From Rise of Protestantism in France to Publication of the Institutes - James Aitken Wylie

Vicar of Jesus Christ. This seemed truly a temple
of God's own building. With all its faults it yet was
a glorious Church, Divine and heavenly. Must he
leave this august society and join himself to a few
despised disciples of the new opinions? This
seemed like a razing of his name from the Book of
Life. This was to invoke excommunication upon
his own head, and write against himself a sentence
of exclusion from the family of God -- nay, from
God himself! This was the great battle that Calvin
had yet to fight.
How many have commenced this battle only to
lose it! They have been beaten back and beaten
down by the pretended Divine authority of "the
Church," by the array of her great names and her
great Councils, and though last, not least, by the
terror of her anathemas. It is not possible for even
the strongest minds, all at once, to throw off the
spell of the great Enchantress Nor would even
Calvin have conquered in this sore battle had he
not had recourse to the Sword of the Spirit, which
is the Word of God. Ever and anon he came back
to the Bible; he sought for the Church as she is
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