§ 159. Calvin's catholicity of spirit. 801
tary associations, which bring Christians of different churches and nationalities together for mutual conference and co-operation, without interfering with their separate organization and denominational preferences.
A lasting monument of Calvin's catholicity is his immense correspondence, which fills ten quarto volumes of the last edition of his works, and embraces in all no less than fortytwo hundred and seventy-one letters. He left to Beza a collection of manuscripts with discretionary power to publish from it what he deemed might promote the edification of the Church of God. Accordingly, Beza edited the first collection of Calvin's letters eleven years after his death, at Geneva, 1575. This edition was several times republit-hed, and gradually enriched by letters discovered in various libraries by Liebe, Mosheim, Bretschneider, Crottet, Jules Bonnet, Henry, Reuss, and Herminjard.
No theologian has left behind him a correspondence equal in extent, ability, and interest. In these letters Calvin discusses the profoundest topics of religion ; he gives advice as a faithful pastor ; administers comfort to suffering brethren ; pours out his heart to his friends ; solves difticult political questions, as a wise statesman, in the complications of the little Republic with Bern, Savoy, and France. Among his correspondents are all the surviving Reformers — Melanchthon, Bucer, Bullinger, Farel, Viret, Cranmer, Knox, Beza, Peter Martyr, John a Lasco ; crowned heads — Queen Marguerite of Navarre, the Duchess Renee of Ferrara, King Sigismund Augustus of Poland, the Elector Otto Heinrich of the Palatinate, Duke Christopher of Wiirtemberg ; statesmen and high officers, like Duke Somerset, the Protector of England, Prince Radziwil of Poland, Admiral Coligny of France, the magistrates of Ziirich, Bern, Basel, St. Gall, and Frankfort; and humble confessors and martyrs to whom he sent letters of comfort in prison.
802 THE KEFOBMATION IN FKENCH SWITZERLAND.
§ 160. Greneva an Asylum for Protestants from all Countries.
Calvin gave to Geneva a cosmopolitan character which it retains to this day. It became, through him, as already stated, the capital of the Reformed Churches, and was called the Protestant Rome. Philip II. of Spain wrote to the French king : " Geneva is the source of all misfortune to France, the refuge of all heretics, the most terrible enemy of Rome. I am ready at any time, with all the power of my kingdom, to aid in its destruction." That city was, indeed, in the sixteenth century what North America has become, on a much larger scale, since the seventeenth century. It Avas an asylum for persecuted confessors of the evangelical faith without distinction of nationality, an impregnable moral fortress built upon the rock of the Bible .^
Ziirich, Basel, and Strassburg were the only places in that age which can be compared with Geneva in generous hospitality to strangers.
At the beginning of the sixteenth century the city of Geneva numbered 12,000 souls, in 1543 not more than 13,000 ; but in the seven years from 1543 to 1550 it increased to 20,000, or at the rate of 1000 a year. This increase was chiefly due to the continuous influx of persecuted Protestants from France, Italy, and England. Some came also from Spain and Holland.^ Most of them were educated men and not a few of them distinguished for learning and social position, as Cordier, CoUadon, Etienne (Stephens), Marot, Ochino, Carraccioli, Knox, Whittingham. They had made sacrifices for the sake of religion, and thereby acquired the
1 Michelet {Histoire de France, vol. X. 414) calls Calvinistic Geneva " la cite de I'esprit bdtie de stoici.ime sur le roc de la predestination," and (in vol. XI. 93) "la fahrique des saints et des martyrs, la sombre forge ouse forgeaissentles^lus de la mort."
- Fourteen hundred French families settled in Geneva in eight years, during the reign of Henri II. Gaberel, Histoire de I'iSglise de Geneve, I. 346 ; Michelet, X. 414.
§ 161. THE ACADEMY OF GENEVA. 803
honor of confessors with the spirit of martyrs. There were special congregations for Italians and Englishmen, who were provided by the city with suitable places of worship. Calvin treated the refugees with great hospitality. He secured to them as far as possible the rights of citizenship. Some of them were even elected to the Large Council. An insnlt to a refugee from religious persecution was as punishable as an insult to a minister of the gospel. The favor and privileges accorded to these foreigners excited the envy and jealousy of the native Genevese, who opposed their admission to citizenship and their right to carry arms. This exclusive nativism gave Calvin a great deal of trouble.
The little Republic of Geneva was continually exposed to the danger of absorption by Savoy, France, and Spain, which hated her as the stronghold of heresy. It was in a large measure due to the wisdom and firmness of Calvin that in those critical times she preserved her liberty and independence. He also resisted the repeated attempts of Bern to interfere with the doctrine and discipline of the Church.
Geneva offers a wonderful aspect in modern history. " Embracing the elite of three nations, melted into one whole by the spirit of one man, it continues in the midst of mighty and bitter foes, without any external support, simply through its moral force. It has no territory, no army, no treasures, no temporal, no material resources. There it stands, a city of the spirit, built of Christian stoicism on the rock of predestination."