#15 Art. IV “Justification” of the Apology of the Augsburg Confession.Our adversaries consider only the commandments of the second table of Moses which treats of external honesty, a virtue which human reason more readily comprehends; and they imagine, that by these external good works they keep God’s law. But they do not consider the first table which requires us to love God with our whole heart, firmly to believe that God is wroth on account of sin, sincerely to fear God, and to be fully assured that God is near us and hears our prayer, &c.
Now we are all so constituted from Adam, previous to our being born again through the Holy Ghost, that our hearts, in their security, despise God’s wrath, judgment, and threats, and hate and oppose his judgments and penalties. Now if all the children of Adam are born so deeply in sin, that we naturally despise God, and doubt his Word, his promises, and his threats; then indeed must the best of our good works, performed previous to our being born anew through the Holy Ghost, be sinful and condemned in God’s sight, although to the world they may appear lovely; for they proceed out of a bad, ungodly, and impure heart; as Paul says, Rom 14:23; “Whatsoever is not of faith, is sin.” For all such self-righteous men perform works without faith, despise God in their hearts, and believe as little as Epicurus, that God takes care of them. Their contempt of God within, must necessarily make their works impure and sinful, although they may appear beautiful before men; for God searches the heart. (Henkel Translation, p. 163).