspired by a high view of the dignity and responsibility of the ministry of the gospel, such as we find in the Epistles of Paul to the Corinthians and Ephesians. "It may be confidently asserted," says a Catholic historian,- " that in no religious society of Christian Europe the clergy was assigned a position so dignitied, prominent, and influential as in the Church which Calvin built up in Geneva."
In liis Institutes Calvin distinguishes three extraordinary officers of the Church, — Apostles, Prophets, and Evangelists, — and four ordinary officers — Pastors (Bishops), Teachei-s, Ancients (Lay-elders), and Deacons.^
Extraordinary officers were raised up by the Lord at the beginning of his kingdom, and are raised up on special occasions when required " by the necessity of the times." The Reformers must be regarded as a secondar}- class of Apostles, Prophets, and Evangelists. Calvin liimself intimates the parallel when he says : * " I do not deny that ever since that period [of the Apostles] God has sometimes raised up Apostles or Evangelists in their stead, as lie has done in our own
^ The French text in Opera, X. 16. note a.
2 Kampschulte I. 396.
^ In the " Ordinances " they are called Pasteurs, Dorteitrs, Anciens, Diacres.
* Inst. IV. cli. III. § 4.