A17698:3739
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.
Now therefore, let us learn, not to provoke Gods wrath so far against us; but let us suffer ourselves to be tamed by him; and let us yield our selves conformable & gentle so soon as he hath summoned us, let us yield ourselves guilty without using any starting holes: for we shall win nothing thereby. There is nothing better than to enter §40into pure and free confession, saying, Lord what wilt thou do to these frail & wretched creatures? It is true that we have a hundred fold deserved to be sunken: but yet for all that, we flee unto thy mercy: wherefore have pity upon us. When we have thus condemned our selves, it is a mean to pacifi• the anger of God, which thing will not be done by hardening of our hearts. For then he will ever more proceed farther, until he have brought us to these signs and wonders, that be §50here mentioned. Again God must needs do the like also in respect of mens slothfulness & negligence, or rather utter senselessness. If we could be subdued at the first blow: God would take no pleasure in laying plague upon plague. But when he seeth that there is such a kind of stoutness, and such a presumption in us, that we will not stoop nor bow our necks: he must needs hold on until he make us to feel in very deed & after a strange manner, that it is he before whom we must yield §60our account. Let us therefore mark well how the obstinate malice of the world is the cause why God sendeth so strange corrections to put us in fear. And if we considered well the state of the world at this day, it would make the hairs of our head to stand upright. Certainly they do all sigh at the feeling of the stripes, and they complain, howbeit not to any amendment, but rather they bite on the bridle: Insomuch that when those which be not altogether blockish do make comparison of the present state, with that which we have seen before the wrath of God was on this wise provoked; they see it as it were a sea gulf: & that ought to make us afraid. And so let us come back again to that which Moses declareth, to wit, that God must needs have found the world very rebellious & hardhearted when he augmenteth his punishments in such sort: for it should never come to that pass, were it not that men were otherwise unreformable. Let us not accuse God of cruelty, when we see his rigour to exceed in punishing us: