So Much Madness Everywhere Prevailing

Grant, Almighty God, that since the rule of your true and lawful worship is sufficiently known to us, and you continue to exhort us to persevere in our course and abide in that pure and simple worship which you have fully approved--O, grant that we may, in true obedience of faith, respond to you. And, though we now see the whole world carried here and there, and all places full of the awful examples of apostasy, and so much madness everywhere prevailing, that men become more and more hardened daily--O, grant that, being fortified by invincible faith against these many temptations, we may persevere in true religion, and never at any time turn aside form the teaching of your Word, until we be at length gathered to Christ our King, under whom, as our head, you have promised that we shall ever be safe, and until we attain that happy life which is laid up for us in heaven, through the same Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. 

(a prayer of John Calvin, in his Commentary on Hosea, translated into English in 1846 and updated by me into modern English; photo by Amber Kipp via Unsplash.com)