from all later editions by the emphasis it lays, not on
dogma, but on morals, on worship, and on polity. Calvin conceives the
Gospel as a new law which ought to be embodied in a new life, individual
and social. What came later to be known as Calvinism may be stated in an
occasional sentence or implied in a paragraph, but it is not the
substance or determinative idea of the book. The problem discussed has
been set by the studies and the experience of the author; he has read
the New Testament as a humanist learned in the law, and he has been
startled by the contrast between its ideal and the reality which
confronts him. And he proceeds in a thoroughly juridical fashion, just
as Tertullian before him, and as Grotius and Selden after him. Without a
document he can decide nothing; he needs a written law or actual custom;
and his book falls into divisions which these suggest.

Hence his first chapter is concerned with duty or conduct as prescribed
by the Ten Commandments; his second with faith as contained in the
apostolic symbol; his third with prayer as fixed by the words of Christ;
his fourth with the sacrament as given in the Scriptures; his fifth with
the false sacraments as defined by tradition and enforced by Catholic
custom; and his sixth with Christian liberty or the relation of the
ecclesiastical and civil authorities. But though the book is, as
compared with what it became later, limited in scope and contents--the
last edition which left the author's hand in 1559 had grown from a work
in six chapters to one in four books and eighty chapters--yet its
constructive power, its critical force, its large outlook impress the
student. We have here none of Luther's scholasticism, or of
Melanchthon's deft manipulation of incompatible elements; but we have
the first thoughts on religion of a mind trained by ancient literature
to the criticism of life.

The _Institutio_ bears the date "_Mense Martio; Anno_ 1536"; but Calvin,
without waiting till his book was on the market, made a hurried journey
to Ferrara, whose Duchess, Renee, a daughter of Louis XII, stood in
active sympathy with the reformers. The reasons for this brief visit are
very obscure; but it may have been undertaken in the hope of mitigating,
by the help of Renee, the severity of the persecutions in France. On his
return Calvin ventured, tradition says, to Noyon, probably for the sake
of family affairs; but he certainly reached Paris; and, while in the
second hal