John Calvin, a French theologian and religious reformer during the Protestant Reformation. Calvin’s beliefs later became known as Calvinism, a specific denomination of Protestantism. Milton draws attention to the fact that Calvin was influenced by the religious writings of John Wyclif, without whom the Protestant Reformation may have never happened.
Get the entire Areopagitica LitChart as a printable PDF.
Calvin Character Timeline in Areopagitica
The timeline below shows where the character Calvin appears in Areopagitica. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Areopagitica
...reformed,” Milton asserts, then “we have looked so long upon the blaze that Zwinglius and Calvin hath beaconed up to us, that we are stark blind.”
(full context)
...prelates against the divine and admirable spirit of Wyclif,” perhaps neither Hus, Jerome, Luther nor Calvin would have been known. “The glory of reforming all our neighbors had been completely ours,”...
(full context)
