A17698:611
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.
and even in the Sermon which he maketh in the seventeenth of the Acts, he speaketh not to any one people alone,1 but to all the heathen §40universally. And to the same purpose he allegeth them a saying of their own heathen writers. For it is written by a heathen Poet, that we be Gods generation.2 Saint Paul reasoneth hereupon, if we be the generation of God, is it either comely or reasonable that we should make him any image either of wood or stone, gold, or silver? None of these things can resemble him. But we must mark that when this poor heathen man spake after that fashion,§50 he meant not that we resemble God either in eyes, or in nose, or in ears, but in soul, forasmuch as we have reason to discern between good and evil, understanding to conceive and comprehend things,3 and are so excellent above all brute beasts, that there is no creature in the world so noble as man. That is the thing wherein we resemble God. But now, with what painting can mans soul be expressed? Seek all the cunning that can be, & what portraiture can §60be made thereof? And yet for all that, what are our souls? They be but as little sparks in comparison of the infinite brightness that is in God. Our souls are created, and God is without beginning: He is the ground and wellspring of all things. Our souls are weak, subject to ignorance, subject to sin, and subject to many wicked lusts. But God with his infinite being and majesty is the perfection of all virtues. To be short, as oft as we think of him, we ought to be ravished into wondering and astonishment. So then, is it not apparent that men are worse than mad, when they will needs take upon them to shape out Gods being, seeing that no shape can be made of their own souls, which are nothing in comparison of him? For seeing that S. Paul speaketh so to the heathen, I pray you do not the Papists show that their meaning is to reprove him of ignorance, and of the misapplying of Gods law? Or else must they not needs be confounded in their blasphemies? Yes: and therefore let us mark well, that this doctrine that God will not have any manner of image made of him, serveth not for two or three days, but for all ever. And there is even one reason which ought to suffice us, which I alleged even now out of the prophet Isaiah.