1st. It follows from the inherent activity of the human soul, and from the inherently obliging power of moral right that the absence of right dispositions immediately leads to the formation of positively sinful dispositions. Not to love God is to hate him,
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not to obey him is to disobey. Disobedience leads to fear, to falsehood, and to every form of sin. — See above, question 1.
2d. As a matter of fact, innate depravity exhibits its positive character by giving birth to sins, involving positive viciousnes sin the earliest stages of accountable agency as pride, malice, etc.
3d. The Scriptures assign it a positive character, when they apply to it such terms as "flesh," "concupiscence," "old man," " law in the members," "body of sin," " body of death," "sin taking occasion," " deceived me," and " wrought all manner of concupiscence." — Rom. vii.
7. How may it he shown that it affects the entire man ?
Original sin has its seat in the will, and primarily consists in that proneness to unlawful dispositions and affections which is the innate habit of the human soul. But the several faculties of the human soul are not separate agents. The one soul acts in each function as an indivisible agent, its several faculties or powers after their kind mutually qualifying one another. ■ When the soul is engaged in understanding an object, or an aspect of any object, e. g., mathematics, with which its affections are not con- cerned, then its action has no moral element. But when it is en- gaged in understanding an object with respect to which its de- praved affections are perversely interested, its action must be biased. The consequence, therefore, of the sinful bias of the will in its controling influence over the exercises of the soul, in all its functions, will be —
1st. The understanding, biased by the perverted affections, acting concurrently with the moral sense in forming moral judg- ments, will lead to erroneous judgments, to a deceiving conscience, and to general " blindness of mind" as to moral subjects.
2d. The emotions and sensibilities which accompany the judg- ments of conscience in approving the good and in condemning the wrong, by repeated outrage and neglect, will be rendered less lively, and thus lead to a seared conscience, and general moral insensibility.
3d. In a continued course of sinful action the memory will become defiled with its stores of corrupt experiences, from which the imagination also must draw its materials.
4th. The body in its turn will be corrupted. (1.) Its natural
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appetites will become inordinate in the absence of proper control. (2.) Its active powers will be used as " instruments of unrighte- ousness unto sin."
5th. The Scriptures teach (1.) that the understanding of the " natural man" is depraved as well as his affections, 1 Cor. ii., 14 ; 2 Cor. iv., 4 ; Eph. iv, 18 ; Col. i., 21. (2.) That regener- ation involves illumination as well as renewal of the heart, Acts xxvi., 18 ; Eph. i., 18 ; v., 8 ; 1 Pet. ii., 9. (3.) That truth ad- dressed to the understanding is the great instrument of the Spirit in regeneration and sanctification, John xvii., 17; James i., 18.
8. What is meant by the affirmation that man by nature is totally depraved ?
By this orthodox phrase it is not to be understood, 1st, that the depraved man has not a conscience. The virtuousness of an agent does not consist in his having a conscience, but in the conformity of the dispositions and affections of his will to the law of which conscience is the organ. Even the devils and lost souls retain their sense of right and wrong, and those vindicatory emo- tions with which conscience is armed.
Or, 2d, that unregenerate men, possessing a natural con- science, do not often admire virtuous character and actions in others.
Or, 3d, that they are incapable of disinterested affections and actions in their various relations with their fellow-men.
Or, 4th, that any man is as thoroughly depraved as it is pos- sible for him to become, or that each man has a disposition in- clined to every form of sin.
But it is meant, 1st. That virtue consisting in the con- formity of the dispositions of the will with the law of Grod, and the very soul of virtue consisting in the allegiance of the soul to God, every man by nature is totally alienated in his governing dispo- sition from Grod, and consequently his every act, whether morally indifferent, or conformed to subordinate principles of right, is vitiated by the condition of the agent as a rebel.
2d. That this state of will leads to a schism in the soul, and to the moral perversion of all the faculties of soul and body (see preceding question.)
3d. The tendency of this condition is to further corruption in
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endless progression in every department of our nature, and this deterioration would, in every case, be incalculably more rapid than it is, if it were not for the supernatural restraints of the Holy Ghost.