And Joseph said unto his father, Not so, my father: for this [is] the firstborn; put thy right hand upon his head.
Ver. 18. Not so, my father, &c.] Here are a couple of holy prophets differing in their judgments; yet not about the substance of the blessing, but the circumstance of it. Wonder not though such things still fall out in the true Church, and the doctors be likewise divided in points less material, and that touch not the foundation. Luther interprets those words of Christ, "This is my body," synecdochically; Calvin, metonymically. Hence the Jesuits straight cry out: The Spirit of God dissents not from itself; but these interpretations dissent one from another, therefore they are not of the Spirit. a Now it were easy to stop their foul mouths, by telling them of their own far worse differences. But is it not a doleful thing that we should, with those birds, aqnoscere in nostris vulneribus nostras pennas? "Brother goeth to law with brother, and that before infidels." 1Co 6:6 This is the devil's malice, to sow tares, &c. Christ came to destroy his works; yet never were so many possessed as about that time.
a See The Peace of Rome.