Chapter VIII (continued, part 5)
2. Others contend that we have in the free agency of man a sufficient solution of the universality of sin. Men can sin; they choose to sin, and no further reason for the fact need be demanded. If Adam sinned without an antecedent corrupt nature, why, it is asked, must corruption of nature be assumed to account for the fact that other men sin? A uniform effect, however, demands a uniform cause. That a man can walk is no adequate reason why he always walks in one direction. A man may exercise his faculties to attain one object or another; the fact that he does devote them through a long life to the acquisition of wealth is not accounted for by saying that he is a free agent. The question is, Why his free agency is always exercised in one particular direction. The fact, therefore, that men are free agents is no solution for the universal sinfulness and total apostasy of our race from God.
3. Others seek in the order of development of the constituent elements of our nature, an explanation of the fact in question. We are
so constituted that the sensuous faculties are called into exercise before the higher powers of reason and conscience. The former therefore attain an undue ascendency, and lead the child and the man to obey the lower instincts of his nature, when he should be guided by his higher faculties. But, in the first place, this is altogether an inadequate conception of our hereditary depravity. It does not consist exclusively or principally in the ascendency of the flesh (in the limited sense of that word) over the Spirit. It is a far deeper and more radical evil. It is spiritual death, according to the express declarations of the Scriptures. And, in the second place, it cannot be the normal condition of man that his natural faculties should develop in such order as inevitably and universally to lead to his moral degradation and ruin. And, in the third place, this theory relieves no difficulties while it accounts for no facts. It is as hard to reconcile with the justice and goodness of God that men should be born with a nature so constituted as certainly to lead them to sin, as that they should be born in a state of sin. It denies any fair probation to the race. According to the Scriptures and the doctrine of the Church, mankind had not only a fair but a favourable probation in Adam, who stood for them in the maturity and full perfection of his nature; and with every facility, motive, and consideration adapted to secure his fidelity. This is far easier of belief than the assumption that God places the child in the first dawn of reason on its probation for eternity, with a nature already perverted, and under circumstances which in every case infallibly lead to its destruction. The only solution therefore which at all meets the case is the Scriptural doctrine that all mankind fell in Adam's first transgression, and bearing the penalty of his sin, they come into the world in a state of spiritual death, the evidence of which is seen and felt in the universality, the controlling power, and the early manifestation of sin.
The Scriptures expressly Teach the Doctrine
The Scriptures not only indirectly teach the doctrine of original sin, or of the hereditary, sinful corruption of our nature as derived from
Adam, by teaching, as we have seen, the universal and total depravity of our race, but they directly assert the doctrine. They not only teach expressly that men sin universally and from the first dawn of their being, but they also assert that the heart of man is evil. It is declared to be "Deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: Who can know it?" (Jer. 17:9.) "The heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil." (Eccl. 8:11.) Every imagination of the thoughts of his (man's) heart is only evil." (Gen. 6:5); or as it is in Gen. 8:21, "The imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth." By heart in Scriptural language is meant the man himself; the soul; that which is the seat and source of life. It is that which thinks, feels, desires, and wills. It is that out of which good or evil thoughts, desires, and purposes proceed. It never signifies a mere act, or a transient state of the soul. It is that which is abiding, which determines character. It bears the same relation to acts that the soil does to its productions. As a good soil brings forth herbs suited for man and beast, and an evil soil brings forth briars and thorns, so we are told that the human heart (human nature in its present state), is proved to be evil by the prolific crop of sins which it everywhere and always produces. Still more distinctly is this doctrine taught in Matt. 7:16–19, where our Lord says that men are known by their fruits. "Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit." And again, in Matt. 12:33, "Either make the tree good and his fruit good, or else make the tree corrupt and his fruit corrupt: for the tree is known by his fruit." The very pith and point of these instructions is, that moral acts are a revelation of moral character. They do not constitute it, but simply manifest what it is. The fruit of a tree reveals the nature of the tree. It does not make that nature, but simply proves what it is. So in the case of man, his moral exercises, his thoughts and feelings, as well as his external acts, are determined by an internal cause. There is something in the nature of the man distinct from his acts and anterior to them, which determines his conduct (i.e., all his conscious exercises), to be either good or evil. If men are universally sinful, it is, according to our Lord's doctrine,
proof positive that their nature is evil; as much so as corrupt fruit proves the tree to be corrupt. When therefore the Scriptures assert that the heart of man is "desperately wicked," they assert precisely what the Church means when she asserts our nature to be depraved. Neither the word, heart, nor nature, in such connections means substance or essence, but natural disposition. The words express a quality as distinguished from an essential attribute or property. Even when we speak of the nature of a tree, we do not mean its essence, but its quality. Something which can be modified or changed without a change of substance. Thus our Lord speaks of making a tree good, or making it evil. The explanation of the Scriptural meaning of the word heart given above is confirmed by analogous and synonymous forms of expression used in the Bible. What is sometimes designated as an evil heart is called "the old man," "a law of sin in our members," "the flesh," "the carnal mind," etc. And on the other hand, what is called "a new heart," is called "the new man," "a new creature" (or nature), "the law of the Spirit," "the spiritual mind," etc. All these terms and phrases designate what is inherent, immanent, and abiding, as opposed to what is transient and voluntary. The former class of terms is used to describe the nature of man before it is regenerated, and the other to describe the change consequent on regeneration. The Scriptures, therefore, in declaring the heart of man to be deceitful and desperately wicked, and its imaginations or exercises to be only evil continually, assert in direct terms the Church doctrine of original sin.
The Psalmist also directly asserts this doctrine when he says (Ps. 51:5), "Behold I was shapen in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me." In the preceding verses he had confessed his actual sins; and he here humbles himself still more completely before God by acknowledging his innate, hereditary depravity; a depravity which he did not regard as a mere weakness, or inclination to evil, but which he pronounces iniquity and sin. To this inherent, hereditary corruption he refers in the subsequent parts of the Psalm as his chief burden from which he most earnestly desired to be delivered. "Behold, thou desirest truth in the inward parts; and in the hidden
part shalt thou make me to know wisdom. Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean; wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.… Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me." It was his inward parts, his interior nature, which had been shapen in iniquity and conceived in sin, which he prayed might be purified and renewed. The whole spirit of this Psalm and the connection in which the words of the fifth verse occur, have constrained the great majority of commentators and readers of the Scripture to recognize in this passage a direct affirmation of the doctrine of original sin. Of course no doctrine rests on any one isolated passage. What is taught in one place is sure to be assumed or asserted in other places. What David says of himself as born in sin is confirmed by other representations of Scripture, which show that what was true of him is no less true of all mankind. Thus (Job 14:4), "Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean." (15:14), "What is man that he should be clean? and he which is born of a woman, that he should be righteous?" Thus also our Lord says (John 3:6), "That which is born of the flesh is flesh." This clearly means that, That which is born of corrupt parents is itself corrupt; and is corrupt in virtue of its descent or derivation. This is plain, (1.) From the common usage of the word flesh in a religious sense in the Scriptures. Besides the primary and secondary meanings of the word it is familiarly used in the Bible to designate our fallen and corrupt nature. Hence to be "in the flesh" is to be in a natural, unrenewed state; the works of the flesh, are works springing from a corrupt nature; to walk after the flesh, is to live under the controlling influence of a sinful nature. Hence to be carnal, or carnally minded, is to be corrupt, or, as Paul explains it, sold under, a slave to sin. (2.) Because the flesh is here opposed to the Spirit. "That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit." As the latter member of this verse undoubtedly means that, That which is derived from the Holy Spirit is holy, or conformed to the nature of the Holy Spirit; the former member must mean that, That which is derived from an evil source is itself evil. A child born of fallen parents derives from them a fallen, corrupt nature. (3.) This interpretation is demanded by the context. Our Lord is assigning the reason for the
necessity of regeneration or spiritual birth. That reason is, the derivation of a corrupt nature by our natural birth. It is because we are born in sin that the renewing of the Holy Ghost is universally and absolutely necessary to our salvation.
Another passage equally decisive is Eph. 2:3: "We also" (i.e., we Jews as well as the Gentiles) "were by nature the children of wrath, even as others." Children of wrath, according to a familiar Hebrew idiom, means the objects of wrath. We, says the Apostle, as well as other men, are the objects of the divine wrath. That is, under condemnation, justly exposed to his displeasure. This exposure to the wrath of God, as He teaches, is not due exclusively to our sinful conduct, it is the condition in which we were born. We are by nature the children of wrath. The word nature in such forms of speech always stands opposed to what is acquired, or superinduced, or to what is due to ab extra influence or inward development. Paul says that he and Peter were by nature Jews, i.e., they were Jews by birth, not by proselytism. He says the Gentiles do by nature the things of the law; i.e., in virtue of their internal constitution, not by external instruction. The gods of the heathen, he says, are by nature no gods. They are such only in the opinions of men. In classic literature as in ordinary language, to say that men are by nature proud, or cruel, or just, always means that the predicate is due to them in virtue of their natural constitution or condition, and not simply on account of their conduct or acquired character. The dative φύσει in this passage does not mean on account of, because φύσις means simply nature, whether good or bad. Paul does not say directly that it is "on account of our (corrupt) nature we are the children of wrath," which interpretation requires the idea expressed by the word corrupt to be introduced into the text. He simply asserts that we are the children of wrath by nature; that is, as we were born. We are born in a state of sin and condemnation. And this is the Church doctrine of original sin. Our natural condition is not merely a condition of physical weakness, or of proneness to sin, or of subjection to evil dispositions, which, if cherished, become sinful; but we are born in a state of sin. Rueckert, a rationalistic commentator, says in reference to this
passage: "It is perfectly evident, from Rom. 5:12–20, that Paul was far from being opposed to the view expressed in Ps. 51:7, that men are born sinners; and as we interpret for no system, so we will not attempt to deny that the thought, 'We were born children of wrath,' i.e., such as we were from our birth we were exposed to the divine wrath, is the true sense of these words."
The Bible Represents Men as Spiritually Dead
Another way in which the Scriptures clearly teach the doctrine of original sin is to be found in the passages in which they describe the natural state of man since the fall. Men, all men, men of every nation, of every age, and of every condition, are represented as spiritually dead. The natural man, man as he is by nature, is destitute of the life of God, i.e., of spiritual life. His understanding is darkness, so that he does not know or receive the things of God. He is not susceptible of impression from the realities of the spiritual world. He is as insensible to them as a dead man to the things of this world. He is alienated from God, and utterly unable to deliver himself from this state of corruption and misery. Those, and those only, are represented as delivered from this state in which men are born, who are renewed by the Holy Ghost; who are quickened, or made alive by the power of God, and who are therefore called spiritual as governed and actuated by a higher principle than any which belongs to our fallen nature. "The natural man," says the Apostle (that is, man as he is by nature), "receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them; because they are spiritually discerned." (1 Cor. 2:14.) "You hath he quickened who were dead in trespasses and sins;" and not only you Gentiles, but "even us," when dead in sins, hath God "quickened together with Christ." (Eph. 2:1, 5.) The state of all men, Jews and Gentiles, prior to regeneration, is declared to be a state of spiritual death. In Eph. 4:17, 18, this natural state of man is described by saying of the heathen that they "walk in the vanity of their mind (i.e., in sin), having the understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of
their heart." Man's natural state is one of darkness, of which the proximate effect is ignorance and obduracy, and consequent alienation from God. It is true this is said of the heathen, but the Apostle constantly teaches that what is true of the heathen is no less true of the Jews; for there is no difference, since all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. With these few passages the whole tenour of the word of God agrees. Human nature in its present state is always and everywhere described as thus darkened and corrupted.
Argument from the Necessity of Redemption
Another argument in support of the doctrine of original sin is that the Bible everywhere teaches that all men need redemption through the blood of Christ. The Scriptures know nothing of the salvation of any of the human family otherwise than through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus. This is so plainly the doctrine of the Bible that it never has been questioned in the Christian Church. Infants need redemption as well as adults, for they also are included in the covenant of grace. But redemption, in the Christian sense of the term, is deliverance through the blood of Christ, from the power and consequences of sin. Christ came to save sinners. He saves none but sinners. If He saves infants, infants must be in a state of sin. There is no possibility of avoiding this conclusion, except by denying one or the other of the premises from which it is drawn. We must either deny that infants are saved through Christ, which is such a thoroughly anti-Christian sentiment, that it has scarcely ever been avowed within the pale of the Church; or we must deny that redemption, in the Christian sense of the term, includes deliverance from sin. This is the ground taken by those who deny the doctrine of original sin, and yet admit that infants are saved through Christ. They hold that in their case redemption is merely preservation from sin. For Christ's sake, or through his intervention, they are transferred to a state of being in which their nature develops in holiness. In answer to this evasion it is enough to remark, (1.) That it is contrary to the plain and universally received doctrine of the Bible as to the nature of the work of Christ. (2.) That this view supersedes
the necessity of redemption at all. The Bible, however, clearly teaches that the death of Christ is absolutely necessary; that if there had been any other way in which men could be saved Christ is dead in vain. (Gal. 2:21; 3:21.) But, according to the doctrine in question, there is no necessity for his death. If men are an unfallen, uncorrupted race, and if they can be preserved from sin by a mere change of their circumstances, why should there be the costly array of remedial means, the incarnation, the sufferings and death of the Eternal Son of God, for their salvation. It is perfectly plain that the whole Scriptural plan of redemption is founded on the apostasy of the whole human race from God. It assumes that men, all men, infants as well as adults, are in a state of sin and misery, from which none but a divine Saviour can deliver them.
Argument from the Necessity of Regeneration
This is still further plain from what the Scriptures teach concerning the necessity of regeneration. By regeneration is meant both in Scripture and in the language of the Church, the renewing of the Holy Ghost; the change of heart or of nature effected by the power of the Spirit, by which the soul passes from a state of spiritual death into a state of spiritual life. It is that change from sin to holiness, which our Lord pronounces absolutely essential to salvation. Sinners only need regeneration. Infants need regeneration. Therefore infants are in a state of sin. The only point in this argument which requires to be proved, is that infants need regeneration in the sense above explained. This, however, hardly admits of doubt. (1.) It is proved by the language of the Scriptures which assert that all men must be born of the Spirit, in order to enter the Kingdom of God. The expression used, is absolutely universal. It means every human being descended from Adam by ordinary generation. No exception of class, tribe, character, or age is made; and we are not authorized to make any such exception. But besides, as remarked above, the reason assigned for this necessity of the new birth, applies to infants as well as to adults. All who are born of the flesh, and because they are thus born, our Lord says, must be born again. (2.) Infants always have been
included with their parents in every revelation or enactment of the covenant of grace. The promise to our first parents of a Redeemer, concerned their children as well as themselves. The covenant with Abraham was not only with him, but also with his posterity, infant and adult. The covenant at Mount Sinai, which as Paul teaches, included the covenant of grace, was solemnly ratified with the people and with their "little ones." The Scriptures, therefore, always contemplate children from their birth as needing to be saved, and as interested in the plan of salvation which it is the great design of the Bible to reveal. (3.) This is still further evident from the fact that the sign and seal of the covenant of grace, circumcision under the Old dispensation, and baptism under the New, was applied to new-born infants. Circumcision was indeed a sign and seal of the national covenant between God and the Hebrews as a nation. That is, it was a seal of those promises made to Abraham, and afterwards through Moses, which related to the external theocracy or Commonwealth of Israel. But nevertheless, it is plain, that besides these national promises, there was also the promise of redemption made to Abraham, which promise, the Apostle expressly says, has come upon us. (Gal. 3:14.) That is, we (all believers) are included in the covenant made with Abraham. It is no less plain that circumcision was the sign and seal of that covenant. This is clear, because the Apostle teaches that Abraham received circumcision as a seal of the righteousness of faith. That is, it was the seal of that covenant which promised and secured righteousness on the condition of faith. It is also plain because the Scriptures teach that circumcision had a spiritual import. It signified inward purification. It was administered in order to teach men that those who received the rite, needed such purification, and that this great blessing was promised to those faithful to the covenant, of which circumcision was the seal. Hence, the Scriptures speak of the circumcision of the heart; of an inward circumcision effected by the Spirit as distinguished from that which was outward in the flesh. Compare Deut. 10:16; 30:6; Ezek. 44:7; Acts 7:51; Rom. 2:28. From all this it is clear that circumcision could not be administered according to its divinely constituted design to any who did not need the circumcision or regeneration of heart, to fit
them for the presence and service of God. And as it was by divine command administered to infants when eight days old, the conclusion is inevitable that in the sight of God such infants need regeneration, and therefore are born in sin.
The same argument obviously applies to infant baptism. Baptism is an ordinance instituted by Christ, to signify and seal the purification of the soul, by the sprinkling of his blood, and its regeneration by the Holy Ghost. It can therefore be properly administered only to those who are in a state of guilt and pollution. It is, however, administered to infants, and therefore infants are assumed to need pardon and sanctification. This is the argument which Pelagius and his followers, more than all others, found it most difficult to answer. They could not deny the import of the rite. They could not deny that it was properly administered to infants, and yet they refused to admit the unavoidable conclusion, that infants are born in sin. They were therefore driven to the unnatural evasion, that baptism was administered to infants, not on the ground of their present state, but on the assumption of their probable future condition. They were not sinners, but would probably become such, and thus need the benefits of which baptism is the sign and pledge. Even the Council of Trent found it necessary to protest against such a manifest perversion of a solemn sacrament, which reduced it to a mockery. The form of baptism as prescribed by Christ, and universally adopted by the Church, supposes that those to whom the sacrament is administered are sinners and need the remission of sin and the renewal of the Holy Ghost. Thus the doctrine of original sin is inwrought into the very texture of Christianity, and lies at the foundation of the institutions of the gospel.
Argument from the Universality of Death
Another decisive argument on this subject, is drawn from the universality of death. Death, according to the Scriptures, is a penal evil. It presupposes sin. No rational moral creature is subject to death except on account of sin. Infants die, therefore infants are the
subjects of sin. The only way to evade this argument is to deny that death is a penal evil. This is the ground taken by those who reject the doctrine of original sin. They assert that it is a natural evil, flowing from the original constitution of our nature, and that it is therefore no more a proof that all men are sinners, than the death of brutes is a proof that they are sinners. In answer to this objection, it is obvious to remark that men are not brutes. That irrational animals, incapable of sin, are subject to death, is therefore no evidence that moral creatures may be justly subject to the same evil, although free from sin. But, in the second place, what is of far more weight, the objection is in direct opposition to the declarations of the Word of God. According to the Bible, death in the case of man is a punishment. It was threatened against Adam as the penalty of transgression. If he had not sinned, neither had he died. The Apostle expressly declares that death is the wages (or punishment) of sin; and death is on account of sin. (Rom. 6:23 and 5:12.) He not only asserts this as a fact, but assumes it as a principle, and makes it the foundation of his whole argument in Rom. 5:12–20. His doctrine as there stated is, where there is no law there is no sin. And where there is no sin there is no punishment. All men are punished, therefore all men are sinners. That all men are punished, he proves from the fact that all men die. Death is punishment. Death, he says, reigned from Adam to Moses. It reigns even over those who had not sinned in their own persons, by voluntary transgression, as Adam did. It reigns over infants. It has passed absolutely on all men because all are sinners. It cannot be questioned that such is the argument of the Apostle; neither can it be questioned that this argument is founded on the assumption that death, in the case of man, is a penal evil, and its infliction an undeniable proof of guilt. We must, therefore, either reject the authority of the Scriptures, or we must admit that the death of infants is a proof of their sinfulness.
Although the Apostle's argument as above stated is a direct proof of original sin (or inherent, hereditary corruption), it is no less a proof, as urged on another occasion, of the imputation of Adam's sin. Paul does argue, in Rom. 5:12–20, to prove that as in our justification the
righteousness on the ground of which we are accepted is not subjectively ours, but the righteousness of another, even Christ; so the primary ground of our condemnation to death is the sin of Adam, something outside of ourselves, and not personally ours. But it is to be borne in mind that the death of which he speaks in accordance with the uniform usage of Scripture, in such connections, is the death of a man; a death appropriate to his nature as a moral being formed in the image of God. The death threatened to Adam was not the mere dissolution of his body, but spiritual death, the loss of the life of God. The physical death of infants is a patent proof that they are subject to the penalty which came on men (which entered the world and passed on all men) on account of one man, or by one man's disobedience. And as that penalty was death spiritual as well as the dissolution of the body, the death of infants is a Scriptural and decisive proof of their being born destitute of original righteousness and infected with a sinful corruption of nature. Their physical death is proof that they are involved in the penalty the principal element of which is the spiritual death of the soul. It was by the disobedience of one man that all are constituted sinners, not only by imputation (which is true and most important), but also by inherent depravity; as it is by the obedience of one that all are constituted righteous, not only by imputation (which also is true and vitally important), but also by the consequent renewing of their nature flowing from their reconciliation to God.
Argument from the Common Consent of Christians
Finally, it is fair, on this subject, to appeal to the faith of the Church universal. Protestants, in rejecting the doctrine of tradition, and in asserting that the Word of God as contained in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments is the only infallible rule of faith and practice, do not reject the authority of the Church as a teacher. They do not isolate themselves from the great company of the faithful in all ages, and set up a new faith. They hold that Christ promised the Holy Spirit to lead his people into the knowledge of the truth; that the Spirit does dwell as a teacher in all the children of God, and that
those who are born of God are thus led to the knowledge and belief of the truth. There is therefore to the true Church, or the true people of God, but one faith, as there is but one Lord and one God the Father of all. Any doctrine, therefore, which can be proved to be a part of the faith (not of the external and visible Church), but of the true children of God in all ages of the world, must be true. It is to be received not because it is thus universally believed, but because its being universally believed by true Christians is a proof that it is taught by the Spirit both in his Word and in the hearts of his people. This is a sound principle recognized by all Protestants. This universal faith of the Church is not to be sought so much in the decisions of ecclesiastical councils, as in the formulas of devotion which have prevailed among the people. It is, as often remarked, in the prayers, in the hymnology, in the devotional writings which true believers make the channel of their communion with God, and the medium through which they express their most intimate religious convictions, that we must look for the universal faith. From the faith of God's people no man can separate himself without forfeiting the communion of saints, and placing himself outside of the pale of true believers. If these things be admitted we must admit the doctrine of original sin. That doctrine has indeed been variously explained, and in many cases explained away by theologians and by councils, but it is indelibly impressed on the faith of the true Church. It pervades the prayers, the worship, and the institutions of the Church. All true Christians are convinced of sin; they are convinced not only of individual transgressions, but also of the depravity of their heart and nature. They recognize this depravity as innate and controlling. They groan under it as a grievous burden. They know that they are by nature the children of wrath. Parents bring their children to Christ to be washed by his blood and renewed by his Spirit, as anxiously as mothers crowded around our Lord when on earth, with their suffering infants that they might be healed by his grace and power. Whatever difficulties, therefore, may attend the doctrine of original sin, we must accept it as clearly taught in the Scriptures, confirmed by the testimony of consciousness and history, and sustained by the faith of the Church universal.
Objections
The objections to this doctrine, it must be admitted, are many and serious. But this is true of all the great doctrines of religion, whether natural or revealed. Nor are such difficulties confined to the sphere of religion. Our knowledge in every department is limited, and in a great measure confined to isolated facts. We know that a stone falls to the ground, that a seed germinates and produces a plant after its own kind; but it is absolutely impossible for us to understand how these familiar effects are accomplished. We know that God is, and that He governs all his creatures, but we do not know how his effectual controlling agency is consistent with the free agency of rational beings. We know that sin and misery exist in the world, and we know that God is infinite in power, holiness, and benevolence. How to reconcile the prevalence of sin with the character of God we know not. These are familiar and universally admitted facts as well in philosophy as in religion. A thing may be, and often certainly is true, against which objections may be urged which no man is able to answer. There are two important practical principles which follow from the facts just mentioned. First, that it is not a sufficient or a rational ground for rejecting any well authenticated truth that we are not able to free it from objections or difficulties. And, secondly, any objection against a religious doctrine is to be regarded as sufficiently answered if it can be shown to bear with equal force against an undeniable fact. If the objection is not a rational reason for denying the fact it is not a rational reason for rejecting the doctrine. This is the method which the sacred writers adopt in vindicating truth.
It will be seen that almost all the objections against the doctrine of original sin are in conflict with one or the other of the principles just mentioned. Either they are addressed not to the evidences of the truth of the doctrine whether derived from Scripture or from experience, but to the difficulty of reconciling it with other truths; or these objections are insisted upon as fatal to the doctrine when they obviously are as valid against the facts of providence as they are against the teachings of Scripture.
The Objection that Men are Responsible only for their Voluntary Acts
1. The most obvious objection to the doctrine of original sin is founded on the assumption that nothing can have moral character except voluntary acts and the states of mind resulting from or produced by our voluntary agency, and which are subject to the power of the will. This objection rests on a principle which has already been considered. It reaches very far. If it be sound, then there can be no such thing as concreated holiness, or habitual grace, or innate, inherent, or indwelling sin. But we have already seen, when treating of the nature of sin, that according to the Scriptures, the testimony of consciousness, and the universal judgment of men, the moral character of dispositions depends on their nature and not on their origin. Adam was holy, although so created. Saints are holy, although regenerated and sanctified by the almighty power of God. And therefore the soul is truly sinful if the subject of sinful dispositions, although those dispositions should be innate and entirely beyond the control of the will. Here it will be seen that the objection is not against the Scriptural evidence of the doctrine that men are born in sin, nor against the testimony of facts to the truth of that doctrine; but it is founded on the difficulty of reconciling the doctrine of innate sin with certain assumed principles as to the nature and grounds of moral obligation. Whether we can refute those principles or not, does not affect the truth of the doctrine. We might as well deny all prophecy and all providence, because we cannot reconcile the absolute control of free agents with their liberty. If the assumed moral axiom that a man can be responsible only for his own acts, conflicts with the facts of experience and the teachings of Scriptures, the rational course is to deny the pretended axiom, and not to reject the facts with which it is in conflict. The Bible, the Church, the mass of mankind, and the conscience, hold a man responsible for his character, no matter how that character was formed or whence it was derived; and, therefore, the doctrine of original sin is not in conflict with intuitive moral truths.
Objection Founded on the Justice of God
2. It is objected that it is inconsistent with the justice of God that men should come into the world in a state of sin. In answer to this objection it may be remarked, (1.) That whatever God does must be right. If He permits men to be born in sin, that fact must be consistent with his divine perfection. (2.) It is a fact of experience no less than a doctrine of Scripture that men are either, as the Church teaches, born in a state of sin and condemnation, or, as all men must admit, in a state which inevitably leads to their becoming sinful and miserable. The objection, therefore, bears against a providential fact as much as against a Scriptural doctrine. We must either deny God or admit that the existence and universality of sin among men is compatible with his nature and with his government of the world. (3.) The Bible, as often before remarked, accounts for and vindicates the corruption of our race on the ground that mankind had a full and fair probation in Adam, and that the spiritual death in which they are born is part of the judicial penalty of his transgression. If we reject this solution of the fact, we cannot deny the fact itself, and, being a fact, it must be consistent with the character of God.
The Doctrine represents God as the Author of Sin
3. A third objection often and confidently urged is, that the Church doctrine on this subject makes God the author of sin. God is the author of our nature. If our nature be sinful, God must be the author of sin. The obvious fallacy of this syllogism is, that the word nature is used in one sense in the major proposition, and in a different sense in the minor. In the one it means substance or essence; in the other, natural disposition. It is true that God is the author of our essence. But our essence is not sinful. God is indeed our Creator. He made us, and not we ourselves. We are the work of his hands. He is the Father of the spirits of all men. But He is not the author of the evil dispositions with which that nature is infected at birth. The doctrine of original sin attributes no efficiency to God in the production of evil. It simply supposes that He judicially abandons our apostate
race, and withholds from the descendants of Adam the manifestations of his favour and love, which are the life of the soul. That the inevitable consequence of this judicial abandonment is spiritual death, no more makes God the author of sin, than the immorality and desperate and unchanging wickedness of the reprobate, from whom God withholds his Spirit, are to be referred to the infinitely Holy One as their author. It is moreover a historical fact universally admitted, that character, within certain limits, is transmissible from parents to children. Every nation, separate tribe, and even every extended family of men, has its physical, mental, social, and moral peculiarities which are propagated from generation to generation. No process of discipline or culture can transmute a Tatar into an Englishman, or an Irishman into a Frenchman. The Bourbons, the Hapsburgs, and other historical families, have retained and transmitted their peculiarities for ages. We may be unable to explain this, but we cannot deny it. No one is born an absolute man, with nothing but generic humanity belonging to him. Every one is born a man in a definite state, with all those characteristics physical, mental, and moral, which make up his individuality. There is nothing therefore in the doctrine of hereditary depravity out of analogy with providential facts.
It is said to destroy the Free Agency of Men
4. It is further objected to this doctrine that it destroys the free agency of man. If we are born with a corrupt nature by which we are inevitably determined to sinful acts, we cease to be free in performing those acts, and consequently are not responsible for them. This objection is founded on a particular theory of liberty, and must stand or fall with it. The same objection is urged against the doctrines of decrees, of efficacious grace, of the perseverance of the saints, and all other doctrines which assume that a free act can be absolutely certain as to its occurrence. It is enough here to remark that the doctrine of original sin supposes men to have the same kind and degree of liberty in sinning under the influence of a corrupt nature, that saints and angels have in acting rightly under the
influence of a holy nature. To act according to its nature is the only liberty which belongs to any created being.
§ 14. The Seat of Original Sin
Having considered the nature of original sin, the next question concerns its seat. According to one theory it is in the body. The only evil effect of Adam's sin upon his posterity, which some theologians admit, is the disorder of his physical nature, whereby undue influence is secured to bodily appetites and passions. Scarcely distinguishable from this theory is the doctrine that the sensuous nature of man, as distinguished from the reason and conscience, is alone affected by our hereditary depravity. A third doctrine is, that the heart, considered as the seat of the affections as distinguished from the understanding, is the seat of natural depravity. This doctrine is connected with the idea that all sin and holiness are forms of feeling or states of the affections. And it is made the ground on which the nature of regeneration and conversion, the relation between repentance and faith, and other points of practical theology are explained. Everything is made to depend on the inclinations or state of the feelings. Instead of the affections following the understanding, the understanding, it is said, follows the affections. A man understands and receives the truth only when he loves it. Regeneration is simply a change in the state of the affections, and the only inability under which sinners labour as to the things of God, is disinclination. In opposition to all these doctrines Augustinianism, as held by the Lutheran and Reformed Churches, teaches that the whole man, soul and body, the higher as well as the lower, the intellectual as well as the emotional faculties of the soul, is affected by the corruption of our nature derived from our first parents.
As the Scriptures speak of the body being sanctified in two senses, first, as being consecrated to the service of God; and secondly, as being in a normal condition in all its relations to our spiritual nature, so as to be a fit instrument unto righteousness; and also as a partaker of the benefits of redemption; so also they represent the body as
affected by the apostasy of our race. It is not only employed in the service of sin or as an instrument to unrighteousness; but it is in every respect deteriorated. It is inordinate in its cravings, rebellious, and hard to restrain. It is as the Apostle says, the opposite of the glorious, spiritual body with which the believer is hereafter to be invested.
The Whole Soul the Seat of Original Sin
The theory that the affections (or, the heart in the limited sense of that word), to the exclusion of the rational faculties, are alone affected by original sin, is unscriptural, and the opposite doctrine which makes the whole soul the subject of inherent corruption, is the doctrine of the Bible, as appears,—
1. Because the Scriptures do not make the broad distinction between the understanding and the heart, which is commonly made in our philosophy. They speak of "the thoughts of the heart," of "the intents of the heart," and of "the eyes of the heart," as well as of its emotions and affections. The whole immaterial principle is in the Bible designated as the soul, the spirit, the mind, the heart. And therefore when it speaks of the heart, it means the man, the self, that in which personal individuality resides. If the heart be corrupt the whole soul in all its powers is corrupt.
2. The opposite doctrine assumes that there is nothing moral in our cognitions or judgments; that all knowledge is purely speculative. Whereas, according to the Scripture the chief sins of men consist in their wrong judgments, in thinking and believing evil to be good, and good to be evil. This in its highest form, as our Lord teaches us, is the unpardonable sin, or blasphemy against the Holy Ghost. It was because the Pharisees thought that Christ was evil, that his works were the works of Satan, that He declared that they could never be forgiven. It was because Paul could see no beauty in Christ that he should desire Him, and because he verily thought he was doing God service in persecuting believers, that he was, and declared himself to
be, the chief of sinners. It is, as the Bible clearly reveals, because men are ignorant of God, and blind to the manifestation of his glory in the person of his Son, that they are lost. On the other hand the highest form of moral excellence consists in knowledge. To know God is eternal life. To know Christ is to be like Christ. The world, He says, hath not known me, but these (believers) have known me. True religion consists in the knowledge of the Lord, and its universal prevalence among men is predicted by saying, "All shall know Him from the least unto the greatest." Throughout the Scriptures wisdom is piety, the wise are the good; folly is sin, and the foolish are the wicked. Nothing can be more repugnant to the philosophy of the Bible than the dissociation of moral character from knowledge; and nothing can be more at variance with our own consciousness. We know that every affection in a rational creature includes an exercise of the cognitive faculties; and every exercise of our cognitive faculties, in relation to moral and religious subjects, includes the exercise of our moral nature.
3. A third argument on this subject is drawn from the fact that the Bible represents the natural or unrenewed man as blind or ignorant as to the things of the Spirit. It declares that he cannot know them. And the fallen condition of human nature is represented as consisting primarily in this mental blindness. Men are corrupt, says the Apostle, through the ignorance that is in them.
4. Conversion is said to consist in a translation from darkness to light. God is said to open the eyes. The eyes of the understanding (or heart) are said to be enlightened. All believers are declared to be the subjects of a spiritual illumination. Paul describes his own conversion by saying that, "God revealed his Son in him." He opened his eyes to enable him to see that Jesus was the Son of God, or God manifest in the flesh. He thereby became a new creature, and his whole life was thenceforth devoted to the service of Him, whom before he hated and persecuted.
5. Knowledge is said to be the effect of regeneration. Men are renewed so as to know. They are brought to the knowledge of the truth; and they are sanctified by the truth. From all these considerations it is evident that the whole man is the subject of original sin; that our cognitive, as well as our emotional nature is involved in the depravity consequent on our apostasy from God; that in knowing as well as in loving or in willing, we are under the influence and dominion of sin.
§ 15. Inability
The third great point included in the Scriptural doctrine of original sin, is the inability of fallen man in his natural state, of himself to do anything spiritually good. This is necessarily included in the idea of spiritual death. On this subject it is proposed: (1.) To state the doctrine as presented in the symbols of the Protestant churches. (2.) To explain the nature of the inability under which the sinner is said to labour. (3.) To exhibit the Scriptural proofs of the doctrine; and (4.) To answer the objections usually urged against it.
The Doctrine as stated in Protestant Symbols
There have been three general views as to the ability of fallen man, which have prevailed in the Church. The first, the Pelagian doctrine, which asserts the plenary ability of sinners to do all that God requires of them. The second is the Semi-Pelagian doctrine (taking the word Semi-Pelagian in its wide and popular sense), which admits the powers of man to have been weakened by the fall of the race, but denies that he lost all ability to perform what is spiritually good. And thirdly, the Augustinian or Protestant doctrine which teaches that such is the nature of inherent, hereditary depravity that men since the fall are utterly unable to turn themselves unto God, or to do anything truly good in his sight. With these three views of the ability of fallen men are connected corresponding views of grace, or the influence and operations of the Holy Spirit in man's regeneration and conversion. Pelagians deny the necessity of any supernatural
influence of the Spirit in the regeneration and sanctification of men. Semi-Pelagians admit the necessity of such divine influence to assist the enfeebled powers of man in the work of turning unto God, but claim that the sinner coöperates in that work and that upon his voluntary coöperation the issue depends. Augustinians and Protestants ascribe the whole work of regeneration to the Spirit of God, the soul being passive therein, the subject, and not the agent of the change; although active and coöperating in all the exercises of the divine life of which it has been made the recipient.
The doctrine of the sinner's inability is thus stated in the symbols of the Lutheran Church. The "Augsburg Confession" says: "Humana voluntas habet aliquam libertatem ad efficiendam civilem justitiam et deligendas res rationi subjectas. Sed non habet vim sine Spiritu Sancto efficiendæ justitiæ Dei, seu justitiæ spiritualis, quia animalis homo non percepit ea quæ sunt Spiritus Dei (1 Cor. 2:14); sed hæc fit in cordibus, cum per verbum Spiritus Sanctus concipitur. Hæc totidem verbis dicit Augustinus; est, fatemur, liberum arbitrium omnibus hominibus; habens quidem judicium rationis, non per quod sit idoneum, quæ ad Deum pertinent, sine Deo aut inchoare ant certe peragere: sed tantum in operibus vitæ presentis, tam bonis, quam etiam malis."
"Formula Concordiæ:" "Etsi humana ratio seu naturalis intellectus hominis, obscuram aliquam notitiæ illius scintillulam reliquam habet, quod sit Deus, et particulam aliquam legis tenet: tamen adeo ignorans, cœca, et perversa est ratio illa, ut ingeniosissimi homines in hoc mundo evangelium de Filio Dei et promissiones divinas de æterna salute legant vel audiant, tamen ea propriis viribus percipere, intelligere, credere et vera esse, statuere nequeant. Quin potius quanto diligentius in ea re elaborant, ut spirituales res istas suæ rationis acumine indagent et comprehendant, tanto minus intelligunt et credunt, et ea omnia pro stultitia et meris nugis et fabulis habent, priusquam a Spiritu Sancto illuminentur et doceantur." Again,3 "Natura corrupta viribus suis coram Deo nihil aliud, nisi peccare possit."
"Sacræ literæ hominis non renati cor duro lapidi, qui ad tactum non cedat, sed resistat, idem rudi trunco, interdum etiam feræ in domitæ comparant, non quod homo post lapsum non amplius sit rationalis creatura, aut quod absque auditu et meditatione verbi divini ad Deum convertatur, aut quod in rebus externis et civilibus nihil boni aut mali intelligere possit, aut libere aliquid agere vel omittere queat."
"Antequam homo per Spiritum Sanctum illuminatur, convertitur, regeneratur et trahitur, ex sese, et propriis naturalibus suis viribus in rebus spiritualibus, et ad conversionem aut regenerationem suam nihil inchoare, operari, aut coöperari potest, nec plus, quam lapis, truncus, aut limus."
The doctrine of the Reformed churches is to the same effect. "Confessio Helvetica II.:" "Non sublatus est quidem homini intellectus, non erepta ei voluntas, et prorsus in lapidem vel truncum est commutatus: cæterum illa ita sunt immutata et inminuta in homine, ut non possint amplius, quod potuerunt ante lapsum. Intellectus enim obscuratus est: voluntas vero ex libera, facta est voluntas serva. Nam servit peccato, non nolens, sed volens. Etenim voluntas, non noluntas dicitur.…
"Quantum vero ad bonum et ad virtutes, intellectus hominis, non recte judicat de divinis ex semetipso.… Constat vero mentem vel intellectum ducem esse voluntatis, cum autem cœcus sit dux, claret quousque et voluntas pertingat. Proinde nullum est ad bonum homini arbitrium liberum, nondum renato; vires nullae ad perficiendum bonum.… Cæterum nemo negat in externis, et regenitos et non regenitos habere liberum arbitrium.… Damnamus in hac causa Manichæos, qui negant homini bono, ex libero arbitrio fuisse initium mali. Damnamus etiam Pelagianos, qui dicunt hominem malum sufficienter habere liberum arbitrium, ad faciendum præceptum bonum."
"Confessio Gallicana:" "Etsi enim nonnullam habet boni et mali discretionem: affirmamus tamen quicquid habet lucis mox fieri tenebras, cum de quærendo Deo agitur, adeo ut sua intelligentia et ratione nullo modo possit ad eum accedere: item quamvis voluntate sit præditus, qua ad hoc vel illud movetur, tamen quum ea sit penitus sub peccato captiva, nullam prorsus habet ad bonum appetendum libertatem, nisi quam ex gratia et Dei dono acceperit." "Articuli XXXIX:" "Ea est hominis post lapsum Adæ conditio, ut sese naturalibus suis viribus et bonis operibus ad fidem et invocationem Dei convertere ac præparare non possit. Quare absque gratia Dei quæ per Christum est nos præveniente, ut velimus et cooperante dum volumus, ad pietatis opera facienda, quæ Deo grata sunt ac accepta, nihil valemus."3
"Opera quæ fiunt ante gratiam Christi, et Spiritus ejus afflatum, cum ex fide Christi non prodeant minime Deo grata sunt.… Immo, cum non sint facta ut Deus illa fieri voluit et præcepit, peccati rationem habere non dubitamus."
"Canones Dordrechtanæ," "Omnes homines in peccato concipiuntur, et filii iræ nascuntur, inepti ad omne bonum salutare, propensi ad malum, in peccatis mortui, et peccati servi; et absque Spiritus Sancti regenerantis gratia, ad Deum redire, naturam depravatam corrigere, vel ad ejus correctionem se disponere nec volunt, nec possunt."
"Residuum quidem est post lapsum in homine lumen aliquod naturæ, cujus beneficio ille notitias quasdam de Deo, de rebus naturalibus, de discrimine honestorum et turpium retinet, et aliquod virtutis ac disciplinæ externæ studium ostendit: sed tantum abest, ut hoc naturæ lumine ad salutarem Dei cognitionem pervenire, et ad eum se convertere possit, ut ne quidem eo in naturalibus ac civilibus recte utatur, quinimo qualecumque id demum sit, id totum variis modis contaminet atque in injustitia detineat, quod dum facit, coram Deo inexcusabilis redditur."
"Westminster Confession." Original sin is declared in sections second and third to include the loss of original righteousness, and a corrupted nature; "whereby," in section fourth, it is declared, "we are utterly indisposed, disabled, and made opposite to all good, and wholly inclined to all evil."
"Their (believers') ability to do good works is not at all of themselves, but wholly from the Spirit of Christ."
Effectual calling "is of God's free and special grace alone, not from anything at all foreseen in man, who is altogether passive therein, until, being quickened and renewed by the Holy Spirit, he is thereby enabled to answer this call, and to embrace the grace offered and conveyed in it."
The Nature of the Sinner's Inability
It appears from the authoritative statements of this doctrine, as given in the standards of the Lutheran and Reformed churches, that the inability under which man, since the fall, is said to labour, does not arise:—
Inability does not arise from the Loss of any Faculty of the Soul
1. From the loss of any faculty of his mind or of any original, essential attribute of his nature. He retains his reason, will, and conscience. He has the intellectual power of cognition, the power of selfdetermination, and the faculty of discerning between moral good and evil. His conscience, as the Apostle says, approves or disapproves of his moral acts.
Nor from the Loss of Free-agency
2. The doctrine of man's inability, therefore, does not assume that man has ceased to be a free moral agent. He is free because he determines his own acts. Every volition is an act of free selfdetermination. He is a moral agent because he has the consciousness
of moral obligation, and whenever he sins he acts freely against the convictions of conscience or the precepts of the moral law. That a man is in such a state that he uniformly prefers and chooses evil instead of good, as do the fallen angels, is no more inconsistent with his free moral agency than his being in such a state as that he prefers and chooses good with the same uniformity that the holy angels do.
Inability not mere Disinclination
3. The inability of sinners, according to the above statement of the doctrine, is not mere disinclination or aversion to what is good. This disinclination exists, but it is not the ultimate fact. There must be some cause or reason for it. As God and Christ are infinitely lovely, the fact that sinners do not love them is not accounted for by saying that they are not inclined to delight in infinite excellence. That is only stating the same thing in different words. If a man does not perceive the beauty of a work of art, or of a literary production, it is no solution of the fact to say that he has no inclination for such forms of beauty. Why is it that what is beautiful in itself, and in the judgment of all competent judges, is without form or comeliness in his eyes? Why is it that the supreme excellence of God, and all that makes Christ the chief among ten thousand and the one altogether lovely in the sight of saints and angels, awaken no corresponding feelings in the unrenewed heart? The inability of the sinner, therefore, neither consists in his disinclination to good nor does it arise exclusively from that source.
It Arises from the Want of Spiritual Discernment
4. According to the Scriptures and to the standards of doctrine above quoted, it consists in the want of power rightly to discern spiritual things, and the consequent want of all right affections toward them. And this want of power of spiritual discernment arises from the corruption of our whole nature, by which the reason or understanding is blinded, and the taste and feelings are perverted. And as this state of mind is innate, as it is a state or condition of our
nature, it lies below the will, and is beyond its power, controlling both our affections and our volitions. It is indeed a familiar fact of experience that a man's judgments as to what is true or false, right or wrong, are in many cases determined by his interests or feelings. Some have, in their philosophy, generalized this fact into a law, and teach that as to all æsthetic and moral subjects the judgments and apprehensions of the understanding are determined by the state of the feelings. In applying this law to the matters of religion they insist that the affections only are the subject of moral corruption, and that if these be purified or renewed, the understanding then apprehends and judges rightly as a matter of course. It would be easy to show that this, as a philosophical theory, is altogether unsatisfactory. The affections suppose an object. They can be excited only in view of an object. If we love we must love something. Love is complacency and delight in the thing loved, and of necessity supposes the apprehension of it as good and desirable. It is clearly impossible that we should love God unless we apprehend his nature and perfections; and therefore to call love into exercise it is necessary that the mind should apprehend God as He really is. Otherwise the affection would be neither rational nor holy. This, however, is of subordinate moment. The philosophy of one man has no authority for other men. It is only the philosophy of the Bible, that which is assumed or presupposed in the doctrinal statements of the Word of God, to which we are called upon unhesitatingly to submit. Everywhere in the Scriptures it is asserted or assumed that the feelings follow the understanding; that the illumination of the mind in the due apprehension of spiritual objects is the necessary preliminary condition of all right feeling and conduct. We must know God in order to love Him. This is distinctly asserted by the Apostle in 1 Cor. 2:14. He there says, (1.) That the natural or unrenewed man does not receive the things of the Spirit. (2.) The reason why he does not receive them is declared to be that they are foolishness unto him, or that he cannot know them. (3.) And the reason why he cannot know them is that they are spiritually discerned. It is ignorance, the want of discernment of the beauty, excellence, and suitableness of the things of the Spirit (i.e., of the truths which the Spirit has revealed),
that is the reason or cause of unbelief. So also in Eph. 4:18, he says, The heathen (unconverted men) are "alienated from the life of God, through the ignorance that is in them." Hence his frequent prayers for the illumination of his readers; and the supplication of the Psalmist that his eyes might be opened. Hence, also, true conversion is said to be effected by a revelation. Paul was instantaneously changed from a persecutor to a worshipper of Christ, when it pleased God to reveal his Son in him. Those who perish are lost because the god of this world has blinded their eyes so that they fail to see the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. It is in accordance with this principle that knowledge is essential to holiness, that true religion and life everlasting are said to consist in the knowledge of God (John 17:3); and that men are said to be saved and sanctified by the truth. It is therefore the clear doctrine of the Bible that the inability of men does not consist in mere disinclination or opposition of feeling to the things of God, but that this disinclination or alienation, as the Apostle calls it, arises from the blindness of their minds. We are not, however, to go to the opposite extreme, and adopt what has been called the "light system," which teaches that men are regenerated by light or knowledge, and that all that is needed is that the eyes of the understanding should be opened. As the whole soul is the subject of original sin the whole soul is the subject of regeneration. A blind man cannot possibly rejoice in the beauties of nature or art until his sight is restored. But, if uncultivated, the mere restoration of sight will not give him the perception of beauty. His whole nature must be refined and elevated. So also the whole nature of apostate man must be renewed by the Holy Ghost; then his eyes being opened to the glory of God in Christ, he will rejoice in Him with joy unspeakable and full of glory. But the illumination of the mind is indispensable to holy feelings, and is their proximate cause. This being the doctrine of the Bible, it follows that the sinner's disability does not consist in mere disinclination to holiness.
Inability Asserted only in Reference to the "Things of the Spirit."
5. This inability is asserted only in reference to "the things of the Spirit." It is admitted in all the Confessions above quoted that man since the fall has not only the liberty of choice or power of selfdetermination, but also is able to perform moral acts, good as well as evil. He can be kind and just, and fulfil his social duties in a manner to secure the approbation of his fellow-men. It is not meant that the state of mind in which these acts are performed, or the motives by which they are determined, are such as to meet the approbation of an infinitely holy God; but simply that these acts, as to the matter of them, are prescribed by the moral law. Theologians, as we have seen, designate the class of acts as to which fallen man retains his ability as "justitia civilis," or "things external." And the class as to which his inability is asserted is designated as "the things of God," "the things of the Spirit," "things connected with salvation." The difference between these two classes of acts, although it may not be easy to state it in words, is universally recognized. There is an obvious difference between morality and religion; and between those religious affections of reverence and gratitude which all men more or less experience, and true piety. The difference lies in the state of mind, the motives, and the apprehension of the objects of these affections. It is the difference between holiness and mere natural feeling. What the Bible and all the Confessions of the churches of the Reformation assert is, that man, since the fall, cannot change his own heart; he cannot regenerate his soul; he cannot repent with godly sorrow, or exercise that faith which is unto salvation. He cannot, in short, put forth any holy exercise or perform any act in such a way as to merit the approbation of God. Sin cleaves to all he does, and from the dominion of sin he cannot free himself.
In one Sense this Inability is Natural
6. This inability is natural in one familiar and important sense of the word. It is not natural in the same sense that reason, will, and conscience are natural. These constitute our nature, and without them or any one of them, we should cease to be men. In the second place, it is not natural as arising from the necessary limitations of our
nature and belonging to our original and normal condition. It arises out of the nature of man as a creature that he cannot create, and cannot produce any effect out of himself by a mere volition. Adam in the state of perfection could not will a stone to move, or a plant to grow. It is obvious that an inability arising from either of the sources above mentioned, i.e., from the want of any of the essential faculties of our nature, or from the original and normal limitations of our being, involves freedom from obligation. In this sense nothing is more true than that ability limits obligation. No creature can justly be required to do what surpasses his powers as a creature.
On the other hand, although the inability of sinners is not natural in either of the senses above stated, it is natural in the sense that it arises out of the present state of his nature. It is natural in the same sense as selfishness, pride, and worldly mindedness are natural. It is not acquired, or super-induced by any ab extra influence, but flows from the condition in which human nature exists since the fall of Adam.
In another Sense it is Moral
7. This inability, although natural in the sense just stated, is nevertheless moral, inasmuch as it arises out of the moral state of the soul, as it relates to moral action, and as it is removed by a moral change, that is, by regeneration.
Objections to the Popular Distinction between Natural and Moral Ability
In this country much stress has been laid upon the distinction between moral and natural ability. It has been regarded as one of the great American improvements in theology, and as marking an important advance in the science. It is asserted that man since the fall has natural ability to do all that is required of him, and on this ground his responsibility is made to rest; but it is admitted that he is morally unable to turn unto God, or perfectly keep his
commandments. By this distinction, it is thought, we may save the great principle that ability limits obligation, that a man cannot be bound to do what he cannot do, and at the same time hold fast the Scriptural doctrine which teaches that the sinner cannot of himself repent or change his own heart. With regard to this distinction as it is commonly and popularly presented, it may be remarked:—
1. That the terms natural and moral are not antithetical. A thing may be at once natural and moral. The inability of the sinner, as above remarked, although moral, is in a most important sense natural. And, therefore, it is erroneous to say, that it is simply moral and not natural.
2. The terms are objectionable not only because they lack precision, but also because they are ambiguous. One man means by natural ability nothing more than the possession of the attributes of reason, will, and conscience. Another means plenary power, all that is requisite to produce a given effect. And this is the proper meaning of the words. Ability is the power to do. If a man has the natural ability to love God, he has full power to love Him. And if He has the power to love Him, he has all that is requisite to call that love into exercise. As this is the proper meaning of the terms, it is the meaning commonly attached to them. Those who insist on the natural ability of the sinner, generally assert that he has full power, without divine assistance, to do all that is required of him: to love God with all his soul and mind and strength, and his neighbour as himself. All that stands in the way of his thus doing is not an inability, but simply disinclination, or the want of will. An ability which is not adequate to the end contemplated, is no ability. It is therefore a serious objection to the use of this distinction, as commonly made, that it involves a great error. It asserts that the sinner is able to do what in fact he cannot do.