After the Diet of Ratisbon, Calvin returned to Geneva, at the eager desire of the people.  The great Council summoned him to return; every voice was raised for him.  “Calvin, that learned and righteous man,” they said, “it is he whom we would have as the minister of the Lord.”  Yet he did not willingly return; he preferred his quiet life at Strasburg, but obeyed the voice of conscience.  On the 13th of September, 1541, he returned to his penitent congregation, and was received by the whole city with every demonstration of respect; and a cloth cloak was given him as a present, which he seemed to need.

The same year he was married to a widow, Idelette de Burie, who was a worthy, well-read, high-minded woman, with whom he lived happily for nine years, until her death.  She was superior to Luther’s wife, Catherine Bora, in culture and dignity, and was a helpmate who never opposed her husband in the slightest matter, always considering his interests.  Esteem and friendship seem to have been the basis of this union,—­not passionate love, which Calvin did not think much of.  When his wife died it seems he mourned for her with decent grief, but did not seek a second marriage, perhaps because he was unable to support a wife on his small stipend as she would wish and expect.  He rather courted poverty, and refused reasonable gratuities.  His body was attenuated by fasting and study, like that of Saint Bernard.  When he was completing his “Institutes,” he passed days without eating and nights without sleeping.  And as he practised poverty he had a right to inculcate it.  He kept no servant, lived in a small tenement, and was always poorly clad.  He derived no profit from any of his books, and the only present he ever consented to receive was a silver goblet from the Lord of Varennes.  Luther’s stipend was four hundred and fifty florins; and he too refused a yearly gift from the booksellers of four hundred dollars, not wishing to receive a gratuity for his writings.  Calvin’s salary was only fifty dollars a year, with a house, twelve measures of corn, and two pipes of wine; for tea and coffee were then unknown in Europe, and wine seems to have been the usual beverage, after water.  He was pre-eminently a conscientious man, not allowing his feelings to sway his judgment.  He was sedate and dignified and cheerful; though Bossuet accuses him of a surly disposition,—­un genre triste, un esprit chagrin.  Though formal and stern, women never shrank from familiar conversation with him on the subject of religion.  Though intolerant of error, he cherished no personal animosities.  Calvin was more refined than Luther, and never like him gave vent to coarse expressions.  He had not Luther’s physical strength, nor his versatility of genius; nor as a reformer was he so violent.  “Luther aroused; Calvin tranquillized,” The one stormed the great citadel of error, the other furnished the weapons for holding it after it was taken.  The former was more popular; the latter