while they were in their loins may justly follow go there guilt did go before The major is proved in that all punishment is for some fault whereof the person punished was some way guilty Obj. It sufficeth that another were guilty of it Answ One mans sin deserveth not another mans punishment further than that other doth some way participate in the guilt Only we must distinguish between guilt by personal commission or omission and guilt by moral and reputative or by natural participation Only Adam or other Parents were guilty by personal commission or omission as to those particular sins but we are guilty by natural participation in that we derive all our nature and personal being from persons so guilty And we are guilty by reputative participation of the sins of mankind in Adam and of the Societies that we are members of quoad nudum meritum still in that we are justly reputed to consent to partake of the benefits or penalties of such Societies when we voluntarily become and continue members of them Obj. Christ himself was justly punished and yet was not guilty of our sin Answ He was not guilty by commission or by natural participation but he had an analogical guilt by reputative participation that is by his own voluntary sponsion putting himself quoad poenam in the room of finners but mark the limitation it was but quoad poenam that he undertook this task viz. that though he were not properly guilty yet he consented to suffer as if he were guilty for the sakes of them that were So that his own consent was a just cause of the derivation of the penalty to his own person which did not commit the sin and so that analogical guilt was instead of proper guilt It may well he said that Christ was guilty ad poenam as obliged to punishment in that his own consent was sufficient to induce an obligation to punishment Obj. May not God's pleasure bring on us a reputative guilt of Adam's sin and not of our neerer Parents seeing he hath absolute power over us and therefore his will may serve instead of our consent as the will of a Parent may be instead of the infants will Answ God bringeth not guilt on any by efficiency or making them such as deserve punishment but by imputation and adjudication Otherwise God should be the cause of sin as sin for so to make guilty is to make a man really a sinner Our Parents may will sin and so may do it for us because we are seminally in them but God cannot will sin Our Parents by willing it do first become sinners themselves and then convey the guilt to us but so cannot God It being therefore but by reputation and adjudication that he judgeth men so guilty of sin it is apparent that his judgment must have some ground in the nature of the thing and the man must be guilty before God judge him so for his judgment is according to truth And therefore it must needs be that there must be some reason in our selves why Adam's sin should be judged ours or why we should be judged liable to punishment for it and that must be because we derive our natures from him And then there is the same reason for our guilt of neerer Parents sin save only that God hath since more freed us from the danger of that suffering which by such sins we might have undergone as he pardoneth to us Adam's imputed sin also The minor of the Argument will be anon cleared in the following Arguments Obj. It is indeed a punishment that is due to children for their Parents sins but it is only to the Parents that it is formally punishment and to themselves it is but materially so and so but affliction because the sin and so the guilt was only the Parents though the child be the subject of the suffering Answ 1. If this were granted it would still hold good that God may justly lay that suffering which is materially punishment upon children for the sins of immediate Parents 2. If this were so then it will equally follow that we may not be formally but materially punished for Adam's sin seeing the reason is manifested to be the same 3. I have shewed that there must be some reason on the part of the sufferer why he should suffer for another mans sin Now with us in the present case it is evident that the reason is because we are their seed and have our natures from them go this is a less-perfect or analogical guilt Obj. God doth inflict sufferings on the beasts for mans sin without any cause on their part go he may do so by infants Answ 1. God is not the Rector of Beasts in a moral proper sense but only in a natural improper sense as a Pilot ruleth a Ship or an Herdsman Cattel And therefore he hath made no Law for them nor hath engaged his fidelity to them concerning the conditions of their happiness or misery as he hath done to man And therefore bruits are not capable of sin or punishment though they be of suffering So that childrens case and theirs do differ 2. Yet when the bruits suffer for mans sin it is because of their relation to man And therefore children must suffer because of their relation which is natural and so neer that it makes them truly capable of guilt So that according to the subject the same suffering receives a various form and denomination and so doth the obligation In the personal committers of the sin there is guilt and punishment due to them in the primary fullest and most proper sense on the children that were then in their loins it is guilt and punishment more imperfectly as by analogy of attribution in the bruits when sacrificed or destroyed for their Masters sin it is but equivocally guilt and punishment I shall proceed to some Texts of Scripture Arg. 9. Deut. 28. 18. Cursed shall be the fruit of thy body Children are cursed for the sins of immediate Parents go punished Obj. It is only to the Parents that it is a punishment Answ True in the primary sense but as the children participate of their nature so also of the nature of guilt and punishment It is a threatning of natural evil to a rational creature because of a moral evil which he hath some participation of go it is by participation a true punishment Obj. You may as well say that the bruits and inanimates are punished for they are here cursed too Answ This was answered even now The same evil threatned against a bruit is no punishment which threatned against a reasonable creature is a punishment because of their different capacities Obj. The meaning of the Text is but this Thou shalt be denied the desired fruit of tby body i. e. your women shall be barren Answ That may be part of the meaning but as that is not the full proper sense of the words so is there no reason from the Text for limiting it to
of his eating the forbidden fruit if we are guilty only of his first sin For that was not the first His unbelief of God and believing the Serpent and others more did go before it 3. Yea the sins that Adam committed after the Promise do in their nature deserve our sufferings as much as the first though that desert had a remedy provided If any still reduce all to God's meer will and say that it was his will in his first actions to deal with Adam as the root of mankind but not in his later sins I must expect till they bring some proof of such a will of God or such a Law and still say that the will and law of God doth not make sinners of innocent men nor make sinners no sinners any otherwise than by pardoning and sanctifying them So that 〈◊〉 were as much in Adam after the promise as before and his sin was of the same demerit naturally and therefore we are as well guilty of that as of the first And then for the consequent it is acknowledged by most of those whom we now oppose that we are equally related to Adam's later sins and to those of our neerer Parents I mean to all that Adam committed before the propagation of his Progeny And there are the same causes as is before manifested Though our neerer Parents were not the root of all mankind as Adam was yet are they as much a cause of us and our nature and of so much of mankind as spring from their loins as Adam was And all the progeny of Cain did spring as truly from him as from Adam And all the World since the Flood were as truly in the loins of Noah as of Adam and so naturally equally interessed in their sins Arg. 4. If our natures may be corrupted more by the sins of our neerer Parents then may they be guilty by them as well as by Adam's But the antecedent I have before proved go The consequence depends on the fameness of the reasons that guilt and depravation should concur from our neerer Parents as well as from our first And it seems that participation in guilt is pre-requisite to the depravation of nature else it might seem some kind of injury to us that another should have power to make us so miserable Sin is commonly called the punishment of sin Arg. 5. If God may without any injustice bring death both temporal and eternal on the son of a sinner without intending it as a punishment to the Son for the Father's sin then may he also without injustice nay in justice inflict the same death as a penalty for the Father's sin But the antecedent is true as I prove thus 1. That which all Rulers may do without injustice that God may do without injustice But all Rulers may without injustice deprive the children of a Traytor or other offender of those enjoyments which the Father hath forfeited himself and which were to have been conveyed from the Father to the child if the Father had not forfeited them If a Traytor forfeit his Lands and Honours his Son is justly deprived of them though the Prince intend it not as a punishment to the Son Because the Father cannot convey to his Son that which he hath not himself as having lost it on his forfeiture and the Son hath no right to it when the Fathers right is gone So if a wicked man do forfeit his right to all blessings in this life or that to come he cannot convey a right to his Son which he had not himself And what other way should that Son have such a right unless God should give it him which he is or was free to do or not It 's true that God by a new covenant hath given this everlasting life to believers but that 's not to all nor doth that deny them to be guilty of their Parents sin before nor yet that it deserveth death still as to its nature and might bring it were it not pardoned 2. God hath no obligation on him according to the Law of works to give health peace or any blessing in this life much less eternal glory to the son of a sinner 2. And for the consequence 1. It is evident from what is said that God cannot be charged with hard or cruel dealing in regard of any wrong that we should suffer if he punish us thus by deprivation for our Parents sins for if it be no cruelty to do the same thing upon the meer occasion of their sins which is unquestionable then it is no cruelty to do it in respect to their sin as the deserving cause 2. And for the point of justice as it is already proved to be non injustum so it may be proved to be justum thus Where there is a real participation in the sin there it is just that there should be a participation in the punishment because of that sin But we did really participate in the sin as of Adam so of our neerer Parents go For the minor they that were seminally in them though not by personal existence did really participate with them in their sin But we were seminally in them go This will be further confirmed in that which followeth Arg. 6. If we should have been guilty of the sin of our neerest Parents though Adam had never sinned then are we guilty of them now But the antecedent is true go Here I suppose that Adam had not sinned and our neerest Parents had If any say this is not to be supposed I answer Though it may not be affirmed to have so been yet we may in dispute suppose it had been Nor have I yet seen it proved that God made any such promise to Adam as to confirm all his posterity on condition that he did not commit that or any sin If Adam had begot a posterity no better than himself was in his first created perfection and under the same Law then they would have been peceable and mutable as he was and liable to the same penalty upon their sin as he was But Adam would have begot a posterity no better than himself for ought we can find by Scripture which no where promiseth him a better that is an immutable or indesectible posterity and they would have been under the same Law for it was suited to their perfect nature go From what is said the antecedent is evident For if we should have been as much in our neerest Parents as we were in Adam and they have been under the same Law then their sin would have brought on us the same guilt and punishment For example if Cain had been the first sinner and Seth had been innocent the posterity of Cain would have been all guilty and corrupted as Adam's posterity now is For the same causes would have produced the same effects The consequence is clear in that Adam's sinning first can be no cause why we should not be guilty of the following sins of our neerer Parents which otherwise we
and our participation of his guilt is our original sin in a double sense 1. As he was the original of all mens sin 2. and as we are guilty of it from the original of our being But of Parents sin not all the world is guilty but their own posterity and that not as the first but as a secondary or neerer cause Sect. 17. IX That God hath made many promises to the seed of the faithful above all others is notorious in Scripture in the case of the blessed seed and sons of God before the flood and in the case of Sem Japhet Abraham Isaac Jacob and so on to the end But were there no more than the second Commandment and Exod. 34. 6 7 8. it would be justly past controversy And I have largely proved it to Mr. Tombs in two Books my Plain Scripture-proof and my More proof of infants Church-membership Sect. 18. X. The Apostle expresly saying else were your children unclean but now are they holy and this very supposition being the reason of our baptizing the children of some persons but not of all the World doth yet more exclude all reasonable do ubt with those that are for Infants Baptism Sect. 19. XI As to be baptized and taken into the Church is not the right of any infant meerly as a child of Adam redeemed for then we could make no difference nor meerly as they are elect for that we know not but as they are children of Believers dedicating them to God which is the condition of their right so not to have right to Baptism and its benefits is not the meer fruit of Adam's sin but of the Parents privative not-believing and not-dedicating them to God the controversies about pro-Parents is not pertinent to our business and need not stop us Here therefore is notorious a grand penalty of Parents sin on children for a penal privation it is Sect. 20. XII The true natural interest of Parents in their children now is as certain as Adam's in his off-spring We have our being as truly from them as from him and were as truly naturally in them as in him Sect. 21. XIII The promises to the children of Believers are more numerous and plain in Scripture than the promises to Adam's seed if he had stood Sect. 22. XIV The penal comminations against the seed of the wicked are so numerous and notorious in Scripture that it is a thousand pities that any Minister should not acknowledge them and the effects Even from Cain to Cham and the children of all the old World and of Sodom and so to the end And if there were no Texts to prove it but the two before-mentioned the second Commandment and Exod. 34. with Matth. 23. It 's sad that any Christian should deny it Sect. 23. XV. It is notorious in Scripture also as to the execution that God hath punished the children not only for Adam's but for the neerer Parents sins Which is true of all those drowned in the deluge as the assigned cause sheweth and of the seed of Cham and the Sodomites and the infants of the Amalekites and all the Nations destroyed by the command of God of Ishmael Esau the Egyptians Achan Gebezi and abundance more named after in this Dispute and recorded throughout the Scripture and the Jews were not ignorant of it when they said His blood be on us and our children nor the Disciples when they said Did this man sin or his Parents that he was born blind Job 9. The matter of fact is past all doubt and therefore the right Sect. 24. XVI It is daily notorious among us that the children of some wicked persons Adulterers Drunkards Gluttons idle persons c. have their bodily temper vitiated by propagation from their Parents by reason that the Parents had first by sin corrupted their own nature some have the pox some ideots some decrepit some otherwise diseased c. And to say that this is no punishment to the children or that it is only for Adam's sin is that which I will not do whatever any other may Sect. 24. XVII And it is certain that the minds of some such persons children are extraordinarily depraved some have natures extraordinarily lustful some furious some sensless and inconsiderate some slothful some false versatile and untrusty some mutable and unconstant some have appetites hardly to be restrained c. Yea and all the foresaid diseases of the body much tend to the evil of the soul And is all this no punishment or of none but Adam's sin Sect. 26. XVIII It is notorious that outward calamities in their estates and other accidents befall children for the Parents sins The sacrilegious perjured murderers and despisers of Parents seldom have a progeny that is not notably plagued for their sin And Divines should not teach Atheists to deny such judgments of God Sect. 27. XIX He that saith that children have no guilt of the sins of any Parents since Adam doth by consequence say that God neither ever did or will do or justly can punish any child in the least degree positively or privatively for any such Parents sin But he that dare so say is bolder and blinder than I would have any wise and holy Teachers of Christ's Flocks to be Sect. 28. XX. Holy men in Scripture were used in their sufferings to confess and lament the sins of their fore-fathers as the cause as I have after cited out of the Psalms Ezra Nehem. Daniel c. Sect. 29. By this and what followeth I have rendred to the Reader a true account and reason of my supposed dangerous opinion But nothing maketh me more wonder at my learned and worthy accuser than his O caecos ante Theologos quicunque unquam fuistis I had almost said It is more modest for me to say that my unacquaintedness with Grammar maketh me here not understand him than to suspect that so Learned an Academical Doctor among so many Learned men and Libraries can possibly mean as his words seem to import But modesty must not blind us And yet I am loth here to be tempted to waste so much of my little time to the wearying of my self and the Reader as the recital of the words of so many Divines as concurr with me in this opinion would require but a taste may serve to cure his admiration and vindicate Divines from his reproach Sect. 30. 1. Tertullian saith advers Marcion li. 2. c. 15. p. 467. c. 1. 1. Justitiam ergo primo judicis despice cujus si ratio constiterit tunc severitas per quae severitas decurrit rationi justitiae reputabuntur Ac ne pluribus immoremur asserite causas caeteras quoque ut sententias condemnetis excusate delicta ut judicia reprobetis Nolite reprehendere judicem sed revincite malum judicem nam etsi patrum delicta ex filiis exigebat duritia populi talia remedia compulerat ut vel posteritatibus suis prospicientes legi divinae obedirent Quis enim
them And if I had that as theirs first I must by the same reason have more of theirs And who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean And David's Mother is said to conceive him in sin Psal 51. 8. Let it be noted for answer to the objections from Ezek. 18. c. 1. That there is by the Covenant of Grace a pardon with right to Christ and Life freely given to all the faithful and their infant-seed as by them having full power thereto in Covenant given up to Christ Now no one is damned for pardoned sins The infant is at once guilty of Adam's and his Parents sin and at once his nature receiveth pravity from both but immediately only by the immediate Parents and at once both are pardoned to him and this pardon solemnly sealed and delivered in Baptism Therefore well may God say to the pardoned to the penitent and to the innocent that he shall not die for his Parents sins no not for Adam's 2. For the Text speaketh to the adult and to men that thought themselves innocent and that they suffered for their Parents sins and not their own And God assureth them 1. that if they are innocent they shall not die 2. yea if they be repenting persons and pardoned and obedient evangelically hating all the sins of their wicked Parents they shall live 3. yea this is true of their children also for their sakes But this is not because the Law never judged them guilty and worthy of death but because the Grace of Christ forgiveth it else the Text would exempt all infants from the guilty of death for Adam's sin But there is not a word in the Text to prove 1. that children need no pardon for their guilty of Parents sins 2. or that those that are not pardoned being themselves unsanctified or if adult live wickedly as their Parents did shall not die for them 3. or that such sins of Parents are not the cause of such guilt and pravity in the child as that he is truly said to die for his own sin Sect. 43. XIII Yet further methinks to a conformable Doctor the judgment of the Church of England in her Liturgy should not be insignificant Remember not Lord our offences nor the offences of our fore-Fathers neither take thou vengeance on our sins In what sense do men subscribe this and daily use it 1. Do they think that the Church meaneth only Adam's sin by our fore-Fathers 2. Or that by not-remembring they mean not-pardoning and not-punishing 3. Or do they think that they pray for the dead in Purgatory Hell or Heaven Or rather do they not imitate David and the Jewish Church and Ezra Nehemiah Daniel c. who confessed that they were punished for their Fathers sins Sect. 44. I conclude this subject with a second request to the Christian Reader to pity and pray for the poor distressed Church of Christ which is distracted and distressed thus even by such as are most devoted to its service through the great weakness of our judgments and the unhappy passions and strivings that thence follow Either I or this worthy person are mistaken or else we differ not When I look to the Person only and not to the Evidence nor to the Consenters I have far greatest reason to suspect that I am liker to erre than he And if it prove so the evidence yet seemeth to me so full for what I hold that I am almost hopeless of being otherwise perswaded And my judgment is not at my command How then shall I avoid the injury of souls But yet I think that to hold our selves more guilty of our Parents sins than we are is no dangerous damning error it may molest us but not undo us and I never saw many much molested by it But if either we differ not when yet he giveth you so loud an Alarm or if it be he that erreth indeed alas what must the Church expect from the too great number of ignorant and ungodly Teachers when it must be thus used by the Learned and the Godly My thoughts are 1. that it deserveth tears from faithful Ministers to observe that so considerable a part of the common guilt and misery of all mankind should by godly men be no more confessed and lamented 2. And that by those that for any denial or extenuation of our original sin as from Adam are so heinously and justly offended with the erroneous yea ready to vilifie men as Arminians if not Socinians that they think come near it 3. That ever the stream of a Party Reputation Interest Example or whatever else of that kind should with so many good men have so great a power in making truth or error duty or sin good or evil orthodox or heretical in their conceits and so much faction he found in their Religion 4. That ever so many millions should be taught impenitency in so plain a case when repentance and confession have so considerable a place among the requisites to remission 5. That ever so many millions should by Preachers be taught that they have no need of a Saviour nor of Pardon nor to pray for Pardon for so much of their guilty and punishment 6. That ever so much of the plain stream of Scripture-evidence can be denied and made light of by good men that cry up the Scripture authority and sufficiency even when they can lay a great stress in some unprofitable hurtful controversie upon some one Text whose sense is not to be certainly understood 7. That ever good and learned Teachers should be so conceited of their own conceptions as in their confidence in such a cause to brand God's truth with the name of error and their brethren as dangerous men for not erring as they do 8. And finally that the poor people must be under such grievous perplexing temptations as I before mentioned and that the Papists should be thus hardened in their opinion that we shall never be at peace and concord unless we unite in their usurping tyrannical Peace-maker And that Poor Scholars and young Ministers must be thus frightned from Truth Duty Charity and Peace and men made believe that the Church is about to be set on fire if we are told of that which is contrary to our former opinions This must be lamented if it be not I but others that here erre Sect. 45. But yet before I end he calls me so loud to consider of another matter that I must not deny his invitation In my Direct for Cure of Church-Divisions Dir. 42. I said Your belief of the necessary Articles of Faith must be made your own and not taken meerly on the authority of any And in all points of belief and practice which are of necessity to salvation you must ever keep company with the universal Church for it were not the Church if it erred in these And in matters of peace and concord the greater part must be your guide that is caeteris paribus In matters of humane obedience
all that have sinned that are said to have sin imputed to them 3. The All that have sinned ver 12. are the same All that are made righteous and have the justification of life and that shall reign in life by Jesus Christ ver 16 17 18 19. This is plain in the Context in the opposition But infants are included in the latter All that shall reign in life by Jesus Christ c. go infants are included in the former All that have sinned He that denieth the minor must deny not only the Baptism but the justification and salvation of all infants 4. All old interpretations which the Churches have used that are now most known do shew that thus they understood the Text. The Syriack turns it by so death passed on all the sons of men for that all have sinned The Arabick seeing all have now sinned referring to that past sin The Ethiopick thus And as by the iniquity of one man sin entred into the World and by that sin death came upon all men because that sin is imputed to all men even to them that knew not what that sin is Here is a Paraphrase instead of a Version more fully to express this sense The in quo makes the sense of the Latin Interpreter past doubt This is the first argument from these verses Arg. 2. from the same verses especially 18 They that are under condemnation by Adam's sin have original sin at least the imputed part But infants are under condemnation for Adam's sin go infants have original sin If I prove no more but that they are under condemnation for the minor it is enough for the consequence is thence apparent The major is plain in that condemnation is only for sin and infants have no sin but original 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is as essentially related to culpa as poena is The minor is proved from ver 18. By the offence of one judgment came on all men to condemnation or as the Syriack rendereth it For the offence of one condemnation is on all or as the Ethiopick All men are condemned so ver 15. Through the offence of one many are dead That All men includeth infants here the former arguments prove This one 18 th ver of Rom. 5. were there no more in all the Scripture is so plain for an imputation of Adams sin on all to condemnation that it might end the controversy Both major and minor I yet further confirm 1. That it is a condemnation proving the condemned to be sinners by just imputation is manifest 1. in that ver 13 14. sin is hence said to be imputed to the sufferers 2. ver 12. they are said to have sinned 3. ver 19. they are said to be made sinners If any say that this signifieth but metonymically to be used as sinners I answer 1. He that would make what his list of God's plain words by pretended unproved metonymies is not to be believed 2. If it were true yet it must mean such a using men as sinners as implyeth them to be justly so reputed and their being sinners must be connoted as the cause as it is in all punishment It is surely a penal evil to the adult by the adversaries confession and here 's no distinction 3. To be made righteous which is the opposite member is more than to be used as righteous though we have no sin at all inherent or imputed go to be made sinners is more than to be used as sinners though we have no sin at all inherent or imputed 4. That evil interpretation doth but accuse God of injustice of which anon 2. And for the minor it is sufficient to prove that infants are included 1. Because infants die on this account 2. Because it is a being made sinners by one man's disobedience ver 19. and a being dead and under condemnation through one man's offence as ver 15. 18. that is mentioned and those that are now adult had their relation in infancy to Adam's offence as well as after It is not actual sin that brings them to be thus related to Adam It is both by one offence ver 18. and by the offence of one ver 17. and ver 15. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in or by the sin of one It is not go the effect of actual sins of the adult that the Apostle here principally speaks of much less only them but it is the participation and imputation of that one mans offence which he opposeth to the righteousness of one Arg. 3. from the punishment of infants If infants are punished they have original sin But infants are punished go they have original sin for they have no other The consequence is certain because it is essential to punishment to be propter malum morale the effect of sin as the meritorious cause All that requireth proof is the minor which I have proved at large in another disputation of the guilt of our immediate Parents sins To which I add 1. God doth not ordinarily at least afflict any rational creature with death but for their sin But God doth ordinarily afflict infants even with death go he doth it for their sin The minor is too well known The major I prove thus 1. In the lamentations of Jeremy the pains of the sucking children are mentioned often among the rest and of all it s said ch 3. 33. For he doth not afflict willingly nor grieve the children of men that is He doth it not till he be provoked by their sins But if he afflict even unto death all infants that so die in the World without their desert by sin then he doth it willingly even because he will do it without their demerit But wherefore doth a living man complain a man for the punishment of his sin ver 39. Though it be the adult that principally complain yet this intimateth that all suffer for their sin Ezek. 18. 23. Have I any pleasure at all that the wicked should die saith the Lord God 32. For I have no pleasure in the death of him that dieth saith the Lord God Ezek. 33. 11. Say unto them As I live saith the Lord God I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked Much less hath he so much pleasure in the death of innocents as to kill them ordinarily without their desert Rom. 6. 23. The wages of sin is death Scripture speaks of no other death to man but what is the fruit of sin 1 Cor. 15. In Adam all die and Gen. 3. 19. Dust thou art and to dust thou shalt return extends to all the posterity of Adam ordinarily which shews some participation in the sin or else why should we all participate so much of the suffering for it 1 Cor. 15. 26. The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death By enemy is meant a penal evil which Christ was to remove as our Redeemer go even to infants death is a penal evil 1 Cor. 15. 56. The sting of death is sin and the strength of sin is
the Law that is As a serpent could not wound us without its sting so neither could death have any power over us to kill us but for sin nor sin have any force to oblige us to this punishment but by the Law This is spoken of the death of infants as well as others unless you will deny their resurrection go sin is the sting that is the deserving cause even of their death Mic. 1. 5. For the transgression of Jacob is all this and for the sins of the house of Israel Hence Satan is said to have the power of death Heb 2. 14. as the executioner of God's wrath for sin from whom Christ delivereth us 2. If the death of infants be an act of God's justice on them then it is a punishment for it is no act of remunerative justice go it must be of punitive justice if of any But it is an act of God's justice on them as I prove 1. It is the execution of God's sentence Gen. 3. 19. go it is an act of his justice on them that were sentenced which was mankind 2. It is their condemnation Rom. 5. 18. go it is an act of justice on them 3. Subjects are ordinarily secured from being by their Soveraigns put to death without any desert of theirs even by the justice of the Soveraign but infants are God's subjects go ordinarily they are secured by his justice from being put to death by him without any desert of theirs The major is proved 1. From the very nature of Government and Justice Governing Justice consisteth in giving to all the subjects according to their deserts ut bonis bene sit malis male go to kill the innocent and that ordinarily is contrary to Governing Justice 2. From the Law of Nature and Scripture which constantly threatneth the sinner and only the sinner and promiseth good to them that sin not Now the contrary opinion 1. either denieth God to be a King to infants of which anon or 2. denieth his Justice 3. and nullifieth the use of his Law which is to be Norma judicii 2. That infants are God's subjects is proved 1. In that they are of the number of reasonable creatures though yet they have not the use of reason and go are not perfect members of his Kingdom 2. In that they are to be entred into the holy Covenant with him as his subjects Deut. 29. c. 3. In that they have promises and threatnings in his Laws 4. They are subjects in all particular Common-wealths which are but parts of his universal Kingdom But this I have proved at large in my Treatise of Infants Church-membership and Baptism Obj. But God is an absolute Lord as well as a King or Ruler and go may do with his own as he list Answ His dominion or propriety is in order of nature antecedent to his Government or Kingdom and so in that antecedent instant he may do with his own what he will and so he may still but then by becoming a Governor to the rational nature he thereby signifieth that he will give to all according to their works or moral aptitude for God cannot be an unjust Governor nor without justice And his Laws do signifie this yet more Moreover the contrary opinion overthroweth all our consolation and leaveth us uncertain whether God will not damn all the godly at least it denieth them any comfort from the light or law of Nature and the justice of God though they had no sin of their own For if God notwithstanding all his Governing Justice may and do ordinarily kill the innocent because he is an absolute Lord then he may damn the innocent hereafter for ought we know notwithstanding his governing justice For instance the adversaries must on the same grounds say that for ought they know all infants that die in infancy are damned For God may no question torment his own as he is an absolute owner of them as well as kill them And if his natural justice give no security from damnation to the innocent then neither can his righteous Laws and then they can have no security at all which is false and injurious to God and man Obj. Bruits die without their desert Answ God is not the Rector of bruits nor are they his subjects and go he is not engaged by any relation to deal with them in justice nor are they capable of justice remunerative or vindictive nor are they under any Law Arg. 4. Infants are capable of moral good and have such go infants are capable of moral evil and have it The capacity is the chief thing in controversy for if we prove that they are capable of having virtue or vice in habit or disposition without consent then I find none that will deny the consequence that de facto they have it That infants have moral good is proved thus 1. Else they could not be inwardly sanctified 2. Else they did not morally differ one from another 3. And so one were no more amiable to God than another 4. Nor one any more fit for Heaven than another and so none should be saved that die in infancy as being unqualified for salvation or if holiness inherent be needless then all might be saved as well as any 5. And then Baptism nor any priviledges of holy birth or dedication to God could give no hope of any moral good upon them 6. And thus they are made meer bruits that are capable of no moral good or evil All which are most absurd and disproved in my Treatise of Infant Baptism The consequence is undeniable If they are capable of moral good without actual moral volitions so are they of moral evil for there is eadem ratio If a disposition to holy action be a moral good or virtue then a disposition to evil actions is vice or moral evil Arg. 5. Infants have a privation of moral good but a privation of moral good is a moral evil go infants have a moral evil The major is proved in that Adam's posterity should have been born in original righteousness or moral goodness if he had not sinned go it is a privation of a moral good to be born without it and not a meer negation The minor is undeniable privations belonging by reduction to the kind of that which they are a privation of else a privation would be but a meer negation that is no privation at all Arg. 6. All that are the members of Jesus Christ and saved by him or for whom he died as a Redeemer are when existent sinners but infants are the members of Christ and saved by him he is their Redeemer and died for them go they are when existent sinners go they have original sin The major I prove from Matth. 1. 21. Thou shalt call his name Jesus for he shall save his people from their sins If it be the very reason of his denomination why he is called a Saviour because he saveth his people from their sins then he is a Saviour to none
but sinners but the antecedent is true go c. The antecedent is in the Text most plain The consequence is undeniable because the essence or formal reason denominateth go he can be called a Saviour to none other And to prevent all cavils note that 1. it is sin it self and not meer suffering much less undeserved suffering that connoteth not sin as the cause that is here mentioned 2. That it is their sin and not other mens sin that they are said to be saved from Nothing go but violence can evade this evidence Matth. 9. 12. The whole need not a Physitian but the sick To be sick is to be sinful to be a Physitian is to be the Saviour go those that have no sin have no need of a Saviour Eph. 5. 23 25 26 27. Christ is the Head of the Church and Saviour of the Body and how doth he save them Christ loved the Church and gave himself for it that he might sanctifie and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word that he might present it to himself a glorious Church not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing So that to be a Saviour to the body is to sanctifie cleanse and wash it that it may be without spot Those go that have no spots or filth to be washed and cleansed from cannot be of that body or have Christ for their Saviour Rev. 1. 5 6. The Apostle speaks in the name of the Church Vnto him that hath loved us and washed us from our sins in his own blood be glory c. If infants come to Heaven they must give this praise to Christ for washing them from their sins as well as others His work on the Cross was to purge or make purgation of sin Heb. 1. 3. He died for our sins 1 Cor. 15. 3. He died for us while we were sinners and enemies to reconcile us to God Rom. 5. 6 8 10. He came to give his life a ransome for many Matth. 20. 28. He gave himself a ransome for all 1 Tim. 2. 6. Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree that we being dead to sin should live to righteousness by whose stripes we are bealed 1 Pet. 24 25. For Christ also once suffered for sins the just for the unjust that he might bring us to God 1 Pet. 3. 18. Christ our Passover is sasacrificed for us 1 Cor. 5. 7. He appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself Heb. 9. 26. He was once offered to bear the sins of many ver 28. By his own blood he entred into the holy place having obtained eternal Redemption He offered himself without spot to God to purge our consciences c. And for this cause he is the Mediator of the New Testament that by means of death for the redemption of the transgressions under the first Testament they that are called might receive the promise of eternal inheritance Heb. 9. 12 14 15. He is the propitiation for the sins of the whole World 1 Joh. 2. 2. If one died for all then were all dead 2 Cor. 5. 14. that is in sin and for sin Joh. 1. 29 Behold the Lamb of God that taketh away the sins of the World A multitude of such passages of Scripture tell us that Christ's death was for sinners only and go that he died for none but sinners for what need had the innocent of a satisfaction to Justice and of a Sacrifice and Ransome and Redemption No one text of Scripture can be produced in which Christ is said to die for any that had no sin or to be the Redeemer or Saviour of any such And go to say that he died for infants to procure them supernatural Grace and Heaven and not to save them from their sin is vain Scripture knows no such design of Christ's death And the very privation of that rectitude which they call supernatural grace is sin as is manifested nor can a rational creature be shut out of Heaven but penally for his sins it being a very grievous punishment And for the minor that Christ died for infants and is their Saviour c. it 's proved 1. In that he is oft said to die for all the World 2. In that there is no other name under Heaven given by which we can be saved 3. In that he hath taken infants into his Church and Covenant before and since his incarnation and took them in his arms and blessed them and said his Kingdom was of such 4. In that he would have gathered the Jewish infants with their Parents into his Church Matth. 23. 37. 5. Else they are not Christians no not imperfect ones nor to be baptized Many more proofs I have given in the foresaid Treatise of Infant Baptism And few I think deny the minor Arg. 7. All that ought to be baptized with the Christian Baptism are sinners But some infants ought to be baptized with the Christian Baptism go they are sinners The minor I shall suppose to be proved in the foresaid Treatise The major I have proved at large in my Disput of Right to Sacraments especially pag. 79 80. where it 's proved that Christ hath commanded or instituted no other Baptism but what is for remission of sin to p. 88. The sign it self the washing by water and burying under it and rising from under sheweth that this is essential in the signification what else but sin are we to be washed from Read over all the texts of Scripture that speak of Baptism as instituted by Christ and when you have found that no one of them intimateth such a thing as baptizing them that are no sinners washing them that are not unclean then tell us why we should believe that there is such a thing Nay it importeth a false dissimulation with God when we will assert infants to be washed by the blood of Christ when we believe that they have no sin and need no such washing Arg. 8. If infants have no sin they must either never come to Judgment or be justified by the Law or their meer innocency without remission by a Redeemer but the consequent is false go so is the antecedent The consequence is undeniable in that no justice can condemn the innocent the Law will justify them that have no sin for its commination hath nothing against them such go need not pardon by a Redeemer The falshood of both parts of the consequent is proved easily 1. Many Scriptures shew that all men shall be judged Heb. 9. 27. all that die Rom. 14. 12. Joh. 5. 28 29. all that are in the graves with many such places 2. If infants be not judged they would neither be justified nor condemned but that 's not true go c. 2. And that all infants nor any are not justified by the Law or their own Innocency is plain in the Apostle's arguings Rom. 3. 4 and 5. throughout and in the Epist to Galat. Rom. 3. 20. by the deeds of the Law there
is not begotten but with the soul nor would the semen inanimatum come to be an embrio 5. We are sure that semen in corpore animatur anima illius cujus est corpus 6. The conceit of two or three souls which is the last refuge and that the rational only is created is at large confuted by many and it feigneth man not to procreate his kind when bruits do theirs nor to beget children indeed but something else that is irrational And yet even this way supposing God to have at the creation by a decree annexed his creating act of the rational soul to mans procreating of the sensitive the propagation of original sin might be defended Obj. But by this doctrine still God is made the cause of the sin for you say he is the total cause of the soul even as much as if man were no cause Answ God causeth it two waies 1. At the first creation of man he put a virtue into the souls of our first Parents to propagate their like on supposition of his requisite universal influx to bring that cause or virtue into act 2. As an universal cause he effectually procureth second causes to do their part and draweth forth their virtue and communicateth on his part all that belongeth to the universal cause to communicate Now if God be the Author of Original sin it must be by one of these two acts viz. by Creation or by his universal Causation and influence but it is by neither of these Not by creation giving the generative specifying virtue to man for he made man upright and commanded him to continue so and so it was an upright nature that he should have propagated if he himself had not depraved it by sin Not by his universal concourse or causality for that causeth only the soul as such and not as defective or corrupted as the Sun causeth the life of a toad as well as of a lion and of a stinking weed as well as of a flower of the greatest beauty and sweetness but is no cause of the ugly venemous nature of the toad or of the stinking nature of the weed save only by accident nor is it any fault in the Sun that such creatures are generated by it so though God is the cause of generation by his universal influx yet is he not the cause of Original sin for the universal cause supposing the specifying virtue in the seed doth work on all things according to their natures and though God was and is the specifying cause by creating the procreating force in man yea and by his constant creative emanation yet he created not the vice and go is not the cause of that Obj. But a lame man doth not beget a lame child nor a blind man a blind child Why then should a sinner beget a sinner and corrupted Parents have a corrupted issue Answ The eye and leg are not the soul which hath the generative power nor yet essential parts of the body But let any of the essentials of the body as the brain or heart be depraved and it will appear in the issue especially if it be so with both the Parents much more when the soul is depraved by whose power the body it self is formed and which is most essential to the man the pravity must needs be communicated Lameness and blindness in the Parents alter not the procreating seed but consist with its integrity But none can communicate that which he hath lost and hath not either actually or virtually himself Obj. Righteousness and holiness were not communicable by natural generation if Adam had not fallen go by generation we have no privation of them Answ 1. The antecedent is false they would have been propagated to posterity as health and beauty to the body as I proved in the beginning 2. If generation as such had not conveyed them yet if God had affixed by a standing law his supernatural gifts to natural procreation it would have proved against the consequent that we are sinfully defective in being without them Obj. Learning and wisdom are not now derived to posterity Answ Nor any thing that is acquired and not natural Obj. Godliness is not now conveyed by nature go it should not have been so then Answ I deny the consequence 1. Because that holiness that was natural then is supernatural now You may propagate eye-sight to your children because it is natural but you can neither restore your own nor theirs when it is put out without a supernatural power 2. Because though Adam was our natural head and root and so had power to hold or lose the grace which he had received for himself and us yet when it came to the work of our restoration he being utterly insufficient to recover himself or us the work is put into another hand and Jesus Christ the second Adam is now our Root and Head and as he purchased all so all our mercies are at his disposal and he giveth them out as he seeth meet and go as he gave Adam pardon and holiness for himself so will he give to all his members for themselves himself being still the treasury of his Church and keeping the keys of life in his own hands 3. Sanctification is imperfect in this life and go leaving some corruption no wonder if that be propagated by the best 4. But yet as Adam should have conveyed an innocent holy nature to his children if he had not lost it even a legal righteousness such as he had himself so now though generation do it not yet Christ in his Gospel Covenant hath made over a Gospel Righteousness to the infants of the sanctified who devote themselves and their children unto God in the Baptismal Covenant so that as posterity is unhappy through their first Parents sin so children may recover happiness from Christ by means of their Parents faith and holiness and dedicating them to God in Christ Obj. Foolish Parents beget wise children go wicked Parents may beget godly children Answ 1. I grant that God may graciously sanctifie the seed of the ungodly but that is not by their procreation 2. I deny the consequence because that foolishness comes from the distemper of the organs and the bodies ineptitude to serve the soul and no alteration may be made by it upon the seed of generation But when the soul is depraved by sin there is no virtue left in nature to rectify that by generation and hinder the propagation of the pravity 3. And still as to guilt all these objections say nothing No man can convey the innocency which he had not Obj. Adam when he was pardoned had no guilt go he could not convey what he had not Answ 1. There is a threefold guilt 1. Reatus facti 2. Reatus culpae 3. Reatus ad poenam To be guilty of the fact is to be truly one that did commit it or participated therein To be guilty of the fault is to be truly culpable by reason of that fact it being really
a fault These two God taketh not away by pardon for it is impossible that which is done should be undone or that which was a fault should be no fault The third which is the obligation to punishment is it that is done away by pardon Now suppose this perfectly done away to Adam or any godly man yet this pardon is but for himself and he propagateth to his children the two former reatum facti culpae which were never done away and then the third obligation to punishment will follow immediately per nudam resultantiam as long as they have themselves no pardon 2. Christ is the Quickening Spirit though Adam was a Living Soul and Christ is now the Fountain of Grace and gives it out in the measure and on the terms that he seeth meet And as God past sentence on mankind before he granted his pardon to Adam and promised the Messiah so his pardon was no full remitting of that sentence but such a personal remission to Adam as should consist with much punishment in his imperfection in grace and his toyl and labour and death c. and with the guilt of his posterity till each man received from Christ the Mediator his own remission And so as he gave in the promise a pardon to Adam he hath on the same condition given it to all Adam had not power to cure himself when he had poisoned his nature but Christ being become the common Physitian hath prepared a remedy for him and us and if we take it as Adam did we shall be healed And the infants are included in the Covenant with their Parents So that notwithstanding all these objections the 12th Argument standeth good Arg. 13. If natural corruption be in infants viciously disposing them to evil and against good then original sin is in them But such corruption is in them go c. The minor is proved by the common experience of the World All infants shew their inclination to sin as soon as they can act it yea so strong and obstinate doth it prove that frequently it resisteth all the endeavours of the most prudent diligent godly Parents that would root it up and of Masters and Teachers that apply both Doctrine and Discipline against it And never is it conquered but by special grace and never is it so restrained in any that live to the use of reason as not to break out into many actual sins And if all men in all ages in all the World do sin and frequently sin it shews that there is some corrupt inclination in the nature of man to sin for the effect revealeth the cause yea it is so great corruption as to lead into some kind of moral necessity of sinning or moral impossibility of not sinning or else some one in the World would have escaped it which none did but Christ and the Papists except but the Virgin Mary Obj. Adam sinned that yet had no corruption Answ The fall of one or two may come from wilful carelesness or inconsiderateness where there is no corrupt inclination antecedent but so cannot the fall of all the World especially their so frequent falls and ordinary obstinacy in sin If now and then a man only should die we might impute it to some accident but when all mankind dieth we are convinced that mortality even a disposedness to death in some sort necessitating it is become natural to him so here Obj. Infants have the use of sense as soon as they are born and are long coming to the use of reason and reason is long weak when sense is strong and this by reason of infancy as such and go in all this time the prevalency of sense can be no sin and so long a prevalency must needs breed a habit and this is it which you take for original corruption Answ 1. If sin had not made the appetite inordinate infants might have lived till they had overgrown their infancy without transgressing an ordinate appetite would have carried them to no inordinate acts And they would not have been so liable to many of those evils that now provoke their passion and to cry when they are hurt would be no sin And so as they had grown up their temptations would have been but proportionable to their reason and go they might well have overcome them As children have not the reason of grown men so neither have they their temptations They have not worldly riches or honours or dignities to care for they are not tempted to the sins of lust And as now the love of their Parents keepeth them even in childhood from transgressing the commands of their Parents and maketh them desirous to please them so would the love of God have made them desirous to please him and keep his commands 2. We see sin now break out in children before custom can engage them to such a habit and against that custom which Parents engage them in against it and with greater obstinacy than that meer custom could so soon produce So much for the minor The consequence of the major is proved 1. From the purity of God's nature and of his Law and from the nature of this corruption This corruption is a disconformity to the holy nature will and law of God and that in his subjects go it is sin The inclinations contrary to his holy nature and image in a rational creature must needs be abhorred of God because they are such And the fleshly mind the body of death is contrary to the Law 2. These same corruptions which are born with us remain in the unsanctified and partly in others till they come to age and then they are sin even the same degree that was born with us for it is not only the degree that custom after superaddeth that is sin Certainly that absence of good and backwardness to it and proneness to evil is sin in the adult go it was sin before For it was the same thing and in a true subject capable of vice and virtue 3. The only Argument against it is vain viz. from the involuntariness as shall be shewed Arg. 14. Adam and Eve had moral good before any actual volition go infants are capable of moral good before any actual volition and consequently actual volition or willing is not of necessity to the morality of a habit or inclination and go they are capable of moral evil The antecedent is proved by the concession of all that Adam had whether naturally or supernaturally the image of God and virtue or holiness ut principium before he acted it and so had original righteousness by creation or gift which was bonum morale and made him capable of the divine complacency and acceptance The parity of reason proveth the consequences Or if there be any disparity it makes against the adversary infants being virtually pre-existent in their Parents Arg. 15. The doctrine that numbreth infants with bruits in point of morality and felicity is false but such is that doctrine which denieth original
want of necessary grace to innocent nature as the adversaries think is plain for necessary grace hath some sufficiency to its ends and go it it is called sufficient grace by the adversaries commonly But that which never attaineth its end in any one person in the World in their own judgment is not sufficient It is their common and last argument against our doctrine of special effectual grace given to all the elect as distinct from that sufficient grace which say the Dominicans is given to others that the grace is not sufficient that never proveth effectual in any We may much more confidently say so here when we speak of the whole World that the grace is not sufficient that never is was or will be effectual in any If it suffice to make the event naturally possible yet not to remove the moral impossibility 3. And that God is the Author of the Law that forbiddeth sin and of innocent nature is granted and past doubt The certainty of this universal event cannot come from a contingent cause as such The will is naturally free that chooseth but it is not morally free or else the World would not choose evil So that it is certain that if there be no original sin the cause of this universal event that all men sin must be resolved to be somewhat in nature or something in providence of which God is the cause If God have so framed pure nature and so order the affairs of the World that no man on earth shall eventually escape the sin which he so much prohibiteth and abhorreth it must needs follow that he is the moral reputative cause at least And yet it is one of the pretences against the doctrine of original sin that it maketh God the Author of it in infants when it 's they that make him the Author of it in all Seeing therefore that sin hath so overspread the World that all men sin in all Countries in all Ages except Christ this must proceed either from mans natural principles and so be chargeable upon God his Maker or it is the fruit of original sin and to be charged on our first Parents and our selves Arg. 19. If infants have in their corrupted natures a virtual enmity to God and Holiness then have they original sin but such an enmity they have I mean in disposition seed or habit go they have original sin The antecedent or minor I prove 1. From the common experience of the World that manifest such an enmity as soon as they come to the use of reason and that maintain it so obstinately till renewing grace do overcome it How early do they shew an aversness to the work and ends for which they were created How little do the precepts of Parents or Teachers and all the means of grace themselves to conquer it in the most And where it is most conquered even in the godly it is most confessed because there is a troublesome remnant of it still so that there is no man in the World that hath not more or less of it in him the wicked being under the power of it and the godly under the trouble of these remainders 2. From Gen. 3. 15. Joh. 3. 5 6. Rom. 8. 3 5 6 7 8 9. Rom. 7. 21 23 24 25 compared In Joh. 3. 6. we find that flesh begets but flesh That which is born of the flesh is flesh and that go a new birth by the spirit is necessary to make us spiritual of which before In Rom. 8. we find that it was through the flesh that the Law was weak and that God sending his son in the likeness of sinful flesh not as sinful but as flesh and for sin condemned sin in the flesh Where it is undeniable that by flesh is not meant sin it self for then it had not been called sinful nor the subject of sin nor Christ said to have taken the likeness of it and go the word flesh here is taken in no worse a sense than in Joh. 3. 6. We find here also that all flesh is universally called sinful which Christ took the likeness of And Christ took the likeness of infants and that first only growing up to the likeness of the adult infants go have sinful flesh And ver 5 6. This flesh as the principle that prevaileth in some is opposed to the spirit which prevaileth in others and their fruits opposed the one sort mind fleshly things the other spiritual things and death belongs to one and life and peace to the other And ver 7. The carnal mind is enmity against God for it is not subject to the Law of God neither indeed can be And ver 8. They that are in the flesh cannot please God that is they that have not the spirit to subdue and mortify the flesh as it is explained ver 9. And if any man have not the spirit of Christ he is none of his So that flesh without spirit which is now mans natural estate is a principle of enmity and rebellion and proves men none of Christ's and in a state of death And many Expositors judge that in Gen. 3. 15. such being none of Christ's till they have the spirit are annumerated to the serpents seed that hath the enmity against the spiritual seed which so sheweth it self when they come to age that as Cain by Abel and Ishmael by Isaack so still He that is born after the flesh persecuteth him that is born after the spirit if not restrained Gal. 4. 29. And Rom. 7. 18. I know that in me that is in my flesh dwelleth no good thing that is in Paul so far as he was without the spirit And as this innate universal enmity is thus proved so it is proved to be sin 1. By the Law of nature which tells us that an habitual enmity of the rational creature against God and Holiness is sin if any thing be sin It is an inclination or disposition contrary to the primitive nature and moral image of God in man and contrary to what our relation to God importeth and as it is commonly said of actual hatred of God it may as truly if not much more evidently be said of this dispositive virtual enmity that it is an evil that cannot become good and so naturally sin that it can be no other 2. It 's proved to be sin by the express assertion of the Text. Rom. 8. 3. 10. it is sinful flesh and the subject of sin till the spirit come Ver. 9. it proves them none of Christ ' s. Rom. 7. 14. 17. 20. 24 25. it is called in-dwelling sin and a Law of sin and to be carnal is to be sold under sin 3. From the effects which nothing can produce but sin They cannot be subject to the Law of God They please not God To be carnally minded is death c. Rom. 8. So 1 Cor. 2. 14. The natural meerly animal man now in his corrupt estate receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God for they are foolishness
you have thought this a cruelty or injustice Why might not God leave such a thing to his free will as well as his own salvation or damnation And if he might leave it to a serpent necessarily to beget a serpent why might he not leave it to the will of man to do it freely And if man had chosen such a generation could his off-spring if capable have charged God with cruelty And if not as nothing surer why might not God leave it to the will of man to remain righteous and beget a righteous seed or to fall and beget such as himself Obj. 7. But the pains of hell consist in the torments of conscience and the conscience of an infant will not torment him for that which he could not help Answ 1. It is past our reach here to understand fully the nature of hell torments 2. The loss of Heaven is the greatest part of the misery 3. The sense of that loss will be no small positive misery 4. And all this which the adversaries grant will be confessed due for original pravity and because they are the seed of sinners Obj. 8. No Law forbiddeth us to be the seed of Adam or to draw corruption from our Parents Answ The Law forbad Adam in whom we were to sin and it requireth perfection of acts and habits and condemneth sinful habits as well as sinful acts and go we are violaters of that Law Obj. 9. If Original sin were derived from Adam to us it would have been in the humane nature of Christ at least Adam's act would have been imputed to him as being really the son of man Answ The relation and corruption go together and both of them belong to them that derived their natures only from Adam according to the way of natural generation But Christ was conceived by the Holy Ghost who by sanctifying the substance of the Virgin of which he had his humane nature and by the miraculous way of procreation prevented the derivation of guilt or sin Obj. 10. Christ saith except we become as little children we shall not enter into Heaven Answ He speaks not of their innocency but of their beginning the World and their lowliness except we be little in our eyes and begin the World a-new by conversion we cannot enter into his Kingdom But this denieth not but that infants may have corruption that unfits them for his Kingdom as you confess Obj. 11. 1 Cor. 7. 14. The children of believers are holy Answ 1. But not by nature but by grace and the faithful's interest in the covenant and dedication of them to Christ in Baptism 2. They had no need of this hallowing if they had not naturally some corruption And 3. The children of unbelievers are still unclean 4. And the children of the faithful are not perfectly holy for then they should be better than the Parents Obj. 12. By the same reason you may say that we are guilty of our immediate Parents sins for we were in them more immediately than in Adam Answ We have the same natural interest in our nearest Parents sin and some participation which we must lament and not excuse But of that I have spoken by it self The chief objections here omitted I answered before from Adam's or our nearer Parents being themselves forgiven and so having no guilt to derive to us and their being sanctified and from the creation of the soul c. and go shall not again repeat the answers to them It better beseems us to confess our sin and misery and value the remedy than to tell Christ that we will not so much as pray for the pardon of Original sin nor be beholden to him to forgive it nor to his spirit to cure it which yet is really the thoughts of them that think they have no such thing Among others read Philip Mornay Lord du Plessis in his Verity of Christian Religion in the Chapters of Original sin The vanity of Dr. Taylor 's opposition may be easily seen by what is said his begging the question about the supernaturality of holiness to Adam his frequent mistakes and self-contradiction Whether Posterity be guilty of Death by reason of the Actual sins of their immediate Parents AS little as is said by Divines on this Question it is no over-curious or needless unprofitable subject but very weighty and needful to be understood by all Christians that can reach to the understanding of it For as it is useful for the opening of the cause and nature of Original guilt so if it should prove true that we are guilty by the sins of our immediate Parents it would be necessary that we know it for our due humiliation and that we may in penitent confessions and deprecations prevail with God for the pardon thereof As it is thought a dangerous thing to deny original sin because they that so do will not be humbled under it and sensible of their misery by it nor of the necessity of God's mercy or Christ's blood for the pardon of it nor will apply themselves to God by Christ in Faith Confession and Prayer for pardon and consequently are in danger of missing of pardon so in the present case the same reasons will prove it as well dangerous to deny our guilt of our Parents sins if indeed we are so guilty Which that we may enquire into after a very brief explication of the terms of the Question I shall lay down a few necessary distinctions and then assert what I judge to be the truth in certain Propositions and prove such of them as most require proof 1. By immediate Parents we mean those that personally beget By Posterity we mean their children so begotten By Reason of Actual sin we mean by the Merit of those sins which our Parents themselves committed or by a resultancy from such sin compared with the rule By guilt we mean obligation to punishment or duness of punishment By death we mean the destruction or final misery of the creature either death temporal or eternal We must here distinguish 1. Between the seminal causal potential and virtual being which we have in our Parents and the personal existence that we have in our selves 2. Between the guilt which immediately resulteth from actual sin and the guilt which riseth but mediately from it viz. by the means of some intervening corruption of our own 3. Between the sins of Parents while we are seminally in them and their sins after our birth either 1. in our infancy or 2. in our riper age 4. Between guilt of fault and guilt of punishment 5. Between the aggravation of voluntariness actual and of voluntariness habitual or dispositive 6. Between plenary proper guilt and guilt so called by analogy of attribution and guilt so called equivocally 7. Between punishment univocally analogically or equivocally so called 8. Between obligation to the pain of loss and to the pain of sense 9. And between the meer sense of that loss and the sensible accusations of conscience for actual
sin 10. Between the curable obligation of the Law of Nature or Works and the peremptory and remediless obligation of the Law of Grace Though these distinctions reach further than to the terms of the Question yet are they all such as will be of necessary use in our determination Prop. 1. God doth not impute to us the sins either of our first or neerest Parents further than our true interest in such sins doth give sufficient ground for such imputation As Dr. Twiss among others hath oft and well proved Prop. 2. God doth not esteem us to have personally committed the sins which our first or neerest progenitors did actually commit For his judgment is true and therefore he judgeth of things as they are and therefore he judgeth us not to have done that personally which we did not do Prop. 3. God doth not by any Law oblige us to punishment as the personal committers of such sins which any progenitors of ours did commit and not we and therefore we are not guilty of punishment on that account He never made such a covenant with Adam or any since as some imagine wherein he declareth that he will judge the Posterity guilty of the Parents sin further than their true desert or interest in it meerly because God will so judge or because he will impute the sins of one to another without his desert that were to make him the causer of such mens sins or rather to mistake and call that their sin which indeed is not so Prop. 4. It seems to me that in the same kind as we are guilty of Adam's actual sin we are also guilty of the sins of our neerest Parents allowing for some accidental differences and also our guilt having a remedy at hand which his had not that he knew of we being under a pardoning covenant Because this proposition is not agreeable to the commonest opinion I shall speak to the proof of it and of some that are near to it anon towards the end Prop. 5. If it should prove true which some of the Reformed Divines maintain that original sin doth consist only in the real qualitative corruption of our nature and not directly in any imputation of Adam ' s actual sin to us and that there is no such direct imputation of his sin to us but that it is only the cause of our proper Original sin and not our sin formally then must it needs follow that the like must be said for the negative of the sins of our immediate Parents for they can be no more our sins than Adam's was If this opinion therefore stand good then our controversy is at an end and we are not guilty either of Adam's sin or of our next Parents nor of death for them I will not presume to make my self judge between the Learned Divines that disagree upon this point Camero and his followers go this way against the imputation of Adam's sin to us of which see the sum of their Arguments in Jos Placaeus his Disputat de statu hominis lapsi ante Gratiam in lib. 1. Thesium Salmuriens pag. 206 207. And Chamier is not only of the same mind but confuteth the contrary among the Popish errors as you may see in Tom. 3. lib. 1. cap. 7. against Pighius sect 20 21. but specially throughout chap. 8. contra Salmeronem So also Peter Martyr on Rom. 5. But yet the far greater number of our Writers go the other way and so do the Papists too Prop. 6. It seems not to be a guilt so plenary and perfect which we lie under for any Parents sin if such a thing be proved as that is which a man is under for his own personal sin The difference will appear if we consider that it is not a punishment in so full and perfect a sense which we are obliged to for the suffering is but the matter of the punishment its form lieth in the relation of that suffering to the fault if the malum naturale be not propter malum morale it is not punishment and the punishment is his in the fullest sense who suffereth for his own sin now the sin of Adam or any Parent is not so fully our own as that is which we personally commit seeing as we were but seminally causally and potentially in our Parents and not by existence personally so it is not so much to be esteemed the son of a sinner as to be esteemed the actual sinner himself So that it seems our guilt of and punishment for the actual sin of any Parent is so called by analogy of attribution as they speak as Accidens is called Ens being a more imperfect kind of guilt and punishment Prop. 7. It is past doubt that God may and doth punish Parents in their children In which case the sufferings of the children are materially though not as the next matter the punishment of the Parent but the next matter is the Parents own suffering real or reputative in the suffering of his children but this God doth not without respect to some concurrent guilt in the child unless as he will repair his hurt with a greater good Prop. 8. When the sufferings of a child are but the meer consequents of the Parents sin or punishment then are they no punishment themselves unless equivocally so called but when they are intended by the Rector for the demonstration of justice for the Parents fault then it hath the nature of punishment though the child were imagined innocent For example If a Traytor be sentenced to death and his estate forfeited to the Prince his Heirs will be deprived of all their hopes though the Judge never thought of them in his sentence because the Parent cannot convey to his posterity what he hath lost himself And here the suffering of the Heirs is not formally a punishment but the meer consequent of a punishment But if the Rector do ordain that the Heirs of a Traytor shall be desinherited and intend this as part of the penalty to deter others from Treason then it is not a meer consequent but a real punishment though the Heir be personally innocent Prop. 9. It seems to me that we are so far guilty both of Adam's sin and of our neerer Parents committed whilst we were seminally in them as that God may not only without injustice but also in positive execution of vindictive justice punish us with temporal death for such guilt though it be but a more imperfect kind of guilt and punishment Prop. 10. If this interest in our Parents sins deserve a temporal death then also an everlasting death For when the creature hath lost his life by the stroke of justice God is not bound to restore it Prop. 11. It hence followeth that God may in justice deprive us of everlasting glory for such guilt which is one part of Hell viz. the poena damni for the dead enjoy not glory Prop. 12. Hence also it followeth that God may justly for such guilt leave man under
some penalty of sense too as well as of loss 1. Because he may if he please continue natural life to man when he depriveth him of glory for he that may justly take away both may take away one only and then man being rational must needs have a sense of the greatness of his loss 2. And there is no man of reason but would rather choose a tolerable degree of pain for ever as a less evil than to be annihilated And he that may inflict the greater may inflict the lesser Prop. 13. Those positive torments of conscience which follow the review of wilful actual sin and which men must suffer for such in Hell cannot be the punishment of our guilt either of Adam's or our neerest Parents actual sin Because conscience hath no such matter to work upon it cannot charge us with choosing that evil by our own wills for so far this guilt was involuntary Prop. 14. God is the Rector of the Universe of Common-wealths Churches and Families as well as of individual persons and therefore he may punish the World as such and punish a Common-wealth as such for their sins or a sinful Church or a sinful Family And so some individual persons not as such but as parts of the society may justly suffer the loss of those benefits which as members of that society they did possess though they committed not the sins for which the punishment is inflicted In which case the nature of punishment is divided between the society and that individual sufferer It is the Societies fundamentaliter because they are the sinners it is the sufferers Terminative because he beareth it and true punishment it is for it is suffering for sin though not for his personal sin And thus a Child a Subject a Church-member may suffer for the sins of the Heads or Body of the Society Nor can it well be said that this is but on occasion of their sin and not for it and so that it is but equivocally punishment and not truly so for it is an evil of suffering for the evil of sin and inflicted for demonstration of justice on the whole and so on each part Yea and it seems that positive punishments as well as losses may be inflicted on this account Prop. 15. Yet as God is Rector of each particular person as well as of societies so he dealeth justly with every person and therefore in punishing societies he still observeth his established Laws concerning individuals and therefore he punisheth no person beyond his due For 1. it is supposed that a man who by consent is a member of any Society doth consent to bear or venture on the common inconveniencies and infelicity of that Society so that he may be partaker of the felicity and benefits of it and where nature makes a man a member of a society it supplies the place of our personal consent For in it self it is a necessary good to us to be in society with others seeing no man can live happily by himself and it is supposed in nature that no man will dissent from his own necessary good It is therefore by their own consent fundamentally that such persons though innocent in themselves are made liable to punishment and therefore in all wars when the innocent do suffer with the guilty in the besieging of a City the punishing of a Country it is no injustice Obj. But that is because men are not able to discern between the righteous and the guilty or to difference in the execution as God can do Answ It 's true that God can do this and man cannot but withal God doth not all that he can do He ruleth the World by means in an established order and it is he that hath given men authority to rule under him and therefore whatsoever punishment they righteously execute it is God that righteously doth it by them So that as men do us no wrong in such cases so neither doth God 3. But yet God hath determined in his Laws that none shall bear the punishment of eternal damnation for the sins of a society but for his own sin yea he hath resolved that all shall tend to the everlasting felicity of the innocent 4. It cannot be accounted any wrong to such when God will repair their hurt or loss with far greater advantages which he might have denied them 5. But yet for all this it is certain that de facto God doth not punish any man who is not guilty by personal sins for there is none such on earth to punish but though God doth so sweetly and in perfect order carry on the work of Government that none shall have cause to complain of injustice and doth keep an harmonious consent between his more general and his particular punishing justice so punishing societies that he will make good all his promises to each individual yet 1. It seems to me that in one and the same penalty materially considered God may punish us both as individual persons for our own sin and as members of a Society for the sins of the Society which are no otherwise ours than by being such members of a sinful body and so being liable to the justice which that Body is liable to 2. And it seems to me that if we were supposed to be personally innocent yet God might in justice punish us with such a society so far as may stand with his Covenant to individuals and that that Covenant doth not restrain him from inflicting the least penalty on us for any besides our own sins which we have personally committed Though still even the guilt of that common sin is participative personally ours as we communicate in it by being members of the society as the hand is guilty of the sin of the tongue because it is a member of the body that is guilty Obj. There is no sin and so no punishment where there is no willingness Answ Here is a willingness fundamentally in that in hope of the good of the society and benefit from it we consent to share with them and speed as they though we consent not to the sin so that the sin is reputatively ours so far as that we should be obliged to punishment by it though not in it self nor so as that we should be accounted the actual offenders Even as our sins became Christ's by his voluntary sponsion so far as to bear the penalty but not so far as to be accounted the committer of them so that his sufferings were truly punishments because for sin though not for his own yet not punishments in so full and strict a sense as ours that suffer for our own sins but by analogy of attribution or ob inaequalem generis attributionem and such as it seems to me are those punishments which innocent persons suffer meerly for the sins of the Societies that they are members of Prop. 16. It is not a meer reputative interest as the last described but a natural interest which we have in the guilt of
which the first sin did not bring us under As to the pain of loss it is clear because when we have forfeited all we can forfeit no more but by the first sin we forfeited all But this is not because the sin in its own nature hath not the same demerit as the first but because man is capable of no greater privation than he hath incurred already nor of any greater torment if the first sin deserved as much torment as mans nature was capable of So that terminative here is no new super-added punishment according to the first Law But yet none may hence conclude that here is no new guilt because it is another fundamentaliter formaliter For divers relations may have the same Terminus We do by following sins incur a new and further obligation to the same penalty which would be to a greater penalty were we capable of it naturally When a Felon is guilty of death on one crime yet twenty bills may be brought in against him which may charge him with a manifold guilt though but of one death As a man may have a manifold right to one good thing which he possesseth and a right super-added to his first right as God hath the right of Redemption to us super-added to the right of Creation so may a sinner have super-added and manifold obligations to the same punishment Yet here we see some difference between our first guilt of Adam's sin and all super-added guilt that the first having deprived us of all our felicity none that follows can deprive us of any more except of the mercies new given us by the Gospel which the meer sins of Parents shall deprive no man of that disowneth them Prop. 22. Though it be but an imperfect analogical guilt which the act of Adam's or other Parents sin doth directly and immediately leave upon us yet the corruption or pravity of our own nature inherent in each person which by Adam's sin was introduced doth bring on us a further guilt And so mediately the said actual sin doth bring it Which occasioneth so many Protestant Divines to place original sin as ours in this pravity alone Prop. 23. Though this natural depravedness may seem to infer a lesser guilt because it is not voluntary as our actual sins are Yet 1. we being seminally in him that voluntarily caused it and 2. it being the habitual pravity of the will it self and so far voluntary and 3. therefore containing virtually all future actual voluntary sins 4. and being more contrary to God's holy nature and will than one single actual sin would be it hath therefore many aggravations instead of that one which it seemeth to have less of And so must needs bring a true and proper obligation to punishment till Christ dissolve it as well as actual sins Prop. 24. It seems to me that the sins of neerer Parents may do much to the corrupting of our natures as well as the sin of Adam and to increase the pravity that from his only sin would have been upon them Proved 1. There is the same reason why the sins of immediate Parents should deprave the nature of Posterity as there is that Adam's sin should do it Some Divines say that God took away his image from Adam some that he took away his spirit and so the loss of his image followed some that Adam's sin did it self destroy or blot out that image As to the first I say 1. It is not sound because it makes God the most proper immediate if not the only true efficient cause of sin and of the sinning sin which is the worst of sins Also because there is no word of God that saith any such thing 2. If it were true the sin of Cain deserved the same as well as the sin of Adam As to the second opinion I say 1. It is yet undetermined de nomine among Divines whether it be not the Redeemer only that giveth the spirit and whether it can properly be said that God gave his spirit to Adam in innocency though I am for the affirmative 2. But suppose that there be some conserving aid which God did withdraw by what name soever it be called yet thaat withdrawing was in order of nature consequential to mans sinning and not before it and that sin it self did deprave the soul 3. The sin of Cain deserveth the like desertion as well as the sin of Adam but man's nature is not now capable of it in the same sort as then it was because then we were innocent and had the perfect image of God upon us and were capable of losing it but now we have lost it already our Parents sins can but remove us further from God and hinder our recovery The third opinion seemeth most warrantable that Adam put away or blotted out God's image and so depraved his own soul for which see Capel of Tempt and Thes Salmuriens Vol. 1. disp de statu hominis lapsi ante gratiam sect 19 20 21. But there is the same reason why Cain's sin should deprive his posterity of God's image save only that they had not the same to lose for the destructive nature of the sin is the same and so is the merit And though they have not that perfect image of God now to lose yet they have some remnants of moral virtue assisted by the light and law of nature and the nature of man is capable of being made worse than yet it is And there is the same reason why Cain's sin may make it worse as there is why Adam's may make it bad Man's fall was a change of his end He first took God for his ultimate end and chief good He was seduced to take him for one that envied his felicity and for a liar and to seek his felicity in the creature against the command of God The ultimate end of man's actions being thus changed all moral good is so far perverted for all means and subordinate ends depend on it And so the stream of mans actions are turned into a wrong channel the sensitive appetite is hereupon become the master-principle in the soul as ruling the rest For as Placaeus saith ubi sup Cujus facultatis finis proximus est hominis ultimus ea caeteris omnibus facultatibus tanquam architectonica imperat that faculty whose neerest end is mans ultimate end doth rule all the other faculties as the master of the work And thus man being turned finally to sensibles from God his nature is depraved and God's image defaced Yet is not the soul removed to the utmost distance from God for then he should be as bad as the Devils and all men should be equally evil and the sensitive appetite would so uncontrouledly reign that man would be worse than bruitified his reason serving only to purvey for the flesh so that the light and law of nature would not restrain him nor any thoughts of a God and a life everlasting once stop him in his sin Now it is apparent
that there is the same natural and meritorious force in Cain's sin to turn his nature further from God as was in Adam's to turn it so far away Or if man were at the worst yet his following sins have the same power to fix him in that misery as his first had to bring him into it For they also are a wilful turning from God to the creature as well as the first Arg. 2. It is past all doubt that the sinners own personal nature is made worse by his own actual sin experience proves it too fully Scripture saith that they that have been accustomed to do evil can no more learn to do well than a Blackmoor can change his skin or a Leopard his spots And there is no reason that I know of that can be given why a more corrupt Parent should not beget a child more corrupt and deliver him the sinful improvement of his pravity as well as that all sinful depraved Parents should beget depraved children And though this controversy be mixed with the great difficulties about the propagation of the soul and the matter of its corruption yet which way soever those be determined it makes not against the thing that I assert If the soul be ex traduce and so corrupted then the case is most easy If man beget the sensitive soul corrupted and God do then promove that to the excellency of being a rational soul as some think the material species of the phantasy is raised by the active intellect to be the intelligible immaterial species still there is the same reason why the more corrupt Parent should propagate a soul more corrupt as that all should propagate a corrupt one If the soul be depraved either by a taint from the body or by a willing accommodation of it self to the body through the force of the natural desire of union de quo vide Placaeum ubi supra as water to the shape of the vessel that it is put into still the reason holds the same for the degree of corruption as for the thing it self That God by way of penalty should create the soul sinful immediately seems plainly to make him the Author of sin But if it were so yet there is the same reason of demerit to provoke him to create the soul of Cain's son yet more sinful as there is in Adam's to provoke him to create it sinful at all Arg. 3. Besides experience assureth us that all children bring not an equal degree of pravity into the World if we may judge by their first exercise of reason or use of passions But if there were no difference made since it should seem that all should be corrupted alike further than God cureth any and so maketh a difference We see also that many of the children of the most vicious people are more vicious than the ordinary sort of men are We see also that some mens bodies being distempered by their vices they propagate those bodily distempers to their posterity which we evidently perceive do make a great alteration on the soul from whence we see some persons very sottish and silly yea some ideots and some extreme talkative some extreme passionate some lustful some malicious some gluttonous some drunkards and this above the corrupt inclination which appeareth in the ordinary sort of men and plainly sed by the temper of the body Obj. 1. If our corruption were increased by the sins of immediate Parents then the World would grow worse and worse and we should have been Devils long before this age Answ 1. Most Divines say that the first sin would have done all this if God in mercy had not prevented or remedied it 2. God still resolveth to keep the World in order under his Government and therefore restraineth corruption and will not suffer it to grow as according to its nature it would 3. This is one of the common benefits that the World receiveth by the grace of the Redeemer that they grow not as bad as else they would 4. For the sake of the Church God will restrain them Obj. 2. We see many of the worst men have good children Answ No mans corruptions do put his children into a remediless condition and therefore God may sanctifie whom and when he pleaseth So may he do also by the Parents themselves for all their sins and yet those sins do make them worse Obj. 3. Then you may say that Grace is propagated by generation from our immediate Parents as well as sin and yet experience telleth us the contrary Answ 1. This makes as much against the propagation of original corruption from Adam as from our neerer Parents If it were of any force it would be against both 2. There is so great a difference between grace and sin that quite alters the case For 1. Grace is something extrinsecally adventitious and now as to the cause of it and manner of working it supernatural but so is not sin 2. Grace is an adventitious perfecting quality Sin is a defect as it is in the rational faculties But defects are more easily propagated than adventitious qualities for one requireth nothing thereto but a defective nature for nothing can convey to another that which it hath not it self but the other requireth more than nature to its propagation No acquired knowledge or skill in Languages Sciences Arts or Manufactures are propagated to posterity by nature but the ignorance of these is natural 3. But above all it 's considerable that original sin so far as it containeth a positive inclination seems to be radically in the inordination of the sensitive appetite raging against the rule of reason though the rational faculty be corrupted too and gives up it self to the slavery of the sensitive yet the sensitive seems to be the root Now it is evident that nature doth much in propagation of the sensitive or else man should do less in generation than a beast But Grace is radically subjected in the rational faculties though by participation also it reach the sensitive and here nature doth less in propagation We see by experience that a natural gentleness and calmness of the passions and such other lower common virtues as are subjected in the sensitive part are born with some men and from the temperament of the body one man is more mild patient temperate than another but it is not so with the intellectual Perfections nor Christian Graces Faith Hope or Charity I shall now proceed to prove so much of the affirmative as I have here owned more than is now held viz. That there ariseth to children from the sins of their neerest Parents such an imperfect guilt so called by analogie of attribution as that God may in vindictive justice inflict on them for the same the penalty so called by the same analogy both of temporal death and of eternal at least as to the penalty of loss supposing that it be not pardoned through Christ And this I prove by these following Arguments Arg. 1. If we are guilty of
Adam's first sin on that account because we were seminally in him and are propagated from him then are we guilty of our neerer Parents sins on the same account But the antecedent is true go so is the consequent Here I suppose it granted that Adam's first sin is imputed to us and we guilty of it for I now deal not with those Divines that deny it but with those that maintain it For as I said before if we are not guilty of Adam's sin then I must give up my cause and confess that we are not guilty of the sins of our neerer Parents Supposing then the imputation of Adam's sin to us I must First prove that the reason of that imputation is because we are propagated from him and were seminally in him 2. That on the same reason we have the like guilt of neerer Parents sins 1. For the first I may safely premise this that as in all relations there must be a relate correlate and foundation and as to the disconformity of a crooked line from the rule there must be the crookedness of the line and the straightness of the rule and is the rule will not give you ground to denominate the line disconform or crooked unless it be truly so even so there must be merit on mans part consisting in performance or some participation in the evil before the Law which is the rule will judge him guilty The Law is first the rule of duty and then the rule of judgment And it first shews them to be guilty of the sin reos culpae before it shew their obligation to punishment reatum poenae This being so it seems clear that the doctrine of too many that lay the chief or only cause of man's guilt and punishment upon God's covenant is not sound They say God made a covenant with Adam that he should stand or fall for all his posterity that is as some expound it that his desert of life or death should be imputed theirs and as others that if he sinned he and his posterity should be guilty of death and if he did not sin that first sin of eating the forbidden fruit both he and his posterity should be confirmed in their happiness as the good Angels and never fall afterward And this covenant say they makes us guilty of Adam's sin though we have not a natural interest to make us guilty and so God imputeth it to us not because it was ours before the imputation but because he is pleased to make it ours by that imputation or by his covenant That it is not the imputation or covenant that primarily makes us guilty but determineth us guilty of the fault who are so in our selves and consequently determineth us guilty of punishment I prove thus 1. Else it should be God only or primarily that should make us sinners and not we our selves nor our Parents But that 's most false go The consequence is most apparent If a man be therefore a sinner because God by his covenant or imputation saith he is one and not because he is first made one by himself or Parents then God is the principal if not only cause of sin 2. Yea then God should make a man a sinner by that Law whose essential nature is to prohibit and hinder sin 3. Or else thus God's judgment by Law or Sentence is ever according to the truth of the thing He judgeth or pronounceth things to be as they are and not as they are not But if he should determine or pronounce a man a sinner that is not his judgment were not according to truth but he should make that which is false become true by judging it true which is no tolerable conceit 4. If it were without any antecedent ground in us that God's covenant doth judge or make us guilty of Adam's sin or God impute it to us but meerly because he will do it then on the same reason might God have made or judged the innocent Angels or the Lord Jesus Christ guilty of Adam's sin yea he might have imputed it to the Sun or Moon or any creature For if real innocency secure not us from being made sinners by God or reputed such then it would not secure them Or if God's will to impute it be enough without an antecedent interest to ground that imputation upon then there is no difference as to interest in that sin between them and us But that 's too gross a conceit to be defended 5. There is no such covenant of God with Adam mentioned in Scripture as lays the final standing of his posterity upon that first obedience or disobedience of his much less that determineth that they shall be judged guilty for his sake of more than they are guilty of indeed by natural interest The foundation of the relation is in our selves I conclude therefore that it is most certain that there is in man some sufficient ground or cause why God's Law should denominate or judge him guilty before it do so And this cause can be no other than one of these two either because we were seminally in Adam and are his children or because God making his covenant as the Rector of all mankind did make it upon supposition of a virtual consent contained in the very nature of man and so supposing that what we ought to do we would do and that if all men had then existed we ought to have consented to venture our felicity upon Adam's act and to run the hazardâ— of perishing with him on condition we might be saved with him if he stand and so such a supposed consent is the ground of our guilt But though I will not exclude this last ground yet certainly it is upon a supposition of the former or else it is none at all For man was not to exist till the fall was past and therefore could not be supposed to exist And if God had decreed to create every individual person to the end of the World of nothing as he did Adam without any derivation from him what virtual consent can be supposed or on what ground should it be presupposed that we would all consent to live and die with him any more than with the Angels that fell or any more than the good Angels might be supposed to consent to such a thing I conclude therefore that the first ground of our interest in Adam's sin or our guilt of it is our being his off-spring and then seminally in him and next that God might make one Law for him and all that should come of him as supposing the equity of their consent yet by that Law he hath not that I know of involved them in his first sin any more than in his second or third nor offered them happiness meerly on condition of his avoiding that first sin whatsoever they should afterwards do themselves nor yet promised to make them impeccable or prevent all after sin 2. It being then our natural interest that is the first ground of our guilt
of Adam's actual sin so far as we are guilty and we being as truly the children of our neere Parents as of him and seminally in them as well as in him it follows that we have the same natural interest in their sins as in his and therefore the same guilt and reason why God should impute them to us Unless the change of Laws do make a difference which if it do it can be no more than by adding the Law of Grace to that of Nature to remedy its obligation For the nature of things being still the same the same Law of nature still remains and therefore children must now be naturally guilty of all Parents sins as well as then before that guilt be dissolved by remission Though now God will not punish the adult meerly for Parents sins imputed to us yet he might do it if he would supposing he had not by the Law of Grace determined the contrary if it be proved that he might do it then Moreover as then God might suppose a civil interest in Adam's sin as we were parts-future of the same World of mankind on presupposition of our natural interest as his off-spring so now though our Parents be not the root of mankind as Adam was and that 's the main difference yet seeing our neerest Parents may be the root of Families or other Societies whereof God is also the Rector he may suppose another sort of civil interest or guilt of their sins upon us As he imputed Adam's sin to us as he was Rector of all mankind so may he our neerer Parents as he is Ruler of a Family or of some more remote as Ruler of a Common-wealth Obj. But that Law which made us guilty of Adam's sin is abrogated and instead of it is made the Law of Grace God doth not now say to any In the day thou sinnest thou shalt die Answ I know that commination stands not alone and unremedied and I yield that the promissory part is ceased but still every sin doth leave upon us a guilt of death till Christ take it off or else what need could we have of the pardon of it Obj. But that Law was particular and positive in the day thou eatest thou shalt die go it is ceased Answ The particular prohibition of that act of eating is ceased cessante objecto But that particular was grounded on and presupposed a general and that which you call positive how fitly I now enquire not was first natural as to the duness of penalty for each particular sin The Law of nature first saith death is the due wages of sin or every sin deserveth death and this Law doth still remain So that though as to the event we have not that reason to expect eternal death now for Parents sins nor for every sinful act of our own as before the promise of Christ we might have had yet that is not because the Law is abrogated which is the very standing Law of nature nor because now each sin deserveth not such death but because we have now a remedy at hand to put away the guilt I am sure this is the commonest judgment of those Divines that are most against Arminianism for they maintain that all the unbelievers are still under the Law of works it self as to the cursing and punishing power Arg. 2. If we receive the guilt of one sin from our immediate Parents then may we as well receive the guilt of more But we do receive the guilt of one from them go The antecedent is plain For we receive from them the guilt of Adam's sin It is theirs before it can be ours Adam delivered it not immediately to us As we received our nature and persons from our neerest Parents so did we therewith our guilt of that sin The consequence is proved in that there is the same reason of both Why did not our Parents propagate us free from the guilt of Adam's sin Because they were not free from it themselves naturally and therefore cannot give us a better nature than they have themselves And so on the same reason it must follow that being themselves guilty of other sins they cannot convey to us a nature not guilty of them If one be therefore ours because it was first theirs and our nature from them the other must be so too Obj. The Law makes the difference for God hath not made us liable to Justice for our neerer Parents sins as he did for the first Answ This is already answered The Law indeed makes a difference as to the event and execution and actual remaining obligation but not as to the desert The Law declares and shews men to be as they are and doth not judge unequally of men that are equal or of equal actions The same Law though remedied is still so far in force Obj. Our Parents if faithful are pardoned and justified and therefore cannot convey to us the guilt of any sin because they have it not themselves Answ It must be carefully understood that pardon takes not away 1. either the reatum culpae so as that person should hereafter be judged not to have done what he did or not to have sinned in so doing 2. nor yet the natural merit of punishment as if that sin and the person for it did cease to deserve death but only it remitteth the punishment deserved and takes away the legal effectual obligation to punishment or that duness of punishment which must bring it upon us So that Parents may nevertheless convey to their children that natural desert which was not removed from themselves 2. And then remission being a free act of God extendeth no further than he pleaseth and therefore unless the covenant to the faithful and their seed do pardon all their guilt to their seed as well as themselves the very effectual obligation to punishment will follow the natural desert of it to those children that have not such a remission And if this would prove any thing it would prove us not guilty of Adam's sin Arg. 3. If we are guilty of more of Adam's sins than the first or than the eating of the forbidden fruit then on the same grounds we may be guilty of the sins of our neerer Parents But the antecedent is true go so is the consequent The antecedent is proved thus If there were the same causes to make us guilty of Adam's following sins as of the first then thâ—â—e is the same guilt But there were the same causes go 1. We were seminally in Adam as well when he committed his second sin as his first 2. The same Law as to the precept and threatning was in force as de futuro when he committed his second sin as when he committed the first 1. It cannot be doubted but Adam sinned oft between the time of his eating the fruit and God's making the promise of a Redeemer For his soul being depraved and turned into a wrong course of action must needs act sinfully 2. Yea we could not be guilty
that only and many other Texts of Scripture tell us that it is to be extended further Obj. This was the voice of the Law of Works which God doth not now govern the World by Answ 1. This is a Law which was in force since Adam and the Promise and therefore not then abrogated 2. It is as much as I plead for that according to the law of nature punishment is our due for our neerer Parents sins or else it had not been put in this curse by Moses But that Christ hath provided a remedy in the Gospel for that and original sin as from Adam and our actual sin it self I thankfully acknowledge I say not therefore that eventually any shall perish for the imputed act of his Parents sin to whom it is pardoned by the Grace of Christ Arg. 10. Exod. 20. 5. It is expressed in the moral Law it self For I the Lord thy God am a jealous God visiting the iniquity of the Fathers upon the children to the third and fourth Generation of them that hate me so Deut. 5. 9. and so God proclaims his name to Moses Exod. 34. 7. Here then is a threatning determining punishment to be due to the children for their neerer Parents sin for God will visit that is in justice punish it on them The objections before answered I pass by Obj. This is only against those children that do themselves tread in their Fathers steps Answ True as to the adult But it is the Parents sins that are visited on them Those children are especially threatned because it is they that lie under such guilt ununremedied But it 's thence plain that it was the case of all till they receive the remedy for the childs actual sin doth not then begin to make him guilty of his Parents sin but only shews him to lie under that guilt Obj. Yes it is by consenting to our Parents sin when we come to age that we become guilty of them Answ That 's not the first guilt and that consenting brings not on us the same formal numerical sin or guilt that was on our Parents for one accident cannot pass from one subject to another nor remain in two subjects but it brings only a guilt of the like sort so that ours is but the guilt of consenting to their sin But the Text here saith expresly that it is the sins of the Fathers that are visited on the children Obj. It is meant of children in an ethical sense that is not natural but the heirs of their vices Answ It is plain in the Text that it is to natural children and therefore the third and fourth Generation are mentioned though it 's true that it is not all those children that lie under that guilt but only those that inherit their vices Otherwise the threatning should be equally to any other mans natural children that imitate your sin But that 's against the plain Text Though it be true that any other mans children that imitate your sin are liable to punishment for such imitation yet not for your sin Arg. 11. Eph. 2. 3. 11 12. Were by nature the children of wrath even as others Remember that ye being in time past Gentiles in the flesh that at that time ye were without Christ being aliens from the Common-wealth of Israel and strangers from the Covenants of Promise having no hope and without God in the World The first words are commonly understood of a state of wrath derived from Parents by natural Generation If that be not the meaning then I confess it makes nothing to prove either the imputation of Adam's sin or other Parents nor native corruption neither But if that be the sense as is commonly judged then is there no intimation for a restriction of it to Adam's sin as the only cause of our desert of that wrath nay the later verses and the whole scope of the place gives it as a special reason that they were Gentiles in the flesh So that it seems to me some state of wrath which Israel was not under that is here meant or at least some what more to them as the seed of the Gentiles than was common to Israel It appears also from the following verses that when Christ took away the enmity so that the Gentiles were no more strangers and foreigners but fellow-Citizens of the Saints and of the houshold of God and no more without God Covenant Hope c. that Christ did deliver the Gentiles from a special punishment and consequently guilt which lay on them and their seed more than on the Jews So Gal. 2. 15. We who are Jews by nature and not sinners of the Gentiles which intimates plainly that the Gentiles were by nature in a worse state than the Jews and therefore had by nature some more guilt than they Obj. That is not because the Gentiles were by nature guilty of any more than Adam's sin but because the Jews were by nature freed from that guilt which made the difference Answ I confess that may be much taking the word nature but as the cause of the persons to whom the benefit is given and not as the cause of the gift or thing given But yet that seems not all which is meant when we are called sinners of the Gentiles and strangers and foreigners c. For these shew some further transgression of our Parents that bound the sin of Adam falier on us and increased our guilt beyond that of the Jews I mean increased it fundamentaliter quoad â—iusam meritoriam though not terminative quoad poenam demeritam And indeed it was not all the Jews that were freed from the guilt of Adam's sin but only those of them that were within the special Covenant of Grace Arg. 12. Matth. 23. 31 35 36. Wherefore ye be witnesses to your selves that ye are the children of them which killed the Prophets Fill ye up then the measure of your Fathers Ye serpents ye generation of vipers how shall ye escape the damnation of hell That upon you may come all the rightous blood shed on the earth from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zaccharias son of Barachias whom ye slew between the Temple and the Altar Verily I say unto you all these things shall come upon this Generation Here 1. that which they are brought in to witness against themselves is something that may justly subject them to punishment But that which they must so witness is that they are the children of them that killed the Prophets and not of Adam only go c. 2. From hence Christ concludeth 1. Fill up the measure of your Fathers c. q. d. 1. Having the same corrupt natures with your Parents no wonder if ye do the same deeds 2. It is just with God to forsake you for their sakes and permit you to follow the nature that you have from them 2. He calls them a generation of vipers and serpents not only because of their first Father but because of the murderers of the
more for thereby sin is propagated with and in nature If the Law of this Land do ordain that a Traytor and his posterity be all disinherited and banished you may here put your dilematical question and as you answer it so would we If the Law of God deprive rebellious man of all his felicity and leave him his natural being he will beget a posterity therefore deprived of it because they are his posterity Call this one guilt or two as you please I call it one fundamentally and one subjectively while there was but one subject and many consequently by propagation when that one subject is as it were multiplied into many So that this is but about words and not things 11. It 's further argued Lastly if we are therefore guilty of Adam's disobedience because we are his Sons so that neither the miraculous generation in respect of both Parents such as was Isaack's and John Baptist's nor yet a divine creation of the soul without the operation of man can exempt any man from it what then shall we say of our Lord For his miraculous Conception by the Holy Ghost did not hinder him from being truly the Son of Adam arising from the fruit of David's loins Answ I confess this objection hath oft seemed more difficult to me than all the rest but I see no reason that it should overthrow all our grounds For it stands on the supposition of many uncertainties especially about the way of humane generation and the natural interest of male and female comparatively therein c. But passing by all these because the very naming of difficulties I find offendeth many I stand on the common answer though the part or interest of Mary in Christ's Conception was so much as might prove him man of man and give him the name of the Son of Man of David of Adam yet that was but secundum quid or in the smaller part for the interest of the Holy Ghost in that Conception was the predominant interest and therefore he is said in our Creed simply to be conceived by the Holy Ghost and born of the Virgin Mary and he is principally and more fully to be called the Son of God than of Man even according to his humanity how much soever of his material substance might be of the Virgin This being so he could not stand guilty of Adam's or any Parents sin because in the predominant sense he was not one of their off-spring but the Son of God conceived by the Holy Ghost 2. And if the Holy Ghost's Conception do free Christ from the actual corruption of his nature as your self confess why not as well from the foresaid guilt or imputation supposing that such there is For why else should not natural pravity adhere to the substance which he received from the Virgin To imagine that Mary was born without original sin is but to make the difficulty greater how she was free that was not conceived as Christ by the Holy Ghost or to run it I know not how far It were more plausible to say that she was perfectly sanctified by the Holy Ghost before Christ's Conception and therefore could convey no guilt to him but what proof this would have let them tell that know 12. After these reasons the judicious Author concluds thus These things I thought good briefly to dispute following the authority of most grave Divines who have disallowed this imputation either tacitly by their silence as Calvin Instit Tilen Thes c. or else openly and in express words as Pet. Martyr in Rom. 5. Chamier Panstrat First that we may not take that for God's word which is not his word 2. That we ascribe not that to God which becometh him not And that we may free the Christian Religion from such unnecessary difficulties And lastly that we may the stronglier prove original sin as it is described Art 10. and 11. of the confession of our Churches Answ 1. We stick not on mens names though we have more Divines against you 2. Whether it be God's word let our foregoing proof manifest 3. Which if we have proved then should not humane reason say it becomes him not especially when the same reason confesseth the like to become all Princes and Common-wealths 4. I think I have done more to free the Christian Religion from difficulties by asserting such an imputation of all Parents sins as aforesaid than you have done by denying all 5. And I think that we may far more rationally maintain original corruption and the justness of punishment for original sin if we maintain the said guilt than if we deny it as you do So much to this excellent Writer Having answered their Objections let me add this in the conclusion Arg. If we cannot be guilty of inherent original sin without the derived guilt of Adam's actual sin then we do derive a guilt of Adam's actual sin But the Antecedent is true therefore so is the Consequent That we are guilty of inherent original sin is by them confessed But this cannot be without a cause or foundation And the foundation or cause must be ours or else the guilt cannot be ours Now this foundation is either meerly the inherent pravity it self or somewhat Antecedent Not meerly the inherent pravity it self For 1. It would prove against no Law for no Law forbad us to be born as we 〈◊〉 Laws are not made to prohibit that which 〈◊〉 not to be what it cannot choose but be The Law against Adultery prohibiteth the Parents to commit it but not the childâ—â—â— be born in it There might 〈…〉 be a Law to prohibit a child in the womb to come forth as to prohibit the â—eed to become a man and such a man Laws 〈◊〉 made to the intelligent 〈…〉 Yet I deny not but original 〈…〉 is contrary to the Law of God 〈…〉 but that is only consequentially 〈…〉 which it could not be if we had not the guilt of the voluntary act which is primarily against the Law 2. The esse of our inherent 〈◊〉 on pâ—â—â—â—ations is in order of nature before the 〈◊〉 or culpability But we could not have had so much as the esse without an antecedent guilt Which I prove thus Either the being of our original dispositions is only a sin or also a punishment If it be only a sin without any antecedent sin or guilt of ours then either God or Man is the Author of it Not God for he is not the author of sin and if he were it would excuse of the guilt If man either our selves or our Parents Not our selves for we made not our selves If our Parents then either their acts are imputable to us or else that would make it never the more ours So that our corruption would be miserie at non peccatum no more sin than the venom of a toad is sin But it 's certain that the very being of our natural qualities and privations is a punishment For God would not inflict so great an evil on us