ed from within, the Bernese, on receipt
of an unsatisfactory reply to an appeal in behalf of their allies, came
to their assistance with an army of ten or twelve thousand men.
Discouraged by the threatening aspect his affairs had assumed, Charles
relaxed his grasp on the throat of his revolted subjects, and withdrew
to a safe distance. His obstinacy, however, cost him the permanent loss
not only of Geneva, but of a considerable part of his most valuable
territories, including the Pays de Vaud--a district which, after
remaining for more than two hundred and fifty years a dependency of
Berne, has within the present century (in 1803), become an independent
canton of the Swiss confederacy.[389]

[Sidenote: Calvin the apologist of the Protestants.]

The horrible slanders put in circulation abroad, in justification of the
atrocities with which the unoffending Protestants of France were
visited, furnished the motive for the composition and publication of an
apology that instantly achieved unprecedented celebrity, and has long
outlived the occasion that gave it birth. The apology was the
"Institutes;" the author, John Calvin. With the appearance of his
masterpiece, a great writer and theologian, destined to exercise a wide
and lasting influence not only upon France, but over the entire
intellectual world, enters upon the stage of French history to take a
leading part in the unfolding religious and political drama.

[Sidenote: His birth and training.]

[Sidenote: Studies at Paris;]

[Sidenote: also at Orleans and Bourges.]

John Calvin was born on the tenth of July, 1509, at Noyon, a small but
ancient city of Picardy. His family was of limited means, but of
honorable extraction. Gerard Cauvin, his father, had successively held
important offices in connection with the episcopal see. As a man of
clear and sound judgment, he was sought for his counsel by the gentry
and nobility of the province--a circumstance that rendered it easy for
him to give to his son a more liberal course of instruction than
generally fell to the lot of commoners. It is not denied by Calvin's
most bitter enemies that he early manifested striking ability. In
selecting for him one of the learned professions, his father naturally
preferred the church, as that in which he could most readily secure for
his son speedy promotion. It may serve to illustrate the degree of
respect at this time paid to the prescriptions of canon law, to note
that Charles de Hang