Calvin and Servetus

Extract

In the Genevan suburb of Champel, in an angle formed by the crossing of two unfrequented roads, stands a monument erected in the year 1903 by citizens of Geneva to commemorate an incident in the history of their community which for three centuries and a half has justly been regarded by critics as a blot upon its good name. The monument consists of a rough, irregular granite block about a man's height and resting upon a base of natural rock. On one side is the name of Michael Servetus, and on the other the following touching inscription:

FILS

RESPECTUEUX ET RECONNAISSANTS

DE CALVIN

NOTRE GRAND REFORMATEUR

MAIS CONDAMNANT UNE ERREUR

QUI FUT CELLE DE SON SIECLE

ET FERMEMENT ATTACHES

A LA LIBERTE DE CONSCIENCE

SELON LES VRAIS PRINCIPES

DE LA REFORMATION ET DE L'EVANGILE

NOUS AVONS ELEVE

CE MONUMENT EXPIATOIRE

LE XXVII OCTOBRE MCMIII

That such an inscription could be accepted as an expression of the best judgment of the modern Genevese in regard to this action of their fathers is evidence of a change of sentiment that has required all these three and a half centuries to come to its rights. During my travels two years ago I met a Genevan scholar of world-wide reputation in a field of knowledge that has kept him for the greater part of his active life far removed from the provincial feeling that might well cling to one who had never left the familiar scenes of early life. He was a member of an ancient Genevan aristocratic family, still in possession of a landed estate that for six generations at least had been in the hands of his fathers. In the course of conversation I remarked upon the admirable action of his fellow-citizens in showing, though tardily, their sense of the historic significance of Calvin's terrible act of justice. In so doing I meant to pay to Geneva the respectful tribute of my humble admiration. But the response was not such as I had anticipated. Not even yet was this Genevan aristocrat quite ready to admit that his fellow-citizens had done well to recognize thus publicly their regret that the man to whom they as well as he looked back as the creator of their redoubtable commonwealth had allowed himself this one human slip. Even modified as their expression of regret was, even though they had guarded the reputation of Calvin by ascribing his fault to the Spirit of the Age, still it seemed to this sturdy conservative that any such confession of error could be only another outburst of that radical temper which was slowly transforming the Geneva of Calvin into a community more in sympathy with the liberalism of the modern world.