For the gifts and calling of God are without repentance.
Ver. 29. Are without repentance] When God is said to repent, it is Mutatio rei non Dei, effectus non affectus, facti non consilii, a change, not of his will, but of his work. Repentance with man is the change of his will; repentance with God is the willing of a change. But what a sweet comfort is this, that God's favour is so constant that what he hath written he hath written, that there is no blotting out of the book of life (Nulla litura in decretis sapientum, say the Stoicsno erasure of the decrees of the wise,), that it is, I have blessed him, and he shall be blessed; and that his blessing is (as Thucydides saith of a well composed history), κτημα εις αει ξυγκειμενον, an everlasting possession.