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"And to Seth," it is said, "there was born a son, and he called
his name Enos: he hoped to call on the name of the Lord God."
Here we have a loud testimony to the truth. Man, then, the son of
the resurrection, lives in hope: he lives in hope as long as the city
of God, which is begotten by faith in the resurrection, sojourns in
this world. For in these two men, Abel, signifying "grief," and
his brother Seth, signifying "resurrection," the death of Christ
and His life from the dead are prefigured. 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."
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." 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."
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.
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