It is not, then, our want of interest in immortality upon the ac- count whereof we know not of ourselves the way to immortality by the blood of Christ. But there are two other reasons that enforce the truth of it : —
1. Because it is a way of 'inere grace and mercy, hidden from all eternity in the treasures of God's infinite wisdom and sovereign will, which he neither prepared for man in his created condition nor had man any need of ; nor is it in the least discovered by any of the works of God, nor by the law written in the heart, but is solely reveal- ed from the bosom of the Father by the only-begotten Son, neither angels nor men being able to discover the least glimpse of that majesty without that revelation, John i. 18; 1 Cor. ii. 7; Eph. iii, 8-11; Col. ii. 2, 3; 1 Tim. iii. 16.
2. Because man in h\^ fallen condition, though there be retained in his heart some weak and faint impressions of good and evil, re- ward and punishment, Rom. ii. 14, 15, yet is spiritually dead, blind, alienated from God, ignorant, dark, stubborn; so far from being able of himself to find out the way of grace unto a blessed immortality, that he is not able, upon the revelation of it, savingly, and to the great end of its proposal, to receive, apprehend, believe, and walk in
OF man's condition before and after the fall. IGl
it, without a new spiritual creation, resurrection from the dead, or new birth, wrought by the exceeding greatness of the power of God.^ And on these two doth depend our disabiUty to discover and know the way of grace leading to life and glory. And by this brief re- moval of the covering is the weakness and nakedness of their whole ensuing discourse so discovered as that I shall speedily take it with its offence out of the way. They proceed : —
Q. But why hath man nothing to do with {or no interest in) immortality ?
A. Therefore, because from the beginning he was formed of the ground, and so was created mortal ; and then because he transgressed the command given him of God, and so by the decree of God, expressed in his command, was necessarily subject to eternal death.^
1. It is triie, man was created of the dust of the earth as to his bodily substance ; yet it is as true that moreover God breathed into him the breath of life, whereby he became " a living soul," and in that immediate constitution and framing from the hand of God was free from all nextly disposing causes unto dissolution. But his im- mortality we place on another account, as hath been declared, which is no way prejudiced by his being made of the ground.
2. The second reason belongs unto man only as having sinned, and being fallen out of that condition and covenant wherein he was created. So tliat I shall need only to let the reader know that the eternal death, in the judgment of our ca.techists, whereunto man was subjected by sin, was only an eternal dissolution or annihilation (or rather an abode under dissolution, dissolution itself being not penal), and not any abiding punishment, as will afterward be farther mani- fest. They go on : —
Q. But hoiv doth this agree with those places of Scripture wherein it is written that man was created in the image of God, and created unto immortality, and that death entered into the ivorld by sin. Gen. i. 26 ; Wisd. ii. 23 ; Rom. v. 12 ?
A. As to the testimony which declareth that man was created in the image of God, it is to be known that the image of God doth not signify immortality (which is evident from hence, because at that time when man was subject to eternal death the Scripture acknowledgeth in him that image, Gen. ix. 6, James iii. 9), but it denoteth the power and dominion over all things made of God on the earth, as the same place where this image is treated of clearly showeth, Gen. i. 26. ^
' Eph. ii. 1 ; John i. 5 ; Rom. iii. 17, 18, viii. 7, 8 ; 1 Cor. ii. 14 ; Tit. iii. 3 ; Eph. ii. 5, iv. 18 ; Col. i. 13, ii. 13, etc.
2 "Cur vero nihil commune babet homo cum immortalitate ? — Idcirco, quod ab initio de humo formatus, proptereaque mortalis creatus fuerit ; deiude vero, quod mandatum Dei, ipsi propositum, transgressus sit ; ideoque decreto Dei ipsius in mandato expresso, seternre morti necessario subjectus fuerit."
* " Qui vero id conveniet iis Scripturte locis in quibus scriptum extat, homincm ad imaginem Dei crcatum esse, ct creatum ad immortalitatem, et quod mors per pcccatum inmundum introierit, Gen. i. 26, 27; Sap. ii. 23 ; Horn, v. 12? — Quod ad testimonium attinet, quod homincm creatum ad imaginem Dei pronunciat, sciendum est, imaginem Dei non significai-e inimortalitatem (quod liinc patet, quod Scriptura, eo tempore quo homo Eetemte morti subjectus erat, agnoscat in liomine istam imaginem. Gen. ix. G, Jacob. iii. 9), sed potestatem bomiuis, et dominium in onines res a Deo conditas, supra terram, dcsignare ; ut idem locus, in quo de bac cadem imagine agitur. Gen. i. 2G, aperte indicat." VOL. XIL 11