Two and twenty sermons of Master John Calvin In which sermons is most religiously…Two and twentie sermons of Maister Iohn Caluin In which sermons is most religiously…

I pray thee that thy mercy may comfort me: according unto thy promise unto thy servant.

I praye thee that thy mercie may comfort me: according vnto thy promise vnto thy seruant.

Here David maketh and more general request, then that which before we have seen. He desireth God to instruct him: and now he addeth, O let thy merciful kindness be my comfort. As if he had said, O Lord I have besought thee for a special and particular thing, but I add now, that thou wilt be merciful unto me in all and through all, that thy mercy be extended upon me, that I fail in nothing. Thou knowest what is necessary and profitable for me: O Lord let me feel thee to be gracious and pitiful all manner of ways. Lo what difference there is between the first request which we have already seen, and this second. Now this is a point worth the noting. For (as we have before said) see the first which we ought to have in a singular recommendation, and that is, that we may be taught by God, and not to be taught only by words, but that he will also lighten us with his holy spirit, to make us know, that it is his word which guideth us. See here, I say, the very right way to salvation. Now have we made this request? we may crave of God that he will not let us fall in anything whatsoever, that his mercy may comfort us. But yet here we see how that David was not comforted nor yet ⟨image 91⟩rejoiced but only in God, knowing that all the joy that we have here below shall be accursed, when as we have no regard unto our Creator. And yet for all this, see how commonly we are wonted to rejoice and comfort our selves, that is, even to forget God, & to turn our backs upon him. Now accursed be such joy, for the issue thereof can be none other, but as our Lord Christ Jesus sayeth, That it shall be turned into weeping and gnashing of teeth. Howbeit, the world is waxen drunk, for whatsoever is said unto it, it maketh no reckoning thereof, but utterly refuseth all good & sound doctrine. In deed this is true, that this same was not written in vain: but that we shall be so much the more inexcusable, when as we shall have the example of David, except we follow it. See then for this first point, that after David had compassed the whole world both above and beneath, he found no rest to comfort his spirit and soul, but at such time as he made his repair unto God. And there I say, he found wherewith to rejoice and comfort him self: finding nothing else but unquietness in all living creatures.