A17698:1995
Sermons upon Deuteronomy
The sermons of M. John Calvin upon the fifth book of Moses called Deuteronomy faithfully gathered word for word as he preached them in open pulpit; together with a preface of the ministers of the Church of Geneva, and an admonishment made by the deacons there. Also there are annexed two profitable tables, the one containing the chief matters; the other the places of Scripture herein alleged. Translated out of French by Arthur Golding.The sermons of M. Iohn Caluin vpon the fifth booke of Moses called Deuteronomie faithfully gathered word for word as he preached them in open pulpet; together with a preface of the ministers of the Church of Geneua, and an admonishment made by the deacons there. Also there are annexed two profitable tables, the one containing the chiefe matters; the other the places of Scripture herein alledged. Translated out of French by Arthur Golding.
London: printed by Henry Middleton for George Bishop, 1583
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
But there is yet a further thing, which I said to be the second point: and that is, that §20God hath set his image in us. Therefore when I do any outrage to my neighbour, it is all one as if I should deface the image of GOD, and so am I guilty of high treason. Wherefore let us bear well in mind that our Lord maketh great account of the maintenance of peace & agreement between men: the mean whereof is that no man offer any violence or wrong unto his neighbour. And surely we know how greatly God misliketh manslaughter. For the law was made §30so strait in that behalf,1 that if a body were found dead by chance, and it was not known who killed it, the elders should meet about it, and after great search for the matter, they should take a solemn oath that none of them was guilty of the murder: thereupon they should offer a sacrifice, to witness that the land should be as it were defiled if God punished not so heinous an offence, though the murderer were not found. And what shall §40then become of us when our hands are imbrued with blood, and the murderer is known, and we be full of cruelty towards our brethren? Think we to scape the hand of the Judge unpunished, when as he hath pronounced such sentence? Yea and even when manslaughter is committed in battles, although the same be permitted when the wars are Lawful: Yet notwithstanding the scripture telleth us there is a kind of defiling in it, to the end ye even §50when men are compelled to slay their enemies in the maintenance of just quarrels,2 they should consider thus with themselves: Alas, I must be fain to deface here the creatures that are shaped after the image of God: and thereupon be sorry and loth to do it. Now then let us mark that above all things it is Gods will we should live quietly among our selves, without offering of any violence or outrage one to another. But truly, murders are above all things most §60horrible in Gods sight: and yet must we mark therewithal, that by that means all other outrages are forbidden. And that was the cause why the Prophet Isaiah upbraided the Jews, with the bloodiness of their hands.