And by faith in these is begotten in this world the city of God, that is to say, the man who has hoped to call on the name of the Lord."For by hope," says the apostle, "we are saved: but hope that is seen is not hope: for what a man seeth, why doth he yet hope for? But if we hope for that we see not, then do we with patience wait for it."(3) Who can avoid referring this to a profound mystery? For did not Abel hope to call upon the name of the Lord God when his sacrifice is mentioned in Scripture as having been accepted by God? Did not Seth himself hope to call on the name of the Lord God, of whom it was said, "For God hath appointed me another seed instead of Abel?" Why then is this which is found to be common to all the godly specially attributed to Enos, unless because it was fit that in him, who is mentioned as the first-born of the father of those generations which were separated to the better part of the heavenly city, there should be a type of the man, or society of men, who live not according to man in contentment with earthly felicity, but according to God in hope of everlasting, felicity? And it, was not said, "He hoped in the Lord God," nor He called on the name of the Lord God,"but" He hoped to call on the name of the Lord God." And what does this "hoped to call" mean, unless it is a prophecy that a people should arise who, according to the election of grace, would call on the name of the Lord God? It is this which has been said by another prophet, and which the apostle interprets of the people who belong to the grace of God: "And it shall be that whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved."(4) For these two expressions, "And he called his name Enos, which means man," and "He hoped to call on the name of the Lord God," are sufficient proof that man ought not to rest his hopes in himself; as it is elsewhere written, "Cursed is the man that trusteth in man."(5) Consequently no one ought to trust in himself that he shall become a citizen of that other city which is not dedicated in the name of Cain's son in this present time, that is to say, in the fleeting course of this mortal world, but in the immortality of perpetual blessedness.
CHAP.19.--THE SIGNIFICANCE OP ENOCH'S
TRANSLATION.
For that line also of which Seth is the father has the name "Dedication"in the seventh generation from Adam, counting Adam.
For the seventh from him is Enoch, that is, Dedication.But this is that man who was translated because he pleased God, and who held in the order of the generations a remarkable place, being the seventh from Adam, a number signalized by the consecration of the Sabbath.But, counting from the diverging point of the two lines, or from Seth, he was the sixth Now it was on the sixth day God made man, and consummated His works.But the translation of Enoch prefigured our deferred dedication;for though it is indeed already accomplished in Christ our Head, who so rose again that He shall die no more, and who was Himself also translated, yet there remains another dedication of the whole house, of which Christ Himself is the foundation, and this dedication is deferred till the end, when all shall rise again to die no more.And whether it is the house of God, or the temple of God, or the city of God, that is said to be dedicated, it is all the same, and equally in accordance With the usage of the Latin language.For Virgil himself calls the city of widest empire "the house of Assaracus,"(1) meaning the Romans, who were descended through the Trojans from Assaracus.He also calls them the house of AEneas, because Rome was built by those Trojans who had come to Italy under AEneas.(2) For that poet imitated the sacred writings, in which the Hebrew nation, though so numerous, is called the house of Jacob.
CHAP.20.--HOW IT IS THAT CAIN'S LINE TERMINATES IN THE EIGHTH GENERATION, WHILENOAH, THOUGH DESCENDED FROM THE SAME FATHER, ADAM, IS FOUND TO BE THETENTH
FROM HIM.
Some one will say, If the writer of this history intended, in enumerating the generations from Adam through his son Seth, to descend through them to Noah, in whose time the deluge occurred, and from him again to trace the connected generations down to Abraham, with whom Matthew begins the pedigree of Christ the eternal King of the city of God, what did he intend by enumerating the generations from Cain, and to what terminus did he mean to trace them? We reply, To the deluge, by which the whole stock of the earthly city was destroyed, but repaired by the sons of Noah.For the earthly city and community of men who live after the flesh will never fail until the end of this world, of which our Lord says, "The children of this world generate, and are generated."(3) But the city of God, which sojourns in this world, is conducted by regeneration to the world to come, of which the children neither generate nor are generated.In this world generation is common to both cities; though even now the city of God has many thousand citizens who abstain from the act of generation; yet the other city also has some citizens who imitate these, though erroneously.For to that city belong also those who have erred from the faith, and introduced divers heresies; for they live according to man, not according to God.And the Indian gymnosophists, who are said to philosophize in the solitudes of India in a state of nudity, are its citizens; and they abstain from marriage.For continence is not a good thing, except when it is practised in the faith of the highest good, that is, God.Yet no one is found to have practised it before the deluge; for indeed even Enoch himself, the seventh from Adam, who is said to have been translated without dying, begat sons and daughters before he was translated, and among these was Methuselah, by whom the succession of the recorded generations is maintained.