Wherein doth it specially consist?

Not only in the deprivation of justice, and absence of good; but also in a continual presence of an evil principle and wicked property, whereby we are naturally inclined to unrighteousness, and made prone unto all evil. James i. 14. Rom. vii. 21, 23. For it is the defacing of God's image, consisting chiefly in wisdom and holiness, whereof we are now deprived; and the impression of the contrary image of Satan, (John viii. 41, &c.) called concupiscence, (Rom. vii. 7. James i. 14.) consisting, first, in an utter disability and enmity unto that which is good; (Rom. vii. 18. viii. 7.) secondly, in proneness unto all manner of evil; (Rom. vii. 14.) which also every man hath at the first minute and moment of his conception; contrary to the opinion of the Pelagians, who teach that sin cometh by imitation.

In what part of our nature doth this our corruption abide?

In the whole man, from the top to the toe, and every part both of body and soul, (Gen. vi. 5. 1 Thess. v. 23.) like unto a leprosy that runneth from the crown of the head to the sole of the foot. But chiefly it is the corruption of the five faculties of the soul, which are thereby deprived of that holiness wherein God created them in Adain.

Is not the substance of the soul corrupted by this sin?

No; but the faculties only depraved, and deprived of original holiness. For, first, the soul should otherwise be mortal and corruptible: secondly, our Saviour took our nature on him without this corruption.

To come then to the special corruptions of the five faculties of the soul: show, first, how this sin is discerned in the understanding? The mind of man is become subject to, first, darkness; blindness in heavenly matters, and ignorance of God, and of his will, and of his creatures, 1 Cor. ii. 14. Eph. iv. 17-19.

Secondly, uncapableness; unableness and unwillingness to learn, though a man be taught, Rom, viii. 7. Luke xxiv. 45.

Thirdly, unbelief and doubting of the truth of God, taught and conceived by us.

Fourthly, vanity, falsehood, and error: to the embracing

whereof

man's nature hath great proneness, Isaiah xliv. 20. Jer. iv. 22. Prov. xiv. 12. xvi. 25.

What use make you of this corruption of the understanding?

That the original and seeds of all heresies and errors are in man's heart naturally, without a teacher; and therefore we should distrust, our own knowledge to lead us in the matters of God and religion ; and only be directed by God's holy word.

Archbp. Usher's Body of Divinity.

In the fall of man we may observe, 1, The greatest infidelity. 2, Prodigious pride. 3, Horrid ingratitude. 4, Visible contempt of God's majesty and justice. 5, Unaccountable folly. 6, A cruelty to himself, and to all his posterity. Infidels, however, have treated the account of the fall and its effects with contempt, and considered the whole as absurd; but their objections to the manner have been ably answered by a variety of authors; and as to the effects, one would hardly think any body could deny; for, that man is a fallen creature, is evident, if we consider his misery as an inhabitant of the natural world, the disorders of the globe we inhabit, and the dreadful scourges with which it is visited; the deplorable and shocking circumstances of our birth; the painful and dangerous travail of woman; our natural uncleanliness, helplessness, ignorance, and nakedness; the gross darkness in which we naturally are, both with respect to God and a future state; the general rebellion of the brute creation against us; the various poisons that lurk in the animal, vegetable, and mineral worlds, ready to destroy us; the heavy curse of toil and sweat to which we are liable; the innumerable calamities of life, and the pangs of death. Again, it is evident, if we consider him as a citizen of the moral world; his commission of sin; his omission of duty; the triumph of sensual appetites over his intellectual faculties; the corruption of the powers that constitute a good head, the understanding, imagination, memory and reason; the depravity of the powers which form a good heart, the will, conscience, and affections; his manifest alienation from God; his amazing disregard even to his nearest relatives; his unaccountable unconcern about himself; his detestable tempers, in general outbreaking of human corruption in all individuals; the

universal overflowing of it in all nations. Some striking proofs of this depravity may be seen in the general propensity of mankind to vain, irrational, or cruel diversions; in the universality of the most ridiculous, impious, inhuman, and diabolical sins; in the aggravating circumstances attending the display of this corruption; in the many ineffectual endeavours to stem its torrent; in the obstinate resistance it makes to divine grace in the unconverted; the amazing struggles of good men with it; the testimony of the heathens concerning it; and the preposterous conceit which the ungodly have of their own goodness. Buck's Theo. Dict.

The denomination of original sin, to denote the corruption or depravation of human nature, derived from the lapse of our first parents, is not of very early use in the Church. St. Austin is esteemed first to have used it. But, however, the doctrine is as old as Christianity itself, and the writers of the first centuries do express very clearly the thing itself, though under different names. For they call it, "the old guilt," "the ancient wound," "the old sin," &c. But after the Pelagian controversy was set on foot, the divines of the Church generally used originale peccatum, to signify the cor ruption of nature and proneness to sin, which was transmitted down from the first parents to their posterity; following therein St. Aus tin, who thought this the most significant expression, to denote that depravation of nature which the Pelagians denied.

Now, that there is such an original warping of our nature, which renders us unapt to good and prone to sin, and for that reason places us out of favour with God, is the constant doctrine of the holy scriptures.

"God saw that every imagination of the thoughts of man's heart was only evil continually." Gen. vi. 5. "The imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth." Gen. viii. 25. "Tis with relation to this general corruption of nature, which accompanies us from our birth, that Job asks the question, "Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean?" Job xiv. 4. To the same purpose the Psalmist speaks, “Behold, I was shapen in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me." Ps. li. 5. Our Saviour says, "That which is born of the flesh is flesh." John iii, 5, The apostle tells

us, that both Jews and Gentiles are equally born children of wrath; "Were by nature children of wrath, even as others." Eph, iii. 4, "Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned." Rom. v. 12.

These express passages of holy scripture, together with ordinary experience, occasioned the ancient writers of the Church, even before the Pelagian heresy sprang up, to assert in their writings this general depravation of human nature and proneness to ṣin, caused by the fall of our first progenitors. But they were contented with the doctrine in general, without descending into those nice speculations, and particular ways of explaining the modes of it, which later divines, in opposing this heresy, have filled their books with.

Ignatius owns that this old crime of our first parents brought an impurity upon our nature, which was only to be cleansed by the blood of Christ. 66 Giving himself a ransom for us, that with bis blood he might purge us from the old transgression."

Ign. Ep. ad Trall.

Justin Martyr owns our proneness to sin, and our giving way to the wiles of the devil, and our subjection to death, to proceed from the lapse of our first parents. "He was not born and crucified for his own sake, as having no need of any of these things, but for the sake of mankind, which on account of Adam had fallen into death, and the temptation of the serpent."

Just. Mart. Dial. cum Tryph.

Irenæus says, that this old wound given by the serpent is only healed by faith in Christ. "Meu cannot otherwise be saved from the old wound of the serpent, unless they believe in Him, who, ac cording to the similitude of the sin of the flesh, being lifted from earth in the martyrial wood, draws all men after him, and quickens the dead." Iren, adv. Hæres, lib. iv. cap. 5.

Origen, contr. Cels. lib. iv. says, that the curse of Adam and Eve was common to all their posterity. "The curse of Adam is common to all men; and there is no woman of whom the same things may not be said, as are said of Eve."

Tertullian will have that the sin of Adam involved all bis posterity in the same condemnation. "We say Satan, by whom man in the beginning was circumvented, to violate the command of God, from whence his whole race which proceeded from his seed being infected, made them liable to his condemnation. Tert. de An.

S. Cyprian asserts, that in baptism the old Adamical sin is remitted. "An infant ought not to be repelled from baptism, who being newly born has committed no sin, but only being born carnally according to Adam, by his first nativity has contracted the contagion of the old death: who for this reason is more readily admitted to baptism: he has not his own sins, but those of another, remitted. Cypr. Ep. ad Fid.

S. Athanasius, Or. ii. speaks of the traduction of Adam's guilt

upon all men. "As through Adam's fall sin came upon all man

kind, so the Lord having conquered the serpent, his power shall have effect upon us all." And again, "That old sin, which by Adam came upon all." Syn. Sacr. Script.

S. Basil speaks of the spiritual weakness which has befallen all mankind by reason of the fall. "I was beautiful according to nature, but now am weak, because I am dead through the wiles of the serpent." Bas. in Psal. xxix,

Nazianzen says, that all of us were dead in sin through Adam. "All that have participated of the same Adam, and have been beguiled by the serpent, are dead by sin, and are restored to health by the heavenly Adam, and by the ignominious tree are restored to that tree of life from which men were cut off." Naz. Orat. xxv. And elsewhere. "There was a necessity of my being saved in every part, because in every part I fell, and was condemned through the disobedience of my first parent, and the fraud of the devil.

Ib. Orat. iii.

S. Chrysostom says, that the predominancy of our sensual appetites was owing to Adam's sin. "Our body before the coming of Christ was easily attacked; for after death there entered a swarm of passions. Chrys, in Rom. cap.vi. Hom. ii. And again," After Adam