2. According to a principle observed in the case of the angels, and we believe universal, God created Adam with a nature positively holy and inclined to good, yet fallible, and made his future character and destiny to depend upon his obedience for a definite period, called a probation, during which he remained in a condition of instable moral equilibrium. The alternatives placed _ before him were, that if he obeyed for the term ap- pointed he should be confirmed in moral excellence and rendered infallible and blessed for ever; and, on the other hand, if he disobeyed, his trial should he, zpso facto, closed, and he himself morally degraded in character and _ made an heir of misery for ever. This most natural and reasonable divine constitution is commonly called the Covenant of Works or the Covenant of Life.
3. In making this covenant with Adam, and assigning him a favourable state and definite .period of probation,
CHAPTER Vil.
The points in- volved in the Re- formed doctrine.
CHAPTER VII.
104 THE NATURE OF THE ATONEMENT.
God, acting as the Guardian of the whole human race, and for their benefit, provided for all Adam’s descendants the best conceivable conditions of moral probation for a race of moral agents propagated through an animal nature such as mankind, by appointing Adam _ their federal head and representative, and making their per- manent character and destiny to depend upon his con- duct during his period of personal trial. The ground in reason and right of this divine appointment of Adam as the federal head and representative of his descendants, as far as made known to us, is (a) the indefeasible right of God sovereignly to order the probation of the subjects of his moral government according to the pleasure of his infinitely wise, righteous, and benevolent will. (b) The evident fact that in the arrangement in question, God, as the faithful Guardian of his creatures, has ordered their probation under the very best conditions-—the holy and adult Adam in the virgin earth being in a condition for passing the trials of a moral probation far more favour- able than any single infant or any number of infants developing into childhood could ever be. (c) Adam’s natural relation to his descendants made him the proper person to represent them. Without going the length of Realism, it appears probable that the divinely ordained representative and substitutionary constitution, alike of the probation in Adam and the redemption in Christ, is conditioned upon the generic unity of men as constitut- ing a race propagated by generation. (d) The headship of the first Adam is an inseparable part of that infinitely glorious system which culminates in the headship of the second Adam.
4. It is involved in this covenant headship that all Adam’s descendants were federally embraced in him and represented by him, so that im case either of obedience or of disobedience, the corresponding reward or penalty is
FEDERAL HEADSHIP OF ADAM. 105.
by the conditions of the covenant as justly and as really theirs as it is his.
5, It plainly follows that Adam’s first sin, which, zpso facto, closed his probation and theirs, although it be as respects us a peccatum alienwm when it is regarded simply as an action, is, notwithstanding, when considered in respect to its guilt or legal responsibility or obliga- tion to punishment, as justly and as really ours as it is his, since by the law of the covenant he acted as our agent, and we are bound by his action. In one sense the sin is very plainly his, and not ours. It is ours only as the covenant makes our moral standing to depend upon his action. The personal character of one man never can be transferred to another. But, on the other hand, it is plain one man may be, under certain conditions, justly and morally responsible for the action of another man. Now, it is precisely the reatus, the legal responsibility, the federal obligation to punish- ment incurred by Adam’s sin, that is justly charged to each of his descendants. In this sense only is his sin their sin. And in this sense it is just as much and as really theirs as his.
6. Consequently God, by a strictly judicial, not sove- reign, act, justly wmputes Adam’s apostatizing act to us ; that is, God simply acts upon the facts of the case, ae ing us as legally responsible for Adam’s sin, and justly obnoxious to its penalty. This imputation proceeds upon no fiction, makes no confusion between Adam’s personality and our personalities, between Adam’s agency and our agency, presumes no absurd transfer of Adam’s personal subjective moral character to us, nor confusion of his subjective states with ours; but it simply (a) re- cognizes our legal oneness with Adam, and consequent common responsibility with him for the guilt of his pub- lic sin; (6) consequently charges the guilt of his sin to
CHAPTER. Vit.
Of impu- tation of 9 guilt.
CHAPTER Vil.
106 THE NATURE OF THE ATONEMENT.