It must be added that Calvin, in this preface, does not confine himself to the refutation of the charges of heresy drawn up against him by Caroli; but he vindicates his own course at Geneva, particularly in that vexatious affair of the oath which gave rise to the debate of November 25, 1537, the overthrow of the government on February 3, 1538, and the expulsion of Calvin and his friends on April 23 following. This document is, with the letters written by Calvin at this period, the most precious source of information as to the reformer’s feelings during this cruel struggle; and in quoting it at this place the author has made a judicious use of it. Let us quote further some words from an article in the _Athenæum_, of which we have already spoken. In the course of criticisms, sometimes severe, the writer acknowledges that ‘there are to be found in this volume, in unimpaired vigor, the qualities we admired in its predecessors. Few narratives are more moving than the simple tale of the death of Hamilton, the first of the Scotch martyrs; and the same may be said of the chapter devoted to Wishart.’ In regard to Calvin the same writer tells us—‘M. Merle possessed, as we have already remarked, a knowledge truly marvellous of the writings of Calvin; and there are few books which enable us to understand so well as M. Merle’s the mind of the reformer—not perhaps as he was on every occasion, but such as he would have wished to be.’ Professor F. Godet, of Neuchâtel, expresses the same opinions and insists on them.[7] After having spoken of ‘that stroke of a masterly pencil which was one of the most remarkable gifts of M. Merle d’Aubigné,’ he adds—‘It is always that simple and dignified style, calm and yet full of earnestness, majestic as the course of a great river, we might say—like the whole aspect of the author himself. But what appears to us above all to distinguish the manner of M. Merle is his tender and reverential love for his subject. The work which he describes possesses his full sympathy. He loves it as the work of his Saviour and his God. Jesus would no longer be what he is for the faith of the writer if he had not delivered, aided, corrected, chastened, governed and conquered as he does in this history. St. John, in the Apocalypse, shows us the Lamb opening the seals of the book containing the designs of God with respect to his church. M. Merle, in writing history, appears to see in the events which he relates so many seals which are broken under the hand of the King of Kings. In each fact he discerns one of the steps of his coming as spouse of the church or as judge of the world. And just as the leaves of the divine roll were written not only without but within, M. Merle is not satisfied with portraying the outside of events, but endeavors to penetrate to the divine idea which constitutes their essence, and to unveil it before the eyes of his reader. Do not therefore require him to be what is called an objective historian, and