The Doctor, in order to find out _that_ image, and likeness of God in man, of which _Moses_ writes, looks into the constitution of that _two-legged_ animal, who is the _disputer of the world_. As likely to succeed, as if in order to find out _that paradise_, of which _Moses_ writes, he should search for it in the _hundreds_ of _Essex_, or in the _wilds_ of _Kent_.
For _Moses_, to prevent the folly of looking for the divine image in any thing, that is _natural_ to the _present_ state of man, has given us assurance, that _this first_ man, created in the image of God, died the very day that he did eat of the forbidden tree. And that nothing of this divine man remained but terrors within, and such a figure of himself, as filled him with shame and confusion.
And a greater than _Moses_ has told us, _that_ man, in his present _natural state_, is so dead to that first divine glory, that he has no possibility of entering into the kingdom of God till he is born again from above. This sufficiently shews _that_ he who will find out in what the image of God in man consisted, must as the apostle saith, _walk by faith and not by sight_.
The next text of _Moses_, which the Doctor miserably injures, is thus quoted by him, “The Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into him the breath of life, and man became a living soul; that is, say the objectors, had an immortal soul.”
Who the objectors are, I know not; but the truth of the text requires us to say, that therefore man had a divine and godlike soul, a true offspring of the divine nature. Because the breath or Spirit of the holy triune God, was that breath by which he was made a living soul.――And therefore the riches of this first life in man, were the riches of the divine nature manifesting itself in the soul.
But the Doctor will have it, that only an unlearned _English_ reader, can collect any thing to be divine in the soul, from the words of _Moses_, as not knowing that what is translated a living soul, signifies, in the original, only a living animal. But this, every _English_ reader may know to be a vain criticism; for no stress is laid upon the expression, a living soul, no more than if it had been said, a living animal. But the full proof of the divine greatness of the human soul, lies solely in this, that the breath or spirit of the holy Trinity was breathed into it, and was that which made it to be a living soul, and therefore the life that arose in it, was the life of God in the soul.
The Doctor thus comments upon the words of the text. “God, the great plastic artist, is here represented, as making and shaping out a figure of earth and clay, which he afterwards animates or inspires with life. He breathed into this statue the breath of life, and the lump of clay became a living creature.”
Had this elegant and most graphical description been only found in some minor poet, or school declamation, it might have been overlooked; but in a prose treatise of divinity, it ought not to pass uncensured. I know of nothing that can equal it, unless it be supposed that some ingenious anthropomorphite, reading these words, _and the Lord God did unto Adam and Eve make coats of skins, and cloathed them_; should thus describe the matter, “Here, God, the great artist, is represented, as having the skins of beasts before him, and with his divine hands, cutting, shaping and joining them together in forms of garments, fitted to the size and distinction of the first man and his wife.”
I may defy any one to shew, that this comment does not pay as great a regard to the _letter_, and do as much honour to the sense of this scripture, as the Doctor’s doth to the other text.
The sacred text, _God formed man_ of the dust of _the ground, and breathed into him the breath of life_, is a short and full declaration of a most important truth, namely, that man was brought into being, _in a twofold nature_, having the nature of this outward world, and the nature of heaven; the former signified by his being formed of the dust of the ground, the _latter_, by the breath of God breathed into him. To be formed out of the dust of the ground, is the same thing, as if it had been said, that he was formed out of all the _riches_, _powers_, and _virtues_ that are in this whole visible world. For every property of nature is hidden in the earth. And man, so far as he was designed to be a creature of this outward world, is therefore said to be formed out of the earth, because the earth is not only the treasure-house of all that is in outward nature, but is the _mother_ of all the three other elements. And as all things of this world, whether animate or inanimate, are from the earth as their mother, so in the earth is there every power and blessing of life, to sustain every thing _that_ has its body from it; as appears by that fruitful power, which is continually giving forth itself in all kinds of vegetable food, _fitted_ to the wants of every living creature.