136. Moses had before testified that the Holy Spirit would be taken from the wicked and they would be sent in the ways of their own desire. They were, accordingly, such rascals as the pope today with his cardinals and bishops, who are not only styled princes and possess kingdoms, but also take to themselves the name of Church, so as to subject us as heretics to the ban, and securely to condemn us. They do not permit themselves to be called tyrants, nor wicked, nor temple-robbers. They wish to be styled most kind, holy and reverend gentlemen.

137. The meaning, therefore, is not that which Lyra follows when he understands "famous" as "notorious." As the world does not call the pope Antichrist, but ascribes to him the name of the greatest saint and admires him as if he and his carnal creatures were filled with the Holy Spirit and incapable of error, and therefore humbly worships whatever he commands or advises—exactly so those giants had a noble name and were held in admiration by the whole world. On the contrary, Noah with his followers was condemned as a rebel, as a heretic, as a traducer of the dignity of State and Church. So today do bishops regard us who profess the Gospel.

D. THE SIN AGAINST THE HOLY SPIRIT.

138. This passage furnishes a description of the sins with which that age was burdened: Men were averse to the Word; they were given over to their own lusts and reprobate minds; they sinned against the Holy Spirit by persistent impenitence, by defending their ungodly behavior and by warring upon the recognized truth. Yet with all these blasphemies they retained the name and authority, not only of the State, but also of the Church, as if God had exalted them to the place of the angels. When this was the state of things, and Noah and Lamech with their pious ancestor Methuselah taught in vain, God turned them over to the desires of their hearts (Ps 81, 12) and maintained silence until they should experience the flood, the prophecy of which they refused to believe.

139. This is falling away from God and Church and entering upon illicit marriage. One sin, unless corrected at once, will lead to another, and so on indefinitely until the state is reached which Solomon describes in Proverbs 18, 3, "When the wicked cometh, there cometh also contempt, and with ignominy Cometh reproach." They who thus sin, even if afterward rebuked, do not heed. They imagine they stand in need of no instructor, and think they represent a just cause. They do not believe in a life after this, or even hope for salvation, while living in open sin. Notwithstanding, scorn and shame shall overwhelm them. It was this persistent impenitence and consummate contempt for the Word that impelled God to visit all flesh with a universal flood.

IV. GOD'S REPENTANCE AND GRIEF THAT HE MADE MAN.
A. THE REPENTANCE OF GOD.
1. The Words, "The wickedness of man was great."
a. How Luther used these words against the doctrine of free will; how the advocates of free will falsely interpreted them, and how they are refuted [140-141].
* Concerning free will.
(1) Augustine's doctrine of free will misinterpreted by the schools [140].
(2) The schools unreasonably defend it [141].
(3) Man has no free will and without the grace of the Holy Spirit can do nothing [142-143].
(4) The reproving office of the Holy Spirit makes it clear that man has no free will [144].
(5) Whether there is hope, if a council be held, that the Papists will abandon their false doctrine of free will [145].
(6) How the true doctrine of free will leads us to a knowledge of sin and what we are to hold in reference to it [146].
(7) Why we should guard against the false doctrine concerning free will [147].
* The comfort for one who commits sins of infirmities [147].
* All endeavors without the Holy Spirit are evil [148].
(8) We are to distinguish in the doctrine of free will what is good politically from what is good theologically [149-150].
b. These words are wrongly understood by the Jews and sophists [151].
* How we should view the discussions of philosophers in regard to God and divine things [152].
c. These words should be understood as spoken not only of the people before the flood, but of all men [153].
2. The Words, "It Repented Jehovah."
a. How the repentance of God is to be reconciled with the wisdom and omniscience of God.
(1) The way sophists answer this question [154].
(2) Luther's answer [155-157].
* How man should treat questions which lead us into the throne of the divine majesty [158].
* How the passages of Scripture are to be understood which attribute to God the members of a human body [159].
* Whether the Anthropomorphites were justly condemned [159].
* Why God is represented to us as if he sprang from the temporal and the visible [161-163].
* We cannot explore God's nature [163].
* In what pictures God reveals himself in the Old Testament, and in the New [164].
* The will of God in signs and the will of God's good pleasure, "signs" and "Beneplaciti."
(a) How we can know God's will in signs [165-166].
(b) Why we cannot know the will of God's pleasure, nor fathom it [165-166].
(c) What is really to be understood by the will in signs [167].
b. The way the schools explain these words [168].
c. How they are to be rightly understood [169].
* Disputing about God's majesty and omnipotence places man in a dangerous position [169-171].
* How man should hold to the signs by which God revealed himself [171].
* What the will of God's pleasure is, to what it serves and how it is revealed in Christ [172-176].
* The will of good pleasure of which the fathers speak cannot comfort the heart [175].
* The only view of the Godhead possible in this life [176].
d. In what sense it can be said that "it repented Jehovah that he had made man" [177].