they forfeited their title to that extraordinary grace and affiftance before-mentioned, and were in a manner left alone to their natural inclinations towards fenfible pleafures, which occafioned a miferable diforder and confufion, and brought mankind into a ftate of corruption and degeneracy, which must needs be very deplorable, when they were abandoned by their Maker, and expofed to all the temptations of the devil, and their own affections and frail nature. One effect was ", The eyes of them both were opened, and they know that they were naked; that is, they felt fuch a change upon the commiffion of fin, that they thereby apprehended an unfecmlinefs in nakednefs, which they did not before. Guilt caufed confufion, and a conception of fhame in what before was natural, and feemed not indecent, and made them cover themselves with fir-leaves, and hide themselves among the trees of the garden °. Fourthly, This tranfgreffion of our first parents affects us their pofterity; for they being driven out of paradife, and from the tree of life, lost their title to the delights of paradife, and to immortal life, for themfelves and all their pofterity; as when a fubject is convicted of high-treafon, and forfeits his eftate, his pofterity must be beggar'd too: Whence we are all fubject to labour and forrow, to sickness and death. Far corrupt abufe of the natural power, the liberty of the will Neither is it inconfiftent with the perfection of an infinite Being, to endow his creatures with fuch a liberty or power. See Juft. Martyr. apol. i. ftct. 36, and 55. Edit. Grabe. » Gen iii. 7. • Indicatur rem quandam in homine ortam fuiffe, quâ turpe in fe agnoverit id, quod antea nullo modo turpe habebat. Maimon. Mor. Nevoch, lib. 1. ch. 2. Furthermore, as our firft parents, by their ароftacy from God, loft their innocency, and forfeited their intereft in that spiritual affistance above-mentioned, whereby their natural appetites were grown exorbitant and commanding, and their very natures were flained and polluted; fo from this corrupted stock we defcend, and (as a corrupt tree cannot but bring forth evil fruit) there is a fault or corruption of the nature of every man, which naturally is engendered of the offspring of Adam P. This is called the old man, being that corrupted ftate of nature we derive from the old or first Adam, contrary to the new man, that ftate of regeneration or grace, wherein we are placed by faith in Chrift, the fecond or new Adam. Hence our rational part is borne down and enflaved by the fenfible; not only our bodies are decaying, but alfo the flesh lufteth against the spirit: We derive, from our first parents the feeds and principles of natural corruption; and this experience frequently teaches us, that the moral inclinations of parents, as well as their depraved conftitutions, are propagated to their children; and when it is otherwife, as that vicious parents have virtuous children, that is, because the inclinations, being vicious in either, are fubdued by the affiftance of the grace and fpirit of God; fo that in general our judgments are prone to error, and our affections depraved: We all fadly experience a pronenefs to act against reafon and found principles, and a ftrong biafs to. wards evil: So much do we partake of the bitternefs and impurity of the fountain from which VOL. I. U we P The ninth article of the church. 4 Eph. iv. 22. ver. 24. we fpring: Which general corruption of our nature is often mentioned in the holy fcriptures '. This flain or pollution of the foul by fin, being contrary to righteoufnefs and true holiness, cannot but be offenfive to God; the confequence whereof is our being born the children of wrath, or subject to the wrath of God, without being cleahfed by Christ's blood in the laver of regeneration, by the facrament of baptifm. As for the immaculate conception of our bleffed Lord Jefus Chrift, we are to remember, that although he received the fubftance of his human body from the Virgin Mary, yet he received his life and formation, which alone are capable of a mortal or moral contagion, from the immediate power of God, from which nothing that is impure can come; therefore, though our Saviour be the offspring of Adam, according to his human nature, yet he is not the finful and polluted offspring. The devil prevailed on our firft parents by a downright lye; for whereas God had threatened that they should die, or become mortal upon their eating the forbidden fruit, the devil affured them on the contrary; Ye fhall not furely die ". W Hence Chrift faid of him, that he was a liar, and the father of it ". So that all liars are the very children of the devil, and do the works of the devil. As to the curfe on the ferpent, mentioned in this hiftory, Thou art curfed above all cattle; upon Melanthon Apol. five corpus Doctrine Chriftianæ. De Peccati origine. Quod omnes peccaverunt, Rom. v. 32. Hebraica Phrafis eft, i. e. rei funt, & habent peccatum, rem malam & damnatam.- -Quod eft peccatum in ipfâ naturâ hominis As Gen. vi. 5. Jer. xvii. 9. Gal. v. 17. V de ovulo hu propagatum. "See ch. iii. obf. 3. Note Eph. iv. 22. mano. w Gen. iii. 4. X Gen. iii. 14. . 9 upon thy belly fhalt thou go; though he was only the inftrument by which the devil acted, and had neither will nor understanding to offend, we are to confider, that as the ox which fhould gore a man, was ordered to be ftoned 2, to fhew the value which God fet on man's life, and to fecure it, (the owner being obliged hereby to take care to prevent it, or lofe his beaft;) fo the ferpent was curfed by God, (who being the fovereign Lord of all his creatures, might do with them as he pleafed,) to fhew the foulness of fin, and to excite finners to repentance, and deter men from the commiffion of fin, when they behold a creature which was but the inftrument fo debafed; and there was no more injuftice in changing the form of the ferpent for man's fake, than in fuffering other creatures to be flain for his food; efpecially, fince they were made by God for the ufe of man, in one kind or other. What follows, a I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy feed and her feed; it fhall bruife thy head, and thou shalt bruife his heel, contains the firft eftablifhment of the covenant of grace, or of the gofpel, which was afterwards renewed with Abraham, (although this paffage is not particularly applied to Chrift in the New Teftament, yet he is therein faid to be promised to Abraham under the term of the feed) ©. Here we read the gracious promife of Chrift's deliverance of the church, and the malice and deftiny of the devil, under the reprefentation of the enmity between the feed or offspring of the woman, (that is, fome one of mankind,) and the feed or kind of ferpents. Man is able to reach U 2 the z Exod. xxi. 28. Gal. iii. 16. ⚫ Gen. iii. 15: b Gen. xii. 3. the ferpent's head where a blow is deadly; but the ferpent can only feize on man by the heel. Thus the true feed of the woman, Jefus Chrift, (fo called because he took on him our nature from the Virgin Mary, one of the feed or offspring of Eve,) was to bruife the ferpent's head, that is, destroy the work and power of the devil, who was the author of fin, and death and mifery; whereas the ferpent, the devil, could only bruife his heel, by his inftruments profecute and crucify him, and also, as far as he can, profecute the members of his church. d Here it may be proper, for the present, to remark briefly, that this promifed feed was afterwards called the Meffiah, or Chrift. Meffiah is Hebrew, and Christ is Greek ", and both fignify the fame thing, that is, Anointed. The anointing of things or perfons with oil was an ancient ite of confecration, or dedicating them to a peculiar and facred ufe . Hence our Lord, being that promised feed, and ordained by the Father to be the Saviour of mankind, and for that purpose being anointed not with material cil, but with the Holy Spirit, was called the Meffiah, that is, the Anointed, or Chrift: And therefore Andrew told his brother, We have found the Meffiah, which is, being interpreted, the Chrift. Here d The Latins, being ftrangers to the Jewifh customs, called him Chreftus, and the Christians Chreftiani. Suetonius, in Vitâ Claudii, chap. 25. Tertul. adverfus Gentes. See Bifhop Pearson on the fecond Article of the Creed, Jefus Chrift, P. 79 e Gen. xxviii. 18. Lev. viii. 11. Exod. xxx. 30. f Acts x. 38. 8 Dan. ix. 26. h John i. 41. Note, the word Meffiah, with an b, is nearer to the Hebrew; and Mellias, with an s, is fuitable to the Greek pronunciation. In thefe papers the former is chofen. |