BX 9315 .G66 1861 v. 10 Goodwin Thomas, 1600-1680 The works of Thomas Goodwin PDEITAN PERIOD. THE W. LINDSAY ALEXANDER, D.D., Professor of Theology, Congregational Union, Edinburgh. JAMES BEGG, D.D., Minister of Newington Free Church, Edinburgh. THOMAS J. CRAWFORD, D.D., S.T.P., Professor of Divinity, University, Edinburgh. D. T. K. DRUMMOND, M.A., Minister of St Thomas's Episcopal Church, Edinburgh. WILLIAM H. GOOLD, D.D., Professor of Biblical Literature and Church History, Reformed Presbyterian Church, Edinburgh. ANDREW THOMSON, D.D., Minister of Broughton Place United Presbyterian Church, Edinburgh. ©fttfral ©Ditor. REV. THOMAS SMITH, M.A., Edinbubgh. THE WORKS LINCOLN COLLEGE; IIONORART CANON OF WORCESTKR; RECTOR OF ST MARTIN'S, BIRMINGHAM.

CONTAINING :

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Of an %mreg€nerate maiis r/uiltiness before God, from the imputation of Adam's first transgression to every person of his posterity.

CHAPTER I.

The yeneral design and division of the discourse.

We have seen the state of pure nature, as to the holiness and happiness thereof, bj the law of God.* I come now unto man's fallen and lost condition in a state of sin and wrath, which is the condition of all by nature, and whilst in the state of nature. My method shall be this:

I. To handle the sinfulness of all men by nature in respect of their birthsin (which from Augustine we have used to call original sin), both in the guilt and corruption thereof.

II. To treat of it as it is a state, or an abiding condition, and therein to discover the several sorts of men remaining unregenerate in the church, and of a common profession of Christ: viz. 1, of ignorant persons; 2, profane; 3, civil and formal Christians; and to detect the deceits and false pleas which each of these have, why they think themselves happy if they should die therein. That which I intend therein is a conviction of all these sorts of persons (that are the generality of the church) that they are still in the state of nature, and, without true regeneration, will eternally perish.

III. The third is the sinfulness of sin, and the aggravations of it, as in sinning against mercies, against knowledge, &c. ; together with the fearfulness of that punishment which is due unto men for the least sin in that estate.

* In the Discourse of the Creatures, anrl the Condition of their State by Creation in Vol. n. of his Works. [Vol. VII. of this edition.— Ed.]

I. As to the first, my method is,

iFirst, To shew the first entrance of sin upon all men by Adam's first sin, that is, the first imputation of that eoct to all men; and how far the guilt of that act is charged on us, and how far it was personal and proper only to him.

Secondly, To lay open that corruption of nature which hath defiled all oui* natures. Concerning which, 1, how it flows from the guilt of that first act; 2, that it is truly and properly a sin; then, 3, the gi-eat abounding sinfulness thereof; and, 4, the parts thereof in general, as that it is,

First, A total privation and emptiness of all that is truly good.

Secondly, Positive inclinations to all evils, which consist in two things :

1. In lusts, and therein of the nature of lusts, their inordinacj', their sinfulness and deceitfulness.

2. In an inbred enmity and opposition unto God, and whatever is holy and good (which I make the third particular branch of original corruption).

This in general.

II. More particularly, I lay open this corruption, as itlsjn the whole man^ and in every faculty.

First, The understanding in blindness, unbelief, practical false reasonings and deceits, &c.

Secondly, The thinking power, the vanity of thoughts.

Thirdly, The defilement in the conscience.

Fourthly, The subjection and bondage of the will and afifections unto lusts; then the varieties of these lusts, and of those master-lusts which are in the hearts of several men.

CHAPTEE 11.

The text explained. — That all men are in a state of sin. — That it is worth our inquiry to know how sin, which thus involves all men in it, came into the v-orld. — That sin had its entrance by Adanis first transgression. — How Adam, being created holy, ivas capable of sinning.

Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death jjossed upon all men, in whom all have sinned: for until the law sin teas in the world: but sin is not imjmted when there {■s no law. Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression, who is the figure of him that was [to] come. — Rom. V. 12-14.

You read the story of Adam's fall in the third of Genesis, and here you have how it concerned his whole posterity, and that illustrated by the antitype of Adam, Jesus Christ, and his conveying righteousness unto his, of which Christ God intended Adam to be the type. And in this these two are parallel (as in other respects), that look as the story of Christ's birth, circumcision, obedience, and sufi"erings, are but barely and nakedly related in the three first evangelists, whereas the intent, efficacy, and benefit from thence accruing to us, was reserved to be set forth by the apostles in their epistles; so it falls out in this. Moses tells the history of Adam's fall, and Paul explains the mystery and consequence thereof.

That sin hath not only entered in upon the world of mankind, but hath universally ovei-flown it for sin,* not a man excepted, is evident in that speech, 'all have sinned,' upon which, he says, 'death followed;' yea, this * Qu. ' ever since ' ? — Ed.

is that which the apostle hath been proving at large all this while in the former part of the epistle, chaps, i.-iii. So then (as concluding he says) we have proved that both Jew and Gentile (which two then shared the world between them) are under sin, all and every one of them: ' Not one righteous,, no, not one,' chap. iii. 10. And what need we say any more of it (says he), it being such an irrefragable truth, as every mouth must be stopped, and 'become' (in his own acknowledgment) 'guilty before God,' ver. 19. And it might be proved by induction of all men of all ages, and will be at the latter day, when the story of all the world shall be ripped up. There is no man in whom shineth but the light of nature, that either casts his eye into his own bosom, or looks out upon the sons of men, but must acknowledge as much.

Neither is it any new thing lately befallen the world, but it is the ancient brine it hath lain soaked in, steeped in, these six thousand years almost. * The whole world lay in wickedness,' in John's time, 1 John v. 19. There was not by nature ' any man righteous, no, not one,' in David's time, when God looked down from heaven: Ps.. xiv. 2^ 3, * The Lord looked down from heaven upon the children of men, to see if there were any that did understand, and seek God. They are all gone aside, they are all together become filthy; there is none that doth good, no, not one.' Solomon says,. Eccles. vii. 27-29, ' Behold, this have I found (saith the preacher), counting one by one, to find out the account; which yet my soul seeketh, but I find not: one man among a thousand have I found; but a woman among all those have I not found. Lo, this only have I found, that God hath made man upright; but they have sought out many inventions.' That he viewed men and women one by one: ' And, lo, this I found,' says he, ' that they are all corrupted.' And therefore at verse 20 he says, * For there is not a just man upon earth, that doth good, and sinneth not.' So also his speech in his prayer, 2 Chron. vi. 36, * If they sin against thee (for there is no man which sinneth not), and thou be angry with them, and deliver them over before their enemies, and they carry them away captives unto a land far off or near.' If you think the infant times (called the golden, innocent age of the world) was free, see what an account the text gives you: ver. 13, * Sin was in the world from Adam,' the first man, ' to Moses;' take the account shorter, from Adam to the flood. God, whose all-seeing eye runs through the whole earth, views every man, yea, every thought in man, brings in this bill and account, having viewed them one by one: Gen. vi. 5, 12, 'All flesh have corrupted their way upon earth.' Yea, and that so as from the first imagination or act the mind puts forth, to the last, ' all and every figment of the heart is corrupt.'

To give you one evidence, which the text suggests, of this universal guilt and sinfulness of all men, ' death reigned from Adam to Moses' (or else that which is equivalent to death, a change, as in Enoch). It speaks of a mighty monarch here, death, the most universal and most lasting monarchy that ever was. It reigns, says the text; its sceptre hath subdued, and brought under, all the sons of men: 'Death hath passed upon all men.' Other monarchs never subdued all; some outlaws and nations were not overcome; here not a man but falls under it. Other monarchies cease and determine; this hath lasted in all ages, 'from Adam to Moses;' so the text says, and experience shews, ever since. Take the experience of the present age, not a man alive was seven score or eight score years ago; nay, it comes into your houses, tears your children from your dugs, and kills them before your faces, and you cannot resist it. Millions come into the world, and but salute their friends, and then go weeping out again, so says the text; that children who actually never sinned as Adam did (for that is the meaning of ' not sinning after the

similitude of Adam's transgi-ession'), do die as well as others. Now, if you ask death, as they asked Christ, Mat. xxi. 23, ' By what authority he doth these things' — by what title he reigns over all, even over children — the text shews his commission, and gives this as the ground of it (which we are now a-demonstrating therefore by this effect), that ' all have sinned;' and tells us that * death entered into the world by sin,' being the ' wages' of it, Rom. vL 23, and the ' child' of it: James i. 15, ' Then, when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin; and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death.' And to the elect it is ordained, through the grace of God, to be his messenger to fetch sin out of the world, as sin was a means to bring it in.

2. Doubtless it is a matter worth the knowing, and oui* most diligent inquiry, how this deluge of sin and death entered in upon all the world, what was the first gap, the fia'st breach made, that let it in ; this universal flood that covers the face of the earth, which could never yet be drained and cast out ; yea, and what should be the spring that should feed it all this while continually in all the thoughts that is from every man's heart, so as it should never be dry ?

The greatest scholars of the world have spent their wits often in the search of the original of trifles; whole volumes are written of the original of other things; but Solomon, the wisest man that ever was, thought this very point (namely, how all men came thus universally corrupt) a point of deepest wisdom, use, and profitableness: Eccles. vii. 25, ' I applied my heart,' says he, 'to know, and to search, to seek out wisdom, and the reason of things;' and above all else, as appears in the next words, ' to know wickedness and folly, and to find the cause of it,' for that, the former words shew, is his meaning. For he says in the nest verses that he took a survey of all the world of mankind — women first, with whom he was too much acquainted, and then men also — and observed their dispositions: ver. 27, 'And this I found,' says he, 'God made man (originally) righteous; but now they are all corrupt, and have found out many inventions.'

And indeed it is our privilege and advantage, who enjoy God's word, to know the original of this universal confusion in man's nature, and of the misery all are exposed unto; which the wisest men among the heathen, who, though they filled the world with complaLats about it, as Plato in the second book of his Commonwealth complains that men by their natures are evil, and cannot be brought to good; and TuUy,* as he is cited by Augustine in his fourth book against JuUan, ' that man is brought forth into the world, in body and soul, exposed to all miseries, prone to evil, and in whom that divine spark of goodness, of wit and morality, is oppressed and extinguished:' yet they could never dive into the bottom of this universal disease and mischief. They found that all men were poisoned; but how it came there they none of them did know or could imagine, or would ever have found out, but run to false counsel, attributing it to destiny and fate, or some evil planet, its having a malign influence into man's nature, or to an evil angel that attended upon every man. All which, how short is it of the truth!

And together- with this secret now made common to us, the knowledge of it is most profitable, yea, and necessary, for us, and is one of the main principles, yea, the first, which is committed to the church to be known and

* Cicero, lib. iii., de Republica, cited by Aiigustiue, lib. iv., contra Julianum, cap. xii. p. 226, in torn. vii. oper. ed. Paris, 1571 : — ' In libro tertio de Eepublica, idem Tnllius hominem dicit non ut a matre, sed ut a noverca natura editum in vitam, eorpore et nudo, et fragili, et infirmo ; animo autem anxio ad molestias, humili ad timores, molli ad labores, prono ad libidines ; in quo tamen inesset tanquani obrutus quidam divinus ignis ingenii, et mentis. Quid ad lia?c dicis? Js'on hoc author iste male viventium moribus dixit affectum, sed naturam potius accusavit.'

believed; and therefore was the first thing which, next to the creation of the world and man, God manifested in the first book that ever he wrote.

The first query will be, How all men come generally, and universally, and continually thus unrighteous, and thereupon exposed to death?

The text resolves us, saying, that ' by one man sin did enter into the world, and so death passed upon all.' If we had never heard of this same one man before, we would all be inquisitive who he should bo. The fourteenth verse tells us it was Adam. You have all heard of him who in 1 Cor. XV. 45 is called ' the first man, Adam,' the first man that ever was in the world; for how could sin by him enter upon all if he had not been before all? Some men otherwise would have been free, if any had been before him. And the rest of the verses, from the 14th to the 20th, do generally inform us that he committed *a transgression,' ver. 14; * an offence,' ver. 15, 17, 18; that 'he sinned,' ver. 16; that 'he disobeyed,' ver. 19; and by that transgression, offence, sin, disobedience (call it what you will), it comes to pass that all other men are ' made sinners,' ver. 19; and that ' the guilt' of that sin ' came upon all men to condemnation.'

If you ask, how it came to pass that this man should sin, God having created him righteous? As Solomon, Eccles. vii. 29, ' Lo, this only have I found, that God hath made man upright; but they have sought out many inventions;' and as you read of him in the first and second of Genesis, that he was created in the image of God!

First, I confess I had rather, upon the experience of mine own frailty, fall down before the gi'eat God, and acknowledge mine own slipperiness and changeableness, as I am a creature, if left to mine own will, and that when so left, I am obnoxious to sin, over and above and beyond what corruption hath yet swayed me to, than dispute this point out with God or men; for though I came not into the world holy, and endowed with created inclinations and dispositions contrary unto sin, as Adam did, yet in the course of my life I have full often found mine own will hath of and from itself cast the balance, and given forth a command for many a sinful act, not merely out of that sinful bias and inclination it hath to commit sin, but over and above out of that mere mutabihty and fickleness which is in my will to cast itself to evil. And when inclinations and assistances unto the contrary have been sufficient to preserve me from so sinning, yet mine own will hath determined itself to an outward act of evil, so as I could and might resolve the act done into that uncertainty and aptness to change and fall, even (as I am a creature) to fall into that, which is a step into that nothing we were first created out of, namely sin; so that beyond what the bias or poise which corruption sways man unto, it appears that in many passages of a man's life a vertibility of will hath been the cause of sin, which is then seen, when strong motions and impressions have been to the contrary, as well as impulses of sin and wickedness (so as the man could not but say he had power not to have done it), from whence a man may discern what he himself was like to have done, if he had been in Adam's state and case.

Secondly, That also of James, that it is God's prerogative alone (and no person's else but he who is God withal, or one person with God), not to be capable of being tempted to evil, so as to be prevailed with by it: James i. 13, ' Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man.' To be ' without variableness, or shadow of turning,' ver 17, proves my assertion. It is further evidenced by this, that the greatest and holiest creature that could be made by God, if but a mere creature, and having no other but that providential assistance due by the law of the creation, was not only capable to

reel and fall, but was slippery, and might easily totter and fall, and so break itself, as a glass without a bottom.

Neither could this be laid upon God, that he upheld him not; because to have been invincibly kept and preserved by God, was above the due that, as creator, God was any way obliged unto, and must have proceeded from a principle of an higher kind, namely, his free grace, and was inconsistent with his covenant of works; so as God, in letting him fall, did therein no more but only not assist him by such a supernatural aid as was above the law of creation, and unto which God therefore was no way bound; and it was but to leave the creature, to shew what as a creature it might will to do, and so that it was mutable. Which pi-erogative of God's so to do, who shall deny unto him, or put the contrary upon him, as meet to be expected from him, when it was a pure act of supernatural grace to have done otherwise? The wisest of men, Solomon, having sought into the nature and original of wickedness and madness, lays all at man's door: ' God made man righteous, but they found or sought out many inventions,' Eccles. vii. 29.

Neither is it to be conceived that man's heart was exposed to Satan to infuse sin, as a piece of fair paper lies exposed to an external hand to cast a blot or stain of ink upon it at his pleasure; no, it must be an act of a man's own will, without the consent of which the devil cannot now in our corrupt estate force any man to sinning, much less then, when he had no matter in Adam to work upon.

The which mutability God (when Adam was at the best and prime of his condition), gave him an extraordinary monitory and warning of; yea, and that which was to be as a sacrament thereof unto him, God singled forth of the garden he was placed in, two trees: ' the tree of life,' which was ordained to seal his constant estate of life and happiness, if he would persist in obedience; * the tree of knowledge of good and evil,' to signify that he was mutable from good to evil; and of this last tree God forbade him to eat, and that if he did, he died: Gen. ii. 17, ' But of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die; ' and that therefore he must look to himself, for this was his covenant, and the essential terms of it, and therefore sealed up by these two sacraments. Now the word disobedience here in the text points us to his sin, as it is also charged upon him by God: Gen. iii. 17, ' Because thou hast hearkened to the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree whereof I commanded thee not to eat,' which shews wherein lay the very sin. Adam had an express commandment from God, and the light of it, together with the principles of the law written in his heart, was in his understanding and judgment, ready to have guided him if he would use and ask counsel thereof, and attend thereto upon all temptations to the contrary. Neither was it possible that if he would have had recourse to those principles, and consulted with them, that he should have erred, or that his will should have inclined to such an act expressly contrary to God's law, if he had continued fully to consider what was at hand ready to his view, for neither could error befall his understanding, if he would use the light he had in that estate (fov then his understanding must be said to have been created by God, not ablo to judge of what was good in every action), neither could man's will then but fixedly cleave to that which the understanding did think j.good; only he not being taken up into the seeing of God face to face, and so to have his understanding possessed with such a sight of God and his will, so filled and fixed with the possession of him thereby as he might not cast an eye to look and consider whether there might not be some further good as to himself, than he was yet possessed of in that condition; and then this being sug-

Chap. III.]j in respect of sin and punishment, 9

gested to him by Satan that there was, he turned a sudden squint eye aside, as Lot's wife did hers backwards; and thus the Scripture expresseth his sin, by a not hearkening or attending to the h'ght of the law, and the voice of it in his judgment, but an * hearkening to the voice of his wife.' It was a not consulting with the command, or not suffering it to speak, or not cleaving fixedly to the advice thereof; but his will would have his understanding gad and wander with a glance, to see if there might not be something in what SatanI suggested. And this very rash incogitant squint was his first slip from God, so as after it, when God's law came upon him, and was considered by him, yet this sin having first entered, thereupon followed a doubting of the truth of what God had said, a jealousy that God kept him from eating of that tree out of envy, lest they should bo as God, and so hoping to mend his condition another way than by obeying God, and to be free of the service of God, which by God's law he was (if he would have happiness from God) to be subject unto; he rather chose to set up for himself, and seek his fortune, as we say, and so to be absolutely free as God is. And thus thinking he had found out a new trick to be happy, without and beyond what that condition would afibrd which God had set him in, he fell into sin and misery. And that this was the sin of his fall, is part of Solomon's meaning, when he saith, ' they sought out new inventions; ' and having once left God, he doth now nothing else but seek a new way to be happy; but being a beggar of himself, finds he cannot himself support himself, and therefore is forced for happiness and comfort to go to every creature to supply him, and so is plunged into the worst of servitudes, ' whilst he promised himself liberty,' even to be a servant to every creature. This for that one man's sin.

CHAPTER III.

How sin is derived from Adam to all mankind. — What sin it is which is propagated by the first man to his posterity. — Whether original sin consists only in a corruption of nature, or also in the guilt of Adam's first sin imputed to us. — The inqnitation of that sin proved. — Adam, a public person representing us. — By ivhat law he came to be so. — The justice and equity of God's imputing the first sin of Adam to us all.

Now there are but two ways to pass sin to another: the one is by way of example, as Jeroboam is said to have caused Israel to sin, and as Eve caused Adam; or else parlicipatione culpce, by partaking of the sin of another. Now by the first way this sin is not derived, for besides that Adam being dead 4600 years ago, the force of this example reacheth not to us, nor to the multitudes of ages past; that this was the way of deriving it, is not intended in the text, for then not Adam the first man, but Eve and the devil, should have been assigned as those by whose offence sin entered into the world, in that they were the ' first in the transgression,' and also because then children (as the 14th verse of the 12th chapter of the Romans affirms) should not be guilty, as yet that verse afiirms they are, in that they die. Now God exerciseth no punishment where there is no fault; also the apostle intends a comparison of Adam with Christ, that sin comes by Adam, as righteousness by Christ. Now Christ conveys not righteousness to all by example, for many persons saved by him lived afore him, as all under the Old Testament, as Hkewise infants. This indeed, as is likely, was the way by which the most of the angels fell, whom Satan as a head drew into the

faction with him, and those whom his example prevailed not with did stand, and do still, which no man doth, but ' all have sinned.'

Now concerning the second way how we should come to be partakers of Adam's sin, the Scriptures elsewhere tell us it was by propagation natural or generation, as David: Ps. H. 5, 'Behold, I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me.' I will not earnestly contend that this way is directly expressed in this text, which yet Augustine pressed from the word ' entering into the world,' as a lues or contagion, and so passing and piercing through, or invading the whole world as it were by stealth; but this may justly be argued for it from the text, that even infant children are affirmed here to die upon the account of that first sin's entrance, * who sinned not after the similitude of Adam's transgression,' that is, personally; which shews this to be the way of conveying this sin, for to them there can be no other. And why else were such children circumcised and now baptized, both being sacraments of remission of sin and sanctification? Col. ii. 11-13, * In whom also ye are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, in putting oft' the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ; buried with him in baptism, wherein also you are risen with him through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised him from the dead. And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath he quickened together with him, having forgiven you all ti'espasses.' And indeed this to be the way, other scriptures plainly affirm, not only that instance of David (though enough, for what could David have done before his conception that he should be conceived in sin? and there is the same case of all), but Christ plainly affirms it, John iii. 6, ' Whatsoever is born of the flesh is flesh,' that is, what is^born of fleshly generation. The first birth (for he opposeth it to the second birth) is flesh, that is, sinful; for flesh he opposeth to that grace which in the second birth the Spirit works, called spirit there; and so Paul, Ephes. ii. 3, ' We are all the children of wrath by nature.' By nature, is there in part meant the natural course of propagating our nature, namely, generation, and conception, and propagation natural; and so Aristotle useth the word (pucig.

Now, if we be the ' children of wrath' by virtue of our natural birth, then, first, children of sin thereby; for God is not angry with us but for sin. And hence it is that because natural conception, by that ordinary law of generation, is the way of conveying sin, that therefore all men, all and every one, are corrupted; for to be sure all are born as from him, he being the first man, and having committed that sin ere he begat any. And why was it that Christ, though the son of Adam, Luke iii. 38, as having the matter of his body from him, yet was without sin, and born an holy one? How came he to be free and exempted, but because he was conceived not by natural propagation from a man, but by the overshadowing of the Most High? Luke i. 35, ' And the angel answered and said unto her. The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee: therefore also that holy thing, which shall be born of thee, shall be called the Son of God.' So that this remains the only means why men are sinful, that they are propagated from Adam after the natural manner of all flesh; the ground whereof you have hereafter.

The third question and demand will be. What sin it is that is propagated and entered upon the world, and of which all men, as soon as they are made men by conception or birth, are guilty, by that one man's oftence?

To make way for the answer of which we must know that all sins are reduced unto two branches: 1, that which consists in the guilt of some act of sin done and perpetrated; or, 2, an inherent corruption in the heart contracted by that guilt. Now it is certain, that whether every man had had this original sin or not, that yet ixpon any act of sinning committed by any man, there doth and should have entered in that man a depravation of nature; for by sinning a man is made the servant * of iniquity unto iniquity.' Kom. vi. 19, ' I speak after the manner of men, because of the infirmity of your flesh: for as ye have yielded your members servants to uncloanness, and to iniquity unto iniquity, even so now yield your members servants to righteousness, unto holiness.' Which comes to pass not upon that mistaken ground that an habit follows upon acts in a philosophical way; for then it must be that many reiterated acts produce such an inclination, and so not any one act of sin; but depravation followeth by way of curse and forfeiture, even of the spirit of all inherent holiness, because man's having of it did hold of a covenant of works, of which more hereafter. Now therefore according unto this, Adam sinning, there were two things befell him: 1, an everlasting guilt of that act committed, binding him over to death; 2, a forfeiture of the Holy Ghost in him, and so of the image of God in holiness, and so by consequence the contrary depravation of his nature. Now Adam having contracted by his first sin both these to himself, if the question be, which of these two, or whether not both of these are the sin that entered, and is propagated by birth to all men?

The answer is. Both of them.

First, The guilt of that very act of disobedience, which was lately spoken of, so as we all are accounted guilty of it as he, and as truly as if we had had a hand in it; and that (besides what is to follow) appears plainly out of Rom. V. 12. For, first, it is said, that ' all have sinned; ' secondly, the 16th and 18th verses clear it, for they say, that ' by the offence of that man, judgment (that is, the guilt of that offence, whereby they were judged guilty as well as he) came on them all to condemn them.' Now God could not condemn them for that act, unless he did in justice judge them guilty of it. And whereas it is said here, they sinned, the very text viewed and compared cleareth its own intendment. A person may be said to have sinned, or to have done a thing two ways: 1, when one actually and personally doth it himself; and so we did not sin that sin, but Adam only; for in ver. 14, it is said of infants that they * sinned not after the similitudeof his transgi-ession,' that is, in their own persons; yet, 2, one may be said to have sinned in another. And look as the text gives that part of the distinction, that they sinned, not personally as Adam did, so it appositely sets out this other Ip' cL, ' in whom all have sinned,' speaking of Adam; for that may be when one actually himself doth it not; as what a whole body doth, a member of the same body may be said to do; and so the word here, theij sinned, is to be understood, that is, they are to be accounted sinners, as the word is in 1 Kings i. 21, ' That I and my son Solomon shall be counted offenders' {Heh., sinners), upon what ground you shall hear afterwards; and besides, I must speak presently to this very point again.

The second thing conveyed is," a corruption of nature, which is a sin that is inherent, remaining and residing in us, and conveyed to us from him, as a leprosy is from the parent to the child, so as it may be said to be in them. Of this Jobspeaks, chap. xv. 14, ' What is man, that he should be clean? and he that is born of a woman, that he should be righteous? ' And in the 16th verse of that chapter, he calls man ' filthy and abominable, drinking in sin as water.' In which place you see, that, first, there is a want of righteousness, which once he was made in; secondly, a contrary uncleanness or proneness to sin, and therefore he calls him filthy or greedy of sinning; and, thirdly, this is conveyed by his natural propagation by man and woman; for

it is inserted, ' that is born of a woman.' So that now you are to conceive thus of it: that Adam committing that act of disobedience, his nature was thereby first in himself for ever defiled by it. We often see that one blow or fall strikes a man's members out of joint, so as of themselves they ever remain so, and so did that fall of his, though but one act of sin. If therefore we also be proved guilty of that act in him, then by the like reason also must that nature we receive from him by natural propagation be tainted with sin, as his was by virtue of that act; so as it must first be supposed that we are guilty of that act, as the ground and reason why our nature is thus infected, that being a consequent thereof, and in part a punishment of it, and so as indeed it could not have been infiicted on our natures as a sin, unless we be first found guilty of that act of sin itself.

Now, because this is questioned by some divines, I shall corae next to speak unto this great and main proposal, namely.

Whether original sin doth consist only in a corruption and defilement of nature, and want of that first created righteousness? Or, whether not also in the guilt of that first act of sin and disobedience of Adam's, by way of imputation derived down unto us, and that as the ground of that corruption propagated?

That the corruption conveyed is the whole of original sin, and not at all the guilt of that first disobedience as imputed to us, is maintained by some, but usually (if not generally) by such as withal deny the imputation of Christ's righteousness also. And indeed the occasion why they have denied the imputation of Adam's sin, hath been for the sake of their other opinion, that we are not justified by Christ's righteousness as imputed, but only for Christ's sake, and for his righteousness. For they see that if they should hold the imputation of Adam's first actual disobedience, that then they might as well assent unto the imputation of Christ's righteousness and obedience, Adam being Christ's type.

The point therefore to be proved now is not, that the corruption is conveyed, but that the guilt of the act of his first sin is also derived down to us. I shall endeavour it out of this scripture, in Rom. v. 12, 13, &c. (Of the conveyance of the corruption itself I shall after speak.)

Now the proof of this is made up of these particulars laid together.

1. Let the general order of the apostle's discourse in this epistle about about man's sinfulness be considered. In the two first chapters, he had shewn how, in respect of actual sins and a state of wrath, first, the Gentiles, chap, i., secondly, the Jews, chap ii., are all involved; and then, chap, iii., he speaks of both together, Jew and Gentile, laying open that inbred and general corruption of nature, concluding that ' all are unrighteous, and fallen short of the glory of God.' Now, then, in this fifth chapter, he proceeds to shew the source and spring of this corruption, viz., Adam's first sin : ' By one man sin entered into the world.' So then, having fully treated of the corruption afore, he here orderly next treats of the consequence of the guilt of the act, which is the ground of that corruption.

2. The sin of that one man which he treats of in this chapter was, the act of sinning, and not so much the corruption of nature in him, which also befell himself, for he termeth it a transgression, ver. 14 ; an ofi'ence, ver. 15-17 ; and says, that he sinned, ver. 16; and a disobedience, ver. 19; and ver. 17, termeth it, that one ofience.

3. When he says, ' Sin entered into the world by that one man,' he by sin means one and the same sin, which by him as the author was first brought into the world, the guilt whereof accrued to himself as the perpetrator of it, and to his posterity ; so as in that word, * sin entered into the world,' himself first is to be undorstood as one of, yea, the head of, this world of mankind which sin entered upon ; and he speaks of the first entrance of sin therefore of that sin which was first begnn in himself, and that is evidently the guilt of the act here spoken of, and therefore the same sin or guilt is to bo understood, which is said that it goes on and is derived to the rest of mankind. And if otherwise it be understood, then, whilst Adam's sin is spoken of, and that as begun in him, one kind of sin, namely, the guilt of the act, but when the sin of the rest of mankind, then another kind of sin, viz., the corruption of nature, should be variously intended, which is not uniform to the apostle's scope.

4. He thereupon says, that * death passed upon all,' this sin having first

entered upon all; that is, death as the effect and punishment of that act of sin

thus spoken of; and the connection of these two sayings is with an emphasis,

* and so death passed.' Every word is emphatical to this purpose : 1, passed,

as a sentence upon a crime foregoing ; and therefore, 2, he adds, xai ovrug,

and so, which words are causal, or assigning a reason why death and the

sentence of death passed upon all, even because sin, and that sin of Adam

had entered first upon all. And look as death seized on Adam for the act

which he did, so still likewise the same sentence on us all for the same act.

Now we find that unto that act of disobedience it was that death was threatened: Gen, ii. 17, ' That day thou eatest thou shalt die.' And look as it

is one and the same death that seizeth on both Adam and us, so the guilt

of one and the same sin entered on both.

5. And to that end he might be understood both to hold forth that sin of his to have been the cause of death, and also how sin, and what sin it was he intended, in saying it entered upon the world by that man, he further indigitates it and repeats it, in that (saith he) ' in whom all have sinned ; ' and this fully resolves us.

For, first, if no more had been said of all men, than that they sinned, ii/Mas^Tov, it imports an act of sinning; he says not, 7nade sinful, but have sinned; therefore his intention is to speak them guilty of that act of his first sin, of which he manifestly speaks of afore and after. And further, seeing that many of them whom death reigned over were infant children, as well as others (for experience sheweth death reigneth over them also), and they are part of this world, which sin is said to have entered into, and that they are not guilty of any act of their own in themselves, therefore guilty they must be supposed of that act (if of any at all), viz., the first sin and disobedience of Adam (which he, you see, is discoursing of), nor of any other can they be supposed guilty in common together with all men else; so then put but rt?^ and have snecZ together, it must be the guilt of his first sin that is intended; and then the manner of involving children in that guilt can be no otherwise than by imputation, for of personal sin in themselves they are not guilty-

6. Farther, to clear this, take the words that follow : ver. 14, ' Death reigned,' saith he ' even over them that sinned not after the similitude of Adam's transgression.'

1st, That reif/ning attributed unto death upon sin's entrance hath, as Parous observeth upon the words, a respect to those violent prerogative extraordinary judgments which were (long before Moses) executed, as the flood on the old world, and on Sodom and Gomorrah, &c., in which children and infants were involved as well as those of riper years.

And then, 2dly, those other words, * even over them that sinned not after the similitude of Adam's transgression,' is a designing, by a periphrasis, infant children, and their case and condition, as those that death

reigneth over, as well as others, though they had never actually or personally sinned, or in like manner as Adam had done. Now, besides other considerations, if only inherent corruption were the sin that had been intended, upon which it is that death had passed on all, and as that wherein infants, as well as those of riper years, are in common and alike involved, then the apostle had put no difference between Adam and them; for concerning that sin it might be said of infants that they have inherent corruption in their persons, after the similitude that Adam had it in his person; for it is expressly said of it. Gen. v. 3, that ' Adam begat a son in his own image or likeness.' And those (with whom in this point I have now to do) all grant that same comaption to have been the punishment of that first act of Adam's, as well in Adam himself as in us, and so in all these respects bearing the very simihtude of that sinful corruption that was in Adam; but it is not so in respect of the guilt of that first act; we are not sinners in respect thereof after the similitude of Adam's transgression therein. So then, having first said that nil had sinned, and yet of some of that all, namely infants, that they sinned not after the similitude of Adam's transgression, it is an explication or correction that they are to be understood to have sinned, not in their own persons, as Adam did, but that only by way of imputation it is yet reckoned to them, which is the only way whereby it can be imagined they should be said to have sinned therein.

And 7. After he had thus connected these two, the first man's sin and death, as cause and effect, he plainly sends us to that first curse directed against that very fact, ' That day thou eatest ' (which was the first sin) ' thou shalt die the death.' And this the scope of his ensuing argumentation clearly shews that bis meaning is, that death (then threatened) had, according to the tenor of that threatening upon that man's first sin, seized on all the world. His words that follow are these: ver. 13, 14, 'For until the law sin was in the world: but sin is not imputed where there is no law. Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression, who is the figure of him that was to come.' He lays his foundation of arguing thus: children and all men die, and death is but for some sin, and all sin must have some law it is committed against; now, what law should that be, says he? He removes any kind of sins forbidden in Moses's law, or contained therein, to have been the cause of that death of mankind, yea, of children; and yet it must be a sin against some law that was in the world, which must be the cause of that death; for ' sin is not imputed where there is no law.' Now what law is it (that was no part of Moses's law, nor contained therein) against which all, even children, should be supposed to have sinned, and by vu-tue of which death should pass upon them and all, but that which was given to Adam, over and above any other command that is in Moses's law, which so expressly threateneth death in it? That law which he first sinned against, namely, in eating the forbidden fruit; and therefore it must be the sin against that law which brought in death upon the world, in w^hich law or command this curse was in terminis, and expressly annexed, ' that day thou eatest thou shalt die.' It is certain, then, that it must be by virtue of this law that children die, or by none, for they died when Moses's law was not vet given; so then, when you read that even children died afore Moses as well as others, you know what cm'se and what law to attribute it unto, even to the first law, and that first curse given to Adam, ' that day thou eatest, thou shalt die.'*

* Faius, the Geneva preacher, together with Calvin, in his comment on these ■words, resolves the apostle's argument thus : — Si est transgressio in infantibus, est