Ephesians 4:22 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

That ye put off, &c.— The verbs put off, be renewed, and put on, in this and the following verses, are in the infinitive mood; which shews their connection with the preceding words, and that the sense is, "Ye have been instructed to put off the old man, to be renewed, to put on," &c. As particular dispositions of mind are sometimes expressed by particular garments, when a man appears in them; so the whole of a good or bad character may be represented by a complete dress; yea, by the body in which he appears; and vice, alas! being too natural, and having the first possession, whereas goodness, if it ever succeeds at all, is supervenient and supernatural; the former may well be called the old, and the latter, the new man; which opposite characters may be seen clearly delineated in the following part of this, and in several other of St. Paul's Epistles. Some have explained the deceitful lusts spoken of in this verse, of the lusts into which they were led by the artifices of the heathen priests, who represented them as not disagreeable to their established deities; or by the sophistry oftheirphilosophers,who found out so many fallacious excuses for the grossest vices; but it is a more important sense to understand these deceitful lusts of those which generally prevail in the world; which can lead to no rational solid happiness, but delude by vain appearances and fallacious hopes, always ending in shame and disappointment.