men are subject to penal evils on account of the sin of Adam. It is for the offence of one that many die.
In order to the proper understanding of the apostle's argument, it should be borne in mind that the term death stands for penal evil; not for this or that particular form of it, but for any and every evil judicially inflicted for the support of law. Paul's reasoning does not rest upon the mere fact that all men, even infants, are subject to natural death ; for this might be accounted for by the violation of the law of Moses, or of the law of nature, or by their inherent native depravity. This covers the whole ground, and may account for the universality of natural death. But no one of these causes, nor all combined, can account for the inflic- tion of all the penal evils to which men are subjected. The great fact in the apostle's mind was, that God regards and treats all men, from the first moment of their existence, as out of fellowship with himself, as having forfeited his favour. Instead of entering into communion with them the moment they begin to exist (as he did with Adam), and form- ing them by his Spirit in his own moral image, he regards them as out of his favour, and withholds the influences of the Spirit. Why is this? Why does God thus deal with the human race? The fact that he does thus deal with them is not denied by any except Pelagians. Why then is it? Here is a form of death which the violation of the law of Moses, the transgression of the law of nature, the existence of innate depravity, separately or combined, are insufficient to account for. Its infliction is antecedent to them all ; and yet it is of all evils the essence and the sum. Men begin to exist out of communion with God. This is the fact which no sophistry can get out of the Bible or the history of the world. Paul tells us why it is. It is because we fell in Adam ; it is for the one of- fence of ONE MAN that all thus die. The covenant being formed with Adam, not only for himself, but also for his posterity (in other words, Adam having been placed on trial not for himself only, but also for his race), his act was, in virtue of this relation, regarded as our act; God withdrew from us as he did from him ; in consequence of this withdrawal we begin to exist in moral darkness, destitute of a disposition to delight in God, and prone to delight in ourselves and the world. The sin of Adam, therefore, ruined us ; it was the ground of the withdrawing of the divine favour from the whole race; and the intervention of the Son of God for our salvation is an act of pure, sovereign, and wonderful grace.
Whatever obscurity, therefore, rests upon this passage, arises from taking the word death in the narrow sense in which it is commonly used among men ; if taken in its scriptural sense, the whole argument is plain and conclusive, het penal evil be substituted for the word death, and the argument will stand thus, 'All men are subject to penal evils on account of one man; this is the position to be proved (v. 12). That such is the case is evident, because the infliction of a penalty supposes the violation of law. But such evil was inflicted before the giving of the Mosaic law, it comes on men before the transgression of the law of nature, or