Quotes from John Calvin

But this passage shows, that what Paul has hitherto meant by the Spirit, is not the mind or understanding (which is called the superior part of the soul by the advocates of freewill) but a celestial gift; for he shows that those are spiritual, not such as obey reason through their own will, but such as God rules by his Spirit.

And this is the evidence of faith that we never allow ourselves to be torn away from Christ and the promises we have in him. The

The church is, as Paul declares, founded on the doctrine of Apostles and Prophets [Eph 2:2]; but these men [of the Roman Catholic Church] speak as if they imagined that the mother owed her birth to the daughter.

The decree is dreadful indeed, I confess.

Let us imagine, for example, a merchant who, entering a wood with a company of faithful men, unwisely wanders away from his companions, and in his wandering comes upon a robber's den, falls among thieves, and is slain. His death was not only foreseen by God's eye, but also determined by his decree. For it is not said that he foresaw how long the life of each man would extend, but that he determined and fixed the bounds that men cannot pass [Job 14:5]. Yet

Faith acquires what the Law requires; nay, the Law requires, in order that faith may acquire what is thus required; nay, more, God demands of us faith itself, and finds not what he thus demands, until by giving he makes it possible to find it.

Unless God feed us daily, the largest accumulation of the necessaries of life will be of no avail.

Error can never be eradicated from the heart of man until the true knowledge of God has been implanted in it.

By piety I mean that union of reverence and love to God which the knowledge of his benefits inspires.

By these words it is plain he does not make love the cause of forgiveness, but the proof of it.

All those who storm heaven like giants, without Christ's help, are deprived of any right knowledge of God.

For even if the Word in his immeasurable essence united with the nature with the nature of man into one person, we do not imagine that he was confined therein. Here is something marvelous: the Son of God descended from heaven in such a way that, without leaving heaven, he willed to be borne in the virgin's womb, to go about earth, and to hang upon the cross; yet he continuously filled the world even as he had done from the beginning.