of grace than the merits of the case warranted.

141. As far as this passage is concerned, it is slandered when it is
held that it speaks only of the evil generation before the flood, and
that now men are better, at least some who make good use of their
freedom of will. Such wretched interpreters do not see that the
passage speaks of the human heart in general, and that a particle is
plainly added, _Rak_, which signifies "only." In the third place, they
fail to see that after the flood the same declaration is repeated in
the eighth chapter in almost precisely the same terms. For God says,
"The imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth," Gen 8, 21.
Here evidently he does not speak only of the antediluvians. He rather
speaks of those to whom he makes the promise that henceforth another
general flood of water shall never come, that is, of all the offspring
of Noah. These are words of universal application: "The imagination of
man's heart is evil."

142. We draw, therefore, the general conclusion that man without the
Holy Spirit and without grace can do nothing but sin, and thus he
unhaltingly goes forward from sin to sin. When in addition, he will
not endure sound doctrine but rejects the word of salvation and
resists the Holy Spirit, he becomes an enemy of God, blasphemes the
Holy Spirit and simply follows the evil desires of his heart.
Witnesses of this are the examples of the prophets, Christ and the
Apostles, the primeval world under Noah as teacher, and also the
example of our adversaries today, who cannot be convinced by anything
that they are in error, that they sin, that their worship is ungodly.

143. Other declarations of Holy Scripture prove the same thing. Is not
the statement of the fourteenth Psalm, verse 3, sweeping enough when
it says: "Jehovah looked down from heaven upon the children of men, to
see if there was any that did understand, and did seek after God. They
are all gone aside?" Thus, Ps 116, 11, "All men are liars;" and Paul,
"God hath shut up all unto disobedience," Rom 11, 32. These passages
are most sweeping, and emphatically force the conclusion that we all,
without the Holy Spirit, whose dispenser is Christ, can do nothing but
err and sin. Therefore, Christ says in the Gospel, "I am the vine, ye
are the branches: ... apart from me ye can do nothing," Jn 15, 5.
Without me you are a branch cut off, dry, dead and ready for the
burning.

144. And the very reason the Holy Spirit perfor