punishment but no fault of sin properly defiling so the Pontificians and especially their Scholasticks That it is neither defection depravation corruption nor truly and properly a Sin but only an affliction or punishment descending upon posterity through the guilt of Adams transgression like as to be born a Slave or a Bastard is his shame only and not his sin That nothing was born in us and with us which was not good and the very work of God That Adams disobedience was in no wise ours neither were we therefore in any wise obnoxious to eternal death so the Pighians and the Catharinians That we become infected by Original sin not by way of Generation or Propagation but only by way of imitation and outward occasion That the death of the body is the sequel of Nature and no punishment for sin whether original or actual so the Socinians and Racovians That Original sin is not a vicious accident or adjunct but is become our very Nature Essence and Substance the very heart and flesh and body and soul so the Flaccians and Substantialists That a mans meer pure naturals notwithstanding the Fall are good and perfect That Original sin is but like a little spot upon the skin or light wound for all which there remain still in a man his natural capacities dispositions powers and forces to Good That Men from their Mothers womb are as fully endowed with Liberty and Freewill as Adam was before his fall That Original sin to a man's Freewill is but like Garlick to a Loadstone easily wipt off and so it falls to work as fresh as at the first That the Adamical will or will from Adams fall hath it self not merely passive in the act of Conversion but is thereunto actively cooperating together with God so the Erasmians the Sunergicts and Arminians That Original sin was but St. Augustins dream and Puppet That Infants under the New Testament are not born in Original sin That there 's no necessity to baptize Infants with respect to any benefit they thus can have against it That Original sin and all other is to be remedied only by revelations and raptures of the Spirit without any use either of Word or Sacraments so the Swenckfeldians the Enthousiasts Anabaptists Fanaticks and Familists That Original sin is not properly a sin but a Disease or a Condition or else figurative form of speaking viz. by a Metonymie may be so called so Zwinglius and some of the Zwinglians That God reprobates God damns men absolutely because it is his will and pleasure without any respect or condition whether of Original or Actual sin so the Supralapsarians Thus you see Sir what a crowd of Errors have obtruded only through mens leaning to their own understandings amongst which more than once this Author may find his own which to me at first view seems so like to diverse of the aforesaid Errors that taken up in strict syllables I begin to suspect it would not only appear so but appear so and much more But I look not upon him in a likenesse to them but in some unlikenesse to the Holy Scriptures and the Church of England taking his way of understanding it to be another both to what the first teaches to understand and in what the last would be understood And let him not think I speak this as one that would revile him but as one that according to his understanding must dissent from him using my liberty which I wish may be mutual but keeping my Charity nevertheless my understanding I doe faithfully and in all humility submit to those two witnesses neither will I oppose him in any thing but what I receive from them they that will undertake him in other passages that fall not directly within this compass let them do it as they shall find themselves concerned in it or called to it This I take to be the safest way to begin and if he will keep his own word the readiest way to make an end For taking the 5 Chapter to the Romans to be objected against him If it be so saies he I have done if it be not so say I I have nothing to do Let me be beleeved both by him and you in this I have look'd again and again upon his Paraphrase with a single eye only to find out truth and proper truth if there explained hoping he will doe likewise with this Exposition when it shall come to his sight In which I make his own words mine if I use any violence I can easily be reproved For the Scripture Rom. 5. 12. Wherefore as by one Man Sin entred into the World and Death by Sin and so Death passed upon all Men for that all have sinned {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Wherefore therefore for this cause I begin with the search and examination of the letter for it is the Grammatical sifting that must render the plain Construction and then the Rhetorical glossing may come in to adorn with a certain circumlocution and therefore a broad Paraphrase if it be not unsuitable yet it is untimely when it shall presume in place before a narrower Exposition have done its part For this canse so I am bold to render it because I find it mostly so rendred in this Epistle to the Romans chap. 1. 26. and 13. 6. and 15. 9. which very inference serves to shew plainly the principal reason or cause why it pleased God to permit the Entrance and Passage of Original Sin viz. For this cause even for the reconciliation and attonements sake immediately before spoken of vers 10. and 11. Therefore God suffered this sin to enter into the world The Enmity or hainous aversion the wrath or dreadfull desert of Original Sin can never be more truly and fully considered and measured than in and by Christs death and satisfaction which who so contends to lessen either for Fault or Guilt such endeavours to extenuate the vertue and merits of Christs reconciling and attoning Gods great end in the Fall was to manifest and magnifie the infinite perfection of his own Son who then would not labour earnestly that Wisdom might principally be justified in the point Doth not God herein commend his love towards us vers. 8. How then can we imagin there should be the least prejudice upon the Divine Attributes in such an Ordination or Permission upon such a motive or intention But was this inferential motive heedlesly escaped or not rather purposely pretermitted to usurp a more uncontrouled licence in the wanton daliances of words that I may not call them petulancies of prophanation It is no reputation to a Phisician to say he hath cured us of an Evil which we never had and shall we accuse the Father of mercies to have wounded us for no other reason but that his Son may have the honour to have cured us I understand not that he that makes a necessity that he may find a remedy is like c. The sufficiency and excellency of our Saviour in
this case is a thing that both he and we all are bound to understand and seriously beleeve and not only that but Gods ordination and dispensation to such an end as the manifestation of his honour and glory But why such playing with a thing so sacred As here 's nothing to provoke his spleen to indignation from an horrible decree of absolute necessitating and damning so neither can I see any thing that should move it to laughter or levity the Apostle himself defines what affection it is that should hence be raised We joy in God through our Lord Iesus Christ ver. 11. and well we may since the sufferance or entrance of Sin is here referred to the gracious purpose of Reconciling attoning and saving Is this the way of vindicating the glory of the Divine Attributes to make no more but a light jest at Christs honour in this kind still I say Wisdom is justified of all her Children Luk. 7. 34 39. this he himself spake when men imputed to him a carnal Dispensation with our actual Sins and so much may we say when any man will deprive him of that honour is due unto him from his spiritual dispensation in our Originals Neither let him say to us That the honour of our blessed Saviour does no way depend upon our imaginations and weak Propositions we will say so too and peradventure might say so more justly against him only we let him know right inferences are no imaginations neither are strong deductions weak propositions And if what I have drawn hence be not directly from the Text let him but be pleased to take the illative along with him and then inferr what he can otherwise or to the contrary I confess I would not in any wise have this illation thought redundant for that were to make the Scripture either impure and corrupt or or else idle and superfluous yet should I not have excepted at all if any following my Siriack Transletion had omitted it upon this consideration That it is a hard matter especially in a comparison betwixt Adam and Christ to define a cause or give a reason for Original Sins entrance into the world or descent upon posterity But then this should be observed withall if such a thing be hardly rendred it should not be rashly inquired into because our inquisitiveness in this case tends more to the dishonour than all our Resolution can to the honour of the Divine Attributes As by one Man Whom we may not amiss understand in an unity of name order person nature sex action and Type 1. Of name Adam which appellation comprehends also both the person the sex and the kind 2. Of Order sc. the first man Adam 1 Cor. 15. 45. and so the very Hebraism or Grecism of the cardinal for the ordinal would give it if need were 3. Of Person sc. in the individual in number singularly and precisely taken and so Original Sin properly derived from the prime and not from the proximate Parents or according to their pluralities 4. Of sex the male and not the female who though she was first in the transgression yet some will have him to be solely understood in this propagation But for my part I confesse I can see no cause for such an exception but that they may be understood one Flesh one in the Image one in the praevarication and so one in the Propagation 5. Of Nature as one not only in individuo but in specie one comprehending and representing the whole root and stock and seed and generation and nature and condition of Mankind so Adam is taken for the whole species of Men and the Beast singularly for the whole species of Beasts 6. Of Act namely one in the Dis-obedience or Offence For it was not the simple or meer nature that was the means of such a derivation but the offending and disobedient Nature by which causally and instrumentally this privation and depravatiou this stain and guilt descended upon all yea not only the Offence of one but one offence for it was his first Act that was imputed to us and none of the rest 7. Of Type for Adam is here said to be the Figure or Type of Christ under this notion of one as much as in any thing else he whole Comparison throughout Sin No great matter how many and various soever be the acceptions of Sin in the Scriptures since in this place it is defined by the Apostle to be Sin in the singular and not said plurally Sins as if he would precisely determine it of that one root of Sin distinct from those many following fruits Yea it may be thus rendred the Sin very Emphatically and is understood by almost all from antient to modern for no other but Original Sin simply so accepted as the only Sin which came by one Man singularly and entred into all the world universally whereas actual sins are by many men neither enter they into all the world in general but rather into these and those particulars therein yea it is Sin simply absolutely properly formally For as himself grants this Sin had its beginning by the disobedience of Adam and disobedience is a transgression of a Law and that 's the very formality of Sin and that law was the law of the Image or of perfect Nature Now see Sir I beseech you what is here but in the least shew whereby to collect this sin to be Metonymically so called or what kind of Metonymie would he have it is it a Metonymie of the cause put for the effect So it seems he would have it because it is the effect of one sin Surely that one sin was a proper and real cause how strange is it then That it should beget an effect like to it in no thing but in a Tropical or Tralatitious an equivocal and abusive name if by the cause for the effect be meant Sin but for the Punishment how contrary is that to St. Pauls express words Sin entred into the world and death by Sin so far is he from confounding them that in most express manner he distinguishes between them both in name and signification For should his words be made to signifie thus Death that is the punishment entered by Sin that is the punishment Death the punishment of the punishment I beseech you what sense were this yet we grant though it is not so to be argued from the word in this place Original Sin is both a Sin and a punishment too A sin from the humane injustice perverting a punishment from the Divine Justice deserting Or will he have it a Metonymie of the Effect put for the Cause for so his other words intimate because it is the cause of many sins and those many sins without doubt he means properly so called then seems it so much the more strange and almost prodigious that so many real effects should proceed from a poorly equivocal and transnominated cause Rhetoricians observe that such kind of Metonymies are usual in external causes
and effects only that an internal cause then should be put for an external effect must needs be most unusual Entred into the World We may understand this Entrance of Sin in divers senses and that very Orthodoxally 1. Sin was not in the beginning for it had no being before the Entring and therefore was no eternal evil principle but only the issue of some inordinate and irregular Act. 2. It entered not as a creature or substance that had some existence in it self but as a vicious accident that could not subsist without a Subject in which it must inhere And therefore though it entred into our Nature and substance yet our nature and Substance it was not 3. It entered not of it self but by means by one man by a second cause Therefore himself grants Sin had its beginning and thence let the fault and guilt be fetcht causally what need is there to seek further than the beginning why then is there such prying into the first cause such disputing such labouring to entitle hereunto his Decreeing his ordaining and permitting disposing dispensing c. For so indeed the most we do is bus to disparage and dishonour him in his glorious Titles and Attribut It is enough for us to beleeve him to be just wise good c. in all things because he cannot possibly be otherwise although in some dispensations it is not possible for us to comprehend him 4 If entred into Loe the Apostle speaks plainly of an ingression not as of an accession of a thing inward and not outward only doubtless then it must needs be something inherent and not imputed only 5. It entred into the World {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} it came into even the reduplicated praeposition is a note of more intimate and peculiar manner of introduction namely by way of Generation and Propagation not by Temptation nor by Imitation not by Temptation for so it came from the Devil to Eve not by Imitation for so it came from Eve to Adam but by Propagation for so it came from Adam to us all Had it been otherwise than so Sin could not in any adaptness or propriety have been said to have Entred into the world but the world must then have caused it and called it and sought it and brought it and taught it to it self And death by Sin that is to say by the same Sin which came into the world by one Man namely the Original So then death it is that cannot be denied But now men must be Judges and take upon them to determine what kind of death albeit the Apostle speak it never so indefinitely He must mean temporal death says he well and thus he may inferr it because St. Paul speaks of such a Death as entred into this world and that 's but temporal But then he ought to observe withall that St. Paul speaks here not only of Deaths first Entrance but of Deaths through passage now such a passage is out of the world and beyond it and so must be eternal But he objects eternal death did not pass upon all men That 's easie to be answered from some of his own words The Sentence did though the Execution did not in the one was the Divine Justice to be magnified and his Mercy in the other Thus the Divine Attributes know how to save and to exalt themselves on either side if men would not seek to make them seem to clash by humbling those high things to their low and weak apprehensions And so Death passed upon all men sc. Death entred by Sin and so by Sin Death passed So that whether we consider the terminus a quo or ad quem we may directly hence collect that Death even the coporal as well as the eternal was not the sequel or necessity of Nature but even the penalty and wages of Sin because death is a separation quite contrary to the natural union especially to that of Nature in her integrity and original perfection But say that because of a composition and that of contrary Elements there might be nevertheless some kind of mutation migration melioration yet this was far from separation dissolution confusion and that dolorous and ignominious execrable and damnable This makes me I cannot so well brook or digest those passages of his His Sin left him to his Nature we returned to the state of meer nature of our prime creation thrust back to the form of Nature was remanded to his mortal natural State means he to a corrupt state of Nature that was not the former or from the prime Creation or means he by the form of Nature that of Natures first forming why that was after the Divine Image and similitude or means he by meer Nature those they call Pure Naturals which indeed are nothing because Nature cannot be so abstractly considered but either in the state of Integrity or in the state of Corruption a third state before between of after those two never was and therefore is not to be imagined Ever since the Fall and Original Sin we aptly conceive that there is a difference still to be made betwixt the substance of Nature and the corruption of Nature But that this Nature and this corruption was ever separated in any Christ only excepted we beleeve not or that there shall be a State of pure Naturals again till the Resurrection of the Dead We all know and beleeve Adam by his disobedience defected and fell from what he was before sc. from the Image and Original Righteousness but that by his Sin he fell into a Nature or state which he had before or without original righteousness that we understand not not yet of any remanding obtruding or returning thither Indeed we read God said Dust thou art and to Dust thou shalt return Gen. 3. 19. but that noted only some materials in part but no certain state neither had that dust returned to the dust but that the Image and righteousness was forfeited and lost For we see it was so not by a natural propensity so much as by a provoked Commination Besides this methinks he says something to oppose himself in this part when he says our Nature is of Gods making and consequently is good or Nature is almost the same c. What good and yet punished nay and we remanded to it for a punishment What almost the same in goodness and yet nothing the same in immortality and the blessing Thus here again Gods Justice is brought upon the Stage nay and upon the rack too especially by our scanning betwixt the two Terms of Death entring by one man and Death passing upon all men For we cry why the punishment and how of all for one so forth Mean while it is not considered by us Nay not believed how we were all in the lump loyns of that one which remains hereafter to be demonstrated only thus much is now to be said That while the Divine Attributes are pretended for saved harmless by us either
we our selves doe it or else give occasion for others to quarrel at them For that all have sinned This clause thus translated was greedily snatch'd at of old to extenuate and excuse the severity of Deaths universal passing and not only so but to alter and divert the cause and guilt from the Original Sin to the Actual For this cause the Antients did either reject this Translation or did not so wel accept it But I am to speak of this our Paraphrast whose words by reason of this Translation are imposing on the Apostle if he means eternal Death he must not mean that it came for Adams sin but in as much as all men have sinned that is upon all those upon whom eternal death did come it came because they also have sinned and again in passing on us For that all have sinned that is the sin was reckoned to all not to make them guilty like Adam but Adams Sin pas'd upon all imprinting this real calamity on us all but yet death descended also upon Adam's posterity for their own Sins for since all did Sin all should die His also once and again seems to admit of original sin for her share in this reckoning but his in asmuch quite thrusts it out brings in actual sin in its stead Actual sin I say is obtruded and Original sin excluded at least for propriety for guilt for imputation for likeness for equality Yet I shall not therefore reject this Translation because I see our Church hath accepted it and shall hope to make it stand good in this sense For that all have sinned that is sinned Originally although not Actually sinned naturally in Adams Sin although as yet not personally or in their own and am confident he is not ignorant I can find Abettors for this exposition amongst the reformed and Orthodox Expositors far before him But Sir if you will be pleased to look upon the Margin which I suppose he winked at know it is pointed at by our Church as a note of equal indifferency and authority and there you find in whom all have sinned this speaks plainly of sinning not actually in our selves but originally in Adam and this Translation is every whit as much and rather more congruous to the Original Text for my part I rather embrace this latter Translation with most Translaters or Interpreters old or late And with them conceive it to be the safer as not giving such way to the Errors of the Pelagians old or new Nay I hold it to be the sounder and more consonant to the very Letter for why should {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} be translated so flatly in the Neuter Gender when 't is found so Emphatically in the Masculine being it may with so close and so apt Concotd be referred to the One Man spoken of before for construe it in the Masculine and the Relative fairly agrees with the proximate and eminent Antecedent but take it in the Neuter and then the Relative is without any Antecedent at all or else must be turned into some obscurer and less significant part of speech Erasmus who labours like a Critick to draw it this other way would not allow of St. Augustines referring it to Sin because of the different gender though he confesses it to be the same in sense to say in which Man or in which Sin As for Erasmus whom all have occasion to honour from the Cradle to the Crown of learning him this Author recommends to us more precisely to be reckoned amongst the greatest and the best Expositors of Scripture that any age since the Apostles and their immediate Successors hath brought forth as for the learned Grotius whom he reckons with him I only say thus much As he was a most eminent Adversary to the Socinian so he was sometimes a not approved Advocate of the Arminian both which are reproved for their opinions about Original sin But on Gods name let him add all he can to Erasmus yet I would not have him detract any thing from St. Augustin which thing was sometime charged upon Erasmus himself both are to be mentioned with honour as the Worthies of their Ages And therefore all he hath said had it been more should have past for me without exception had he spoken it at another time and upon another place For upon on this place he cannot but know That Erasmus hath not only been suspected but taxed even by learned men of his own time and religion for more than I now think fit to express only as to the clause nay and whole verse in hand Erasmus is much contending for a Tropologie and peradventure hence it was that he hinted his Metonymie But for all his Rhetorick he turns Grammarian and plaies the Critick betwixt {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} and {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} and will hardly be perswaded of {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} for {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} in the Dative Case yet at length acknowledges Because the use of Greek Prepositions are so various I dare not affirm that {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} is no where joyned with a Dative Case where one thing is declared to be in another like as the Tree is in the seed A most apt similitude to illustrate our being in Adam and our sinning in him too Were it not for this his confession places of such construction were easie to be produced but I spare them as likewise his propter unum his pervasit his quatenus peccavimus which also might be of a facile connivence were it not in case of dangerous consequence and contention besides my task is to pursue not his but this Authors paraphrase Verse 13. For until the Law Sin was in the World but sin is not imputed where there is no Law FOr until the Law Sin was in the world That is from the beginning of the world all that time which went before until that very period wherein the Law was externally promulgated Sin was nevertheless even all that while in the world For the Apostle so speaks now with intent to occur to a certain objection an Objection not so much of mens Mervail or Scruple but rather of their Petulancy and Cavillation an objection that indeed hath been always but too much inculcated by the Adversaries of Original Sin Thus Where there is no Law there is no transgression But there is no Law given against Original Sin Ergo This is it which the Apostle here prevents by saying Sin was in the world during all that space of time which went before the giving or promulging of the Law of Moses notwithstanding it was not a Sin without a Law but so it was by vertue of the Law of Nature the rule of original righteousness the dictates of right reason the eternal moral Law the Law written in Mens hearts before it was written in Tables of stone For Original sin was not so much forbidden convinced condemned by
as being the eternal Law and eternally existing in the divine mind yea and more or less imprinted in the minds and consciences of Men from the beginning The Law therefore being before the Sin there was no time of the world after Sin wherein Sin was not imputed But much adoe is here made by the means of distinguishing or diversifying Questions viz. whether this imputing of Sin be by God or by men whether it be of Original Sin or of actual whether it be by the eternal and natural or by the written and published Law whether it be of the fault and corruption or of the guilt and punishment whether it be to penalty temporal or eternal whether this imputation be of our own sins or anothers Whether this imputation be distinguished or divided from inherence Thus we trouble our selves and one another and the Truth betwixt us with many a Fallacy of Division whereas much error were to be avoided by taking both together in a conjoyned sense and the Truth were easily determined in all those questions or in most part of any of the questions by accepting both parts indifferently even the one as well as the other As to speak only to this Authors words or divided Propositions The Apostle he saith speaketh here of Sin imputed therefore not of Sin inherent Not so by his leave for the Apostle speaks not here of any distinction at all betwixt imputed and inherent sin but of Sin indefinitely and universally and that imputed only by a Law now the Law properly imputes Sin be it never so properly inherent as in actual sins though they be inherent yet the Law properly does but impute them So in Original Sin the Law does impute it yet so as it is inherent So that in one or other the Sin is nevertheless inherent for being imputed nor imputed for being inherent And if imputed to such purposes as he here speaks of viz. to Temporal Death then it is neither a Sin properly nor yet imputable so eternal so far as is or can be implyed by the Apostles words Yes yes the contrary to all his in every purpose is not only implyed but apparent from the Apostles words For the Apostle speaks of Death indefinitely without any limitation to these or those purposes and that 's an universal implying all kinds of Death Besides Death here by Adam must so be taken as proportionably extending to the-life by Christ otherwise wrong is done to the whole comparison and consequently to all our Saviours Attributes Now the life we are here said to gain by the Excellency of Christ is not only a corporal life opposite to a temporal death but a justification of life opposite to a spiritual Death and a reigning in life opposite to an eternal Death Whensoever another mans sin is imputed to his relative therefore becaeuse it is anothers and imputed it can goe no further but to effect certain evils to afflict the relative but to punish the cause not formally to denominate the descendant or relative to be a Sinner So he saith again to which thus much is to be said That what perhaps may be congruously spoken betwixt one particular man and another is very inconsutile to be said betwixt Adam and all Mankind Betwixt Man and Man we know the Descendants of Traitors and Vassals in relation to their progenitors offences are punish'd though they were not formally the Offenders And therefore such words may say something in respect of proximate Parents and of relatives yet living upon whom their condition may reflect and to whom their example may be usefull but in relation betwixt the prime Parent and us his descendants they say nothing at all For he was not punished for our Sins but we for his neither was he punished in our punishment but we in his neither was his simply another mans sin but ours also neither was it imputed only but inherent also neither were we Relatives only but accessories only neither were we Descendants only but participants all this is to be understood of the Common nature union and representation and therefore here was enough to denominate us formally to be Sinners But I cannot but wonder at such a restrictive largness in the saying Another mans sin imputed therefore because it is anothers and imputed For the Sin or the crime to be imputed therefore because it is imputed and for the evil or punishment to be inflicted for another mans sin therefore because it is anothers this is horrid to think of even in Men what is it then to urge in such a case as this where it cannot but reflect even upon God himself But about this imputation he yet urges Nor Reason nor Sciptures nor Religion does enforce and no Divine attribute does permit that we should say that God did so impute Adams sin to his posterity that he did really esteem them to be guilty of Adams sin equally culpable equally hatefull though this latter part be said but by few yet this Scripture in hand inforces us to say That God did really esteem them to be guilty of Adams Sin in whom all have sinned that is really sinned and by whose disobedience they were made Sinners sc. really so made if he did so only impute as not really and verily esteem guilty what kind of imputation I pray was that imaginative opinionative suspitious pretensive presumptive conjectural phantastical equivocal abusive or as are his own words figurative Metonymical collateral indirect this we are sure no Reason no Scripture no Religion no Divine Attribute will permit to say so But because he wil have us say equally culpable equally hatefull c. we will say it in the most convenient sense we may be equally culpable in our common nature equally hatefull in our Natural Sin the same Malice of our Nature the same action of our Nature as much guilty as he according to that universal nature wherein he comprised and represented us all and so much he is not unknowing all Religions primitive and latter Protestant and Papists have said not without reason and Scripture nor is any Attribute of God to be objected there against But to suppose that we have sinned take us truly as in our Nature union mass root stock c. less than he or That God imputed this Sin lesse to us than to him this say we is but supposition and that is far from probation and therefore we would fain learn that Analogie of Faith those Words of Scripture that proportion and Notice of the Divine Attributes that would inforce us to suppose so much But I return to the Apostles supposition who here supposes that there was no time of the world since the First mans fall wherein there was not a Law and sin and the imputation How is it then that he says of Mankind They did do actions unnatural and vile enough but yet these sins were not yet so imputed were they indeed unnatural and vile and yet not so imputed upon what ground then does
is upon the Sons of Adam from the day that they goe out of their Mothers womb till the day that they return to the Mother of all things would not be so grievous or so unequal to their apprehensions But they would soon be convinc'd to lay their hands upon their mouths yea would be content to say every man for himself This is my Yoak the image of the earthy and I will bear it I will bear the indignation of the Lord because I have sinned against him which is never to be brought to passe if we once go about to unyoak our selves of the Sin But whether we will do so or no God will be true when all men are found Lyers his ways will be proved equal when our ways are reproved for unequal and wisdom will be justified and cleared when she is judged though no flesh living can be justified in her sight The very punishment and infliction from God is sufficient to argue the sin and guilt in us For Death reigned by one not only by one man in the Masculine as he spake immediately before but by one in the Neuter one Sin for death could never so have reigned by the one Man had it not been by the one sin Yet see how he would labour to bring the Original punishment on our heads that will not admit us to bring the Original Sin so much as upon our Shoulders For so he supposes it If the sin of Adam alone could bring death upon the world who by imitation of his transgression on the stock of their own natural choice did sin against God though not after the similitude of Adams transgression How says he no Sin but in imitation no punishment but for imitation he knows full well whose exploded heresie that was and therefore shall do very well to renounce both name and thing at once But how agree his own words to themselves sinning by imitation and yet not after the similitude of Adams transgression which cannot genuinely no nor conveniently be interpreted but of sinning actually and by imitation yea let it be understood of sinning less than he did yet so it is by imitation Again Sinning on the stock of their own natural choice and yet not sinning after the similitude of Adams transgression Why how sinned Adam but out of the stock of his own natural choice And how sinned we in him but out of the stock of his natural choice for indeed he was our natural stock and we were the branches thereof And it was he that received the whole stock of Natures choice liberty Free will and consent for himself and likewise for us all and out of this stock of natural choice and liberty it was that we sinned not only by him but in him and with him wherefore I heartily wish him to be wary how he exempts sinning after the similitude of Adams transgression and sinning on the stock of our own natural choice each from other lest he impâ—ir that stock and overthrow that Rock of liberty and Free will which against both Supralapsarians and Sublapsarians he laboured ere while so earnestly to establish and so prove to strike upon them and himself and the Divine Attributes all at once But to remedy all this here it is not only by one Man who had his personal choice but by one sin wherein was our natural choice and therefore let us go on to see what the Apostle inferrs and preferrs in such a case How much more they which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousnesse shall reign in life by one Iosus Christ sc. Though Death reigned much both by one man and by one sin yet by one Christ they shall reign much more But then they must be duely qualified for it is They which receive and that argues no capacity no ability in them notwithstanding the blemish of Orginal sin for thereby they were under Death's reign which was spiritual and not corporal only and held under the power and utter slavery of Sin as well as Death rather it convinces them of their privation and impotence as not having but as they receive yet notwithstanding such emptiness and unaptness being prepared and embled by Christs abundance they must receive that is rightly apply Grace sc. the grace of justification by Faith and likewise the Gift of Righteousness sc. the sanctification of the Spirit to holy walking And both these they shall have both in their kinds and measures sc. abundance namely for sufficiency but not to supererogation And so they shall reign in life sc. from Vassals under Sin and Death become Free-men nay Kings in life both of Grace and Glory And all this not of themselves nor for any worthiness of their own but by the sole merits and mediation of one Iesus Christ who is God all-sufficient and besides whom there is no Saviour All these Excellencies of Remedy put together serve but to set forth the destituteness and desperateness of the Disease Verse 18. Therefore as by the offence of one Iudgement came upon all men to condemnation even so by the righteousness of one the Free gift came upon all men unto justification of life THerefore as by the offence of one man judgement came upon all men c. This 18 verse by the illative seems to me rather to refer to the 16 verse than to any of the rest and may thence more expresly and peculiarly be supplyed Howbeit the Comparison was there with more precise respect to the Things huâ— here to the persons Therefore then the illative is a reduplicate and concludes so much the stronger as by the offence of one man or by one offence whether the primordial Act of his person or the original stain of our Nature judgement of the Divine Decree so wise so just came upon all men all common men and born after the ordinary way of Nature not the blessed Virgin none but Christ himself excepted unto condemnation at least from his sentence and according to our desert even so by the righteousnesse of his person natures offices the Free gift of grace and salvation came upon all men sufficiently yea and effectually too upon all the faithfull For he is the Saviour of all men especially of those that beleeve unto justification of life sc. that life which only the justified or which by justification only all men attain unto And here I have only those words of his to except against The proportion and comparison lies in the mayn emanation of death from one and life from the other That certainly it does not if we look at the Comparison no further than as it lies in the present verse for here the main proportion and comparison is betwixt the offence of one and the righteousness of one both here and throughout the whole Comparison Sin and Grace the offence and the free-gift these are the main opposites as being the principal causes The other two Death and Life are but secondarily set opposite as being but the consequents
Man can doe a Child can doe What God is able to doe c. the Devil is able to doe c. Whereas our manner of arguing is not in matter of power and prevalency but for matter of being and reallity Now betwixt the greater and the lesse though there may be a disproportionate action yet there must be some proportionate being And what is affirmed of the greater may likewise be affirmed of the lesser and that in the same kind and manner although not according to the same measure or degree yea very Opposites and and Disparates if they come to be compared are accepted as opposite and different only in their proper forms and adjuncts but alike and agreeing in their common Attributes according to which they are compared and without which there could be no ground for comparison And where there is no ground for Collation there can be no cause for prelation as here in the Apostles worlds Take away the reallity of Sin and the Proper being of the offence and in such a comparison with what excesse or excellency can the Grace the Free-gift Iustification and the righteousnesse of Christ be preferred thereunto There 's nothing now remaining but to put it into an Hypothetical Syllogism and so to leave it concluding without all Fallacy according to his own condition viz. If we be made really righteous by Christ then we were made really Sinners by Adam But we are made really righteous by Christ Ergo And thus worthy Sir though I cannot presume my self to be one of those wise persons he speaks of yet this I presume that I am not unwarily perswaded by this way of arguing neither can I out of my simplicity observe that it is this way but rather his own whole way of arguing that appears unconcluding But let it be with your own judgement how we either of us appear to you from what we have said 2. For the Church TO this objection That his Doctrine is against the 9th Article in the Church of England He saith I have already answered it in some additional Papers which are already published I would I might have had the opportunity to have seen them supposing they may contain some kind of Apologie which might have saved me the labour of an Additional in this latter part But for what I here see he must give me leave for to speak as that he may see That in judgement though not in Charity we are Two His zeal for the Church of England seems to be such and so much that he is protesting before hand against all that shall but seem to suspect it But he is indigning him in especial that shall take upon him to tax him for it in the least degree I hope this will not overprovoke his patience only to intreat him First to reconcile his own understanding to his subscription and then his own words to the words of the Article First A faithfull subscription of a dutifull Son of the Church is to submit his understanding and consent simply unto her suffrage And to under-write with hand and heart her Articles and Canons accepted in their plain literal sense And not to bring to them nor yet reserve from them any other understanding or intention of his own Laws we say are to be interpreted and accepted according to the mind of the Law-givers and a promissary Oath ought to be performed according to the intention of him to whom the promise is made Now for him to say I have oftentimes subscribed that Article and I am ready a thousand times to subscribe that Article and yet to say again I doe not understand the words of that Article as most men doe but I understand them as they can be true and as they can very fairly signifie and as they agree with the word of God and right reason What kind of subscription call you this with such a liberty or reservation a man might have without all scruple taken the Protestation the Covenant the Engagement or an Oath of Abjuration But whom means he by those most men certainly not the Adversaries of the Church who refuse to subscribe them But the Sons of the Church his brethren who have subscribed them as well as he The Adversaries though they consent for the most part to the Doctrine yet they refuse to subscribe the Article meerly because it is our Churches But as it is the Churches so we that are Sons and Brethren doe with one understanding simply subscribe it nor doe we make our own conditions by way of exception but we take them all in an undoubted concession For we also understand the words of the Article as they can be true and as they can fairly signifie and that is even in their literal and grammatical sense And likewise as they agree with the Word of God and right reason for so we suppose them in the sense aforesaid And although we confesse with him that the Church used an incomparable wisdom and temper in composing her Articles both with respect to New-reformists and Non-conformists too notwithstanding we believe her Prudence and Piety was such that she intended not so to secure the outward Peace of the Church against either as that the Truth of it in either part might be prejudiced thereby much less that she contrived any thing in such a charitable latitude as to give license to any for passing the rectitude and arctitude of Verity or that any one should presume upon his private and dissentaneous opinion notwithstanding her publique and unanimous Judgement It was discovered by some of themselves that when the Councel of Trent compleated her Canons of Original Sin and many particulars of them appearing so consonant to the Scriptures and to Orthodox Antiquity yet they studied to compile the whole with such Artifice as that notwithstanding they might leave to their own Scholasticks a liberty of disputing and opining what they pleased But I trust the like shall never be said of the Church of England either as touching this or any other of her Articles and for my part I conceive it to be a truer part of a Son of the Church rather to restrain his sense to her words than to strain or enlarge her words to his own sense Secondly As concerning this Article of Original birth or Sin or Birth-Sin in as much as he says if I had cause to dissent from it I would certainly doe it in those just measures which my duty on the one side and the interest of truth on the other would require of me Hereupon I am very willing to beleeve him on his own word as liking exceeding well of his ingenious Confession I have no cause to disagree and not much misliking his resolution I will not suffer my self to be supposed to be of a differing judgement from my dear Mother which is the best Church of the world Wherefore I shall doe no more which is the least that can be done in an appearing difference but set down the
or effects And this I note that Christs excellency might appear much more in remedying the cause than in removing the effect only Verse 19. For as by one Mans disobedience many were made Sinners so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous FOr as by one man's disobedience many were made Sinners here concludes the comparison betwixt Adam and Christ and he says well this is the sum of all for 't is the principal scope of the Holy Ghost to prefer Christ making righteous to Adam making sinners And therefore he saith yet better we are made much more righteous by Christ than we were sinners by Adam and yet best of all the graces we derive from Christ shall be more and mightier than the corruption and declination by Adom because the excess and excellency of Christ appeareth much more in taking away the Sin and corruption than in a delivering from the misery and mortality of Original Sin And therefore the Apostle in this case and comparison concludes it for his greatest glory in making Sinners righteous above that of making the miserable happy or bringing those that were subject to Death to reign in life saying thus as the sum of all as by one mans disobedience Adams prime and personal Act with all the affections and circumstances Many {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} the many that is all for none that ordinarily proceeded out of his loyns are to be excepted were made Sinners from and in that very Act not only imputed and accounted but constituted and really so effected And so the very word is used both by St. Paul in this place and by St. Peter 2 Pet. 1. 8. and by St. Iames Iam. 4. 4. to signifie the very being of the thing and not the bare reckoning only And we may take his own construction of the word put into the order of sinners but then we understand it of the humane and natural order as by generation and propagation and the like but not of the divine and eternal order as made such by Gods appointment It stranges me still that he who even now was so vehemently invective against both Supralapsarians and Sublapsarians upon the account of the horrible and necessitating Decree in this case of Original Sin as reproving their supposition if it be by the Decree of God by his choice and constitution that it should be so c. and again if God may ordain men to Hell for Adams Sin which is derived to them by Gods only constitution c. And now for all that that himself is here saying many were constituted or put into the order of sinners they were made such by Gods appointment to speak altogether so like them Is this the way I pray you to vindicate the Divine Attributes against them nor will such an exception salve it at all to say not that God could be the Author of a Sin to any but that he appointed the evil which is the consequent of Sin to be upon their heads who descended from the Sinner For though Sin and the Sinner may be put for the punishment and the punished in some other places of Scripture yet can neither be so understood or accepted in this to the Romans because the Sin and the punishment both are here noted again and again in their proper plain and distinct expressions and comparisons Neither is there truth much lesse safety to the Divine Attributes to speak in such a sense as that God appointed by his Decree the evil of punishment and misery which is the consequent of Sin anothers and not their own to be upon their heads outwardly and temporally though the pravity was never in their hearts who descended from the Sinner and yet descended not Sinners themselves For thus though he labours not to speak out a man of any strict observation or narrow search must needs accept him and the rather because of former passages to this purpose not a few besides what necessity is there to wrap in here the divine constituting either for sin or suffering where the humane constituting is so evident so sufficient It is but asking by whom or by what were many made sinners and the answer is here already made to our hands by one Mans disobedience to bid us satisfie all our curiosity in that and to seek no further for a constituting cause nor indeed will the whole Analogie endure it For the total comparison is not betwixt God and Christ but betwixt Christ and Adam neither is all this excesse or excellence of State wherein Christ constituted us above that wherein Adam destituted us spoken with any respect to God but in a direct and compleat respect to Adam only So by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous By the obedience both active and passive of one Lord Jesus Christ who alone is sufficient to satisfie for all sins original and actual shall many even all the Elect all that beleeve be made righteous made as himself says well and constituted righteous And we hope he means really righteous by the Spirits imparting as well as Christs imputing else where were all this contrariety of the Comparison For what excesse or excellency were it to make a thing really righteous if it was not really sinfull and corrupt before and righteous that is not only happy but holy withall And therefore the Sinners must needs be understood not only as miserable and afflicted but as declined and corrupted and so signifying we joyn with him as we have already approved him in what he says to the end of the Paraphrase Nevertheless we may not doe so as touching the Consequents or Antecedents thereof Therefore 1. As to the Antecedents HIs Position which he intimates in opposition to the Objection is That to deny original sin to be a sin properly and inherently is not expresly against the words of St. Paul in the 5 chapter to the Romans And for this he hath these sayings For as for reasons he hath more reason than to call them so 1. He supposes the words are capable of interpretation otherwise than is vulgarly pretended Now I suppose that the interpretation of the Primitive Churches Councils Fathers Papists Protestants Lutherans Calvinists and the most learned and moderate of them is of other account with him than either as vulgar or as pretended Yea a reason or the Maior of it is propounded by him For any interpretation that does violence to right reason to Religion to holinesse of life and the divine Attributes of God is therefore to be rejected and another chosen True but then it remains on his part to be proved That such an Interpretation as is contrary to his understandiug does so in all or in some one of them at least And withall that an Interpretation of his own understanding be not such in all or any one of them 2. Sin in the Scripture is taken for the punishment what then it is not so here nor in more than hundreds of