EFFECT OF THE FALL UPON THE RACE

Adam, as the first, was father of the race, whatever affected his nature, affected the nature of his descendants. By the simple law of heredity or race connection, the injured nature of Adam would be passed on to his offspring. It is a righteous and beneficent law-an expression of the infinite wisdom of God. It helps to propagate good qualities as well as bad, and so blesses as well as curse men. We cannot condemn the law without condemning God; and in practical life we could not get along without it. We must accept the evil effects if we would have the good.

Now in a way the trial and fall of our first parents was the trial and fall of the race. It was a trial of a good specimen of human nature under favorable conditions. To God it was not an experiment. He foresaw the result; but it was necessary that such an experiment should be made, and such an exhibition of human nature should be given to the world to justify the ways of God to men.

"At once there was a change in God's treatment of the race, penalty was visited upon them for their disobedience. A sterner discipline was adopted-a treatment better fitted to a weak and temptable and sinful race. The conditions of Eden were good to begin with, but not to continue; and thus our first parents were sent out of the garden and subjected to new conditions of hardship, labor, suffering, toil and death; and the race went with them into these stern conditions. The change must be accepted as a token of God's displeasure; yet it was rather disciplinary than penal. A promise was added, with the expulsion from Eden, and hope encouraged, God's providence and care over His sinful creatures was continued; and the work of regeneration and redemption of man went on.

This was the fall of man, a fall into a depressed and painful condition. On the part of our first parents, it was a fall into sin;| on the part of the race, it was a coming down from ease and external blessedness, bordering on heaven and immortal life, to hard-f ship, suffering and death. Under these stern conditions the race ha; been propagated, and has existed, from that day to this. Every man is born to a heritage of hardship and evil; and every man as he enters upon moral agency, falls into sin. The evidence is that this condition of hardship is appropriate to a temptable and sinful race, that the ease and pleasantness of Eden was unfavorable. The trial or experiment of Eden was necessary at the beginning; otherwise men might have had occasion to call in question God's wisdom and goodness.

All the descendants of Adam inherit his weak and temptable nature, and in their turn fall under temptation and sin, and thus come into condemnation; "And so death passed upon all men for that all have sinned." Men are a fallen race not simply because Adam sinned, but because "all have sinned and have come short of the glory of God." We receive then, from Adam, by natural generation, our weak and temptable nature, by which we sin and come into condemnation; and also, this depressed condition of the race, involving all the trials and hardships and discipline of life, and finally death itself" (Fairchild's Theology, pp. 156, 157).

I. We here meet the phrase-original sin.

In Augustinian anthropology, original sin includes: 1. A common guilt of Adam's sin; 2.A common native depravity as the consequence of that guilt; and 3. A sinfulness of the depravity which in all men deserves both temporal and eternal punishment. Webster defines it as "The imputation of Adam's sin to his posterity, or a natural corruption and tendency to sin inherited from him."

An old Calvinistic Confession says: "By this sin (of our first parents) they, and we in them, fell from original righteousness and communion with God, and so became dead in sin, and wholly defiled in all the faculties and parts of soul and body. They being the root, and by God's appointment standing in the room and stead of all mankind, the guilt of this sin was imputed, and corrupted nature conveyed to all their posterity descending from them by ordinary generation. From this original corruption whereby we are utterly Indisposed, disabled, and made opposite to all good, and wholly inclined to all evil, do proceed all actual transgressions. Every sin, both original and actual, being a transgression of the righteous law of God, and contrary thereunto doth in its own nature bring guilt upon the sinner, whereby he is bound over to the wrath of God, and curse of the law, and so made subject to death, with all miseries, spiritual, temporal and eternal."

This is the doctrine of original sin as usually held by Calvinistic writers. Unfortunately it has been borrowed by many Methodist theologians. Ralston says (p. 120), "We believe the most rational and Scriptural view of the subject is, that Adam, in the transaction of the fall, was the federal head and proper legal representative of his posterity, in-so-much that they fell in him as truly, in view of the law as he fell himself; and that the consequences of the first sin are visited upon them, as a penal infliction, for the guilt of Adam imputed to them. That such was the relation of Adam to his posterity we think can be satisfactorily shown." Then he labors through forty pages to show it to his own satisfaction. But two hundred and thirty pages later in his theology in Chapters XXIX and XXX, finding his doctrine of "Imputation" an inconvenient burden he throws it all overboard, and says there is no such thing. On page 388, he says: "We remark, in reference to impute and imputation that these terms are never used as implying the imputation of something possessed by, or done by, one person to another as his own. But, on the contrary, these words are always spoken in reference to something possessed or performed by the person to whom the imputation is made. Thus it is said, "Abraham believed God, and it (the faith of Abraham) was imputed to him for righteousness." Again: But to him that worketh not, but believeth, his faith is imputed to him for righteousness"-that is, his own faith, and not the faith of another man. On page 389, he says: "To come home to the imputation of Adam's sin to his posterity, I answer, first, that either to say that the righteousness of Christ is imputed to his posterity (of believers) or the sin of Adam to his, are both expressions at least unknown to the Holy Ghost in the Scriptures. There is neither word, nor syllable, nor letter, nor title, of any such thing to be found there." Methodist theologians need to be exceedingly careful about adopting any of the peculiar phrases or fictions of Calvinism into their writings. They are sure to bring them trouble afterward; for they can not possibly be any consistent portion of Methodist theology.

Now that we have mentioned this strange doctrine of imputation, which is in the mouth and writings of so many theologians, we will finish the discussion of it.

We have examined every passage in the Bible where the word occurs, and in every case it is a man's own character or conduct that is imputed to him, and not some other person's. Dr. Albert Barnes, the Bible commentator of blessed memory in his "Romans" 4: 3 declares that there is not a passage in the Old or New Testament where the word impute means to transfer one person's moral desert to another. He says: "The word is never used to denote charging that on one which does not properly belong to him." He was a mild Calvinist; but he was too honest not to admit this truth. This is precisely what we might expect. If there is anything in the moral, universe that is strictly personal and private it is moral character. Nobody's sin or holiness can by any possibility be charged up against or credited to anybody else. Yet this absurd notion has filled the theologies for centuries.

President Fairchild comments thus: "Nor is it implied that the sin of Adam is imputed to his posterity in the sense that it is regarded as theirs. Sin belongs to him who commits it; and it cannot in any proper sense be charged to another. The least offensive form of this imputation is, that the sin of Adam is charged to his posterity, not in the sense that the unworthiness or wickedness is theirs, but the guilt, or liability to punishment is imputed to them. This imputation is supposed to be the ground upon which God gives to Adam's posterity by a sovereign act, a corrupt nature. The corrupt nature is sinful, ill-deserving, and all its motions are necessarily sinful; and thus men fall under the wrath and curse of God. The ground of this supposed imputation is, by some, held to be that Adam was the natural and federal head of the race; that by God's appointment he acted for his posterity. His acts are properly attributed to them, and they are held responsible, in a legal sense-not responsible for all the sins of Adam, nor for the sins of our ancestors generally, but only for the first sin. This it is claimed, was in accordance with a special covenant, or appointment, of God. The view is too formal and mechanical and arbitrary; it lacks the character of naturalness and reasonableness, and could be accepted, if at all, only on the ground of a positive revelation. It cannot be shown that we have any such revelation" (Theology, pp. 158, 159).

Finney, with his unsparing logic wrote of imputation as follows: "I could not receive that THEOLOGICAL FICTION OF IMPUTATION. First my teacher maintained that the guilt of Adam's first transgression is literally imputed to all his posterity; so that they are justly sentenced and exposed to eternal damnation for Adam's sin. Secondly, he maintained that we receive from Adam by natural generation, a nature wholly sinful, and morally corrupt in every faculty of soul and body; so that we are totally unable to perform any act acceptable to God, and are necessitated by our sinful natures to transgress his laws in every action of our lives. And this, he insisted, is the state into which all men fell by the first sin of Adam. For this sin of nature thus received from Adam by natural generation, all mankind are sentenced to, and are deserving of eternal damnation.

Thirdly, he maintained that we are all justly condemned and sentenced to eternal damnation for our own unavoidable transgressions of .the law. Thus we find ourselves justly subject to a triple eternal damnation!"

"Then the second branch of this wonderful imputation is as follows:

1. The sin of all the elect, both original and actual-that is, the guilt of Adam's sin together with the guilt of their sinful nature, and also the guilt of their personal transgressions, are all literally" imputed to Christ; and therefore the divine government regarded Him as an embodiment of all the sins and guilt of .the elect; and treated Him accordingly; that is, the Father punished the Son precisely as much as all the elect deserved. Hence their debt being thus fully discharged by the punishment of Christ, they are saved upon principles of exact justice."

"The third branch of this WONDERFUL THEOLOGICAL FICTION is as follows:

First, The obedience of Christ to the divine law is literally imputed to the elect; so that in him they are regarded as always having perfectly obeyed the laws.

Second, His death for them is also imputed to the elect; so that in him they are regarded as having fully suffered all that they deserve on account of the guilt of Adam's sin imputed to them, and also on account of their sinful nature, and also on account of all their personal transgressions.

Third. Thus by their surety the elect have perfectly obeyed the law; and then they have by their surety suffered full penalty to which they were subject in consequence of Adam's sin imputed to them, and also the guilt of their sinful nature, and still further their blameworthiness for their personal transgressions. Thus they were punished in Christ as if they had not obeyed in him. He FIRST perfectly obeys for them, which obedience is strictly imputed to them, so that they are regarded by the government of God a having fully obeyed in their surety; SECOND, He has suffered for them the penalty of the law, just as if no obedience had been rendered; THIRD, after the law had been doubly satisfied, the elect are still required to repent as if no satisfaction had been' rendered FOURTH, payment in full having been rendered twice over, the discharge of the elect is claimed to be an act of infinite grace. Thus the elect are saved by grace, on principles of justice, so that strictly there is no grace or mercy in our forgiveness, but the whole grace o our salvation is found in the obedience and suffering of Christ.

It follows that the elect may demand their discharge on the score of strict justice. They need not pray for pardon or forgiveness; it is all a mistake. This inference is my own; but it follows, as every one can see, irresistibly, from what the confession of faith itself asserts, that the elect are saved on principles of exact and perfect justice" (Finney's Autobiography, pp. 56-58).

Surely nothing more is needed to show the utter absurdity of this doctrine of the imputation of Adam's sin, and of Christ's righteousness. Nothing but the supposed exigencies of a system of theology would lead men to believe that countless billions of immortal beings could be considered worthy of, and liable to, eternal damnation for the guilt of one sin committed before they were born, and arbitrarily imputed to them. There is not a millionth of a probability that a holy God would treat moral beings in that way.

Dr. Daniel Steele was once asked (question 904): "In what sense were Adam and Eve created holy? And how did they before they sinned differ from infants?" Answer: "They had no leaning toward sin. This is negative holiness. To have positive holiness they must make it their choice. They chose sin, and did not become positively holy under the dispensation of law, but we trust they did under the dispensation of grace, foreshadowed in the promise of the Savior. None of the descendants of Adam-save the second Adam-have had a concreated, or negative, purity. BUT THIS DEFECT DOES NOT ENTAIL GUILT IN THE NEW BORN INFANT, as a hard and severe theology once taught, although it still lingers in some belated creeds. Where sin abounds in its effects, grace does now under the atonement much more abound in its conditional blessings. Positive holiness is within the reach of every believer in Christ, and is freely bestowed upon every infant denied a probation." Amen! In other words, there is no imputation of the guilt of Adam's sin upon the infant or anybody.

Men have recoiled from this horrible doctrine of imputation into infidelity in vast numbers. Others have accepted the doctrine and been swept by its logical consequences into antinomian-ism. What could be more reasonable? If Christ obeyed for us, why do we need to obey? If his holiness is imputed to us why do we need to be holy? Calvinists have imbibed the idea of "a finished salvation for all the elect"-finished in the plans of God from all eternity, and effected on Calvary, so that their sins were forgiven before they committed them, and "they were justified and sanctified and glorified before they were born."

John Fletcher pieced together the following confession of faith from the writings of a "plain spoken Calvinist" of his day, and there is much of this kind of thought in the minds of Calvinists still, for it is a logical inference from their creed, and the writer of these lines has heard it from the lips of living men:

Confession I. "I believe in God the Father Almighty, who from all eternity, unconditionally predestinated me to life, and absolutely chose me to eternal salvation. Whom he once loved he will love forever; I am therefore persuaded (pp. 28-31) that, as he did not set his love on me at first for anything in me, so that love, which is not at all dependent upon anything in me, can never vary on account of my miscarriages; and for this reason when I miscarry, (suppose by adultery or murder) God ever considers me as one with His own Son, who has fulfilled all righteousness for me. And as He is always well pleased with Him so with me, who am absolutely bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh (pp. 26, 31). There are no lengths, then, I may not run, nor any depths I may not fall into, without displeasing Him; as I see in David, who, notwithstanding his repeated backslidings, did not lose the character of the man after God's own heart. I may murder with him, worship Ashtaroth with Solomon, deny Christ with Peter, rob with Onesimus, and commit incest with the Corinthian, without forfeiting either the divine favor or the kingdom of glory. Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect? to the charge of a believer? to my charge? For,

II. Pages 26, 27, 32, "I believe in Jesus Christ, that by one offering has forever perfected me, who am sanctified in all my sins: -In Him I am complete in all my iniquities. What is all sin before His atoning blood? Either He has fulfilled the whole law, and borne the curse, or he has not. If he has not, no soul can be saved: If he has, then all debts and claims against His people and me, be they more (suppose a thousand adulteries and so many murders) or be they less, (suppose only one robbery) be they small, or be they great, be they before or be they after my conversion, are forever and forever, cancelled. I set up no more mountainous distinctions of sin, especially sins after conversion. Whether I am dejected with Elijah under the juniper-tree, or worshipping Milcom with Solomon, whether I mistake the voice of the Lord for that of his priest as Samuel, or defile my neighbor's bed as David; I am equally accepted in the Beloved. For in Christ I am chosen, loved, called, and unconditionally preserved to the end. All these trespasses are forgiven me-I am justified from all things. I already have everlasting life. Nay, I am now (virtually) set down in heavenly places with Christ, and as soon shall Satan pluck His crown from his Head as His purchase from His hand.

Pages 27, 28, "Yes, I avow it in the face of all the world; no falls or backslidings can ever again bring me under condemnation; for Christ hath made me free from the law of sin and death. Should I out sin Manasseh himself, I should not be a less pleasant child; because God always views me IN CHRIST, and IN HIM I am without spot or wrinkle or any such thing. Black in myself, I am still comely through the comeliness put upon me; and therefore, He who is of purer eyes than to behold iniquity, can, in the midst of all adulteries, murders and incest, address me with, 'Thou art all fair, my love, my undefiled, there is no spot in thee! And,

III. "I believe in the Holy Ghost, the Spirit of Grace, against whom I can never sin (p. 26) whose light and love, I can never quench, to whom I can never do despite, and who, in His good time, will IRRESISTIBLY and INFALLIBLY (Review, p. 38) work in me to will and to do. In the mean time, I am perfectly secure; for I can never perish, MY SALVATION BEING ALREADY FINISHED in the full extent of the expression (Review p. 63)." (Check's Vol. II, pp. 107-109). We could quote pages of similar horrible antinomian teaching, all logically inferred from this wretched Calvinistic "IMPUTATION," "IDENTIFICATION WITH CHRIST," "FINISHED SALVATION," "IRRESISTIBLE GRACE," and "FINAL PERSEVERANCE." We met this teaching in Scotland, the home of Calvinism, where three men at once leaped to their feet and interrupted us in the midst of a sermon, screaming out at the top of their voices, these very doctrines. They were Plymouth Brethren. Mrs. Catherine Booth met these teachings and spoke and wrote against them, as her Biography reveals. Dr. Daniel Steele met them in England. He was asked,- are the doctrines of the Plymouth Brethren Scriptural? If not, wherein lies the error? He answered: "They are the tallest Calvinists who walk the earth of the antinomian type. Their sins, past and future, were all punished on Calvary, hence they do not need to repent, nor to be forgiven. Believers are literally incorporated into Christ's glorified body in heaven, and are perfectly safe, though they constantly commit gross sins. Mr. Darby, their founder, once said to me, 'Jesus Christ, in whom we are incorporated, does not walk about in heaven dropping off fingers and toes.' This is their STANDING. God sees them only in their STANDING, not in their sinful state. They will be judged only in their STANDING in which they are as holy as Christ, because they are parts of Him. Their sins are of no account. Christ's righteousness is IMPUTED to them. By quoting and perverting Scripture they gain converts" (question 2482). Of course such people reject sanctification with one accord. They have sanctification as a STANDING in Christ; therefore, they do not need it as an experience in their own hearts. Let every preacher and teacher and theologian drop the words, impute, and imputation, from his working vocabulary, just as the revisers dropped the words from our revised Bible. Behind them lurk the rankest heresies of theological thought.

We have given the Calvinistic statement of original sin, and pointed out the fallacy of it. Let it be understood, we are not denying the doctrine of depravity. It is the only explanation of the moral history of the race. "It is within us and of us, not as a physical entity, or any form of essential existence, but as a moral condition or state. As such, it is below consciousness, but reveals itself in activities. These are conclusive both of its reality and evil quality. Many things are beyond apprehension in their mode, yet fully certain in their reality. We know not the difference in the inner states of the lion and the lamb; but we know there is a difference which determines the ferocity of the one and the gentleness of the other. So there are differences in the lives of men which lead to the certainty of a difference in their inner states" (Miley, Vol. I, p. 442). There is a something within-a moral condition which determines the difference between the life of the holy Apostle Paul, and the cruel, lustful monster Nero-between the arch-angel Gabriel and Satan. They are all moral beings, having intellect, sensibility and free-will. But there is a something which makes the difference between them. That something is what we are writing about. God is not responsible for it. It is the result of a moral fall. Sane and sound theologians call it MORAL DEPRAVITY. We are not going to surrender the term and the idea it conveys, to satisfy the flippant, and shallow, and profane. It means a deranged state of the spontaneous impulses and dispositions, and an abnormal condition of the moral nature-including conscience and moral reason.

Finney thought that all moral depravity was in the will. What he meant by it seems to have been that the word "moral" ought not to be applied to anything but voluntary acts. He admitted that man's entire nature was in a deranged condition from the fall. He wrote: "Man is not morally but physically depraved. Physical depravity may be predicated of all the powers and involuntary states of body and mind, of the intelligence, of the sensibility, and of the faculty of will. That is, the actings and states of the intelligence may become disordered, depraved, deranged or fallen from a state of integrity and healthiness. The sensibility or feeling department of the mind may be sadly and physically depraved. The appetites and passions, the desires and cravings, the antipathies and repellencies of the feelings fall into great disorder and anarchy. Artificial appetites are generated, and the whole sensibility becomes a wilderness, a chaos of conflicting and, clamorous desires, emotions and passions. The sensibility acts as a powerful impulse to the will, from the moment of birth, and secures the consent and activity of the will before the reason is at all developed. The will is thus committed to the gratification of feeling and appetite when first the idea of moral obligation is developed" (Theology, pp. 250-254).

We need nothing more for our discussion. Finney simply insisted on a technical use of the word moral. He admitted a derangement or depravity of our whole nature from the fall; but he insisted that we make OUR OWN MORAL DEPRAVITY, by our own depraved choices, since nothing should be called moral which is not the result of choice.

Miley makes the point that theologians who locate depravity in the will treat the will as a person, and not simply an instrumental faculty of the mind, which completes its power of personal action. "There is no impulse or inclination in the will itself. All impulse and inclination are from the sensibilities. The motives of action which arise through the sensibilities address their solicitations to the personal agent, and it is not for his will, but for himself in the use of his will, to refuse or accept these solicitations" (p. 443).

"The willing power is deeply involved in the depravity of our nature, but rather through the perversion of the sensibilities and the moral nature than by any direct effect upon the will itself" (Ibid, p. 443).

The sensuous nature (using the word sensuous in its most general sense, including the sensibilities of body and mind) is most affected by the fall. The feelings, in a healthful state of the sensuous nature, are subordinate to prudence and reason, and may perform their proper functions in harmony with a truly spiritual life. But depravity, brought on by the fall, is "A DISORDERED STATE OF THE SENSUOUS NATURE, WITH THE RESULT OF INORDINATE SENSIBILITIES. Thus arise evil tendencies and vicious impulses and appetencies, inordinate forms of feeling,-all that may be included in "the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life." There are many instances of such perverted and inordinate sensibilities, as indicate a disordered state of the sensuous nature. Such disordered state is a part of the depravity of human nature." Added to this is the disordered condition of the conscience and moral reason, so that the moral nature is darkened or perverted. The perception of duty is dim, the conscience is voiceless or ineffective. The vision of God is clouded and uncertain. He seems far away and unreal, and His effective power in the life is lost. The intuitions perceive Him necessarily; but He is no longer powerfully felt as a living presence in the moral consciousness.

"In such a state the soul is morally weak, the sensibilities are selfish and secular in impulse and tendency; and without proper moral restraint they easily run to excess and dominate the life" (Miley, p. 444). THIS IS SIN, THE YIELDING TO THE SENSIBILITIES INSTEAD OF OBEYING THE DICTATES OF RIGHT REASON. So it is that depravity, easily leads human lives into sin and brings them all into condemnation before God.

We can see, then, the effect of the fall. Adam and Eve sinned. Their own spiritual death followed-the deprivation of the peculiar sustaining presence of the Holy Spirit, and the consequent depravation of their sensuous nature and the darkening and weakening of their moral nature. This state was transmitted by the law of heredity to their descendants.

It might be asked-Did the fall of our first parents necessarily constitute all men sinners? To be critically exact, we must answer, No. As a Baptist theologian, Dr. Sheldon, says in his "Sin and Redemption," page 105: "I designedly guard against the view, that the sin of Adam has an immediate causal and determining influence on the sin of his posterity, that his sin directly makes them sinners. All men who sin make themselves sinners. Sin is always a personal and voluntary matter. Outward influences may contribute to lead men into sin; but they can only do this by gaining the consent of the men themselves. Adam had no absolute power to make a sinner of any human being beyond himself. He may have contributed by his example and influence to gain the consent of others to sin; but since, to use the words of Dr. Emmons, all (actual) sin consists in sinning, and hence implies a personal responsible sinner, a free moral agent acting for himself and on his own account, it is plainly in the power of no man whatever to create (voluntary) sin in another mind; just because no man has control of the volitions of another mind. What we say here is not only the spontaneous dictate of our reason; but it is the general current teaching of Scripture, implied in every warning against sin; 'if sinners entice thee, consent thou not'."

President Fairchild says: "The fall of man does not imply that men are born sinners. Such an idea is contrary to our reason and impossible. Sin cannot be a matter of nature, but of responsible, voluntary action. Human nature is not sinful as a nature; it is temptable and weak, liable to fall. A sinful nature in the sense of a blameworthy nature, that which brings the soul under the condemnation of God, is inconceivable and impossible. The idea involves a confusion of nature and character which should be held as utterly distinct. The passages of Scripture supposed to prove the doctrine that men are sinners by birth, are doubtless misinterpreted. Psalms 51: 5, "Behold I was shapen in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me," is an intense, poetical expression of utter sinfulness; and it is poor interpretation to employ it in the sense of a theological dogma. Psalm 58: 3, "The wicked are estranged from the womb; they go astray as soon as they are born, speaking lies." This is a similar expression of the utter perverseness of abandoned men. Eph.

2: 3, "Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature, the children of wrath, even as others." It is not necessary to make the passage involve an absurdity; and we are permitted to interpret the phrase by nature, with proper regard to what is reasonable and possible (Theology, pp. 157, 158).

President Finney, also, says: "The Bible once, and only once, incidentally intimates that Adam's sin has in some way been the OCCASION, not the necessary physical cause, of all the sins of men. (Rom. 5: 12-19). It neither says nor intimates anything in relation to the manner in which Adam's sin has occasioned this result. It only incidentally recognizes the fact, and then leaves it, just as if the quo modo was too obvious to need explanation (Theology, p. 253).

Like President Fairchild, while not denying the depravity of man's entire nature, he objects to the phrase "sinful nature" in the sense of "blame-worthy nature, that which brings the soul under the condemnation of God." He quotes the shorter catechism, "Wherein consists the sinfulness of that estate whereinto man fell? Answer. The Sinfulness of that estate whereinto man fell, consisteth in the guilt of Adam's first sin, the want of that righteousness wherein he was created, and the corruption of his nature, whereby he is utterly indisposed, disabled, and made opposite unto all that is spiritually good, and wholly inclined to all evil, and that continually, and from which do proceed all actual transgressions. Original sin is conveyed from our first parents unto their posterity by natural generation, so as all that proceed from them in that way, are conceived and born in sin." He comments thus: "These extracts show, that the framers and defenders of this confession of faith account for the moral depravity of mankind by making it to consist in a sinful nature, renders mankind utterly disabled from all that is spiritually good, and wholly inclined to all that is evil" (pp. 240,241). Eph. 2:3, "By nature, children of wrath." I remark upon this text that it cannot consistently with natural justice, be understood to mean, that we are exposed to the wrath of God on account of our nature. It is a monstrous and blasphemous dogma, that a holy God is angry with any creature for possessing a NATURE with which he was sent into being without his knowledge or consent. The Bible represents God as angry with men for their wicked deeds, and not for their NATURE. We speak of sinners before regeneration as in a state of nature. We do not necessarily mean that they have a nature sinful in itself, but merely that before regeneration they are universally and morally depraved, that this is their natural as opposed to their regenerate state. Total moral depravity is the state that follows and results from their first birth and is in this sense natural, and in this sense alone, can it be truly said, that they are by nature 'children of wrath.' But the Scriptures teach that men are to be punished only for their deeds" Finney found that this doctrine of "a sinful nature" was the stronghold of universalism, and of the Calvinistic doctrines of MORAL INABILITY and IRRESISTIBLE grace. "Universalists, assuming the doctrine of original constitutional sinfulness, they proceed to show that it would be infinitely unreasonable and unjust in God to send them to hell. What! Create them with a sinful nature, from which proceed, by law of necessity, actual transgressions, and then send them to an eternal hell, for having this nature, and for transgressions that are unavoidable! "Impossible!" say they, and the human intellect responds, Amen.

From the doctrine of a sinful nature, irresistibly flowed the doctrine of inability to repent, and the necessity of a physical regeneration. They infer the salvation of all men from God's benevolence and physical omnipotence. Men are constitutionally depraved, and are unable to repent. God will not, cannot send them to hell. They do not deserve it. Sin is a calamity, and God can save them, and he ought to do so. This is the substance of their argument, and assuming the truth of their premises, there is no evading their conclusions" (p. 252).

The Calvinists have reasoned thus: Man has a sinful nature as a result of the fall. It makes him wholly unable to do anything to please God. He is wholly unable to repent or believe. Out of this universal mass of moral impotents, God sovereignly and arbitrarily elects a few; upon these God, in His own good time, sends an "irresistible and efficacious grace, inducing repentance and faith." All these are inevitably and "infallibly saved"; all the rest are "infallibly damned," for inheriting a sinful nature from Adam, which they could not help! We may well say, the improbability of the truth of such a doctrine is infinite.

The most common Greek word for sin is hamartia. The first three definitions of it in the Lexicon before us are, "error, offence, sin." Of course these define actual sins for which we are directly responsible. The next three definitions are, "a principle or cause of sin; proneness to sin; sinful propensity." This means the inherited derangement or abnormality of nature, the sad result of the fall, and covered by the word depravity. For this we are not responsible or blameworthy, or guilty. It is our misfortune and not our fault. God does not blame us for it, but pities us, and, as a compensation for this abnormal condition of nature, with its weakness and temptableness and propensity to sin, He graciously gives us all the helps of His redemption. This is the real Gospel of the Son of God.

We will now summarize the effects of the fall.

1. Our first parents lost their primitive holiness, their peculiarly helpful and sustaining presence of the Holy Spirit; and the depravation of their entire physical and mental and moral nature, ensued.

2. When Adam propagated children he gave them just what he had to give, a depraved and fallen nature, weak, temptable, abnormal, deranged, liable to sin, and doomed to face death.

3. Men are born with a nature full of propensities to sin, which lead them universally to commit sin; but they are not born sinners. They make themselves sinners by their own wicked choices.

4. Men are not born with a sinful nature, in the sense of a blameworthy nature, deserving of divine punishment. But they are born full of the "principle of sin, proneness to sin, sinful propensity," which leads all men to commit sin and become sinners. It is called sin, often "the sin" in the New Testament -Greek. For this God does not condemn us, but gives us His infinite pity and helping grace.