Fifthly, If the Deity pleases to withhold this necessary aid, are we to be blamed and punished eternally for not doing that which the Calvinists confess it is impossible for us to perform?

Although they confess our incapacity now, they alledge that we were furnished with suffi cient powers in Adam, our federal head, to enable us to have kept the laws of God perfectly; but as we were not in being at the time, the Deity chose Adam as our representative to act for us, and if he had obeyed his Maker, and fulfilled his injunction, they presume that all his posterity would have been happy in consequence of his obedience; but as he transgressed, his guilt was imputed to all his posterity, which, they say, gave the Deity a just and equitable right to sentence and send the whole human race to eternal perdition!

But as it is impossible to vindicate the justice of imputing the guilt of Adam's trangression to his posterity on any other principle than that of his being our representative and head, chosen by God to act for us; so, also, it is impossible that God intended any individual of the human race should suffer any real injury by a plan which he had concerted in infinite wisdom and goodness. He therefore had provided for us an

other and better head and representative instead of Adam; to wit, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time.*

St. Paul tells the Corinthians he would have them know that the head of every man is Christ, and that the head of Christ is God. This second connexion is certainly preferable to the first; for if Christ is the head of every man, he certainly will never resign any of his members to the devil, if he is possessed of wisdom and power to prevent it. He has already fulfilled the law for us, having suffered the penalty in our stead; for, when by the offence of Adam judgment came upon all men to condemnation ; even so, by the righteousness of our present glorious head, the free gift came upon all men (pantas anthropous) unto the justification of life.t We are assured, that "as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. And as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly." Thus we find by these and a number of other passages of scripture, that the entire work of our salvation was, and is to be carried on, and finally

.18.

1 Tim. ii. 5, 6. † 1 Cor. xi. 3.

|| 1 Cor. xv. 22, 49. .

+ Rom. v.

compleated by proxy. God in the first place chose Adam as our head and representative, without our knowledge or consent, who transgressed and fell without our agency or knowledge. The guilt of his transgression is said to be imputed to us long before we existed; not that the Deity intended that we should suffer any real inconvenience from the choice which he made for us by the appointment of a representative which he infallibly knew would transgress for we are told that God hath concluded us all in unbelief (why, that he might damn us all?) No, by no means; but that he might have mercy upon all.*

To answer this just and benevolent purpose, he had prepared another and better head and representative for us, long before we existed, by whose righteousness we are to be justified, and not by our own.

"Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law; that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world become guilty before God. Therefore by the deeds of the law, there shall no flesh be justified in his sight: for by the law is the knowledge

* Rom. xi. 32.

of sin. But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets; even the righteousness of God, which is, by faith of Jesus Christ, unto all, and upon all them that believe; for there is no difference [no partiality.] For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God; being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness [not ours] for the remission of sins that are past through the forbearance of God: to declare, I say, at this time, his righteousness, that he might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus. Where is boasting, then? It is excluded. By what law? Of works? Nay, but by the law of faith. Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law. Is he the God of Jews only? Is he not also of the Gentiles? Yes, of the Gentiles also."*

By the above statement it appears, evidently, that the first covenant which was made by God with Adam, as our federal head, was violated and broken without our knowledge or agency,

* Rom. iii. 19 to 30.

long before we existed. We could in this case be accounted criminal only by means of the delinquency of the agent which the Deity chose to act for us; and therefore we could not be justly liable to God's wrath and curse to all the miseries of this life, to death itself, and to the pains of hell forever. See the Westminster Catechism.

But in the covenant which God the Father made with Christ on our behalf, it is positively declared that we are to be justified and saved by the righteousness of Christ, and not by the deeds of the law; that is, by any thing which we can perform to merit salvation; therefore, if we miscarry a second time, it must happen through some defect in the plan, or by the delinquency of our present federal head.

If the imputation of the guilt of Adam's sin to his posterity be tenable or justifiable on any rational ground, it must be on condition of the full and free imputation of the perfect righteousness of Christ, our present head, to every individual descendant of Adam: for to impute the guilt of Adam's disobedience and transgression to any individual who should be precluded from the benefit of Christ's obedience and perfect righteousness, would not only be unjust, but