founded upon expresse Apostolical practise and implicite Apostolical precept which we are sufficiently able to prove and evince by the collation of foure Scriptures if we were put upon that argument But this would be too larg a digression from the matter in hand Next you come to shew the sense of the commination And here you tell us that Adam did not dye the same day if the day be taken for the space of twelve or twenty four houres This is in plain termes to contradict the scope and sense of the text For there it is expressely said in the very same moment and instant of time in which our first parents did eat the forbidden fruit their eyes were opened and they saw that they were naked Gen. 3.7 If you take this for the eyes of their mind it is most clear that their eyes were opened not onely to see their inward nakednesse in the losse of the image of God but also to feel the guilt of sinne as the just fruit of their disobedience If the opening of the eyes be taken for the eyes of the body then their eyes were opened to see that which they did not nor could see before Their nakednesse before was a nakednesse of honour innocency and righteousnesse but their nakednesse after was a nakednesse of dishonour of misery of sinne of provocation to sin And for the particular time it is expressed in the Comination in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt dye the death And accordingly in the same instant of time when they had eaten the forbidden fruit the eys of them both were opened they knew that they were naked Therefore death misery did seize upon them the same day according to the Commination But because you are so peremptory in it that Adam did not dye the same day if the day be taken for an ordinary day of twelve houres long For the clearing of this I would intreat you to answer me this question why did God appear to Adam in the evening in the cool of the day If you shall say it was to call the man and his wife to account for their disobedience I grant this to be true but it doth not satisfie the question for the particular time He might have called him to account at any other time and what necessity was there that it should be left upon record that he came to judgment the very same day The Lord had said in the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt dye the death and the same day that the forbidden fruit was eaten at evening in the cool or wind of the day as the Hebrew hath it the Lord came to inquire after the fact to give sentence and to execute judgment In Scripture where promises or threats are declared to be fulfilled in such a particular time there the Holy Ghost is punctuall in the observation of the time The children of Israel should be in bondage soure hundred years according to the promise Gen 15.13 14. And when that time was fulfilled the very same day they came out of the land of Egypt with their Armies Exod. 12. 41 42. So our Lord and Saviour did signifie to his Disciples that he should be crucified and slain and the third day rise again Mat. 16.24 And how careful are all the Evangelists to repeat the time of the resurrection that it was on the first day of the week the third day after his passion And so in the present case when it is said in the day that thou eatest thereof shalt thou dye the death to the fulfilling of this the eyes of our first parents were opened the very first day And the Lord came to execute judgment upon them for their disobedience the evening of the same day After all this let us now hear what exposition you do give of the text Though Adam say you did not dye the same day as he did eat of the forbidden fruit yet he forfeited his life to the Lord of the great Charter of the world he was then in a capacity to dye he did then fall under the expectation of death As in the English such a man is a dead man because he is condemned by the sentence of the Law That which you say is true and it is in effect that which I teach but according to your sense it is not the whole truth For when the Lord saith in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt dye the death he doth not speak this onely of a capacity of dying but of an actual seizing of death for he was struck with spiritual death the very same day he sinned And for a temporal death likewise though there was not a present dissolution of the soul from the body yet presently he fell under the curse to conflict with Armies of diseases which should never leave him till they had brought him to his grave In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread untill thou return unto the ground for out of it was thou taken for dust thou art and unto dust thou shalt return Chap. 3. ver 19. But now you further adde If Adam had dyed the same day he could not have tilled the ground he could not have lived so long as to see a son of his own To all this I agree if you take death in the most strict sense for the actual dissolution of the soul from the body but what ground have we so to limit the words of the text I have said before that God did smite him the same day with spiritual death and for a temporal death he came under the dominion and reign of it In that famous place when the Apostle saith by one man sinne entred into the world and death by sinne and death hath passed over all men to condemnation Rom. 5.12 He doth here speak of the immediate reign of death Death reigned from Adam to Moses over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adams transgression ver 14. And in the close of all as sinne hath reigned to death so might grace reign thorough righteousnesseunto eternal life v. 21. Therfore the same day that Adam sinned though he lived to till the ground and to beget children after his own image yet he and all his fell immediately under the reign of death so that all who are now born into the world infants as well as others are under the reigne of death by the disobedience of the first man Having given the true sense of the Scripture we will take a view of your interpretation And here you say ☞ that Adam did dye the same day though he lived nine hundred thirty nine yeares after And to make good this strange glosse of yours you tell us that God did not prescribe any quantity of houres but hath declared that a thousand yeares are as one day in his account page 118. I must indeed acknowledge that a day is taken sometimes for a year sometimes for a greater revolution of time as may be seen
in the Prophetical Scriptures But the scope of the text is plainly to be taken for a literal ordinary day as we have formerly proved And strange it is that the Lord in the denunciation of judgment should go to the typical and parabolicall expressions used in Daniel and the Revelation and Peters Epistle After this you come to enquire whether Christ by his suffering did not prevent the falling of death upon Adam And you resolve it in the negative For say you either Adam must suffer or the Word of God seeing God had once declared the sentence thou shalt surely dye In case then he should give his Son to prevent the death of Adam there had been a clear contradiction page 119. In the commination there are some things which I do acknowledge to be infallible as the Laws of the Medes and Persians which alter not and therefore to make good the sentence all that are now born into the world after the course of natural generation are borne in the state of spiritual death subject to the miseries of nature and shall inevitably be brought to temporal death at last All these things do hold by vertue of the first sentence yet you must take heed that you go no further because the second man hath all fulnesse of grace to repair the losses brought in by the first By his intervening patience and long-suffering is extended to all the sonnes of men And therefore whatsoever you suggest to the contrary there is indeed and in truth no contradiction between the sentence in the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt dye the death and the delay thereof in a qualified sense In some particulars long-suffering may be extended and yet in others there may be a speedy execution of the sentence But you go on seeing God would not have Adam to come near the tree of life therefore he would not have him to be free from death that way page 119. Neither do we maintain that it was the purpose of God to free Adam in that manner that he should not taste of a temporal death He came under the dominion of that death the same day he sinned and the most holy Saints that are must all dye before they can be raised again to set forth the truth and certainty of the Lords commination Yet for all this at present the stroke was stayed by the Mediators blood and long-suffering was extended to men that salvation might be had by the Covenant of grace As for the tree of life it is most true that God did forbid Adam accesse to that tree not absolutely because he would not have him to recover life but because he had provided another way for the restoring of man by Christ the promised seed He would not come to the most extream and final execution of the sentence because his purpose was to have a posterity upon the earth and a seminary for the Church Further you argue there was a necessity for Adam to dye otherwise Christ could not make him alive page 119. Here you mistake the state of the question we agree that Christ did not dye simply to free man that he should not fall into the dust but only to raise him from the dust again It was necessary to fulfill the truth of the commination that Adam should return to dust but it was not necessary that he should return to dust the very same day It was necessary that he should fall under the reign of death and under a necessity of dying the same day he sinned and this to continue to the resurrection of the just Then this mortal shall put on immortality and this corruptible shall put on incorruption 1 Cor. 15.53 The Apostle also saith when he shall change these vile bodies that they may be made like his glorious body Phil. 3.21 All the bodies of the Saints shall be made like the body of Christ as now it is in glory But how did the bodies of the Saints begin to be vile bodies By vile bodies he doth mean these corruptible tabernacles of the soul lyable to diseases and to all the miseries of nature But when did this vilenesse and misery begin seeing they were not made vile by creation They began to be vile bodies the same day that Adam did sin they have been so ever since and they must continue such unto the resurrection and then the bodies of the Saints shall be made conformable to the bodie of Christ in glory Philip. 3 Vlt. CHAP. XIV Whether Adam did dye a spiritual death yea or no IN the discovery of this point you observe this method First you shew what spiritual life is Secondly you resolve upon the question For your description of spiritual life though you miserably confound the Scriptures we will take it in the best sense for such a life as hath the Spirit for the cause Gal. 4.19 John 6.63 Col. 33. But you erre in your application when you use such an expression as this that Adam had not such a cup of water in all his foure Rivers You say also that he could not savour the voice of the resurrection from the dead for the goodnesse of a Saviour must be resented by those that are lost but Adam knew no such need page 122. Your argument is fallacious because Adam had not spiritual life in the same way as the Saints now have therefore he had no spiritual life at all He might have ability to love Christ as Lord Creator Further you say that the voice of forgivenesse of sinne was a stranger to him Well let this be admitted it doth not prove the point neither Sicknesse it self was a stranger to Adam before his fall will you inferre then that there were no herbs for medicine and that the Lord did not create the herb of the field with a medicinal vertue So in the like case what if remission of sinne and the way of pardon of sinne by Christs blood was a thing hidden from Adam as being not compatible with his condition will you inforce from hence a want of capacity in him to understand the mystery of salvation by Christ or will you affirme from hence that he was a meere carnal man before his fall Take heed that by these and such like positions you do not reflect upon God himself The Apostle saith the carnal mind is enmity against God for it is not subject to the Law of God neither indeed can be Rom. 8. ver 6 7. If you go to the Original of this enmity or non-subjection and say it did proceed from the fall of Adam you do agree with us But if you go higher and stand upon it that Adam was a meere natural man by the condition of his creation then you will lay the blame upon God that set him in such a state of enmity and whither will you go in the issue if you maintain such positions as these But to make good your assertion you argue The first man is of the earth earthy the
second man is the Lord from heaven So though Adam was the first man a living man yet it was not a living soul that proveth that Adam had a quickned Spirit page 12◠But in this you do miserably soobisticate For though the Apostle doth draw a parallel between both the Adams If you do well ponder the Scripture you shall finde that the parallel doth not stand so much between Adam before his fall as between the first Adam the second after the fall 2ly upon good consideration you shall finde that the Apostle in this Scripture doth not speak so much concerning the Spirit of God in the soules of the Saints as concerning the spirituality of their bodies that shall be at the resurrection It is sown in corruption it is raised in incorruption it is sown in dishonour it is raised in glory it is sown a natural body it is raised a spiritual body There is a natural body and there is aspiritual body 1 Cor. 15.43 44. If then you will needs conclude Adam to be a carnal man before his fall because his body was not made a spiritual body by the same reason you must conclude all the Saints that have ever been since the creation of the world to be carnal men and absolutely destitute of the work of the Spirit For the bodies of the Saints are yet carnal and must abide in their incarnality till the resurrection of the dead But whereas you build so strongly upon that expression the first man Adam was made a living soul the last man Adam was made a quickning Spirit verse 45. This doth not prove the first man to have been meerely carnal or absolutely void of the Spirit before his fall For it is not the scope of the Apostle in this Scripture to speak of the excellency of man made after the image of God but onely of the corruptible state of the body as it standeth in immediate relation to that immortal condition which it shall have at the resurrection of the dead And whereas it is said the second man was a quickning Spirit this is meant principally of the divinity of Christ by and thorough which he will raise the dead So then if you will build upon this ground and argue from hence that the first man was a meere carnal man because he was not a quickning Spirit by the same principle you must conclude that all the Saints living are carnal men For of what one of them may it be affirmed that he is a quickning Spirit who by his power and divinity is able to raise the dead But if you will make a right analogy let us compare the things that ought to be compared First let us consider what the first man was before his fall and what the Saints are as renewed by grace Secondly let us compare what the first man might have been if he had eaten of the tree of life and what the Saints shall be at the resurrection of the dead For the first of these if you speak of the Saints as renewed by grace though their bodies be natural they are spiritual in respect of the inward man The same may be said of Adam before his fall though his body was made of the dust yet by grace and special favour he did carry the image of God For the second if you shall affirme that all the bodies of the Saints shall be made immortal and spiritual at the resurrection consider what the body of Adam might have been if he had continued in his obedience and eaten of the tree of life If you would make a right collation between state and stat ethe parallel should runne in these termes But because you stand so strongly upon this expression that the first man is of the earth earthy the second man is the Lord from heaven seeing you will have all this to be applied to Adam before his fall I pray you resolve me this question seeing the Apostle saith as we have born the image of the earthy so shall we bear the image of the heavenly Who are they that bear the image of Adam before his fall I think if you were put to it you could not produce any one instance in all Europe Asia Africa or America that ever stood up after this similitude The scope of the text is onely concerning man after the fall and how the resurrection of the dead doth take away that death which is brought in by the fall In the close of the Chapter you propound this question whether was not Adam to have dyed an eternal death for eating of the forbidden fruit For the clearing of the question let us distinctly set down how the three kinds of death did seize upon Adam and how they come upon all his branches First for spiritual death it is evident that he died this death as soon as he did eat of the forbidden fruit For the temporal death he fell under the reign of it the same day he sinned And for eternal death though according to the truth of the commination Adam and his posterity should have dyed the Lord Christ stepping in did set a stop to the sentence And therefore for the cause of the condemnation of man it is now principally and immediately for the neglect of the grace of God that should lead him to repentance But you adde further I can safely say that if Adam was to have dyed an eternal death and that by the appointment of God then Christ neither would nor could have stept in nay he could not have lifted up his little finger to have helped Adam or his posterity page 125. I answer If God had decreed in his secret purpose that Adam and all his posterity should have dyed the death in such a case Christ neither would nor could have stept in to cross the Decree of God but Sir who is the man that doth maintain that position For my part I take the Decree of God to be one thing and the outward denunciation of judgment to be another For the Decree that cannot be changed but the sentence may recieve alteration according to divers outward circumstances and conditions that may occurre Besides if you should build never so strongly upon the letter of the text we can easily reconcile the truth of the commination in saying that Adam might dy the death the same day he sinned ☞ though the Lord was not pleased presently to inflict death in all its kinds From all which we do conclude if the Lord Christ came to free men from the reign of death Heb. 2.14 15. We may easily gather that Adam brought himself and all his posterity under the dominion of that syrant and so he and all his should have dyed that kind of death if the Lord Christ had not stepped in But you go about to deface this speech in the end of the Chapter for if in case that Christ had not stepped in there had been no recovery this were to exclude all other means and to limit
spirit He did desire that his defilement by natural generation might be done away by the work of the new creation And whereas these confident men would desire to know whether it be not Davids scope in his confession to aggravate his sinne I answer it is and therefore he doth cry out against the sinne of the nature he doth use the same expression in effect as Paul doth Rom. 7. I know that in me that is in my flesh dwelleth no good thing ver 18. And O wretched man that I am who shall deliver me from the body of this death ver 24. Where we may observe these three points First they who are inwardly and truly enlightned do feel the burden of a carnal mind which they have by natural generation whereas other men account the liberty of lust their greatest freedome Secondly they feeling the propension of their nature wholly to sinne do hereupon aggravate the sinfulnesse of their nature Thirdly by this means they do more highly prize the grace of Christ and that freedome which he doth bring to set them at liberty from the bondage of corruption and the reigne of their lusts Joh. 8.31 32 33. Isa 61.1 2 3. Mat. 12.20 The promise of Christ is that a bruised reed he will not break and the smoaking flax he will not quench untill he have brought forth judgment unto victory By judgment is here meant deliverance from under the tyranny and reign of original sin when men serve divers lusts and pleasures The deliverance from the power of corruption is the judgment meant in the text This deliverance is not wrought in an instant but by degrees and our Saviour is ready to help the weakest that flie to him in a sense of their own misery There is nothing more weak than a bruised reed and the least degree of fire will make flax to smoak Even so if there be the least grace to feel the bondage of corruption the Lord Christ is ready to cherish it and never to leave till he have brought forth judgment unto victory to make men conquerors of their lusts But the ground of all this is to feel the burden of a carnal mind which it is most probable these Censors are strangers to or else they would not so extenuate the sin of the nature as they do Now let us heare what interpretation they give of the Psalmists words It was say they the lie or lying promises of Sathan with the folly therein contained by which he was shapen in iniquitie or conceived in sin pag. 74. And they ground themselves upon that passage that the devil is the father of sin These are their words besides our natural parents we have spiritual fathers and mothers whether for our begetting in evil and iniquity or for our regeneration in grace and goodnesse Concerning our procreation in sin our Saviour speaks thus unto the Jewes Joh. 8.44 Ye are of your father the Devil and his lusts will ye do Now this father makes use of a twofold mother to beget men in wickednesse besides their own lust which when it is enticed and drawn away by temptation conceiveth and bringeth forth sin Jam. 1.14 15. And here first they reckon the lying word or promise by which Sathan deceiveth men and secondly the false Synagogue which thorough Sathans helps begets men in a false faith Page 75. 76. But this glosse will not serve their turn neither for though the Devil be the father of sin he is so onely by temptation and suggestion but the Psalmist speaketh of sin by derivation and propagation I was shapen in iniquitie and in sin did my mother conceive me And for that which they alledge out of the Epistle of St. James he doth onely speak of the order of generation of sin in the heart every man is drawn away of his own lust and enticed and lust when it hath conceived bringeth forth sin But what is this to the purpose of the Psalmist he doth not speak of the generation of lust or of sin in his heart but he doth speak of his own generation This is evident from the words themselves I was shapen in iniquitie and in sin did my mother conceive me Secondly it is manifest from the words that follow because he was defiled with the pollution of the natural birth by way of opposition he prayeth unto the Lord to create in him a clean heart because his old was defiled therefore he did beg a new nature Fourthly to that place Eph. 2.3 And were by nature the children of wrath as well as others they answer by a distinction It is one thing say they to be sinners from our first nativity and another thing in time to become the children of wrath by our personal fall and actual disobedience which also coming to passe in our natural man and by his default we may truly be said by nature to be the children of wrath when sin by custome becomes a second nature to us Page 78. Here I yield that the Ephesians before their conversion and all other natural men do thorough their own actual disobedience serve divers lusts and pleasures This is the truth but it is not the whole truth If they were only defiled by custome which in a sense may be called a second nature by good custome then they need onely a remedy of the evil of their nature and we need not the knowledge of Divinity but onely of Moral Philosophie toward the recovery out of our misery For that which is now the judgment of these Censors was sometimes the opinion of Aristotle He did beleeve that man in his birth was like a white sheet of paper and that thereupon the habit of vertue was attainable by many acts But the Apostle doth not deal upon such weak beggerly and Ethical grounds because the Ephesians were not only sinners by conversation but by nature also were the children of wrath hereupon in relation to their natural corruption he saith you hath he quickened which were dead in trespasses and sinnes Their quickening by the spirit a posteriori doth shew the pollution of their natures a priori But if they were the children of wrath only by custome a second nature by breaking off old customes they might reduce themselves to their ancient purity of nature And this is the Moral Philosophie of these Censors and the separate Churches of this way Fifthly for that place of the Romans by one man sin entred into the world and death by sin Chap. 5. v. 12. That we may more orderly proceed let us consider how they plant their own interpretation and then how they oppugne ours This one man say they by whom sinne entred into the world is not our first parent Adam but our own earthly or natural man which is called Adam and Edom from the earth of his foundation pag. 78. Here I do plainly and openly confesse I do not know what they meane by this Adam neither can I see how possibly they can apply such a sense to
powers they cannot without a new grace and favour go to heaven But then it cannot presently be inferred that therefore they go to hell but this ought to be inferred which indeed was the real consequent of it therefore it is necessary that Gods grace should supply this defect if God intends heaven to them at all and because nature cannot God sent a Saviour by whom it was effected so far he pag. 15. Now I leave it to any man to judge whither the same mutatis mutandis may not be said of our opinion though infants are borne in Original sin and are by nature the children of wrath yet they may be saved by grace By all this it is evident that we are as faire for the salvation of infants as he is and by the same doore as he goes out we will go out at the same And for the sayings of our writers I have three things to answer First some speak more mildly in the point rather inclining to the salvation than the damnation of infants Junius in his collation de naturâ gratiâ hath these words Nemo nostrum it a fuerit aut furere compertus est c. There is none of ours that is so mad or was ever found so void of reason who would simply affirme infants to be damned They which teach otherwise let themselves look to it by what right they moy do it and by what authority it may be done For although in respect of their own selves and that common nature of ours they may be in a state lyable to damnation it follows not that we should passe the sentence of damnation upon them c. In the processe of his discourse he giveth sundry reasons First the promise of God to believers and their natural seed Secondly his mercy to thousands and that through many descents where the Ancestors have sometimes belonged to the Covenant Thirdly The judgement of charity seeing it is the Lords pleasure to take them away in their infancy we may presume that by that fatherly act of his he intends to receive them to mercy Other testimonies may be brought of such that have gone in the milder way but these shall suffice A second sort of our Expositiors there are that do pitch more hard They say that some infants may go to hell yet they moderate their sentence as Chamier Non abhorret a verisimilitudine paenas eorum esse mitissimas It is very probable their punishments are most mild A third sort leave the matter wholly in suspence they think it sufficient to believe that all infants are borne in a state lyable to damnation they have in them the seeds of all evil yet for all this they conceive that God may shew mercy in and through Christ specially to the infants of such that do belong to the Covenant specially where conscience is made to enter them into the outward visible Church by baptisme And this is all that we will say of this question Leaving this businesse of the state of infants and reserving to God the secrets of election or non-election we will come to the point that is more useful and more easie to be understood And here he questions whether Adam did debauch our nature and corrupt our will and manner by his fall And if he did it he further enquires after the manner how it was done First whether it was done by a natural or physical efficiency of sin it selfe Secondly whether was it because we are all in the loynes of Adam or Thirdly whether was the sentence and the decree of God the cause thereof he hath foure arguments against a physical efficiency which we have in part handled already and shall have occasion to speak afterwards And therefore to avoid repetition we will come to the second branch whether Adam did debauch our nature because we are all in his loynes Against this he hath sundry reasons that follow in order By the same reason saith he we are guilty of all the sins that he committed while we were in his loynes there being no imaginable reason why the first should be propagated and not the rest Answ As I have formerly shewed so I declare againe the pollution of nature can only be propagated from the first sin because in that only Adam did act as a publick man in which sence the Apostle calls him the figure of him that is to come But of this I have spoken already Secondly upon this account saith he all the sins of all our progenitours will be imputed to us because we were in their loynes when they sinn'd them Answ Not so neither for though we were in their loynes when they sinned yet in a strict sence they are only vehicula so many conduit pipes of the conveyances of the nature from the first root To speak properly there are only two roots of the nature Adam the root of corruption to all his branches Christ the root of grace and spiritual life to all his branches If any question be made of the truth of this there is every where in the doctrine of St. Paul an antithesis between the flesh and the spirit between the old man and the new betwixt generation and regeneration betwixt Adam and Christ Between these two there is a plaine opposition in three things in point of justification Secondly in point of sanctification Thirdly in point of the resurrection from the dead And therefore whereas the first man by his act brings us under the guilt of sin the second washes away the guilt of sin by his blood and whereas the first man pollutes our nature and is the root of the corruption of nature the second man sanctifies our nature and is the root of a new nature to all his branches And whereas the first man did bring in death and all the miseries of nature upon our bodies that lead to death the second man frees us from all these by the resurrection from the dead But he further alledgeth Thirdly Sin saith he is seated in the will it is an action and so transient and when it dwels or abides it abides no where but in the will by approbation and love to which is naturally consequent a readinesse in the inferiour faculties to obey and act accordingly and therefore sin doth not infect our meer natural faculties but the will only and not that in the natural capacity but in its moral only Answ Though it be true that sin is principally seated in the will yet we shall finde all along that the Scriptures do lay great weight upon the blindnesse and the perversity of the judgement and as in the old creation so it is in the new The first work that is done is the creation of light Besides the Christ-like disposition is begun and carried on by degrees and all this by the renovation of light The understanding is first enlightned and then the will comes to choose the things of God Further let it be supposed that sin is only seated in the will
Great difference is to be made between the will of other sinners and the will of the first man The will of other sinners doth only redundare in personam it doth encrease the habit of sin in their own persons alone the will of the first man did redundare in naturam it did vitiate and deprave the whole nature as we have formerly shewed And yet thirdly whereas he saith that sin doth infect the will not in its natural capacity but in its moral only This expression of his must under favour be taken with a graine of salt We do willingly yield that the will is morally or rather spiritually corrupt because she wents that holinesse that purity and righteousnesse which the law requires yet if we look to the reasons of things the corruption was brought into the will by the fall of Adam They then do not speak improperly that call the corruption of the will pravitatem physicomoralem It is a moral depravation because it is against the rectitude of the moral law it is a natural depravation because it flows from the first man as the root of corruption For the proofe of the latter let us have recourse to that place of the Apostle ye have put off the old man with his deeds and have put on the new man In these words of his there is a direct opposition between the old man and the new By the old man he meaneth the pravity and corruption of nature which though it hath had its being in hundreds thousands and millions of men yet originally all comes out of one root In this regard the whole nature is called by the title of the old man So proportionably the Christ-like disposition though it hath been diffused into infinite persons who have lived in several ages of the Church yet the whole nature doth originally proceed out of one root and therefore in this regard is elegantly called by the title of the new man Secondly the opposition is between 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 their being uncloathed and their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 their being cloathed upon By this way of expression the Apostle doth insinuate the corrupt disposition of the flesh is that which the soul is cloathed upon which cloathing she had from Adam the root of corruption Now the believing Colossians because they had a living principal within and had begun to put off and did so continue in putting off the old man he speaks of it as a work already done ye have put off the old man with his deeds So likewise the new nature or the Christ-like disposition is here resembled to a garment with which they were cloathed upon because they had begun and did so continue to put it on by degrees he doth speak of it as a matter already effected ye have put on the new man From all which we gather the pravity of the will though it be in its own nature a moral or rather spiritual obliquity Yet respecting the cause it proceeds from Adam the root of corruption If this truth be not admitted we shall crosse and hinder the very chief designe of the Gospel For the corruption of nature being laid in the first Adam it doth cast us all upon the seeking longing desiring the new nature that is to be had from the second Fourthly saith he to him that considers it it will seem strange and monstrous that a moral obliquity in a single instance should make an universal change in a natural suscipient and in a natural capacity Answ This is no more strange then true we say that Adams disobedience was a moral obliquity and he by that single act of his did cause an universal change in the whole nature of man By it the souls of men come to be cloathed upon with the habit of sin and their bodies with corruption And if he or any man else shall marvel at this they must upon this account wonder at the chiefe foundations of the Gospel For we will not doubt to say in the parallel case as the Lord Christ did humble himselfe to the death of the crosse it was in genere moris a moral obedience he did obey the command of his Father Yet by this one act of his he did make a change not only in a moral but also in a natural suscipient he did a thing by and through which the souls of the Saints may be freed from inward pravity and corruption and their bodies raised from the dead at the last day Phil. 3. ult Fifthly He reasons no man can transmit a good habit a grace or a virtue By natural generation as a great Scholars son cannot be borne with learning c. and how can it be that a naughty quality should be more apt to be disseminated than a good one when it is not in the goodnesse or badnesse of the quality that hinders his dissemination but its being an acquired and superinduced quality that makes it cannot naturally descend Answ We willingly yield that a good quality is as apt to be disseminated as a bad and therefore had Adam stood he had disseminated the image of God to the posterity that did come of him But seeing that he fell by his fall he doth now disseminate Original corruption to all his branches Further though Adam doth disseminate corruption by natural generation mankind is not left under an absolute necessity of perishing as long as a second Adam is prepared to disseminate grace and spiritual life by regeneration Excellent is that speech of Hillary upon the fourty eighth Psalm Quoniam animarum medicus non venit vocare justos c. Because the Physitian of souls came not to call the just but sinners to repentance therefore he ordained that whatsoever was worst in every company should be soonest called Of all men living upon the earth the heathen were the worst yet they were the soonest called Further whereas our Author saith that a great Schollars son cannot be borne with learning and the child of a Judge cannot upon his birth-day give wise sentences the reason is plaine personal priviledges and acquired habits do not naturally descend But with the two Adams the case is far otherwise for they have a nature to communicate to all their branches The first doth communicate it by generation the second by regeneration as we have formerly proved And whereas he argues How can a quality morally bad be directly and regularly transmitted by an action morally good and since that neither God that is the Maker of all doth amisse and the Father that begets sins not and the child that is begotten cannot sin by what conveyance can any positive evil be derived to posterity To this we say that the body and the soul are both the workmanship of God yet both may be made the subject and the seat of sin through the temptation of Sathan and a vitious propagation Neither is the evil any way to be ascribed to the Creatour but to the temptation of Sathan and the