ditional weight derived from the solemnity of the occasion on which it was published."[1]
Again, in his work on the Eternal Predestination of God, written more particularly against Albertus Pighius, a Catholic writer, who opposed the doctrine of unconditional election, Calvin says:
"If Pighius does not think original sin sufficient for the damnation of men, and will make no account of the secret judgment of God, what will he do with infant children, who have been snatched out of this life before they were able, on account of their age, to give any such proof [of wickedness]? Since the same condition of birth and death was common to the little ones who died at Sodom and Jerusalem, and there was no difference in their works—why will Christ, at the last day, separate some of them to his left hand, from others standing at his right? Who does not here adore the admirable judgment of God, in that it has been ordered that some should be born at Jerusalem, whence they presently pass to a better life, and that Sodom, the entrance of hell, should be the birthplace of others?"[2]
According to Calvin as here quoted—and thousands of his followers have held the same—the little ones of Sodom and Gomorrah will stand "on the left hand." And to ascertain what he meant by this, we have only to refer to that chapter in Matthew, to which he alludes. We there read that "the King shall say also unto them on the left hand, Depart
