to a higher intelligence.  The Saxon reformer was more eloquent; the Swiss reformer was more dialectical.  The one advocated unity; the other theocracy.  Luther was broader; Calvin engrafted on his reforms the Old Testament observances.  The watchword of the one was Grace; that of the other was Predestination.  Luther cut knots; Calvin made systems.  Luther destroyed; Calvin legislated.  His great principle of government was aristocratic.  He wished to see both Church and State governed by a select few of able men.  In all his writings we see no trace of popular sovereignty.  He interested himself, like Savonarola, in political institutions, but would separate the functions of the magistracy from those of the clergy; and he clung to the notion of a theocratic government, like Jewish legislators and the popes themselves.  The idea of a theocracy was the basis of Calvin’s system of legislation, as it was that of Leo I. He desired that the temporal power should rule, in the name of God,—­should be the arm by which spiritual principles should be enforced.  He did not object to the spiritual domination of the popes, so far as it was in accordance with the word of God.  He wished to realize the grand idea which the Middle Ages sought for, but sought for in vain,—­that the Church must always remain the mother of spiritual principles; but he objected to the exercise of temporal power by churchmen, as well as to the interference of the temporal power in matters purely spiritual,—­virtually the doctrine of Anselm and Becket.  But, unlike Becket, Calvin would not screen clergymen accused of crime from temporal tribunals; he rather sought the humiliation of the clergy in temporal matters.  He also would destroy inequalities of rank, and do away with church dignitaries, like bishops and deans and archdeacons; and he instituted twice as many laymen as clergymen in ecclesiastical assemblies.  But he gave to the clergy the exclusive right to excommunicate, and to regulate the administration of the sacraments.  He was himself a high-churchman in his spirit, both in reference to the divine institution of the presbyterian form of government and the ascendancy of the Church as a great power in the world.

Calvin exercised a great influence on the civil polity of Geneva, although it was established before he came to the city.  He undertook to frame for the State a code of morals.  He limited the freedom of the citizens, and turned the old democratic constitution into an oligarchy.  The general assembly, which met twice a year, nominated syndics, or judges; but nothing was proposed in the general assembly which had not previously been considered in the council of the Two Hundred; and nothing in the latter which had not been brought before the council of Sixty; nor even in this, which had not been approved by the lesser council.  The four syndics, with their council of sixteen, had power of life and death, and the whole public business of the state was in their