Calvin's denial does not meet the case. It is not charged against him that he entered into any sudden and familiar correspondence with the Catholic authorities. What is imputed to him is, that he instigated Trie to denounce Servetus, and furnished, voluntarily, all the documentary evidence which was necessary to sustain the charge of heresy and obtain a conviction. Could it be proved-we put the case hypothetically-that Calvin had no share in the preparation of Trie's letters, the fact of his parting with Servetus's papers is established by evidence incapable of refutation. Having thus learnt "the Reformer's share" in the proceedings against Servetus at Vienne, we shall proceed with the inquiry to Geneva, to ascertain how far he may be considered to have been implicated in the persecutions to which the Spanish physician was subjected in that city. Servetus, having escaped from prison at Vienne, arrived at Geneva on the evening of the 12th of August, 1553, intending immediately to cross the lake, and proceed by way of Zurich to Naples, where he purposed to settle in the exercise of his profession. The following day being Sunday, he was tempted by curiosity to quit his hiding-place, to hear a sermon at the church of St. Peter, where Calvin officiated. Here he was recognized, and afterwards forthwith denounced to the syndics, put under arrest, and committed to prison. Sunday was at Geneva considered sacred to religion; and no arrest could, by law, take place on that day except for some capital offence. To justify, therefore, this imprisonment of Servetus, it was necessary that a criminal accusation should at once be preferred against him. The arrest of a stranger in so extraordinary a manner was an event that had about it an air of mystery, and this mystery is studiously kept up in the record of the transaction in the "Register of the Company of Pastors of Geneva," under the date of August 13, 1553*" M. Servetus having been recognized by some brethren, it was found good to cause him to be imprisoned, to the end that he might not farther infect the world with his blasphemies and heresies." This account left it uncertain who the person was by whom he was recognized and betrayed, and the fact remained for some time unknown. At last, however, the secret was revealed: some brethren” turned out to intend one brother, and that brother was John Calvin! We derive this information from himself. "Whatever," he writes, "has been done by our senate, has been ascribed to me. Nor, indeed, will I dissemble that it was at my instigation and by my advice that (Servetus) was committed to prison."† 66 Here, then, we see Calvin, having found Servetus within the walls of Geneva, taking the preliminary steps to prevent his departure living; and the reader will hereafter find that he kept this purpose steadily in view, and applied all the force of his talents, and all the influence of his position, to secure its accomplishment. Servetus being now in the hands of the magistrates, the law required the presence of an ostensible prosecutor, to prefer specific charges amounting to a capital crime. The case having acquired the importance of one of life and death, it was natural to expect to find in the prosecutor a man of some rank and weight in the community. It is not, therefore, without surprise that we meet in this responsible office * Rilliet, p. 86. + Defensio, &c., ut supra, p. 7. a poor French exile, if not the menial, at best the humble dependent or student of Calvin-Nicolas de la Fontaine ! Had not serious and fatal results been involved in the proceedings, there would have been something truly ridiculous in the appearance of such a creature standing up in a court of justice against a man of the splendid talents and vast erudition of Servetus,-charging him with being the "sower of great heresies," and solemnly declaring that he had raised the criminal action in his own proper and private name, and demanding that the prisoner should reply to a long series of questions relating to abstruse theological and metaphysical speculations, to which one of the first scholars of the age had devoted his studies for at least twenty years! The indictment contained, indeed, one charge more within the reach of his understanding, viz., that Servetus had "in the person of Calvin, the minister of the word of God at Geneva, defamed, in his printed book, the doctrine which he preached." No one could for a moment suppose that such a man was the actual prosecutor, and the reason is subsequently explained why he was put forward as a temporary substitute. The law of Geneva required that the accuser in criminal cases should submit to share the imprisonment of the accused till he had satisfied the judges that he had good evidence to substantiate his charges. The agency of de la Fontaine was allowed by the magistrates to be sufficient to give validity to the initiatory proceedings. In the next stage he was accompanied by a person of higher station, a professional jurist, Germain Colladon, who appeared to act as the legal speaker and manager of the prosecution. Colladon was also a native of France, who had fled to Geneva on account of his religion. He was a member of Calvin's church, his personal friend, and warmly devoted to his party and interest. He entered with great zeal upon the duties of his office, but his intemperate warmth provoked an opposition which brought the sitting to a sudden close. The proceedings of this day were chiefly of importance by bringing into public view the mysterious personage who had, from his concealment, been the actual instigator and director of all the movements. This was no other, as the reader may have anticipated, than John Calvin. The cause had not, in the hands of his agents, advanced to his satisfaction; on which account, at the next sitting, on the 17th of August, the Reformer entered the council-chamber in person. The mystery was now dispelled. The curtain which had hidden the hand of the magician who had moved the puppets suddenly dropped, and John Calvin appeared full in view. "Ceasing," we are told, § "to conceal himself behind La Fontaine and Colladon, he became, for the first time, openly the accuser of the prisoner, and drew attention to many errors written by Servetus, as his books shewed;" declaring, "that he did not wish to excuse himself for having permitted his servant (son serviteur) Nicolas to become a party against the said Servetus, and that he was willing to pursue, as one prepared to become himself the prosecutor." The mask, so artfully put on, having now dropped, Calvin was by the judges recognized as the prosecutor of Servetus-was "authorized to assist, in order that his errors might be the better demonstrated, Rilliet, p. 96. + Ib. 101. Ib. 109. § Ib. p. 113. and to have whomsoever he chose with him at the examination of the prisoner." Here, then, we have ascertained, from his own confession, "the Reformer's share" in the arrest and initiatory proceedings against Servetus. He was himself their sole author and director. On his first public appearance in this character, Calvin confined himself, as far as appears, with the aid of Colladon and his clerical brethren of the Consistory, to open charges against Servetus, grounded on his writings, printed and manuscript. But this course seems to have been thought by him not sufficiently summary and efficacious. Something more appeared wanting to expedition and success; and he did not deem it beneath the dignity of his profession as a Christian minister to resort to secret interviews with the judges, to tamper with their consciences, and, by persuasion, to gain them over to his purpose. It is stated by Rilliet that during a short suspension of the process, "Calvin had dealt urgently with the judges to confirm them in the design of establishing the culpability of Servetus; and he depicted him less as his theological adversary than as an enemy to the Christian faith, already tried on that single account by the Romanists themselves." This statement needs no comment; but it is not a little curious to see Calvin adducing, as evidence of the theological guilt of Servetus, his conviction at Vienne, which had been obtained by proofs furnished by himself, before the Papal Inquisition, the tender mercies of which he had himself but narrowly escaped. Strange to say, however, this urgent dealing with them in private prevailed upon the judges to entertain his suggestion, that application should be made to the Court at Vienne for the record of the conviction, and that such record should be admitted at Geneva as evidence of his guilt. They accordingly determined to send a messenger to obtain those documents for the purposes of their proceedings, and afterwards to submit the whole case to the judgment of the magistrates and clergy of the Protestant cantons of Switzerland. At this stage of the trial, the law required that the further direction of the cause should be committed ostensibly to the Procureur-Général, or public prosecutor. The office was at this time held by Claude Pigot, the intimate friend and zealous supporter of Calvin. He commenced his professional labours by presenting thirty new articles of accusation, in which his chief aim was, to impress the judges with the belief that, with being a heretic and blasphemer, Servetus was, as to his private life and habits, an abandoned profligate,-accusations which proved to be as false as they were malicious. On the very day, however, when the management of the cause devolved legally upon this officer, Calvin, accompanied by his clerical brethren, appeared in court, and occupied nearly the whole of the sitting in elaborate discourses, directed to demonstrate the theological errors and heretical delinquencies of the prisoner. Rilliet allegest that, after this display, Calvin disappeared before the general interests of the Reformed Churches, and ceased to take a personal part in the public courts. If such were actually the fact, he did not abstain from the employment of other means to prejudice the case and obtain the condemnation of his adversary. If he was silent in the council-chamber, his voice was heard and his accusations pro claimed within the walls of St. Peter, where his influence and his power were paramount. On Sunday, the 27th of August-the trial being then in progress before the court-he delivered from the pulpit, with unusual vehemence, a long discourse, denouncing the alleged impieties and blasphemies of Servetus, and holding him forth as an abandoned wretch, unworthy the sympathy and compassion of Christians. It must be recollected that this display of intolerance was exhibited in the presence of some of the persons who were at the very time sitting in judgment on the man whom he was thus, ex cathedrá, denouncing as guilty. And there is no mistaking its purpose: it was an unworthy appeal to the base passions of the multitude, to create a pressure from without which might force the council to a compliance with the preacher's will.* This discourse was the prelude to a new bill of indictment against Servetus, preferred before the judges on the following day, comprising no less than thirty new articles of accusation. Rilliet, speaking of these articles, says they were prepared by Pigot, "or perhaps, under his name, by Calvin himself, as Servetus pretends." Servetus was right; there is now no room for doubt as to the author of this violent document. M. Trechsel, who has given it at full length from the original registers, prefixes the following notice: "This document is written by the hand of which Calvin was accustomed to avail himself to write from his dictation or to copy his letters, so that it has every appearance of being prepared by him." We thus see how far he had kept aloof and abstained from personal interference. Our limits will not permit us to give even an abstract of this paper. It must suffice to say that it is perfectly in character with the most virulent of the documents adduced before the judges. On the 31st of August, the court received the official return for which they had applied to the ecclesiastical authorities of Vienne relative to the trial and conviction of Servetus; on the following day, Calvin again appeared, to pursue personally his charges. In recording this fact, M. de la Roche mildly remarks, "I am sorry to encounter him (Calvin) so often in my way."§ This meeting was opened with an oral discussion of the theological questions so frequently debated. But the judges interposed, and ordered that, with the view of bringing the matter before them into an intelligible form, Calvin should extract from the writings of Servetus the passages upon which he grounded his charges; that Servetus should give his answers in writing; and that Calvin should, if he thought proper, again reply to the whole. These selections, amounting to 38 articles, and the replies, were prepared accordingly, and delivered to the judges on the 15th September, the whole subscribed with the names of Calvin and the other ministers of Geneva.|| But though the document was presented The author of the masterly answer to Calvin's defence, Contra Libellum Calvini, pointedly alludes to this sermon, paragraph 16, page 32: Cur ergo quodam die frequentissima concione Serveti (qui tum recens erat in carcere) opiniones populo exposuisti et copiose tractasti? An malebas cum absente pugnare quam cum presente? † Page 141. Die Protestantischen Antitrinitarier, ut supra, Appendix, page 307. Calvini, Defensio Orthodoxæ Fidei, &c., ut supra, pp. 64, et seq. officially at this date, some delay occurred before it was forwarded to the Swiss churches. 66 The preparation of this elaborate document may be considered as the closing act of Calvin in his character of public prosecutor, and the judicial inquiry was suspended till the judgment of the Swiss cantons could be received. It was not in Calvin's nature, however, calmly to await the result of this appeal. He well knew how important it was to the accomplishment of his great purpose, the destruction of his enemy, to secure the suffrages of the heads of the Protestant churches of the Confederation. If it was not beneath him to tamper in private with the members of the court entrusted with the trial, in order to bring them over to his views, he could scarcely scruple to avail himself of his personal influence with his clerical brethren to solicit their decision in his favour. Accordingly, before the papers could be sent off, he despatched his private communications. On the 17th of September, he wrote to Bullinger at Zurich, informing him of the determination of the council to ask his advice. "It is in spite of us," he says, that they give you this trouble; but they have arrived at that pitch of madness and rage, that they look with suspicion on all that I say. Our brother Walter" [who was married to one of Bullinger's daughters] "will tell you more." He had fully informed Walter of his wishes, and could depend upon his friendly offices with his distinguished relation. Bullinger's answer to this letter shews him to be well inclined to meet his views. "If," he writes, "they treat Servetus as he deserves, for being an impudent blasphemer, the whole world will declare that the Genevese abhor the impious, that they pursue with the sword of justice heretics who are really obstinate, and that they thus maintain the glory of the Divine Majesty." To Sultzer, the minister of Basle, Calvin wrote on the fifteenth of the same month to the like effect. After adverting to the proceedings against Servetus, "I will only add," he says, "that I wish to apprise you that the quæstor of the city, who is the bearer of this letter, is rightly affected in this business, so that he will not fail as to the consummation I desire. Would that your old disciples were actuated by the same spirit." The documents to which this correspondence relates, the papers and books comprising the charges preferred against Servetus, were forwarded on the twenty-first of September to the churches of Berne, Zurich, Schaffhausen and Basle, by an express messenger, who was to deliver them to the several parties, to solicit their judgment upon them, and wait to receive their replies. On the eighteenth of October following, the messenger returned to Geneva, and delivered to the council the answers with which he had been charged. The replies of the Swiss churches were, in effect, as favourable to Calvin's views as he could have desired. They were unanimous in pronouncing the theological guilt of Servetus, and in the justice of inflicting upon him some punishment; but they studiously abstain from naming the penalty, though they hint, in no very ambiguous terms, that he ought to be capitally condemned. * Joannis Calvini Epistolæ, Lausannæ, 1576, No. 157, p. 269. † Calvini Epistolæ, ut supra, No. 156, p. 262. |