Page:Institutes of the Christian Religion Vol 1.djvu/13



earliest of writings—a Commentary on Seneca's Two Books, De Clementia—was published at Paris in 1532, before he had completed his twenty-third year. In this Commentary there is nothing to indicate that its author had begun, or was ever destined, to be a distinguished Reformer. It is dedicated to the Abbot of St Eloy of Noyon, who is addressed as a "most wise and holy Prelate," and complimented not for the faithful discharge of his sacred functions, but for learning and taste; the highest motive for publishing the work is plainly avowed to be the acquisition of literary fame: and throughout, though there are passages in Seneca's text which might have furnished ground for serious reflection, the subject of religion is scarcely once alluded to—certainly not alluded to in such a way as could lead any one to infer that the author had made his final choice, and was resolutely prepared to make every sacrifice for the furtherance of the Gospel.

The probability is, that at the period when Calvin wrote this Commentary, he had not embraced the Reformed Faith. Whatever his misgivings may have been, it would seem he had not altogether renounced the hope of being able to obtain, in connection with the Romish Church, that respectable status and literary ease which, in his Letter to Cardinal