The Institution of Christian Religion

I will not go through all the testimonies which at this day the foolish Sorbonists rashly snatch out of the scriptures, as they first come to hand, & do throw them against us. For, some of them are so worthy to be laughed at, that I my self also can not rehearse them, unless I would worthily be counted fond. Therefore I will make an end, when I shall have declared the saying of Christ, wherewith they marvellously please themselves. For, to the lawyer which asked him what was necessary to salvation, he answered: if yt wilt enter into life,¹ keep the commandments. What would we more (say they) when we are commanded by the author of grace himself to get the kingdom of God by the keeping of his commandments. As though forsooth it were not certain, that Christ tempered his answers to them with whom he saw that he had to do. Here a doctor of the law asketh of the mean to obtain blessedness, & not ye only, but with doing of what thing men may attain unto it. Both the person of him that spake & the question it self led the Lord so to answer. The lawyer being filled with the persuasion of the righteousness of the law, was blind in conscience of works. Again, he sought nothing else but what were yt works of righteousness, by which salvation is gotten. Therefore he is worthily sent to the law, in which there is a perfect mirror of righteousness. We also do with a loud voice pronounce that the commandments ⟨p. 208⟩must be kept, if life be sought in works. And this doctrine is necessary to be known of Christians. For how should they flee to Christ if they did not acknowledge y• they are fallen from the way of life into the headlong downfall of death? But how should they understand how far they have strayed from the way of life, unless they first understand what is that way of life? For them they are taught that the sanctuary to recover salvation, is in Christ, when they see how great difference there is between their life & y• righteousness of God which is contained in the keeping of the law. The sum is this, that if salvation be sought in works, we must keep the commandments by which we are instructed to perfect righteousness. But we must not stick fast her, unless we will faint in our mid course: for none of us is able to keep the commandments. Sith therefore we are excluded from the righteousness of the law, we must of necessity resort to an other help, namely to the faith of Christ.