Understanding the real John Calvin II

I am slowly making my way through the biography. It is quite an achievement. Calvin is presented sympathetically but with a real awareness of his weaknesses. A regular theme seems to be Calvin's acute sense of his own intellectual superiority and his regular self-vindication both in personal correspondence and more public writing. Amongst the gems so far is this paragraph from page 147:

The enduring image of Calvin as an unyielding, moralistic and stone-faced tyrant who rejected all the pleasures of life has been his opponents' greatest victory. The iconography of the Frenchman has hardly helped matters, above all, the Reformation monument in Geneva, which casts him to look like some forgotten figure of Middle Earth. His sermons reveal a man whose attitudes towards material things were far more interesting and textured than his reputation suggests. The fruits of the world, according to Calvin, are not simply for subsistence, but rather to be enjoyed: good wine, good food, conversation, friendship, the pleasures of children and of marital relations. He was fond of wine and, indeed, when the nobleman Jacques de Bourgogne was preparing to come to Geneva Calvin purchased a barrel of fine wine for him in anticipation of his arrival. The drinking of a glass of wine was, for him, associated with the most pleasurable things of life — laughing with friends, sharing a meal with intimates, music and art. Naturally, he preached against gross consumption of worldly goods and immodesty; his own sense of style, however, allowed him to admire clean lines and simplicity. He liked what was tasteful. In his correspondence he could let drop a line that indicated an eye for beautiful buildings and a well-dressed woman. His painted portraits reveal his modest yet evident elegance — a good-quality cloak or gown with fur collar, nothing ostentatious or extravagant. The fine things of life point to a gracious God. Through the eyes of faith the elect enjoy these things not as momentary pleasures but as the revelation of God's love. The Christian life is not just about suffering, though there was enough of that in the sixteenth century. The wonders of creation and the joys of life, when viewed through the lens of faith, sustain and nourish the pilgrim along the journey.