giving other instances which forcibly exhibit the mediating, moderating, conciliatory character of Calvin.[211] If Calvin was everywhere to be found, at least by his influence, at the head of the armies which contended with Rome, he was also to be found everywhere preaching the brotherhood and the unity of all evangelical Christians. He was united in the closest friendship with Farel, minister at Neuchâtel, and with Viret, minister at Lausanne; and he wrote to them, ‘By our union the children of God are gathered into one flock of Jesus Christ, and are even united in his body.’[212] He soon endeavored to draw into this union, into this body, not only the churches of Reformed France, but also those of German Switzerland, of Germany, the Netherlands, England, and other countries. The aim of his life and his chief desire was to see all of them included in one great network of unity. ‘For this end,’ said he with heroic energy, ‘I should not shrink from crossing ten seas, if that were needful.’[213] He succeeded, at least in the most important part of his aim; for if it was not possible to establish an external unity between the various churches, which was not his object, there is at this time an internal, spiritual unity between all those who love Jesus Christ and keep his word. [Sidenote: Calvin As Mediator.] In the procession of the ages there is one epoch which reminds us of the moment when the sun rises and pours out his rays over the earth to guide men in their goings. It is that epoch at which the _day-star from on high_, Jesus Christ, the light of the world, appeared, and left behind him in his Word a luminary intended to shed light and life into the minds of men; but the natural darkness of man’s heart easily rises around and obscures it, even if it cannot wholly extinguish it. Since that time there have been other epochs of secondary importance, in which God has rekindled the waning light of heavenly doctrine, and has restored its pristine brightness for the salvation of the world. Of these secondary epochs the Reformation is that which has exerted the most powerful and most lasting influence in enlightening and in converting men, and in giving to man and the world a new life and new activity. No man had a greater share in this than Calvin; not, indeed, in the first impulse; that was Luther’s alone; but in the happy influence which it has had on human society in the two great spheres of spiritual and temporal things. To convince ourselves of this, nothing more is necessary than to glance at those countries in which this influence of the great reformer prevails, and which generally present a contrast to those in which the pope has prevailed. We know how many enemies Calvin had, and we confess that there were shadows in his life, as there are in the life of every human being; but we have an immovable conviction that the truths which he announced with incomparable purity and force are the mightiest remedy for the decay of the individual and