Henceforth the garden of the Basses-Treilles became a favourite resort with Calvin: he was accustomed to go there freely and openly. There, like Socrates in the garden of Academe, the young christian Plato and his friends sought for truth.[102] The truth which the Reformation was then restoring to the world, was of quite a different order, and of far greater power than that of the Greek philosophers. Wherever its voice was heard, the idea of a clerical priesthood disappeared, the prerogatives of monastic life vanished, and a personal, individual, living Christianity took their place. The divine revelations were given to laymen in their mother-tongue, and the sacraments, stripped of their pretended magical virtues, exercised a spiritual influence over the heart. Such were the principles professed by Calvin in the garden of the lieutenant-general. As he walked up and down beneath the pleasant shade, he spoke to his friend of the heavenly Father, of his only Son, of grace, and of eternal life. His disciples, as they listened, imagined that all things were about to become new, and said to one another that now at last a barren formalism in the church would give way to a living power—a breath from heaven. The catholics of Poitiers were distressed. 'As our first parents,' they said, 'were enchanted in a garden, so it was in the lieutenant-general's garden of the Basses-Treilles that this handful of men were cajoled and duped by Calvin, who easily made a breach in the souls of those who listened to him.' This is a remarkable confession. One day a meeting was held there at which Calvin and his friends consulted about what France needed most. The answer was easy: the Gospel. But France, alas! rejected it. They did not confine themselves to this topic, and Calvin was anxious to substitute in the church the spirit for the form, life and reality for ritual observances. He acquitted himself worthily of his task, and taking up the principal point explained specially his spiritual doctrine on the Saviour's presence. 'This,' says the catholic historian, 'was the first Calvinist council held in France.'[103] The word 'council' is too ambitious, but it was a meeting that bore fruit. The living faith which inspired the young doctor gained over a few rebellious spirits. De la Place, who raised numerous objections at first, but who was a man of common sense and 'good conscience,' thought that he might possibly be mistaken. 'The seed fallen into his heart began to grow, and it put forth fruit in the season God had ordained.'[104]