Thus we have the Subject and the Privilege; But in the next place, we have the Description of the efficient cause, for it was not their own power and freewill that made them believe; Therefore the efficient cause is set down, first, Negatively, and then Positively; Negatively, by removing those false causes that men might imagine; and we have a three-fold enumeration of them, Not of blood, not of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man. Divers Interpreters go divers ways, though much to the same sense: Some think the Evangelist by blood doth not in the general mean natural generation, and then afterwards distribute it into two particulars, not of the will of the flesh, that is of the woman; Nor of the will of man, that is not of the man. Others (supposing the general) interpret the distribution thus; Not of the will of the flesh, that is not naturally; Nor by the will of man, that is, not by humane adoption, for so some are made legal sons amongst man. Others, they think all these enumerations are but to signify one thing, and therefore the opposition to all is God; But we may not think the holy Ghost doth so industriously reckon up these several ways, but that some special thing is intended by every one; Although, as Erasmus observeth, the emphatical Article is not in the original. By blood therefore we understand any dignity or excellency of birth, it's bloods in the plural number, either by an Enallage, and so an Hebraism, as Maldenate; Or else because of the long succession ⟨p. 270⟩by birth: And this may well oppose the carnal opinion reigning both with Jew and Gentile, for all know how the Jew boasted in his birth, because he was the seed of Abraham, therefore he thought the favour of God necessarily annected to him; And for the Gentile, What a vanity and sinful humour is in persons to be proud of their birth, that they come of noble parents? For, although this be an outward civil dignity amongst men, yet it maketh nothing at all to their spiritual dignity, yea many times hindereth it, according to that observation, Heroum filiinoxae, Regeneration then doth not come according to such civil and political respects.
Thus we have the Subject and the Priviledge; But in the next place, we have the Description of the efficient cause, for it was not their own power and freewill that made them believe; Therefore the efficient cause is set down, first, Negatively, and then Positively; Negatively, by removing those false causes that men might imagine; and we have a three-fold enumeration of them, Not of blood, not of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man. Divers Interpreters go divers wayes, though much to the same sense: Some think the Evangelist by blood doth not in the general mean natural generation, and then afterwards distribute it into two particulars, not of the will of the flesh, that is of the woman; Nor of the will of man, that is not of the man. Others (supposing the general) interpret the distribution thus; Not of the will of the flesh, that is not naturally; Nor by the will of man, that is, not by humane adoption, for so some are made legal sonnes amongst man. Others, they think all these enumerations are but to signifie one thing, and therefore the opposition to all is God; But we may not think the holy Ghost doth so industriously reckon up these several wayes, but that some special thing is intended by every one; Although, as Erasmus observeth, the emphatical Article is not in the original. By blood therefore we understand any dignity or excellency of birth, it's bloods in the plural number, either by an Enallage, and so an Hebraism, as Maldenate; Or else because of the long succession ⟨p. 270⟩by birth: And this may well oppose the carnal opinion reigning both with Jew and Gentile, for all know how the Jew boasted in his birth, because he was the seed of Abraham, therefore he thought the favour of God necessarily annected to him; And for the Gentile, What a vanity and sinfull humour is in persons to be proud of their birth, that they come of noble parents? For, although this be an outward civil dignity amongst men, yet it maketh nothing at all to their spiritual dignity, yea many times hindereth it, according to that observation, Heroum filiinoxae, Regeneration then doth not come according to such civil and political respects.
