Commentary upon the Epistle to the Galatians

Here once again he useth not a sharp, but a most gentle word. He sayeth not. I marvel that ye slide so soon back: that ye are so disobedient, light, inconstant and unthankful: but that ye are so soon removed away. As if he would say: Ye are altogether patients or sufferers. For ye have done no harm, but ye have suffered and received harm. To the intent therefore that he might call back again those backsliders, he rather accuseth those that did remove, then those that were removed, and yet very modestly he blameth them also when he complaineth that they were removed. As if he would say: Albeit I embrace you with a fatherly affection, and know that ye are deceived, not by your own fault, but by the fault of these false Apostles, yet notwithstanding I would have wished, that ye had grown up a little more in the strength of sound doctrine. Ye took not hold enough upon the word, ye rooted not your selves deep enough in it, and that is the cause that at so light a blast of wind, ye are carried away and removed.¹ Jerome thinketh that Paul meant to interpret the name of the Galatians by alluding to the Hebrew word Galath, which is as much to say, as, fallen or carried away. As though he would say: Ye are right Galatians both in name and in deed, that is to say, fallen, or removed away. Some think that we Germans are descended of the Galatians. Neither is this divination perhaps untrue.² For we Germans are not much unlike to them in nature. And I my self also am constrained to wish to my countrymen more steadfastness and constancy. For in all things that we do, at the first brunt we be very hot: but when that heat of our first affections is allayed, anon we become more slack, and look with what rashness we begin things, with the same we give them over and utterly reject them.