I declare that Abraham, Moses, and the prophets are not only saved but most blessed, and I prove that they were saved by none but Christ, since the Lord Himself says in the Gospel: Abraham your father longed to see my day; he saw it and was glad (John VIII, 56). Of Moses: If you believed Moses, you would perhaps believe me also; for he wrote of me (Ibid. V, 46). Likewise of the prophets: How many prophets desired to see the things that you see, and to hear the things that you hear (Matt. XIII, 17)! And in another place of the Gospel the Lord Himself, embracing all these things which I have recounted one by one: That all things may be fulfilled which are written in the law, and the prophets, and in the psalms concerning me (Luke XXIV, 44).
You then, judge whether they believed in Christ, of whom it stands so manifest that they wrote about Christ. For Paul the Apostle also, expounding that those who were saved before Christ's birth were redeemed in Christ, thus defines the whole matter: As in Adam all die, so in Christ shall all be made alive (I Cor. XV, 22). Whence, just as no one perishes except through the old Adam, so none is gained except through the new.