universal declension of manners that had overspread the Gentile world. This is true; but then he speaks of the corruption of the heart also. This appears, first, because the 10th, 11th and 12th verses are taken from the xiv. liii. Psalms, the contents of both which inform us, that therein David describeth the corruption of a natural man. Accordingly, he begins, the fool hath said in his heart, and he speaks chiefly of the depraved state of the heart in the three first verses, and then proceeds to describe the wickedness of their lives, ver. 4. where he calls them workers of iniquity. The apostle takes the same course; he first describes the sinfulness of men's hearts, ver. 10, 11, 12. and then he shows the sins of their lives and outward actions, ver. 13, 14, 15, &c. The apostle, therefore, and the Psalmist both give their suffrages to the truth of our doctrine. They both pourtray the ignorance, impiety, infidelity and atheism of the heart, as well as the sins and follies of the external conversation of men. 2dly, I would remind the objectors of the exclusive terms, no not one. Now, do they think none abstained from outward sin in David's or St. Paul's time? Do they think none were free from gross immorality? Where there no servants of God, no believers in Christ? yet the apostle says, there is none righteous, and he adds no, not one, neither infants nor adults; which shows that he speaks of that original sinful stain, that epidemical disease of our nature with which all are infected, and from which none are free. The seventh chapter is full of this doctrine; so ver. 8. Sin taking occasion by the commandment, wrought in me all manner of concupiscence. If man was in his primitive state of purity and holiness, he would take occasion by the divine commandment to show his love and obedience to God; but since he is apostatized from his original creation, and hath contracted an antipathy to God, the law irritates and provokes the corruption of his heart, and makes it more boisterous and predominant; yea, causes it to overflow just like a river stopt in its course. This makes him say, I had not known sin but by the law, ver. 7. and by the law is the hnowledge of sin, chap. iii. ver. 20. When the divine law is spread before a sinner in its fullest extent, purity and perfection, then he sees what a filthy detestable creature he is ; the law, as in a glass represents to him the sinfulness and deformity of his heart, the blindness of his mind, the perverseness of his will, and the irreg ularity, extravagance and dissoluteness of all his affections. Hence he who was before alive, i. e. thought himself in a state of grace and salvation, dies, i. e. sees in himself the sentence of death, is obliged to acknowledge death is his due, and is under fearful apprehensions lest all the damnation of hell should be revealed in his soul, ver. 9. and 2 Cor. i. 9. This inward conviction of sin persons have when the law of God is set home upon their hearts, and the inward sin of which they are then convinced is the original pollution whereof we speak; and when men have the experience of the corruption of their hearts, they will then know what this innate spiritual defilement is. that in me (that This was the case of every The apostle saith, ver. 18. I know is, in my flesh) dwelleth no good thing. case of the apostle; and this is the man by nature, no good dwelleth in him, but on the contrary, all manner of evil; there is no carnal appetite in a brute, no wicked temper in a devil, but man hath a degree of it in himself. Justly, therefore, doth bishop Hall stile an evil man half a beast and half a devil.* This corruption of nature the apostle speaks of again, ver. 20. and calls it the sin that dwelleth in him, the law in his members, ver. 23. and the flesh, ver. 25. and the old man, Eph. iv. 22. Col. iii. 9. The apostle James mentions this depravity of the soul, chap. i. ver. 14. calling it lust or desire,† which is the very same appellation the apostle Paul gives it, Rom. vii. 7. I had not known lust, or desire, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet. There is in every unregenerate heart a perpetual bent and inclination to evil, a desire to commit sin; and the desire of sin is sin? it is sin in its rise and original; and this lust or desire, when it hath conceived, bringeth forth sin. James i. 15. Some deny that concupis * See his Meditations, Cent. ii. * Επιθυμία. cence, or the desire of sin, is sin, especially the Papists. And I wish none who call themselves Protestants were liable to censure here; but whosoever they are that are thus criminal, how contrary they go to scripture the texts above recited may show them; and how contrary they are to the church of England, the conclusion of the ninth article may inform them concupiscence and lust hath of itself : "the nature of sin." I have insisted the longer upon this head, because it is the hinge upon which the controversy turus, and the centre of the whole doctrine of original sin; forasmuch, as it implies Adam's sin imputed, and infers a liableness to God's eternal wrath.* And this is a truth of the highest importance. If you deny it, you do in effect deny the necessity of the gospelrevelation, and of salvation by Christ: For if children are born into the world pure and innocent, and have a natural will and power to obey the will of God, then they may save themselves, and so what need have they of being beholden to Christ for salvation? We see, therefore, the error and danger of the Pelagian scheme; and hence we may learn, what judgment to form of those who espouse and vindicate * This is easily explained; for the original defilement of our nature, is both a sin and a punishment; when we take it in the latter sense, it implies the translation of the guilt of Adam's sin to us; and when in the former, it shows us that we are objects of the divine vengeance, and deserve to suffer eternal misery. it; they are not to be looked upon only as impugners of a single article of the christian faith, but as underminers and subverters of the whole evangelical. dispensation. And as this doctrine is of great weight and moment, so the evidences of it are clear, copious, conclusive, demonstrative. It is demonstrated from the scriptures: it is demonstrated from the state of men's hearts, and from the debaucheries of their lives. The whole world is full of it. The weakness, the sinfulness, the miseries of the human species, all conspire to prove it. Unawakened sinners, who are dead in trespasses and sins, and deny it themselves, are a glaring proof of the truth of it to others. They, by their ignorance, perverseness, hypocrisy and bestiality, demonstrate the innate turpitude of the soul, and are miserable instances of the truth of that doctrine which they strive to oppose. The. saints of God experience this corruption in their own hearts, and groan under the plague and burthen of it. If we rightly know ourselves, if we see all our own vileness, filthiness, and exceeding sinfulness, we shall be obliged to own, that we are very wicked, unholy, ungodly, abominable wretches. And this will further appear, (as Bisdop Wilkins observes,) "if we look upon our own natures in the rage, blas phemies, baseness, madness of other men's lives: "there being not any kind of evil, which either man ❝or devil hath committed, but there are in our na"tures the principles and inclinations to it; the best |