Hence in the Christian life ceremonies are to be no otherwise looked
upon than as builders and workmen look upon those preparations for
building or working which are not made with any view of being permanent
or anything in themselves, but only because without them there could be
no building and no work. When the structure is completed, they are laid
aside. Here you see that we do not contemn these preparations, but set
the highest value on them; a belief in them we do contemn, because no
one thinks that they constitute a real and permanent structure. If any
one were so manifestly out of his senses as to have no other object
in life but that of setting up these preparations with all possible
expense, diligence, and perseverance, while he never thought of the
structure itself, but pleased himself and made his boast of these
useless preparations and props, should we not all pity his madness and
think that, at the cost thus thrown away, some great building might have
been raised?
Thus, too, we do not contemn works and ceremonies--nay, we set the
highest value on them; but we contemn the belief in works, which no one
should consider to constitute true righteousness, as do those hypocrites
who employ and throw away their whole life in the pursuit of works, and
yet never attain to that for the sake of which the works are done. As
the Apostle says, they are "ever learning and never able to come to the
knowledge of the truth" (2 Tim.
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