- 02324 - 6 - Calvinists and Catholics during Holland ’ s Golden Age

In 1667, Cosimo de Medici, heir to the Grand Duchy of Tuscany, embarked on a grand tour of Europe, mostly at his father’s urging, in order to escape his unhappy marriage to a cousin of French king Louis XIV.1 Prince Cosimo’s travels took him to, among other places, the province of Holland in the Dutch Republic, where he famously visited the aging painter Rembrandt van Rijn in Amsterdam.2 Religion apparently interested Cosimo at least as much as art, for his secretaries recorded in their travel journals that their lord also visited numerous churches in the metropolis. On Christmas day in 1667, Cosimo first attended mass in a Jesuit oratory, then proceeded to attend a Reformed church service, and concluded the day with subsequent visits to Mennonite, Lutheran, Socinian, and Remonstrant churches.3 To this progress through the city’s ecclesiastical geography was later added an extensive tour of a Jesuit house church. The visitors noted the exterior, which looked like every other house on the street, and marveled at the interior, which, at the top of a long stairwell, included a proper Catholic worship space containing an altar as well as an organ and other musical instruments. The priests present were dressed in secular clothing and explained that all activities within the house took place privately.4 That such an arrangement