Excerpt from The Eleventh Annual Report of the Calvin Society: Instituted in May 1843, for the Publication of New Translations of the Works of John Calvin
The correspondence of Calvin commenced in his early youth, in the year 1528, and was concluded on his deathbed in the month of May'1564. It thus includes each phase of his event ful life, from the Obscure scholar of Bourges and of Paris, - only escaping death by exile, - to the triumphant Reformer, who having lived to see his task accomplished, would not fear to die. We know not a work of equal interest with these letters, written almost daily, in which the events of an epoch and a life of in comparable importance are re ected, where the familiar out pourings of friendship are mingled with grave and scientific disquisitions, and the high and holy breathings of a fervent faith. From a bed Of suffering and unceasing toil, Calvin pursues, with an attentive eye, the progress of the Reformation, recording anxiously its victories and its reverses in every State of Europe. He exhorts our own Edward VI., the youthful king of England, and Margaret of Valois, the noble sister of Francis the First; he writes to Luther and Melanchthon; he prompts John Knox, and directs Coligny, Conde, and the Duchess of Ferrara.
John Calvin (1509 - 1584)
Was an influential French theologian and pastor during the Protestant Reformation. He was a principal figure in the development of the system of Christian theology later called Calvinism. Originally trained as a humanist lawyer, he broke from the Roman Catholic Church around 1530. After religious tensions provoked a violent uprising against Protestants in France, Calvin fled to Basel, Switzerland, where he published the first edition of his seminal work The Institutes of the Christian Religion in 1536.Calvin's writing and preachings provided the seeds for the branch of theology that bears his name. The Reformed, Congregational, and Presbyterian churches, which look to Calvin as the chief expositor of their beliefs, have spread throughout the world.
John Calvin was an influential French theologian and pastor during the Protestant Reformation. He was a principal figure in the development of the system of Christian theology later called Calvinism. Originally trained as a humanist lawyer, he broke from the Roman Catholic Church around 1530. After religious tensions provoked a violent uprising against Protestants in France, Calvin fled to Basel, Switzerland, where in 1536 he published the first edition of his seminal work Institutes of the Christian Religion.
Calvin's writing and preaching provided the seeds for the branch of theology that bears his name. The Presbyterian and other Reformed churches, which look to Calvin as a chief expositor of their beliefs, have spread throughout the world. Calvin's thought exerted considerable influence over major religious figures and entire religious movements, such as Puritanism, and some have argued that his ideas have contributed to the rise of capitalism, individualism, and representative democracy in the West.
Founder of Calvinism. John Calvin, a French scholar who became a leading preacher and dominant force in the Reformation of the 16th Century, studied at the University of Paris and at the University of Orleans. He became dissatisfied with the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church and allied himself with the cause of the Protestant Reformation in 1532.
When the king of France decided to settle the religious question in his country in favor of the Catholics, Calvin fled to Geneva, Switzerland, where his writings and lectures made Geneva the Rome of Protestantism. His institutes of the Christian religion became the basis for the Presbyterian way of thought and church life. Calvinism is the main doctrine of the Presbyterian and Reformed Churches.
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