Institutes of the Christian Religion

V. Now, John was placed between the Law and the Gospel, holding an intermediate office connected with both. For though, in calling Christ “the Lamb of God” and “the victim for the expiation of sins,”(944) he preached the substance of the gospel; yet, because he did not clearly express that incomparable power and glory which afterwards appeared in his resurrection, Christ affirms that he is not equal to the Apostles. This is his meaning in the following words: “Among them that are born of women, there hath not risen a greater than John the Baptist: notwithstanding, he that is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.”(945) For he is not there commending the persons of men, but after having preferred John to all the prophets, he allots the highest degree of honour to the preaching of the gospel, which we have elsewhere seen is signified by “the kingdom of heaven.” When John himself said that he was only a “voice,”(946) as though he were inferior to the prophets, this declaration proceeded not from a pretended humility; he meant to signify that he was not intrusted with a proper embassy, but acted merely in the capacity of a herald, according to the prediction of Malachi: “Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord.”(947) Nor indeed, through the whole course of his ministry, did he aim at any thing but procuring disciples for Christ, which he also proves from Isaiah to have been the commission given him by God. In this sense he was called by Christ “a burning and a shining light,”(948) because the full day had not yet arrived. Yet this is no reason why he should not be numbered among the preachers of the gospel, as he used the same baptism which was afterwards delivered to the apostles. But it was not till after Christ was received into the celestial glory, that the more free and rapid progress of the apostles completed what John had begun.

Chapter X. The Similarity Of The Old And New Testaments.

From the preceding observations it may now be evident, that all those persons, from the beginning of the world, whom God has adopted into the society of his people, have been federally connected with him by the same law and the same doctrine which are in force among us: but because it is of no small importance that this point be established, I shall show, by way of appendix, since the fathers were partakers with us of the same inheritance, and hoped for the same salvation through the grace of our common Mediator, how far their condition in this connection was different from ours. For though the testimonies we have collected from the law and the prophets in proof of this, render it sufficiently evident that the people of God have never had any other rule of religion and piety, yet because some writers have raised many disputes concerning the difference of the Old and New Testaments, which may occasion doubts in the mind of an undiscerning reader, we shall assign a particular chapter for the better and more accurate discussion of this subject. Moreover, what would otherwise have been very useful, has now been rendered necessary for us by Servetus and some madmen of the sect of the Anabaptists, who entertain no other ideas of the Israelitish nation, than of a herd of swine, whom they pretend to have been pampered by the Lord in this world, without the least hope of a future immortality in heaven. To defend the pious mind, therefore, from this pestilent error, and at the same time to remove all difficulties which may arise from the mention of a diversity between the Old and New Testaments, let us, as we proceed, examine what similarity there is between them, and what difference; what covenant the Lord made with the Israelites, in ancient times, before the advent of Christ, and what he has entered into with us since his manifestation in the flesh.

II. And, indeed, both these topics may be despatched in one word. The covenant of all the fathers is so far from differing substantially from ours, that it is the very same; it only varies in the administration. But as such extreme brevity would not convey to any man a clear understanding of the subject, it is necessary, if we would do any good, to proceed to a more diffuse explication of it. But in showing their similarity, or rather unity, it will be needless to recapitulate all the particulars which have already been mentioned, and unseasonable to introduce those things which remain to be discussed in some other place. We must here insist chiefly on three principal points. We have to maintain, First, that carnal opulence and felicity were not proposed to the Jews as the mark towards which they should ultimately aspire, but that they were adopted to the hope of immortality, and that the truth of this adoption was certified to them by oracles, by the law, and by the prophets. Secondly, that the covenant, by which they were united to the Lord, was founded, not on any merits of theirs, but on the mere mercy of God who called them. Thirdly, that they both possessed and knew Christ as the Mediator, by whom they were united to God, and became partakers of his promises. The second of these points, as perhaps it is not yet sufficiently known, shall be demonstrated at large in its proper place. For we shall prove by numerous and explicit testimonies of the prophets, that whatever blessing the Lord ever gave or promised to his people, proceeded from his indulgent goodness. The third point has been clearly demonstrated in several places. And we have not wholly neglected the first.

III. In discussing the first point, therefore, because it principally belongs to the present argument, and is the grand subject of their controversy against us, we will use the more diligent application; yet in such a manner, that if any thing be wanting to the explication of the others, it may be supplied as we proceed, or added afterwards in a suitable place. Indeed, the apostle removes every doubt respecting all these points, when he says, that God the Father “promised afore by his prophets in the holy Scriptures, the gospel concerning his Son,”(949) which he promulgated in the appointed time: and again, that the righteousness of faith, which is revealed in the gospel, is “witnessed by the law and the prophets.”(950) For the gospel does not detain men in the joy of the present life, but elevates them to the hope of immortality; does not fasten them to terrestrial delights, but announcing to them a hope reserved in heaven, does as it were transport them thither. For this is the description which he gives in another place: “In whom also after that ye believed, ye were sealed with that Holy Spirit of promise, which is the earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession.”(951) Again: “We heard of your faith in Christ Jesus, and of the love which ye have to all the saints, for the hope which is laid up for you in heaven, whereof ye heard before in the word of the truth of the gospel.”(952) Again: “He called you by our gospel, to the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.”(953) Whence it is called “the word of salvation,” and “the power of God to the salvation of believers,” and “the kingdom of heaven.” Now, if the doctrine of the gospel be spiritual, and open a way to the possession of an immortal life, let us not suppose that they, to whom it was promised and announced, were totally negligent and careless of their souls, and stupefied in the pursuit of corporeal pleasures. Nor let any one here cavil, that the promises which are recorded in the law and the prophets, respecting the gospel, were not designed for the Jews. For just after having spoken of the gospel being promised in the law, he adds, “that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law.”(954) This was in another argument, I grant; but when he said that whatever the law inculcates truly belonged to the Jews, he was not so forgetful as not to remember what he had affirmed, a few verses before, concerning the gospel promised in the law. By declaring that the Old Testament contained evangelical promises, therefore, the apostle most clearly demonstrates that it principally related to a future life.

IV. For the same reason it follows, that it was founded on the free mercy of God, and confirmed by the mediation of Christ. For even the preaching of the gospel only announces, that sinners are justified by the paternal goodness of God, independently of any merit of their own; and the whole substance of it terminates in Christ. Who, then, dares to represent the Jews as destitute of Christ,—them with whom we are informed the evangelical covenant was made, of which Christ is the sole foundation? Who dares to represent them as strangers to the benefit of a free salvation, to whom we are informed the doctrine of the righteousness of faith was communicated? But not to be prolix in disputing on a clear point, we have a remarkable expression of the Lord: “Abraham rejoiced to see my day; and he saw it, and was glad.”(955) And what Christ there declares concerning Abraham, the apostle shows to have been universal among the faithful, when he says that Christ remains “the same yesterday, and to‐day, and for ever.”(956) For he there speaks, not only of the eternal Divinity of Christ, but of his power, which has been perpetually manifested to the faithful. Wherefore both the blessed Virgin and Zachariah declare, in their songs, that the salvation revealed in Christ is a performance of the promises which the Lord had made to Abraham and the patriarchs.(957) If the Lord, in the manifestation of Christ, faithfully performed his ancient oath, it cannot be denied that the end of the Old Testament was always in Christ and eternal life.

V. Moreover the apostle makes the Israelites equal to us, not only in the grace of the covenant, but also in the signification of the sacraments. For when he means to adduce examples of the punishments with which the Scripture states them to have been formerly chastised, in order to deter the Corinthians from running into similar crimes, he begins by premising, that we have no reason to arrogate any preëminence to ourselves, which can deliver us from the Divine vengeance inflicted on them; since the Lord not only favoured them with the same benefits, but illustrated his grace among them by the same symbols;(958) as though he had said, If ye confide in being beyond the reach of danger, because both baptism by which you have been sealed, and the supper which you daily receive, have excellent promises, while at the same time you despise the Divine goodness, and live licentious lives,—know ye, that the Jews also were not destitute of such symbols, though the Lord inflicted on them his severest judgments. They were baptized in their passage through the sea, and in the cloud by which they were protected from the fervour of the sun. Our opponents maintain that passage to have been a carnal baptism, corresponding in some degree to our spiritual one. But if that were admitted, the apostle’s argument would not proceed; for his design here is to prevent Christians from supposing that they excel the Jews in the privilege of baptism. Nor is what immediately follows, that they “did all eat the same spiritual meat, and did all drink the same spiritual drink,” which he interprets of Christ, liable to this cavil.

VI. To invalidate this declaration of Paul, they object the assertion of Christ, “Your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness, and are dead. If any man eat of this bread, (that is, my flesh,) he shall live for ever.”(959) But the two passages are reconciled without any difficulty. The Lord, because he was addressing auditors who only sought to be satisfied with corporeal sustenance, but were unconcerned about food for the soul, accommodates his discourse in some measure to their capacity, and institutes a comparison between manna and his own body, particularly to strike their senses. They demand that in order to acquire authority to himself, he should prove his power by some miracle, such as Moses performed in the desert, when he obtained manna from heaven. In the manna, however, they had no idea of any thing but a remedy for corporeal hunger, with which the people were then afflicted. They did not penetrate to that sublimer mystery of which Paul treats. Christ, therefore, to demonstrate the superiority of the blessing they ought to expect from him, to that which they said their fathers had received from Moses, makes this comparison: If it be in your opinion a great and memorable miracle, that the Lord, to prevent his people from perishing in the wilderness, supplied them, by means of Moses, with heavenly food, which served them as a temporary sustenance,—hence conclude how much more excellent that food must be, which communicates immortality. We see, then, why the Lord omitted the principal thing designed by the manna, and only remarked the lowest advantage that resulted from it. It was because the Jews, as if with an intention of reproaching him, contrasted him with Moses, who had supplied the necessities of the people with manna. He replies, that he is the dispenser of a far superior favour, in comparison with which the corporeal sustenance of the people, the sole object of their great admiration, deserves to be considered as nothing. Knowing that the Lord, when he rained manna from heaven, not only poured it down for the support of their bodies, but likewise dispersed it as a spiritual mystery, to typify that spiritual vivification which is experienced in Christ, Paul does not neglect that view of the subject which is most deserving of consideration. Wherefore it is certainly and clearly proved, that the same promises of an eternal and heavenly life, with which the Lord now favours us, were not only communicated to the Jews, but even sealed and confirmed by sacraments truly spiritual. This subject is argued at length by Augustine against Faustus the Manichæan.

VII. But if the reader would prefer a recital of testimonies from the law and the prophets, to show him that the spiritual covenant was common also to the fathers, as we have heard from Christ and his apostles,—I will attend to this wish, and that with the greater readiness, because our adversaries will thereby be more decisively confuted, and will have no pretence for any future cavil. I will begin with that demonstration, which, though I know the Anabaptists will superciliously deem it futile and almost ridiculous, yet will have considerable weight with persons of docility and good understanding. And I take it for granted, that there is such a vital efficacy in the Divine word as to quicken the souls of all those whom God favours with a participation of it. For the assertion of Peter has ever been true, that it is “an incorruptible seed, which abideth for ever;”(960) as he also concludes from the words of Isaiah.(961) Now, when God anciently united the Jews with himself in this sacred bond, there is no doubt that he separated them to the hope of eternal life. For when I say, that they embraced the word which was to connect them more closely with God, I advert not to that general species of communication with him, which is diffused through heaven and earth, and all the creatures in the universe, which although it animates all things according to their respective natures, yet does not deliver from the necessity of corruption. I refer to that particular species of communication, by which the minds of the pious are enlightened into the knowledge of God, and in some measure united to him. Since Adam, Abel, Noah, Abraham, and the other patriarchs, were attached to God by such an illumination of his word, I maintain, there can be no doubt that they had an entrance into his immortal kingdom. For it was a real participation of God, which cannot be separated from the blessing of eternal life.

VIII. If the subject still appear involved in any obscurity, let us proceed to the very form of the covenant; which will not only satisfy sober minds, but will abundantly prove the ignorance of those who endeavour to oppose it. For the Lord has always made this covenant with his servants: “I will be your God, and ye shall be my people.”(962) These expressions, according to the common explanation of the prophets, comprehend life, and salvation, and consummate felicity. For it is not without reason that David frequently pronounces, how “blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord; and the people whom he hath chosen for his own inheritance;”(963) and that not on account of any earthly felicity, but because he delivers from death, perpetually preserves, and attends with everlasting mercy, those whom he has taken for his people. As it is expressed in the other prophets, “Art thou not from everlasting, O Lord my God, mine Holy One? we shall not die.”(964) “The Lord is our Lawgiver, the Lord is our King; he will save us.”(965) “Happy art thou, O Israel: who is like unto thee, O people saved by the Lord?”(966) But not to labour much on a point which does not require it, we are frequently reminded, in reading the prophets, that we shall have a plenitude of all blessings, and even a certainty of salvation, provided the Lord be our God. And that on good ground; for if his face, as soon as it has begun to shine, be a present pledge of salvation, will God manifest himself to any man without opening the treasures of salvation to him? For God is our God, on the express condition of his “walking in the midst of us,” as he declared by Moses.(967) But this presence of his cannot be obtained without the possession of life. And though nothing further had been expressed, they had a promise of spiritual life sufficiently clear in these words: “I am the Lord your God.”(968) For he announced that he would be a God, not only to their bodies, but chiefly to their souls; for the soul, unless united to God by righteousness, remains alienated from him at death. But let that union take place, and it will be attended with eternal salvation.

IX. Moreover, he not only declared himself to be their God, but promised to continue so for ever; in order that their hope, not contented with present blessings, might be extended to eternity. And that the use of the future tense conveyed this idea to them, appears from many expressions, where the faithful console themselves not only amidst present evils, but for futurity, that God will never desert them. But in regard to the second part of the promise, he still more plainly encouraged them concerning the extension of the Divine blessing to them beyond the limits of the present life: “I will be a God to thy seed after thee.”(969) For if he intended to declare his benevolence to them after they were dead, by blessing their posterity, much more would he not fail of manifesting his favour towards themselves. For God is not like men, who transfer their love to the children of their friends, because death takes away their opportunity of performing kind offices to those who were objects of their regard. But God, whose beneficence is not interrupted by death, deprives not the dead of the blessings of his mercy, which for their sakes he diffuses through a thousand generations. The design of the Lord, therefore, was to show them, by a clear proof, the magnitude and abundance of his goodness which they should experience after death, when he described its exuberance as reaching to all their posterity.(970) Now, the Lord sealed the truth, and, as it were, exhibited the completion of this promise, when he called himself the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, long after they were dead.(971) For what is implied in it? Would it not have been a ridiculous appellation, if they had perished? It would have been just as if he had said, I am the God of those who have no existence. Wherefore, the evangelists relate, that with this single argument the Sadducees were so embarrassed by Christ,(972) as to be unable to deny that Moses had given a testimony in favour of the resurrection of the dead; for they had learned from Moses himself, that “all his saints are in his hand.”(973) Whence it was easy to infer, that death had not annihilated those whom he, who is the arbiter of life and death, had received into his guardianship and protection.

X. Now, to come to the principal point on which this controversy turns, let us examine, whether the faithful themselves were not so instructed by the Lord, as to be sensible that they had a better life in another world, and to meditate on that to the neglect of the present. In the first place, the course of life which was divinely enjoined them was a perpetual exercise, by which they were reminded that they were the most miserable of all mankind, if they had no happiness but in the present life. Adam, rendered most unhappy by the mere remembrance of his lost felicity, finds great difficulty in supplying his wants by anxious toils.(974) Nor does the Divine malediction confine itself to his manual labours; he experiences the bitterest sorrow from that which was his only remaining consolation. Of his two sons, he is deprived of one by the parricidal hands of his brother; the survivor is deservedly the object of his detestation and abhorrence.(975) Abel, cruelly assassinated in the flower of his age, exhibits an example of human calamity. Noah, while the whole world securely abandons itself to sensual delights, consumes a valuable part of his life with excessive fatigue in building the ark.(976) His escape from death was attended with greater distress than if he had died a hundred times. For besides that the ark was, as it were, a sepulchre to him for ten months,(977) nothing could be more disagreeable than to be detained for so long a period almost immersed in the ordure of animals. After having escaped from such great difficulties, he meets with a fresh occasion of grief. He sees himself ridiculed by his own son, and is constrained to pronounce a curse with his own mouth upon him, whom by the great goodness of God he had received safe from the deluge.(978)

XI. Abraham is one who ought to be deemed equal to a host, if we consider his faith, which is proposed to us as the best standard of believing, so that we must be numbered in his family, in order to be the children of God. Now, what would be more absurd, than that Abraham should be the father of all the faithful, and not possess even the lowest place among them? But he cannot be excluded from the number, nor even from the most honourable station, without the destruction of the whole Church. Now, with respect to the circumstances of his life;—when he is first called, he is torn by the Divine command from his country, his parents, and his friends, the enjoyment of whom is supposed to give life its principal relish; as though God positively intended to deprive him of all the pleasures of life.(979) As soon as he has entered the land in which he is commanded to reside, he is driven from it by a famine. He removes, in search of relief, to a place where, for the preservation of his own safety, he finds it necessary to disown his wife, which would probably be more afflictive to him than many deaths.(980) After having returned to the country of his residence, he is again expelled from it by famine. What kind of felicity is it to dwell in such a country, where he must so frequently experience hunger, and even perish for want of sustenance, unless he leaves it? In the country of Abimelech, he is again driven to the same necessity of purchasing his own personal safety with the loss of his wife.(981) While he wanders hither and thither for many years in an unsettled state, he is compelled, by the continual quarrels of his servants, to send away his nephew, whom he regarded as a son.(982) There is no doubt that he bore this separation just as he would the amputation of one of his limbs. Soon after he is informed that enemies have carried him away captive.(983) Whithersoever he directs his course, he finds himself surrounded by savage barbarians, who will not even permit him to drink the water of wells which with immense labour he has himself digged. For he could not have bought the use of them from the king of Gerar, if it had not been previously prohibited.(984) When he arrives to old age, beyond the time of having children, he experiences the most disagreeable and painful circumstance with which that age is attended.(985) He sees himself destitute of posterity, till, beyond all expectation, he begets Ishmael; whose birth he purchases at a dear rate, while he is wearied with the reproaches of Sarah, just as if he encouraged the contumacy of his maid‐servant, and so were himself the cause of the domestic disturbance.(986) At length Isaac is born; but his birth is attended with this condition, that Ishmael the first‐born must be banished from the family, and abandoned like an enemy.(987) When Isaac is left alone to solace the good man in his declining years, he is soon after commanded to sacrifice him.(988) What can the human mind imagine more calamitous, than for a father to become the executioner of his own son? If he had been taken away by sickness, every one would have thought the aged parent unhappy in the extreme, as having had a son given him in mockery, at the loss of whom, his former grief on account of his being destitute of children would certainly be redoubled. If he had been massacred by some stranger, the calamity would have been greatly increased by the horrible nature of his end; but to be slain by his father’s own hand exceeds all the other instances of distress. In short, through the whole course of his life, Abraham was so driven about and afflicted, that if any one wished to give an example of a life full of calamity, he could not find one more suitable. Nor let it be objected, that he was not entirely miserable, because he had at length a prosperous deliverance from such numerous and extreme dangers. For we cannot pronounce his to be a happy life, who for a long period struggles through an infinity of difficulties; but his, who is exempted from afflictions, and favoured with the peaceful enjoyment of present blessings.

XII. Isaac, though afflicted with fewer calamities, yet scarcely ever enjoys the smallest taste of pleasure. He also experiences those vexations which permit not a man to be happy in the world. Famine drives him from the land of Canaan; his wife is torn from his bosom; his neighbours frequently harass him, and take every method of distressing him, so that he also is constrained to contend with them about water.(989) In his own family he suffers much uneasiness from Esau’s wives;(990) he is distressed by the discord of his sons, and unable to remedy that great evil, but by the exile of him to whom he had given the blessing.(991) With respect to Jacob, he is an eminent example of nothing but extreme infelicity. He passes his childhood at home, amidst the menaces and terrors of his elder brother, to which he is at length constrained to give way.(992) A fugitive from his parents and his native soil, in addition to the bitterness of exile, he is treated with unkindness by his uncle Laban. It is not sufficient for him to endure a most hard and severe servitude of seven years, but he is fraudulently deceived in a wife.(993) For the sake of another wife he must enter on a new servitude,(994) in which, as he himself complains, he is scorched all the day by the fervid rays of the sun, and through the wakeful night benumbed by the icy cold.(995) During twenty years, which he spends in such extreme hardships, he is daily afflicted with fresh injuries from his father‐in‐law. Nor does he enjoy tranquillity in his own family, which he sees distracted and almost torn asunder by the animosities, contentions, and rivalship of his wives.(996) When he is commanded to return to his own country, he is obliged to depart in a manner resembling an ignominious flight. Nor even then can he escape the iniquity of his father‐in‐law, but is harassed with his reproaches and insults in the midst of his journey.(997) Immediately after, he falls into a much greater difficulty. For as he advances towards his brother, he has death before his eyes in as many forms as a cruel and inveterate enemy can possibly contrive. He is exceedingly tormented and distracted with dreadful terrors, while he is expecting the approach of his brother; when he sees him, he falls at his feet like a person half dead, till he finds him more reconciled than he could have ventured to hope.(998) Moreover, on his first entrance into the land, he is deprived of Rachel, his dearly beloved wife.(999) Afterwards he hears that the son whom he had by her, and whom, therefore, he loved above the rest, is torn asunder by wild beasts. The severity of his grief on account of his death is expressed by himself, when, after many days of mourning, he obstinately refuses all consolation, saying, “I will go down into the grave unto my son mourning.”(1000) In the mean time, the rape and violation of his daughter, and the rashness of his sons in revenging it, which not only made him an object of abhorrence to all the inhabitants of the country, but put him in immediate danger of being massacred; what abundant sources were these of anxiety, grief, and vexation!(1001) Then follows the horrible crime of Reuben, his first‐born, than which no greater affliction could befall him. For if the pollution of a man’s wife be numbered among the greatest miseries, what shall we say of it, when the crime is perpetrated by his own son?(1002) Not long after, his family is contaminated with incest;(1003) so that such a number of disgraceful occurrences may be expected to break a heart otherwise very firm and unbroken by calamities. Towards the end of life, when he is seeking sustenance for himself and family in a season of famine, his ears are wounded by the report of a new calamity, which informs him that one of his sons is detained in prison; and in order to recover him he is obliged to intrust his darling Benjamin to the care of the rest.(1004) Who can suppose that in such an accumulation of distresses he had a single moment of respite? He himself, who is best able to give a testimony respecting himself, declares to Pharaoh, that his days on the earth have been few and evil.(1005) By affirming that he has lived in continual miseries, he denies that he has enjoyed that prosperity which the Lord had promised him. Therefore either Jacob formed an improper and ungrateful estimate of the favour of God, or he spake the truth in asserting that he had been miserable on the earth. If his affirmation was true, it follows that his hope was not fixed on terrestrial things.

XIII. If these holy fathers expected, as undoubtedly they did expect, a life of happiness from the hand of God, they both knew and contemplated a different kind of blessedness from that of this terrestrial life. This the apostle very beautifully shows, when he says, “By faith Abraham sojourned in the land of promise, as in a strange country, dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise; for he looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God. These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth. For they that say such things declare plainly that they seek a country. And truly if they had been mindful of that country from whence they came out, they might have had opportunity to have returned. But now they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly; wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God; for he hath prepared for them a city.”(1006) For they would have been stupid beyond all comparison, so steadily to follow promises, of which there appeared no hope on earth, unless they had expected the completion of them in another world. But the apostle, with great force, principally insists on this—that they called the present life a _pilgrimage_, as is also stated by Moses.(1007) For if they were strangers and sojourners in the land of Canaan, what became of the Divine promise, by which they had been appointed heirs of it? This manifestly implies, therefore, that the promise, which the Lord had given them concerning the possession of it, related to something more remote. Wherefore they never acquired a foot of land in Canaan, except for a sepulchre; by which they testified that they had no hope of enjoying the benefit of the promise till after death. And this is the reason why Jacob thought it so exceedingly desirable to be buried there, that he made his son Joseph promise it to him by oath;(1008) and why Joseph commanded that his bones should be removed thither, even several ages after his death, when they would have been long reduced to ashes.(1009)

XIV. In short, it evidently appears, that in all the pursuits of life they kept in view the blessedness of the future state. For why should Jacob have so eagerly desired, and exposed himself to such danger in endeavouring to obtain, the primogeniture, which would occasion his exile, and almost his rejection from his family, but from which he could derive no possible benefit, unless he had his views fixed on a nobler blessing? And that such was his view he declared in these words, which he uttered with his expiring breath: “I have waited for thy salvation, O Lord.”(1010) What salvation could he expect, when he felt himself about to expire, unless he had seen in death the commencement of a new life? But why do we argue concerning the saints and children of God, when even one, who in other respects endeavoured to oppose the truth, was not entirely destitute of such a knowledge? For what was the meaning of Balaam, when he said, “Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my last end be like his,”(1011) but the same which David afterwards expressed in the following words? “Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints.”(1012) “Evil shall slay the wicked.”(1013) If death were the ultimate bound of human existence, no difference could be observed in it between the righteous and the impious; the distinction between them consists in the different destinies which await them after death.

XV. We have not yet proceeded beyond Moses; whose only office, our opponents allege, was to persuade a carnal people to the worship of God by the fertility of the land, and an abundance of all things: and yet, unless any one wilfully rejects the evidence presented to him, we already discover a clear declaration of a spiritual covenant. But if we come down to the prophets, there we have the fullest revelation both of eternal life and of the kingdom of Christ. And first, with what perspicuity and certainty does David direct all his writings to this end; though, as he was prior to the rest in point of time, so, according to the order of the Divine dispensation, he shadowed forth the heavenly mysteries more obscurely than they did! What estimate he formed of his terrestrial habitation, the following passage declares: “I am a stranger with thee, and a sojourner, as all my fathers were. Verily, every man at his best estate is altogether vanity. Surely every man walketh in a vain show. And now, Lord, what wait I for? my hope is in thee.”(1014) He who, after having confessed that there is nothing substantial or permanent on earth, still retains the constancy of his hope in God, certainly contemplates the felicity reserved for him in another world. To this contemplation he frequently recalls the faithful, whenever he wishes to afford them true consolation. For in another place, after having spoken of the brevity and the transitory nature of human life, he adds, “But the mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting upon them that fear him.”(1015) Similar to which is the following: “Of old hast thou laid the foundations of the earth; and the heavens are the work of thy hands. They shall perish, but thou shalt endure; yea, all of them shall wax old like a garment; as a vesture shalt thou change them, and they shall be changed; but thou art the same, and thy years shall have no end. The children of thy servants shall continue, and their seed shall be established before thee.”(1016) If, notwithstanding the destruction of heaven and earth, the pious cease not to be established before the Lord, it follows that their salvation is connected with his eternity. But this hope cannot be at all supported, unless it rest on the promise which we find in Isaiah: “The heavens,” saith the Lord, “shall vanish away like smoke, and the earth shall wax old like a garment, and they that dwell therein shall die in like manner; but my salvation shall be for ever, and my righteousness shall not be abolished;”(1017) where perpetuity is ascribed to righteousness and salvation, considered not as resident in God, but as experienced by men.

XVI. Nor can what he frequently says concerning the prosperity of the faithful be understood in any other sense than as referring to the manifestation of the glory of heaven. Such are the following passages: “The Lord preserveth the souls of his saints; he delivereth them out of the hand of the wicked. Light is sown for the righteous, and gladness for the upright in heart.”(1018) Again: “The righteousness of the righteous endureth for ever; his horn shall be exalted with honour. The desire of the wicked shall perish.”(1019) Again: “Surely the righteous shall give thanks unto thy name; the upright shall dwell in thy presence.”(1020) Again: “The righteous shall be had in everlasting remembrance.”(1021) Again: “The Lord redeemeth the soul of his servants.”(1022) For the Lord frequently leaves his servants to the rage of the impious, not only to be harassed, but to be torn asunder and ruined; he suffers good men to languish in obscurity and meanness, while the impious are almost as glorious as the stars; nor does he exhilarate the faithful with the light of his countenance, so that they can enjoy any lasting pleasure. Wherefore David does not dissemble that, if the faithful fix their eyes on the present state of things, they will be most grievously tempted with an apprehension lest innocence should obtain from God neither favour nor reward. So much does impiety in most cases prosper and flourish, while the pious are oppressed with ignominy, poverty, contempt, and distress of every kind. “My feet,” says he, “were almost gone; my steps had well nigh slipped. For I was envious at the foolish, when I saw the prosperity of the wicked.”(1023) At length he concludes his account of them: “When I thought to know this, it was too painful for me; until I went into the sanctuary of God; then understood I their end.”(1024)

XVII. We may learn, then, even from this confession of David, that the holy fathers under the Old Testament were not ignorant, that God rarely or never in this world gives his servants those things which he promises them, and that, therefore, they elevated their minds to the sanctuary of God, where they had a treasure in reserve which is not visible amid the shadows of the present life. This sanctuary was the last judgment, which, not being discernible by their eyes, they were contented to apprehend by faith. Relying on this confidence, whatever events might befall them in the world, they, nevertheless, had no doubt that there would come a time when the Divine promises would be fulfilled. This is evident from the following passages: “I will behold thy face in righteousness: I shall be satisfied, when I awake, with thy likeness.”(1025) Again: “I am like a green olive‐tree in the house of God.”(1026) Again: “The righteous shall flourish like the palm‐tree: he shall grow like a cedar in Lebanon. Those that be planted in the house of the Lord shall flourish in the courts of our God. They shall still bring forth fruit in old age; they shall be fat and flourishing.” He had just before said, “O Lord, how great are thy works! and thy thoughts are very deep. When the wicked spring as the grass, and when all the workers of iniquity do flourish, it is that they shall be destroyed for ever.”(1027) Where can this beauty and gracefulness of the faithful be found, but where the appearance of this world has been reversed by the manifestation of the kingdom of God? When they could turn their eyes towards that eternity, despising the momentary rigour of present calamities, they securely broke forth into the following expressions: “The Lord shall never suffer the righteous to be moved. But thou, O God, shalt bring them” (wicked men) “down into the pit of destruction.”(1028) Where, in this world, is the pit of destruction, to absorb the wicked, as an instance of whose felicity it is mentioned in another place that without languishing for any long time “they go down to the grave in a moment?”(1029) Where is that great stability of the saints, whom David himself, in the language of complaint, frequently represents as not only troubled, but oppressed and consumed? He certainly had in view, not any thing that results from the agitations of the world, which are even more tumultuous than those of the sea, but what will be accomplished by the Lord, when he shall one day sit in judgment to fix the everlasting destiny of heaven and earth. This appears from another psalm, in which he gives the following beautiful description: “They that trust in their wealth, and boast themselves in the multitude of their riches; none of them can by any means redeem his brother, nor give to God a ransom for him. For he seeth that wise men die, likewise the fool and the brutish person perish, and leave their wealth to others. Their inward thought is, that their houses shall continue for ever, and their dwelling‐places to all generations; they call their lands after their own names. Nevertheless man being in honour abideth not: he is like the beasts that perish. This their way is their folly: yet their posterity approve their sayings. Like sheep they are laid in the grave; death shall feed on them; and the upright shall have dominion over them in the morning; and their beauty shall consume in the grave from their dwelling.”(1030) In the first place, this derision of fools, for placing their dependence on the mutable and transitory blessings of the world, shows that the wise ought to seek a very different felicity. But he more evidently discloses the mystery of the resurrection, when he establishes the reign of the pious after the ruin and destruction of the wicked. For what shall we understand by “the morning” which he mentions, but the revelation of a new life commencing after the conclusion of the present?

XVIII. Hence arose that reflection, which served the faithful as a consolation under their miseries, and a remedy for their sufferings: “The anger of the Lord endureth but a moment; in his favour is life.”(1031) How did they limit their afflictions to a moment, who were afflicted all their lifetime? When did they perceive so long a duration of the Divine goodness, of which they had scarcely the smallest taste? If their views had been confined to the earth, they could have made no such discovery; but as they directed their eyes towards heaven, they perceived, that the afflictions with which the Lord exercises his saints are but “for a small moment,” and that the “mercies” with which he “gathers” them are “everlasting.”(1032) On the other hand, they foresaw the eternal and never‐ending perdition of the impious, who had been happy, as in a dream, for a single day. Hence the following sentiments: “The memory of the just is blessed; but the name of the wicked shall rot.”(1033) “Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints.”(1034) Also in Samuel: “The Lord will keep the feet of his saints, and the wicked shall be silent in darkness.”(1035) These expressions suggest to us, that they well knew, that whatever vicissitudes may befall the saints, yet their last end will be life and salvation; and that the prosperity of the impious is a pleasant path, which gradually leads to the gulf of everlasting death. Therefore they called the death of such the “destruction of the uncircumcised,”(1036) as of those from whom all hope of resurrection had been cut off. Wherefore David could not conceive a more grievous imprecation than this: “Let them be blotted out of the book of the living, and not be written with the righteous.”(1037)

XIX. But the following declaration of Job is remarkable beyond all others: “I know that my Redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth; and though after my skin, worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God; whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold, and not another.”(1038) Some, who wish to display their critical sagacity, cavil that this is not to be understood of the final resurrection, but even of the first day on which Job expected God to be more propitious to him. Though we partly concede this, we shall extort an acknowledgment from them, whether they are willing or not, that Job could never have attained to such an enlarged hope, if his thoughts had been confined to the earth. We must, therefore, be obliged to confess that he, who saw that his Redeemer would be present with him even when lying in the sepulchre, must have elevated his views to a future immortality. For to them, who think only of the present life, death is a source of extreme despair, which, however, could not annihilate his hope. “Though he slay me,” said he, “yet will I trust in him.”(1039) Nor let any trifler here object, that these were the expressions of a few persons, and are far from furnishing proof that such a doctrine was current among the Jews. I will immediately reply, that these few persons did not in these declarations reveal any recondite wisdom, in which only superior understandings were separately and privately instructed; but that the Holy Spirit having constituted them teachers of the people, they publicly promulgated the Divine mysteries which were to be generally received, and to be the principles of the popular religion. When we hear the public oracles of the Holy Spirit, therefore, in which he has so clearly and evidently spoken of the spiritual life in the Jewish church, it would be intolerable perverseness to apply them entirely to the carnal covenant, in which no mention is made but of the earth and earthly opulence.

XX. If we descend to the later prophets, there we may freely expatiate as quite at home. For if it was not difficult to prove our point from David, Job, and Samuel, we shall do it there with much greater facility. For this is the order and economy which God observed in dispensing the covenant of his mercy, that as the course of time accelerated the period of its full exhibition, he illustrated it from day to day with additional revelations. Therefore, in the beginning, when the first promise was given to Adam, it was like the kindling of some feeble sparks. Subsequent accessions caused a considerable enlargement of the light, which continued to increase more and more, and diffused its splendour through a wide extent, till at length, every cloud being dissipated, Christ, the Sun of Righteousness, completely illuminated the whole world. There is no reason to fear, therefore, if we want the suffrages of the prophets in support of our cause, that they will fail us. But as I perceive it would be a very extensive field, which would engross more of our attention than the nature of our design will admit,—for it would furnish matter for a large volume,—and as I also think that by what has been already said, I have prepared the way even for a reader of small penetration to proceed without any difficulties, I shall abstain from a prolixity which at present is not very necessary. I shall only caution the reader to advance with the clew which we have put into his hand; namely, that whenever the prophets mention the blessedness of the faithful, scarcely any vestiges of which are discernible in the present life, he should recur to this distinction; that in order to the better elucidation of the Divine goodness, the prophets represented it to the people in a figurative manner; but that they gave such a representation of it as would withdraw the mind from earth and time, and the elements of this world, all which must ere long perish, and would necessarily excite to a contemplation of the felicity of the future spiritual life.

XXI. We will content ourselves with one example. When the Israelites, after being carried to Babylon, perceived how very much their dispersion resembled a death, they could scarcely be convinced that the prophecy of Ezekiel concerning their restitution(1040) was not a mere fable; for they considered it in the same light, as if he had announced, that putrid carcasses would be restored to life. The Lord, in order to show that even that difficulty would not prevent him from displaying his beneficence, gave the prophet a vision of a field full of dry bones, which he instantaneously restored to life and vigour solely by the power of his word. The vision served indeed to correct the existing incredulity; but at the same time it reminded the Jews, how far the power of the Lord extended beyond the restoration of the people, since the mere expression of his will so easily reanimated the dry and dispersed bones. Wherefore you may properly compare that passage with another of Isaiah: “Thy dead men shall live; together with my dead body shall they arise. Awake and sing, ye that dwell in dust; for thy dew is as the dew of herbs, and the earth shall cast out the dead. Come, my people, enter thou into thy chambers, and shut thy doors about thee: hide thyself as it were for a little moment, until the indignation be overpast. For, behold, the Lord cometh out of his place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity: the earth also shall disclose her blood, and shall no more cover her slain.”(1041)

XXII. It would be absurd, however, to attempt to reduce every passage to such a canon of interpretation. For there are some places, which show without any disguise the future immortality which awaits the faithful in the kingdom of God. Such are some which we have recited, and such are many others, but particularly these two; one in Isaiah: “As the new heavens and the new earth which I will make, shall remain before me, saith the Lord, so shall your seed and your name remain. And it shall come to pass, that from one new moon to another, and from one sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith the Lord. And they shall go forth, and look upon the carcasses of the men that have transgressed against me; for their worm shall not die, neither shall their fire be quenched.”(1042) And another in Daniel: “At that time shall Michael stand up, the great prince which standeth for the children of thy people; and there shall be a time of trouble such as never was since there was a nation even to that same time; and at that time thy people shall be delivered, every one that shall be found written in the book. And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt.”(1043)

XXIII. Now, the two remaining points, that the fathers had Christ as the pledge of their covenant, and that they reposed in him all their confidence of the blessing, being less controvertible and more plain, I shall take no pains to prove them. We may safely conclude, therefore, what all the machinations of the devil can never subvert, that the Old Testament, or covenant which the Lord made with the Israelitish nation, was not limited to terrestrial things, but contained a promise of spiritual and eternal life; the expectation of which must have been impressed on the minds of all who truly consented to the covenant. Then let us drive far away from us this absurd and pernicious notion, either that the Lord proposed nothing else to the Jews, or that the Jews sought nothing else, but an abundance of food, carnal delights, flourishing wealth, external power, a numerous offspring, and whatever is esteemed valuable by a natural man. For under the present dispensation, Christ promises to his people no other kingdom of heaven, than where they may sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob;(1044) and Peter asserted the Jews of his time to be heirs of the grace of the gospel, when he said that “they were the children of the prophets, and of the covenant which God made with their fathers.”(1045) And that this might not only be testified in words, the Lord also proved it by a matter of fact. For on the day in which he rose from the dead, he honoured many of the saints with a participation of his resurrection, and caused them to appear in the city;(1046) thus furnishing a certain assurance that whatever he did and suffered for the acquisition of eternal salvation, belonged to the faithful of the Old Testament as much as to us. For, as Peter declares, they also were endued with the same Spirit, who is the author of our regeneration to life.(1047) When we are informed that the same Spirit, which is as it were a spark of immortality in us, and is therefore called in one place “the earnest of our inheritance,”(1048) dwelt in a similar manner in them, how can we dare to deprive them of the inheritance of eternal life? It is therefore the more surprising, that the Sadducees formerly fell into such stupidity as to deny the resurrection, and the immortality of the soul, since they had proofs of these points from such clear testimonies of Scripture. And the folly of the whole nation of the Jews in the present age, in expecting an earthly kingdom of the Messiah, would be equally extraordinary, had not the Scriptures long before predicted that they would thus be punished for their rejection of the gospel. For it was consistent with the righteous judgment of God to strike with blindness the minds of those, who, rejecting the light of heaven when presented to them, kept themselves in voluntary darkness. Therefore they read Moses, and assiduously turn over his pages, but are prevented by an interposing veil from perceiving the light which beams in his countenance;(1049) and thus it will remain covered and concealed to them, till they are converted to Christ, from whom they now endeavour as much as they can to withdraw and divert it.

Chapter XI. The Difference Of The Two Testaments.

What, then, it will be said, will there be no difference left between the Old Testament and the New? and what becomes of all those passages of Scripture, where they are compared together as things that are very different? I readily admit the differences which are mentioned in the Scripture, but I maintain that they derogate nothing from the unity already established; as will be seen when we have discussed them in proper order. But the principal differences, as far as my observation or memory extends, are four in number; to which if any one choose to add a fifth, I shall not make the least objection. I assert, and engage to demonstrate, that all these are such as pertain rather to the mode of administration, than to the substance. In this view, they will not prevent the promises of the Old and New Testament from remaining the same, and the promises of both Testaments from having in Christ the same foundation. Now, the first difference is, that although it was always the will of the Lord that the minds of his people should be directed, and their hearts elevated, towards the celestial inheritance, yet, in order that they might be the better encouraged to hope for it, he anciently exhibited it for their contemplation and partial enjoyment under the figures of terrestrial blessings. Now, having by the gospel more clearly and explicitly revealed the grace of the future life, he leaves the inferior mode of instruction which he used with the Israelites, and directs our minds to the immediate contemplation of it. Those who overlook this design of God, suppose that the ancients ascended no higher than the corporeal blessings which were promised them; they so frequently hear the land of Canaan mentioned as the eminent, and indeed the only, reward for the observers of the Divine law. They hear that God threatens the transgressors of this law with nothing more severe than being expelled from the possession of that country, and dispersed into foreign lands. They see this to be nearly the whole substance of all the blessings and of all the curses pronounced by Moses. Hence they confidently conclude, that the Jews were separated from other nations, not for their own sakes, but for ours, that the Christian Church might have an image, in whose external form they could discern examples of spiritual things. But since the Scripture frequently shows, that God himself appointed the terrestrial advantages with which he favoured them for the express purpose of leading them to the hope of celestial blessings, it argued extreme inexperience, not to say stupidity, not to consider such a dispensation. The point of controversy between us and these persons, is this: they maintain that the possession of the land of Canaan was accounted by the Israelites their supreme and ultimate blessedness, but that to us, since the revelation of Christ, it is a figure of the heavenly inheritance. We, on the contrary, contend, that in the earthly possession which they enjoyed, they contemplated, as in a mirror, the future inheritance which they believed to be prepared for them in heaven.

II. This will more fully appear from the similitude which Paul has used in his Epistle to the Galatians.(1050) He compares the Jewish nation to a young heir, who, being yet incapable of governing himself, follows the dictates of a tutor or a governor, to whose charge he has been committed. His application of this similitude chiefly to the ceremonies, is no objection against the propriety of its application to our present purpose. The same inheritance was destined for them as for us; but they were not of a sufficient age to be capable of entering on the possession and management of it. The Church among them was the same as among us; but it was yet in a state of childhood. Therefore the Lord kept them under this tuition, that he might give them the spiritual promises, not open and unconcealed, but veiled under terrestrial figures. Therefore, when he admitted Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, with their posterity, to the hope of immortality, he promised them the land of Canaan as their inheritance; not that their hopes might terminate in that land, but that in the prospect of it they might exercise and confirm themselves in the hope of that true inheritance which was not yet visible. And that they might not be deceived, a superior promise was given them, which proved that country not to be the highest blessing which God would bestow. Thus Abraham is not permitted to grow indolent after having received a promise of the land, but a greater promise elevates his mind to the Lord. For he hears him saying, “Abram, I am thy shield, and thy exceeding great reward.”(1051) Here we see that the Lord proposes himself to Abraham as his ultimate reward, that he may not seek an uncertain and transitory one in the elements of this world, but may consider that which can never fade away. God afterwards annexes a promise of the land, merely as a symbol of his benevolence, and a type of the heavenly inheritance. And that this was the opinion of the saints, is plain from their own language. Thus David rises from temporary blessings to that consummate and ultimate felicity. “My soul longeth, yea, even fainteth, for the courts of the Lord.”(1052) “God is my portion for ever.”(1053) Again: “The Lord is the portion of mine inheritance and of my cup: thou maintainest my lot.”(1054) Again: “I cried unto thee, O Lord: I said, Thou art my refuge and my portion in the land of the living.”(1055) Persons who venture to express themselves thus, certainly profess that in their hopes they rise above the world and all present blessings. Nevertheless the prophets frequently describe this blessedness of the future world under the type which the Lord had given them. In this sense we must understand the following passages: “The righteous shall inherit the land;”(1056) “But the wicked shall be cut off from the earth;”(1057) and various predictions of Isaiah, which foretell the future prosperity of Jerusalem, and the abundance that will be enjoyed in Zion. We see that all these things are inapplicable to the land of our pilgrimage, or to the earthly Jerusalem, but that they belong to the true country of the faithful, and to that celestial city, where “the Lord commanded the blessing, even life for evermore.”(1058)

III. This is the reason why the saints, under the Old Testament, are represented as holding this mortal life with its blessings in higher estimation than becomes us now. For although they well knew that they ought not to rest in it as the end of their course, yet when they recollected what characters of his grace the Lord had impressed on it, in order to instruct them in a manner suitable to their tender state, they felt a greater degree of pleasure in it than if they had considered it merely in itself. But as the Lord, in declaring his benevolence to the faithful by present blessings, gave them, under these types and symbols, a figurative exhibition of spiritual felicity, so, on the other hand, in corporal punishments he exemplified his judgment against the reprobate. Therefore, as the favours of God were more conspicuous in earthly things, so also were his punishments. Injudicious persons, not considering this analogy and harmony (so to speak) between the punishments and rewards, wonder at so great a variety in God, that in ancient times he was ready to avenge all the transgressions of men by the immediate infliction of severe and dreadful punishments, but now, as if he had laid aside his ancient wrath, punishes with far less severity and frequency; and on this account they almost adopt the notion of the Manichæans, that the God of the Old Testament is a different being from the God of the New. But we shall easily get rid of such difficulties, if we direct our attention to that dispensation of God, which I have observed; namely, that during that period, in which he gave the Israelites his covenant involved in some degree of obscurity, he intended to signify and prefigure the grace of future and eternal felicity by terrestrial blessings, and the grievousness of spiritual death by corporal punishments.

IV. Another difference between the Old Testament and the New consists in figures, because the former, in the absence of the truth, displayed merely an image and shadow instead of the body; but the latter exhibits the present truth and the substantial body.(1059) And this is generally mentioned wherever the New Testament is opposed to the Old, but is treated more at large in the Epistle to the Hebrews than in any other place.(1060) The apostle is there disputing against those who supposed that the observance of the Mosaic law could not be abolished, without being followed by the total ruin of religion. To refute this error, he adduces the prediction of the psalmist concerning the priesthood of Christ;(1061) for since he has an eternal priesthood committed to him, we may argue the certain abolition of that priesthood, in which new priests daily succeeded each other.(1062) But he proves the superiority of the appointment of this new Priest, because it is confirmed with an oath.(1063) He afterwards adds that this transfer of the priesthood implies also a change of the covenant.(1064) And he proves that this change was necessary, because such was the imbecility of the law, that it could bring nothing to perfection.(1065) Then he proceeds to state the nature of this imbecility; namely, that the law prescribed external righteousnesses, consisting in carnal ordinances, which could not make the observers of them “perfect as pertaining to the conscience,” that by animal victims it could neither expiate sins nor procure true holiness.(1066) He concludes, therefore, that it contained “a shadow of good things to come, but not the very image of the things;”(1067) and that consequently it had no other office, but to serve as an introduction to “a better hope,”(1068) which is exhibited in the gospel. Here we have to inquire in what respect the Legal covenant is compared with the Evangelical, the ministry of Christ with the ministry of Moses. For if the comparison related to the substance of the promises, there would be a great discordance between the two testaments; but as the state of the question leads us to a different point, we must attend to the scope of the apostle, in order to discover the truth. Let us, then, bring forward the covenant, which God has once made, which is eternal, and never to be abolished. The accomplishment, whence it derives its establishment and ratification, is Christ. While such a confirmation was waited for, the Lord by Moses prescribed ceremonies, to serve as solemn symbols of the confirmation. It came to be a subject of contention, whether the ceremonies ordained in the law ought to cease and give place to Christ. Now, though these ceremonies were only accidents or concomitants of the covenant, yet being the instruments of its administration, they bear the name of the covenant; as it is common to give to other sacraments the names of the things they represent. In a word, therefore, what is here called the Old Testament is a solemn method of confirming the covenant, consisting of ceremonies and sacrifices. Since it contains nothing substantial, unless we proceed further, the apostle contends that it ought to be repealed and abrogated, in order to make way for Christ, the Surety and Mediator of a better testament,(1069) by whom eternal sanctification has been at once procured for the elect, and those transgressions obliterated, which remained under the law. Or, if you prefer it, take the following statement of it; that the Old Testament of the Lord was that which was delivered to the Jews, involved in a shadowy and inefficacious observance of ceremonies, and that it was therefore temporary, because it remained as it were in suspense, till it was supported by a firm and substantial confirmation; but that it was made new and eternal, when it was consecrated and established by the blood of Christ. Whence Christ calls the cup which he gives to his disciples in the supper, “the cup of the New Testament in his blood;”(1070) to signify that when the testament of God is sealed with his blood, the truth of it is then accomplished, and thus it is made new and eternal.

V. Hence it appears in what sense the apostle said, that the Jews were conducted to Christ by the tuition of the law, before he was manifested in the flesh.(1071) He confesses also that they were children and heirs of God, but such as, on account of their age, required to be kept under the care of a tutor.(1072) For it was reasonable that before the Sun of Righteousness was risen, there should be neither such a full blaze of revelation, nor such great clearness of understanding. Therefore the Lord dispensed the light of his word to them in such a manner, that they had yet only a distant and obscure prospect of it. Paul describes this slenderness of understanding as a state of childhood, which it was the Lord’s will to exercise in the elements of this world and in external observances, as rules of puerile discipline, till the manifestation of Christ, by whom the knowledge of the faithful was to grow to maturity. Christ himself alluded to this distinction, when he said, “The law and the prophets were until John: since that time the kingdom of God is preached.”(1073) What discoveries did Moses and the prophets make to their contemporaries? They afforded them some taste of that wisdom which was in after times to be clearly manifested, and gave them a distant prospect of its future splendour. But when Christ could be plainly pointed out, the kingdom of God was revealed. For in him are discovered “all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge,”(1074) by which we penetrate almost into the furthest recesses of heaven.

VI. Nor is it any objection to our argument, that scarcely a person can be found in the Christian Church, who is to be compared with Abraham in the excellency of his faith; or that the prophets were distinguished by such energy of the Spirit as, even at this day, is sufficient to illuminate the whole world. For our present inquiry is, not what grace the Lord has conferred on a few, but what is the ordinary method which he has pursued in the instruction of his people; such as is found even among the prophets themselves, who were endued with peculiar knowledge above others. For their preaching is obscure, as relating to things very distant, and is comprehended in types. Besides, notwithstanding their wonderful eminence in knowledge, yet because they were under a necessity of submitting to the same tuition as the rest of the people, they are considered as sustaining the character of children as well as others. Finally, none of them possessed knowledge so clear as not to partake more or less of the obscurity of the age. Whence this observation of Christ: “Many prophets and kings have desired to see those things which ye see, and have not seen them; and to hear those things which ye hear, and have not heard them.”(1075) “Blessed are your eyes, for they see; and your ears, for they hear.”(1076) And, indeed, it is reasonable that the presence of Christ should be distinguished by the prerogative of introducing a clearer revelation of the mysteries of heaven. To the same purpose also is the passage, which we have before cited from the First Epistle of Peter, that it was revealed to them, that the principal advantage of their labours would be experienced in our times.(1077)

VII. I come now to the third difference, which is taken from Jeremiah, whose words are these: “Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah; not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt; which my covenant they brake, although I was a husband to them, saith the Lord; but this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel. After those days, saith the Lord, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people. And they shall teach no more every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord; for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith the Lord; for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.”(1078) From this passage the apostle took occasion to institute the following comparison between the law and the gospel: he calls the former a literal, the latter a spiritual doctrine; the former, he says, was engraven on tables of stone, but the latter is inscribed on the heart;(1079) the former was the preaching of death, but the latter of life; the former was the ministration of condemnation, but the latter of righteousness; the former is abolished, but the latter remains. As the design of the apostle was to express the sense of the prophet, it will be sufficient for us to consider the language of one of them, in order to discover the meaning of both. There is, however, some difference between them. For the apostle speaks of the law in less honourable terms than the prophet does; and that not simply with respect to the law itself, but, because there were some disturbers, who were full of improper zeal for the law, and by their perverse attachment to the ceremonies obscured the glory of the gospel, he disputes concerning the nature of the law with reference to their error and foolish affection for it. This peculiarity in Paul, therefore, will be worthy of our observation. Both of them, as they contrast the Old and New Testaments with each other, consider nothing in the law, but what properly belongs to it. For example, the law contains frequent promises of mercy; but as they are borrowed from another dispensation, they are not considered as part of the law, when the mere nature of the law is the subject of discussion. All that they attribute to it is, that it enjoins what is right, and prohibits crimes; that it proclaims a reward for the followers of righteousness, and denounces punishments against transgressors; but that it neither changes nor corrects the depravity of heart which is natural to all men.

VIII. Now, let us explain the comparison of the apostle in all its branches. In the first place, the Old Testament is literal, because it was promulgated without the efficacy of the Spirit; the New is spiritual, because the Lord has engraven it in a spiritual manner on the hearts of men. The second contrast, therefore, serves as an elucidation of the first. The Old Testament is the revelation of death, because it can only involve all mankind in a curse; the New is the instrument of life, because it delivers us from the curse, and restores us to favour with God. The former is the ministry of condemnation, because it convicts all the children of Adam of unrighteousness; the latter is the ministry of righteousness, because it reveals the mercy of God, by which we are made righteous. The last contrast must be referred to the legal ceremonies. The law having an image of things that were at a distance, it was necessary that in time it should be abolished and disappear. The gospel, exhibiting the body itself, retains a firm and perpetual stability. Jeremiah calls even the moral law a weak and frail covenant, but for another reason; namely, because it was soon broken by the sudden defection of an ungrateful people. But as such a violation arises from the fault of the people, it cannot be properly attributed to the Testament. The ceremonies, however, which at the advent of Christ were abolished by their own weakness, contained in themselves the cause of their abrogation. Now, this difference between the “letter” and the “spirit” is not to be understood as if the Lord had given his law to the Jews without any beneficial result, without one of them being converted to him; but it is used in a way of comparison, to display the plenitude of grace with which the same Legislator, assuming as it were a new character, has honoured the preaching of the gospel. For if we survey the multitude of those, from among all nations, whom, by the influence of his Spirit in the preaching of the gospel, the Lord has regenerated and gathered into communion with his Church, we shall say that those of the ancient Israelites, who cordially and sincerely embraced the covenant of the Lord, were extremely few; though, if estimated by themselves without any comparison, they amounted to a considerable number.

IX. The fourth difference arises out of the third. For the Scripture calls the Old Testament a covenant of bondage, because it produces fear in the mind; but the New it describes as a covenant of liberty, because it leads the heart to confidence and security. Thus Paul, in the eighth chapter of his Epistle to the Romans, says, “Ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father.”(1080) To the same purpose is that passage in the Epistle to the Hebrews, that the faithful now “are not come unto the mount that might be touched, and that burned with fire, nor unto blackness, and darkness, and tempest,” where nothing can be either heard or seen, but what must strike terror into the mind; so that even Moses himself is exceedingly afraid at the sound of the terrible voice, which they all pray that they may hear no more; but that now the faithful “are come unto mount Sion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem,”(1081) &c. What Paul briefly touches in the passage which we have adduced from the Epistle to the Romans, he explains more at large in his Epistle to the Galatians, when he allegorizes the two sons of Abraham in the following manner—that Agar, the bond‐woman, is a type of mount Sinai, where the people of Israel received the law; that Sarah, the free‐ woman, is a figure of the celestial Jerusalem, whence proceeds the gospel. That as the son of Agar is born in bondage, and can never attain to the inheritance, and the son of Sarah is born free, and has a right to the inheritance,(1082) so by the law we were devoted to slavery, but by the gospel alone are regenerated to liberty. Now, the whole may be summed up thus—that the Old Testament filled men’s consciences with fear and trembling; but that by the benefit of the New Testament, they are delivered, and enabled to rejoice. The former kept their consciences under a yoke of severe bondage; but by the liberality of the latter they are emancipated and admitted to liberty. If any one object to us the case of the holy fathers of the Israelitish people, that as they were clearly possessed of the same spirit of faith as we are, they must consequently have been partakers of the same liberty and joy, we reply, that neither of these originated from the law; but that, when they felt themselves, by means of the law, oppressed with their servile condition, and wearied with disquietude of conscience, they fled for refuge to the gospel; and that therefore it was a peculiar advantage of the New Testament, that they enjoyed an exception from the common law of the Old Testament, and were exempted from those evils. Besides, we shall deny that they were favoured with the spirit of liberty and security, to such a degree as not to experience from the law some measure both of fear and of servitude. For notwithstanding their enjoyment of that privilege, which they obtained by the grace of the gospel, yet they were subject to the same observances and burdens as the people in general. As they were obliged, therefore, to a diligent observance of these ceremonies, which were emblems of the state of pupilage similar to bondage, and the hand‐writing, by which they confessed themselves guilty of sin, did not release them from the obligation, they may justly be said, in comparison with us, to have been under a testament of bondage and fear, when we consider the common mode of procedure which the Lord then pursued with the Israelitish nation.

X. The three last comparisons which we have mentioned are between the law and the gospel. In these, therefore, “the Old Testament” denotes _the law_; and “the New Testament,” _the gospel_. The first comparison extends further, for it comprehends also the promises, which were given before the law. When Augustine denied that they ought to be considered as part of the Old Testament, he gave a very proper opinion, and intended the same that we now teach; for he had in view those passages of Jeremiah and Paul, in which the Old Testament is distinguished from the word of grace and mercy. He very judiciously adds also in the same place, that the children of the promise, from the beginning of the world, who have been regenerated by God, and, under the influence of faith working by love, have obeyed his commands, belong to the New Testament; and _that_, in hope, not of carnal, terrestrial, and temporal things, but of spiritual, celestial, and eternal blessings; especially believing in the Mediator, through whom they doubted not that the Spirit was dispensed to them to enable them to do their duty, and that whenever they sinned they were pardoned. For this is the very same thing which I meant to assert: That all the saints, whom, from the beginning of the world, the Scripture mentions as having been peculiarly chosen by God, have been partakers of the same blessing with us to eternal salvation. Between our distinction and that of Augustine there is this difference—that ours (according to this declaration of Christ, “the law and the prophets were until John; since that time the kingdom of God is preached;”)(1083) distinguishes between the clearness of the gospel and the more obscure dispensation of the word which preceded it; whilst the other merely discriminates the weakness of the law from the stability of the gospel. Here it must also be remarked concerning the holy fathers, that though they lived under the Old Testament, they did not rest satisfied with it, but always aspired after the New, and thus enjoyed a certain participation of it. For all those who contented themselves with present shadows, and did not extend their views to Christ, are condemned by the apostle as blind and under the curse. For, to say nothing on other points, what greater ignorance can be imagined than to hope for an expiation of sin by the sacrifice of an animal? than to seek for the purification of the soul by an external ablution with water? than to wish to appease God with frigid ceremonies, as though they afforded him great pleasure? For all these absurdities are chargeable on those who adhere to the observances of the law, without any reference to Christ.

XI. The fifth difference, which we may add, consists in this—that till the advent of Christ, the Lord selected one nation, to which he would limit the covenant of his grace. Moses says, “When the Most High divided to the nations their inheritance, when he separated the sons of Adam,—the Lord’s portion is his people; Jacob is the lot of his inheritance.”(1084) In another place he thus addresses the people: “Behold, the heaven, and the heaven of heavens is the Lord’s thy God, the earth also, with all that therein is. Only the Lord had a delight in thy fathers to love them, and he chose their seed after them, even you above all people.”(1085) Therefore he favoured that people with the exclusive knowledge of his name, as though they alone of all mankind belonged to him; he deposited his covenant as it were in their bosom; to them he manifested the presence of his power; he honoured them with every privilege. But to omit the rest of his benefits, the only one that relates to our present argument is, that he united them to himself by the communication of his word, in order that he might be denominated and esteemed their God. In the mean time he suffered other nations, as though they had no business or intercourse with him, to walk in vanity;(1086) nor did he employ means to prevent their destruction by sending them the only remedy—the preaching of his word. The Israelitish nation, therefore, were then as darling sons; others were strangers: they were known to him, and received under his faithful protection; others were left to their own darkness: they were sanctified by God; others were profane: they were honoured with the Divine presence; others were excluded from approaching it. But when the fulness of the time was come,(1087) appointed for the restoration of all things,(1088) and the Reconciler of God and men was manifested,(1089) the barrier was demolished, which had so long confined the Divine mercy within the limits of the Jewish church, and peace was announced to them who were at a distance, and to them who were near, that being both reconciled to God, they might coalesce into one people. Wherefore “there is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision nor uncircumcision, but Christ is all and in all;”(1090) “to whom the heathen are given for his inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for his possession;”(1091) that he may have a universal “dominion from sea to sea, and from the river unto the ends of the earth.”(1092)

XII. The vocation of the Gentiles, therefore, is an eminent illustration of the superior excellence of the New Testament above the Old. It had, indeed, before been most explicitly announced in numerous predictions of the prophets; but so as that the completion of it was deferred to the kingdom of the Messiah. And even Christ himself made no advances towards it at the first commencement of his preaching, but deferred it till he should have completed all the parts of our redemption, finished the time of his humiliation, and received from the Father “a name which is above every name, before which every knee shall bow.”(1093) Wherefore, when this season was not yet arrived, he said to a Canaanitish woman, “I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel:”(1094) nor did he permit the apostles, in his first mission of them, to exceed these limits. “Go not,” says he, “into the way of the Gentiles, and into any city of the Samaritans enter ye not; but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.”(1095) And though this calling of the Gentiles was announced by so many testimonies, yet when the apostles were about to enter upon it, it appeared to them so novel and strange, that they dreaded it, as if it had been a prodigy: indeed it was with trepidation and reluctance that they at length engaged in it. Nor is this surprising; for it seemed not at all reasonable, that the Lord, who for so many ages had separated the Israelites from the rest of the nations, should, as it were, suddenly change his design, and annihilate this distinction. It had indeed been predicted in the prophecies; but they could not pay such great attention to the prophecies, as to be wholly unmoved with the novelty of the circumstance, which forced itself on their observation. Nor were the specimens, which the Lord had formerly given, of the future vocation of the Gentiles, sufficient to influence them. For besides his having called only very few of them, he had even incorporated them into the family of Abraham, that they might be added to his people; but by that public vocation, the Gentiles were not only raised to an equality with the Jews, but appeared to succeed to their places as though they had been dead. Besides, of all the strangers whom God had before incorporated into the Church, none were ever placed on an equality with the Jews. Therefore it is not without reason that Paul so celebrates this “mystery which was hidden from ages and from generations,”(1096) and which he represents as an object of admiration even to angels.(1097)

XIII. In these four or five points, I think I have given a correct and faithful statement of the whole of the difference between the Old and the New Testament, as far as is sufficient for a simple system of doctrine. But because some persons represent this variety in the government of the Church, these different modes of instruction, and such a considerable alteration of rites and ceremonies, as a great absurdity, we must reply to them, before we proceed to other subjects. And this may be done in a brief manner, since the objections are not so strong as to require a laborious refutation. It is not reasonable, they say, that God, who is perpetually consistent with himself, should undergo so great a change as afterwards to disallow what he had once enjoined and commanded. I reply, that God ought not therefore to be deemed mutable, because he has accommodated different forms to different ages, as he knew would be suitable for each. If the husbandman prescribes different employments to his family in the winter, from those which he allots them in the summer, we must not therefore accuse him of inconstancy, or impute to him a deviation from the proper rules of agriculture, which are connected with the perpetual course of nature. Thus, also, if a father instructs, governs, and manages his children one way in infancy, another in childhood, and another in youth, we must not therefore charge him with being inconstant, or forsaking his own designs. Why, then, do we stigmatize God with the character of inconstancy, because he has made an apt and suitable distinction between different times? The last similitude ought fully to satisfy us. Paul compares the Jews to children, and Christians to youths.(1098) What impropriety is there in this part of the government of God, that he detained them in the rudiments which were suitable to them on account of their age, but has placed us under a stronger and more manly discipline? It is a proof, therefore, of the constancy of God, that he has delivered the same doctrine in all ages, and perseveres in requiring the same worship of his name which he commanded from the beginning. By changing the external form and mode, he has discovered no mutability in himself, but has so far accommodated himself to the capacity of men, which is various and mutable.

XIV. But they inquire whence this diversity proceeded, except from the will of God. Could he not, as well from the beginning as since the advent of Christ, give a revelation of eternal life in clear language without any figures, instruct his people by a few plain sacraments, bestow his Holy Spirit, and diffuse his grace through all the world? This is just the same as if they were to quarrel with God, because he created the world at so late a period, whereas he might have done it before; or because he has appointed the alternate vicissitudes of summer and winter, of day and night. But let us not doubt what ought to be believed by all pious men, that whatever is done by God is done wisely and righteously; although we frequently know nothing of the causes which render such transactions necessary. For it would be arrogating too much to ourselves, not to permit God to keep the reasons of his decrees concealed from us. But it is surprising, say they, that he now rejects and abominates the sacrifices of cattle, and all the apparatus of the Levitical priesthood, with which he used to be delighted; as though truly these external and transitory things could afford pleasure to God, or affect him in any way whatever. It has already been observed, that he did none of these things on his own account, but appointed them all for the salvation of men. If a physician cure a young man of any disease by a very excellent method, and afterwards adopt a different mode of cure with the same person when advanced in years, shall we therefore say that he rejects the method of cure which he before approved? We will rather say, that he perseveres in the same system, and considers the difference of age. Thus it was necessary, before the appearance of Christ, that he should be prefigured, and his future advent announced by one kind of emblems; since he has been manifested, it is right that he should be represented by others. But with respect to the Divine vocation, now more widely extended among all nations since the advent of Christ than it was before, and with regard to the more copious effusion of the graces of the Spirit, who can deny, that it is reasonable and just for God to retain under his own power and will the free dispensation of his favours; that he may illuminate what nations he pleases; that wherever he pleases he may introduce the preaching of his word; that he may give to his instruction whatever kind and degree of profit and success he pleases; that wherever he pleases, in any age, he may punish the ingratitude of the world by depriving them of the knowledge of his name, and when he pleases restore it on account of his mercy? We see, therefore, the absurdity of the cavils with which impious men disturb the minds of the simple on this subject, to call in question either the righteousness of God or the truth of the Scripture.

Chapter XII. The Necessity Of Christ Becoming Man In Order To Fulfil The Office Of Mediator.

It was of great importance to our interests, that he, who was to be our Mediator, should be both true God and true man. If an inquiry be made concerning the necessity of this, it was not indeed a simple, or, as we commonly say, an absolute necessity, but such as arose from the heavenly decree, on which the salvation of men depended. But our most merciful Father has appointed that which was best for us. For since our iniquities, like a cloud intervening between us and him, had entirely alienated us from the kingdom of heaven, no one that could not approach to God could be a mediator for the restoration of peace. But who could have approached to him? Could any one of the children of Adam? They, with their parent, all dreaded the Divine presence. Could any one of the angels? They also stood in need of a head, by a connection with whom they might be confirmed in a perfect and unvarying adherence to their God. What, then, could be done? Our situation was truly deplorable, unless the Divine majesty itself would descend to us; for we could not ascend to it. Thus it was necessary that the Son of God should become Immanuel, that is, God with us; and this in order that there might be a mutual union and coalition between his Divinity and the nature of man; for otherwise the proximity could not be sufficiently near, nor could the affinity be sufficiently strong, to authorize us to hope that God would dwell with us. So great was the discordance between our pollution and the perfect purity of God. Although man had remained immaculately innocent, yet his condition would have been too mean for him to approach to God without a Mediator. What, then, can he do, after having been plunged by his fatal fall into death and hell, defiled with so many blemishes, putrefying in his own corruption, and, in a word, overwhelmed with every curse? It is not without reason, therefore, that Paul, when about to exhibit Christ in the character of a Mediator, expressly speaks of him as a man. “There is one Mediator,” he says, “between God and man, the man Christ Jesus.”(1099) He might have called him God, or might indeed have omitted the appellation of man, as well as that of God; but because the Spirit, who spake by him, knew our infirmity, he has provided a very suitable remedy against it, by placing the Son of God familiarly among us, as though he were one of us. Therefore, that no one may distress himself where he is to seek the Mediator, or in what way he may approach him, the apostle, by denominating him a man, apprizes us that he is near, and even close to us, since he is our own flesh. He certainly intends the same as is stated in another place more at large—“that we have not a high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin.”(1100)

II. This will still more fully appear, if we consider, that it was no mean part which the Mediator had to perform; namely, to restore us to the Divine favour, so as, of children of men, to make us children of God; of heirs of hell, to make us heirs of the kingdom of heaven. Who could accomplish this, unless the Son of God should become also the Son of man, and thus receive to himself what belongs to us, and transfer to us that which is his, and make that which is his by nature ours by grace? Depending, therefore, on this pledge, we have confidence that we are the children from God, because he, who is the Son of God by nature, has provided himself a body from our body, flesh from our flesh, bones from our bones,(1101) that he might be the same with us: he refused not to assume that which was peculiar to us, that we also might obtain that which he had peculiar to him; and that so in common with us he might be both the Son of God and the Son of man. Hence arises that holy fraternity, which he mentions with his own mouth in the following words: “I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God.”(1102) On this account we have a certainty of the inheritance of the kingdom of heaven, because the only Son of God, to whom it exclusively belonged, has adopted us as his brethren; and if we are his brethren, we are consequently co‐ heirs to the inheritance.(1103) Moreover it was highly necessary also for this reason, that he who was to be our Redeemer should be truly both God and man. It was his office to swallow up death; who could do this, but he who was life itself? It was his to overcome sin; who could accomplish this, but righteousness itself? It was his to put to flight the powers of the world and of the air; who could do this, but a power superior both to the world and to the air? Now, who possesses life or righteousness, or the empire and power of heaven, but God alone? Therefore the most merciful God, when he determined on our redemption, became himself our Redeemer in the person of his only begotten Son!

III. Another branch of our reconciliation with God was this—that man, who had ruined himself by his own disobedience, should remedy his condition by obedience, should satisfy the justice of God, and suffer the punishment of his sin. Our Lord then made his appearance as a real man; he put on the character of Adam, and assumed his name, to act as his substitute in his obedience to the Father, to lay down our flesh as the price of satisfaction to the justice of God; and to suffer the punishment which we had deserved, in the same nature in which the offence had been committed. As it would have been impossible, therefore, for one who was only God to suffer death, or for one who was a mere man to overcome it, he associated the human nature with the Divine, that he might submit the weakness of the former to death, as an atonement for sins; and that with the power of the latter he might contend with death, and obtain a victory on our behalf. Those who despoil Christ, therefore, either of his Divinity or his humanity, either diminish his majesty and glory, or obscure his goodness. Nor are they, on the other hand, less injurious to men, whose faith they weaken and subvert; since it cannot stand any longer than it rests upon this foundation. Moreover, the Redeemer to be expected was that Son of Abraham and David, whom God had promised in the law and the prophets. Hence the minds of the faithful derive another advantage, because from the circumstance of his ancestry being traced to David and to Abraham, they have an additional assurance that this is the Christ, who was celebrated in so many prophecies. But we should particularly remember, what I have just stated—that our common nature is a pledge of our fellowship with the Son of God; that, clothed in our flesh, he vanquished sin and death, in order that the victory and triumph might be ours; that the flesh which he received from us he offered up as a sacrifice, in order to expiate and obliterate our guilt, and appease the just wrath of the Father.