Certain homilies of m. Joan Calvin containing profitable and necessary, admonitio[n] for this time,…Certaine homilies of m. Ioan Calvine conteining profitable and necessarie, admonitio[n] for this time,…

When men have done all they can / the worst they may do is to take away our lives. How precious then shall the heavenly life be unto us when it is compared with this present life which is lost? It is not my purpose in this place to collect all the promises set forth in the scripture to this end. Yet sense they be repeated and so often times renewed unto us / we ought so to be exercised not only in the reading / but also in the knowledge and consolation of them / that we might be as it were died and surely confirmed in them.

When men have done all thei can / the worst yei may do is to take away our lyves. How preciouse then shall the hevēly lyfe be vnto vs whē it is compared with this present lyfe whiche is lost? It is not my purpose in this place to collect all the promises set forth in the scripture to this end. Yet sence thei be repeated and so oftē times renued vnto vs / we ought so to be exercised not only in the readīg / but also in ye knowlege and cōsolation of them / that we might be as it wer died and surelye confirmed in them.

But if when the plague hangeth over our heads three or four of them are not sufficient to confirm & strengthen us / truly an hundred should be sufficient to overcome all adverse and contrary temptations. But if god with thes great sweet promises can not entice and draw us to him / are we not very great dullards / and beetle heads / when nether the sever threatenings can work any more in us? ¹Jesus Christ doth appoint a day to accuse all them before his father which deny the truth for fear of losing this life / for whom he declareth destruction both of body and soul to be prepared. ²Also in an other place he protesteth that he will refuse all manner of communion with them that deny him before ⟨image 51⟩men. Thes words onlese we be utterly void of all sense ought vehemently to move our minds and so to fray us / that for fear the hears of our head should start up. But how so ever it be / onles we be so affected and moved as the greatness of the matter and danger requireth / there remaineth nothing ells for us but to look for horrible and most miserable confusion: wherein we may excuse our fault so much as we lust / & we may say that in this great frailty and weakness of nature / we rather are worthy of mercy then of any severity and sharpness of punishment / it will not serve.