The Mystery and Marrow of the Bible

APHORISM I.

G OD was pleased to Enter into Covenant with the First Adam, before his Fall. Under the term, Adam, Scripture sometimes Comprehends both sexes, both Adam and his Wife. And if any shall Contend that God entered into Covenant with both Adam and we at once, as the Compleat Root of mankind, I shall not much gainsay: and yet this will not so easily be proved, nor know I any inconvenience that would follow, should it be denied, the woman coming of Adam as well as any of his posterity. Nor am I ignorant that some are of opinion, that Adam received the Covenant alone, and was to teach it, and did teach it to his Wife, which Opinion hath the more weight, because when God

forbids the Eating of the tree of knowledge under pain of Death, (wherein the Promise of life contrariwise is implied,) he speaks only in the Singular number, viz. To Adam only.

But how may it be evidenced, That God entered into Covenent with the first Adam, even into a Covenant of Works, before the Fall? Answ. Though it be not Positively and plainly said in Scripture, That God gave Adam a Covenant of Works, before his fall: and though the characters and footsteps of this Covenant are not so expressly discovered in Holy Writ, as of some others; yet notwithstanding, upon sundry Scripture-grounds and Considerations, it may be evinced sufficiently. As,

1. From the Inscription of the Covenant of Works in Adam's heart. Before the Fall God wrote the Covenant of Works, viz. The Substance of the Moral Law, perfectly in Adam's heart; and in so doing, Entred into Covenant with him. Here are three thing in this Position to be cleared; viz. ^1. That the Moral Law is the Covenant of Works. ^2. That this Moral Law was perfectly written in Adams heart before the Fall. ^3. That God in writing the Moral Law in his heart, Entred into Covenant of Works with him. 1. That the Moral Law (abstractly and precisely in its self considered, without the additionals, viz. The Preface, Ceremonial Law, &c. jointly promulgated with it in Horeb ) is the Covenant of Works, is manifest; ( ¹ ) Because, the Moral Law (by which is the knowledge of Sin, and which worketh wrath ) is styled by the Apostle The Law of works▪ and is set in Opposition to The Law of Faith. Now this Law of Works, and Law of Faith, amount in effect to as much as the Covenant of works, and Covenant of Faith. ( ² ) Because Righteousness and life were at first by the Moral Law, and should have been so still, had not the Law become unable to give Righteousness and life, in that it was weak through the flesh, Man through Sin being unable to keep it. Now the Law, requiring obedience, and promising life upon that Condition, must needs be a Covenant, and that a Covenant of Works: Works being the proper Condition of it. 2. That this Moral Law for Substance was perfectly written in Adams heart before the Fall, is certain; ( ¹ ) Because, Man was made in God's image upright, and perfect. And consequently was thoroughly furnished with all accomplishments of upright and perfect Human nature: and particularly with the Moral Law, that Law of Nature; The Substance whereof was Engraven Both in his mind, by natural light, knowing it; and in his will, by natural integrity conforming unto it. ( ² ) Because, The Work of the Law remains imperfectly written in some dim characters in the very hearts of Pagans and Heathens since the Fall; They doing by Nature the things contained in the Law, and being a Law unto themselves, without the Law of God written. Whence we may strongly Conclude That much more before the Fall the Moral Law was perfectly written in Adam's heart, there being in him no sin to deface it in the least degree. 3. That, God, in writing the Moral Law in Adam's heart, entered into Covenant of Works with him. viz. By Real Impressions upon his Heart: though not by Verbal Expressions to the ear. For by this Law written in Adam's heart, he had laid before him, what obedience was required and assented to on Adams part: And what recompense should be performed on God's part. And 〈◊〉 this was at least an Implicit, if not an Explicit, Covenanting.

2. From God's express prescription of a Positive Law unto Adam in his innocent State. God's Positive Law is laid down in these words, And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every Tree of the Garden thou mayst freely eat: But of the Tree of the Knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it; for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die. Here are Parties Covenanting, and agreeing upon terms, viz. God and Adam: Here are also terms agreed upon and matters Covenanted reciprocally by these parties; Adam on his part was to be obedient to God, in forbearing to Eat of the Tree of Knowledge only: God on his part, for present, Permits Adam to eat of all other Trees of the Garden; And for future (in his explicit threatening of Death in case of disobedience,) implicitly promiseth life in case of Obedience herein. Now where there are Parties Covenanting and agreeing upon terms: And terms mutually agreed upon by those parties, as here; There's the Substance of an Express Covenant, though it be not formally and in express words called a Covenant:

3. From the intention and use of the two Eminent Trees, viz. The Tree of Life in the midst of the Garden, and the Tree of Knowledge of good and evil. The intended use of these two Trees in Paradise, was Sacramental. Hence they are called Symbolical Trees, and Sacramental Trees. The Tree of life, signifying to Adam, that if he continued in his obedience, and did eat of that Tree, he should have life continued to him forever. God's speech, after the fall of Adam, seems to imply thus much; And now lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the Tree of Life, and eat, and live forever. And Some are of opinion that this Tree signified Christ the Son of God, in whom was life, and that life the light of men: and that, by the Son of God (but not as God-man, nor as Mediator ) this everlasting life was to have been confirmed, according to the Sacramental signification of this Tree of Life. The Tree of Knowledge▪ of good and evil, signifying also to Adam contrariwife, That if he should become disobedient, and eat of that Tree, in that very day he should certainly Die. The former was a Sacrament of life, this of Death: That for Confirmation 〈◊〉 Obedience, this for Exploration of Obedience, and Caution against disobedience. And learned Writers both Ancient and Modern, Count these Trees Symbolical, and Sacramental. Augustine saith, There was a Tree of life, as the Rock was Christ: Nor would God have man to live in Paradise without mysteries of Spiritual things corporally represented. He had therefore in the other Trees, nourishment; but in that Tree, A Sacrament. B. Hall said wittily Neither did these Trees afford him only action for his hands, but instruction to his heart: For here he saw God's Sacraments grow before him. All other Trees had a Natural use; these two in the midst of the Garden a Spiritual.—The one Tree was for confirmation; the other for Trial. One shown him what life he should have; The other what knowledge he should not desire to have. Alas, he that Knew all other things, knew not this one thing, that he knew enough, &c. M. Perkins more solidly; Now for Adam's Sacraments, they were two; The Tree of life, and the Tree of the Knowledge of good and evil: These did serve to exercise Adam in obedience unto God. The Tree of Life was to signify assurance of life forever, if he did keep God's Commandments: The Tree of Knowledge of good and evil, was a Sacrament to show unto him, that if he did transgress God's Commandments, he should die: and it was so called, because it did Signifie, that if he did transgress this Law, he should have experience both of good and evil in himself. To like effect, many other Authors express themselves. Now if these two Trees, were two Sacraments, assuring of life in case of Obedience, and of Death in case of Disobedience; then hence we may collect, That God not only entered into a Covenant of works with the first Adam, but also Gave him this Covenant under Sacramental Signs and Seals.

4. Finally, From the sad event and fruit of the first Adams Fall, to all his ordinary Posterity, even all mankind: viz. Guilt of Sin and Death. The Apostle faith, That in one man (that is, Adam ) all sinned; and That, in Adam all die. As by one man sin entered into the world, and Death by sin: Even so Death passed upon all men ( viz. by that one man,) in whom all have sinned. Thus the words are best translated, as some learned men have well observed. So then in one Adams sinning, all sinned: and in one Adam's dying all died; As the Apostle at large shows in that fifth to the Romans. But how did all mankin •… sin in Adam? Answ. Not only by Imitation of Adam as an evil example: for Death feized on them that have not so finned, not actually sinned, Rom. 5. 14. Nor merely by Propagation, as •… rom a corrupt Root or fountain. For the Apostle doth not parallel Adam and Christ as two common Roots only, but also as two common public or universal Persons. For our immediate parents are Corrupted roots, & we corrupted by them, yet their Actual Sins are not made ours, as Adams is. But in Adams first Sin, we all became Sinners, by Imputation: Adam being an universal Person, and all mankind one in him by God's Covenant of works (as after will appear.) All were that one man, as Augustine saith; viz. by federal Consociation. God covenanted with Adam, and in him with all his Posterity: and therefore Adams breach of Covenant fell not only upon him, but upon all his Posterity.

APHORISM II.

GOds Entring into Covenant with Adam before his fall, was an Act of Divine Grace and favor, not of debt.

For, 1. God the Creator of Adam and of all things, hath an absolute Supremacy over all, and as absolute a liberty to dispose, as he will, of all. He might as Creator have dealt only in a Supreme way of Command, requiring duty from Adam without any Promise of Reward: But he condescends to Adam, Enters into a Covenant and Promise with him of his mere good pleasure, being no way Necessitated or Obliged thereunto. And that was mere Grace. 2. Adam though perfect and upright, and though perfectly persevering in that integrity, could merit no reward, nor any Promise of Reward. For when he had done all he could, he should have been an unprofitable servant, having done nothing but what was duty. And though Adam had walked in perfect Obedience with God, yet might not God (without any wrong to Adam ) for the Manifesting of his Sovereignty, power and liberty, have brought him to nothing as he made him of nothing?

Hence; 1. Adam had great Cause, before his fall, to serve the Lord most freely and cheerfully in all obedience. God creates him: therefore Adam owed him all. God Covenants with him: therefore he owes him (if it were possible) more then all. By bonds of Nature, Adam was obliged to be dutiful: by obligation of Covenant-favor, to be double dutiful. For his Being he owed him much: for his well being, he owed him more. 2. The more divine favor shined in God's Covenant with Adam; the more Haynous and inexcusable was Adams breach of Covenant with God. God's Kindness heightens and aggravates Adams unkindness. 3. If God's Covenant with the First Adam, in his integrity, was an Act of Divine Grace: Then God's Covenant with lapsed man, in Christ the second Adam, is an Act of superabounding and Tanscendent Grace. If Adam, whilst he was without Sin, and able not to Sin, could deserve nothing from God: what can we deserve or challenge from God, who •… re nothing but lumps of sin, and can do nothing but sin?

APHORISM III.

GOd Entring into Covenant with the first Adam before his Fall▪ did, in and with him, Enter into the same Covenant with all his Posterity.

This is Evident; 1. By the Miserable Event of Adams breach of this Covenant upon all his Posterity. In Adams Sinning, all his Posterity Sinned: and in Adams dying they all died. 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. Or as the Greek will well bear it; In whom all have sinned. Or (as a Learned Critick hath well observed, whom in this particular I rather follow) This verse may best be rendered thus; As by one man sin entered into the world, and by sin Death; even so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned. Here's no forcing of the Text; and thus the sense runs clear. But, How have all men sinned, and so death passed upon them? All have not sinned. Actually, as Adam sinned: for many die before they are Capable of Actual sinning. How then? All are sinners Originally, by reason of the Corruption of Nature. True; yet the Apostle reacheth farther, saying, By the offense of one (or, by one offense ) judgment came upon all men unto condemnation. Therefore by Adams one offense, all men are condemned: and that before they actually Sin, or are originally unclean. How can this be, but in reference to the Covenant, wherein Adam and all his posterity, were one party, as God the other? 2. By the Analogy Or Proportion of God's dealing in all other Covenants. His usual course is to take in Head and members, Root and branches. As, Christ the last Adam and his posterity; Noah, and his family, Abraham, David Israel, and their Seed, and their Seeds Seed. In like manner here God deals with Adam and his Posterity Proportionably; God took them all into Covenant with Adam the Common Head, and Root of them all.

APHORISM IV.

THe Covenant which God made with the First Adam and his Posterity before the Fall, hath upon several respects divers Names or Denominations put upon it; but for the Nature of it, It is God's gracious Agreement with Adam, and with his Posterity, in him, To give them Eternal life and happiness, upon condition of Perfect and Personal obedience. For opening the Names and Nature of this Covenant particularly, consider;

I. The Names or Denominations which learned men attribute to this Covenant, are divers, and that upon divers Notions and Considerations. As, 1. A Covenant of Amity, or Friendship. Because the parties to this Covenant, God and Adam with his Posterity, were in perfect Amity, when this Covenant was made: there was no Enmity or Discord at all betwixt them. Adam (as Tertullian expresseth it) was innocent, a most near friend to God, and inhabitant of Paradise, 2. A Covenant of Nature. Because founded upon Creation, and the integrity of man's Nature; and requiring only a natural righteousness. 3. A Covenant of Life. In respect of that happy Life which God implicitly promised to Adam therein. For, under the threatening of death, expressed in case of disobedience, The Promise of life is implied in case of obedience. 4. A Legal Covenant, or Covenant of Works, In respect of Adams Restipulation of Exact obedience required of God; Legal works in all points perfect being the Condition of this Covenant. This last denomination, unto me seems fittest, for Reasons formerly mentioned.

II. The Nature of this Covenant is in this Description represented by ^1. The Author; ^2. Parties; ^3. Form; and ^4. Matter of it.

1. The Author of it, is God. Adam even in innocence stood not upon Equal terms with God, but infinitely below him, as a Creature below his Creator. Therefore it concerned him, not to Capitulate or indent with God about the Covenant, but humbly and thankfully to accept what Covenant the righteous God would impose. Now God became the Author of this Covenant of works with Adam two ways, viz. 1. By giving Adam the substance, Law and Rule of this Covenant, both Inwardly, and Outwardly. Inwardly, in his engraving the Substance of the Moral-law upon his heart: Some dim Characters whereof remain still even upon the hearts of Pagans that have not God's written Law. Outwardly, in that Express Positive Law about the Tree of Knowledge, forbidding to eat thereof under penalty of present Death: but implicitly promising life in case of not eating, in case of obedience: This former was the General Rule for his direction in obedience: This Latter was the special Touchstone for Exploration & Detection of his Obedience. 2. By annexing two Tokens or Sacramental Signs to this Covenant, viz. The Tree of Life, To assure Adam of the certainty of life promised, in Case of perfect Obedience: And the Tree of Knowledge, to assure him of the Certainty of Death, in case of Disobedience. Learned men are of opinion, that these two trees were Sacramental Trees.

2. The Parties to this Covenant of works, are God, and Adam together with Adams Posterity in him. God, As a Creator, well-pleased with Adam, Covenants with Adam as his Creature, fashioned according to his own image, and perfectly upright without all spot of Sin. In this Notion, they were Parties to this Covenant of works; but in a far other notion afterwards to the Covenant of Faith.

3. The Form of this Covenant consists in the Agreement betwixt God and Adam; viz. That Adam in his own Person should yield perfect and perpetual obedience unto God, and Particularly should discover his obedience in forbearing to eat of the tree of Knowledge: and in so doing he should live happily, otherwise die presently. This the sum of the Agreement. God propounds it; Annexes two Sacramental Trees for confirming it: Adam Accepts it.

Now that God should engage himself by Promise and Covenant to give Adam Life in case of obedience, and should also annex two Signs or Tokens to this Covenant: These were Acts of mere favor and Grace from God. Adam could in no respect challenge or expect the one or the other, though he had been never so obedient. Hence it may well be styled God's Gracious Agreement with Adam.

4. The Matter of this Covenant was principally twofold. viz. 1. The blessing Promised, and curse threatened on God's part. 2. The Duty Restipulated on Adams part.

(1) The Blessing promised and Curse threatened, is the matter of the Covenant on God's Part, For, in the day that thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die. Contrariwise he implied; Till the day that thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely live. For clearing this, divers Doubts or Questions hereunto appertaining, are to be resolved. As; 1. What Life Adam had in his innocence? 2. What Life it was which God farther Promised him, upon his persisting in obedience? 3. What death it was which God threatened in case of Disobedience? 4. How God's threatening of Death was fulfilled, Seeing Adam did not die in the self-same day; that he did eat of the tree of Knowledge, but lived 930 years after?

Quest. 1. What life it was which Adam Enioyed in innocence? Answ. It is not here the Question; whether Adam's Life in Innocency was Natural, or Supernatural? And I suppose it will easily be Granted, That, as God's Law written in Adams heart, as the Rule of his life, was Natural: And as God's Image, wherein Adam was Created, As the Principle of his obedience and of his living to God, was Natural: and as everything in Adams primitive Created state was Natural: So his life that he lived in innocence with God & to God, was Natural. But the Question here is; whether Adam had a Mortal or Immortal life in Innocency? If Mortal; How could it be rendered immortal? If Immortal: Then the Promise of life seems needless.

For resolution herein, Consider; (As learned men well observe.) A thing may be said to be Immortal several ways. 1. When it is simply, absolutely and every way incorruptible: having no possible cause of corruption, Inward or Outward. Thus, God only hath immortality. 2. When it hath, by reason of the Perfection of its Nature, no inward matter or caus of corruption, though it may be destroyed from without; as from God. Thus Angels and Souls of men are Immortal. And so Adams soul had an immortal life in innocence; yea and every man's soul even since the fall remains still immortal in this Sense. 3. When it is in its own Nature corruptible; but yet, by the power, or Grace, or Justice of God, is preserved that it neither is nor can be corrupted. Thus the Spiritualized Bodies of the Saints in Heaven; The bodies of Reprobates in Hell; The New Heavens and New Earth, &c. shall be Immortal. 4. When it hath a power not to die, from some gift of the Creator, or from some other supposition: yet in its own Nature it is Corruptible. Thus, Adam was immortal in innocence; not by an inability of Dying, but by an ability of not dying. Which ability of not dying, Adam and his posterity should still have retained, according to God's Covenant and Promise if he had not fallen: And God's power, grace and justice would have preserved him still in this immortal life, upon supposition of his perfect obedience. Adam then before the Fall had an immortal life; His Soul being inwardly, and in itself immortal: and his body being (though inwardly and in itself corruptible, yet) outwardly and from God rendered incorruptible. It had a remote capacity of dying: and yet an immediate ability of not dying: So that; Adam in innocence had a possibility of not dying, if he sinned not: Saints in glory shall have an impossibility of both sinning and of dying. And though before the Fall Adam had a Mortality, or remote capacity of dying: yet since the fall both he, and all his, have an actual necessity of dying.

Quest. 2. What life it was which God further promised Adam▪ upon his persisting in Obedience? Answ. 1. It seems clear, that not only a temporary life, only for some limited time, was promised Adam; but even an Eternal life, without end, in case of perfect obedience. Forasmuch as not only Temporal, but also Eternal Death was threatened to Adam, and inflicted on his Posterity, for disobedience. 2. But whether Adam should have enjoyed this Eternal life still in the Earthly Paradise, or should after some certain time have been translated and taken up to the Heavenly Paradise: that is by some Disputed. Yet, ( ¹ ) Seeing Scripture is silent touching any such Translation, and ( ² ) Seeing the giving of the Heavenly Paradise is the Prerogative of Christ the Last Adam, the Heavenly Adam, as the Earthly Paradise came by the First and the Earthly Adam; it would argue too much temerity to determine upon it. This is certain, His everlasting life would have been a most sweet and happy life with God.

Quest. 3. What death it was which God threatened Adam in case of disobedience? Answ. Whatsoever comes under the Name and Notion of Death, was threatened to Adam, in that phrase, Thou shalt surely die; or in dying thou shalt die as the Hebrew Phrase affords it. And the doubling of the Hebrew word seems to imply thus much, As some learned Hebrews are of opinion. Now Death is the Privation of Life: and this, by Separation of that which lives, from the Principle or Fountain of its living. Life consists in union: Death in dis-union, or Separation. This, the Nature of death in general. Hence particularly there is a manifold Death. I. A Death temporal, viz. A Death for a time only. 1. Of the soul, when by sin its separated from God, from his image, and from the Life of God. Dead in trespasses and sins. — She that liveth in pleasure, is Dead while she liveth. — Let the dead bury their dead. 2. Of the Body, ( ¹ ) When its separated from the Soul by Natures dissolution. And this, the most common acceptation of Death. Thus, Lazarus is Dead. Abraham is dead, and the Prophets. ( ² ) When it is gradually in any measure disposed or prepared for such a Separation, by afflictions, pains, diseases, infirmities, &c. Hence such afflictions, &c. are called Death, because they are Death's Harbingers, and steps thereto. As not the running out of the last sand, but also of all that went before, empties the Hour-glass: not the last stroke, but also the fore-going blows, fell the tree.— Take from me this Death only. — There is Death in the Pot. — I dy daily. — In deaths often. II. A Death eternal of both body and soul, when by damnation particular or universal they shall be separated from the glorious fruition of God and his favor for evermore. This is called the second Death, Everlasting Punishment, &c. These are several sorts of Death mentioned in Scripture. Now all these were Threatned to Adam in case of disobedience. viz.

Death Eternal both of Body and Soul. For, 1. Death Eternal is the most full adequate proportionable wages of sin, as the Apostle intimates in opposing there eternal life to Death. And the due wages of sin was threatened to Adam. 2. The Threatning limits not Death; therefore no death can be excluded, consequently not eternal Death. 3. Guilt of Eternal Death and Condemnation comes upon all Adams posterity by his fall, as the Apostle intimates; and the Actual execution of it shall come upon Reprobates, as Christ implies: therefore in the threatening God intended Eternal Death.

Temporal Death of the Soul in Sin. For Sin in its own Nature alienates and separates from God and his favor, which is the Spiritual Death of the Soul, for so long time, till the Soul be reconciled to God.

Temporal Death of the Body, in separation of it from the Soul, was also threatened to Adam in a special manner. For, 1. Death and Dying, in their most usual and proper acceptation import the dissolution of Soul and Body: and the most usual and proper Sense of the words should here especially be taken. 2. The Sentence of Corporal Death was denounced by God upon Adam after his Fall. In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground: For out of it wast thou taken; For dust thou art, and unto dust thou shalt return. Therefore Death corporal was threatened to Adam before the Fall. 3. The Apostle doth partly interpret this Death inflicted upon all men for Adam's sin, to be the Death of the Body. For all men do not dy Eternally.

Finally, under the name of Death, were threatened to Adam, all manner of Evils and afflictions, whether in the Soul, as grief, fear, horror, &c. Or in the Body, hunger, thirst, pains, diseases, &c. Even all in-lets, Preparatories and Harbingers of Death. For, 1. All these are as so many Gradual and Partial Deaths. Hence Scripture often calls them by the name of Death. 2. In inflicting the Death threatened upon Adam and Eve, and their posterity, God lays on them these afflictions, of sorrow, sweating, toil, &c. therefore in threatening Death, he intended all such afflictions. By all this it appears it was no small matter that God threatened to Adam under the Name of Death, in case of his Disobedience.

Quest. 4. But How was God's Threatning truly fulfi •… ed, Seeing Adam in the day that he did eat of the forbidden Tree, did not dy: but lived many hundreds of years after? Gen 5. 5. Answ. For clearing of this doubt, I. Some say, That Adam dying within a thousand years after his Fall, died the same day he fell: because with the Lord a thousand years are but as one day, and one day as a thousand years. But this is rejected, as too much forced. In Historical Books, as this of Genesis, the word [ Day ] being always taken in its proper Signification. And this is a very needless shift. II. Some of the Hebrews were of Opinion, That this Speech of God was not Peremptorily Definitive and determinatory, but only Minatory, like that pronounced against the Ninevites. And that Adam repenting, he did not presently dy, as otherwise he would have done. But Adam presently repented not till God extorted it from him: but rather did excuse and extenuate his fault. And though Adam repented, yet he died, and that presently, in some sense, as after will appear. This therefore satisfies not. III. Some refer this word [ in the day ] in the Threatning, to Adams Eating, not to his Dying: and take those words absolutely, [ Thou shalt surely dy. ] As if God had intimated, There was no day, no time excepted, but if they did eat any day whatsoever, They should dy; but he tells them not when they shall so die. But this Resolution seems too dilute, more witty then solid, and too much to force the text. IIII. Others joining the Circumstance of the Day with the Threatning of Death, conceive that in the self-same day that Adam Sinned, he did dy the Death; And that the threatening was presently fulfilled upon his sinning. And this, as it is the commonest, so it is the best Resolution. But let us see how Adam died, in the same day wherein he sinned. 1. In his Soul he was presently separated from God by sin, and died Spiritually. Sin, in the inward Nature of it, carries death in it. Dead in trespasses and sins. Adam had no sooner sinned, but he was dead in sin: being immediately deprived of the Image of God, of the Favor of God, and of Communion with God, which was the life of his Soul. 2. In his Body he died also in the same day wherein he sinned. But how? Not Actually; For God intending to make of one blood, all Nations of men, did respite the actual execution of bodily Death on Adam, till he had a considerable posterity. But in his body he died the same day, ( ¹ ) In respect of the Guilt of Death Corporal; He according to his desert, was presently condemned, and under Sentence of Death, though reprieved for a time. Now we count a condemned man, a dead man. ( ² ) In respect of the inevitable Necessity of Death Corporal, which he contracted upon himself. He became presently Mortal: though he did not presently dy. He that before his fall had an ability of not dying, after his fall brought upon himself an impossibility of not dying. Hence Jerome commends Symmachus his version, who instead of [ Thou shalt dy, ] renders it, [ Thou shalt be mortal: ] as Rivet observes. So then Adam in Paradise before his Fall, had a Posse non mori, an ability of not dying: After the Fall, a non posse non mori, an impossibility of not dying: In heaven he shall have, a non posse mori, An impossibility of dying anymore. (3) In respect of the Experimental beginnings, Symptoms, Signs, and Harbingers of Death Corporal. Adam presently begun to feel, heat, cold, weariness, &c. His natural heat and radical moisture began to consume one another, and so went on, till the accomplishment of Death. So that as a wounded man cries out, I am a dead man: so Adam, beginning to be wounded with afflictions, might cry out, I am a dead man. 3. In both his Soul and Body, Adam was presently liable to eternal death, the proper wages of Sin, & under the arrest of God's wrath & Curse.

Thus of the Blessing Promised, and Curse threatened, the Matter of the Covenant of works on God's part.

(2.) The Duty restipulated▪ the Matter of the Covenant on Adams part, was Perfect and Perpetual Personal Obedience. For clearing of this, two Questions are to be resolved. 1. How it may appear That such obedience was required of Adam, and restipulated. 2. What was the Law Rule or Measure of Adams Obedience?

Quest. 1. How it may appear, that God required of Adam in this Covenant such Perfect and Perpetual Personal obedience, and that Adam restipulated such obedience? Answ. That Perfect and Perpetual Personal Obedience was required by God, and restipulated on Adams part, is evident divers ways. As 1. From the Manner of God's threatening. He threatens present Death upon the least single Act of Adams Personal disobedience: In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die. Consequently God Covenanted with Adam for such Personal Obedience, as should be both Perfect and constant. The least Act of disobedience destroys both the perfection and constancy of Obedience. 2. From the Nature of the Covenant of works, which requires all exactness of personal obedience both for kind, degree and duration, under a Curse. Cursed is everyone that continueth not in all things, which are written in the Book of the Law to do them. Here's Obedience, Personal Obedience, Perfect Obedience, and Perpetual Obedience required by the Legal Covenant of works. And the Law was never given as a Covenant of works, but only to Adam in innocence. 3. From God's process in judgment with Adam and his Posterity upon one Act of Disobedience. He brought the threatened Death upon them, as hath been explained. Which God would not have done, had he not Covenanted with Adam, for perfect and perpetual Personal Obedience. 4. From God's mysterious method in Repairing the First Adams Breach of the Covenant of works through disobedience: by the Last Adams exact fulfilling and satisfying of the Covenant of works through obedience. Now the last Adam Jesus Christ God-man exactly fulfilled and satisfied the Covenant of works through obedience, Passively, and Actively. Passively, whilst Christ, as our Surety, humbled himself and became obedient to the Death, even the Death upon the Cross; and so became a Curse for us, to redeem us from the Curse of the Law, or Covenant of works, by satisfying Divine justice to the full for our Breach of Covenant in Adam. Actively, whilst Christ as our Mediator actually kept and fulfilled the whole Law, or Covenant of works in every kind, degree, and circumstance of Duty for us, who of ourselves are no way able to keep it. That so the whole obedience and righteousness of Christ may be through faith imputed to us: that the righteousness of the Law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit So then, the Covenant of works must be fulfilled and made good. The first Adam could not do it, because he had broken it: the Last Adam is therefore brought in, to fulfil all righteousness, and satisfy for all our unrighteousness. If then the Breach of the Covenant was made up again by the Last Adams Perfect and Constant personal obedience: sure that breach was made by the First Adams failing in such Obedience. Therefore Perfect and Constant personal obedience was required of the First Adam therein.

Quest. 2 What was the Law Rule or Measure of Adams Obedience? Answ. The Law or Rule for Adams Obedience was 1. More Generally the whole Covenant of works. 2. More Particularly the two sorts of Laws Comprehended in the Covenant of works, viz. I. The Moral Law written in Adams heart. For, why was it written there, but to be an inward Rule and Principle of his Obedience? And that it was written in Adams heart before the fall, is evident, because even Pagans which have not the written Law, yet have the work of the Law written in their hearts, doing by Nature the things contained in the Law, after the fall. II. The positive Law of not eating of the tree of Knowledge under pain of Death. I call it A Positive Law, because it merely depended upon the will of the imposer: the not eating of that Tree was not engraven in Nature, but merely imposed at the pleasure of the Law-giver. The subjectmatter of the Law, viz. The Eating or not Eating of the tree of Knowledge, was not bad or good in itself, more then of other Trees; but only in respect of God's Prohibition, it became bad and unlawful to eat of it. This Positive Law some call a Symbolical Precept, because Adams Obedience thereto was to have been a Symbol or outward Testimony of his Obedience and service to God; His Homage-penny, &c. Some call it A Precept of Exploration, because it was given as a Special Law for Trial & discovery of Adams Obedience. Doubt. 1. But why is this forbidden Tree called The Tree of knowledge of Good and Evil? Answ. This Tree was so called, I. Not from any inward virtue in it, to confer the use of Reason to our first Parents, who are imagined to be created like Infants without the use of Reason, as some Hebrews think; but erroneously. For, 1. Why should God prescribe to them such a Law with a Capital penalty, who had not the use of Reason? 2. Adam had such use of Reason, that upon the first sight he could Name the creatures according to their Natures. And understoood that the woman, brought to him was bone of his bone, and flesh of his flesh, &c. II. Not from any effect or physical efficacy of it, for increasing of Knowledge either by working it immediately upon the Soul: or immediately upon the animal spirits, refreshing and awaking them, and so mediately upon the soul: As some think, but falsely. For, 1. The Material fruit could not immediately act upon the immaterial Soul, to improve knowledge. 2. All the Trees of the Garden tended to refresh and enliven the Spirits, being good for food: and upon that account should all of them be called Trees of Knowledge. 3. Could this •… ree have increased Adams Knowledge, can it be imagined God would have forbid him a Tree so advantageous, and envied him so much good? 4. Then Adams eating of that Tree was not such an Aggravation of his Sin, The matter of the Prohibition being not small, as Learned writers unanimously judge, and aggravate his sin thereby; but great, and that Tree of more Consequence then all the other Trees of the Garden for improvement of Knowledge, and Consequently Adams strength in Abstinence from it must needs be the more. III. Nor Finally was this Tree called The Tree of Knowledge from the Serpents Suggestion in his Temptation,— ye shall be as God's knowing good and evil, as Popish writers fancy. For, can we probably imagine, that God would denominate this the Tree of Knowledge from the devils impudent Lye in the Serpent? IV. But it was called The Tree of Knowledge, That is, of Experimental Knowledge, by way of Prolepsis, from the Event that would ensue upon eating thereon. For then Adam should experimentally know, to his sorrow, from how much good he had lapsed, and how much evil he had contracted upon himself. As its usual in Scripture by way of Prolepsis or Anticipation to give denominations unto things. And this the best, and most received opinion about this Denomination. Doubt. 2. But why did God besides the Natural Law engraven in Adams heart, impose this Positive Law, forbidding that which was not in itself morally and intrinsically evil? Ans. The Lord seems to have done this, 1. For the more clear discovery of his own absolute power and dominion over man. Whilst God commands or forbids things which in themselves are consonant or dissonant to human Reason, as good or bad: God's supremacy over man is not so evident, such commands leaning and being founded upon man's Reason and Conscience. But when God commands or forbids, that which in its own Nature is morally neither good nor bad, but only becomes good or bad from the mere will of God commanding or forbidding, nor can any other reason thereof be given but God's will and pleasure; then the absolute supremacy and sovereignty of God is notably manifested, As in this Positive Law. 2. For the more evident Trial and manifestation of Mans subjection and obedience to God. For this is pure obedience and subjection indeed, when a man is subject and obedient merely to the will of the Law-giver, though the matter required or forbidden, be in itself neither morally good nor evil. I like Augustine's illustration well; If a man be charged not to touch a poisonous herb, because it will be hurtful to him that toucheth it; or not to touch another man's money, because it will be evil to the owner; This is no such trial of obedience, because the evil of the thing forbidden restrains, and not only the authority of him that commands or forbids. But when a man forbears, what is forbidden: which had it not been forbidden, he needed not at all to have forborne. God therefore forbids a tree in itself lawful and good for food, thereby to try how purely Adam would obey his mere command, without any other motive or consideration. It was expedient Adam should know himself to be under God. And (as the same Augustine ) how shall he be under God, if not under his command? 3. For the Greater Aggravation of Adams sin, in case he should disobey. Partly, in that, if he offended, he should offend in so small a matter and so easy to be observed, especially God having granted him liberty to eat of all the trees in the Garden besides. Partly, in that he by disobeying should so directly reject God's dominion and authority, by doing that which merely was to be forborne, because God had forbidden it. Which were mere disobedience, mere rebellion against God's Dominion. Hence the Apostle charges Disobedience upon Adam as his proper sin, Rom. 5. 19.

APHORISM V.

WHen God Entred into this Covenant of Works with the first Adam, he was completely able in his own Person to keep this Covenant in every point. Herein God required nothing, but Adam was able to perform it: God forbad nothing, but Adam was able to forbear it.

I. That Adam had Compleat ability to keep this Covenant of Works, is evident; 1. From removal of all causes of disability from Adam at that time. Then there was nothing in Adam that might impede or disable Adam, from complete keeping the Covenant of works. The only disabling impediment, is sin. The only Cause why Adams posterity since the fall cannot keep the Covenant of works; nor Consequently be justified thereby, is their sin. The law is weak through the flesh. Now Adam had no sin in him at all, neither Original nor Actual, when God entered into Covenant with him. Sin entered after, by his disobedience in eating the forbidden fruit: And with Sin, Shame and Death, the inseparable attendants upon sin. 2. From Position and Presence of all necessary and sufficient Causes of Ability in Adam: At that time Adam had; ( •… ) The perfection of God's image in him. God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him, wherein this image consisted, I now dispute not. But this is clear, Adam was made upright. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 Iashar, there rendered [ upright ] signifies one Right, Equal, and who bends to neither part: As Mercerus hath observed. So that Adam was even, equal, declining to no part or extreme: thus he was created. Hence he had all necessary inward ability to perform God's will. A Knowing mind, a pure Conscience, An obedient and dutiful will, A loving heart, A tractable and obsequious body, All upright. ( ² ) The Inscription of God's Covenant in his heart, the Moral Law, This he had engraven upon his heart, (as formerly was shown) ( ³ ) The Expression of the Positive Law, about the Tree of Knowledge. This was made known to him by word of Mouth. Hence Adam had a perfect Rule both Inward and Outward for steering his Obedience. Adam therefore having so Perfect a Principle, and so exact a Rule for Obedience, must needs be completely able to fulfil this Covenant of works with God. 3. From absurdities that otherwise upon denial of Adams ability would ensue. For ( ¹ ) Then God should have required impossibilities of Adam. ( ² ) Then the Penalty of Death in case of disobedience, should have been unjust: because God never gave Adam complete ability for Obedience.

II. Hence these things result by way of Corollary,

1. That, Adam before he brake this Covenant of works, neither had, nor needed a Mediator of Reconciliation. He needed not the Mediation of Jesus Christ the second or last Adam; Either for Satisfaction, for he had no way sinned: Or for Intercession, for Adam wanted nothing, and was completely acceptable to God in his person: Or for Imputation of Christ's righteousness and obedience to him, for Adam was perfectly upright and obedient in himself. O what a difference betwixt Adam then, and Adams posterity now! He needed no Christ, we need nothing more, &c. Ob. But the Tree of Life seems to be a Type of Christ, especially if we consider that passage in the Revelation. Answ. The Tree of Life in Eden was Sacramental, but not Typical. Sacramental, to assure Adam of the continuance of his life, if he had continued his obedience and eaten thereof: but not Typical, to set out a Mediator. That Passage in the Revelation alludes to this Tree of Life in Eden: An Allusion is one thing, An interpretation another. And some have turned it into an Allegory, interpreting Paradise to be the Church: The four Rivers therein, the four Gospels: The Fruit-Trees, the Saints: Their fruits, good-works: The Tree of Life, The Holy of Holyes, Even Christ: The Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, The Proper Freedom of Will. This is devised wittily, not solidly.

2. That, Adam, before breach of Covenant, as he neither had, nor needed a Mediator, so he neither had, nor needed Faith in a Mediator. Adam had a Faith in God, whereby he was able, Both to believe whatsoever God revealed, and to depend upon God and his promises, as also to perform in love whatsoever God prescribed. And so in Adam's Faith, there was a remote Capacity of believing any particular Revelation God should make touching a Mediator, but no particular acting of Faith on a Mediator. Adam's Faith under the Covenant of works, differs much from ours under the Covenant of Faith. 1. In respect of their Rise and manner of Conveyance. Adam's Faith was naturally implanted in him by God, ours supernaturally. 2. In respect of their foundation wherein they lean. Adam's Faith leaned on the Title of perfect, upright Nature: ours upon the faithful and free Promises of God in Christ. 3. In respect of their Fruit. Adams Faith produced a changeable righteousness in himself a mutable person: ours an unchangeable righteousness from Christ and the Spirit which are unchangeable. 4. In respect of their Actings. Adams Faith acted towards God without any Consideration of a Mediator: ours acteth towards God by Christ the Mediator. 5. In respect of their associates, or Companions. Faith in Adam was without Repentance, because he was sinless: Faith in us is always accompanied with repentance, because we are sinful.

3. That, Adams Breach of Covenant is without all Excuse. Adam was fully able to keep Covenant: Therefore Adam is left without all Apology for his breach of Covenant. He must needs justify God, and condemn himself under severest penalties for breach of Covenant: for God gave him power Compleatly to keep it. And what is here said of Adam, is to be understood also of all Adam's Posterity in him.

APHORISM VI. This Covenant of works Adam utterly brake, by disobedience.

For clearing of this, Consider 1. That Adam thus brake the Covenant of works. 2. How Adam broke this Covenant. 3. When and how soon he brake it. 4. How grievous and heinous this Breach. 5. Corollaryes.

I. That Adam utterly brake the Covenant of works by disobedience, is evident. 1. By Scripture-Testimonies, both of Old and New Testament. In the Old Testament, is the Narration of this Covenant-breach, How the woman seduced by the Devil in the Serpent, did eat of the Tree of Knowledge, and how she gave unto Adam her hus •… and, and he did eat. And what sad effects followed thereupon to them both; viz. Shame; Fear; Hiding themselves from God; Translation of their fault, the man to his wife, and She to the Serpent; Enmity betwixt the seed of the woman and Serpent; The multiplication of the woman's sorrows, and aggravation of her subjection to her husband; The curse upon the earth; The toil, sorrows, and Mortality of Adam; The Expulsion of Adam out of Eden; And the effectual abstention of Adam, by Cherubims and a flaming sword turning every way, from the Tree of life. In the New Testament is an Explication of Adam's breach of Covenant, how all his Posterity sinned and broke Covenant in him. By one man sin entered into the world,—in whom all have sinned. — By one man's disobedience many were made sinners. And this breach of Covenant is set forth by divers Denominations, viz. Sin; Adam's Transgression; The offense of one; One man's disobedience: all tending to describe the Nature of it. 2. By the sad Experience which all Adams Posterity have had of the woeful effect of Adam's breach of Covenant to this day: All being thereby involved in Sin, Death, and Condemnation. Therefore All Adams ordinary Seed, were in Covenant with him, Broke Covenant in him, and smart under Covenant-breach by him. 3. By the Manner of God's Administration. After Adams Disobedience God utterly laid aside the Covenant of works, and never set it on foot more: but instead thereof advanced The Covenant of Faith in Christ the second Adam. Thereby notifying to us that, the Covenant of works was utterly broken and dissolved by the First Adam's sin.

II. How Adam brake this Covenant of works? Answ. I. Adam brake the Covenant of works by Eating of the Tree of Knowledge, contrary to God's Positive Symbolical Precept imposed upon Adam for Trial of his Obedience. This Act of Adam did complete his Fall, and Covenant-breach. II. This Covenant-breach was brought on, not all at once, but by certain steps and degrees. 1. The woman hearkens to the Serpent, that is, to the Devil in the Serpent, Tempting. 2. She Mis-reports God's command, Partly, Adding thereto; neither shall ye touch it. For God had not forbidden the Touching of it, but only the eating of it. Partly, Taking thence from, detracting from the fidelity of it. For what God spoke peremptorily, In the day thou eatest thereof, dying thou shalt die: she alleges doubtfully, lest peradventure ye die; as the Hebrew phrase properly Signifies. 3. She so far credits the Serpent, as to behold, or eye the Tree of Knowledge with desire and affectation: Conceiving the Tree to be ^1. Good for Food; ^2. Pleasant to the eye, ^3. And desirable to make one wise. As John ranks all that is in and of the world, and not of the Father, under these three heads, The lust of the Flesh, the lust of the Eye, and the Pride of Life. 4. She took of the fruit of the Tree and did Eat. 5. She gave unto her husband, and he did eat. Hence we may understand that of the Apostle, Adam was not deceived, (that is, not by the Serpent) but the woman being deceived was in the Transgression (that is, was first in the Transgression before Adam. ) This sin was brought upon Adam by degrees. ( ¹ ) Suggestion: ( ² ) Aversion from Good. ( ³ ) Delightful Inclination to Evil. ( ⁴ ) to Execution or acting of Sin inclined and Consented to. ( ⁵ ) Propagation or Derivation of sin to others. Thus Adam sinned, and brake Covenant with God. III. The Causes of Adam's sin and Covenant-breach, thus brought to pass, were divers. The Instrumental Cause Remote, was the Serpent, and the Devil in him: Immediate, was the woman, Adam's wife. The Efficient Cause of Adam's sin, is hard to be found out. Properly Adams sin had no Efficient Cause at all, but rather a Deficient Cause. God neither Directly nor indirectly could be any Cause of it at all: For, God made man upright, and God, as he cannot be tempted with evil, so he tempteth no man to evil. But Adam being created mutable, though upright: and having a Will flexible to good or to evil, and not being confirmed and stablished immovably in Good, but left to his own power and liberty, (for God was not bound to confirm, and uphold him,) he declined unto evil, and became like the beasts that perish.

III. When, and how soon Adam brake this Covenant of works? Answ. In the History of Adams Fall, the Circumstance of time is not expressly described: and other Scriptures are very silent. Hence, They that have written about this Question, both Jewish Doctors, Ancient Fathers, School-men and Modern Authors, have been of divers opinions herein, and somewhat unsatisfied. Omitting the diversity of others Opinions, I shall briefly declare herein what to me seems most probable and Consentaneous to Scripture without prejudice to others judgments.

1. It is Evident that Adam continued in Paradise in his Concreated integrity for a certain Considerable Season, before he fell. For, before the Fal, 1. Adam gave names to all living Creatures which God brought before him. 2. The Woman was made of one of Adam's ribs, taken out of his side, Adam▪ meanwhile being cast into a deep sleep. 3. God brought the Woman to Adam, gave her to him to wife, and Adam so accepted her. 4. God blessed them with the blessing of Fruitfulness, and Dominion over the Earth, and over all the Creatures therein. 5. God gave them every herb and every fruit-bearing Tree for food. 6. Adam was placed in the Garden of Eden to dress it, and to keep it. 7. God permitting them to eat of all the other Trees of the Garden, Gave command under pain of present Death not to eat of the Tree of Knowledge. All this was orderly done before Adams Fall. And all this required some considerable time.

2. It is not likely that Adam continued any long time in his innocence before his Fall. For, 1. Then, Adam in all probability would have Eaten of the Tree of Life, and have been confirmed in life against falling, as that phrase intimateth, Gen. 3. 23. which he did not. 2. Then, probably Eve should have conceived a pure and spotless seed from Adam. The blessing of Generation and Fruitfulness being already bestowed upon them: and no Curse of barrenness inflicted. That was the Fruit of the Fall. And Consequently such Seed should not have been begotten in Adams own likeness, sinful. 3. After the Historical Narration of these seven Particulars forementioned (which would not require any long time to be effected in) presently the story of Adams Fall is related, which seems to intimate, that the Fall was not long after Adam's creation. Hence Calvin modestly, As I have not what to assert touching the time, so I think it may be gathered from Moses his Narration, that they did not long retain the integrity which they had; for as soon as he had spoke of their Creation, without mention of any other thing, he passeth to their Defection, &c. And Augustine thinks the Transgression presently followed the Creation.

3. It is Probable, That Adam continued in Paradise neither years, months, weeks, nor days: but sinned and lost Paradise in the self-same day in which he was created. That he was Created and Corrupted; formed and deformed; made and mar'd; alive and dead; an inhabitant in, and an exile from Paradise, in one and the self-same day. For, 1. There is nothing in the Text intimating that Adam stood longer then that one day in which he was created: but rather that he fell on the same day. We find not that he kept one Sabbath in Paradise. We find that Adam and his wife were created on the sixth day, after the Beast of the Earth, Cattle and creeping things had been on the same day created. So that Adam was not created in the beginning of the sixth day. And those seven Particular occurrence ensuing Adams Creation, which were forementioned, might all of them easily be dispatched in a few hours of the same sixth day. Besides, the Serpents Temptation and seducing of the woman, The woman's eating of the Tree of Knowledge, and giving thereof to her husband, Their shame upon their fall, and sewing fig-leaves to cover their shame, might all without difficulty be effected on the same day. And after this the very next thing mentioned, is the voice of God (whereby Adam was called to account for his sin) walking in the Garden in the cool of the day. Hebr. in the wind of the Day. Jerome renders it, In the wind after mid-day. The Greek, In the Evening. Chrysostom, Afternoon, Irenaeus, In the Eventide. Hence, saith Calvin, that Opinion hath prevailed, That Adam sinned about Noon, and was brought into judgment for it about Sun-set. Now its very observable that This is the first Evening mentioned after Adam's Creation, and the Covenant made with him. And the phrase of God's voice walking in the Garden in the Cool of the day, seems so to be brought in, the Context being well considered, as if it related to the close of the day of Adams Creation. 2. When the Serpent began to Tempt the woman, The words of the Serpent and woman to one another are such, and in the future tenses, as they imply that as yet Adam and his wife had not eaten of any Tree at all in the Garden. And it is very improbable they would have continue •… a whole Day in the Garden, in the midst of all that delicious fruit, and not have eaten of some. And if of any, then of that which was most excellent and desirable, The Tree of Life. But they tasted not of the Tree of Life, for then they had been confirmed in eternal life; and had not fallen. Therefore eating of none at all, they seem not to have continued one day in their innocent state. 3. Christ saith The Devil was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the Truth.—A liar, and the father of it. A murderer of whom? Of our first parents and their Posterity. From what beginning? Not from the beginning of the worlds Creation, which at the least was six days before Adam was murdered by him: but from the beginning of Mans Creation and being, which most properly and precisely implies the sixth day wherein man was made. Then it was that the devil deceived our first parents by Lying, and Murdered them. Consequently they fell the first day of their Creation. 4. Christ the second Adam, incarnate in fullness of time, was put to Death for man's sin on the sixth day of the week, which was the Preparation before the Passover or Sabbath. He was crucified about the sixth hour, that is, our twelve of the clock; and he yielded up the Ghost about the ninth hour, that is, about our three of the clock afternoon. Probably therefore the First Adam ( the figure of him that was to come, and that in respect of this point) fell into his Sin on the sixth day in the afternoon. And so God's Threatning to Adam In the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die, was most notably fulfilled in Adams Surety Christ, then dying corporally, and tasting of the second Death remarkably, for sin. 5. That passage of the Psalmist is observable to this Purpose. viz. Adam being in Honor, lodged-not-a-night, but is likened to beasts that are silenced. That which in our Translation is [ Man ] in the Hebrew is [ Adam ] And Ainsworth saith well, This may be minded both for the first man Adam, who Continued not in his dignity, and so for all his children. And the word [ 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 Bal-jalin ] which we render, [ abideth-not, ] most Properly signifieth, [ Lodgeth-not-a-night ] as in Gen. 28. 11. Exod. 23. 18. & 34. 25. Deut. 16. 4. 2 Sam. 17. 8. & 19: 8. Psal. 30. 5. Josh. 8. 9. And this the learned in the Hebrew tongue acknowledge. Though therefore I will not restrain the sense of this place only to the first Adam, but extend it also to his posterity for denoting the mutability and momentariness of their honor: yet it seems singularly to point out Adams sudden fall from the top-excellency of his dignity, not enjoying it one night. 6. Learned men both Antient and Modern have much inclined upon former Considerations to this Opinion of Adams fall in the same day he was framed. Augustine thinks Adam stood only six hours, as Calvin and Mercerus vouch him. Iedudus inclines to Adams fall in the Afternoon. And the Annotations there upon Irenaeus allege Cyril, Epiphanius, Diodorus Tresensis, and others, who held that Adam was cast out of Paradise in the same day in which he was Created. Rachi saith, That Adam and Eve rebelled about the tenth hour, that is, two hours before Sun-set: as Lud. de Dieu hath noted. Latter writers also hold, that in one and the same day Adam was Formed and Deformed: As that accurate H. Broughton in his Concent of Scripture shows upon divers grounds; As also in his General view of Scriptures, (for that Book published again with enlargements by Tho. Hayne, was at first Penned by H. Broughton, as one of his Hearers informed me, and as the Book itself seems plainly to witness.) And as that learned M ^r . G. Walker in his Doctrine of the Sabbath, insisting in Broughtons steps, more fully declares.

Hence then 1. Adam kept not one Sabbath in Paradise, nor did he see one Sabbath in his innocence. 2. The happiness of Adam and of all his posterity, whilst it was in their own keeping, and bottomed upon mutable Nature, though upright, stood upon a very tickle foundation. Its well for Christians that now their happiness is in Christ's keeping, not in their own: grounded not upon mutable Nature, but immutable Grace. 3. Mans Corruption is almost as ancient as Mans Creation. How soon was God dishonored: and how long hath God been provoked by mankind! 4. Adams sin must needs be the Greater, that he so speedily forgot and forfeited all God's greatest favors. 5. Satan is deservedly branded for A Murderer from the beginning, and styled that old Serpent the Devil: His subtlety deceiving, and his cruelty murdering mankind from the the first day of their Being.

IV. How grievous and Haynous was Adams Breach of Covenant? Answ. Adams Sin and breach of Covenant with God was heinous beyond our expression or Conception. Who can sufficiently Enumerate or aggravate the Aggravations thereof? Some few exaggerations I shall touch upon. viz. in respect of the 1. Person who sinned. 2. Condition and state, wherein. 3. Place, where. 4. Time, when. 5. Law, against which. 6. Objects, against whom. 7. The many and great evils of sin and punishment attending upon Adams sin.

1. The person who sinned, was Adam. Not an ordinary, but an extraordinary Person: Consequently his, not an ordinary but an extraordinary sin. For, 1. Adam was an innocent Person, without all sin, perfect and upright in the image of God without any defect. Therefore his mind was most clear, bright, and apprehensive, to have detected the darkness and evil both of Sin and of the Temptation thereunto. His conscience also was pure and active, under God, to warn him against sin, and all occasions thereof. His will free, and able to have withstood all sin, and all seducements thereunto, most easily. Never mere man since Adam, had such perfection of mind, Conscience, will, and of the whole man: being habitually prone to no evil, but propense to all good. Now that Adam every way able not to sin, should have this mind blinded, this Conscience corrupted, this free-will enslaved by •… in: how grievous was his sinning! He sinned Knowingly, he sinned willingly; therefore he sinned more heinously. Sin the more willingly it is admitted, the more wickedly it is committed. No wonder if a carnal man, who hath nothing but sin in him, can act nothing but sin; or if a Christian, that hath much Corruption mingled with his Grace, mix also infirmities with best performances: but for Adam to sin, who had no sinful inclination in him, how strange is it and inexcusable! 2. Adam was a public person, a complexive person; all mankind were in him, and all in Covenant with God with him. He standing, all stood: he falling, all fell. Never man, by one sin, made so many sinners. By one sin, he made himself and all his posterity sinners from the beginning to the end of the world. Hence learned Augustine well observes, that though some other sins, as the unpardonable sin against the Holy-Ghost, may be greater then this sin of Adam, Intensively; yet Adams sin is the very greatest and most grievous sin in the world, extensively considered.

2. The condition and state wherein he sinned, was most happy. For, God's image, was his beauty▪ God's Covenant of works, his charter for Eternal life: All God's Creatures on Earth, his servants and under his Dominion: The whole Earth, his Possession: Paradise, his Habitation: All the fruits of Paradise, except of the Tree of Knowledge, his food: And familiar Communion with God there, the Paradise of Paradise. In a word, so blisful his Condition, as the absence of all evil, and presence of all good, could render it. We may therefore with the Psalmist burst out into Admiration; Lord, what is man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man that thou visitest him? For thou hast made him a little lower then the Angels; and hast crowned him with glory and honor. Thou madest him to have dominion •… ver the works of thy hands: thou hast put all things under his feet. Elegantly Augustine delineates Adams Paradise-felicity; Man in Paradise lived as he lifted, as long as he willed what God had commanded: he lived enjoying God, from whom most good he was good. He lived without any penury, having power so to live perpetually. Meat was at hand, left he should hunger: drink, lest he should thirst: The Tree of Life, lest age should dissolve him: No corruption in his body, or out of his body, brought any trouble to any of his senses. No disease within, no blow was feared from without. In his flesh greatest soundness: in his spirit entire calmness. As in Paradise was neither Heat nor Cold: so in its inhabitant there was no offense to his good will, by desire or fear. There was nothing at all grievous, nothing vainly joyous: true joy was perpetuated from God, towards whom love did flame out of a pure heart and a good conscience, and faith unfeigned. And a faithful conjugal society from an honest love, An harmonious vigilancy of mind and body, and an unlaborious custody of the Command, &c. Thus and thus happy was Adams state, in which he sinned. Therefore he offended against all God's benefits wherewith he had loaded him: against all the bonds of love, wherewith▪ God had obliged him: against all the dignities and Privileges wherewith God had crowned him, when he broke God's Command in such Condition. The greater God's lovingkindness to Adam: the deeper Adams unkindness to God. Did God's favors to David so aggravate David's sin? And God's mercies to Israel so heighten Israel's offenses? how much more did God's superabounding blessings to Adam, beyond measure exaggerate Adams disobedience? Hear O heavens, and give Ear O Earth! God on every side surrounded Adam with happiness: And this Adam rebelled against the Lord.

3. The place where Adam sinned, was Paradise▪ A place most unfit for sinning in. There God familiarly conversed with Adam: To sin there, was to sin in the presence of God. There God entered into the Covenant of works with Adam: To sin there, was to be extremely unmindful of, and unfaithful in God's Covenant. There was the Tree of Life, to confirm him in Obedience, and the Tree of Knowledge to caution him against disobedience: To Sin there, was to sin against God's Antidotes and Preservatives. There grew every Tree pleasant to the sight, and good for food, all pointing at their maker, and inciting Adam to admire his wisdom, adore his power, and extol his goodness; To sin there, was to sin against multitudes of mercies. All the Trees and fruits of Paradise would aggravate that ingratitude. In a word, Paradise was a place wherein was no sin, nor sorrow: Therefore to sin there, was to pollute Paradise, and to transform the Eden of pleasure into an Achor of trouble and Perplexity.

4. The Time when Adam sinned, was quickly after his Cre •… tion. Probably he was corrupted, (as I have shown) the self-same day he was Created. What? was Adam Created such a complete soldier, and armed so perfectly with God's image, that he had power to conquer all his spiritual Enemies, and that continually: and is he utterly foiled at the very first on •… et? was he made so skillful a Pilot, able to cross all Seas of danger in safety: and is he shipwrecked in the very harbor? was he able to Persevere forever in obedience: and is he turned aside the very first day to disobedience? was he created, and corrupted: formed, and deformed: Alive, and dead: blessed, and cursed: Happy, and miserable: God's freeman, and Satan's bond-man: The child of God, and the child of the devil: &c. all in one day? This renders Adams sin exceeding grievous. If this aggravated Israel's sin, that after God's Covenant renewed in Mount Sinai, They turned aside quickly out of the way which God Commanded them: much more must it aggravate Adams sin that he turned aside more quickly from God's way: they being corrupt, Adam innocent; They being of themselves unable to persevere, Adam fully able; They turning aside after almost forty days, Adam the very first day.

5. The Law against which Adam sinned, was such, that it notably greatened Adams sin. And the LORD God Commanded the man, saying, of every Tree Of the Garden thou mayest freely eat: but of the Tree of the Knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the Day that thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die. Here Consider, 1. The greatness of the Law-giver, The LORD God. He who created Adam, and all the world by his word: whose dominion is absolute. Of whom alone Adam had his being, well-being and whole dependence. Was it a small thing to sin against so great a God? 2. The meanness of him on whom the Law was imposed. The man. Our first parent, A finite creature: in his original despicable dust and ashes. Adam, Red-earth. And shall dust and ashes rebel against the command of the mighty God? 3. The weight and importance of the Command. It was of greatest importance and concernment, both as an Original Covenant, and as an Original Law. ( ¹ ) As an Original Covenant. This (though it had not the name, yet) had the Nature of a Covenant: As hath been shown. It was a Covenant of works. The first Covenant that ever was in the world. Wherein God and All mankind in Adam were parties. To sin against this Command then, was to break Covenant, and to make himself and all mankind as Covenant-breakers guilty of Death. ( ² ) As an Original Law. For, as Tertullian well observes, This Law being given, all Laws were given, which were afterwards published by Moses. That is, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy sou •… : and thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself, &c. For it was an Original Law which was given to Adam and Eve in Paradise, as it were The Womb of all God's Precepts. If they had loved the Lord their God, they had not done against his Precept: if they had loved their neighbor and themselves, they had not believed the Serpents persuasion, nor had committed murder against themselves, by falling from immortality, &c. Now to transgress a law of such Consequence, which was God's Faederal Law with mankind; And so Comprehensive a Law containing as it were all other Laws in its fruitful womb, must needs be the deeper transgression. 4. The Penalty of the Breach of this law was dreadful, viz. Present Death; and that both Spiritual, Corporal, and Eternal, as hath been explained. Death (said the Heathen) is 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , of Terribles the most terrible. Death, (saith the Scripture) is the King of Terrors: And therefore (as Augustine well noteth) how great an evil was this, to sin against such a Terrifying punishment! 5. The Promise implied consequently to the keeping of this law, was most sweet and desirable. viz. Perpetual life; and that in Paradise, or in a Paradise-Condition; or in Heaven which is best of all. Who would not have obeyed to the utmost ability for the eternizing of such a life? life is most precious All that a man hath will he give for his life. And eternal life in Paradise, would have been a double life: the life of life. Oh how deeply did Adam & we in him fin against our own life, by violating this law of life! And its most unnatural to sin against a man's own life. 6. Finally, Consider with what great Ease and Facility Adam, and we in him, might have kept this Command. Might not Adam easily have forborne one Tree, when all other Trees in Eden besides were allowed him? And the more easy it was to keep it, the more heinous it was to break it. Augustine said excellently, This of not eating one sort of meat, when of others there was such plenty, was so light a precept for observance, so short for remembrance, (especially where concupiscence did not as yet resist the will, which afterwards ensued as a punishment,) that it was with so much greater injustice violated, by how much more easy observance it might have been performed. And yet elsewhere more Excellently; The forsaker of eternal life, if grace had not delivered, was damned with eternal Death. If any think this judgment to be too much or unjust, surely he knows not how to measure, how great the iniquity was in sinning, where there was so great facility of not sinning. For as Abraham's obedience was deservedly proclaimed great, because the thing commanded was most difficult, to kill his son: so in Paradise the disobedience was so much greater, because that which was commanded was of no difficulty. And as the obedience of the second man was therein the more honorable, in that he was obedient even to death; so the disobedience of the first man was therein the more detestable, in that he became disobedient even to death.

6. The Objects against whom Adam sinned, do also render Adams sin more grievous. He sinned against God, Himself, and All Mankind. 1. Against God, rebelliously breaking his Command, perfidiously violating his Covenant, ingratefully rendering Evil unto God for all the multitudes of Blessings shown upon him, and most abominably believing the lying Suggestions of Satan the Father of Lyes, rather then the infallible word of the God of Truth, the God that cannot lie, Either in his Promise or Threatning. Now thus to sin against God, is to sin against an infinite Majesty, against an infinite glory. And what finite creature can sufficiently comprehend, how infinitely it aggravates Sin, to sin against such infiniteness! 2. Against himself. Adam sinned against himself many ways; viz. Against his Soul, in disrobing it of God's image in which it was created, and defiling it with Satan's image wherewith it was corrupted. Against his body; in embasing it in the Service of Sin and Satan, that should have been only employed in uprightness and purity: in clothing it with confusion and shame, that before was adorned with nothing but beauty and honor: and in exposing it to Sorrows, wearisomeness, toylsomness, and thousands of infirmities and miseries, which before was utterly unacquainted with all misery and sorrow. Against his Person, in involving himself in Mortality and Death, in depriving himself of all his Paradise-felicities, of his Primitive integrity, of his dominion over the Creatures, and of his Communion with the blessed God transcending all. Against his Name, filling it with ignominy and reproach, that was crowned with glory and honor: for sin is a reproach to any people, most of all to him that was totally free from sin, and fully able so to keep himself free. Finally, Against his Outward Estate, in forfeiting both Paradise and all the possessions, comforts and Privileges which he had on Earth, and bringing a Curse and a bondage of Corruption upon the whole Creature, under which it even groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now. Thus Adam sinned against himself in respect of Soul, Body, Person, Name, and State: How unnatural, horrid and cruel was it for Adam so to sin against himself! 3. Against all Mankind, Even his whole ordinary Posterity from the beginning to the End of the world, who all were stained in him, in respect of Soul, Body, Person, Name and State, as Adam was. At once all mankind were polluted and defiled by sin: spoiled and robbed of all their happiness: plunged and drowned in all sorts of misery: murdered and swallowed up of death. Extensively considered, there was never such a sin, such a Contagion, such a spoil, such a Murder since the world stood; nor can be till the Worlds end.

7. The Manifold and great Evils both of Sin and Punishment Attending upon Adam's eating of the Tree of Knowledge, Extremely aggravate his sin, and manifest it to be out of measure sinful.

(1.) Evd of sin attending upon Adam's Eating of this forbidden Tree, is manifold. Especially it is Antecedent, Concomitant, or Consequent thereunto. I. Antecedent Evds of sin, repugnant, Partly to the Moral Law, written in Adam's heart; Partly to the Positive Law, given for his Trial: gradually foregoing his and Eves eating of the forbidden fruit, were divers. viz. 1. Idleness. In that the woman seems not to be so diligently employed about the dressing and keeping of the Garden, in assistance of her husband as she ought, according to God's appointment: when Satan came to tempt. Idleness is a Temptation to Satan to tempt us; where as it is the Devils work to tempt others, its the idle-man's business to tempt the Devil. 2. Presumptuous Curiosity, or Curious Presumption. In that the woman, being the weaker vessel, durst entertain so dangerous a conflict with the Serpent, in her husbands absence. For, its most likely that at the beginning of the Serpents onset, Adam was at some distance from Eve: And the subtle Serpent took that advantage. 3. Inconsiderateness, and heedless forgetfulness of God's most strict command, which appears in her mis-recital of it two ways. Partly, In adding to it, Neither shall ye touch it: whereas the Command only forbad the Eating, not at all the touching of the Tree of Knowledge. Partly by Detracting from it. For God said, In the day thou eatest thereof, dying thou shalt die. i. e. thou shalt surely die, and that presently ipso facto. But she omits both the Peremptoriness of the threatening, and saith, lest ye die; or, lest perhaps ye die, as the Hebrew word intimates. What God threatened peremptorily, she recites with a perhaps or a peradventure: And she also omits the present suddenness of death threatened in the day of Sinning, For in the day that thou eatest thereof, &c. And by this forgetful mis-recital of God's Command, She gives Satan advantage against herself both to persuade her they should not dy, and to accuse God of a kind of envy at their happiness. 4. Unhelief towards God. In that she did not so fully as she ought credit God's peremptory Threatning of Death Expressed, in case of disobedience: nor his Contrary Promise of Life implied, in case of obedience. 5. Rash and headlong Credulity of the Serpent, and of Satan in him; though he both contradicted God's Command, and accused God of Envy at their happy state, and falsely suggested that by Eating they should become as God's, knowing good and evil. How abominable and idolatrous to believe Satan the Father of Lyes: before the God of Truth, who cannot lie! 6. Discontenting dislike with their present Condition wherein God had so happily set them. 7. Ambitious proud aspiring above their pitch to be as God's knowing good and evil. 8. Inordinate affection and evil concupiscence. In desiring an object unlawful, the fruit prohibited. 9. Irregularity of will. In choosing rather to hearken to the Serpents Suggestion, then to God's Command. 10. Lust of the eyes. In that she fixed a Longing look upon the forbidden fruit; and by looking on it▪ liked it, and designed to eat it. 11. Incontinence of hands. In that she refrains not from taking the forbidden fruit. 12. Intemperance of taste and Palate; In that she Eats the fruit, taken; and so her Sin was completed and finished. II. Concomitant Evils of Sin, accompanying the Eating of the forbidden fruit, are also divers. viz. 1. Eves Tempting her husband, both by word and Action, to Eat of the Tree of Knowledge: Thereby, with herself undoing her husband, to whom she was given for a meet help. 2. Adams inconsiderate hearkening to the voice of his wife, who was made for him: rather then to the voice of God, for whom himself was made. 3. Deep ingratitude against God, who had crowned Adam with so many and excellent Privileges in Paradise. Ingratum dixeris, omnia dixeris. What worse then to be challenged for Ingratitude? How was God displeased with Hezekiah, Judah, and Jerusalem, for not rendering again according to the benefits done unto him? But Adam had benefits done to him, incomparably transcending those of Hezekiah: yet he so far from rendering according to the benefit done to him, that he rendered evil for good which is the worst point of ingratitude. To render good for good, is man-like: To render good for evil, is God-like; But to render evil for good, is Devil-like. 4. Direct disobedience to God's express Command. And its no small crime to be disobedient: as we may see in the Aggravations of King Saul's disobedience. Disobedience, is a rejecting of the word of the LORD, yea it is Stubborness, which is as iniquity and Idolatry: yea it is rebellion, which is as the Sin of witch-craft. 5. Covenant-breaking with God most perfidiously, being able to keep it. 6 Woful Apostasy, from a sin-less and happy state, to a sinful and miserable Condition: from God blessed forever, and his blisful service, to the Devil damned forever, and his cursed slavery. None of the sons of men ever Apostatized from such Eminency, to such Extremity. III. Consequent Evils of Sin, ensuing upon the Eating of the forbidden fruit; were finally various and grievous. As, 1. An evil Conscience filled with guilt, and filling them with shame and terror in respect of God. 2. Flight from God and his presence, which before were so sweet and comfortable. 3. Hypocrisy in hiding their nakedness with figleaves, and in extenuating their sin by translating it from themselves, the man to the woman, and the woman to the Serpent. 4. Most cruel Murder both of themselves, and of all mankind at once, both in body and soul from the beginning to the end of the world; and of the Son of God, Jesus Christ, in some respect also. Themselves they murdered actually, in themselves all mankind virtually and interpretatively, and Jesus Christ himself the Lord of glory Occasionally; The first Adams sin occasioning the second Adams Death. There was never such an heinous horrid cruel murder as this committed in the world by any of the sons of men. 5. The universal Corruption of the whole Nature of Man-kind. Whereby Every person descending from Adam by ordinary propagation, is in soul and body utterly unable, indisposed, yea opposite to all spiritual good: and totally evil, and only inclined to evil, and that continually. Which Corruption of Nature is Commonly called Original Sin, As being the Original spawn and spring-head of All Actual sins: and it is propagated by natural generation from our first parents to all their ordinary posterity. 6. All the Actual sins that have been, are, or shall be in this world from the First Adams fall, till the Second Adams coming to judgment; together with all the Kinds, Degrees, sinful Circumstances and horrid Aggravations thereof, which are utterly beyond man's numbering, measuring or comprehending: All these have taken their rise from Adams disobedience in eating the forbidden fruit. For, All Actual sins flow immediately from Original: and Original sin from Adams sin. Hence is that school-distinction of Original sin, into Original Sin Originated, and Original Sin Originating. That, is the Corruption of Nature, the immediate Original of all Actuals; This, is Adams sin, the immediate Original of the Corruption of Nature. Never Sin in this world had such a black train of innumerable and intolerable sins following it at the heels, as this sin of Adam had. They seem to parallel the stars of Heaven, the sands of the Sea shore, the dust of the Earth, the grass-piles upon the ground, and the motes in Sun, for multitude. Oh how grievous was Adams sin, that was attended with such Antecedent, Concomitant, and Consequent Evils of sin! An horrid Hydra of many monstrous heads. A complexive, complicated sin indeed. Hereat Heaven and Earth might stand astonished. O ye holy Angels, how were ye offended, to see Adam and all the Elect in him (of whom ye had such special charge, Psal. 91. 11, 12. Heb. 1. 14.) so quickly transformed into such transgressors! O ye celestial Lights, Sun, Moon and Stars, did not ye blush, and veil your brightest faces with Sables, beholding Adam such a Sinner? O ye fowls of the air, and ye beasts of the Field, were not ye filled with horror, when man, your earthly Lord, disrobed himself of his Honor by disobedience, and became like the beasts that perish, Psal. 49. 12. O ye streams of Paradise, were not ye congealed within your banks, when such a deluge of sin overflowed mankind? O ye Tres of Eden, did not ye sweat out your moisture: and ye pleasant fruits of the Garden, did not ye all presently fade and fall to the Earth, when Adam the dresser of the Garden, by disobedient tasting of the Tree of Knowledge, fell so foully from uprightness to unrighteousness, Eccles. 7. 29. from God to the Devil, from heaven to hell? Surely the whole Creation groaneth and travelleth in pain together until now under the tedious bondage of this corruption, most earnestly longing for complete deliverance, Rom. 8. 19, 23.

(2) Evil of punishment ensuing upon Adams disobedience was also various and grievous. And this both in respect of himself, of his wife, and of all their common posterity. As, 1. The obliteration and defacing of God's image. God made man upright; but they have sought out many inventions. No sooner did Adam sin, but he blotted out of his soul thereby the beauteous image of God, and thereon Satan stamped his own odious image instead thereof: So that naturally all are the children of the Devil. 2. Shame. Before they finned, Adam and his wife (though naked ) were not ashamed. But as soon as they had defiled themselves with sin, they were covered with shame: and they sewed figleaves together, and made themselves aprons, to hide their shame. Shame attends upon sin, as inseparably as the shadow upon the Body. 3. Horrour of a guilty self-accusing and self-condemning Conscience. Therefore after their fall, they presently were afraid at the presence of God; and hid themselves, because they were naked. And being examined of God, they confess not, but excuse their sin; As Augustine notes; Did Adam say I have sinned? No; his pride had the deformity of Confusion, not the humility of Confession. 4. Inability to stand in judgment, when God arraigned them at his bar. And therefore both of them labor to excuse and translate their fault: Adam to his wife, and she to the Serpent. It is the misery of unrighteous persons, that they are not able to stand, but fall in judgment. 5. The Peculiar Punishments of the female Sex. The Hebrews observe, as Mercerus noteth, five Degrees of Eves sin: and answerably five degrees of her, and women's Punishment. She sinned, ( ^1. ) By entertaining the Serpents Temptation, believing him rather then God, contrary to God. ( ² ) By being lifted up with ambitious desire to be as God. ( ³ ) By beholding the Tree of knowledge with a longing look. ( ⁴ ) By taking and eating of it. ( ⁵ ) By giving also to her husband, so that he did eat. So she and women in her, were punished five ways: viz. ( ¹ ) By their many Sorrows in general. ( ² ) By their sorrows in Conception. ( ³ ) By their sorrows and pains in bringing forth of children. ( ⁴ ) By their ardent desires after their husbands notwithstanding. ( ⁵ ) By their subjection to their husbands. But the Text seems to refer the Punishments of the female sex to two Heads; viz. Multiplied sorrows, and Aggravated subjection, ( ¹ ) Multiplied sorrows: Partly, In the woman's Conceiving with child. Wherein understand all her sorrows, during the time she is with child, till she be delivered: viz. Her weakness and nauseousness of stomach, rejection of food, distempered appetite after unwholesome and unfit nourishment, weakness, dullness, wearisomeness, frowardness, longings, faintings, swounings, and much sickliness, with manifold fears. Partly, in the woman's bringing forth of children, which usually is with such exquisite pains and sharp tortures, as that Scripture is wont thereby to represent The churches extreme afflictions; The pangs of Death; The terrors of the day of judgment; and the very torments of Hell; the same word for substance being used to signify all these. And sometimes these pains of child-bearing prove mortal. Now under Bringing forth, we may understand also the Bringing up of children, as the phrase is elsewhere used. And in both, what multitudes of cares, fears, griefs, watchings, toilsome troubles, torments, vexations, &c. flow in upon them! (2) An aggravated subjection to their husbands; Their desire must be subject to their husbands, and they must rule over them. By the law of Nature and Creation, the woman being made after and for the man, was to be subject unto man, though they had never sinned. But that subjection would have been sweet, pleasant and delightful; and the husbands Rule loving, as over a Second-self: whereas now since the fall, the husbands Rule over his wife seems to be somewhat augmented, and her subjection is become painful, tedious, irksome, and grievous to her. These the Punishments peculiar to women-kind. 6. God's curse upon the Earth. By Earth, seems to be implied, the whole visible world, made for man's use and Comfort: in the Curse whereof, man (whose subsistence was to be on and from the earth) is cursed and punished. By God's Curse, the Earth, and visible world proportionally, are smitten with Barrenness, Toilsomeness, and vanity. ( ¹ ) With Barrenness; Partly in not yielding their strength of influence and fruitfulness, as before the fall they did abundantly and freely. Partly in bringing forth weeds, thorns and thistles, instead of good fruits; which before the fall it did not bring forth. ( ² ) With Toylsomeness. The Curse and barrenness of the Earth being in toylsomeness and laborious wearisome travel with the Earth, to improve it unto fruitfulness. All things are full of labor, man cannot utter it. ( ³ ) With vanity. Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher, vanity of vanities, all is vanity. All sublunaries are vanity; Partly in respect of their Emptiness. There's no satisfaction in any sublunary enjoyment. The eye is not satisfied with seeing: nor the ear filled with hearing. He that loveth silver shall not be satisfied with silver; nor he that loveth abundance, with increase; This is also vanity. Partly in respect of their Perishableness. Of old hath God laid the foundation of the earth: and the heavens are the works of thy hands. They shall perish, but thou shalt endure; yea all of them shall wax old like a garment: as a vesture shalt thou change them, and they shall be changed. Hence Paul saith, That the Creation is made subject to vanity, —and is under the bondage of Corruption, as it were waiting for a state of glorious liberty. Therefore the whole Creation groaneth, and travelleth in pain together until now. And Peter tells us expressly, That in the day of the Lord, The heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the Elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burnt up.—Nevertheless we look for New Heavens and New Earth. Oh, man's sin hath in a sort so deeply stained the beauty and glory of this visible world, that the old universal deluge of waters could not wash it, but the fire of the last day must purify it. Heaven and Earth groa •… and travel-in-pangs under the Curse of man's sin: and shall not man much more groan and be in pain for his own sin? This is the curse upon the Creature. 7. God's actual dooming of Adam, and of mankind in him, To an ignonimious Provision, Miserable life, and Certain Death after all. ( ¹ ) His ignonimious Provision of Sustenance: In that he must eat the herb of the field. Before the fall he had for food the liberal and delicate fruits of Eden: but since, his allowance was both shorter, and courser. As he made himself like the beasts that perish: so he must as well as the beasts eat the herb of the field, a more ignoble nourishment. ( ² ) His miserable life: in regard of the Continual Sorrows, and laborious painful wearisome toil in providing food and other necessaries all the days of his life. In sorrow shalt thou eat all the days of thy life.—In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground. Hence man is necessitated, To rise up early, to set up late, to eat the bread of sorrows. This sweat the Hebrews refer to the many laborious works and ways of preparing bread; As manuring the ground, Plowing it, Sowing it, Harrowing it, Breaking the clods, Weeding the Corn, Reaping it, In-gathering it, Thrashing it, Winnowing it, Grinding it, Dressing it, Kneading it, Baking it in the Oven. O how many toilsome tyring employments is man Obnoxious to in providing food and raiment for himself and family! ( ³ ) His certain Death as the Period of all.— Till thou return unto the ground: for out of it wast thou taken: for Dust thou art, and unto Dust thou shalt return. Here man is not only sentenced to Death, but also to the Grave. Under which understand, all Sicknesses, Diseases, Causes, Occasions, Harbingers or inlets to Death, as harmful influence of the Heavens, infectiousness of the air, unwholsomeness of the Earth, &c. 8. Expulsion of man out of Paradise, and Guarding it and the Tree of life, with Cherubims and a flaming sword turning every way, to keep the way of the Tree of life: That Adam might not fondly delude himself with vain hopes of life by the Sacrament of the Covenant of works, when he had broken the Covenant itself. These, these were the woeful Evils of Punishment, that like a Torrent burst in upon our First Parents presently upon their fall, and in them upon all mankind. To speak nothing of the miseries of man in this world in respect of his Goods, Relations, Name, Body and Soul, which are innumerable: Nor of his endless Calamities in the world to come, which (without Christ) are inevitable and intolerable.

Hitherto hath been evidenced at large, 1. That Adam brake the Covenant of works. 2. How Adam brake this Covenant by disobedience. 3. When and how soon he brake it. 4. How grievous and heinous this his Breach of Covenant was. Now in the last place, 5. Certain Corollaries, flowing from all are to be Considered.

V. Corollaries, resulting from this Aphorism, and the Explanation of it, are divers. As, 1. Hence; Not only Adam, but all mankind in Adam were Covenant-Breakers with God. It hath formerly been cleared, tha •… not only Adam but all his Posterity were Parties to this Covenant with God: Consequently, in Adams Covenant-breaking, they all became Covenant-breakers with God. Its dangerous to be Covenant-breakers with man: dreadful to be Covenant-breakers with God. Here seriously consider, 1. That Covenant-keeping is most acceptable to God. For, 1▪ God commands us to keep Covenant with himself. 2. God's Promises are to them that keep Covenant with him. To David, that if his children would keep his Covenant, they should sit upon his Throne for evermore. To all the Godly, That the mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting upon them that fear him; and his righteousness unto children's children: To such as keep his Covenant, and to those that remember his Commandments to do them. 3. Covenant-keeping makes us like God, and notably resemble him, who is the faithful God, which keepeth Covenant and mercy with them that love him, and keep his Commandments to a thousand generations. And the more we resemble God, the more acceptable we are unto God. 4. Covenant-keeping with God, obtains rich recompense from God. Levi, for observing God's word and keeping his Covenant, is stablished and accepted in his office, and divinely blessed. Yea All the paths of the Lord are mercy and truth unto such as keep his Covenant and his Testimonies. II. That contrariwise Covenant-breaking is most abominable to God. For 1. Covenant-breaking is ranked by the Holy Ghost amongst the worst of Sins, & Covenant-breakers among the vilest of Sinners. And God cannot abide that such should any way so much as profess, name, or meddle with his Covenant. 2. Covenant-breaking is Exposed to many Threatenings. 3. Covenant-breaking pulls down upon men's heads many severe and heavy Judgments. How was Israel plagued, for dealing falsely in God's Covenant, again and again? yea How hath God taken vengeance even upon them that have broke their Covenants with men! Joshua and Israel made a Covenant with the Gibeonites, that they should live peaceably with them: King Saul contrary thereunto slew some of them; whereupon the Philistines slew him and his sons, and many of the Israelites; and the whole land was plagued with a three years famine, till seven of Saul's sons were hanged at the request of the Gibeonites. Zedekiah brake Covenant with Nebuchadnezzar, and God delivered him into the hands of his Enemies, who slew his sons before his eyes, and then put out his eyes. Now if they that brake Covenant with man are thus plagued: where shall they appear that have broke Covenant with the living God, and that in Paradise?

2. Hence, Adam's first Sin, his Covenant-breaking Sin, and ours in him, was not small, but extremely sinful. The Act of eating of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge, seems to be a small matter: whereupon some have seemed to excuse and extenuate his sin. But how ignorantly, how inconsiderately! Can that sin be small, thats clothed with such and so many unparalleled Aggravations, as have been already unfolded?

3. Hence The Covenant of Works being broken by the first Adam, and by all mankind in him: He and all his Posterity lie woefully involved under the Curse and Penalty of it, even Death itself. This Corollary is of great Importance, and most seriously to be considered. For opening of it, Note 1. Why Adam and all his Posterity, upon breach of the Covenant of works lie involved under the Curse and Penalty of it, Death. 2. What Death it is under which they lie involved, and How they are so involved. 3. What are the Aggravations of this their sad condition under Death for sin.

(1) Adam and all his Posterity upon breach of the Covenant of works lie involved under the Curse and Penalty of it, Death itself. 1. Because God in making Covenant with Adam and his Posterity threatened present and certain Death, in Case of breach thereof by disobedience in eating the forbidden fruit. The Covenant therefore being broken, it concerned God in point both of Justice and Truth, wherein he is incomparable, to inflict upon them the punishment threatened. Otherwise God had not been True and Just in his words and ways. 2. Because Death is the Proper wages of Sin, and eternal Death the most adequate and proportionable recompense thereof. Hence the Apostle saith By one man sin entered into the world, and Death by Sin: and so death passed upon all men by that one man, in whom all have sinned. And again, By the offense of one, judgment came upon all men •… o Condemnation. 3. Because God made his Covenant not only with Adam, but with all his Posterity in him, as hath been already shown: and therefore when Adam fell from his integrity, he fell not alone, nor brought the Curse and Penalty of the Covenant upon himself alone, but all his ordinary Posterity fell in him, were involved under the Penalty of Death with him. 4. Because The Covenant of Works in the Nature of it, under pain of the Curse and Death, requires perfect and perpetual Personal obedience: According to that of the Apostle, As many as are of the works of the Law, are under the Curse, (presupposing man's Fall, and consequently his inability to keep it): For it is written, Cursed is everyone that that continueth not in all things which are written in the Book of the Law to do them. The Covenant of works therefore affords no mercy to the Transgressors thereof: but inflicts Death and the Curse for the least delinquency. For whosoever shall keeep the whole Law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all.

(2) What Death it is under which Adam and all his Posterity lie involved: and how they are so involved under Death, though Adam did not presently die; hath before been declared. Only here I add, touching Corporal Death, That we may consider three things, viz. The Commination, Sentence, and execution of it. 1. The Commination or Threatning of Death Corporal, as well as Spiritual or Eternal, in case of disobedience, was Propounded to Adam in innocence, to keep him in due obedience. 2. The Sentence of Corporal Death was pronounced upon Adam presently upon his disobedience in the same Day that he did eat of the forbidden fruit, in these words; Dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return. So that Adam was now as A condemned malefactor: Dead in Law, Civilly Dead; to be executed at the Judges pleasure. 3. The Execution of Corporal Death upon Adam and his Posterity was respited a while. The Death of Adam, and so of the Fathers before the Flood was respited for about 900 years: so long God reprieved them in the First world, from Adam to Noah. In the second world from Noah to Abraham, Mans Life, or man's Reprieve from death, is shortened half in half, and brought to about 450. years. In the third world, from Abraham to Moses, Mans Life was contracted to 100 and some odd years. Yea Moses himself saith, The days of our years are threescore years and ten, and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years, yet is their strength labor and sorrow: for it is soon cut off and we fly away. To this short scantling of 70 or 80 years, are our lives reduced, few reach to 100. Thus the Sentence of Death Corporal is executed upon all mankind, by degrees, to this day, and so will be to the end of the world.

(3) The Aggravations of this sad Condition of Adam and his Posterity under the Penalty of the Covenant of works broken, are dreadful. For clearing hereof we are to consider Adam and his Posterity after breach of the Covenant of works, as in a fourfold estate, viz. As Covenantless; As Carnal; As Gracious; As Glorious. I. In a Covenantless estate, were Adam and all his Posterity in the interval, of space betwixt the breach of the Covenant of works and the Making known the Covenant of Faith in Christ. From the Fall, till the Promise of the Seed of the woman, Adam and all his Posterity were Covenantless, without all Covenant with God. They had not the Covenant of works, for that was Broken: Nor the Covenant of of Faith in Christ, for that was not yet revealed. Hence, In this Covenantless Condition, Adam and all his Posterity were involved under the penalty of Death, 1. Without all Remedy. For Christ, the only Remedy against Sin and Death, was not as yet Promised or Revealed at all. 2.