Abraham Kuyper — Calvinism: The Origin and Safeguard of Our Constitutional Liberties, translated from the Dutch by J. Hendrik de Vries and printed in the Bibliotheca Sacra for October 1895 (pp. 645–674; this is the offprint), transcribed from the page images of the Internet Archive scan. Published in 1895, it is in the public domain.
The second of Kuyper’s articles on the Reformed roots of political liberty. It goes back from the Calvinistic troubles in England to the Huguenots of France, and compares Coligny’s plans and the Huguenot constitution with the Independents and, in outline, the American Constitution; it asks why the Calvinist principle of the separation of church and state was not carried through, and ends with Kuyper’s own programme for the Netherlands.
By the Rev. Abraham Kuyper, D. D.
IV.
WE go back another century, from 1650 to 1550, from the Calvinistic troubles in England to the struggle of the Huguenots in France. It must be shown that the Independents and the Huguenots were congenial to each other, as well as that they differed; only when the affiliation of the two is established, does the line of Calvinistic development appear unbroken.
Their spiritual affiliation is shown, first of all, by de Coligni’s plan of colonization, which, though but little known, is exceedingly noteworthy. It is well known that de Coligni, however different in character, was the Cromwell of the Huguenots; and, without his faults, was, no less than the Protector, the soul and sword of Calvinism. As much as four years before the Huguenots took up arms against the court in 1559, and the martyrs’ woes had been endured in silence for nearly forty years, the natural leaders of the Calvinists began to see that it would not do, in the long run, to submit to slaughter without defence. From a writing to Cardinal Borromeus it appears that the Huguenots numbered nearly half of the population of France, and this fact stimulated both their desire to offer armed resistance, and the purpose of the king to violently exterminate them. The very increase of their numbers rendered their position critical. This was suspected in the cabinet of Catherine de’ Medici, and led to the horrors of the Bartholomew massacre. Admiral de Coligni likewise saw through this, and it led him to devise a plan of colonization. “If then Calvinism is not to be tolerated in France, allow your Huguenots to emigrate to America. Let there be a Catholic France with Calvinistic colonies. Then will our persecutions be ended, and as a naval power also, France will be the successful competitor of Spain and Portugal.” Henry II. deemed this project not altogether impracticable, and in August of 1555 Durand de Villegagnon, a Maltese Knight, and Vice-Admiral of Bretagne, set sail with two of the king’s men-of-war, to found a colony in Brazil. He landed in the Bay of Janeiro, planted the flag of France, and named the fort which he built Coligni, after the hero whose project he was carrying out. In the following year three ships of the royal navy were employed in the transportation of emigrants. But, alas! even then a less noble intention was entertained at court. Orders were sent to Fort Coligni to introduce Romish worship. This put a stop to further Huguenot emigration, and those who were already in Brazil were overtaken by the Portuguese and most pitilessly massacred.
But de Coligni went on, and in 1562 induced King Charles IX. to send out three men-of-war with Huguenot colonists to North America. The fort they built was named, after the king, Carolina, to which in their turn the states of North and South Carolina owe their name. By bad management, however, this fort also fell into the enemy’s hands. The Spanish marines took it, and the Huguenots they strung on trees, with the base superscription over their heads: “Killed as heretics, not as Frenchmen.” This cruelty became the more notorious in history because it incited that Gascony nobleman, Dominique de Gourgues, to take revenge by going to America, and obtaining a hearing with the Indians; with their help to recapture this fort, and then, with equal cruelty, to string up the Spaniards to the same trees on which he found the bodies of the Huguenots, with this writing above their heads: “Killed as murderers, not as Spaniards.” But aside from this historic incident, who does not see the striking similarity between this colonization plan of de Coligni which ended in failure, and that of the Puritans which met with success? The eyes of both looked for a new world, the glance of both was turned toward America, and in Coligni’s idea, as well as in Robinson’s, the consciousness found expression that Calvinistic faith could not flourish in a commonwealth constituted after Romish state-law, but rather carried within itself a creative principle which contained a state-law of its own, and a new political life.