Page:Readings in European History Vol 2.djvu/161

 Protestant Revolt in Switzerland and England 123 (2) he furnished the Protestants with a text-book of theology, — his Institutes of the Christian Religion, — which for two or three centuries enjoyed unrivaled authority among a large and influential class in France, Scotland, England, and America ; (3) lastly, in the ordinances drawn up under his influence for the city of Geneva, he established a system of government, civil and ecclesiastical, which in its spirit became the ideal of the various English Puritan sects, as well as of those who migrated to Holland and New England. As a preface to the first edition of his Institutes, pub- lished at Basel shortly after his flight from France, Cal- vin prepared an address to King Francis I, in which he briefly states the reasons for the Protestant revolt and exposes the slanders heaped upon his party. John Calvin, to the most mighty and noble monarch, Francis, the most Christian king of the French, his sovereign prince and lord, with peace and salvation in the Lord : When I did first set my hand to this work [i.e. his Insti- tutes^ I thought nothing less, most illustrious King, than to write anything to be presented to your Majesty. My mind was to teach certain rudiments whereby they that are touched with some zeal of religion might be instructed to true godli- ness. And this travail I undertook principally for my coun- trymen, the French, of whom I understood very many to hunger and thirst for Christ, but few had received so much as any little knowledge of him. That this was my purpose the book itself declareth, being framed to a simple and plain manner of teaching. But when I perceived that the furious rage of certain wicked men hath so far prevailed in your realm that in it there is no room for sound doctrine, I thought I should do a thing worth my travail if in a single work I should give both instruction for them whom I proposed to instruct, and 257. Ex- tracts from Calvin's address to Francis I (1536). (Condensed.] Aim of the Institutes. Calvin adds to his Insti- tutes an " Apology " for the Protestants.