In the New Testament he that is guilty is .said to be WohiKog, Rom. iii. 19; that is, obnoxious to judgment or vengeance for sin, one that ri dixri ^/jc oux s'/adiv, as they speak. Acts xxviii. 4, " whom vengeance will not suffer to go unpunished ;" — and ho^og, 1 Cor. xi. 27, a word of the same signification; — once by ofs/Xw, Matt, xxiii. 18, to owe, to be indebted to justice. To be obnoxious, liable unto justice, vengeance, punishment for sin, is to be guilty.
" Reus," " guilty," in the Latin is of a large signification. He who is " crimini obnoxius," or " poenas propter crimen," or " voti debitor," or " promissi," or " officii ex sponsione," is called " reus." Especially
198 ON JUSTIFICATION.
every sponsor or surety is "reus" in the law. " Cum servus pecu- niam pro libertate pactus est, et ob earn rem, reum dederit," (that is, " sponsorem, expromissorem,") " quamvis servus ab alio manumissus est, reus tamen obligabitur." He is " reus," who engageth himself for any other, as to the matter of his engagement; and the same is the use of the word in the best Latin authors. " Opportuna loca dividenda prgefectis esse ac suae quique partis tutandas reus sit," Liv. De Bello Punic, lib. v. 30 ; — that every captain should so take care of the station committed to him, as that if any thing happened amiss it should be imputed unto him. And the same author again, " An, qui- cunque aut propinquitate, aut affinitate, regiam aut aliquibus minis - teriis contigissent, alienee culpge rei trucidarentur," B. P., lib. iv. 22; — should be guilty of the fault of another (by imputation), and suffer for it. So that in the Latin tongue he is " reus," who, for himself or any other, is obnoxious unto punishment or payment.
" Reatus" is a word of late admission into the Latin tongue, and was formed of " reus." So Quintilian informs us, in his discourse of the use of obsolete and new words, lib. viii., cap. 3, " Quse Vetera nunc sunt, fueruut olim nova, et qusedam in usu perquam recentia ; ut, Mes- sala primus reatum, munerarium Augustus primus, dixerat;" — to which he adds " piratica, musica," and some others, then newly come into use : but " reatus" at its first invention was of no such signification as it is now applied unto. I mention it only to show that we have no reason to be obliged unto men's arbitrary use of words. Some lawyers first used it " pro crimine," — a fault exposing unto punish- ment ; but the original invention of it, confirmed by long use, was to express the outward state and condition of him who was " reus," after he was first charged in a cause criminal, before he was acquitted or condemned. Those among the Romans who were made " rei" by any public accusation did betake themselves unto a poor squalid habit, a sorrowful countenance, suffering their hair and beards to go undressed. Hereby, on custom and usage, the people who were to judge on their cause were inclined to compassion : and Milo furthered his sentence of banishment because he would not submit to this cus- tom, which had such an appearance of pusillanimity and baseness of spirit. This state of sorroiu and trouble, so expressed, they called " reatus," and nothinof else. It came afterward to denote their state who were committed unto custody in order unto their trial, when the government ceased to hepojndar; wherein alone the other artifice was of use : and if this word be of any use in our present argument, it is to express the state of men after conviction of sin, before their justi- fication. That is their " reatus," the condition wherein the proudest of them cannot avoid to express their inward sorrow and anxiety of mind by some outward evidences of them. Beyond this we are not
SURETISHIP. 199
obliged by the use of this word, but must consider the thing itself which now we intend to express thereby.
Guilt, in the Scripture, is the 7'espect of sin unto the sanction of the law, whereby the sinner becomes obnoxious unto punishment; and to be guilty is to be vmdixog tw ©soS* — liable unto punishment for sin from God, as the supreme lawgiver and judge of all. And so guilt, or " reatus," is well defined to be " obligatio ad poenam, propter culpam, aut admissam in se, aut imputatum, juste aut injuste;" for so Bathsheba says unto David, that she and her son Solomon should be Q^Jj^l^ri, — sinners; that is, be e&ie&med. guilty, or liable unto punish- ment for some evil laid unto theu* charge, 1 Kings i. 21. And the distinction of " dignitas poeme" and " obligatio ad poenam" is but the same thing in diverse words ; for both do but express the relation of sin unto the sanction of the law : or if they may be conceived to differ, yet are they inseparable ; for there can be no " obligatio ad poenam" where there is not " dignitas poense."
Much less is there any thing of weight in the distinction of " rea- tus culpa; " and " reatus poense;" for this " reatus culpoe" is nothing but " dignitas poenge propter culpam." Sin hath other considera- tions,— namely, its formal nature, as it is a transgression of the law, and the stain of filth that it brings upon the soul ; but the guilt of it is nothing but its respect unto punishment from the sanction of the law. And so, indeed, "reatus culpse" is "reatus pcense," — the guilt of sin is its desert of punishment. And where there is not this " reatus culpse" there can be no "poena," no punishment properly so called; for " poena" is " vin dicta noxae," — the revenge due to sin. So, therefore, there can be no punishment, nor " reatus poence," the guilt of it, but where there is " reatus culpse," or sin considered with its guilt ; and the " reatus poenae " that may be supposed without the guilt of sin, is nothing but that ohnoxiousness unto afiictive evil on the occasion of sin which the Socinians admit with respect unto the suffering of Christ, and yet execrate his satisfaction.