up on the basis of his Institutes, which had been published the year before. This compend was already in 1537 made public in its French form[1] and it was rendered into Latin in the spring of the following year.[2] Its first section bears the heading: “That all men are born to know God”;[3] and its first paragraph runs as follows: “Since there is no one of men to be found, no matter how barbarous and altogether savage, who is not touched by some religious notion,[4] it is clear that we are all created to this end, that we should know the majesty of our Creator; and knowing Him, should hold Him in esteem, and honor Him with all fear, love and reverence.”[5] And its last paragraph runs as follows: “It is necessary, then, that the principal care and solicitude of our life should be to seek God and to aspire to Him with all affection of heart and not to rest anywhere save in Him.”[6] However catechetical in intention, this document, it will be perceived, was not at all what we know as a catechism in form. It requires mention here, however, as the foundation-stone in the edifice of Reformed catechetics; although it was soon supplanted in Geneva itself by the document which has for three hundred and fifty years been known affectionately throughout the whole Reformed world as “Calvin’s Catechism”. This new formulary was published in French and Latin in 1545 and entered at once upon a world-wide mission. Translated
- ↑ Instruction et Confession de Foy, dont on use en Leglise de Geneue. (Opp. xxii, pp. 4 sq.)
- ↑ Catechismus, sive Christianae Religionis Institutio ecclesiae Genevensis, etc. (Opp. v, 313 sq.)
- ↑ In the Latin; “born for religion.”
- ↑ Latin, “sense”.
- ↑ We have rendered the French: the Latin—which was more broadly known—runs as follows: “Quum nemo hominum reperiatur, quamlibet barbarus sit ac toto pectore efferatus, qui non aliquo afficiatur religionis sensu; nos in hunc finem creatos omnes esse constat, ut majestatem agnoscamus creatoris nostri, agnitam suspiciamus, omnique et timore, et amore, et reverentia colamus.”
- ↑ The Latin runs: Haec igitur praecipua vitae nostrae cura et sollicitudo sit oportet, Deum quaerere et ad eum omni animi studio adspirare, nec alibi nisi in ipso acquiescere.
