Calvin: Institutes of the Christian Religion (The Library of Christian Classics)

As a consequence, we must infer that man is never sufficiently touched and affected by the awareness of his lowly state until he has compared himself with God’s majesty.

that he

no religion is genuine unless it be joined with truth.

b(a)Nearly all the wisdom we possess, that is to say, true and sound wisdom, consists of two parts: the knowledge of God and of

to trust

For until men recognize that they owe everything to God, that they are nourished by his fatherly care, that he is the Author of their every good, that they should seek nothing beyond him—they will never yield him willing service. Nay, unless they establish their complete happiness in him, they will never give themselves truly and sincerely to him.

Probably “existential apprehension” is the nearest equivalent in contemporary parlance.

all men have a vague general veneration for God, but very few really reverence him; and wherever there is great ostentation in ceremonies, sincerity of heart is rare indeed.

The miserable ruin, into which the rebellion of the first man cast us, especially compels us to look upward.