CALVIN (modified from the French form
Cauvin or Caulvin), John, Swiss reformer of
the 16th century; b. Noyon, Picardy, 10 July
1509; d. Geneva, Switzerland, 27 May 1564. Though born in humble condition, his father, as procureur-fiscal of the district of Noyon and secretary of the diocese, was able by personal influence to further the interests of his family. Calvin's mother, Jeanne Lefranc, was distinguished alike by personal beauty and piety. Even as a lad Calvin was deficient in physical vigor, but gave early tokens of more than ordinary intellectual powers, a circumstance that attracted to him the regards of a noble family at Noyon who received him under their care and gave to him the same opportunities of schooling as were enjoyed by their own children (1523). It was his father's original intention to fit him for the priesthood and in pursuance of that object he was sent to the Collège de la Marche at Paris; then to the Collège Montaigu where he was trained in logic by a learned Spaniard who afterward directed the education of Ignatius Loyola while a student at the same school. He easily stood in the front rank of his fellow-students but was little disposed to affiliate with them, and from a certain unsocial severity of bearing acquired among them the nickname of the “Accusative Case.” At the age of 12 he received part of the chapel revenue of Noyon in return for some services there. In 1527 his father secured for him the curacy of Saint Martin de Martinville, from which he resigned in 1529, in favor of his younger brother, and in the same year exchanged the curacy for that of Pont l'Evêque, his father's birthplace.
Then his father changed his plans with
reference to John and determined to have him
prepared for the profession of law, putting
him for that purpose under instruction at
Orléans (1528), where he studied with Pierre
d'Etoile and Bourges (1530), where he applied
himself to his studies with the same assiduity
evinced at Paris, and attained immediate
distinction, though at the expense of impaired
health. Without confining himself strictly to
the curriculum of the school he devoted himself
at the same time to the study of Greek under
the German professor, Melchior Wolmar, whose
Protestant views strengthened the bias toward
the new faith already existing in his pupil's
mind, for his attention had previously been
drawn to the careful study of the Scriptures
by his kinsman Olivetan, the first Protestant
translator of the Bible into French. When
Calvin was 22 his father died, whereupon the
young man gave up his law studies and returned
to Paris, where he met Lefèvre and Farel, studied theology, issuing soon after his first publication, an annotated edition of Seneca's ‘De Clementia.’ Up to this point it is safe to presume that his interests and ambitions were purely those of a humanist, and whatever thought he may have had in regard to the need of reform in the matters of Church doctrine
and discipline, he doubtless felt with Erasmus
and Reuchlin that all the reforms that might
be required would come about as the result
of completer knowledge.
It was not long after this that he experienced
what he calls his “sudden conversion.” He
writes: “After my heart had long been
prepared by the most earnest self-examination, on
a sudden the full knowledge of the truth, like
a bright light, disclosed to me the abyss of
errors in which I was weltering, the sin and
shame with which I was defiled.” His experience
is near of kin to that of Luther, and we
are set thinking also of the "great light" that
shone upon Saul as he was nearing Damascus. Yet with all the profound disclosure thus made to him, he still felt no special call to the work of preaching the reformed doctrine and sought only for the undisturbed retirement that would permit him farther prosecution of his serious studies.