2d. God pronounced all his works, man included, to be " very good," Gen. i., 31. The goodness of a mechanical provision is essentially its fitness to attain its end. The " goodness" of a moral agent can be nothing other than his conformity of will to the moral law. Moral indifFerency in a moral agent is itself of the nature of sin.
3d. This truth is asserted, Eccle. vii., 29.
4th. In regeneration, man is renewed in the image of God ; in creation, man was made in the image of God ; the image, in both cases, must be the same, and includes holiness, — Eph. iv., 24.
17. What is the Pelagian doctrine with regard to the original state of man ?
The Pelagians hold, 1st, that a man can rightly be held re- sponsible only for his unbiassed volitions ; and, 2d, consequently moral character as antecedent to moral action is an absurdity, since only that disposition is moral which has been formed as a habit by means of preceding unbiassed action of the free will, i. e., man must choose his own character, or he can not be responsible for it.
They hold, therefore, that man's will at his creation was not only free, but, moreover, in a state of moral equilibrium, equally disposed to virtue or vice.
18. What is the Romish doctrine as to the original state of man ? They agree that man was created holy ; yet maintain that
original righteousnesss did not pertain to man's nature as such, but was a supernatural grace added to it. They hold that the various wayward affections and desires which war against the law of conscience are natural to man, and in themselves not of the nature of sin, but tending necessarily to becoming inordinate, and
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THE ORIGINAL STATE OF MAN.
therefore sinful, whenever the supernatural endowment of original righteousness is withdrawn, for it is the office of that righteous- ness to preside over and hold them in order. — See Catechismus Romanus, Part I., Chap. II., question 18, and Part II., Chap. II., question 32, and Part IV., Chap. XII., question 3.
19. Row may it be shown that a holy character may be formed in a creature at his creation, before he can have per- formed any holy action ?
Pelagians hold, 1st. That it is an essential condition of moral responsibility, that the will must be left to act unbiassed by any preceding dispositions and desires. 2d. That the only dis- positions or character which are consistent with free agency are those gradually formed as habits in consequence of repeated moral action. Therefore, a created moral character, holy or sin- ful, they hold to be an absurdity, for if it be created or innate it can not be moral.
To this we answer — ■
1st. It is contradicted by what the Scriptures plainly teach us concerning Adam as created, (see question 16), concerning in- fants as born children of wrath, etc., (see chapter on Original Sin), and concerning regeneration by the Holy Ghost, (see chapter on Regeneration.)
2d. It is absurd, because the very essence of virtue is, that it obliges the will. Moral indifferency of disposition in presence of any moral obligation is an impossibility, because it is itself sin.
3d. It is true that all character, in order to be moral, must be voluntary, i. e., it must be the character of the will itself, as a good or a bad will, (or, in Scripture language, a good or a bad heart,) and therefore it is free and spontaneous ; but it is not true that such a character must be formed by a previous unbiassed choice of the will itself. Every man feels that he is morally re- sponsible for the moral state of his own heart, no matter how that state originated, simply because it is the state of his own heart. If a man hates virtue and loves vice he is a bad man, no matter how he came to possess such affections. " The essence of the virtue and vice of dispositions of the heart and acts of the will lies not in their cause, but their nature" — Pres. Edwards on Will, Part IV., Section 1.
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