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just, and good, and worthy of God, the great Governor of the world; and, as such, sweetly acquiesce in it, saying, "God's ways were holy, just, and good, and blessed be his name; but to us, (to all the human race,) belong shame and confusionof face, for that we have sinned." But until men are a wakened, at least to some sense of their natural corruption, they are commonly very blind and deaf to all the scripture says about this matter. It is hard to make men believe contrary to their own experience; to make them believe that they fell in Adam, when they do not feel that they are, by nature, fallen creatures. Let the scripture speak ever so plain, yet they cannot believe that it means as it says. It must mean, they think, something else. The best method, therefore, to convince sinners of the doctrine of original, (imputed,) sin, and to silence all their cavils, is to open the true meaning of the moral law, and show them their native depravity. This is the method which God takes in the Bible. He says but little about Adam's first sin, but says much to show us what we really are, as knowing that, if we are but once convinced of our native corruption, a few words are sufficient to show us whence our ruin originally took its rise:

Thus God, the great Governor of the world, in the gospel dispensation, considered mankind as being in a perishing condition; sinful, guilty, justly condemned, helpless, and undone ; and one ground and reason of his looking upon mankind to be in such a condition was, our original apostacy from him in our first parents. And since that constitution, whereby Adam was made our common head and public representative, was holy, just, and good, in its own nature; and since God, the supreme Lord of all things, had full power and rightful authority so to ordain and appoint; hence, therefore, he has sufficient reason to look upon mankind, on account of this first apostacy, as he does.

Therefore, at the same time he provided a Saviour for Adam, at the same time did he also provide a Saviour for his posterity too; they being considered as one with him, and involved in the same sin, and guilt, and ruin; and so standing in equal need of relief. Hence Christ is called the lamb slain from the foundation of the world. Then was it said,

that the seed of the woman shall bruise the serpent's head. To which original grant our Saviour seems to have respect, when he says, God so loved the world, that he GAVE his only begotten Son, &c. Whereas, had Adam acted in the capacity of a private person, and sinned and fallen for himself alone, and his posterity not been involved in the same ruin, he might have had a Saviour provided for him. But his posterity would no more have needed one than the angels in heaven, or than Adam before his fall.

OBJ. But those words, In the day thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die, (Gen. ii. 17.) were evidently spoken only to Adam; nor is there a word said about his posterity having any interest or concern in the affair.

ANS. So also were those words, in Gen. iii. 19. Dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return, spoken only to Adam, without the least intimation that his posterity were any of them included in the sentence. And yet, by virtue of that sentence, all his posterity are subject to death. Rom. v. 12, 13, 14. Do you account for this, and you will, at the same time, account for that; for the truth is, that, in both cases, Adam was considered not merely as a single private person, but as a public head and representative, standing in the room of all his posterity: and, considered in this capacity, was he threatened with death, in case he sinned; and, considered in this capacity, was natural death denounced upon him after his fall. So that, in both, his posterity were equally included: and therefore St. Paul calls Adam a type of Christ, Rom. v. 14.; and calls Christ the second Adam, 1 Cor. xv. 45. ; because both these, by the authority of the great Governor of the world, were constituted public persons, to act in the behalf of mankind and all mankind were so included in them, that St. Paul speaks as if there had been but only these two men, Adam and Christ. 1 Cor. xv. 47. The first man is of the earth, earthly; the second man is the Lord from heaven.

2. God, the supreme Ruler of the world, does, in the gospel, consider mankind as being in a perishing condition; not only on the account of their original apostacy in Adam, their common head and representative, but also because they are what they are in themselves. (1.) Destitute of the divine image.

(2.) Contrary to God in the temper of their hearts. (3.) Utterly averse to a reconciliation. (4.) In a disposition, if unrestrained, to live in all open rebellion against the Majesty of heaven, before his face. (5.) And yet insensible of their just desert, and of their need of sovereign grace; and ready rather to think it a cruel thing, if God should damn them.

The law requires

(1.) God saw mankind destitute of his moral image; for being conscious of the holy temper of his own heart; of the holy propensity of his own nature; and being conscious to the temper of their hearts; to the propensity of their nature, at first view he saw what they were. God looked down from heaven upon the children of men, to see if there were any that did understand, that did seek God. Every one of them is gone back; they are altogether become fithy; there is none that doeth good; no, not one. Psalin liii. 2, 3. He saw mankind destitute of a conformity to his holy law. mankind to love God supremely, live to him ultimately, and delight in him superlatively; and to love one another as their own souls; but he looked down from heaven; he beheld, and, lo, all the human race were entirely devoid of that temper. None were in a disposition to account him infinitely glorious in being what he was not one had the least relish or taste for the beauty of his moral perfections: every heart was empty of holy love and of holy delight, and devoid of any true spirit or principle of obedience; and all mankind had lost that frame of spirit towards one another which they ought to have. The whole world lay in ruin. He knew his law was holy, just, and good, and that his creature, man, was under infinite obligations to a perfect conformity thereto. He saw what grounds there were for the law, and what reasons for their obedience. He saw his own infinite excellency, and his original, underived, entire right to them; and was conscious to his rightful authority over them. He judged them infinitely to blame for their nonconformity, and worthy of an infinite punishment. Speaking after the manner of men, he did, in the inward temper of his heart, perfectly approve of those words in Gal. iii. 10, as being strictly just. Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things written in the book of the law to do them. Therefore, he looked on mankind in a perishing condition. But,

(2.) He viewed mankind not only destitute of good, but full of evil; not only void of the true love to God and to one another, but enemies to God, and living in malice and envy among themselves. He looked down from heaven and viewed a guilty world, and saw their contrariety to his nature and to his law. Conscious of his own divine temper, he saw every contrary temper, in them. What he esteems, they despise; what he delights in, they loathe. The end which he prosecutes, they oppose; and they esteem and delight in that which is contrary to him, and prosecute ends and designs contrary to his. He saw their views, their tempers, their wills, their ends, designs, and ways, were all contrary to him, and diametrically opposite to his law. He considered them as his enemies, and their tempers as perfect enmity and contrariety to the divine nature. Rom. viii. 7.

(3.) And, inasmuch as he thus saw them entirely destitute of love to him, and diametrically contrary to the divine nature in the temper of their hearts, he knew they would have no inclination to a reconciliation to God; but would be nuturally averse to it. He knew their aversion to a reconciliation would be as strong as their contrariety to the divine nature, from which it took its rise. He saw that if he should attempt to reclaim them, he should only meet with resistance; that if he should spread the news of pardon and peace through a guilty world, and invite them to return and be reconciled, that they would make light of it and despise it; that if he should send messengers after them, to persuade them to return, and beseech them to be reconciled, that they would put many of them to death. He saw just what treatment the prophets, and Christ, and his apostles were like to meet with. He knew not one in all the world would repent and convert, unless brought thereto by his own almighty arm, and all-conquering grace. Mat. xxi. 38–39. Rom. viii. 7. 1 Cor. iii. 6, 7.

(4.) Yea, so far from a disposition to repent and convert, that, if left wholly to themselves, unrestrained, no wickedness would be too bad for them. All would act as bad as Cain, Manasseth, or Judas; and the whole human race be like so many incarnate devils; they having the seed of all sin in their hearts. Mark vii. 21, 22.

(5.) And yet insensible of their sin and guilt, and just desert, and that they lie merely at the sovereign mercy of God, and that he is at liberty to show mercy, or not, as seems good in his sight : yea, so averse to the knowledge of this their true state, as to be disposed to hate the light, and shut their eyes against it, ready to resist all methods of conviction; yea, that some would be even so perverse, as actually to rise in arms against his messengers, who endeavoured to show them their ruin and the way of their recovery, and put them to death, as not fit to live; and yet so stupid as to think, that, in all, they did God good service. And that, in general, a great out-cry would be raised round a proud and guilty world, against the Lord, for supposing mankind to be in so bad, so very forlorn a state. God knew the pride of man, that he is exceedingly proud; and saw how great offence would be given to a guilty world, who would by no means endure to be so affronted. John iii. 19, 20. viii. 33. 47.

Now, such were the grounds upon which God looked upon the human race in a perishing condition; sinful, guilty, justly condemned, helpless, and undone. And considering that the original constitution with Adam, according to which he and all his posterity were doomed to destruction, in case he fell, was holy, just, and good; and considering that the law of nature, which all mankind are naturally under, and according to which the least sin exposes to eternal damnation, is also holy, just, and good; and considering our apostacy in Adam, and what we are in ourselves; I say, considering all these things, it is most certain and evident that the judgment of God was according to truth, while he esteemed mankind to be thus in a perishing condition.

That mankind are actually of such a nature, has been demonstrated in the former discourse. That God, whose understanding is infinite, and who sees all things as being what they really are, must therefore now see mankind to be such, is selfevident and such as he now sees them to be, such he, from the beginning, knew they would be. It is evident, therefore, a priori, that God must have considered mankind to be such, when he first entered upon his designs of grace revealed in the gospel. And if we consider the nature of the gospel, and

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