An exact collection of the works of Doctor Jackson ... such as were not published before : Christ exercising his everlasting priesthood ... or, a treatise of that knowledge of Christ which consists in the true estimate or experimental valuation of his death, resurrection, and exercise of his everlasting sacerdotal function ... : this estimate cannot rightly be made without a right understanding of the primeval state of Adam ...

CHAP. VI.

The usuall distinction between the Act and obliquitie of the Act, can have no place in the first oblique Act of our first Parents.

1. THe former Question or Probleme might justly be allowed in any Aca∣demicall Act or Commencement, albeit the Answerer or Defendant were furnished with no other grounds or occasions of his Theses, besides that usually avouched Distinction between the Act and Obliquitie of the Act; specially if the Distinction were applyed unto the First Sin of our First Parents. In that sin whether we refer it to our Father Adam, or to our Mother Eve, the Act and the Obliquitie are altogether as unseparably annexed, as Rotun∣ditie or roundnes is with a Sphere or moulded Bullet. And to imagine there should be one Cause of the Act, and another of the Obliquitie or sinfulness of the Act, would be as gross a Soloecisme, as to assigne or seek after any other Cause of the Rotunditie or roundnesse of a Sphere or Bullet, besides him that frames the one or moulds the other: or as it would be to enquire any other Cause of the equality between two bodies before unequall, be∣sides him that makes the quantity to be of one and the same-size or scant∣ling; or of the similitude between the Fleece of a black sheepe, and of a white sheep perfectly dyed black, besides the Dyer. Now the similitude betwixt that which is perfectly dyed black and that which is black by na∣ture,

doth inevitably result from the Dyer without the intervention of any other Cause imaginable. Easie it were to produce a volume of like instan∣ces in the workes of nature, or of mens works and practises upon them; all of them concludently enforcing the resolution of the former Probleme to be allowable in Schooles, by most perfect and absolute Induction, if Arts or Sciences were once so happy as to have none but true and accurate Artists to be their Judges. As indeed they are the sole competent Judges in like Cases, and Judges they are within these precincts as Competent, as the Reverend Judges of this or any other Land are in Causes Civil, Municipal, or Criminal.

2. Admit then a man were found guilty of murther by a Jury of his honest Neighbours upon the Authentick Testimonies of two or three witnesses which had seen him run his Neighbour through the body in some vitall part, or to cleave his head in two, and a Philosopher or Physitian should undertake to arrest the Judgement or make Remonstrance to the Judge, that the Delin∣quent arraigned, and convicted by the Jurie, was not the true or immedi∣ate Cause of the others death, upon these or the like allegations out of his own facultie;

That death properly consists in the dissolution of naturall heate and moysture, whereas the party arraigned did never intend to make any such dissolution, or to terminate his Action to the point of death, but onely to thrust his sword through him or to knock him in the head, which Actions can have no direct Terme, besides the Vbi or Terme of lo∣call motion:

Can we imagine that any Judge could be so milde as not to censure such an Apologizer for a saucy Artificiall Foole or a Crack'd-brained Sophister? And yet this Apologie is not, cannot be in vulgar judgments so Censurable of Artificiall folly, as the former Apologie for salving the Es∣capes, Errors, or ill Expressions of some Learned and Pious Men, by nice distinctions betwixt the Act, and the Sinfulnesse of it, in our First Parents Case, was. For there is not so immediate or so absolute or necessary connexion between death and the deadliest wound that can be given to any man, as there is between Acts peremptorily forbidden by the Law of God, and the Obliquitie or sinfulnesse of them. For there is not, neither is it possible there should be, any minute of time, or, which is less then the least part of a minute, any moment of time, betwixt such Acts, and the Ob∣liquitie resulting from them. Both of them come together, both in respect of order of time, and of nature, by absolute indispensable Necessity: Where∣as between death and wounds given meritorious of Capital punishment, there usually is a distance of time, and oftentimes no absolute or unpreven∣table necessity, that the one should follow within a year and a day of the other.

3. But the best Method to convince such as Invented or used the former Distinction, of gross error and somewhat more then so, will be to retort their own Illustrations or justifications of it, upon themselves; as I have learned by successefull Experience upon some learned Ingenuous students which have revoked their own opinions, and reclaimed others upon the reading of my meditations upon this argument in another Dialect. One of the most usuall Illustrations or intended corroborations of the former di∣stinction is borrowed from a Man, that rides a Lame or halting horse. Such a rider, say they, (especially if he ride with switch and spur,) is the Cause why the horse goes or runs as fast as he can, but not the Cause of his lame∣nesse or of his halting. Of his lamenesse, supposed he was lam'd before, the Rider (I confess) is no Cause: yet of his actuall halting down-right, or of

the increase of the lameness which will follow upon the unseasonable riding or over-riding, he is the only Cause. For if the poor Beast might have rest∣ed his bones when he was enforced to trot or gallop, he would not have halt∣ed at all at that time, nor would he have been so grievously lame, as by such unseasonable usage he is. But this instance or Illustration, suppose it were not much amisse in respect of men now living, can no way sute or fit the Question concerning the sin of our First Parents. For Adam at his crea∣tion was no way lame or defective either in soul or body, before he tasted of the forbidden Fruit. Now if the Almighty Creator had been the cause of this Act, he had been as true a Cause of the First sin, or of Adams halting in his service; as he that bestrides a sound and lusty horse, and runs him upon the spur in a rugged and stony ground, or in a deep way, is of the lame∣nesse, of the death, or any disease which ensues such desperate riding.

4. To imagin that God should deal so hardly with the First Adam, as to give him a Law which he intended to make him break, and yet to punish him with death for the breach of it; Or that the Second Adam, the wisdom of God should send wise men and Prophets to Jerusalem, to the intent or End that She should stone or put them to death; or for this purpose, that their bloud should in later dayes be required of Her, (as some in our times have publick∣ly taught) is an Imagination in it self much worse and more dangerous then the erection of Images (though Roman-wise) in Reformed Churches; A greater Abomination then any Idol of the Heathens. For Images or Idols are but the External Objects of, or enticements unto grosse Idolatry. Nor was it the Carpenter or Statuary that did make the Heathen gods or Idols: Who then? Qui colit, ille facit; He or they alone turn Images or Pictures into Idols or false Gods, which worship or adore them. But the former Opinion or imagination, whether in respect of God, as he was the First mans Crea∣tor, or of the wisdom of God, as he is our Lord and Re∣deemer, is Intrinsecal and Formal Idolatry, or Idolatry in the Abstract, with∣out any external Object to dote upon, or to entice men to bestow worship upon it. The Heathens committed Idolatry in their Temples, or in their houses: but this Idolatry is committed within his Brain that entertains it: The Essence of it formally consists in the Reflexion of the Imagination upon it self, or in the complacency which men take in such Reflexions; if any man happily (which I much doubt) can be delighted with such imaginations. The very height of Heathenish Idolatry, as our Apostle instructs us, Rom. 1. 23, &c. did consist in changing the glory of the uncorruptible God, into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things. Now if the wisdom of God had sent wise-men and Pro∣phets unto the Jews, unto the End that Jerusalem should be destroyed, and righteous bloud required of them, His weeping over Jerusalem had better resembled or expressed the disposition of a Crocodile, then the Nature either of God or any good Man. Nor was it greater Idolatry in the Heathen, to change the glory of the uncorruptible God into the image or likenesse of a Crocodile, as the Egyptians did; then it is to ascribe the properties of this noysome beast, or any such disposition, as the Historical Emblem of the Cro∣codile doth represent, unto the Son of God, who came into the world, not to destroy or hurt, but to save sinners, and to be consecrated to be the Author of Everlasting Salvation to all that Obey him. These Two Branches of Idolatry; The One planted in the Egyptian, who worshipped the Crocodile for his god; The other in such as worship or nourish such sinister imaginations (of

the Son of God) as have been specified; differ no more, then the way from Athens to Thebes, doth from the way from Thebes to Athens.

5. The main head or source original whence all or most of the harsh ex∣pressions whether of Reformed writers, or of Roman Catholiques; whence all the aspersions which both or either of them indirectly, or by way of ne∣cessary consequence, cast upon our Lord Creator and Redeemer, naturally issue, is that Common or Fundamental Errour, That all things, (the changes and chances of this inferior World not excepted) are necessary in respect of God, or of his irresistible Decree: That nothing, not humane Acts, can be Con∣tingent, save only with reference to Second Causes. Now if there be no Con∣tingency in humanc Acts, there neither is, nor ever was, nor ever can be, any Free-will in man. The original of this common Error; [That all things are Necessary in respect of the Divine Decree,] hath been sufficiently discovered in the sixth book of these Commentaries upon the Apostles Creed, Sect. 2. Chap. 12. Where the Reader may find the Truth of this Proposition or Con∣clusion clearly demonstrated; [That to Decree a Contingency in some works or Course of Nature, in Humane Acts especially, was as possible to him unto whom no∣thing is impossible, as it was to decree a Necessity in some others works or Courses of Nature.] As for instance, To Decree or constitute that our Father Adam should have a Free power or Faculty either to eat or not to eat of the Forbid∣den Fruit, doth imply no Contradiction; and therefore was absolutely pos∣sible to the Almighty Creator so to ordain or Decree. But many things (as the observant Reader will except) are possible which are not probable, or never are brought into Act. True; Yet that the Almighty Creator, did de Facto, or actually decree, a Mutual Possibility of Adams Falling and not Falling, or between his Fall and Perseverance, hath been in this present Treatise, and in some others demonstrated from the Article Concerning The Goodness of God or his Gratious providence, by such Demonstration, as the Case now in handling, is capable of: that is, by Evident Deduction of the Contradictory Opinion, to this Impossibility,

That God otherwise was the only Cause of our First Parents sins, and of all other sins which neces∣sarily issue from their sins; unlesse it be granted and agreed upon, that Adams Falling or not Falling should both be alike possible; that neither should or could be necessary either to the First or Second Causes.

To deny that God did ordain or constitute a true and Facible Mean between the Necessity of Adams Perseverance in the State wherein he was created, and the Necessity of his Falling into sin, that is, a mutual Possibility of falling or not of Falling into sin, would imply as Evident a Contradiction unto, or impeachment of his Good∣ness, as it would do to his Omnipotency, if any man should peremptorily deny that the Constitution or Tenour of such a Decree were possible to his Almighty power. To say, God could not possibly make such a disjunctive Decree, or such a Tenour of mutual possibility betwixt things Decreed, as hath been often mentioned, would be a grosse Error, yet an error (I take it) not so dan∣gerous, as to deny that he did de Facto make such a Decree. For our Gratious Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier is doubtless more jealous to have his Goodness impeached or suspected, then to have his Almighty Power questioned.

6. Thus much of the main general Query, Concerning the manner how sin (or that evil which we call Malum culpae) did find First entrance into the works of God, and in particular into the nature of Man: from the first mo∣ment of whose creation, he and all the rest of Gods visible works, had this Elogium or commendation, that they were Exceeding Good▪ No entrance of sin into the works of God, into man especially, was possible, without the

Incogitancy or Inadvertency of a Free Cause or Agent. The true nature of the first sin and of its haynousnesse did especially consist in this, that whereas our gratious Creator had endowed our First Parents with a Power or faculty to Doe well, exceeding well; and given them good encouragement to per∣severe in so doing, they should so incogitantly and quickly abuse this power, and the Divine Concourse or assistance that did attend it, to do that which was evil; that which the Lord their Creator had so peremptorily forbidden them to do, under commination of a dreadful punishment to ensue upon the doing of it. The difficulty or main Querie which remains (all that hath been said being granted) is principally this: [How this one sinful Act of our First Parents could possibly produce an Habit of sin, or that which is more then a Ha∣bit, an unmoveable custome of sin, or an Hereditary disease of sinfulness through∣out all the successions of the sons of Adam, to the worlds end.] The second Querie, (yet in the first place to be discuss'd) is this, [Wherein the nature of that hereditary disease which we call Sin Original doth properly consist.] The third, [How this hereditary disease doth bring all mankind into a true and pro∣per servitude to sin, and by sin, unto Satan &c.] In the discussion of this and many other difficulties depending upon it, I shall endeavour to observe that Rule which Chemnitius in many of his works hath commended to the obser∣vation of every Student in Divinity; and his Rule is this: To state all Que∣stions upon those places of Scripture out of which they are naturally emergent, or out of those passages, upon whose mistakings or non-observance of them, many Theological controversies were first occasioned, and are to this day abetted or maintained with eagerness of dissension. To begin first with that most hea∣venly discourse of our Saviour, John 8. 30, &c.

Notes

• The Illustrati∣on of the fore∣mentioned distinction re∣torted upon such as use it.
• In solenni Lectione
• Many commit more gross Ido∣latry with their own fancies, then the Hea∣then did with their Idols.
• Qui fingit sacros, auro vel marmore, vultus,
• Non facit ille Deos; qui colit, ille facit.
• Martial.
• Heb. 5. 9.
• The original occasion of the former errors or ill expressi∣ons.