Sermons of M. John Calvin upon the Epistle of Saint Paul to the GalatiansSermons of M. Iohn Caluine vpon the Epistle of Saincte Paule to the Galathians

Paul cutteth off all this gear, and saith that there is none but only Jesus Christ [that can do that] and that men must seek none other helps in that case either one way or other, but simply content them selves with his grace, and not give the law any room in that behalf. For he saith, as for me I am not dead through the Gospel. As if he should say, will ye make me believe that I can get Gods favour by means of the law? Nay, I tell you contrariwise, that it is not the Gospel which hath condemned me, it is not the Gospel that hath showed me my filthiness, to make me ashamed of it▪ it is not the Gospel that hath bereft me of all hope of salvation: but it is the Law, which hath showed me that I am stark dead, that I am damnable before God, that I am undone and damned: This cometh not from elsewhere than from the law. And would ye have me too seek righteousness there? It is all one as if ye would give me a poison to eat, to the end I should take nourishment of it. Howbeit (to say truth) that inconvenience is not to be wited upon the Law, for it should redound to the dishonour of God, from the Law came. But howsoever the case stand,¹ considering the corruption that is in us, the Law can not but kill us, as we have seen in the second too the Corinthians,² and as S. Paul declareth more fully in the ⟨image 118⟩seventh to the Romans. For he saith, that when men believe them selves too have life: that is too say, when they believe themselves to be righteous, and to stand in the grace & favour of God: it is a sign that the law is dead to them, that is to say, that it hath not the power and strength to show them that which else it should do. For to what end was the law given? Too set the rule of good life before our eyes, & that rule is called the righteousness which God alloweth. Mark that for one point. Secondly the law ought to be as a looking glass to us, wherein too behold our own deformities, blemishes, foulness, filthiness, and iniquities, so far out of all order, as we may be as it were swallowed up in despair at the sight of them. Now before we have the law, we see none of all these things: that is too say, we know not what manner of ones we be, nor what evil is in us. But when God setteth his demands before us, and we perceive the same throughly: