Institutes of the Christian Religion, Volume II
- Language:
- English
- Status:
- Complete work
- Authorship:
- Written by the author
- Condition of the text:
- Some scanning errors (automatic measure over the whole text, not checked by hand) · 180 illegible passages, excluded from answers
- Extent:
- ~410,000 words · 1,927 passages
Cite this work
- APAJohn Calvin. (n.d.). Institutes of the Christian Religion, Volume II. Digital reproduction: SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/john-calvin/institutes-of-the-christian-religion-volume-ii
- MLAJohn Calvin. Institutes of the Christian Religion, Volume II. Digital reproduction, SigPhi, https://sigphiai.com/en/works/john-calvin/institutes-of-the-christian-religion-volume-ii.
- ChicagoJohn Calvin. Institutes of the Christian Religion, Volume II. Digital reproduction, SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/john-calvin/institutes-of-the-christian-religion-volume-ii.
Reference to the edition that SigPhi reproduces: SigPhi is its digital reproduction, not its publisher. The edition's year is not in the metadata (hence "n.d."), and the translator appears only when recorded.
What it is about
The second half of the 1559 Institutes, in the same English translation as the first volume.
Context and history
Here is what is most attached to Calvin's name, predestination, and one qualification is worth making: within the whole it takes up little room and is not the foundation on which everything is built. Calvin treats it as a consequence of other things, not as a starting point; it was later Calvinism that moved it to the centre of the system. Anyone coming for it will find it, but it is worth reading what stands around it too.
Editorial context, not a citable source: unlike the passages of the work itself, these statements cannot be checked against the corpus.
prescribed by Divine wisdom, though an act performed by them be externally and apparently good, yet, being directed to a wrong end, it becomes sin. He concludes, therefore, that all the Fabricii, Scipios, and Catos, in all their celebrated actions, were guilty of sin, inasmuch as, being destitute of the light of faith, they did not direct those actions to that end to which they ought to have directed them; that consequently they had no genuine righteousness; because moral duties are estimated not by external actions, but by the ends for which such actions are designed. IV. Besides, if there be any truth in the assertion of John, that “he that hath not the Son of God, hath not life;”[7] they who have no interest in Christ, whatever be their characters, their actions, or their endeavours, are constantly advancing, through the whole course of their lives, towards destruction and the sentence of eternal death. On this argument is founded the following observation of Augustine: “Our religion discriminates between the righteous and the unrighteous, not by the law of works, but by that of faith, without which works apparently good are perverted into sins.” Wherefore the same writer, in another place, strikingly compares the exertions of such men to a deviation in a race from the prescribed course. For the more vigorously any one runs out of the way, he recedes so much the further from the goal, and becomes so much the more unfortunate. Wherefore he contends, that it is better to halt in the way, than to run out of the way. Finally, it is evident that they are evil trees, since without a participation of Christ there is no sanctification. They may produce fruits fair and beautiful to the eye, and even sweet to the taste, but never any that are good. Hence we clearly perceive that all the thoughts, meditations, and actions of man, antecedent to a reconciliation to God by faith, are accursed, and not only of no avail to justification, but certainly deserving of condemnation.…