§ 125. CALVIN AND BOLSEC. 619
and sought admission into the niinistiy of the Reformed Church, but returned at last to the Roman communion.^ He was cLassed by the national synod of Lyon among deposed ministers, and characterized as "an infamous liar" and "apostate" (1563), He lived near Lyon and at Autun, and died at Annecy about 1584. Thirteen years after Calvin's death he took mean and cowardly revenge by the publication of a libellous " Life of Calvin," which injured him much more than Calvin ; and this was followed by a slanderous " Life of Beza," 1582. These books would long since have been forgotten, had not partisan zeal kept them alive.^
The dispute with Bolsec occasioned Calvin's tract, " On the Eternal Predestination of God," which he dedicated to the Syndics and Council of Geneva, under the name of Consensus Grenevensis, or Agreement of the Genevese Pastors, Jan. 1, 1552. But it was not approved by the other Swiss Churches.
Beza remarks of the result of this controvers}^ : " All that Satan gained by these discussions was, that this article of the Christian religion, which was formerly most obscure, became clear and transparent to all not disposed to be contentious."
The quarrel with Bolsec caused the dissolution of the friendship between Calvin and Jacques de Bourgogne, Sieur de Falais et Bredam, a descendant of the dukes of Burgundy, who with his wife, Jolunde de Brederode, a descendant of the old counts of Holland, settled in Geneva, 1548, and lived for some time in Calvin's house at his invitation, when the
^ According to Beza, Bolsec forsook his wife and allowed her to become a prostitute to the canons of Autun.
2 Bayle said in his day : " Bolsec seroit un homme tout-a-fait plonge dans les te'nebres de I'oubli, s'il ne s'etait rendu fameux par certains ouvrages satiriques [meaning his attacks on Calvin and Beza], que les moines et les missionnaires citent encore." In recent times Galiffe and Audin have come up to the defence of Bolsec, but have been refuted by Henri L. Bordier in Lu France Protestante, II. 766 sqq., and in L'ecnie historique de Jerome Bolsec, Paris, 1880. Schweizer (I. 207) calls those libels "ersonnene Verlemnduncfen, wie rechtschaffene Katho- Itken Idngst zugeben, anderen aber gut genug zum Wiederabdrucken."
620 THE REFORMATION IN FRENCH SWITZERLAND.
wife of the latter was still living. His cook, Nicolas, served Calvin as clerk. Calvin took the greatest interest in De Falais, comforted him over the confiscation of his goods by Charles V., at whose court he had been educated, and wrote a defence for him against the calumnies befoi-e the emperor.^ He also dedicated to him his Commentary on the First Epistle to the Corinthians. His friendl}- correspondence from 1543 to lSf52 is still extant, and does great credit to him.^ But De Falais could not penetrate the mysteries of theology, nor sympathize with the severity of discipline in Geneva. He was shocked at the treatment of Bolsec ; he felt indebted to him as a physician who had cured one of his maid-servants of a cancer. He interceded for him with the magistrates of Geneva and of Bern. He wrote to Bullinger: ''Not without tears am I forced to see and hear this tragedy of Calvin.'' He begged him to unite with Calvin for the restoration of peace in the Church.
He left Geneva after the banishment of Bolsec and moved to Bern, where he lost his wife (1557) and married again. Bayle asserts, witliout authority, that in disgust at the Protestant dissensions he returned to the Roman Church.^
Even Melanchthon was displeased with Calvin's conduct in this unfortunate affair ; but tlie alienation was only superficial and temporary. Judging from the imperfect information of Lct'lius Socinus, he was disposed to censure the Genevese for an excess of zeal in behalf of the " Stoic doctrine of necessity," as he called it, while he applauded the Ziirichers for greater moderation. He expressed himself to
1 Apologia illustris D. Jacobi a Burgundia Fallesii Bredanique domini, qua apud Imperatoriam Majestatein inustas sibi criminationes diluit jideique sue confessionem edit. In Opera., X. Pt. I. 269-294.
2 It was published at Amsterdam in a separate volume, 1774, and is reprinted in the Opera and in the collection of Boimet. Comp. on Calvin's friendship with De Falais, Henry, III. 64-69 ; Stiihelin, II. 293-302.
<* Bolsec, in his life of Calvin, invented, among other slanders, the story that the real cause of De Falais' leaving Geneva was an attempt of Calvin on the chastity of his wife !