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A30247 A treatise of original sin ... proving that it is, by pregnant texts of Scripture vindicated from false glosses / by Anthony Burgess. Burgess, Anthony, d. 1664. 1658 (1658) Wing B5660; ESTC R36046 726,398 610

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depriving us of all spiritual sense and feeling So that by it we are put into this sad perpiexity for none need or are bound more to bewail this sinne than an unregenerate man and yet he cannot send forth the least sigh and groan because of it So that hereby we have contracted such an unavoidable exigency upon us that we cannot turn our selves any way mourn and cry we must for this pollution yet mourn and cry we cannot because this is one inseparable effect of it to take away all tendernesse and mourning Hence the stony heart mentioned by Ezekiel Chap. 11. 18. is in a great measure original sinne Till therefore we are regenerated as we see in David Job and Paul we cannot truly mourn under it Lastly This is a work to do as long as we live Because it 's inseparable from our natures while we live in this world God indeed could in our life time wholly free us from it as well as at death but he lets these reliques continue that our tryumph at the Day of Judgement may be the greater Vivum captivum reservantur ad tryumphum Captives are preserved alive for the greater trymph And the rather God doth this that so even his very Pauls his most eminent and choicest servants may have matter of debasement within themselves and more earnestly groan for a day of Redemption A TREATISE OF Original Sin The Second Part. SHEWING VVhat ORIGINAL SINNE is AND How it is Communicated By Anthony Burgess ANCHORA SPEI LONDON Printed in the Year 1658. A TREATISE OF Original Sinne. PART II. CHAP. I. Of the Name Old-man given to Original Sinne SECT I. ROM 6. 6. Knowing this that our Old-man is crucified with Christ c. IN the beginning of the Chapter the Apostle informeth us That no Gospel priviledges or Evangelical grace amplified to the highest may encourage to sinne for the Apostle maketh an Objection himself from the Doctrine he delivered If grace abound where sinne doth abound then why may not we sinne more that grace may abound more Thus there have alwayes been some who have turned bread into stones and fish into serpents making the grace of God to exclude our duty and a tender care against sinne But the Apostle as if blasphemy were in this Objection tryeth out God forbid You see with what indignation and detestation we should look upon all those Doctrines which under pretence of advancing Grace do cry down Duties and an holy life making it a legal and a servile thing Now the Apostle bringeth an Argument against indulgence in sinne notwithstanding Gods grace Because we are dead to it and then how can we live to it Would it not be a monstrous and an afrighting sight to see dead men come out of their graves to live and walk amongst us Thus also it ought to be no less wonderfull yea terrible to see a Christian give himself to any evil way And that we are dead to sinne he proveth by our Baptism concerning which he speaks admirable and sublime matter So that if we consider what great things are here spoken of it we may wonder to see how cold and rare our meditations are about it for he makes it to be that Sacrament in the right use whereof we put on Christ yea that thereby we are ingraffed and implanted into him Hence ver 5. he useth that word of being planted into him a metaphor from the Husbandman who by planting his Science into another stock doth thereby make it partake of the life or death of the Tree if the Tree liveth that liveth if the Tree dieth that dieth so it is with us and Christ By the phrase then is intended no more than our communion with and interest in Christ and that both in his death and his resurrection For you must know that the Scripture doth not only make Christs death and resurrection to be the cause of the death of our sins and of our spiritual resurrection to holiness but also makes them types and resemblances of such things in us That as Christ died in his passible body so we should die to sinne and as Christ after his death did rise again to glory and immortality thus we should rise out of sinne to walk in newness of life and both these are signified in Baptism 1. Our Communion with Christ in the efficacy of his death and resurrection 2. The Representation of this that what was corporally done to Christ should be spiritually fulfilled in us and therefore some think that the Apostle doth allude to that primitive Rite and Custom which was in baptizing when the baptized party was first put under the water for a little season which represented Christs burial and our death to sinne 2. There was the emersion or rising again out of the waters which signified Christs Resurrection and also our rising again to holiness and godliness This is the Summe of the Apostles discourse concerning Baptism in its sacramental signification which he amplifieth further in my Text and that as a reason why we should not live to sinne who were baptized into Christ viz. Because our Old man is crucified with Christ Both because Christ in being crucified did subdue thereby the dominion of sinne and also we are to do to the body of sinne within us what was done to Christs body to crucifie it and thereby to destroy it There is nothing more to be enquired into in the Text but what is meant by our Oldman They limit it too much that understand it only of the habit or acquired custom of sinne which we live in before Regeneration as Grotius seemeth to understand But we are to take it as both Popish and Protestant Commentators do interpret it for that vicious and corrupt nature which we all derive from Adam putting it self forth into several lusts and ungodly actions wherby there is an habituated inveterated custom at last in sin so that although we may understand lusts and actual impieties with long custom therin under the phrase of the Old man yet principally and chiefly we are to interpret it of that polluted nature we have from Adam and this will easily appear to be so if you consider the other two places where this expression is used Ephes 4. 22. That ye put off the Old man c. and that ye put on the New man Col. 3. 9 10. Ye have put off the Old man with his deeds and have put on the New man Where 1. You see the Old man is distinguished from the effects and deeds of it which are actual sins And then 2. Old man and New man are made two immediate opposites now the New man is plainly expressed by the Apostle what it is viz. not so much actual holiness as the Image of God repaired in us so that as the New man is the Image of God and that holy nature repaired in us so the Old man is the contrary to this viz. a deprivation of that Image of God and and an universal
say Christus resurrexit Christ is risen For this end Christ is called The first fruit of them that slept vers 20. As the first fruits did sanctifie the whole harvest of corn that was afterwards to be gathered So did Christ rising all his members by his Resurrection assuring them of theirs Hence it is that the Apostles Arguments are not to prove the Resurrection of wicked men for they arise upon another account but onely of the godly who are his members and have an interest in his mediation It is indeed a Dispute Whether even wicked men do not rise by the virtue of Christs merit and his Resurrection Baldwine for determining the negative in locum is traduced by another Lutheran for Popery and Calvinism as introducing that Doctrine of the particularity of Christs death But certainly The wicked mans resurrection is not to be accounted in the number of any mercies and therefore not merited by Christ Hence it followeth necessarily that they rise not by any relation to Christ but by the power and justice of God because of that immutable and unchangeable Decree that every sinner unrepenting shall die both temporally and eternally which later could not be accomplished unlesse the bodies of wicked men were raised up to life again out of the dust Now our Apostle to prove Christ the cause of our Resurrection draweth an Argument from a comparison between Adam and him making them two originals and fountains but of contrary effects the one of death the other of life For as in Adam all die so in Christ all shall be made alive Not that all men universally shall be saved by Christ but the universal particle must be limited according to the subject matter in hand All that are in Christ all that are his members shall be made alive by him And therefore in the next verse it is so limited Christ the first-fruits and afterwards they that are Christs at his coming So that the sense is That as all Adams posterity die because of him so all that are Christs seed shall live by him For the expression in Adam and in Christ do denote a causality in them the one of death the other of life Therefore we must not think that the Apostle doth here only make a bare similitude and comparison shewing that as by Adam we die so by Christ we shall be made alive but it 's an Argument from the power and causality that is in one to the other The Apostle doth in the fifth of the Romans make the like comparison only there is this difference as Calvin observeth In that place the Apostle maketh the comparison chiefly in respect of spiritual effects death as it brings condemnation and life as it is accompanied with justification here and glorification hereafter This Text is greatly agitated in the controversie between Puccius and Socinus Vide Disput de statu primi hominis ante lapsum The former holding truly though he superaddeth many gross errors that Adam was not made mortal and that death came in only by sinne only he goeth absurdly beyond his bounds when he holdeth the beasts were also made immortal The later on the contrary he holdeth That Adam was made mortal that death in natural that though by sinne we are under a perpetual necessity of death which is an ambiguous phrase he useth yet death it self is natural He granteth That immature and violent death cometh by sinne but death as it is a meer dissolution of a person so it is from his primitive creation and constitution Therefore be would have this difference between the Text I am upon and Paul's Discourse in the fifth of the Romans viz. That there indeed he speaketh of the sinne of Adam by which we come to die But here he would have the Apostle consider Adam as he is by Creation and that being mortal from the beginning we also are mortal from him But who can perswade himself that these passages concerning the change of the body hereafter to what it is now It is sown in corruption it 's raised in corruption it is sowen in dishonour it is raised in glory it is sowen in weaknesse it is raised in power are to be understood of our bodies as at the first Creation and not as they are now by Adam's fall Our bodies are made corruptible and vile bodies by reason of sinne We must then understand the Apostle as speaking of Adam sinning though sinne be not here named So that the fifth of the Romans will excellently illustrate this place and that maketh the sense to be That Adam sinning by his sinne death entered upon all mankind so that death is not natural neither doth it arise from our first constitution but it cometh in wholly by sinne SECT II. Death an Effect of Original Sinne explained in divers Propositions HAving then heretofore spoken of some spiritual effects of original sinne and more might be named such as a necessity to sinne an impotency to all good senslesness and stupidity therein the aldom to Satan but I shall pass them by as being very proper to the Common-place of Divinity which is of the grace of God and mans free-will and shall proceed to the effects of original sinne that are of another nature and that is temporal and eternal death The former effects did so slow from original sinne as that also they are sinfull properties in a man but these are meerly punishments It is not our sinne that we are sick that we die but it is the effect From the words then we observe this truth and doctrine That death cometh upon all mankind because of our sinne we have originally from Adam It is true the Socinian will say We put more in the Doctrine then is in the Text but you heard the comparison used by the Apostle in the fifth of the Romans compared with this doth necessarily suppose death to be because of Adam's sinne not only as imputed unto us but because thereby we are made inherently sinfull This truth is of a very vast compasse but I shall consine my self within as narrow bounds as may be I shall follow my usual method to explicate this in several Propositions ¶ 1. FIrst This controversie about mans mortality is very famous in the Church and hath been of old solliciously disputed The Pelagians as they denied original sinne so consonantly to that falshood they affirmed That death was not the punishment of sinne but did arise by the necessity of our natural constitution Which Assertion was condemned by some Councils and the Laws of Emperours as injurious to God the Creator of men For this experience that Infants new born are subject to many miseries and death it self was a thorn in their sides which they could not endure in nor yet possibly pull out Sometimes with the Stocks they would deny death to be an evil Sometimes they would say Children in the womb are guilty of actual sinnes for which they deserved death but that which they did most constantly adhere
noble creature worse than other creatures if he had not created him with such perfect and suitable qualifications as would inable him to obtain true blessedness for every creature else had an implanted ability in it to accomplish his end and why then should God do lesse bountifully with man one of the chiefest instances of his glorious workmanship But of this I must necessarily speak more because of the Socinian who cals this Doctrine of original righteousness Faetida fabula an old stinking fable SECT V. 5. ORiginal sinne is a privation not only of that righteousness which was a natural perfection due to him upon supposition of his Creation for the enjoyment of God but also of whatsoever supernatural and gracious favour Adam had We do not say That Adam had nothing supernatural in him for assisting and co-operating 〈◊〉 supernatural as also that prophetical light he had concerning 〈…〉 God did superadde many glorious ornaments which were 〈…〉 and which he did not absolutely need as means to make him 〈…〉 and such likewise were those consequents of holinesse mentioned before 〈◊〉 to be the Sonne of God and to be the Temple of the holy Ghost Now all these gratuita are lost as well as the naturalia we are no more the children of God or the Temple of God but our souls are possest with Satan and he ruleth in our hearts as in his proper possession Some Divines call original righteousnesse the absolute Image of God and our sonship and filial relation to God for Adam is called the Sonne of God Luke 3. ult the relative Image now whether absolute or relative Image all is lost and therefore that assisting grace which was then ready at hand for Adam to enjoy that thereby he might b●●nabled to do any good action we are naturally without Oh then the 〈◊〉 and undone estate we are in being without inberent grace dwelling in us and assisting grace from God without us without eyes and the light of the Sun also Who can think that God at first made us such sinfull mortal and wretched creatures It would be much against the wisdom and goodness of God he would then have done worse with man than with any flie or worm SECT VI. What are the most excellent and choice parts of that Original Righteousness that we are deprived of BUt because the greatest part of the privative way of original corruption is in losing that Image of God and concreated holinesse and we have onely spokan in the general of that that we may be the more affected with it and the losse thereof may pierce to our very hearts Let us consider what are the most excellent and choice parts of this original righteousnesse that we are deprived of that so we may not only see our losse in the bulk but be able to account of every particular in this and that we have lost And the first particular to be insisted on is that great dignity God put on man making him with a Free will to do what is holy Free-will is a great perfection though the mutability in it as in Adam was a negative Imperfection this was admirable in Adam that he had power if he willed to doe any holy action whatsoever There was not in him any clog any impediment to stop the exercise of this Free will but as he had dominion over all creatures so also over hi● whole soul and indeed if God had not created him with this dominion over his actions his obedience had not been so eminent nor his disobedience so culpable But this flower is withered this Crown is fallen to the ground Man hath now no free will no power to do any thing that is holy He hath power to eat and drink he hath power to do civil moral actions he hath power to do actions externally religious to come to the Congregation to hear but for those things that are internally holy to love God to believe on him to repent of sin This the Scripture doth in many places deny to him making him to be dead in sinne and untill born again by the Spirit unable to do any holy duty This Raymundus Theol. Natur. de lapsu hominis doth well urge That the soul as to spiritual actions and in reference to God is wholly dead so that as a dead man is not able to produce any vital actions so neither can any natural man spiritual actions and because man being dead is not sensible of this losse therefore doth the same man compare him to a mad man that knoweth not how it is with him yea he much pursueth that similitude of wine degenerated into vinegar saying That as vinegar retaineth nothing of the sweetnesse or goodnesse it had when it was wine Thus neither doth man retain any thing of that light in his mind or love in his heart which once he had Man saith he is not become of good wine bad which though bad retaineth some taste and hath a little relish of the nature of wine but he is as when Wine is degenerated into vinegar which hath all clean contrary to what is had when once wine This comparison he the rather urgeth Because saith he man doth not or cannot discern in himself the difference between his created condition and his fallen therefore he must see how it is with him in similitude by other things We may adde to this similitude another of the body of man while living and an instrument of the soul with it self when dead and separated from it that body then though formerly never so beautifull and comely never so lively and active now is loathsome and hath the clean contrary qualities Such a thing is man now fallen if compared with his Creation SECT VII A Second instance of a particular in this Image of God which we have lost is Faith and dependance upon God as a Father As God made Adam his son in holinesse so Adam had a filial dependance and belief on him resting alone in Gods protection and preservation and thereby was not subject to any fears grief or troublesom dejections of mind about his soul or body This was an excellent pearl in that Crown of glory which God set on mans head but how totally is this lost Every man by this original sinne may justly go up and down trembling like a Cain fearing that every thing should not only kill him but damn him Yea whence is it that the Sea is not fuller of monsters than thy heart is of unbelieving doubting and diffident thoughts about God Why art thou so fearfull suspicious and despairing about God naturally Is not this because God and thy soul are separated Doth not thy conscience secretly suggest to thee that God is offended with thee Is not this a plain discovery of thy losse of God and his Image that thou hast naturally fears and doubts within thy self Thou thinkest of God and art troubled as Adam when he heard Gods voice ran and hid himself All the natural tremblings and
glorifie and honour God all his whole work and life is now to dishonour him and reproach his holy Name Herein then lieth the misery of this losse of the Image of God that we are fallen from our end we are of our selves salt that hath lost its favourinesse we are fit for nothing but eternal torments SECT III. The Harmony and Subordination in Mans Nature dissolved by the loss of Gods Image IN the second place This losse is to be aggravated because of the Nature of it which is the deordination and dissolution of all that Harmony and Subordination which was in mans nature That admirable and composed order which was in the whole man is now wholly broken so that the mind and will is against God and the affections and passions against them A three-fold Subordination there was in man The first of the intellectual and rational part unto God The mind clearly knowing him and the will readily submitting unto him The second was A regular Subordination of all the passions and affections unto the mind so that there did not from the sensible part arise any thing that was unbeseeming and contrary to the rational Hence it was that the Scripture taketh notice of Adam and Eve in their privitive Condition that though naked yet they were not ashamed There being a full purity and simplicity in their natures whereby nothing could arise to disturb all those superiour operations At sin expresseth it well Even saith he as Paradise the place wherein Adam was created had neither heat or cold but an excellent temperament excluding the hurtfull excess of either so also the soul of Adam was without any excessive passion or inordinate motion but all things did sweetly and amicably concur in obedience to the mind The third and last Subordination was of the body both to the rationall and sensitive principles There was a preparednesse in the body of Adam as there was in Christ whereby he did readily do the Will of God and sound the body not obstructing or weighing of it down Now let us consider this three-fold cord which did bind Adam's whole man unto that which is good which was easily broken and then as when the flood-gates are open the streams of water violently rush forth hurrying all away Thus it is with mankind This order being dissolved the whole heart of man is as unruly as the Sea and whereas that hath its natural bounds Hitherto it shall go and no further The heart of man is boundlesse and hath no stops of it self only the infinite God of Heaven he ruleth and ordereth it as he pleaseth Consider the first breach and mourn under that Is it nothing to have the mind of man which hath as many thoughts almost as there are sands upon the Sea shore and yet not to have one of these rise in the soul with subordination to God What a sad bondage is this that our thoughts are no more under our command than the flying birds in the air Do not either sinfull thoughts or if good come in so unseasonably upon thee that they carry away thy soul prisoner Oh this losse of the obedience of the mind to Gods Law in all the thoughts thereof ought to be no mean matter of debasement Not to find one good thought of all those Iliades Chiliades and Myriades of thoughts which thou hast but to have rebellion in them against God What sad impression should it make on thee In the will also those motion and incompleat velleities yea acts of consent in the will which arise in the soul as so many swarms of flies in the air Are not these also so many armies of lusts against God whereas in the state of integrity there would not have risen the least distemper The second breach Is not that also as terrible and powerfull For are not all our affections and passions like so many dogs to Action like so many Locusts and Caterpillers in Egypt like so many flies and hornets till by grace they are crucified What man is there in whom if God should let any one passion or affection have dominion over him that it would not immediately destroy him So that the power of original corruption is more manifested in the affections and passions than any subject else Lastly The disorder which is in the body in respect of its instrumental serviceablenesse unto God can never be enough lamented Do not pains and diseases in the body much indispose in holy things Do not dulnesse drousinesse and wearinesse hinder a man so that when he would religiously serve the Lord this body will not let him Now all this evil and misery is come upon us because we have lost the Image of God As God in nature doth not suffer any vocuum or redundans so neither did he in respect of the frame of the soul at the first There was nothing defective and nothing excessive SECT IV. The Properties of this Losse THirdly This losse by original corruption of Gods Image is exceeding great in the properties of it For 1. It is a spiritual losse principally and chiefly The loss of Gods favour of all holiness is wholly spiritual and did tend to make a man spiritually happy So that if you should compare all the temporal losses that ever have been in the world with this first and spiritual one it would be but as the mole-hill to an high mountain If then our eyes were opened if we were able rightly to judge or losses for this we should mourn more than for any evil that ever befell us or others 〈◊〉 messengers that came with such sad tidings one upon another is nothing to this message that we bring thee But who will believe this report 2. As it is a spiritual loss so it is an universal loss The whole world is in a lost state by losing this Image of God Every creature hath lost in this universal losse The earth hath lost its fruitfulness yea the whole Creation groaneth and is in bondage subject to vanity because of this Thus all the creatures they lose by it yea every thing in man loseth The mind its light the will its holiness the affections their order and the body its soundness and immortality If all the creatures were turned into tongues they would proclaim the loss of their primitive glory and beauty because of this sinne 3. It 's not only universal But it 's the cause of all the temporal losses that we have For death in which is comprehended all kind of evil came in upon the loss of this Image So that if we are sensible of any temporal loss How much more of this spiritual one which is the cause and root of all Therefore is the body pained therefore it dieth because this Image of God is lost therefore do we loose parents and children therefore is the whole world a valley of tears because of this losse If then any private losse be so bitter unto thee how much more ought this to be which putteth a
do phantasmes and imaginations move the understanding The Devil then though he hath no imperious efficacy over thy will yet because he can thus stirre and move thy imagination and thou being naturally destitute of grace canst not withstand these suggestions hence it is that any sinne in thy imagination though but in the outward works of the soul yet doth quickly lay hold on all and indeed by this meanes do arise those horrible delusions that are in many erronious wayes of Religion all is because their imaginations are corrupted yea how often are these diabolical illusions of the imagination taken for the gracious operations of Gods Spirit Divines give many excellent Rules how we may discern between those delusions of the imagination by Satan and the savourie workings of Gods Spirits in illumination and consolations It is not my purpose to enter on that Subject only bewail and humble thy self under this that the Devil hath such command over thy fancy that he can so quickly dart in like so much lightning so many unclean or blasphemous imaginations it is from hence that many have pretended to Enthusiasmes that regard dreames that they leave the Scripture and wholly attend to what they perceive and feel within them And thus much for the opening of this noisome dunghill also SECT XX. Some Corollaryes from the Premises NOw from the corruption which you have heard of all the parts of the soul both the rational and sensitive part of a man conjoyned together we may see the unspeakable misery of man in these particulars and oh that every auditor would smite upon his brest and say O Lord I am the man thus polluted O Lord all this poison and pollution lyeth here For First In having all the powers of the soul thus defiled both superior and inferior hereby man hath lost all liberty and is become a miserable slave and vassal to sinne and Satan For whereas man was made only to serve God and by love to cleave to him the creature is come in his room and thereby man is inslaved in his affections to these temporal things only so that we do very improperly say that a man is the Master or the Lord of such an estate of such an house for indeed he is a slave to them Fiunt servi dum domini esse desiderant as Austin while thou dost so earnestly desire to be master of such an estate thou art indeed made a servant to it but remember thou canst not serve God and the creature these are two contrary masters Secondly He hath by this pollution lost all true judgement to discern of things he doth not know what are the best things yea he doth grossely misjudge he prefereth earth before gold dross before pearles The natural man cannot discern spiritual things because he wants a spiritual eye he mistaketh about God he mis-judgeth about true blessedness he is deceived about the true nature of godliness so that he can no more judge of these things then a worm can of Angelical actions The Apostle speaketh fully to this 1 Cor. 2. 14 15. Thus we are become like children yea natural fools as to spiritual things when we are invited to this feast we pretend excuses when Christ is tendered to us we had rather keep our swine when exhorted to labour for everlasting bread and riches and an eternal crown of glory we had rather have our Barley-Corn then all these Thus we have lost all spiritual judgement and will not part with our bables though for an inheritance in heaven Thirdly A man being thus in his intellectuals and affectionate parts of his soul carried out only to these earthly things and from God hence is it that he is as it were made one with them we may say earth thou art not only in respect of thy body but also of thy soul for if the Apostle say 1 Cor. 6. 17 he that is joyned to the Lord is made one spirit may we not also say he that is joyned to sinne to creatures is made as it were the same with them Although saith Austin the mind when it inclineth to these bodily things is not made corpus a body yet by these appetites and desires quodammodo corporascit it doth as it were become bodily It is as if a mighty Prince should come from his throne of glory and wallow in the mire like a swine this is our state comparatively to that primitive happiness and holiness we are now no better then those lusts and those creatures that we do adhere unto Junge cor tuun aternitati Dei cum ille aeternus eris and again Si terram amas terra es Thou art in Gods account that which thy heart is set upon Oh then God cannot look upon thee as his primitive creature he seeth his image and superscription defaced and another brought in the stead thereof very loathsome and deformed Even as they that worshipt Idols are said to be like them to become as abominable yea and as sensless and as stupid as they are so it is in this case Fourthly From hence also ariseth that impossibility of loosing our selves from the creature to return again to God from wn●m we fell Had not the Lord shewed mercy to some of mankind none of them could ever have recovered out of their lost estate no more than the Devils can to that habitation which they forsook All these creatures are the bird-lime that now hinder the wings of the soul from flying to Heaven Oh that we could say The snare is broken and we are delivered Who will give me wings that I may flie as a Dove and my soul find rest with God! Yea as a man hath no power to break these bonds of sinne so neither hath be any desire for he is kept thus fast joyned to sinne by delight and by pleasure so that the more sinne and the creatures delight him the more strongly is he possessed Samson was as much under Dalilah's power though it was by his delight and consent as when under the Philistims by force and constraint So that the will and affections of man are hereby so glued to sin and the creature That nothing is more offensive and troublesom to them then to be divided from these things So that whereas David having experience of the sweetness of Gods favour saith It is good for me to draw nigh to God They on the contrary judge it their greatest good to draw nigh to and possess the creature Hence In the fifth place There is that difficulty in man to bear the want of the pleasures of sinne and the delight of the creatures yea the exceeding great sorrow under the losing of them Were not man fallen from that glorious state of holiness and enjoyment of God he could not so sadly deplore and bewail the loss of any creature no more then a man should be troubled to have the Moon taken away when the Sunne is in the room thereof but because when fallen from God we center upon
former particular our bodies had some kind of efficiency and working in those sinnes but here it is passive as it were an object that doth allure and draw out the soul inordinately to it so that we mind the body look to the body provide for the body more than the soul so that whereas the soul is farre more excellent and worthy than the body so that our thoughts and studies should be infinitely more zealous to save that then the body yet till grace doth sanctifie and life us up to the enjoyment of God who doth not look after his body more than his soul which yet is as if saith Chrysostom a man should look to his house to see that be repaired and that be in good order but neglect his own self The soul that is properly a man the body is but his house and a vile one also is an house of clay it is but a garment to the soul and a ragged tottered one Now it is good to take notice in what particulars our bodies are thus objectively a cause of sinne to us And First It is evident in that diligent and thoughtfull way of car we have about the feeding and cloathing of it Doth not our Saviour even to his very Disciples prohibit this perplexing care Matth. 6. 25. Take no thought for your life what ye shall eat nor for your body what ye shall put on but how faulty are we here comparatively to our souls we that have so many thoughts to provide for the body how few have we about the soul Is not the body well fed when the soul is starved Is not the body well cloathed when the soul is naked How justly may thy soul cry out murder murder for thou art destroying and damning that every day Will not thy soul witness against thee at the day of judgement the body was taken care for the body was looked to but I was neglected Will it not cry out in hell Oh if I had been as diligently attended unto as the body I had not been roaring in these eternal torments The second particular wherein the body doth objectively and occasionally tempt the soul to sinne is about the adorning and trimming of it not only the care to provide for it but the curiosity to adorn it doth provoke the soul to much sinni And whereas our very garments should put us in constant mind of our original pollution for there was no shame uponnakedness till that first transgression and thereby greatly humble us we now grow proud and vain from the very effect of the first disobedience Every morning we put on our garments we should remember our original sinne The body before sinne was not exposed to any danger by cold and other damages neither was the nakedness thereof any cause of blushing but all this and more also is the fruit of the first sinne and if so how inexcusable is it to be curious and diligent in trimming up and adorning our bodies by those very garments the thoughts whereof should greatly debase us but this is not all The great attendance to the glory of the body doth wholly take off from the care of the soul How happy were it if persons did take as much pains to have their souls cloathed with the robes of righteousness to have them washed and cleansed from all filth as they do about their bodies one spot one wrinkle in the garment is presently spied out when the soul at the same time though full of loathsomness is altogether neglected as if our souls were for our bodies and not our bodies for our souls The Platonists indeed had such high thoughts of the soul and so low of the body that their opinion was Anima est homo the soul is the man they made the body but a meer instrument as the Ship is to the Pilate or musical instruments to an Artificer This is not true in Philosophy though in a moral sense it may have some affinity with truth but if we do regard the affections and actions of all by nature we may rather say The body 〈◊〉 man Yea the Apostle goeth higher he maketh it some mens God Phil. 3. 19. Whose belly is their God Why their God Because all they look at in Religion all they mind is only to satisfie that The Monks belly in Luther's time was their god When then a man liveth his natural civil and religious life onely to have his belly satisfied this man maketh his belly his god And again there are persons whose backs are their god For never did Heathens or Papists bestow more cost upon their Idols and Images to make them glorious then they do on their backs little remembring that we came naked into the world and that we shall not carry any thing out with us If this care were for soul-ornaments if thou didst spend as much time in prayer to God and reading the Scriptures whereby thy soul might be made comely and beautifull as thou doest about thy body this would prove more comfortable If thou didst as often look into the glass of Gods word to find out every sinne thou doest commit and to reform it as thou doest into the material glasse to behold thy countenance and to amend the defilements there thou wouldst find that the hours and day so spent will never grieve thee whereas upon the review of thy life spent in this world thou wilt at the day of judgement cry out of and bewail all those hours all that time in unnecessary adorning of the body The Apostle giveth an excellent exhortation 1 Pet. 3. 3 Whose adorning let it not be of plating the hair or of wearing of gold but let it be the hidden men of the heart in that which is not corruptible The Apostle doth not there simply and absolutely forbid the wearing of gold in such who by their places and calling may do it for Isaac gave Reb●ccah earings of gold but he speaketh comparatively rather look to the adorning of the soul then of the body spend more time about one then the other It is a known History of that Pambo who seeing a woman very industriously trimming her self to please that man with whom she intended naughtinesse wept thereupon because he could not be as carefull to dresse up his soul in such a posture as to please God Oh then look to thy body hereafter Let it not steal so much time from thee as thereby to neglect thy soul and to lose those opportunities thou mayest have of humbling thy self before God! Thirdly The body doth objectively draw out sinne from the soul In that the fear of any danger to that especially the death thereof will make us damne our soules and greatly offend God which doth plainly discover that our bodies are more to us then God or heaven or our soules are Therefore we have our Saviour pressing his Disciples against this fear if fear about hurt to the body may insnare the godly and keep them from their duty no wonder if
it totally prevail with the natural man Mat. 10. 28. Luk. 12. 4. I say to you may friends fear not them which can kill the body only but fear him who can cast both body and soul into hell But what Apostacies what sad perfidiousness in religion hath this love to the body caused the inordinate fear of the death thereof hath made many men wound and damne their soules Times then of dangers and persecutions do abundantly discover how inordinate men are in their love to their bodies looking upon bodily death worse then eternal damnation in hell although our Saviour hath spoken so expresly What will it profit a man to gain the whole world and lose his own soul Mark 8. 36. It is the Scriptures command that we should glorifie God in soul and body which are Gods our body is Gods that is bought with a price as well as your soul so that it ought to be our study how we should glorifie God by our eies by our ears by our tongues It is not enough to say thou hast a good heart and an honest heart if thou hast a sinful body now though there be many wayes wherein we may glorifie God by our bodies yet there is none so signal and eminent as when we do willingly at the call of God give our bodies to be disgraced tormented and killed for his sake then God saith to thee as he did to Abraham upon his willingness to offer up his son Isaac Now I know thou lovest me Thus you have Paul professing Gal. 6. 17. I bear in my body the marks of the Lords Jesus The Greek word signifieth such markes of ignominy as they did use to their servants or fugitives or evil doers now though in the eies of the world such were reproachfull yet Paul gloryed in them and therefore he giveth this as a reason why noue should trouble and molest him in the work of the Ministery this ought to be a demonstration to them of his sincerity and that he seeketh not himself but Christ hence also he saith Phil. 1. 20. Christ shall be magnified in his body whether by life or by death By this it is evident that we owe our bodies to Christ as well as our souls and that any fear to suffer in them for his sake argueth we love our bodies more then his glory ¶ 6. The Bodies indisposition to any service of God a Demonstration of its original Pollution BUt let us proceed to another particular wherein the original pollution of the body may be manifested and that is by the indisposition that is in the body to any service for God though it may be the soul is willing and desirous The drousinesse dulnesse and sleepinesse of the body doth many times cause the soul to be very unfit for any approaches unto God Our Saviour observed this even in his very Disciples when he said The Spirit is willing but the flesh is weak Matth. 26. 41. when our Saviour was in those great agonies making earnest prayer unto God and commanding his Disciples To watch and pray that they might not enter into temptation yet they were heavy and dull and therefore were twice reproved for their sleep and this sleepinesse of theirs was at that time when if ever they should have been throughly awakened but thus it falleth out often that in those duties and at those times when we ought most to watch and attend then commonly the body is most heavy and dull Hence is that drousinesse and sleepinesse while the Word is preached whereas at thy meals or at thy recreations and in wordly businesses there is no such dulnesse falleth upon thee This ariseth partly from the soul and partly from the body The soul that is not spiritual and heavenly therefore it doth not with delight and joy approach unto God and then the body is like an instrument out of tune as earth is the most predominant element in it so it is a clog and a burden to the soul Therefore bewail thy natural condition herein Adams body was expedite and ready he found no indisposition in his body to serve the Lord but how often even when the heart desireth it yet is thy body a weight and trouble to thee Nazianzene doth excellently bewail this How I am joyned to this body I know not saith he how at the same time I should be the Image of God and roll in this dirt so he calleth the body It is a kind enemy a deceitfull friend How strange is this conjunction Quod vereor amplector quod amo perhorresco Doth not God suffer this wrestling of the body with the soul to humble us that we may understand that we are noble or base heavenly or earthly as we propend to either of these Orat. de pauperum curâ This should also make thee earnestly long for the coming of Christ when all this bodily sinfulnesse shall be done away Oh what a blessed change will there then be of this vile heavy dull and indisposed body to an immortal glorious and spiritual body then there will be no more complaints of this body of thine then that will cause no jarre or disturbance in the glorious service of God ¶ 7. How easily the Body is moved and stirred by the passions and affections thereof FOurthly The body is from the original defiled in that it is easily and readily moved and stirred by the passios and affections thereof It cannot be denied but that Heathens and Heretiques have declamed against and reviled the body of man as appeareth by Tertul de Resurrect Carmi. as if it were an evil substance made from some evil principle hence it is written of Piotinus the great Platenist that he was ashamed his soul was in a body and therefore would by no means yeeld to have the picture of it drawn neither would he regard parents or kindred or countrey because his body was from them but we proceed not upon these mens account we follow the Scripture-light and by that we see the body consociated with the soul in evil whereof this of the passions is not the least The passions they are seated in the sensitive and material part of a man and therefore have an immediate operation upon the body being therefore called passions because they make the body to suffer they work a corporal alteration Hence anger is defined from its effect an ebullition or bubling forth of bloud about the heart and thus grief because it is so immediately seated in the body is therefore said to be rottennesse to the bones and it is said to work death 2 Cor. 7. 10. But it was not thus with the body from the beginning Adam indeed had such passions as do suppose good in the object such as love and delight though they were bounded and did not transgresse their limits but then he was not capable of those passions which do suppose evil and hurt as anger fear and grief for these would have repugned the blessed estate he was created in
but since original sinne hath made this violent breach upon the whole man the body is become the foaming and unquiet sea while tempests and storms blow upon it How quickly do these passions of love anger fear and grief put the whole body out of all order So that it is not fit to hear to pray to do any service for God when we are to pray we are to life up our hands without wrath 1. Tim. 6. 8. and so without any other inordinate motion for these make an earthquake as it were in the body These are like a rushing wind and fire but not such as the holy Ghost will appear in We may therefore lie down and roll our selves upon the ground with shame and confusion considering what an unquiet restless and disturbed instrument to the soul our body is now become sometimes anger that set it on fire sometimes sorrow that is ready to drown it Even as we read Matth. 17. 15. the poor lunatique person vexed with the Devil he did ofttimes fall into the fire and oft into the water two contrary elements but dangerous Thus where passions do reign in the body They oft fall into the fire of anger and then as oft into the water of grief and sorrow so that thy body is moulded according to thy passion even as iron heated appeareth no longer iron but fire Surely the experience of this should grieve thee and break thy very heart How many tempests and storms do arise in thy body daily What whirlwinds of passions do carry thee away violently from reason and grace Oh remember this was not in the state of innocency neither will it be in the state of glory Therefore be so farre from being proud of the beauty or strength of thy body that the very thoughts of thy body as now vitiated by original sinne may justly humble thee and though Plotinus the Platonist as you heard was justly to be reproved for the hatred of his body proceeding upon evil principles yet Austin commendeth the modesty and humility of Paulinus for when Sulpictius Severus sent to him to have his Image or Picture Paulinus refused it and that because of the pollution upon it by original sinne and that the Image of God was now lost Erube copingere quod sum non audeo pingere quod non sum Durat enim mihi illud prime Adam virus paternum quo universitatem generis sui pater praevaricatus infecit Thus he being ashamed to give the picture of his body because contamnated by original pollution ¶ 8. The Body when sanctified is become no less glorious then the Temple of the holy Ghost FIfthly Even the very body of a man when sanctified it become no lesse glorious then to be the Temple of the holy Ghost which doth demonstrate that till a man be regenerated it is not such a Temple but a dunghill or stie wherein swinish lusts yea and the Devils themselves do reside as in their proper habitation It is necessary to take notice of several things relating to the body which the Apostle mentioneth 1 Cor. 6. 13 15 19. For having there spoken briefly to the disputes that were then very prevalent about meats the using or not using of our liberty therein he giveth this remarkable reason against too much servency in debate thereof because God shall destroy both belly and meats These were corruptible things and were but for a temporary use and therefore their hearts should be more attentive to those things which are of eternal consequence A necessary truth to moderate our spirits in disputes of that nature Having done this being to aggravate the sinne of fornication which was then generally thought either no sinne or very venial he bringeth in some arguments that being general make against any sinfulness of the body as well as uncleanness As 1. The body is for the Lord that is Christ and the Lord for the body our body is intentionally not for any sinne but the Lord Christ and he demands it as a body dedicated to him How powerfull should this reason be to make us watch against any bodily pollution whatsoever 2. He argueth Know ye not that your bodies are the members of Christ Know ye not He supposeth that this ought to be If it were an undoubted received truth That our bodies when regenerated do become members to Christ their Head and if so Shall I take the members of Christ and make them the members of an harlot God forbid He apprehendeth matter of trembling and abomination at such a thing and this holds of every bodily sinne Shall I take the eye of Christ the ear of Christ the tongue of Christ and imploy it in any lusts or passions God forbid And at the 19th verse he goeth yet higher with a Know ye not again that your bodies are the temple of the holy Ghost which is in you and which ye have of God This doth denote an holy dedication of the body to God So that every sinne committed in the body hath a sacriledge in it with what purity reverence and sobriety should we use our bodies thus it ought to be but take a man in his natural condition there is his whole body set apart to the Devils work all the parts thereof are to fulfill the lusts of the flesh but when a man is regenerated there doth become an intimate and unspeakable conjunction not only of our souls but our bodies also with Christs body so that he doth say We are bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh but the body naturally is farre from any such mystical conjunction with Christ Lastly The pollution of the body from the womb is seen in regard of the senses of the body which are the most noble parts thereof They are the windows or gates to let in all wickedness The greatest part of our impiety entereth into the heart by the bodily senses The subordinate end of the senses were to be a preservation to the body and to maintain the natural life thereof but the principal and chief end was to be instrumental to the salvation of the soul God gave us eyes and ears chiefly thereby to glorifie him and to help forward the salvation of our selves but how greatly are the bodily sences fallen from this principal end Rev. 2. 7. and in many other places we have that expression He that hath an ear to hear let him hear no man hath an ear to hear till God open it and by that phrase is denoted that the ear is principally for this use to hearken to what God saith and therefore Rom. 10. Faith is said to come by hearing Thy ear is not given thee to hear stories and merry jests chiefly for commerce with men but to hearken what God out of his Word saith to thee And so for the eyes they are not to behold wanton objects or to take delight in sights but to behold the creatures that thereby God may be glorified Therefore our eyes our ears need Gods
unto was That Adam was made mortal and would have died if he had not sinned death being a necessary consequence as they say from a mans corporal constitution The Papists especially the Schoolmen of old and the Jesuites of late to whom Jansenius doth vehemently oppose in this point 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Greek expression is say That Adam was indeed by nature mortal but by grace and superadded favour he was immortal So that both Papists and Protestants agree in this That Adam was made immortal in his Creation Only the difference is Whether as original righteousness so immortality may be said to be natural or supernatural to Adam We say it 's natural they say it 's supernatural and yet Bellarmine De gratiâ primi Hom. lib. cap. 5. in his explication of himself in this point cometh very near us or at least speaketh contradictions to himself For he saith if natural be taken for that which was put into man from his nativity if natural be taken for that which was to be propagated to Adam's posterity if natural be taken for that which is convenient to perfect and prepare a man for his end then they say original righteousness and so by consequence immortality would have been natural to Adam's posterity but if we take natural for that which doth internally constitute nature or necessarily flow from the principles of nature then they say immortality was supernatural even as original righteousnesse But the Protestants when they call original righteousnesse natural they doe not meane effectivè as if it were not the gift of God bestowed upon us as if it did flow from the principles of nature but subjectivè that is original righteousnesse and immortality were not supernatural to Adam as they are now to us being we are corrupted but connatural or a due perfection to man supposing God created him for such an end as to enjoy himself So that it is due not so much to the nature of man as to Gods Order and Decree concerning man Thus as in birds supposing God would have them to flie it was necessary they should have wings though they come from a natural principle so in man supposing God made him for communion with and enjoyment of himself it was necessary that he should be indewed with holiness Though flowing not from nature but concreated by God with man Thus that which is the gift of God and cometh only from him may be in respect of the subject a due perfection It was thus with Adam in respect of his soul that was created immediately by God it did not flow from any natural causes yet supposing God would make him a rational creature then this became a due perfection to him Adam then was immortal by nature in a well-explained sense as he had a reasonable soul by nature But however it be Protestants and many Papists agree in the thing that he was made immortal only they differ in the manner How Now the Socinian differeth from all for he dogmatizeth That Adam was made mortal that death was natural and denieth any original righteousnesse or immortality that was bestowed upon Adam any way It is true sometimes he saith That though Adam was made mortal yet God might have preserved him from actual death by some way or other only that he was made immortal that he denieth So that what the Papists dream about their imaginary pure naturals saying God might have created man so Socinians affirm defacto it was so The late Writer Dr. T. is also positive for Adam's mortality by nature That Adam was made mortal by nature saith he is infinitely certain and proved by his eating and drinking c. Further Explicat pag. 453. instancing in those Arguments the Socinians use to bring All which Assertions do directly and evidently oppose the word of God ¶ 2. How many wayes a thing may be said to be Immortal and in which of them man is so SEcondly When we say God made Adam immortal and that upon his transgression both himself and his posterity are subjected to a necessity of death We must rightly understand in what sense he is said to be so For 1. A thing may be said to be immortal absolutely and essentially having no principles of death within nor cannot be destroyed by any cause without Thus 1 Tim. 6. 16. God is said only to have immortality This is that comfortable attribute which the people of God make use of under all changes and vicissitudes God is alwayes the same Though father die though mother die yet God doth not as one in the Ecclesiastical Story said when word was brought him that his father was dead Desine saith he blasphemias loqui pater enim meus immortalis est Cease to speak blasphemy for my father is immortal 2. That may be said to be immortal which is so by some singular dispensation of God either in respect of mercy or of justice and thus it is with the glorified bodies of the Saints and the damned bodies of wicked men for the Saints their vile bodies shall be made like Christs glorious body they are raised to incorruptibility and glory and as for the bodies of damned persons though they be raised to reproach and dishonour yet by Gods justice they are preserved immortal so that the fire cannot consume them to ashes neither shall length of time ever destroy them For if God could make the Israelites cloaths and shoes to last so many years without being consumed no wonder if he do a greater matter upon the bodies of men 3. That may be said to be immortal which by the will of the Creator is so constituted that being separated from all matter it hath no principles of dissolution from within And thus the Angels are immortal they have no principle of corruption within yet they are annihilable by the power of God should God withdraw his preservation of them they would cease to be but from within they have no cause of dissolution The Devils also in this sense are immortal and that is the reason though many wicked and bloudy persecutors of Gods Church have died yet the Devil being immortal hath stirred up new ones which made a good man say to one who did greatly rejoyce at the death of a cruel persecutor At diabolus non moritur but the Devil doth not die Lastly A thing may be said to be immortal Conditionally supposing such and such conditions he performed and in this sense only we say God made Adam immortal for 〈◊〉 had a power to sinne and so a power to die he had a power to stand and to a power to be freed from death So that we do not say Adam had such an immortality as the glorified bodies have that cannot die but conditionally onely As he had in him power to sinne so he had a power to deprive himself of all happinesse and immortality which fell out also to our utter undoing Autin's expression of Posse non mori and Non
the Sacrament what endlesse controversies hath it begotten And therefore it was the King of Navarr's counsel to the Divines when the Lutherans and Calvinists were upon pacification about the Sacrament that they should not De modo ultra modum disputare Now although this be good counsel yet when heretical and erroneous opinions have invaded the Modus then it is our duty to maintain not onely the truth of a thing but the manner of it also What is a greater mystery then the Sonne of God having his being from the Father He that will touch this mystery with meer natural reason doth as if the Smith should handle his live-coals with his hands and not the Tongs saith Chrysostome yet because of the Socinians who say He is onely a made God in time and hath his Deity by donation We are forced not to be content onely to believe that he is the Sonne of God but also how viz. By eternal Generation So in the great Controversie with the Arminians about the conversion of man It is not enough to say we are converted by grace but are necessitated also to expresse the manner How not by a moral suasion or per modum sapientiae onely but by invincible efficacy and power also Thus the manner of Christs presence in the Sacrament was necessarily to be determined against the Lutherans Thus it is in our point in hand we might well enough sit down with this Truth That original sinne is communicated to every sonne of Adam and enquire no further as the primitive Church did till Austin's time in a great measure But when Heretiques will deny the true Doctrine because the manner is difficult to expresse or when men will deny the Creation of the soul then it 's our duty in a sober manner to search into the way how we partake of it Neither doth the fore mentioned Text contradict this For though we know not how the bones grow in the womb exactly and punctually yet we know in the general that they do by virtue of generation So although we know not particularly how the soul cometh to have its being in the body yet in the general that it is by Creation we have had Scripture light fully to convince us therein This then premised Let us proceed to clear the Doctrine of the Propagation of original sinne and that by several Propositions which will be as so many steps and degrees to the main Truth SECT VII Propositions to clear the Doctrine of the Propagation of Original Sinne by the Souls Creation FIrst We lay this for a foundation That God doth create the soul of every man a spiritual substance This Proposition must be the foundation-stone to build upon That God doth create the soul immediately you have heard several Texts attesting thereunto So that Bellarmine was too dissident when moved it seemed by Austin doth wave all Texts of Scripture for the creation of the soul and so proceedeth to other Arguments Perierius on 2 Chap. of Genes vers 7. giveth a better censure of Austin for having produced some Texts for the Creation of the soul he saith Conatur Augustinus sed frustra hos locos elidere I shall adde one more fit for that purpose also The Text is 1 Pet. 4. 19. Wherefore let them that suffer according to the will of God commit the keeping of their souls unto God as to a faithfull Creator Here the afflicted children of God are required as Christ did to commend their souls to God and the reason is Because he is a faithfull Creator of them So that Gods Creation of them is here made an engagement to God to keep them they being now sanctified and made holy Our souls then are created In the next place I say they are created Substances This is to obviate those that make the soul onely an accident or the crasis and temperament of the humours Galen as Cerda on Tertull de animâ alledgeth him in his second Book of prediction by the pulses hath this passage Hitherto I have doubted what should be the substance of the soul but by age and experience being made wiser I dare be bold to affirm it is no other thing then the temperament He was not made wiser but more absurd and foolish in this thing Yea there is one Dicaearchus much spoken of that said The soul was nothing it was but an opinion And the Mortalists they directly joyn with Galen's opinion Who would think that when we have the Scripture speaking so plainly about the soul that it is a spirit that it removeth when the body is killed that any should be delivered up to such licentious and abominable Doctrines Again I adde God createth it a spiritual substance This opposeth the Sadduces who denied any spirits It is plaine by Scripture that they are substances and spiritual ones because they subsist without the body Tertullian though he doth so acutely perstringe the Philosophers about the soul yet some of them were more sound then he Men saith he have thought about the soul either as Platonis honor Zenonis vigor Aristotelis tenor Epicuri stupor Heracliti maestor Empedoclis furor persuaserint It is true some of these thought the souls to be bodies and so doth Tertullian and happily he might have been excused by taking body largely for that which is not nihil in which sense he attributeth a body to God but that he saith the soul is not only a body but effigiated and shaped also yea that the souls differ in sex which is very irrational We may then conclude this with a saying of Numertus That if any souls are corporeal it is of those who say souls are corporeal A second Proposition is That though God doth create immediately the souls of all men spiritual substances yet they are not compleat and perfect substances as Angles are but the essential parts of men Upon this Proposition depends much weight of this Truth about the communicating of original sinne for we are apt to think God createth our souls like Angels perfect and having subsistency of themselves whereas they are created as parts of a man neither do they come from God any otherwise If God should create a soul to subsist of it self and not to be united to the body to constitute a man that soul would not be polluted But because every soul is created as an essential part of man and so hath its being Hence it is That it cometh into the world part of Adam and so obnoxious to that curse which he had deserved whatsoever then in its first being is part of man that is partaker of Adam's sinne and curse But the soul in its first instant of being is part of man therefore no wonder if it became polluted and cursed The example of that miraculous Resurrection of Lazarus and others may something clear this they were fully dead their souls and bodies union dissolved yet because their souls were not made perfect and pure without sinne and translated into Heaven but
by the power of God detained here on earth that the glory of Christ might be exalted he doth unite this soul though with pollution to the body Now Gods uniting of the sinfull soul to the body did not make him the cause of any sinne therein Because he united it as part of that man who yet was not wholly purged from sinne Now the reason why the soul is created not as a perfect substance in it self is Because it 's the forme of man not an assisting forme and therefore is not in the body as when an Angel did assume bodies or as a man in his house or as a Musician useth an Instrument but a form informing whereby it is made an intrinsecal essential part of a man The truth of this will give much light to our point in hand the soul is created by God The informing forme of a man and so hath no other consideration but as an essential part of him and therefore seeing the man is in Adam whose soul this is that is thereby exposed to all the sinne of Adam Hence it is that there is some difference between the creation of Angles and the Chaos at first which were made absolutely of nothing and of the soul For the soul though it be created of nothing yet because a form hath an essential respect to its matter for which cause Contarenus as Zanchy saith affirmed The soul had a middle way of being between Creation and Generation and therefore is that distinction of some learned men that though the soul be not ex materiâ yet it is in materiâ God did not create it but in the body though not of the body and thus farre it may be said to be of man as that he is the cause though not of the being of the soul yet of the being of it n this body The third Proposition The soul being thus created an essential part of a man and the form informing of him Hence it is That we must not conceive the soul to be first created as it were of it self subsisting and then infused into the body but when the materials are sufficiently prepared then as the Schoolmen expresse it well Infundendo creatur and creando infuditur it 's infused by the creating of it and created by infusing So that the soul is made in the body organized not without it so the Scripture Zech. 12. 1. Who formeth the spirit of man with him and because of the souls unon to the body when thus disposed Hence it is that man may truly and univocally be said to beget a man though his soul be created for seeing man who is the compositum is the Terminus generationis Hence it is that man begets man as well as a beast though the soul of a beast be from the matter as we see in Christ the Virgin Mary is truly said to be the mother of Christ though she was not the mother of his Divine Nature nor of his soul Thus man doth properly beget another man though the soul be by Creation as the matter also according to Philosophy is ingenerable because the soul is united to the body prepared and disposed for it by man from which union resulteth the whole person or compositum consisting of soul and body So that although man be not the cause of his childs souls being yet that it hath a being in this body and thereby such a person produced he is the cause of it and by this if well understood you may see original sinne communicated to every one though the soul be created In that way which the humane nature is communicated to every one So that if we truly know how a man is made a man from his parents we may also know how sin is thereby also communicated The fourth Proposition is Although God doth daily create new souls yet his Decree and Purpose to do so was from all eternity And therefore in this respect we may say all men consisting of souls and bodies were present to God in Adam in respect of Gods Decree and also his Covenant with Adam so that although there be a new Creation yet there is no new institution or ordination on Gods part Whereas therefore it 's thought hard that because Adam was so many thousand years ago the soul created now should partake of his sinne The Answer is That in respect of Gods Decree and Covenant we were all present to God in Adam There is no man hath his being De Novo but unto God he was present from eternity so that though the things in time have a succession of being yet to God all are present in eternity Not that we can say they were actually sinners or actually justified but in respect of Gods purpose all were present and this will help much to facilitate this difficulty we are as present to God in respect of his Decree and knowledge as if we had been then actually in Adam in which sense it 's said Omnes fuerunt ille unus homo and Act. 15. 18. Known to God are all his works from the beginning The fifth Proposition Hence it is that the just and wise God is not to alter and change that course of nature because man hath sinned It is vain to say Why will God unite this soul to the body when thereby both shall be polluted For though man hath by his sinne deserved that this should be yet God is not therefore to cease of the continuing and multiplying of mankind God doth keep to the fixed course of nature notwithstanding mans sinne And therefore we see that even to those who are begot in fornication and whoredome yet even to such in that unlawfull act God giveth souls because he will not interrupt the course of nature The sixth Proposition Adam by his first transgression did deserve that all who should be of him should be deprived of the Image of God and the privation of that doth necessarily inferre the presence of all sinne in a subject susceptible As take away light from the air and it must be dark so that this Proposition answereth the whole difficulty Adam deserved by his transgression that all his posterity should become dead in sinne and as he had thus deserved it so God had ordained it and appointed it The soul then of every one being made part of that man who is thus cursed in Adam it becomes deprived of the Image of God and so full of sinne So that although God create the soul naturally good yet because part of man condemned by his sentence he denieth it that original righteousnesse it once had God doth not infuse any evil into the soul nor is the Author of any sinne therein but as a just Judge denieth that righteousnesse which otherwise the soul might have had So that you must not look for an efficient cause of original sinne in the soul but a deficient and a meritorious cause So that the Summe is this If you ask How cometh the soul defiled if created of