his first sin." We repeat, that if this is not the meaning of the Observer, as we sincerely believe it is, we know of no controversy that we have with him: And if this is his meaning, then he denies that Calvin held, what we affirm that he did both hold and teach. Let it be well noted, that as Edwards states, "when the doctrine of original sin is spoken of, it is vulgarly understood in that latitude as to include not only the depravity of nature, but the imputation of Adam's first sin." We are satisfied that the Observer means to deny only the latter of these two constituent parts of original sin; because the depravity of nature, derived from Adam to all his posterity, is the very point which has distinguished the orthodox from Pelagians, from the days of Augustine to the present time; and none of the reformers was, or could be, more explicit on this point than Calvin. It is a point, moreover, clearly expressed in the Articles of the Church of England, and we doubt not is held by the Observer himself. Edwards adds, "So far as I know, most of those who have held one of these, [that is, the depravity of nature,] have maintained the other; [that is, the imputation of Adam's first sin,] and most of those who have opposed one, have opposed the other." Calvin is placed by the Observer among the few exceptions, who, according to Edwards, held one of these particulars, and yet did not hold the other-held the depravity of nature, but not the imputation of Adam's first sin. Had Edwards himself believed that such was the fact, we think he would have noticed it much more distinctly than by saying that "the most of those who have held the one have maintained the other." With Edwards, Calvin was the instar omnium of theologians; and if he had thought he was going to enter into a conflict with Calvin, we should have heard more of it than is wrapped up in the general words, "most of those, who have opposed one have op posed the other." Yet we admit that Edwards was not infallible; although, in regard to such a fact as the one in question, we think it very improbable that he was either ignorant or in error. But we judge it worth remark, that Edwards, when he was planning to write his octavo volume of nearly 400 pages, took the same view of the subject, and pursued the same general train of argument, that Calvin had done two centuries before. Edwards says "It may perhaps appear in our future consideration of the subject, that they [the two points above noticed] are closely connected, and that the arguments which prove the one establish the other, and that there are no more difficulties attending the allowing of the one than the other." Calvin appears to have thought exactly as Edwards didthat the arguments which prove the one of the two points contemplated, establish the other; and he has accordingly treated them con jointly. The scope and burden of Cal vin's argument is, that the whole race of Adam were involved by his act in all that he brought upon himself. Did he break covenant with his God? They broke it too, by his act as their representative Did he lose the divine image, and become totally corrupt? So did they-as was to be realized, and has in fact been realized, in all their generations, from the primi tive apostacy to the present hour, Did he incur the penalty of the broken covenant-death temporal, spiritual and eternal? They incurred the same, and not one of them can be delivered from its infliction, but by a vital union with Christ the Redeemer-the second Adam, who restores the ruins of the first. Such is the manifest T tenor of Calvin's argument, as will be apparent to any one who will read attentively the first five chapters of the second book of his Institutes. Thus, viewing Adam and his posterity as identified under the covenant of works, and subject alike to all the evil consequences of a violation of that covenant, Calvin is at no pains to keep up and mark the distinction between Adam's first sin, by which he fell from his rectitude, and the corruption of his whole nature, which ensued. He treats of both these together; and shows clearly that the whole human race were involved in both with their great covenant head. The imputation of Adam's first sin to his posterity, is introduced only incidentally; but in this manner it is introduced again and again, and in such language as we think cannot be mis taken. There were several reasons why the corruption of our whole nature, (the consequence of the broken covenant) should form the principal, prominent, and direct topick of discussion in Calvin's system. In the first place, this is by far the most important part of the subject. It is the practical part; it is the part which leads individuals to a right view of their state and necessities; and which, by its presence or abssence, will always give complexion and character to the whole of a system of divinity. It is, in a word, fundamental, both in practical and theoretick theology. Again: Calvin, as already intimated, appears to have thought, as Edwards did, that the two particulars to which we have alluded, in the general doctrine of original sin, "are closely connected, and that the arguments which prove the one establish the other, and that there are no more difficulties attending the allowing of the one than the other." Once more: The Papists held the doctrine of the imputation of Adam's first sin-meaning by imputation what Edwards says he meant-as fully as the Protestants did; but in regard to the corruption of the nature of man, they did not hold it to be total, and believed that by the rite of baptism, its power was always removed, so as to insure salvation to the recipient. Calvin, therefore, did not find it necessary to argue, professedly and at length, a point which neither Papists nor Protestants questioned; but on the subject of hereditary depravity, which the Papists did not hold correctly, and which the Pelagians altogether denied, he laid out all the strength of his mighty mind. Now, keeping in recollection what has been stated, that the main The second section, under the article "Original Sin," in the "Decrees and Canons of the Council of Trent," is as fol lows-"Whoever shall affirm that Adam's prevarication injured himself only, and not his posterity, and that he lost the purity from God, for himself only, and not also and righteousness which he had received for us; or that when he became polluted by disobedience, he transmitted to all mankind corporal death and punishment only, but not sin also, which is the death of the soul: let him be accursed. For he contradicts the apostle, who saith, 'By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin, and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned.' Rom. v., 12. "The quotations from Scripture occurring in the decrees, are taken from the Roman Catholic authorized version." We have taken the above translation and note from "A Text-book of Popery, by J. M. Cramp," lately republished in New York-a work which we recommend to those of our readers who wish to obtain a correct view of "the Theological System of Popery." The author of this work, in his notes on the proceedings of the Tridentine Council on the subject of original sin, says "All agreed that eternal death is the punishment of the original transgression. All affirmed that baptism is the remedy, though some would have joined with it the merits of Christ, and some would have added faith. Infants dying unbaptized were variously disposed of The efficacy of the remedy remains, and that in the regenerate (i. e. was considered to be so great, that no sin the baptized,) there is nothing hateful to God." * * scope of Calvin's argument is to show that the fall of Adam entailed a total moral depravity on his offspring, and that their "liableness or exposedness in the divine judgment to partake of the punishment of his sin"-the sin by which he broke covenant with his God-is mentioned only incidentally-let us see if it is not mentioned unequivocally, in the following passages, which we quote from the title of the fourth chapter of the second book of the Institutes, and from the 5th, 6th, 7th, and 8th sections of the same chapter; to which we might add several others. We have carefully compared our quotations with the original Latin, and did intend to insert it at the bottom of the page; but we have, on the whole, judged this unnecessary, as we shall not give a translation of our own, but that of JOHN ALLEN, which was lauded, we think justly, by the Christian Observer, on its first publication, a few years since. The title to which we have referred, stands thus in Allen's translation" The fall and defection of Adam the cause of the curse inflicted on all mankind, and of their degeneracy from their primitive condition. The doctrine of original sin." In this very title, which, it should be remembered, * A small specimen of the character of Allen's translation may be seen in his version of this title. The original is as follows-" Adæ lapsu et defectione totum humanum genus maledictioni fuisse addictum, et à prima origine degenerasse. Ubi de peccato originali." In his preface to his translation, he says-" He has aimed at a medium between severity and looseness, and endeavoured to follow the style of the original, as far as the respective idioms of the Latin and English would admit." So far as we have compared his translation with the original, we think he has been remarkably faithful to the sense of his author. We recollect that when the Christian Observer reviewed this translation, he remarked, that it contain ed some obscure passages; but that, on recurring to the original, he found the same obscurity there. We have observed the すき was placed at the head of this chapter by Calvin himself, a mark ed distinction is made between "the curse inflicted on all mankind," and "their degeneracy from their primitive condition." The fall and defection of Adam, are exhibited as the cause of both, but they are clearly exhibited as dis tinct particulars. This was the doctrine of Calvin, and it has been the doctrine of all real Calvinistsall who have most fully embraced his system-from the publication of his Institutes to the present time. Calvin believed, and his followers have believed, that with whatever difficulties the subject may be attended, they are not in creased but diminished, by holding, that in the first sin of Adam all his posterity were involved; that they sinned in, or with him, as their covenant head and repre sentative, and shared with him in the curse inflicted for breaking covenant with God; and that in consequence of this," they are con ceived in sin, and shapen in ini quity, and go astray as soon as they be born, speaking lies." All who hold the doctrine of innate depra vity, connect it, in some way, with the fall of Adam. Is it easier then to believe that without any cove nant connexion with him, and with out being at all involved in his first transgression, his posterity are, by an absolute appointment o God, all born in sin—is this easier to believe, than that they sinned with their federal head and repre sentative, and, as the consequence share with him in the curse of a broken covenant, and with it, the corruption of their whole nature? We think that Edwards was very safe in saying "there are no more same thing in two passages, on which we shall have occasion to remark. We have much wished, but wished in vain, to get a sight of Calvin's French edition of his Institutes, in hope that some obscurities of his Latin might vanish in the French, which was his vernacular language. difficulties attending the allowing of one than the other" of these two particulars; namely, sharing in Adam's first sin, and "that innate sinful depravity of the heart," which has been transmitted from parents to their offspring, ever since Adam's fall. And with both Calvin and Edwards we believe, that "the arguments which prove the one, establish the other"that if the corruption of our whole nature is derived originally from Adam, we must consider his offspring as having had, by the divine constitution, a connexion with him in the act by which it was brought both on him and on them. If there was no connexion in the act, why should there be a connexion in the consequences? But our immediate object at present, is not so much to reason, as to ascertain what were the views of Calvin. They will appear more fully by the following quotations. We have taken enough of the sections from which we quote to show their scope, and their fair and full import. We have placed in italicks the passages which we wish to be particularly noticed, as bearing on the point which we seek to establish-The few words which the translator had italicised, we have given in small capitals-We begin with Section V. "As the spiritual life of Adam consisted in a union to his Maker, so an alienation from him was the death of his soul. Nor is it surprising that he ruined his posterity by his defection, which has perverted the whole order of nature in heaven and earth. The creatures groan,' says Paul, 'being made subject to vanity, not willingly." If the cause be inquired, it is undoubtedly that they sustain part of the punishment due to the demerits of man, for whose use they were created. And his guilt Rom. viii 20. 22. being the origin of that curse which extends to every part of the world, it is reasonable to conclude its propugation to all his offspring. Therefore when the Divine image in him was obliterated, and he was punished with the loss of wisdom, strength, sanctity, truth, and righteousness, with which he had been adorned, but which were succeeded by the dreadful pests of ignorance, impotence, impurity, vanity, and iniquity, he suffered not alone, but involved all his posterity with him, and plunged them into the same miseries. This is that hereditary corruption which the fathers called ORIGINAL SIN; meaning by sin, the depravation of a nature previously good and pure. On which subject they had much contention, nothing being more remote from common sense, than that all should be criminated on account of the guilt of one, and thus his sin become common. Which seems to have been the reason why the most ancient doctors of the church did but obscurely glance at this point, or at least explained it with less perspicuity than it required. Yet this timidity could not prevent Pelagius from arising, who profanely pretended, that the sin of Adam only ruined himself, and did not injure his descendants. By concealing the disease with this delusion, Satan attempted to render it incurable. But when it was evinced by the plain testimony of the Scripture, that sin was communicated from the first man to all his posterity, he sophistically urged, that it was communicated by imitation, not by propagation. * VI. "We have heard that the impurity of the parents is so transmitted to the children, that all, without a single exception, are polluted as soon as they exist. But we shall not find the origin of this pollution, unless we ascend to the first parent of us all, as to the fountain which sends forth all the streams. Thus it is certain that Adam was not only the progenitor, but as it were the root of mankind, and therefore that all the race were necessarily vitiated in his corruption. The apostle explains this by a comparison between him and Christ: As,' says he, 'by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned;'* so by the grace of Christ, righteousness and life have been restored to us. What cavil will the Pelagians raise here? That the sin of Adam was propagated by imitation? Do we then receive no other advantage from the righteousness of Christ, than the proposal of an example for our imitation? Who can bear such blasphemy? But if it cannot be controverted that the righteousness of Christ is ours by communication, and life as its consequence; it is equally evident that both were lost in Adam, in the same manner in which they were recovered in Christ, and that sin and death were introduced by Adam, in the same manner in which they were abolished by Christ. There is no obscurity in the declaration, that many are made righteous by the obedience of Christ, as they had been made sinners by the disobedience of Adam. And therefore between these two persons there is this relation, that the one ruined us by involving us in his destruction, the other by his grace has restored us to salvation. Any more prolix or tedious proof of a truth supported by such clear evidence must, I think, be unnecessary. Thus also in the first Epistle to the Corinthians, with a view to confirm the pious in a confidence of the resurrection, he shows, that the life which had been lost in Adam, was recovered in Christ. He, who pronounces that we were all dead in Adam, does also at the same time plainly declare, that we were implicated in the guilt of his sin. For no condemnation could reach those who were perfectly clear from all charge of iniquity. But his meaning cannot be better understood than from the relation of the other member of the sentence, where he informs us that the hope of life is restored in Christ. But that is well known to be accomplished, only when Christ, by a wonderful communication, transfuses into us the virtue of his righteousness: as it is elsewhere said, 'The Spirit is life, because of righteousness."* No other explanation therefore can be given of our being said to be dead in Adam, than that his transgression not only procured misery and ruin for himself, but also precipitated our nature into similar destruction. And that not by his personal guilt as an individual, which pertains not to us, but because he infected all his descendants with the corruption into which he had fallen. Otherwise there would be no truth in the assertion of Paul, that all are by nature children of wrath, if they had not been already under the curse even before their birth. Now it is easily inferred that our nature is there characterised, not as it was created by God, but as it was vitiated in Adam: because it would be unreasonable to make God the author of death. Adam therefore corrupted himself in such a manner, that the contagion has been communicated from him to all his offspring. And Christ himself, the heavenly Judge, declares, in the most unequivocal terms, that all are born in a state of pravity and corruption, when he teaches, that 'whatoever is born of the flesh is flesh,' and that therefore the gate of life is closed against all who have not been regenerated. VII. "Nor, to enable us to understand this subject, have we any need to enter on that tedious dispute, with which the Fathers were not a little perplexed, whe * Rom. viii. 10. + Ephes. ii. 3. |