and thereby avoid the temptation to be transported by curious and unnecessary Questions but above all this will prepare to exalt Christ in his Mediatory Office This will be the foundation to build the free and unsearchable riches of Gods grace upon Insomuch that the whole summe of Religion doth consist in the cause of the first and second Adam I shall trouble thee no further only my desire is That the Reader would pass by candidly the Errata he will often meet with in the printing by reason of my distance from the Press as also the mispointings which many times obscure the sense Now the Father of Spirits mould and fashion our hearts according as every divine Truth requireth and make us to gather and hive up Honey from every Flower in his Garden that so our Christianity may not be speculative and from Books only but experimental and savourily affecting the heart which only bringeth hope of eternal life is the prayer of Thine in Christ Jesus ANTHONY BURGESSE Sutton Coldfield Aug. 19. 1658. To the Reader AS for making the Table and prefixing the Contents before the Chapters Sections and Paragraphs of this Book the Reverend Author committed that task to a Friend who desireth the Reader to pardon any failings that he shall discover in them ERRATA PAg. 62. l. 24. for Gnanon r Gnavon p. 68. l. 36. for strictly for r. strictlyâ— largely for p. 69. l. 26. for quantum libet praeferimus r. quantumlibet profecimus l. 27. for cogitate r. cogitata p. 71. l. 40. for because r. â—e because p. 72. l. 18. for are r. were p. 73. l. 14. for reservantur r. reservatur p. 80. l. 13. for ad r. and. p. 82. l. 31. for vorti cordis r. vorticordis p. 85. for coactivum r. coactivam p. 88. l. 27. for Echineips r Echineis p. 92. l. 30. for balbutiri r. balbutire l. 34. for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 94. l. 41. for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 l. 45. dele to p. 95. l. 16. for is r. it is p. 97. l. 10. for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 107. l. 10. for outward r. outwardly p. 121. l. 28. for 〈◊〉 r. ne p. 122. l. 6. for fabula r. tabula l. 8. for imitation r. mutation p. 219. l. 32. for Monasterii Anabaptis r. â—unster Anabaptists p. 221. l. 26. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 225. l. 12. for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 286. l. 27. for rei r. 〈◊〉 p. 307. l. 34. for thereby r. there The Analysis of this Book This Treatise of Original Sinne shews 1. That it is by pregnant Texts vindicated from false Glosses 2. What it is both Name especially the Scripture names Thing Privative and Positive 3. How it comes to be communicated with a consideration of the original of the Soul 4. It s Subject of Inhesion General the whole man In particular The Mind Conscience Memory Will. Affections Imagination Body Predication Every one Christ excepted 5. Its Qualities or Adjuncts The greatnesse Of Adam's Actual transgression which is our original imputed sinne Of our Original Sinne inherent in us The Propriety in every one The Activity The Equality in all A Justification of Gods shutting up all under sinne for the sin of Adam 6. The Immediate Effects of it Propensity to Sinne. The Cause of all Actual sins The Combate between the flesh and Spirit in the godly Death Eternal Damnation THE CONTENTS OF THIS BOOK PART I. PRoving the total and universal Pollution of all Mankind inherently through Sinne. CHAP. I. The first Text to prove Original Sinne improved and vindicated viz. Ephes 2. 3. And were by nature the children of wrath as well as others CHAP. II. Of the Name Original Sinne and of the Utility and Necessity of being clearly and powerfully informed about this Subject CHAP. III. Demonstrations of the Naturality of this sinne that we have it by Natural Propagation CHAP. IV. Objections against the Naturality of Original Sinne answered CHAP. V. A second Text to prove Original Sinne opened and vindicated viz. Rom. 5. 19. For as by one mans disobedience many were made sinners c. CHAP. VI. Whether we are sinners by Natural Propagation or by Imitation CHAP. VII Of the Souls inward filth and defilement by Original Sinne. CHAP. VIII That the inward Contagion that we have from Adam's Disobedience is truly and properly a sinne CHAP. IX Objections Answered CHAP. X. A third Text to make good this Fundamental Point improved and vindicated viz. Job 14. 4. Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean Not one SECT II. A three-fold Uncleanness SECT III. A Comparison between mans moral Uncleanness and Levitical Uncleanness SECT IV. What is comprehended in this expression Uncleanness SECT V. Objections against mans Natural Uncleanness answered CHAP. XI A fourth Text to prove Original Sinne opened and vindicated viz. Psal 51. 5. Behold I was shapen in iniquity and in sinne did my mother conceive me SECT II. Objections answered SECT III. More Advantages accruing from the Belief and Meditation of this Truth SECT IV. That we are to bewail this Original Sinne all our dayes SECT V. Which needed not to have been if Adam had stood SECT VI. We must be humbled for a two-fold Original Sinne and seek from Christ a two-fold Righteousnesse SECT VII The different opinions of men about humiliation for Original Sinne. SECT VIII Repentance may be taken either largely or strictly SECT IX The Difference between godly Sorrow for Original Sinne and for Actual SECT X. Reasons why we must be humbled for Original Sinne. The Contents of the Second Part. SHewing that Original Sinne is and how it is communicated CHAP. I. Of the Name Old-man given to Original Sin Rom. 6. 6. Knowing this that if our old-man be crucified with Christ c. SECT IV. Why it is called Man SECT V. Why it is called Old-Man CHAP. II. Of the Name Law of Sin given to Original Sinne. Rom. 7. 25. But with the flesh the Law of sinne SECT III. Original Sinne compared to a Law in five Respects CHAP. III. Of the Name The Sinne that dwelleth in us given to Original Sinne. Rom. 7. 17. It is no more I but sinne that dwelleth in me CHAP. IV. Of the Epithete Evil is present with us given to Original Sinne. Rom. 7. 21. That when I would do good evil is present with me CHAP. V. Of that Name The Sin that doth so easily beset us given to Original Sinne. Hebr. 12. 1. And the sinne that doth so easily beset us SECT II. What is implied in that expression SECT III. How many wayes Original Sinne is a Burden and an Hinderance unto us CHAP. VI. Of the Name Evil Treasure of the Heart given to Original Sinne. Matth. 12. 35. And an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart bringeth forth evil things SECT II. How Original
live where you have the duty supposed to mortifie that implieth it is not enough to forbear from the actings of sinne but they must kill it Sinne may be left upon many considerations yet not mortified Look therefore that sinne be dead in thee and not asleepy or onely restrained for a season Again To mortifie signifieth the pain and renitency that is in the unregenerate part against this Duty A wicked man had almost as willingly be killed as leave his lusts This sheweth how fast sinne is rooted in us more than a tooth in the jaw or the soul in the body and if any of these are not taken away without much pain and trouble no wonder if the leaving of our corruptions be so troublesom to us Lastly This word supposeth It 's a constant work we are alwayes mortifying alwayes crucifying This is spoken to comfort the godly that they should not wholly be dejected if they find some actings and stirrings of sinne still within them SECT III. SEcondly There is the Object of this Duty and that is The deeds of the body Many translate it The deeds of the flesh for that which was called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 before is here called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Now this body is not only sinne putting it self forth in bodily actions but it is the same with flesh which is original corruption defiling the whole man So that the body here as Beza doth well observe is The whole man in soul and body while unregenerate for the flesh the body here spoken of by the Apostle is in the soul as well as body it is every thing that is opposite to God in a man whether it be in his mind or in his flesh So that Austin said The Epicurean he saith Frui carne meâ est bonum to enjoy the flesh is good The Stock he saith Frui mente meâ est bonum to enjoy my mind is good but both are deceived for to enjoy God only is good and both the body and the mind are all over defiled with sin SECT IV. LAstly There is the Efficient Cause by which we mortifie the deeds of the body and that is the Spirit It 's not our power but Gods Spirit that conquereth these lusts for us Observe That original sinne is a body in us It is a body both in our soul and body it 's called a body not properly as if it were a substance but metaphorically and allusively So Rom. 6. 6. it 's called The body of sinne and certainly it may as well be called so as flesh and the old man SECT V. Why Original Sinne is called a Body BUt let us consider Why it hath such a name given to it And First It is to shew That original sinne doth not lie latent in our breasts but putteth it self forth visibly in all the operations of the body That as the Godhead is said to dwell in Christ boaâ—ly and the Word was made flesh because the Divine Nature which is immaterial and invisible did through the body become as it were visible Thus we may say Original sinne dwelleth in us bodily and that it is made our flesh because in and through all bodily actions it doth manifest it self both to our selves and others It is then the body of sinne because it makes it self outward visible and doth as it were incarnate sinne hence it is called the outward man Indeed it is disputed whether 2 Cor. 4. 16. where the Apostle saith Though our outward man perish yet the inward man is renewed daily By outward man there is meant the body only or original sinne in the bodily deeds thereof Most do interpret it of the body only yet Paraeus understands it of original sinne with the body That as the body and original corruptions with the effects thereof are constantly dying being mortified by the Spirit of God so the inward man which is the work of grace is daily more confirmed Howsoever this be yet it is plain Rom. 7. 22. That the work of grace within us being called the inward man that by opposition original corruption must be the outward man and therefore called The Law in our members It is thought by Nerimbergius that the Apostle taketh this distinction of an outward and inward man from Plato out of whom he quoteth a place with some vicinity to Paul's expression This is certain That original sinne may well be called a body and the Law in our members because by these it doth so palpably put forth its self Insomuch that we may wonder any will not believe there is original sinne for it is obvious to the sense they may behold the effects of it that as you may know a man hath a soul because he speaketh and laugheth though you cannot see the soul Thus though you cannot see original sinne yet because as soon as ever the child can speak or do any thing you see vanity and sinne put forth it self therefore you may conclude there is original sinne Thou then that wilt not be convinced of it by Scripture by reasons and several Authorities we send thee to experience You cannot go from house to house from Town to Town from company to company but you may see the effects and actings of original sinne If you say It 's mens actual sins and custom therein that makes them so vile It is true But still we ask Whence came the custom Whence came they to have those actings Certainly those streams could not have been polluted if the fountain had not been and if original sinne did not infect our natures why should not men generally as well act that which is good and obtain a custom in that which is commendable Therefore experience thy eyes thy ears may convince thee of this bodily sinne Secondly The Apostle calleth it a Body to answer those other expressions that he useth about it for he often calleth upon us to mortifie to kill to crucifie this original sinne Now to mortifie and crucifie are properly relating to a Body we do not say properly accidents or qualities are crucified To make therefore the expression harmonious he calleth it a Body Howsoever therefore it is with our natural body that no man ever yet hated his own flesh we are to nourish and cherish that and it would be murder to mortifie that body yet this Body of sinne is to be kept under we are not to spare it but by the Spirit of God to be constantly crucifying of it neither let that discourage thee because as you heard this will be painfull and grievous to flesh and blood for you must conclude upon this That the way to Heaven is narrow and straight there must be constant violence and opposition to all natural inclinations Every godly man may well be called a Martyr for though he may feel no pain in the killing of his natural body yet he must and will feel much exercise in killing the body of sinne but better endure some grief here than eternal torments hereafter
Our Saviour speaks to this twice as it 's mentioned by the Evangelist Matthew Chap. 5. 30 18. 3. It is better saith he to go halt and blind into life than with two hands and eyes to be cast into everlasting fire Think then whether will be more burdensom to leave the pleasures of sinne here or hereafter to be tormented to all eternity Thirdly Original sinne may be called a Body To shew the reality of it that it is not a meer fancy or humane figment as some call it or a non ens as the late Writer D. J. T. Answ to a letter We know the Scripture and so our use of speech opposeth a body to a shadow The Legal Rites are called a shadow and Christ the body Thus original sinne it is not the shadow or the notion of a sinne it liveth and moveth as well as actual it provoketh God it curseth and damneth as well as actual sins So that we are not to flight it or to be fearless of it but rather to tremble under it as the fountain of all our evil and calamity The word Body is sometimes taken for that which is substantial and real in which sense some have excused Tertullian and others that attributed a body to God and Angels as if they intended nothing but a real substance as the aâ—iome of the Stoicks was Omne quod est est corpus Hence they made Virtues and the Arts Bodies But whatsoever their intentions might be the expression is dangerous for God is a Spirit but there is no danger to call original sinne a Body thereby to express the full and real nature of it and thus farre Illyricus his intention was good though his opinion was absurd to amplifie those terms the Scripture giveth to original sinne in opposition to Popery wherein they speak so coldly and formally of it only that he should therefore make it to be more than an accident even the substance of a man in a theological consideration hence he did overthrow all Philosophy and Divinity So that properly the Lutheran Poet cannot be excused when he saith Ipse Deo eoram sine Christo culpa scelumque Ipse ego peccatum sum proprieque vocer In a figurative expression it may pass but he intended Flaccianism hence Contzen speaks of Illyricus by scorn Cujus vel substantia est peccatum Yet thus much we must take notice of That the Scripture doth not in vain use such substantive names about our natural defilement for hereby it doth aggravate it and would have us also know the greatness and vileness of it For how few are there till sanctified and enlightned by the Spirit of God that do bewail this as an heavy burden They can complain of the pains the aches the troubles of their natural body but do not at all regard this body of sin whereas to a spiritual tender heart this body of sinne is farre more grievous than any bodily diseases or death it self yea death is therefore welcome to them because that alone will free from this body of sinne so that they shall never be molested with it more Fourthly Original sinne is called the Body of sinne Because it is a mass of sin a lump of all evil It is not one sinne but all sinne seminally And this seemeth to be the most formal and express reason why the Apostle giveth it this name calling it a Body and attributing members to it for as a body is not one member or one part but the whole compounded of all Thus is original sinne it is not the defilement or pollution in one part of the soul but it diffuseth it self through all It is a body of sinne and herein it doth exceed all actual transgressions and for this reason we ought the more to grieve and mourn under it The body is heavier than one part why are actual sins a load upon thee but this which is the cause of all and comprehends all thou art never affected with O pray more for the Spirit of conviction by the Word Look oftner into the pure glass of the Law Compare thy universal deformity with that exact purity It is for want of this the pharisaical and the natural man is so self-confident trusteth so much in his own heart doth so easily perswade himself of Gods love whereas if we come to a Christian like Paul complaining of this Law of sinne within him finding it captivating and haling of him whither he would not then we have much a do to comfort such an one all our work is to make him have any hope in Christ he thinketh none are so bad as he that the very devils have not worse in them than he feeleth in himself and all this is because original sinne is such a loathsom dunghill in his brest that as those who have putrified arms or other parts of their body they cannot endure themselves they would flie from themselves Thus it is with them because of this original pollution Fifthly Original sinne may be called a Body Because it inclineth onely to carnal earthly and bodily things not at all savouring the things of God and his Spirit Hence it is called so often the flesh because it only carrieth a man to fleshly things being contrary to God and full of enmity to his will as Rom. 8. And doth not experience confirm this Take any man till renewed by grace and all the bent and impulse of his soul are to such things alone that are earthy and sensual Jam. 3. 17. The Apostle James doth there excellently describe the nature of all natural wisdom It is earthy sensual and devilish Every one by nature is both beastly and devillish This body of sinne presseth him down to the earth and hell Insomuch that you may as soon see a worm flying in the air like a bird as a man abiding in this natural pollution having his conversation in heaven So that being made thus bodily and carnal all the spiritual things of God are both above our apprehension and contrary to our affections Now this very particular if there were no more is as deep as the Sea and containeth unspeakable matter of humiliation viz. That by this natural pollution we are destitute of Gods Spirit Spiritual things are no more apprehended by us than melody by the deaf ear Do ye not see wise men learned men yea great Scholars when you come to discourse with them about spiritual things they are very fools and are as blind as moles that live wholly in the earth But of this more in the effects of original sin Lastly In the Scripture Body is used sometimes for the strength and power of a thing And thus original sinne is the body as that which giveth life and motion to all actual sins Let the Use be greatly to humble thee under this notion Gods word gives original sinne This sinfull body It troubleth thee thou hast a mortal body a corruptible body but above all this body of sinne should be a burden to
and death So that they conclude it injurious and contumelious to Paul reproachfull to the grace of the Gospel and a palpable incouragement to sinne and wickedness to interpret the 7th of the Rom. of a regenerate person But because this is a truth of so special concernement we shall take these things in a more particular consideration for it would be found an heavy sinne lying upon most orthodox Teachers in the Reformed Church if they have constantly preached such a Doctrine as is injurious to Gods grace and an incentive to sinne as also slothfulness and negligence in holy duties for the present this Text will bear us out sufficiently that where ever the Spirit of God is in persons while in the way to heaven they have a contrary principle of the flesh within them whereby they are more humbled in themselves and do the more earnestly make their applications to the throne of grace and that all have such a conflict within them may appear by these following Reasons yea we may with Luther say so farre is it that any do attain to such a measure of grace as to be without this combate that the more holy and spiritual any are the more sensible they are of it for they have more illumination and so discover the exactness and spiritual latitude of the law more then formerly they did and also their hearts are more tender whereby they grow more sensible even of the least weight of any sinful motion though never so transient It is true the godly do grow in grace they get more mastery and power over the lustings of sinne within yet withall they grow in light and discovery about holiness they see it a more exact and perfect thing then they thought of they find the Law of God to be more comprehensive then they were aware of and therefore they are ready to cry out as Ignatius when ready to suffer Nunc incipio esse Christians Oh me never godly but beginning to be godly I believe but how great is my unbelief This Paul declareth Phil. 3. 12. Not as if I had already attained either were already perfect but I follow after c. Thus Paul is farre from owning such commendations which happily others may put upon him It is true indeed Amyraldus denyeth that any are absolutely perfect but yet he goeth beyond the bounds of truth in attributing too much to Paul or other Apostles which will appear First Because the most holy that are have used all meanes to mortifie and keep down the cause of these sinful motions If they did not continually throw water as it were upon those sparks within the most holy man would quickly be in a flame Even this Apostle Paul doth not he confess this of himself 1 Cor. 9. 27. I keep down my body and bring it into subjection c. He doth not mean the body as it is a meer natural substance for the glorified Saints will not keep down their bodyes but as it is corrupted and made a ready instrument to sin for though the Apostle call it not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 yet these are not opposite but suppose one another as Rom. 6. 12. Let not sinne reign in your mortal body and it is a very frigid and forced Exposition of Amyraldus as if the Apostle did understand it of the exposing his body to hunger and thirst and all dangerous persecutioâ—s for the Gospels sake For this was not Paul's voluntary keeping down of his body those persecutions and hardships to his body were against his will though he submitted to them when by Gods providence he was called thereunto but he speaketh here of that which he did readily and voluntarily lest from within should arise such motions to sinne as might destroy him yea it is plain that even in Paul there was a danger of the breakings forth of such lusts because 2 Cor. 12. God did in a special manner suffer him to be buffetted and exercised by Satan that he might not be lifted up through pride neither is this any excuse to say with Amyraldus That such sinnes are apt to breed in the most excellent dispositions for it is acknowledged by all that such sinnes have more guilt in them then bodily sinnes though not such infamy and disgrace amongst men Luther calleth them the sublimia peccat the sublime and high sins such the Devil was guilty of and they were the cause of his final overthrow and damnation If then the most godly have used all means to mortifie sinne within them it is plain they found a combate and that if sinne were let alone it would quickly get the upper hand Secondly That there is a conflict of sinne appeareth in those duties enjoyned to all the godly that they watch and pray that they put on the whole armour of Christ Yea the Disciples are commanded to take heed of drunkenness and surfetting and the cares of this world Luke 21. 34. and generally Paul's Epistles are full of admonitions and exhortations to give all diligence in the wayes of holinesse especially that command is very observable 2 Cor. 7. 1. Having these promises let us cleanse our selves from all filthinesse of flesh and spirits perfecting holinesse in the fear of God Here you see both flesh and spirit that is the rational and sensitive part have filthiness and that those who are truly godly are to be continually cleansing away this filthiness and to perfect what is out of order What godly man is there that can say This command doth not belong to me I am above it I need it not No lesse considerable is that command of Peter 1 Pet. 2. 11. Dearly beloved I beseech you as pilgrims and strangers abstain from fleshly lusts which warre against the soul Not as if this were wholly parallel with my Text as Carthusian is said to bring it in thereby proving that by flesh is meant the body and by spirit the soul but onely it sheweth that no godly man in this life is freed from a militant condition and that with his own flesh his own self which maketh the combate to be the more dangerous For this cause David though a man after Gods own heart though Gods servant in a special consideration yet prayeth Psal 19. 13. Keep back thy servant from presumptuous sins which expression denoteth that even a godly man hath lust within him that would carry him out like an untamed horse to presumptuous sins did not the Lord keep him back But we need not bring more reasons to confirm that which experience doth so sadly testifie SECT III. A Consideration of that part of the seventh Chapter to the Romans which treats of the Conflict within a man Shewing against Amyraldus and others that it must be a regenerate person onely of whom those things are spoken ¶ 1. THe next Proposition that may give light to the weighty truth about the spiritual conflict that is in the most regenerate persons is this That besides the
it the mother of many errors 6 The cause of all miseries 7 Worse than actual 8 Ignorance thereof the cause why men understand not the work of conversion 9 Inseparably adheres to the best 11 A natural evil and how with the several names it hath had 13 The difilement of our specifical being 14 The inward principle of all sinfull motions ib. Flacius his opinion concerning it ib. Is alwayes putting it self forth 16 Neerer to us than actual or habitual sin 18 What it is 19 20 Why compared to death 21 Objections answered 22 Pelagians and Socinians opinion of it 28 Propagated ib. Is an internal and natural depravation of the whole man 32 Adams sin imputed to us is not all our Original sin ib. Of that opinion that Original sinne is vitium but not peccatum 33 Truly and properly a sin 34 Against the Law 35 How voluntary 39 Arminius and the Remonstrants disagree about Original sin 40 Arminius Remorstrants Zuinglius Papists Scotists and Socinians opinions of it 40 A sin a punishment and a cause of sin 41 Original inherent sin and Adams imputed sin are two distinct sins 43 Against the Law and how 44 45 Acknowledged in Old Testament times 48 Remonstrants confess it may be proved by two or three places of Scripture ib. Compared to a leprosie 51 Makes us leathsom to God as soon as born 52 Why called uncleanness ib. Should make us vile in our own eyes ib. Put a man by nature into worse condition than beasts 53 Makes us like the Devils ib. Pollutes our duties and makes us unfit and unworthy to draw nigh to God in duties 54 Makes us to be in the most immediate contrariety to God that can be ib. The denial of it charged upon Calvinists by the Lutherans 56 Acknowledged by the Rabbins and Fathers 62 Meditation thereon wherein advantagious 64 Not one universal thing of general influence but a particular thing in particular men 65 To be bewailed even by those that are regenerate ib. A two-fold Original sin 66 The different opinions of men about humiliation for it 67 In what sense it is to be repented of 68 Papists against sorrow for it 69 Several opinions concerning the pardon of it 67 68 69 Wherein repentance and the pardon of Original and actual sin do differ 70 It is an universal defilement 71 And an universal guilt ib. And the fountain and root of all actual sin ib. And the greatest sin 72 Inseparable from our natures while we live 73 Of the Scripture names of it 79 Not the essence or substance of the soul ib. Why called the old man 80 Improperly called a Law 83 Why called a Law 84 Instructs a man in all evil ib. Inclineth and provoketh to all evil ib. Compelleth to all evil 85 Why called the inherent or in-dwelling sin 90 How it dwels in the regenerate ib. Active and ever stirring 94 Is of an insinuating and contaminating nature 95 Depriveth both of power and will to do good 97 98 Inclines the heart to the creature 98 Resisteth all profers of grace 99 Weakens the principles of grace 100 Why called a treasure 102 An inexhausted stock 103 The cause of all pleasure in sin 104 Called a body and why 105 107 Shews it self outwardly in all our actions 107 Cannot be mortified without pain ib. A reality yet not a substance 108 Not a single sin but a lump of all evil ib. Inclineth only to carnal earthly and bodily things 109 Seth born in Original sinne 110 111 Deprives of more than external happiness and immortality against Socinians 117 Many Papists deny the positive part of it 136 Hath infected all men 137 Positive as well as privative 144 And the reasons thereof 145 Produceth positive sinfull actions 146 Sticks closer then vicious habits ib. Not a pestilential quality in the body 149 Is properly concupiscence or lust 157 And in what sense 159 And why so called 162 It is ignorant also ib. Defined 164 The whole man and the whole of man the subject thereof ib. Propagated and communicated to all Adams posterity 165 Truly known only by Scripture-light 167 How farre Heathens were ignorant thereof 168 The propagation thereof by the souls creation 199 Hath fill'd us with errour 211 And with curiosity 212 And vanity 213 And folly 214 Polluting the conscience how and wherein 221 Polluteth the memory 249 Polluteth the will 268 The affections 325 The imagination 348 The body of a man 392 And every one of mankind 387 Not the children of the most godly or the Virgin Mary excepted but only Christ 387. to 401 Original sin imputed the aggravations of it 405 Inherent the aggravation of it 407 It defiles all the parts of the soul is the root and cause of all actual sin is incurable taketh away all spiritual sense and feeling is habitual radicated in the soul 407. to 410 Objections against the hainousnesse of this sin Every one hath his proper Original sin 412 Vents it self betimes 415 Is alike in all 419 The immediate effects of Original sinne are mans propensity to sin 437. to 455 Is the cause of all other sine 455 Evil motions not consented unto and lusts consented unto 464 The combat between the flesh and spirit 474 Death 505 Eternal damnation 526 P Pray A Natural man cannot Pray 314 Pride Pride the cause of most heresies 218 Propagation Propagation of sin 397 Punishment The same thing may be a Punishment and a sin 41 R Redeemer THe necessity of a Redeemer demonstrates our thraldom to sin 319 Reformation A carnal mans Reformation is but the avoiding of one sin by another 318 Regenerate A sure difference between a Regenerate and unregenerate man 9 Regeneration Three sorts of mistaken Regeneration 10 Reliques Reliques of sin 474 Remember Whence is it that we Remember things when we would not 266 Righteousness Original Righteousness not given to Adam as a curb to the inferiour faculties 25 The difficulty of Rom. 5. 26 Original Righteousness the privation of it a sin 130 We were deprived of it by Adam 131 Vniversally lost 135 The losse of it the cause of all temporal losses ib. The privation of it doth necessarily inferre the presence of all sin in a subject susceptible 202 S Sacraments ONe end of the Sacraments 255 Sanctification Sanctification two fold 391 Satan All by nature in bondage to Satan 370 Scripture Scripture discovers us to our selves better then light of nature or Philosophy 161 168 The end of its being written 253 Self-knowing Self knowing a great duty and the hinderance of it 8 Sensless We are altogether Sensless as to any spiritual concernment 176 Sin A man naturally can do nothing but sin 15 16 The reason why all men do not commit all Sins though inclinable thereto 17 Men lie under a necessity of sinning yet this necessity is consistent with voluntarinesse 18 Sin delightfull to men 21 How Sin is natural to us 24 Christ only born without Sin and how 37. 390 Sin is what
Even as when the Prophet Elisha would make the waters sweet he threw salt into the spring and fountain of them Thus because it 's from a polluted nature that all our actual sinnes flow therefore grace regenerating is principally ordered to take away or conquer that by degrees which is the cause of all If this be so then let us consider What this grace is which doth inable us to do any thing after a godly and holy manner This is a supernatural gift of God and an insused quality into the soul whereby it 's inabled to work above its own proper and natural operations If then to do any thing that is good be wholly of grace it 's Gods gift then to sin is natural and proper to thee The Scripture is copious and plentiful in affirming this That Christ as our head is the cause of all our supernatural actings We receive of his fulness and so are inabled by him Grace then being supernatural to love God to repent of sin to do any thing spiritually being thus wholly above nature it necessarily followeth that when we sin and do evil that we do it naturally SECT X. NInthly The Nature of a thing if compounded and not simple is the complex of the whole The nature of a man is not his hands or his eyes only but his soul and his whole body Thus the nature of original Righteousness was not the perfection of one single faculty the understanding only the will only but it was the complete harmonical rectitude of the whole man called therefore the Image of God Now as the Image of a man is not one limb or member but the pourtraiture of the whole So neither was the Image of God in Adam one grace or some few graces but the perfection of every part Light in the mind holiness in the will order and regularity in the affections Thus it is on the contrary with original sinne it 's called The old man and it 's said to have mâ—mbers by which is implied that it 's not any single sinne or a defect and pollution in one faculty of the soul but it 's universal over all Hence our Saviour saith John 3. Whatsoever is born of the flesh is flesh it is wholly corrupted it is all over sinful So then when we say it 's natural this implieth That it is a Leprosie all over us as farre as our physical being extends Thus also in a moral sense doth our sinful Being inlarge it self Therefore our natural estate is not compared only to a blind man or a deaf man what wants the use of some faculties but unto death it self that depriveth of the use of all The naturality then of this sinne doth denote both the inward inheston as also the universal diffusion of it nothing within a man being free from this contagion SECT XI LAstly The Naturality of this evil doth appear In the great easiness promptitude and delight a man naturally finds to sin This is a way to discover what is natural if the actions be easie ready and with delight This discovers they flow from Nature but what is of art that is with difficulty and much observation We need not hire or teach a man to eat or drink these are natural actions and are accompanied with delight And thus the Naturality of this birth-sinne is notably manifested with what ease pleasure and inward readiness is a man carried out to sinne from his youth up Eliphaz speaks notably of this Job 15. 16. How much more abominable and filthy is man which drinketh iniquity like water like a Leviathan that is said to drink up the river and hasteth not You see he cals every man by nature abominable and filthy which is discovered by this He drinketh iniquity like water as a dropsie or feavorish man that is scorched with heat within doth with greediness and delight pour down water and the more he drinketh the thirstier he is and he never saith he hath enough Thus it is with filthy and corrupted man he doth with earnestness and delight fulfill the lust of the flesh he is never satisfied Every man in the world hath a Sheol within him that is alwayes craving and saying Give Give as hell hath unquenchable sparks of fire such an hell is in every mans heart As our Saviour said It 's my meat and drink to do my Fathers will Thus it is every mans meat and drink by nature to be doing the Devils will Do ye not see it in children how of themselves they are prone to any impiety but call them to learn or to be instructed then there is much aversness All this ariseth from the natural evil within us CHAP. IV. Objections against the Naturality of Original Sinne answered SECT I. THe Naturality of original sinne hath been in divers respects asserted I shall therefore conclude this Text with answers to some Objections that are made against this Doctrine I do not mean against original sinne it self for they are various so unwilling is man to be convinced that he is wholly sinful but against the Naturality of it which this Text doth affirm Neither shall I take in all Objections of this kind because they will be met with on some other Texts only I shall pitch upon one or two whereby your understandings may be more fully cleared in this point and so I shall part with this Text. First therefore it hath been enviously of old objected against this Truth That if there were such a natural pollution adhering to all mankind this would redound to the dishonour of God who is the Author of man This Argument the Pelagians of old insulted with If say they any man hold God is the maker of man presently he is called a Pelagian for thus they flourished If there be original sinne either the parents that beget or the children that are begotten or God the Creator of the soul and in a peculiar manner forming all the parts of our body must be the cause of this sinne This Objection they thought unanswerable unless we should charge God with being the Author of this original defilement Hence it is that they charged Manâ—cheism upon the Orthodox as if they thought that Nature it self was evil Five things there were that these Hereticks did usually commend Nature Marriage the Law Free-will and Holiness none of which they thought could be maintained unless we deny original sinne But when these Arguments are fully searched into there will appear no matter of boasting Let us call the first to account and examine Whether the Doctrine of original corruption doth charge God foolishly or no Whether hereby all the sinne in the world will be laid upon God Now there is a three sold charge drawn up against this Truth as it relateth to God 1. That it makes him the Author of this sinne 2. That it makes him unjust imputing that sinne of Adam to us and punishing us because of it when we had no being or any will of our own
by the power of God detained here on earth that the glory of Christ might be exalted he doth unite this soul though with pollution to the body Now Gods uniting of the sinfull soul to the body did not make him the cause of any sinne therein Because he united it as part of that man who yet was not wholly purged from sinne Now the reason why the soul is created not as a perfect substance in it self is Because it 's the forme of man not an assisting forme and therefore is not in the body as when an Angel did assume bodies or as a man in his house or as a Musician useth an Instrument but a form informing whereby it is made an intrinsecal essential part of a man The truth of this will give much light to our point in hand the soul is created by God The informing forme of a man and so hath no other consideration but as an essential part of him and therefore seeing the man is in Adam whose soul this is that is thereby exposed to all the sinne of Adam Hence it is that there is some difference between the creation of Angles and the Chaos at first which were made absolutely of nothing and of the soul For the soul though it be created of nothing yet because a form hath an essential respect to its matter for which cause Contarenus as Zanchy saith affirmed The soul had a middle way of being between Creation and Generation and therefore is that distinction of some learned men that though the soul be not ex materiâ yet it is in materiâ God did not create it but in the body though not of the body and thus farre it may be said to be of man as that he is the cause though not of the being of the soul yet of the being of it n this body The third Proposition The soul being thus created an essential part of a man and the form informing of him Hence it is That we must not conceive the soul to be first created as it were of it self subsisting and then infused into the body but when the materials are sufficiently prepared then as the Schoolmen expresse it well Infundendo creatur and creando infuditur it 's infused by the creating of it and created by infusing So that the soul is made in the body organized not without it so the Scripture Zech. 12. 1. Who formeth the spirit of man with him and because of the souls unon to the body when thus disposed Hence it is that man may truly and univocally be said to beget a man though his soul be created for seeing man who is the compositum is the Terminus generationis Hence it is that man begets man as well as a beast though the soul of a beast be from the matter as we see in Christ the Virgin Mary is truly said to be the mother of Christ though she was not the mother of his Divine Nature nor of his soul Thus man doth properly beget another man though the soul be by Creation as the matter also according to Philosophy is ingenerable because the soul is united to the body prepared and disposed for it by man from which union resulteth the whole person or compositum consisting of soul and body So that although man be not the cause of his childs souls being yet that it hath a being in this body and thereby such a person produced he is the cause of it and by this if well understood you may see original sinne communicated to every one though the soul be created In that way which the humane nature is communicated to every one So that if we truly know how a man is made a man from his parents we may also know how sin is thereby also communicated The fourth Proposition is Although God doth daily create new souls yet his Decree and Purpose to do so was from all eternity And therefore in this respect we may say all men consisting of souls and bodies were present to God in Adam in respect of Gods Decree and also his Covenant with Adam so that although there be a new Creation yet there is no new institution or ordination on Gods part Whereas therefore it 's thought hard that because Adam was so many thousand years ago the soul created now should partake of his sinne The Answer is That in respect of Gods Decree and Covenant we were all present to God in Adam There is no man hath his being De Novo but unto God he was present from eternity so that though the things in time have a succession of being yet to God all are present in eternity Not that we can say they were actually sinners or actually justified but in respect of Gods purpose all were present and this will help much to facilitate this difficulty we are as present to God in respect of his Decree and knowledge as if we had been then actually in Adam in which sense it 's said Omnes fuerunt ille unus homo and Act. 15. 18. Known to God are all his works from the beginning The fifth Proposition Hence it is that the just and wise God is not to alter and change that course of nature because man hath sinned It is vain to say Why will God unite this soul to the body when thereby both shall be polluted For though man hath by his sinne deserved that this should be yet God is not therefore to cease of the continuing and multiplying of mankind God doth keep to the fixed course of nature notwithstanding mans sinne And therefore we see that even to those who are begot in fornication and whoredome yet even to such in that unlawfull act God giveth souls because he will not interrupt the course of nature The sixth Proposition Adam by his first transgression did deserve that all who should be of him should be deprived of the Image of God and the privation of that doth necessarily inferre the presence of all sinne in a subject susceptible As take away light from the air and it must be dark so that this Proposition answereth the whole difficulty Adam deserved by his transgression that all his posterity should become dead in sinne and as he had thus deserved it so God had ordained it and appointed it The soul then of every one being made part of that man who is thus cursed in Adam it becomes deprived of the Image of God and so full of sinne So that although God create the soul naturally good yet because part of man condemned by his sentence he denieth it that original righteousnesse it once had God doth not infuse any evil into the soul nor is the Author of any sinne therein but as a just Judge denieth that righteousnesse which otherwise the soul might have had So that you must not look for an efficient cause of original sinne in the soul but a deficient and a meritorious cause So that the Summe is this If you ask How cometh the soul defiled if created of
these earthly things therefore it is that as we have inordinate delight in the possessing of them so immoderate sorrow in the losing of them For that is a true Rule about all these things Non est earendo difficultas nisi cum in habendo est cupiditas Now all this trouble and perplexing grief ariseth from the pollution of the soul being destitute of that glorious Image Sixthly Man having lost the Image of God thus in his soul hence it is that he liveth a wretched instable and unquiet life for being off in his heart from God he therefore is tossed up and down according to the mutability of every creature Hence no man having no more then what he hath by Adam can live any quiet secure and peaceable life but is tossed up and down with contrary winds sometimes fears sometimes hope sometimes joy sometimes sorrow so that he is never in the Haven but alwayes floting upon the waters Thus miserable is a mans life till the Image of God be repaired in him Lastly From this universal pollution upon a man it followeth That be abuseth every good thing he hath that he sinneth in all things and by all things That whether he eateth or drinketh whether he buyeth or selleth he cannot refer any one of these to the ultimate end which is Gods glory but to inferiour and self-respects Oh wretched and miserable estate wherein thou hast abused every mercy God hath given thee to his dishonour and thy damnation Thou hast turned all thy honey into gall and poison thou wast never able to fulfill that command 1 Cor. 7. So to use the world as not to abuse it Thy meat thy raiment thy health thy wealth they have all been abused neither hath God been glorified or the salvation of thy soul promoted thereby CHAP. VII Of the last Subject of Inhesion or Seat of Original Sinne viz. the Body of a Man SECT I. 1 THES 5. 23. And the very God of peace sanctifie you wholly and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ HItherto we have been discovering the universal pollution of the soul by original sinne and that both in the upper and lower region the rational and sensitive part thereof Our method now requireth that we should manifest the defilement and contagion that is upon the Body also For as it was in the deluge that did overflow the world the cause did precede both from above and beneath Gen. 7. 11. The fountains of the great deep were broken up and the windows of Heaven were opened from above and below did come the overflowing of waters Thus it is in that spiritual deluge of sinne which doth overflow all mankind There is corruption in the superiour parts of the soul and there is also in the body the lowest and meanest part of man So that whatsoever goeth to the making of man is all over defiled There is nothing in soul or body but is become thus polluted we therefore proceed to the last subject of Inhesion or seat of original sinne and that is the body of man which will be declared from the Text we are to insist upon SECT II. The Text explained FOr the Coherence of it observe that the Apostle having in the former verses enjoyned many excellent and choice duties In this verse he betaketh himself to prayer to God in their behalf that God would sanctifie them and inable them thereunto for in vain did Paul water by this Doctrinal Information unless God did give the increase and withall we see that is a true Rule That precepts are not a measure of our power They declare indeed our duty but they do not argue our power otherwise prayer thus to God would have been needless In the prayer it self we may consider the matter it self prayed for and that is set down 1. Summarily and in the General And then 2. Distributively in several particulars The General is That they may be sanctified wholly or throughout 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Thessalonians were supposed to be sanctified already but yet the Apostle doth here pray for their further sanctification which doth evidence That the Doctrine of perfection in this life is a proud and presumptuous errour If they had attained to the highest pitch of sanctification already why should they still grow in it Thus the Apostle doth often press Gospel-duties upon such as attain to them already but because they have not perfection therefore they are to be urged forward Thus the Apostle writing to those that were reconciled 2 Cor. 5. 20. saith We pray you be reconciled to God So to the Ephes 4. 23 24. Be renewed in the spirit of your mind and put on the new man c. He speaketh as if the work were now to begin as if they had not as yet been partakers of this new-creature Not but that they were so onely there was much behind still to be perfected much leaven was to be purged out they were still imperfect and therefore are to forget what is behind pressing forward to the mark In the second place you have the Distribution of this whole in its parts This Sanctification is to be exercised in a three-fold subject your Spirit Soul and Body It is not Sanctification simply he prayeth for but growing and increasing that it be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as in the Original that it have all that the lot 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is a lot what the condition of them doth require what holiness is the spirits portion the souls condition to have that they are to partake of but because this will never be gradually perfect in this life though integrally it is therefore he saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 without blame Though the godly are not preserved without sinne yet they may without fals such as may make them notoriously culpable and faulty before men but because it is not enough for a time to be preserved and then afterwards to be left to our selves for then we should quickly lick up our old vomit again he therefore addeth that this preservation should be even to the coming of Christ Now that which I intend chiefly out of these words is the Subject to be sanctified and that not the two former viz. Spirit and Soul of whose uncleanness we have largely treated already but of the Body which is last of all Only it is necessary to speak a little to the explication of these three parts of man how they differ for commonly when the Scripture speaketh of man it enumerateth but two parts the Soul and the Body as Eccles 12. 7. and in the creation of man we have only two parts instanced in which are his Soul and his Body Because of this there have been various conjectures upon this place for some have hence made three parts of man his Body his Soul which they make to be the sensitive part of man and his Spirit which they make to be some
estate now in being consistent thus of a body he doth partake with beasts and agreeth with them But the other part of man is spiritual immaterial and immortal substance breathed at first into Adam by God himself and herein he doth agree with Angels According to these two constituent principles a man doth act either according to the soul or the body In the state of integrity his soul was predominant he was like an Angel in this particular but now since man is fallen his body is principal and chief and thereupon is become like the bruit beaâ—â— living and walking according to the inclinations and temptations of the body This the Psalmist observed Psal 49. 12. Man being in honour abideth not he is like the beasts that perish And vers 20 man that is in honour and understandeth not is like the beasts that perish Here you see that though a man be exalted to never so much glory and dignity in the world yet if he understand not if he doth not live according to the true principles of reason and grace he is but like a beast not only in that he perisheth like a beast but also in that he liveth and walketh like one Hence it is that the Scripture doth so often compare wicked men to beasts to the Ass to the Wolf to the Dog and Swina because they fall from the principles of a rational soul and become like them in their operations Thus evil men are said 2 Tim. 2. 26. To be taken captive by the Devil at his will or as in the Greek taken alive As the hunter doth drive wild beasts into his nets and so taketh them alive Thus are wicked men brought as it were willingly into the Devils hands and are tame under him and if so be the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 his will be referred to the Devil as some do then it sheweth in what willing subjection they are in to Satans lusts but because it 's not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it therefore relateth rather to the remote antecedent which is God implying that it is by Gods just judgement that man is thus become a miserable slave and doth the Devils drudgery even as we make beasts do our work And thus it is with all men since the fall they are not worthly the name of a man therfore the whole body of wicked men are compared to the Serpents seed as if they were the off-spring of such a poisonous creature rather then of man yea doth not experience confirme this take men without the work of grace either internally sanctifying of them or externally restraining of them take them as left to their own natural principles and having no more to walk by what do you perceive in them more then a beast Indeed their body is still upright and so they differ from them but in their life and manners they are conformable unto them Oh that men would consider and lay this to heart to be affected with this original sinne that hath thus degraded us even from the honour as it were of a man There doth not appear in us the actings and workings of a rational soul we are as our body and the inclinations thereof do carry us away ¶ 4. The Body by original Sinne is made a Tempter and a Seducer FOurthly The body by original sinne is made a tempter and a seducer it doth administer daily matter and occasion to sinne As the Devil is a tempter without so the body is the tempter within we are incited and drawne away to many bodily sinnes from the temptations thereof hence we read in the Scripture that the word flesh is so often put for the sinful part of a man and spirit for the regenerate part and why is it called flesh but because it is so intimately adhering to the body and by the body so much iniquity and sinfulness is expressed Thus sinne is called our flesh as if it were no longer a quality polluting of us but our very bones and corporeal substance There are several bodily sinnes which are bred as it were in this noisome pudddle of the body as drunkenness this is a bodily sinne and where this vice is accustomed unto how greatly doth the body crave and importune for the accomplishing of it this maketh repentance of it and a through reformation so difficult because it is now soaked as it were in the body that as you see it is with the food we eat while in the mouth or stomack it is with some ease exonerated but when digested and by nourishment turned into the very parts of the body then it cannot be separated Thus when sinnes come to be incorporated into thee when thy body is habituated to any vice it requireth much prayer and agony much humiliation and supplication ere such a lust can be disposessed Oh then bewail thy body that is thus become an enemy to the soul that is like a furnace sending forth continual sparks of fire That as the tree by the moisture and softness thereof doth cause wormes to breed in it which do at last destroy it Thus out of thy body arise such lusts that will at last be thy eternal perdition As drunkenness so uncleanness this is also a lust of the body this sinne ariseth from it and although that be very true which the Apostle saith 1 Cor. 6. 18. That fornication and such uncleanness they are against the body because the body is to be kept holy and pure it being the temple of the Holy Ghost where a man is sanctified yet take it as corrupted and polluted so these lusts are very sutable and consonant to it who can think then that the body is such as at first Creation such a ready instrument to much bodily wickedness yea a tempter and a seducer This is the Dalilah that doth so often plunge us into soul sinnes there was no root of bitterness in mans body at first but as it was with the ground when cursed for mans sinne then it did naturally and of it self bring forth weeds and thorns so doth the body thus defiled it is now the continual nourisher and fomenter of vice we damn our souls to please our bodies we are become slaves to our bodily pleasures and delights though we know they are to the eternal perdition both of soul and body at last nourish it we must provide for it we must yet we cannot nourish that but sinne also is thereby strengthned Hence you have that holy Apostle himself much afraid of his body that it may not rise up in rebellion against the work of grace 1 Cor. 9. 27. he useth two emphatical words to this purpose 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I keep under my body an allusion to those who did fight for masteries by way of exercise so that when one did beat the other black and blue about the face 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is the countenance and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 are those marks upon the face Hence
former particular our bodies had some kind of efficiency and working in those sinnes but here it is passive as it were an object that doth allure and draw out the soul inordinately to it so that we mind the body look to the body provide for the body more than the soul so that whereas the soul is farre more excellent and worthy than the body so that our thoughts and studies should be infinitely more zealous to save that then the body yet till grace doth sanctifie and life us up to the enjoyment of God who doth not look after his body more than his soul which yet is as if saith Chrysostom a man should look to his house to see that be repaired and that be in good order but neglect his own self The soul that is properly a man the body is but his house and a vile one also is an house of clay it is but a garment to the soul and a ragged tottered one Now it is good to take notice in what particulars our bodies are thus objectively a cause of sinne to us And First It is evident in that diligent and thoughtfull way of car we have about the feeding and cloathing of it Doth not our Saviour even to his very Disciples prohibit this perplexing care Matth. 6. 25. Take no thought for your life what ye shall eat nor for your body what ye shall put on but how faulty are we here comparatively to our souls we that have so many thoughts to provide for the body how few have we about the soul Is not the body well fed when the soul is starved Is not the body well cloathed when the soul is naked How justly may thy soul cry out murder murder for thou art destroying and damning that every day Will not thy soul witness against thee at the day of judgement the body was taken care for the body was looked to but I was neglected Will it not cry out in hell Oh if I had been as diligently attended unto as the body I had not been roaring in these eternal torments The second particular wherein the body doth objectively and occasionally tempt the soul to sinne is about the adorning and trimming of it not only the care to provide for it but the curiosity to adorn it doth provoke the soul to much sinni And whereas our very garments should put us in constant mind of our original pollution for there was no shame uponnakedness till that first transgression and thereby greatly humble us we now grow proud and vain from the very effect of the first disobedience Every morning we put on our garments we should remember our original sinne The body before sinne was not exposed to any danger by cold and other damages neither was the nakedness thereof any cause of blushing but all this and more also is the fruit of the first sinne and if so how inexcusable is it to be curious and diligent in trimming up and adorning our bodies by those very garments the thoughts whereof should greatly debase us but this is not all The great attendance to the glory of the body doth wholly take off from the care of the soul How happy were it if persons did take as much pains to have their souls cloathed with the robes of righteousness to have them washed and cleansed from all filth as they do about their bodies one spot one wrinkle in the garment is presently spied out when the soul at the same time though full of loathsomness is altogether neglected as if our souls were for our bodies and not our bodies for our souls The Platonists indeed had such high thoughts of the soul and so low of the body that their opinion was Anima est homo the soul is the man they made the body but a meer instrument as the Ship is to the Pilate or musical instruments to an Artificer This is not true in Philosophy though in a moral sense it may have some affinity with truth but if we do regard the affections and actions of all by nature we may rather say The body 〈◊〉 man Yea the Apostle goeth higher he maketh it some mens God Phil. 3. 19. Whose belly is their God Why their God Because all they look at in Religion all they mind is only to satisfie that The Monks belly in Luther's time was their god When then a man liveth his natural civil and religious life onely to have his belly satisfied this man maketh his belly his god And again there are persons whose backs are their god For never did Heathens or Papists bestow more cost upon their Idols and Images to make them glorious then they do on their backs little remembring that we came naked into the world and that we shall not carry any thing out with us If this care were for soul-ornaments if thou didst spend as much time in prayer to God and reading the Scriptures whereby thy soul might be made comely and beautifull as thou doest about thy body this would prove more comfortable If thou didst as often look into the glass of Gods word to find out every sinne thou doest commit and to reform it as thou doest into the material glasse to behold thy countenance and to amend the defilements there thou wouldst find that the hours and day so spent will never grieve thee whereas upon the review of thy life spent in this world thou wilt at the day of judgement cry out of and bewail all those hours all that time in unnecessary adorning of the body The Apostle giveth an excellent exhortation 1 Pet. 3. 3 Whose adorning let it not be of plating the hair or of wearing of gold but let it be the hidden men of the heart in that which is not corruptible The Apostle doth not there simply and absolutely forbid the wearing of gold in such who by their places and calling may do it for Isaac gave Rebâ—ccah earings of gold but he speaketh comparatively rather look to the adorning of the soul then of the body spend more time about one then the other It is a known History of that Pambo who seeing a woman very industriously trimming her self to please that man with whom she intended naughtinesse wept thereupon because he could not be as carefull to dresse up his soul in such a posture as to please God Oh then look to thy body hereafter Let it not steal so much time from thee as thereby to neglect thy soul and to lose those opportunities thou mayest have of humbling thy self before God! Thirdly The body doth objectively draw out sinne from the soul In that the fear of any danger to that especially the death thereof will make us damne our soules and greatly offend God which doth plainly discover that our bodies are more to us then God or heaven or our soules are Therefore we have our Saviour pressing his Disciples against this fear if fear about hurt to the body may insnare the godly and keep them from their duty no wonder if
a more commodious and fit expression Hence they do more willingly use the word Traduction or happily transmitting and transfusing for the sinne is not properly propagated but the humane nature to which original corruption adhereth because we have not that so properly from our parents though by them as of Adam for the reason why upon the conjunction of soul and body an Infant is immediately defiled with sinne is not because born of such parents but because of Adam and therefore though they be the cause of being a man yet Adam is of being a sinfull man So that as all the lines from the circumference do equally meet in the center Thus do all mankind in Adam and he that is now born doth as immediately partake of Adam's sin as Cain did though so many thousand years ago born immediately of Adam Original sin then doth not in length of time either increase or decrease but we all have our polluted natures as polluted directly from Adam and immediately though as nature from our parents and so administer the subject to which original is applied and so in a remote distance from our common parent Let not then any man think what should we trouble our selves with Adam's sinne and complain of him who lived so many years ago What is his transgression to us who live so many generations after him For thou hast this natural pollution as immediately from him as if thou hadst been his immediate son neither is thy parents sinfulness communicated to thee simply because thy parents but because Adams who was the common parent This rightly considered would affect us as much as if we had lived immediately upon Adam's fall neither would the space of so many years since his transgression at all abate our sad and aggravating thoughts of it SECT IV. Whether the Virgin Mary was born with Original Sinne. IT being thus the nature-sinne and not a personal individual one it is very absurd either from a preposterous admiration or some other respect to exempt any born in a natural way from this birth sinne In this way we find the Papists greatly offending concerning the Virgin out of a sinfull admiration of her thinking thereby to honour Christ Some of them do peremptorily conclude That the Virgin Mary was born without original sinne and thereupon they keep the feast of her Immaculate and undefiled Conception Yea some have gone so farre as to say the Virgin Mary's mother was also without original sinne And if we proceed upon their principles Why should they not affirm so For as they say It is for the honour of Christ to have a Mother without original sinne so it would be for the honour of the Virgin to have her Mother without sinne likewise Now I say some of the Papists determine That the Virgin Mary was conceived without sinne Trithemius his great zeal and devotion in this point is abundantly declared by him in his Tractate of the praises of S. Anna especially Chap. 7. yea he is so confident in his assertion of the immaculate Conception of the Mother of Christ that he saith Si erramus pietas imo Deus ipse est in causâ Piety yea God himself is the cause of it It hath been a very hot Dispute between the Deminicans and the Franciscans Bellarmine goeth a middle way he will not have it an Article of Faith to believe she was thus pure but yet he saith It is a most pious opinion and therefore he giveth several Arguments for it But Estius saith in Rom. 5. the Scriptures and ancient Fathers speak exclusively that none but Christ was freed from original sinne as if it would be an high offence in him to depart from them though he doth not judge others The late heretical Writer D. J. T. as Austin would call him if alive for he maketh every one that thinketh not all mankind except Christ to be born in original sinne so as the flesh of Christ and of other men should be of equal purity to be Detectandus Haereticus Lib. 5. contra Julian cap 9. gloryeth in this Vnum Necessar cap. 6. Sect. 6. Concerning the Dispute between the Papists which could never be ended upon their accounts that he Alexander-like hath cut in pieces this Gordian-knot Therefore he affirmeth not only her but all her family and why not all mankind were free from it but it is a Thrasonical boast and withall full of falshood for hereby original sin is wholly removed made to be a meer Non ens The Subject of the Question is quite taken away so that by his principles all the Disputations about original sin will be de non ente as he acknowledgeth in some sense a striving about a shadow yea and which is the most horrible every one shall now be born as pure as Christ in respect of his humane nature There is no difference between Christ and all the rest of mankind as in respect of their natural immunity from sinne His Clemens Alexandrinus would have informed him better when he saith Stromatum lib. 1 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Word that is Christ is only without sinne for in all men it is imbred to sinne whatsoever Clemens at other times may deliver about this original sinne here he acknowledgeth it and indeed it is easie out of the Ancients to bring contrary passages that seem to savour opposite Doctrines But concerning this poisonous opinion we shall have constant occasion to treat of As for the Franciscans and other Popish Writers that plead for the Virgin Mary's purity they can bring no Scripture but urge some plausible reasons as thinking thereby to give her the more honour especially revelations and miracles are strongly urged in this point But the Scripture is to be our Rule in this matter and there we see none exempted Besides the Virgin Mary cals Christ her Saviour which implieth necessarily that she had sinne yea she had also actual sins as might be proved although the Papists will not endure to hear of it Neither doth this make to the dishonour of Christ to be born of a mother that had sinne in her for seeing he is separated from it it is his greater glory that he alone is exempted And besides we see that the more Christ was debased and made low but without sinne hereby is he the more honoured as a Mediator Hence it was that he was born of one that was very poor and mean not of a rich and great person as appeareth by the Sacrifice offered of two pigeons for her purification he was also born in a stable laid in a manger all which demonstrate the lowliness of Christs humane being Hence the Evangelist Matthew in recording the Genealogy of Christ doth name Thamar and Bathsheba whose uncleanness was famous and yet hereby there is no dishonour to Christ because the lower he humbled himself for our sake the greater is his love demonstrated and so his glory of a Saviour more exalted This opinion of honouring Christ in
original imputed sinne or of that inherent corruption which we have from our birth and both do admit of great aggravations It is true some Orthodox Writers doe deny the imputation of Adam's actual disobedience unto us as Josua Placeus who bringeth many Arguments Thes Salm. Dis de statu hominis lapsi ante gratiam but my work is not to answer them I suppose it for granted as a necessary truth Concerning Adam's sinne which is thus ours by imputation Bellarmine maketh the Question An sit gravissimum Whether it was the greatest of all sinnes And he concludeth following the Schoolmen that absolutely it is not only respectively Secundum quid in some considerations which he mentioneth Bonaventure saith It is the greatest sinne extensive not intensive But we are to judge of the hainousness of sinne as we see God doth who esteemeth of sinne without any errour Now it is certain there was never any sinne that God punisheth as he doth this The sinne indeed against the holy Ghost in respect of the object matter of it and the inseparable concomitant of unpardonablenesse is greater as to a particular person but this being the sinne of the common nature of mankind doth bring all under the curse of God So that we may on the contrary to Bellarmine say That it is absolutely the highest sinne against God but in some respects it is not I shall be brief in aggravating of that not at all touching upon the other Question which hath more curiosity in it Whether Adam's sinne or Eve's was the greatest then edification Because our proper work is to speak of original inherent sinne yet it is good to affect our souls with the great guilt thereof for some have been ready to expostulate with God Why for such a small sinne as they call it no more then eating the forbidden fruit so many millions of persons even all the posterity of mankind should thereby be made children of wrath and obnoxious to eternal damnation Doth not the Pelagian opinion that holdeth it hurteth none but Adam himself and his posterity onely if they willingly imitate him agree more with the goodnesse of God But if we do seriously consider how much evil was in this one sinne which Tertullian maketh to be a breach of the whole Law of God we will then humble our selves and acknowledge the just hand of God For First This is hainously to be aggravated from the internal qualification of the subject Adam who did thus offend was made upright created in the Image of God In his understanding he had a large measure of light and knowledge For though the Socinians would have him a meer I deot and innocent yet it may easily be evidenced to the contrary The Image of God consisteth in the perfection of the mind as well as in holiness of the other parts of the soul Neither did Elâ—phaz in his discourse with Job apprehend such ignorance in Adam when he saith Art thou the first man was born Wast thou made before the hils Dost thou restrain wisdom to thy self Job 15. 7 8. implying that the first man was made full of knowledge If then Adam had such pure light in his mind this made his sinne the greater yea because of this light some have proceeded so far as to make Adam's sinne the sinne against the holy Ghost but I shall not affirm that Certainly in that Adam had so great knowledge this made his offence the more evil hence because there was no ignorance in his mind nor no passions in the sensitive part at that time to disturb him his sinne was meerly and totally voluntary and the more the will is in a sinne the greater it is Hence Rom. 5. It is called expresly disobedience By one mans disobedience Yea learned men say That this was the proper specifical sinne of Adam eveâ— disobedience For although disobedience be in a large sense in every sinne yet this sinne of Adams was specifically disobedience for God gave him a positive command meerly that thereby Adam should testifie his obedience to him The thing in it self was not intrinsecally evil to eat of the forbidden fruit it was sinfull only because it was forbidden and by this God would have Adam demonstrate his homage to him but in offending he became guilty in a particular way of disobedience Secondly If you consider Adam in his external condition His fin is very great God placed him in Paradise put him into a most happy condition gave him the whole world for his portion Every thing was made for his use and delight now how intolerable was Adams ingratitude for so small a matter to rebell against God Therefore the smalness of the matter of the sinne doth not diminish but aggravate he might the more easily have refused the temptation so that this unthankfulness to God must highly provoke him Thirdly The sinne was an aggregate sinne It had many grievous sins ingredient into it It was a Beelzebub sin a big-bellied sinne full of many sins in the womb of it his sinne was not alone in the external eating of the forbidden fruit but in the internal causes that made him do so There was unbelief which was the foundation of all the other sinfulness he believeth the Devil rather then God There was pride and ambition He desired to be like God There was apostasie from God and communion with him There was the love of the creature more than of God and thereby there was the hatred of God Thus it was unum malum in quo omnia mala as God is unumbonum in quo omnia bona Lastly Not to insist on this because formerly spoken to There was the unspeakable hurt and damage which hereby he brought to his posterity Not to mention the curse upon the ground and every creature The damning of all his posterity in soul and body it the grace of God did not interpose It cannot be rationally conceived but that Adam knew he was a publique person that he was acquainted upon what terms he stood in reference to his posterity That the threatning did belong to all his as well as himself if he did eat of the forbidden fruit Now for Adam to be a murderer of so many souls and bodies to be the cause of temporal spiritual and eternal death to all mankind who can acknowledge but that this sinne is out of measure sinfull ¶ 2. The Aggravation of Original Sinne inherent in us OUr next work is to consider the aggravation of original sinne inherent in us and this is our duty to do that so being sensible of our own contagion we may not flatter our selves in the power of our free-will but fly alone to Christ who is a Phisitian and Saviour even to Infants as well as grown men and the rather we are to be serious and diligent in this because of all those prophane opinions which do either wholly deny it or in a great measure extenuate it Some Papists make it less then a venial sinne and many
all those voluminous disputations of this state of pure nature is wholly De non ente there being not the least title in Scripture to establish any such opinion upon it It is true the Author mentioned is often affirming and dictating Magisterially concerning such an estate but never yet hath any Scripture-proof been brought for it some philosophical arguments happily may be Now being this is the foundation upon which many of the Adversaries to original sinne do build I shall in its time and order God assisting raze up this foundation and lay the Axe against the root of the Tree proving that it is both against Scripture and solid reason Lastly That there is such an inclination naturally in a man to sinne and repugnant to what is good a mans own experience may teach him were there no Bible no Orthodox Teachers a mans own heart may convince him of such a perversnesse within him though by natural light he could never discover the spring of it Doth not Paul even while regenerated complain of this Law of sinne within him Rom. 7. Nazianzen maketh sad complaining verses about this constitution of his soul Carmen quartum pag. 69. The conflict with the flesh and spirit which in a most excellent and affectionate manner he doth there bewail And certainly if the Adversaries to this Doctrine find not such a pronenesse in them it is because they are blinded they are benummed within as the Pelagians of old bragged That a man might be without passions and sinfull commotions That they did not pati they felt none of these things but herein they were either horrible hypocrites or stupidly hardened SECT IV. Of the Causes or Fountain of the vehement proneness and inclination to sinne that is in all men by nature and of the false Causes assigned by the Adversaries THus you see this Text hath sufficiently informed us of this Truth That there is in all men by nature a vehement proneness and inclination to sinne To which we have also added many other Demonstrations of this Truth not so much that it is doubtfull and needeth to be proved For the Adversaries do confess it as that thereby we might the more deeply humble our selves under the consideration of it If then there be such constant muddy streames we are to enquire what is the fountain of them And although this Text and many others of the like nature do evidently proclaim it to be that corrupt and unclean heart of a man within that he hath hereditarily and by natural propagation yet because the Adversaries to original sinne will by no meanes assent to this let us consider what are the causes they assign and herein we shall find they do not so much speak falshood as blasphemy against God But before we come to the particular causes specified by them let us in the general consider How many wayes this propensity in mankind may be imagined to proceed for some gave one head or spring to it Others another so that there is not more dispute in Philosophy about the cause of the ebbing and flowing of the sea or about the rise and spring of Nilus that famous river in Egypt then there is about the original of this impetuousness in man to sinne The effect is acknowledged by all but the dispute is about the cause thereof In the first place therefore Some do assign this inclination to sinne to the souls operations before the body was made For they conceit that the soul had a being before the body and according to the evil or good they had they were adjudged to proportionable bodies and thereby it cometh to pass that some have better tempered bodies then others according to that Rule gaudeant bâ—â—è nati They are to rejoyce that have good and kindly constitutions This was the opinion of the Platonists and Origen who was justly called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for the monstrous opinions he brought into the Church did proâ—â—â— absurd fancy Yea it is thought that this opinion was amongst the Jewes as seemeth to be implyed in that Question propounded by the Disciples to our Saviour concerning the man born blind Did this man sinne or his parents Joh. 9. 2. as also a passage in the Apocryphal Writer inclineth thereunto Wiâ—â— 8. 20. And being good I came into a body undifiled which Grotius understands of the pre-existency of the soul adding that Synesius though made Bishop yet did not retract this errour But this being so gross a figment it 〈◊〉 not any confutation and the rather because it is a wonder that no such pre-existent soules should behave themselves well for which they should have assigned to them undefiled and immaculate bodies for we believe not the 〈◊〉 mentioned Author in that boast he there maketh A second opinion of the Manichees who feigned two principles of good and evil and this evil principle they made the cause of man whereupon they condemned marriage as unlawfull and made man to be opus Diaboli the work of the Devil This Manicheism the Pelagians have alwayes endeavoured to fasten upon such as do affirme original sinne but it is done maliciously and ignorantly for we say this evil came not into man at first by nature but by the free and voluntary consent of Adam and since man is fallen we do not say sinne is his nature or his substance but that it is a vitious quality adhering thereunto as leprosie to the body 3. There are others who may be reduced to the Manichees and they were Heretiques called Materiaris who feigned an eternall matter that was so evil that the wisdome and power of God could not subdue it but that this malignancy did adhere to it whether God will or no. And this they make the cause of that vicious inclination in man It is say they from the evil matter man is made off which is inseperable from it but this doth grosly contradict the History of the Creation as recorded by Moses Wherein it is said God made every thing exceeding good Gen. 1. 31. Fourthly The Pelagian many Papists and the late Socinian Writers all these attribute it to mans Creation and constitution at first at least in part for they tell us of a state of pure naturals that man hath whereby the appetite doth rebell against the mind for man confisting of a soul and a body hereby say they do necessarily arise contrary inclinations The soul enclineth one way and the body another way and this conflict they are not afraid to say was in Adam himself and therefore God gave him grace as a supernatural and superadded ornament yea and as a remedy to keep the inferior appetite in its order now man being fallen he hath lost those superadditionals but continueth in his meer naturals and these being weak and imperfect are easily carried out to sinne wanting the grace of God to elevate them This is the mystery of their iniquity This is the fountain of all their poisonous impieties and therefore God assisting is
posse mori is known by all It is not then an absolute but a conditional immortality we speak of ¶ 3. Propos 3. ALthough we say that God made man immortal yet we grant that his body being made of the dust of the earth and compounded of contrary element it had therefore a remote power of death It was mortal in a remote sense only God making him in such an eminent manner and for so glorious an end there was no proxim and immediate disposition to death God indeed gave Adam his name whereas Adam imposed a name upon all other creatures but not himself and that from the originals he was made of to teach him humility even in that excellent estate yet he was not in an immediate disposition to death When Adam had transgressed Gods Law though he did not actually die upon it yet then he was put into a mortal state having the prepared causes of death within him but it was not so while he stood in the state of integrity then it was an immortal state now it is a mortal one I say state because even now though Adam hath brought sinne and death upon us yet in respect of the soul a man may be said to be immortal but then there was immortality in respect of soul and body the state he was created in did require it So that although death be the King of terrors yet indeed original sinne which is the cause of it should be more terrible unto us Now man by sinne is fallen the beasts could they speak would say Man is become like one of us yea worse for he carrieth about with him a sinfull soul and a mortal body ¶ 4. Distinctions about Mortality and that in several respects Adam may be said to be created mortal and immortal THe fourth Proposition is That from the former premisses it may be deducted that in several respects Adam may be said to be created mortal and immortal yet if we would speak absolutely to the question when demanding how Adam was created we must return Immortall Some indeed because mans mortalilty and immortality depended wholy upon his will as he did will to sinne or not to sinne so they have said he was neither made mortal or immortal but capable of either but that is not to speak consonantly to that excellency of state which Adam was created in for as Adam was created righteous not indifferent as the Socinians say neither good or bad but capacious of either qualification so he was also made immortal not in a neutral or middle state between mortal and immortal so that he had inchoate immortality upon his creation but not consummate or confirmed without respect to perseverance in his obedience for the state of integrity was as it were the beginning of that future state of glory Again Adam might be called mortal in respect of the orginals of his body being taken out of the dust of the earth but that was only in a remote power so God did so adorne him with excellent qualifications in soul and body that the remote power could never be brought into a proxime and immediate disposition much less into an actual death for a thin◠may be said to be mortal 1. In respect of the matter and thus indeed Adams body in a remote sence was corruptible 2. In respect of the forme Thus Philosophers say sublunary things are corruptible because the matter of them hath respect to divers formes whereas they call the heavens incorruptible because the matter is sufficiently actuated by one forme and hath no inclination to another and thus Adam might truly be said to be immortal for it was very congruous that a body should be united to the soul that was sutable to it for that being the form of a man and having an inclination or appetite to the body if man had been made mortal at first the natural appetite would in a great measure have been frustrated it being for a little season only united to the body and perpetually ever afterwards seperated from it Surely as an Artificer doth not use to put a precious Diamond or Pearl into a leaden Ring so neither would God at first joyn such a corruptible body to so glorious and an immortal soul 3. A thing may be said to be mortal in respect of efficiency and thus it is plain Adam was not made mortal for he might through the grace of God assisting have procured immortality to himself that threatening to Adam In the day he should eat of that forbidden fruit he should die the death Gen. 2 17. doth plainly demonstrate that had he not transgressed Gods command he should never have died 4. A thing may be said to be mortal in respect of its end Thus all the beasts of the field whatsoever Puccius thought are mortal because their end was for man to serve him so that it is a wild position to affirm as he doth that there shall be a resurrection of beasts as well as of men for they were made both in respect of matter form and end altogether mortal whereas Adam was made after the Image of God to have communion and fellowship with God and that for ever which could not be without immortality ¶ 5. Prop. 5. THe true causes of death are only revealed in Gods Word All Philosophers and Physitians they searched no further then into the proxim immediate causes of death which are either external or internal they looked no further and knew of no other thing but now by the Word of God we Christians come to know that there are three principal causes of death so that had not they been those intermedious and proxime causes of death had never been The first cause is only by occasion and temptation and that was the Devil he tempted our first parents and thereby was an occasion to let death into the world for this cause the Devil is called Joh. 8. 44. a murderer from the beginning it doth not so much relate to Cain as to Adams transgression yet the Scripture Rom. 5. doth not attribute death to the Devil but to one mans disobedience because Adams will was not forced by Satan he had power to have resisted his temptations only the Devil was the tempting cause The second and most proper cause of death was Adams disobedience so that death is a punishment of that sinne not a natural consequent of mans constitution The History of Adam as related by Moses doth evidently confirme this that there was no footstep of death till he transgressed Gods Law and upon that it was most just that he who had deprived himself of Gods Image which is the life of the soul should also be deprived of his soul which is the life of the body that as when he rebelled against God he presently felt an internal rebellion by lusts within and an external disobedience of all creatures whom he did rule over before by a pacifical dominion so also it was just that he who had deprived himself
in this matter Annotat in cap. 5. of the Romans for in his paraphrase on the 12 Verse he makes death and mortality to come upon all men by Adam's disobedience because all that were born after were sinners that is born after the likeness and image of Adam And again on Verse 14 death came on the world because all men are Adam 's posterity and begotten after the image and similitude of a sinful parent By this we see the cause of death is put upon that image and likeness we are now born in to our sinful parent which is nothing els but our original corruption Let not this consideration of our sinful soules and mortal bodies pass away before it hath wrought some affectionate influence upon our soules Cogita temcrtuum brevi moriturum Every pain every â—ch is a memento to esse hominem That is an effectual expression of Job cap. 17. 14. I said to corruption thou art my father and to the worm thou art my mother and sister You see your alliance and kindred though never so great it is your brother-worm your sister-worm Job giveth the wormes this title because his body was shortly to be consumed by them and thereby a most intimate conjunction with them would follow Post Genesim sequitur Exodui was an elegant allusion of one of the Ancients yea the life that we do live is so full of miseries that Solomon accounteth it better not to have been born and the Heathen said Quem Deus amat moritur juvenis which should humble us under the cause of this sinne SECT VI. Q. Whether Death may not be attributed to mans constitution considered in his meer naturalls I Proceed to the second and last Question which is May not death be attributed to mans constitution considered in his meer naturals Is there not a middle state to be conceived between a state of grace and sinne viz. a state of pure naturals by which death would have come upon mankind though there had been no sinne at all This indeed is the sigment of some Popish Writers who make Adam upon his transgression to be deprived of his supernaturals and so cast into his naturals although generally with the Papists this state of pure naturals is but in the imagination only they dispute of such things as possible but de facto they say man was created in holiness and after his fall he was plunged into original sinne Now the Socinians they do peremptorily dispute for this condition of meer naturals de facto that Adam was created a meer man without either sinne or holiness but in a middle neutral way being capable of either as his free will should determine him This state of meer nature is likewise a very pleasing Doctrine to the late Writer so oftern mentioned it helpeth him in many difficulties Death passed upon all men that is the generality of mankind all that lived in their sinne The others that died before died in their nature not in their sinne neither Adam's nor their own save only that Adam brought it upon them or rather lest it to them himself being disrobed of all that which could hinder it Thus he Answer to a Letter pag. 49. This is consonant to those who say as Bellarmine and others that man fallen and man standing differ as a cloathed and and naked man Adam was cloathed with grace and other supernatural endowments but when sinning he was divested of all these and so left naked in his meer natural Thus they hold this state of meer naturals to be a state of negation not privation God taking from man not that which was a connatural perfection to him but what was meerly gratuitous The late Writer useth this comperison of Moses his face shining and then afterwards the withdrawing of this lustre Now as Moses his face had the natural perfection of a face though the glorious superadditaments were removed thus it is with man though fallen he hath his meer naturals still and so is not in a death of sinne or necessity of transgressing the Law of God but though without the aid of supernaturals he cannot obtain the kingome of heaven yet by these pure naturals he is free in his birth from any sinful pollution saith the known Adversary to this truth Thus he that calleth original sinne a meer non ens he layeth the foundation of his Discourse upon a meer non entity Now if you ask what cometh to man by these meer naturals he will answer death Yea that which is remarkable is the long Catalogue of many sad imperfections containing three or four Pages that is brought in by him Vnum Necessar cap. 6. Sect. 7. a great part whereof he saith is our natural impotency and the other brought in by our own folly As for that which is our natural impotency man being thereby in body and soul so imperfect it is he saith as if a man should describe the condition of a Mole or a Bat concerning whose imperfections no other cause is to be enquired of but the Will of God who giveth his gifts as he pleaseth and is unjust to no man by giving or not giving any certain proportion of good things To the same purpose he speaketh also in another place further explicat pag. 475. Adam's sinne left us in pure naturals disrobed of such aides extraordinary as Adam had But certainly there are few Readers who shall consider what is by him made to be the natural impotency of man in soul and body but must conclude he is most injurious to the goodness wisdomè and justice of God in making man of such miserable pure naturals yea that it is a position worse then Manicheisme for the Manichees seeing such evils upon mankind attributed them to some evil principle but this man layeth all upon the good and most holy God It is Gods will alone not mans inherent corruption that exposeth him to so many unspeakable imperfections It is well observed by Jansenius who hath one Book only de statu purae nature opposing the Jesuites and old Schoolmen in their sigment upon a state of meer naturals that this opinion was brought into the Church of God out of Aristotle and that it is the principles of his Philosophy which have thus obscured the true Doctrine of original sinne I shall breifly lay down some Arguments against any such supposed condition of meer nature from whence they say we have ignorance in the mind rebellion against the Spirit and also death it self but without sinne And Arg. 1. The first is grounded upon a rule in reason That every subject capable of two immediate contraries must necessarily have one or the other A man must either be sick or well either alive or dead there is no middle estate between them thus it is with man he must either be holy or sinful he must either be in a state of grace or a state of iniquity The Scripture giveth not the least hint of any such pure naturals Indeed a man may in
its nature If you look upon a Cain a Judas though his outside be so detestable yet his inwards are much more abominable so that a mans heart is like Peters great sheet which he saw in a vision Acts 11. 6. which was full of four-footed beasts and wild beasts and creeping things all unclean such a receptacle is mans soul of all impiety A man cannot tell what is in the sea what monsters are in the bottom of it by looking upon the superficies of the water which covers it so neither canst thou tell all that horrid deformity and wretchedness which is in thy heart by beholding thine outward impieties Oh then that you would turn your eyes inward as it were an introversion is necessary Then you will say O Lord before I knew the Nature of original sinne I was not perswaded of my vileness of my foulness Oh now I see that I am beyond all expression sinfull now I see every day I am more and more abominable O Lord formerly I thought all my sinne was in some words in some actions or in some vile thoughts but now I see this was the least part of all that evil that was in me Now I am amazed astonished to see what a sea of corruption is within me now I can never go to the bottom now I find something like hell within me sparks of lust that are unquenchable Fourthly Where there is not a true knowledge of this native corruption there our Humiliation and Repentance can never be deep enough for it 's not enough to be humbled for our actual sinnes unless also we go to the cause and root of all When a godly man would repent of his lusts of his unbelief or any other actual transgression he stayeth not in the confession of and bewailing those particular sins but he goeth to the polluted fountain to the bitter spring from whence those bitter streams flow and commonly this is a difference between an Ahabs Humiliation and a Davids Ahab humbleth himself only for his actual impieties and that because of judgments threatned and impending over him but David even when he heareth God had forgiven his iniquity yet hath great humiliation for his sinnes and Psal 51. thinketh it not enough to bewail his adultery and murder but to confess That in iniquity he was conceived his actual sinnes carried him to the original Thus Paul also Rom. 7 when he miserably complaineth of that impotency in him to do good that he could never do any good as perfectly fully purely and cheerfully as he ought to do presently he goeth to the cause of all this deordination the Law of sinne within him that original sinne which was like a Law within him commanding him to think to desire to do sinfully and obeyed it in all though against his will insomuch that he saith He was carnal and sold under sinne This the Apostle doth complain of as the heaviest burden of all So that an unregenerate man may by the light of nature bewail and complain of his actual impieties he may cry out Oh wretched man that I am for being such a beast such a devil so exorbitant and excessive but whether he can do this for the body of sinne within him as Paul did that may justly be questioned And therefore you see then the troubles and workings of conscience in some men to miscarry greatly They seem to be in pain and travails of soul but all cometh to nothing Oh how many in times of danger and under fear of death do sadly cry out of such sins they have committed Oh the promises and resolutions they make if ever God give them recovery again But all this passeth away even as mans life it self like a vapour like a tale that is told And one cause of the rottenness and defect of this humiliation is because it did not go to the bottom of the soare there was the inward and deep corruption of original sin that such never took any notice of and so in all his sorrow did omit that which is the most aggravating cause of all grief and trembling O Lord I have not only done this wicked thing but I had an heart an inclination of soul to carry me to it and therefore actual sinnes though ten thousands of them they pass away the guilt only remaining but this original pravity continueth in the pollution of it Fifthly Ignorance of original sinne makes us also mistake in the crucifying and mortifying of sinne No man can truly and spiritually leave a sinne unless he doth conquer it and subdue it in some measure in the original and root of it and this is a sure difference between a regenerate and unregenerate man about leaving or forsaking of sinne They both may give over their wonted actual impieties They both may have escaped the pollution of the world and that through the knowledge of the Gospel 2 Pet. 2. 20. but the one leaveth only the acts of sinne the other mortifieth it gradually though not totally in the cause and inclination of the soul Thus Paul Rom. 7. though he complain of those actual stirrings and impetuous motions of sinne yet withall he can truly say I delight in the Law of God in the inner man Now no hypocrite or unregenerate man can say so Though he be outwardly washed yet he hath a swinish nature still his inward parts are as loathsom as noisom as ever before Though there be a fair skinne drawn over the wound yet in the bottom there is as much corruption and putrefaction as ever before Samson's hair is only cut it 's not plucked up by the root so that it 's not enough to have given over thy former profaneness Thou thankest God thou art not the man once thou wert Oh but consider whether sinne in the root of it as well as in the branches of it doth wither and die daily A disease is not cured till the cause of it be in some measure at least removed As long as originall sinne is not in some degree mortified thy old sins or some other will break out as violently as ever here is the fountain and root of all within thee Sixthly He that is ignorant of the nature and extent of this natural defilement he must needs grosly mistake about the nature of conversion and be wholly ignorant of what regeneration is As you see in Nicodemus John 3. 6. though a master in Israel yet grosly mistaking about a new-birth and what was the reason of it That appeareth by our Saviours argument to prove the necessity of it Whatsoever is born of the flesh is flesh implying by this That if Nicodemus had known that by natural generation he was nothing but flesh that is sinne and evil his soul his mind his conscience all was flesh in this sense as well as his body then he would quickly have discerned the necessity of being born again then he would not have continued a day an hour a moment in such a dangerous condition And what
but busie and acting even in the godly and therefore we may truly say Paul Rom. 7. complained of the reliques of it It is our duty we heard from this example of David to humble our selves for the original sinne that is in us as long as we live Hence whatsoever Austin said at other times yet in one place he spake most truly in this point Propter vitium quantum libet praeferimus esse nobis necessarium dicere dimitte nobis debita nostra cum jam omnia in Baptismo dicta facta cogitate dimissa sint Epist 29 Because of original sinne although we have never so much profited yet we are to pray that God would forgive us our sins This truth is the more diligently to be pressed upon us by how much the more doctrinal opinions have risen up against it for those that deny any such thing they must needs make confessions of it to be a lie and a meer mockery And as for the Papist though most of them hold original sinne to be truly a sinne yet they say Baptism is instituted for the remission of that as repentance is for actual sins So that it should seem by their Doctrine Confession and godly sorrow are required only to take away actual sinne but as for original Baptism in the very opere operato doth remove it for no Infant can put an obex to hinder the effect of that Sacrament Hence it is that Almain a rational Schoolman Opus de peccato orig pag. 72. maketh this Objection Suppose an adultus a man grown up be to baptized and at that very time he puts some obex by a gross sinne to hinder the fruit of Baptism How then can that man saith he ever have his original sin pardoned for there is not a second Baptism and repentance is only to take away actual To this he answers That such a man is not indeed either to have attrition or contrition or confession of original sinne for as it was not contracted by our free-will so it doth not require such a nolition whereby I would not have been born in it Therefore such a man in his opinion is to repent of that sinne which was the obex and then when that is repented of original sinne is forgiven by the very receiving of Baptism I bring this instance to shew That according to the Popish Doctrine which yet holds original sinne yet there is to be no sorrow no contrition or confession yea that we are not to have a nolition of it because it was not committed by our free-will Bellarmine likewise lib. 1. de Sacramento Baptismi cap. 9 saith Originale paccatum non est materia poenitentiae nemo enim rectè poenitentiam agit ejus peccati quod ipse non commisit quod in ejus potestate non fuit Although Onuphrius De poenitentia Disp 3. Sect. 1. Quaest 5. brings out of Aquinas that distinction I mentioned before viz. of Repentance taken strictly and largely and in this later he joyneth with Aquinas holding it necessary for original sinne opposing Medina who affirmed That Repentance taken any way though never so largely was not necessary for original sinne But our Doctrine out of this Text will endure as gold and precious stone when that errour will be Conteâ—â—ed as hay and stubble For as actual sinne so neither original sinne will be forgiven to any persons grown up unless they do acknowledge and with true 〈◊〉 of heart bewail it so that many commands which are to confes 〈…〉 to bewail it and to abhorre our selves because of it as also to pray eaâ—â—â—ly and fervently for pardon must extend to original sinne as well as actual neither is Baptism a Seal of the pardon of original sinne onely but of all 〈◊〉 sinns to grown persons which shall by faith make an holy improvement of that Ordinance only it is true as was hinted before there is some difference in our godly sorrow for original sinne and for actual SECT IX The Difference between Godly Sorrow for Original Sinne and Actual FIrst Repentance or change of our minds and wils is not strictly and properly for original sinne because that was not actually committed by us neither was it ever in our own single persons to have prevented it yet in respect of sorrow detestation and self-abomination so we are as much if not more to bewail our selves than for actual sin Secondly Again In actual sins there is this necessity in our repentance That we do so no more he only truly repents that doth not commit those gross sins again at least not habitually or customarily as our Saviour said to one Go thy way and sin no more but this will not hold in original sinne we cannot say we will have it no more within us we cannot say this Jebusite shall abide no longer within our borders for we shall alwayes carry about with us this body of sinne And therefore in the third place Original sinne and actual differ exceedingly in this That actual sinne when pardoned both the sinne itself and it's guilt is removed but in original sinne though the guilt be removed in the godly neither is it imputable to them yet the sinne it self in some measure and power remaineth with us as is more largely to be shewed in time Onely you see some difference there is in our sorrow and humiliation between original and actual yet not such but that in respect of deep confession and humble acknowledgement both are alike so that we cannot have any pardon of either without such contrite hearts as the Scripture speaks of and it is good to consider the grounds why we ought to be greatly debased and to lay our selves so low under this consideration SECT X. Reasons why we must be humbled for Original Sinne. FIrst Because original sinne is in some sense all sinne It is the universal contagion of all the parts of the soul it hath Maculam universalem all actual sins they have only their particular spot or stain and do more immediately pollute that power or faculty of the soul it is immediately subjected in as blindness of mind doth properly infect the understanding not the will or affections so contumacy in the will doth not but by consent or sympathy as it were infect the mind but original sinne doth pollute all over it 's like a Gangrene over the whole body whereas actual sinnes are like so many several sores Thus original sinne is universal subjectively there being no part of a man no not his mind or his conscience but it is all over defiled whereas no actual sinne hath such a general defilement with it Oh then what cause is here why our hearts should bitterly mourn and even roar out for this sinne makes thy soul all over like a Blackmoor Thou mayest behold thy self in the glass of Gods word and not see one fair spot it is a leprosie upon the whole soul so that it leaveth nothing good in thee It 's true the substance and faculties of
glorifie and honour God all his whole work and life is now to dishonour him and reproach his holy Name Herein then lieth the misery of this losse of the Image of God that we are fallen from our end we are of our selves salt that hath lost its favourinesse we are fit for nothing but eternal torments SECT III. The Harmony and Subordination in Mans Nature dissolved by the loss of Gods Image IN the second place This losse is to be aggravated because of the Nature of it which is the deordination and dissolution of all that Harmony and Subordination which was in mans nature That admirable and composed order which was in the whole man is now wholly broken so that the mind and will is against God and the affections and passions against them A three-fold Subordination there was in man The first of the intellectual and rational part unto God The mind clearly knowing him and the will readily submitting unto him The second was A regular Subordination of all the passions and affections unto the mind so that there did not from the sensible part arise any thing that was unbeseeming and contrary to the rational Hence it was that the Scripture taketh notice of Adam and Eve in their privitive Condition that though naked yet they were not ashamed There being a full purity and simplicity in their natures whereby nothing could arise to disturb all those superiour operations At sin expresseth it well Even saith he as Paradise the place wherein Adam was created had neither heat or cold but an excellent temperament excluding the hurtfull excess of either so also the soul of Adam was without any excessive passion or inordinate motion but all things did sweetly and amicably concur in obedience to the mind The third and last Subordination was of the body both to the rationall and sensitive principles There was a preparednesse in the body of Adam as there was in Christ whereby he did readily do the Will of God and sound the body not obstructing or weighing of it down Now let us consider this three-fold cord which did bind Adam's whole man unto that which is good which was easily broken and then as when the flood-gates are open the streams of water violently rush forth hurrying all away Thus it is with mankind This order being dissolved the whole heart of man is as unruly as the Sea and whereas that hath its natural bounds Hitherto it shall go and no further The heart of man is boundlesse and hath no stops of it self only the infinite God of Heaven he ruleth and ordereth it as he pleaseth Consider the first breach and mourn under that Is it nothing to have the mind of man which hath as many thoughts almost as there are sands upon the Sea shore and yet not to have one of these rise in the soul with subordination to God What a sad bondage is this that our thoughts are no more under our command than the flying birds in the air Do not either sinfull thoughts or if good come in so unseasonably upon thee that they carry away thy soul prisoner Oh this losse of the obedience of the mind to Gods Law in all the thoughts thereof ought to be no mean matter of debasement Not to find one good thought of all those Iliades Chiliades and Myriades of thoughts which thou hast but to have rebellion in them against God What sad impression should it make on thee In the will also those motion and incompleat velleities yea acts of consent in the will which arise in the soul as so many swarms of flies in the air Are not these also so many armies of lusts against God whereas in the state of integrity there would not have risen the least distemper The second breach Is not that also as terrible and powerfull For are not all our affections and passions like so many dogs to Action like so many Locusts and Caterpillers in Egypt like so many flies and hornets till by grace they are crucified What man is there in whom if God should let any one passion or affection have dominion over him that it would not immediately destroy him So that the power of original corruption is more manifested in the affections and passions than any subject else Lastly The disorder which is in the body in respect of its instrumental serviceablenesse unto God can never be enough lamented Do not pains and diseases in the body much indispose in holy things Do not dulnesse drousinesse and wearinesse hinder a man so that when he would religiously serve the Lord this body will not let him Now all this evil and misery is come upon us because we have lost the Image of God As God in nature doth not suffer any vocuum or redundans so neither did he in respect of the frame of the soul at the first There was nothing defective and nothing excessive SECT IV. The Properties of this Losse THirdly This losse by original corruption of Gods Image is exceeding great in the properties of it For 1. It is a spiritual losse principally and chiefly The loss of Gods favour of all holiness is wholly spiritual and did tend to make a man spiritually happy So that if you should compare all the temporal losses that ever have been in the world with this first and spiritual one it would be but as the mole-hill to an high mountain If then our eyes were opened if we were able rightly to judge or losses for this we should mourn more than for any evil that ever befell us or others 〈◊〉 messengers that came with such sad tidings one upon another is nothing to this message that we bring thee But who will believe this report 2. As it is a spiritual loss so it is an universal loss The whole world is in a lost state by losing this Image of God Every creature hath lost in this universal losse The earth hath lost its fruitfulness yea the whole Creation groaneth and is in bondage subject to vanity because of this Thus all the creatures they lose by it yea every thing in man loseth The mind its light the will its holiness the affections their order and the body its soundness and immortality If all the creatures were turned into tongues they would proclaim the loss of their primitive glory and beauty because of this sinne 3. It 's not only universal But it 's the cause of all the temporal losses that we have For death in which is comprehended all kind of evil came in upon the loss of this Image So that if we are sensible of any temporal loss How much more of this spiritual one which is the cause and root of all Therefore is the body pained therefore it dieth because this Image of God is lost therefore do we loose parents and children therefore is the whole world a valley of tears because of this losse If then any private losse be so bitter unto thee how much more ought this to be which putteth a
sting into all Lastly This loss is incurable as to any humane or angelicall power The image of God is so lost as that by our own power we are never able to recover it again Insomuch that when God doth repair it in us it 's a new Creation and a spiritual Resurrection we could not further it in the least degree Let the Use then be deeply to humble us to break our hearts far this and yet still to break them more and more When Tamar was defloured she went with ashes upon her head weeping and saying I whither shall I go Oh do thou much rather mourn and sigh and pray We oh wretched we Whither shall we go What shall we do Call to the Angels they cannot help you Cry to the mountains they cannot hide you from Gods wrath Shall Saul seek for his lost Asses the woman for her lost Groat Micha for his lost gods and wilt nor thou bitterly lament the loss of the true God and his Image in thee CHAP. XV. Of the Positive Part of Original Corruption SECT I. JOH 3. 6. That which is born of the flesh is flesh THe Privative Part of original corruption being largely discovered we come now to the Positive Part of it For although many of the Papists deny it laying the whole nature of it in a meer want of original righteousnes yet not only the Protestants generally but Aquinas and some who follow him do plead for this Positive Part in original corruption as well as the Privative and is therefore called Flesh as here in the Text and in other places lust Of which in its due time We are not then to conceive of this birth-sinne as a meer privation of the Image of God but as including also therewith a propensity and inclination to all evil To the discovery of this Truth we shall find this Text pitcht upon will be very subservient and herein we are to take notice That it is part of that famous Colloquy and Conference Christ had with Nicodemus a Master in Israel wherein several things in the general are briefly obserable As First The Mercy that is to the Church in having this Discourse upon Record For by Nicodemus his carnal cavillings we see the necessity of Regeneration our Saviour is the more powerfull in his asseverations Verily verily I say unto you c. that hereby every one may see that though he be great rich wise learned ingenious yet he must be born again Secondly We may take notice of our Saviours wisdom that pitcheth upon this Subject rather than another to treat upon for herein Nicodemus did grosly erre Nicodemus had learning enough knew the Law of God and the Scriptures but was wholly ignorant of Regeneration Thirdly We therefore see That the work of Regeneration is a mystery even to wise and learned men Twice or thrice saith that great Doctor How can this be What poor and childish Objections doth he make against it and all because this is a thing spiritually discerned Lastly The great cause why Nicodemus did not know what Regeneration was or see the necessary of it was Because of his blindnesse about original sinne Had he believed how carnal and sinfull every one was born he would presently have bewailed his condition and said O Lord it is true I am all over polluted I find nothing of thy Spirit in me I am all over flesh and do therefore need thy Spirit to regenerate and quicken me But this was the root of his destruction from hence did arise that gross miscarriage about a new-birth because was so sensless and unacquainted with the pollution he was born in So that the Text is an Argument to prove the Doctrine of Regeneration and the necessity of it which Nicodemus did so carnally cavil against For although our Saviour did so vehemently assert the truth of it in these expressions twice geminated Verily verily I say into thee c. Yet because Nicodemus still asketh How can this be therefore our Saviour discovereth to him the root and fundamental cause of the necessity of this birth and that not of Nicodemus only but of every man Therefore he speaks generally Vnlesse a man be borne again c. The fundamental cause therefore of the necessity of Regeneration is from that universal Proposition laid down in the Text That which is born of the flesh is flesh which is also illustrated by the contrary That which is born of the Spirit is spirit The strength of the Argument lieth in this Every thing resembleth that it is produced of from a Serpent there cometh a Serpent from a Toad a Toad so from a Dove a Dove a Sheep a Lamb There being therefore two contrary effective principles in us The flesh and the Spirit The flesh that produceth what is flesh the Spirit what is spirit In the first Proposition we have the emphatical expression of this defilement 1. In the Vniversality of the Subject of Predication That which is born of the flesh is flesh There 's none exempted great men noble men Even Kings and Emperors they are flesh of flesh 2. There is the Vniversality of the Subject of Inhesion All is flesh that comes of flesh so that not only the body but the soul also is flesh in this sense for by flesh here as in other places is meant The whole man consisting of soul and body as he is unclean and impure and this appeareth by the opposition which is the Spirit of God and the effects thereof Another emphatical expression is In using the abstract for the concrete is flesh that is fleshly is spirit that is spiritual We see then here a Proposition affirmed concerning all mankind born in a natural way which no humane Philosophy could ever inform us in yea to which it is wholly contrary viz. That we all by nature both in soul and body are nothing but flesh for flesh is here put for the vicious and sinfull quality that is in us and so the mind the intellictual and choisest parts of the soul are thus condemned as well as the more gross and sensitive as in time is to be shewed This is a clear Text to prove our universal contagion by sinne yet upon what weak and poor grounds would the Remonstrants oppose it They therefore by flesh understand Man simply as man flesh and blood begotten in a fleshly and bodily manner not as sinfull and corrupted as if our Saviours Argument had been as what is born of man is man so what is born of the Spirit is spiritual But this is very unsound For what Argument would this be to prove Regeneration Must a man be new born meerly because he is a man Certainly had Adam continued in the state of integrity there would have been procreation of children yet then there would not have been a necessity of Regeneration Our Saviour therefore is giving a reason why there must be a new birth and that is from the sinfull pollution every one is born in And
the Sacrament what endlesse controversies hath it begotten And therefore it was the King of Navarr's counsel to the Divines when the Lutherans and Calvinists were upon pacification about the Sacrament that they should not De modo ultra modum disputare Now although this be good counsel yet when heretical and erroneous opinions have invaded the Modus then it is our duty to maintain not onely the truth of a thing but the manner of it also What is a greater mystery then the Sonne of God having his being from the Father He that will touch this mystery with meer natural reason doth as if the Smith should handle his live-coals with his hands and not the Tongs saith Chrysostome yet because of the Socinians who say He is onely a made God in time and hath his Deity by donation We are forced not to be content onely to believe that he is the Sonne of God but also how viz. By eternal Generation So in the great Controversie with the Arminians about the conversion of man It is not enough to say we are converted by grace but are necessitated also to expresse the manner How not by a moral suasion or per modum sapientiae onely but by invincible efficacy and power also Thus the manner of Christs presence in the Sacrament was necessarily to be determined against the Lutherans Thus it is in our point in hand we might well enough sit down with this Truth That original sinne is communicated to every sonne of Adam and enquire no further as the primitive Church did till Austin's time in a great measure But when Heretiques will deny the true Doctrine because the manner is difficult to expresse or when men will deny the Creation of the soul then it 's our duty in a sober manner to search into the way how we partake of it Neither doth the fore mentioned Text contradict this For though we know not how the bones grow in the womb exactly and punctually yet we know in the general that they do by virtue of generation So although we know not particularly how the soul cometh to have its being in the body yet in the general that it is by Creation we have had Scripture light fully to convince us therein This then premised Let us proceed to clear the Doctrine of the Propagation of original sinne and that by several Propositions which will be as so many steps and degrees to the main Truth SECT VII Propositions to clear the Doctrine of the Propagation of Original Sinne by the Souls Creation FIrst We lay this for a foundation That God doth create the soul of every man a spiritual substance This Proposition must be the foundation-stone to build upon That God doth create the soul immediately you have heard several Texts attesting thereunto So that Bellarmine was too dissident when moved it seemed by Austin doth wave all Texts of Scripture for the creation of the soul and so proceedeth to other Arguments Perierius on 2 Chap. of Genes vers 7. giveth a better censure of Austin for having produced some Texts for the Creation of the soul he saith Conatur Augustinus sed frustra hos locos elidere I shall adde one more fit for that purpose also The Text is 1 Pet. 4. 19. Wherefore let them that suffer according to the will of God commit the keeping of their souls unto God as to a faithfull Creator Here the afflicted children of God are required as Christ did to commend their souls to God and the reason is Because he is a faithfull Creator of them So that Gods Creation of them is here made an engagement to God to keep them they being now sanctified and made holy Our souls then are created In the next place I say they are created Substances This is to obviate those that make the soul onely an accident or the crasis and temperament of the humours Galen as Cerda on Tertull de animâ alledgeth him in his second Book of prediction by the pulses hath this passage Hitherto I have doubted what should be the substance of the soul but by age and experience being made wiser I dare be bold to affirm it is no other thing then the temperament He was not made wiser but more absurd and foolish in this thing Yea there is one Dicaearchus much spoken of that said The soul was nothing it was but an opinion And the Mortalists they directly joyn with Galen's opinion Who would think that when we have the Scripture speaking so plainly about the soul that it is a spirit that it removeth when the body is killed that any should be delivered up to such licentious and abominable Doctrines Again I adde God createth it a spiritual substance This opposeth the Sadduces who denied any spirits It is plaine by Scripture that they are substances and spiritual ones because they subsist without the body Tertullian though he doth so acutely perstringe the Philosophers about the soul yet some of them were more sound then he Men saith he have thought about the soul either as Platonis honor Zenonis vigor Aristotelis tenor Epicuri stupor Heracliti maestor Empedoclis furor persuaserint It is true some of these thought the souls to be bodies and so doth Tertullian and happily he might have been excused by taking body largely for that which is not nihil in which sense he attributeth a body to God but that he saith the soul is not only a body but effigiated and shaped also yea that the souls differ in sex which is very irrational We may then conclude this with a saying of Numertus That if any souls are corporeal it is of those who say souls are corporeal A second Proposition is That though God doth create immediately the souls of all men spiritual substances yet they are not compleat and perfect substances as Angles are but the essential parts of men Upon this Proposition depends much weight of this Truth about the communicating of original sinne for we are apt to think God createth our souls like Angels perfect and having subsistency of themselves whereas they are created as parts of a man neither do they come from God any otherwise If God should create a soul to subsist of it self and not to be united to the body to constitute a man that soul would not be polluted But because every soul is created as an essential part of man and so hath its being Hence it is That it cometh into the world part of Adam and so obnoxious to that curse which he had deserved whatsoever then in its first being is part of man that is partaker of Adam's sinne and curse But the soul in its first instant of being is part of man therefore no wonder if it became polluted and cursed The example of that miraculous Resurrection of Lazarus and others may something clear this they were fully dead their souls and bodies union dissolved yet because their souls were not made perfect and pure without sinne and translated into Heaven but
gloried in humane literature 1 Cor. 1. 23. Though it is true God will by these weak things bring to nought the great admired things of the world Thus 2 Cor. 10. 5. The ministerial weapons of the Gospel are mighty through God to pull down strong holds and to cast down imaginations and every high thing that exalteth it self as Cannon-shot doth strong Castles By this of the Apostle you see the imaginations of men raise up strong and mighty opposition against the Word preached though the Word of God set home by his own power overcometh every thing that doth withstand it It is good then especially for men of quick parts and raised fancies to suspect themselves to fear lest from them arise all their destruction lest these be the bolts and barres that keep Christ out from possessing of their hearts SECT XIV It is more affected with Appearances then Realities TWelfthly The sinfulnesse of the Imagination is seen in that it is more affected with the appearance of things then the reality yea we do wholly satisfie our selves with things as they are in our fancy only and never attain to what is really good or happy Our comforts are but imaginary comforts our delights but imaginary delight yea our wealth our honours are but in imagination onely It 's usual with the Scripture to speak of the Nations of the world comparatively to God as a drop as a little dust How often is a mans life compared to a shadow Insomuch that neither our life and delight are worthy of the name All the things of this world are but in imagination What seemeth to be more substantial than wealth which is said to answer all things yet Solomon saith Why doest thou set thy eyes upon that which is not Prov. 23. 5. Wilt thou cause thine eyes to flie upon it is in the original It sheweth our ardent desires after that thing which is not Hence a wicked man in his greatest triumph and glory is compared but to a dream Job 20 8. He shall flee away as a dream and shall not be All the while we pursue riches honours all the while our hearts are hastening after the creatures we are but in a dream What is true riches What is true food What is true glory We misse and imbrace onely a shadow This is notably represented by the Prophet Isa 29. 8. The enemies of the Church that had in their hopes and expectations devoured Zion are compared to an hungry man that dreameth he eateth but when he is awakened his soul is empty Thus it is in all these worldly enjoyments this life is but a dream we are not awaked till we come within the borders of eternity Oh that this were truly considered how greatly would it mortifie that inordinacy in us to these sading things When the child rejoyceth in his bauble it is but his Imagination that is pleased his counters he taketh for money it is but his fancy that contents him and truly no more are all the great things of the world in respect of God and eternal things SECT XV. The sinfulness of the Imagination in respect of fear and the workings of Conscience 13. AS the Imagination makes us rejoyce and account our selves happy when there is no solid foundation for it so on the other side When the conscience is awakened for sinne many times the imagination doth work so terribly and filleth us with such sad apprehensions that we fear where no fear is we flee when none pursueth So that a disturbed imagination doth many times work with the troubles of conscience hindering both the working of our judgement and of faith representing God and Christ to us farre otherwise then they are Job complaineth Chap. 7. 14. that God did scare him with dreams Oh it is very sad and a grievous condition when God shall turn a mans fancy against his own self To have our conscience against us and our imaginations against us is an hell upon an earth and it is just with God to fill these Imaginations that once received nothing but lustfull and pleasant impressions with terrible and dreadfull ones and both these wayes draw from God both joyfull delights and terrible apprehensions That great change which we read made upon Nebuchadnezzar who from a great Monarch of the world is become like a beast living amongst them his haires being growne like Eagles feathers and his nailes like birds clawes was nothing else as many Expositours judge but a judgement brought upon his Reason and Imagination by a deep melancholly So that the terrours of a troubled Imagination especially when joyned with troubles of conscience doe drive from Christ oppose the comfortable way of the Gospel as well as proud and unclean motions do the pure and holy way thereof SECT XVI Of the Actings of the Imagination in Dreams IN the fourteenth place Herein the pollution of it doth manifest it self That when the senses and the rational part are bound up so that they cease from operation even then that is acting and most commonly in a sinfull manner by dreams Dreams are the proper work of the Imagination and Divines do make three sorts of them Natural Dreams which arise from natural causes and these commonly either have much sinfulness in them or great troublesomness Diabolical such as are cast into the imagination by the Devil or Divine such as are caused by God for the Spirit of God hath used the imagination in some operations thereof Thus Joseph and others were warned by God in a dream And Joel 2. the promise is That their young men should dream dreams These Divine dreams Tertullian Lib. 3. de animâ doth divide into Prophetica such as are meerly fore-telling things to come Revelatoria such as reveal something to be done as Peters vision concerning Cornelius Aedificatoria such as build up to any holy duty And Vocatoria that call to some spiritual service as that vision of Paul inviting him to come into Macedonia Concerning Diabolical Dreams they are not a mans sinnes but afflictions unless a man doth directly or indirectly consent thereunto or walk so that he deserveth God should leave him to such unclean or polluted apprehensions But we speak of Natural Dreams and not such as are meerly natural that arise from some natural cause but such as have had some voluntariness antecedent thereunto while waking such now are proud dreames malicious dreams unclean and unjust dreams All these do either expresly or virtually come from a polluted Imagination while we are awake though happily we cannot remember any such thoughts we had The sinfulness then of our dreams we are to be humbled under as coming from sinne the cause and being also sinnes in themselves No doubt but Adam would have dreamed it being common to all mankind onely it is said of Nero That he seldome or never dreamed till after the murder of Agrippina after which he was afrighted with terrible ones As also of the Atalantes that none dream amongst them Though
that did tare in pieces two and fourty of them They were but little children and you would think none would regard what they said but behold the heavy judgement of God upon them Therefore let Parents be more deeply affected with the lies and sinfulness of their children then commonly they are The wicked man is said Job 20. 11. to have his bones full of his puerilities or as we translate it the sinne of his youth because sinne acted in the youth doth cleave more inseperably then other sins even as he who had been possessed with a Devil from his youth was more difficultly cured therefore the Text addeth Those sins lie down in the dust with him Thy youth-sins will go to the grave with thee if grace make not a powerfull change SECT VI. Whether Original Sinne be alike in All. THe last thing to be treated on is to answer that Question Whether original sinne be alike in all Do we not see some even from the very womb more propense to iniquities then others And if it be equal in all Why should not all be carried out to the same sins alike Why is not every one a Cain a Judas To this we answer these things 1. If we take original sinne for the privative part of it viz. the want of Gods Image so all are alike Every one hath equally lost this glorious Image of God none hath any more left of it in them then another Even as it is concerning those that are damned in hell They are all equal in their punishment in respect of the poena damni they lose the presence of the same God and are all alike cast out from his presence but there is a difference in respect of the poena sensus some have greater torments then others 2. Original sinne is alike in all in the positive part if you do respect the remote power of sinne that is there is in all equally an habitual conversion to the creature Even as all have the same remote power of dying alike though for the proxim power some die sooner and some later The seed then of all evil is alike in all all are equal in respect of the remote power of sinning 3. By original depravation all are alike in respect of the necessity of sinning There is no man in this lost estate but he doth necessarily sinne quoad specificationem as they say whatsoever he doth he sinneth though not quoad exercitium this sinne or that sinne one is more ingaged unto then another Neither is this necessity of sinning like the necessity of hunger and thirst for these are meer natural and not culpable but this necessity of sinning is voluntarily brought upon us and though it be necessary yet is voluntary and with delight also As Bernard expresseth it The voluntariness taketh not off from the necessity nor the necessity from the voluntariness and delight Lastly Original sinne is equal in all in respect of the merit and desert it deserveth death it deserveth hell There is none cometh into the world thus polluted but he is obnoxious to death and an heir of Gods wrath For although some are freed from hell yea and one or two have been preserved from death yet is wholly by the grace of God The desert of original sin is equal in all But then you will say How cometh it about that some are more viciously given then others some more propense to one sinne then another I answer 1. From the different complexions and constitutions of the body with their different temptations and external occasions of sinne as they meet with Though the remote power be equal in all yet the immediate and proxim disposition is the bodies complexion and other concurring circumstances For original righteousness being removed then a man is carried out to sinne violently according as his particular torrent may drive him Even as if the pillars or supporters of an house should fall to the ground every piece of wood would fall to the ground more heavily or lightly as the weight is or as you heard Aquinas his similitude when the mixt body is dissolved every element hath his proper motion the air ascends upward the earth downwards and this is the cause of the divers sins in the world and some mens particular inclinations to one sinne more than another And then 2. The grace of God either sanctifying or restraining doth also make a great difference It is God that saith to the sea of that corruption within thee Hitherto thou shalt go and no further Think not that thou hadst a better nature or lesse original sinne than Judas or Cain but God doth either change thy nature or else he doth several wayes restrain thee that thou canst not accomplish all that actual wickedness thy heart would carry thee unto CHAP. X. A Justification of Gods shutting up all under Sinne for the Sinne of Adam in the sense of all the Reformed Churches against the Exceptions of Dr J. T. and others SECT I. GAL. 3. 24. But the Scripture hath concluded all under sinne that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe THe Apostle having made an Objection against himself vers 21. Is the Law then against the promises of God He answereth it 1. With a detestation God forbid 2. He sheweth wherein the Law is so farre from being contrary that it is subservient to the Gospel Only we must distinguish of the use of the Law which is per se and which is per accidens The use of the Law per se is to give eternal life to such who have a perfect conformity thereunto but per accidens when it meeteth with lapsed man who must needs be cursed by it because he is so farre from continuing in all the duties thereof that he is not able to fulfill perfectly one iota or tittle thereof therefore it provoketh us to seek out for a Saviour as a man arrested for debt enquireth for some friend or surety to deliver him Now this subservient use of the Law is expressed in the Text mentioned wherein you have the condition of mankind declared viz. That they are shut up under sinne 2. The Universality All. 3. The Cause appointing and declaring of this The Scripture 4. The final Cause That the promise c. Let us briefly open the particulars And First The Condition of man is said to be shut up under sinne or concluded it is a Metaphor from those malefactors that are shut up in a prison and cannot come forth So that the word implieth partly the condemnation that is upon all mankind and partly the impossibility to escape it and then whereas it is said under sinne that denoteth both the guilt of it and the dominion of it and that both original sinne and actual for both are comprehended herein else Infants would be excluded from having an interest in Christ for whosoever are brought to Christ are necessarily supposed to be in a state of sinne Hence In the
say Christus resurrexit Christ is risen For this end Christ is called The first fruit of them that slept vers 20. As the first fruits did sanctifie the whole harvest of corn that was afterwards to be gathered So did Christ rising all his members by his Resurrection assuring them of theirs Hence it is that the Apostles Arguments are not to prove the Resurrection of wicked men for they arise upon another account but onely of the godly who are his members and have an interest in his mediation It is indeed a Dispute Whether even wicked men do not rise by the virtue of Christs merit and his Resurrection Baldwine for determining the negative in locum is traduced by another Lutheran for Popery and Calvinism as introducing that Doctrine of the particularity of Christs death But certainly The wicked mans resurrection is not to be accounted in the number of any mercies and therefore not merited by Christ Hence it followeth necessarily that they rise not by any relation to Christ but by the power and justice of God because of that immutable and unchangeable Decree that every sinner unrepenting shall die both temporally and eternally which later could not be accomplished unlesse the bodies of wicked men were raised up to life again out of the dust Now our Apostle to prove Christ the cause of our Resurrection draweth an Argument from a comparison between Adam and him making them two originals and fountains but of contrary effects the one of death the other of life For as in Adam all die so in Christ all shall be made alive Not that all men universally shall be saved by Christ but the universal particle must be limited according to the subject matter in hand All that are in Christ all that are his members shall be made alive by him And therefore in the next verse it is so limited Christ the first-fruits and afterwards they that are Christs at his coming So that the sense is That as all Adams posterity die because of him so all that are Christs seed shall live by him For the expression in Adam and in Christ do denote a causality in them the one of death the other of life Therefore we must not think that the Apostle doth here only make a bare similitude and comparison shewing that as by Adam we die so by Christ we shall be made alive but it 's an Argument from the power and causality that is in one to the other The Apostle doth in the fifth of the Romans make the like comparison only there is this difference as Calvin observeth In that place the Apostle maketh the comparison chiefly in respect of spiritual effects death as it brings condemnation and life as it is accompanied with justification here and glorification hereafter This Text is greatly agitated in the controversie between Puccius and Socinus Vide Disput de statu primi hominis ante lapsum The former holding truly though he superaddeth many gross errors that Adam was not made mortal and that death came in only by sinne only he goeth absurdly beyond his bounds when he holdeth the beasts were also made immortal The later on the contrary he holdeth That Adam was made mortal that death in natural that though by sinne we are under a perpetual necessity of death which is an ambiguous phrase he useth yet death it self is natural He granteth That immature and violent death cometh by sinne but death as it is a meer dissolution of a person so it is from his primitive creation and constitution Therefore be would have this difference between the Text I am upon and Paul's Discourse in the fifth of the Romans viz. That there indeed he speaketh of the sinne of Adam by which we come to die But here he would have the Apostle consider Adam as he is by Creation and that being mortal from the beginning we also are mortal from him But who can perswade himself that these passages concerning the change of the body hereafter to what it is now It is sown in corruption it 's raised in corruption it is sowen in dishonour it is raised in glory it is sowen in weaknesse it is raised in power are to be understood of our bodies as at the first Creation and not as they are now by Adam's fall Our bodies are made corruptible and vile bodies by reason of sinne We must then understand the Apostle as speaking of Adam sinning though sinne be not here named So that the fifth of the Romans will excellently illustrate this place and that maketh the sense to be That Adam sinning by his sinne death entered upon all mankind so that death is not natural neither doth it arise from our first constitution but it cometh in wholly by sinne SECT II. Death an Effect of Original Sinne explained in divers Propositions HAving then heretofore spoken of some spiritual effects of original sinne and more might be named such as a necessity to sinne an impotency to all good senslesness and stupidity therein the aldom to Satan but I shall pass them by as being very proper to the Common-place of Divinity which is of the grace of God and mans free-will and shall proceed to the effects of original sinne that are of another nature and that is temporal and eternal death The former effects did so slow from original sinne as that also they are sinfull properties in a man but these are meerly punishments It is not our sinne that we are sick that we die but it is the effect From the words then we observe this truth and doctrine That death cometh upon all mankind because of our sinne we have originally from Adam It is true the Socinian will say We put more in the Doctrine then is in the Text but you heard the comparison used by the Apostle in the fifth of the Romans compared with this doth necessarily suppose death to be because of Adam's sinne not only as imputed unto us but because thereby we are made inherently sinfull This truth is of a very vast compasse but I shall consine my self within as narrow bounds as may be I shall follow my usual method to explicate this in several Propositions ¶ 1. FIrst This controversie about mans mortality is very famous in the Church and hath been of old solliciously disputed The Pelagians as they denied original sinne so consonantly to that falshood they affirmed That death was not the punishment of sinne but did arise by the necessity of our natural constitution Which Assertion was condemned by some Councils and the Laws of Emperours as injurious to God the Creator of men For this experience that Infants new born are subject to many miseries and death it self was a thorn in their sides which they could not endure in nor yet possibly pull out Sometimes with the Stocks they would deny death to be an evil Sometimes they would say Children in the womb are guilty of actual sinnes for which they deserved death but that which they did most constantly adhere
from Paradise lest he should eat of that tree For it was just that he who had incurred the sentence of death by his transgression should be deprived of all the signs of life and symbols of Gods favour Furthermore this tree of life was not it self immortal Would that alwayes have continued Was not that subject to alterations as well as other trees How then can mans immortality be attributed to that Seeing then there is so much uncertainty amongst Schoolmen upon what to place Adam's immortality the Orthodox do consonantly to Scripture put it upon these things concurring as causes to preserve him from death The first is That excellent constitution and harmony of his body whereby there could not be any humour peccant or excessive So that from within there would not have sprung any disease And although in Adam's eating and drinking being nourished thereby there would necessarily have been some alteration in him by deperdition and restauration which is in all nourishment yet that would have been in part onely not so as to make any total change upon his body 2. The second cause was That original righteousnesse which God made him in For seeing sinne only is the meritorious cause of death while Adam was thus holy and absolutely free from all sinne death had no way to enter in upon the body 3. There was the providence of God in a special manner preserving of him so that death could not come by any extrinsecal cause upon him No doubt but Adam's body was vulnerable a sword if thrust into his heart would have taken away his life but such was the peculiar providence of God to him in that condition that no evil or hurtfull thing could befall him Lastly and above all Gods appointment and divine ordination was the main and chief cause of his immortality For if the Scripture say Deut. 8. 3. in the general That man liveth not by bread alone but by every word that cometh from the mouth of the Lord then this was also true in Adam And if we read of Elias that he went fourty dayes in the strength of a little bread that he did eat Is it any wonder that the appointment of God should work such immunity from death in Adam Whereas then there are three things about death considerable the potentia or power the actus or death it self and the necessity Adam was free from all these unlesse by power we mean a remote power for if he had not had this power of dying then he could not have fallen into the necessity of death Thus you see the excellent constitution of his body original righteousness a divine providence and Gods order and decree therein did sufficiently preserve Adam not only from actual death or the necessity of death or death as a punishment but also from any disposition or habitual principle within him of death and it may be from this state of immortality Adam was created The Poets by 〈◊〉 obscure tradition had their figments of some meats and drinks which made men immortal as their Nectar called so say some because when drunk did make them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 young again or as others from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as that which did not suffer them to die There was also their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as much as sine mortalitate 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is mortalis They had also their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 luctus because it did expell all sorrow and grief But to be sure when we compare our mortal sinfull and wretched estate we are in with this glorious estate of Adams What cause have we to humble our selves to see the sad change that is now come upon us By this we may see how odious that first transgression was unto God that for the guilt thereof hath made this world to be a valley of tears to be like a great Hospital of diseased and miserable men SECT III. Arguments to prove that through Adam's sinne we are made sinners and so mortal ¶ 1. LEt us proceed to prove our Doctrine That through Adam sinning we are made sinners and so mortal which necessarily supposeth that Adam was made immortal and that death had nothing to do with mankind till sinne came into the world The first Argument is From that glorious condition Adam was made in and also the excellent end he was created for All which would have been horribly obscured if death or mortality had then been present The fears and thoughts of death are a bitter herb in the sweetest dish that is when of any comfort we have we may say as the young Prophets to their master there is mors in ella death in the pot death in this or that mercy thou enjoyest this doth greatly abate our delight Therefore we read of one of the Kings of France a Lewis that forbad all those who attended him ever to make any mention of death in his ears that prophane man thought such a speech would damp his delights Seeing then Gods purpose was to make a man such an excellent and blessed creature can we think he was made mortal and that it might have been said to him This night thy soul shall be taken away and then whose shall this Paradise and all these goodly enjoyments be It is the Scriptures designe to aggravate the goodness of God towards man and to shew the excellency and honour God put upon him Whereas the Socinians directly oppose this purpose of Gods Spirit and would make man as miserable as may be Hence they say he was created like a meer innocent that he had not much more knowledge than an Infant that he had no original righteousness that he was made mortal Yea Socinus Resp. ad Puc cap 14 pag. 106. cavils at the explication of that place Genes 2. 8. which is owned by all Interpreters about the garden in Eden which God placed Adam in he would not have any such place of pleasure or delight understood thereby But although the word may be retained as a proper name Eden for so our English Translators do yet because it cometh of a word that signifieth to delight Gen. 18. 12. The Church of God hath alwayes intepreted it of a place of delight yea that Heaven is called Paradise allusively thereunto and therefore it 's horrible impudency in Socinus to say that place was not called Eden when God planted it at first but in following ages it received that appellation Thus whereas the Psalmist doth admire the goodness of God for the honour put upon man at the Creation This Heretique laboureth to debase and diminish it as much as may be ¶ 2. ANd if Adam had been made so righteous and glorious yet subject to death he would have been like that building Paul supposeth 1 Cor. 3. Whose foundation was of gold and precious stones but the superstructure hay and stubble Or like Nebuchadnezzar's Image which was partly of gold with other additaments and partly of clay all
2. 4. Luke 2. 25. The Scripture useth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for quatentus as Rom. 11. 13. And indeed this is most consonant to the Apostles scope for why should Adam's sinne be brought in rather than other parents Were it not that we were considered in him under a common respect as one with him It is true Erasmus saith he doth not remember that ever he read 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with a Dative case but Heb. 9. 17. may confute him And among prophane Authors 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 neither can 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Matth. 26. 50. be said by most men to signifie in as much For as De Dieu observeth the postpositive is for the demonstrative 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Art thou come for this as the other Evangelists Dost thou betray the sonne of man with a kisse Although if we should render it causaâ—ly as the adversaries contend it would no wayes prejudice the truth we plead for seeing that the sinne here charged upon all mankind is because of Adam And therefore if we will make any rational coherence in the Apostles discourse it must be after this manner As by one man sinne entered into the world and death by sinne and so death passed upon all men as much as all have sinned that is all sinned in that one man for what sense it is to say That by one man sinne and death entred upon all because all sinned in themselves This would be a contradiction to lay the death of mankind upon Adam's sinne and upon all mens actual sinnes likewise Yea it is wholly repugnant to the Apostles scope who is comparing Adam and Christ not simply as two originals and beginnings but as two causes of death and life Indeed I would not much contend with any that would render the word causally and so make the verse an whole entire proposition in it self without any defective expression at all so that we understand all mens sinning to be interpreted of that which they are guilty of in Adam It is not worth time to take notice of the wild Divinity imposed upon this Discourse of Pauls by the late Writer Vnum Necessar pag. 365 who would have Death come upon mankind occasionally onely by Adam's sinne and that but till Moses his time and after Moses to come upon a new account by the Law promulged through his ministry The mentioning of this is confutation enough for here in this Text the Apostle doth make all mankind to die because of Adam And why may not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 here be the same with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Text. Another Text witnessing this truth is Rom. 6. 23. The wages of sinne is death Here death is not taken only for eternal death as the Socinians say because the opposite unto it is made eternal life but for both kinds of death eternal and temporal temporal death being the in-let of eternal and so contrary to eternal life Neither is that cavil of their worth any thing who would make the wages of sinne to be the Subject and not the Predicate because the Article 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is put to it but that is no sure Rule Sometimes the Article is put to the Predicate for some emphasis sake and not the Subject as I Cor. 9. 1. Are not ye 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 my work in the Lord Are ye not that eminent and conspicuous singular work of mine in the Lord We see then what it is that sinne deserveth even temporal and eternal death it cometh not from mans primitive constitution but Adam's transgression Therefore it is that we deserve many thousand deaths if it were possible for original sinne deserveth death every actual sinne deserveth death yea and hell also Oh how miserable is man who thus deserveth to die and to be damned over and over again Therefore the Apostle useth the plural number 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to signifie the manifold evils that are in this death The word properly signifieth that meat which was allowed souldiers for their service in warre We see then how fearfull we all are to be of sinne What wages wilt thou have for every pleasant every profitable sinne even death temporal and eternal The last Text I shall mention is that which Austin so much urgeth in this point Rom. 8. 10. The body is dead because of sinne which is chiefly to be understood of our mortal body now he saith it's dead because of the sentence of death passed it so that there is no way to escape it It is sinne then that maketh the body in a state of death that deserveth the whole harmony and good temperament of the body should be dissolved and therby follow a dissolution of the whole man For though sinne deserve death yet there must be thereby some ataxy or disorder made in the body of a man otherwise death would not follow So that though sinne be the meritorious cause yet several diseases the effect of sinne do actually cause death Not that sinne maketh a substantial change in a man but an accidental only Thus you see the Scripture constantly attributing death yea and our mortality and corruptibility to sinne onely and not to our natural constitution Therefore those are strange positions we meet with Vnum Necessar cap. 6. Sect. 1. pag. 371 372. That death came in not by any new sentence or change of nature for man was created mortal and that if Adam had not sinned he should have been immortal by grace that is by the use of the tree of life That to die is a punishment to some to others not It was a punishment to all that sinned before Moses and since upon the first it fell as a consequent of Gods anger upon Adam upon the later it fell as a consequent of that anger which was threatned in Moses Law but to those who sinned not at all as Infants and Ideots it was meerly a condition of their nature and no more a punishment then to be a child is But seeing he professeth himself to be of the same judgement with his incomparable Grotius let him consider how these positions agree with him who doth against Socinus industriously and solidly prove Defens fid de satisfac cap. 1. pag. 19 20 21. that death hath alwayes some respect of a punishment instancing in the Texts I have mentioned using such words Quidclarius Quis vel verba legens non videat hanc sententiam and Corinthians the words of my Text and an ad anussim respondereisti ad Romanos Yea he concludeth That it were easie to prove that it was the perpetual judgment of the ancient Jews and Christians that death of whatsoever kind it be viz. whether with violence or without violence was the punishment of sinne adding that the Christian Emperors did deservedly condemn beside other things this opinion of Pelagians that they held mortem non ex insidiis fluxisse peccati sed exegisse eam legem
immutabilis constituti And indeed if death were not the effect of sinne but consequent of mans nature it would be no evil whereas the Scripture accounteth it of that nature as Deut. 30. 15. See I have set before thee this day life and good and death and evil SECT IV. Arguments brought to prove that Adam was made mortal answered THe next work to be done is to consider those Arguments which they bring to prove that Adam was made mortal and so had a proxim principle of death in him which would have taken effect if God did not provide some way against it and that which is used by all Adversaries to this truth is Because Adam was created in such a condition that be must necessarily eat and drink yea and was also to propagate children all which actions do contradict immortality For he that eateth and drinketh must by degrees have a decay in nature and our Saviour seemeth to prove immortality from this argument Luk. 20. 35 36. because in heaven they shall not marry so that to procreate children is not consistent with such a blessed estate But these Objections are easily answered if we remember the distinction at first given in this point that there is an immortality absolute and immutable or conditional and changeable upon supposition Now it 's true neither eating or marrying can consist with unchangeable mortality with immortality of glory But it may very well consist with conditional immortality that is in tendency to that which is absolute Eating and drinking in the state of integrity was a means subserving to keep up the state of immortality so farre was it from repugning of it This therefore is the root of his errour that men apprehend no other immortality but what is compleat that unless Adam had been made in the same estate that the glorified Saints are put into he could not be said to be immortal Secondly They say Adam is said to be earthly and of the earth to have a natural body and so opposite to that immortal body we shall have in heaven 1 Cor. 15. 47. But first when the Apostle giveth those names to our bodies of vile corruptible and to be in dishonour this is to be understood of our bodies after the fall they are made so through sinne It would be derogatory to God to say they were made such at first It is true the first man is said to be earthy but that expression denoteth only the original of his body whence it was first made not the state he was created in as appeareth by the opposite the second man is said to be the Lord from Heaven It is one thing then to speak of Adam's body in respect of its original and another to speak of the whole person in respect of his condition Thirdly They say All the internal causes of death were in Adam while standing as well as fallen and therefore he was mortal as well as we To this we answer there were indeed the causes of death in him materially but not formally for the bodily humours were not peccant either in quality or quantity the natural heat would not have consumed the radical moisture so that in that estate there would never have been formally existent the proxim causes of death besides the adequate and principal causes of death are the Devils suggestions and mans transgression as you heard Fourthly They ask If man were not made mortal why should immortality be promised as a reward if he had it already Why should it be promised him upon his obedience The answer is easie Adam 's immortality was inchoate onely the consummation of it was promised as a reward to his obedience Lastly They object If death be the punishment of sinne then Christ hath freed believers from this death which is against experience But 1. The Socinians grant That a necessity of death is the fruit of sinne yet Christ hath not freed us from the necessity of it no more than the naturality of it 2. We must distinguish between an actual abolition of death and the right to do it Christ hath purchased for us a right to immortality yet the actual investing of us into it is to be done in its time Death will be swallowed up in victory and for the present the nature of death is changed as to a godly man it 's no more a curse to him the sting of death is taken away as when a Serpent or Wasp have lost their sting they can do no more hurt Thus to the godly it cannot do any hurt It is like Elijah's fiery chariot to carry them to Heaven It 's like passing through the red Sea into the Land of Canaan thus as the cloud was full of darkness to the Aegyptian but light to the Israelite so is death full of terrour and of curses to an ungodly man but pleasant and lovely to a godly man it is his gain to die To live in this world is his losse and disadvantage SECT V. Q. Whether Adam's sinne was only an occasion of Gods punishing all mankind resolved against D. J. T. I Shall conclude this Text with answering a two-fold Question The full discussing whereof may inform us about the most secret and mysterious truths that are in this point And First It may be demanded That suppose it be granted that by Adam we die may not this be understood any more than occasionally God was so displeased with Adam for his transgression that thereupon he insticts the curse threatned to him upon his posterity Even as we read often in Scripture that God for Magistrates sins or for parents sins doth take an occasion to punish a people or children for their own sinnes Thus it may be thought that God by occasion from Adam's transgression did impose on us for our sinnes the same curse that was denounced to Adam not that we were sinners in him not that we come into the world with any inherent sinne but because of our actual impieties God punisheth us with Adam's curse In this manner the late adversary to original sinne doth explicate himself An Answer to a Letter pag. 30 31 32. as if this were all the evil by Adam that for his sake our sinnes inherit the curse Insomuch saith he that it is not so properly to be called original sinne as an original curse upon our sinne That we may not be deceived in his meaning though it is very difficult to reconcile himself with himself For at another time he saith The dissolution of the soul and holy should have been if Adam had not sinned for the world would have been too little to have entertained the â—yriads of men which would have been born An Answer to a Letter p. 86 87 Now how Adam's sinne should bring in the sentence of death as he saith in another place Vnum Necessar cap. 6. sect 1. pag. 367. and yet he have died though he had not sinned is impossible to reconcile He giveth us two similitudes or parallel expressions which may
sense voluntary 38 When a punishment how from God 42 One Sin may suddenly and formally deprive the subject of all grace yet it doth not so alwayes 58 Three sorts of Sin original habitual and actual 89 The first motions of the heart though never so involuntary and indeliberate are sinfull 94 All Sin is potentially and seminally in every mans heart 103 Every man would commit all Sin if not restrained 147 Sin rightly divided into original and actual 164 Whence it comes to passe that men commit known Sins 227 Why men chuse Sin rather than affliction 283 Every man lieth under a necessity of sinning 311 Sinners To be made a Sinner by Adam is more than to be made subject to death as a curse 31 And more than to be obnoxious to eternal wrath ib. All mad truly and properly Sinners by Adam 31 34 Every man Christ excepted 387 393 Socinians Wherein Socinians do make God the author of sin 66 Socinians and Papists blasphemy 114 Socinians deny both original sin and original righteousnesse 121 The rocks they stumble at ib. 122 Soul The arguments of those that hold the Souls traduction 197 Souls not by eduction or traduction but creation and introduction 191 Soul not generated 189 Souls created 194 Origen and Plato's opinion of the Soul 186 Confuted 187 The Soul cannot be neutral 130 Inclined to earthly objects 175 Souls not created before the bodies 187 Souls come not into the world pure and holy ib. Souls not perfect substances 200 The Soul infused by creating and created by infusing 21 How it comes to be infected 393 T Taylor A Character of Doctor J. Taylor 30 He is answered in these places 62 398 407 409 422 430 449 450 452 461 476 485 518 520 521 522 523 524 525 527 528 534 535 V Vanity OF the natural Vanity of our minds 213 Virgin Virgin Mary born in original sin 398 Uncleanness A three-fold Uncleanness corporal ceremonial and moral 50 Understanding Our Understandings very weak in respect of natural things 179 219 And uncapable of holy and spiritual things 212 Voluntariness Voluntariness not requisite to every sin 39 W Wickedness OF the extream Wickedness of the world 172 Will. Willeth No man Willeth sin and damnation as such 38 Adams Will how ours 39 The Nature of the Will 270 The difference between the Will and understanding 271 Will taken ambiguonsly 272 The Will the seat of obedience and disobedience 273 Good is the proper object of the Will. ib. The several operations of the Will 274 The difference between a wicked mans and a good mans doing what he allows not 88 Free Will how far we are deprived of it 116 The corruption of the Will in volition 275 And in efficacious Willing a thing 276 And in fruition 277 And in its act of intention 279 And in election 282 Whence it is that the Will is backward to to follow the understanding 284 The pollution of the Will in its act of consent 286 The first motions of the Will are evil ib. The pollution of the Will in its affections and properties 289 The degeneracy of the Will 293 The Will wholly perverted about the ultimate end ib. The Will naturally inclineth to be independent on God 295 The contumacy and refractoriness of the Will 297 The enmity and contrariety of the Will to Gods will 298 The rebellion of the Will against the light of the mind and the slavery of it to the sensitive part 299 The mutability and inconstancy of the Will 300 The bondage of the Will and of free will 302 No man before grace hath free will to good 305 The Will impotent to spiritual things 313 Free will how call'd in Scripture 307 Exalted by erroneous persons 308 The different effects of free will and free grace in mens lives 310 The difficulty of the question 311 Demonstrations against it ib. The definitions and descriptions of it 320 Doth not consist in an active indifferency to good or evil 321 FINIS TO THE READER A Digressive Epistle concerning Justification by Faith alone excluding the Conditionality of Works in that Act either begun or continued Tending to a friendly debate between a Reverend Learned and godly Brother and my self in that Point THe Doctrine of Original sinne and Justification by Faith alone are not altogether heterogeneous Yea Stapleton maketh the former the Mother and the latter the Daughter as they are avouched in the Protestant way I shall therefore here take the occasion to lay down severall Propositions that may conduce to the further discovery of the Contents of that amicable collation between my learned Brother and my self in this particular Not that my purpose is to vindicate those Arguments I have formerly in a Treatise of Righteousness produced against conditionality of Works in the Act of Justification from the Exceptions and Answers he hath pleased lately to give in unto them for I shall venture their credit and strength notwithstanding all that he hath said to the contrary with the intelligent and impartiall Readers till I am advised by the judicious and Learned there is a necessity of rescuing them from his assaults The generation of Divines which shall arise that knew Joseph who are aquainted with the Doctrine and Spirit of the first Reformers in this matter they will not take up their perswasions from one or two English Writers in this case It is true Aristole saith lib. 1. Rhetor. cap. 11. that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Contentions are pleasant and Conqest in them sweet But that is true in reference to the Philosophers and Oratours of old who were animals of glory and had a libidinous appetite after applause 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 being 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Justin Martyr alludeth and the Oratours so insatiable after praise that rather then want it they would hire their Laudicenes to applaud them with a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But in Theologicall contests we ought to have more mortified and sanctified hearts for when we have watched over our souls with the greatest diligence we can yet we have cause to pray that God would forgive us our Book-sins and preserve us from loosing the comfortable sense and enjoyment of Justification while we dispute about it Not therefore from a spirit of contention or opposition to my learned Brother whom I highly honour but love to that precious and antient Truth as I judge it to be which through infirmity is opposed by him happily inclined thereunto by his laudable Zeal against Antinomian dotages I proceed to lay down severall Propositions which when I have done my thoughts are to say Ite missa est The Reformers in their first Conflicts with the Popish Adversaries about Justification among the controversall Points therein judged this none of the least The Meanes or Manner how we are justified Indeed Justification being the heart as it were of Religion a little prick therein is dangerous It being the eye of Christianity a little
is the cause that most people are still such sots and sensless men about regeneration Yea learned and knowing men are as blind and bruitish in this as the simple and poor people are doth not all arise from this That they feel not neither do perceive that original sin like a leprosie hath run over the whole man both soul and body especially there would not be these three mistakes about the work of grace which are very common As 1. A Philosophical Reformation by the Dictates and Principles of Moralists such as Plutarch and Seneca give would not be taken for Regeneration For although their sayings and directions are admired and there may be some good use of them yet they do not go to the root of the matter they are not an antidote against original sinne that defileth the nature and therefore cannot promote Regeneration which doth properly cure that in some degree Aristotles way to make a man a virtuous man viz. by frequent and constant actions at lest to acquire an habit is absurd and repugnant to Scripture for by that the tree must be made good and a man must be born again ere he can do any thing holily Hence God promiseth to give a new heart to take away the heart of stone and then to cause us to walk in all holiness Ezek. 11. 19. These divine principles must be infused before there can be holy actions So 2. Civility and an ingenuous temperate disposition will be but a glistering dunghill a painted sepulchre when original sinne is known He will presently see for all his civil and inoffensive life his heart is full of all noisomness Therefore civil men of all men do most need this light to shine into their brests we are ready to think of our selves because so harmless and innocent as was said of Bonaventure In hoc homine non peccavit Adam such were born without sinne and brought better natures into the world than others but if you search into the Scriptures it will appear that all are born children of wrath and are equally destitute of that image of God and then as when the pillars of an house are removed the house it self must fall into its own rubbidge Thus when that primitive righteousness was lost man is prone to runne into all evil and every man would be like a Judas or a Cain even the most civil man that is did not God restrain original sin 3. Gifts and abilities which many have in religious exercises will presently be seen not to be Regeneration Though we should preach with the tongue of Angels though admirable in prayer and other holy duties yet these and original sin in the power of it may stand together and so many looking to the flowers but not the dead corpse they are upon conclude themselves to be alive when indeed they are dead SECT IV. I Shall mention some few more spiritual Advantages that come by the full and undoubted perswasion of this original corruption for so of old we are advised Firmissimè texe nullatenus dubita c. Believe most firmly and doubt not in the least manner but that by Adam's sinne all his posterity becomes sinfull and obnoxious to Gods wrath And First upon the Knowledg of originall sinne we evidently see our impossibility to keep the Law of God That when the Law requireth a love of God with all our heart mind and strength and also doth prohibit all kind of lust and sinfull concupiscence even in the very first motions and stirrings of it The Law I say requiring such universal perfection and we being wholly dead in sinne upon the comparing of the Law with our condition we cannot but conclude That we fail in all things That the Law is spiritual but we are carnal And if he be cursed that doth not continue in all things the Law requireth how accursed must he be that is not able to perform any one thing All those opinions that diminish original sinne do also plead for a possibility of keeping Gods Commandments Now this self-flattery is imbred in all Do not most of our common people think they keep the Commandments of God Do they believe that the curses of the Law do belong to them every hour Oh if such convictions were upon them how greatly would it humble them and make them debased before God but they trust in this they readily and confidently say with that young man All these have I kept from my youth up Mat. 9 20. Oh then inform thy self more about this natural defilement and loathsomness that is upon thee and then thou wilt find the Law to accuse and condemn thee in all things Secondly The right knowledge of this will make even the godly and regenerate though in some measure delivered from the power and dominion of it yet to see that because of its stirrings and actings in them there is imperfection in every thing they do And truly this is one of the most profitable effects of true knowledge herein for hereby a godly man is made to go out of all his graces and his duties hereby he is afraid of the iniquity of his holy things and cals his very righteousness a menstruous ragge This is clear in Paul Rom. 7. How sadly doth he complain of the vigorous actings of this original sinne in him For the present I take it as granted that that part of the Chapter must be understood of a regenerate person though vehemently denied by some as is in time to be shewed That Law of sinne was alwayes moving when he set himself to any thing that was holy he desired to obey the Law perfectly to love God compleatly but this Law of sinne would not let him So that because of this natural defilement evil is mixed with all the good we do insomuch that there would be a woe and a curse to all our gracious acts if strictly examined Thus it is with a godly man in this life as those Hetruscan-robbers reported of by Aristotle and mentioned by Austin who would take some live men and bind them to the dead men which was a miserable way of perishing Even thus it is here original corruption is constantly adhering and inseparably to him who is alive in holiness and by this means there is unbelief in his faith coldness in his zeal dulness in his fervency Insomuch that the Apostle crieth out of himself Oh wretched man that I am And that because of this very thing the Papists though they hold original sinne yet maintaining That after Baptism it 's quite taken away and that though there be some languor and difficulty in a man in respect of what is good yet if we do not consent to these motions of lusts within us they are not truly and properly sins do consequentially conclude that there is not necessarily dross and sinne in every holy duty we do but the evidence of Rom. 7. is too great to be contradicted So that preaching of original sinne is not only necessary