of God, as that which is its fource. Sin flows from a fecret enmity of heart against the Almighty, and therefore carries in it a high contempt of him. It may be, men are fo blind that they cannot difcern any fuch thing in it; but God makes breaking the law, and defpifing or contemning the law, to be all one, Amos ii. 4. "Thus faith the Lord, For three tranfgreffions of Judah, and for four, I will not turn away the punishment thereof, because they have defpised the law of the Lord, and have not kept his commandments, and their lies caufed them to err, after the which their fathers have walked." Sin in moft men's eyes is a harmless thing; but how far other wife would it be if its nature were feen in a juft light by the eye of faith; if we faw it trampling upon God's authority, goodness, and ho linefs, and even endeavouring as it were to ungod him.

But that ye may further understand what fin is, we fhall, in the

Third place, mention a twofold infeparable property or adjunct of fin, with which it is ever attended. And,

1. Sin is the defilement of the foul; fin is a filthy thing. The beauty, the glory of man, confifts in his conformity to the holy and pure law of God, and in as far as he devi. ates from that, in fo far is he defiled and polluted. Every fin hath a Satan in it, and robs the foul of its beauty, occafions a fort of loathfomeness, whereby, in the eyes of God, and even of itself, it becomes ugly and abominable; it is the abominable thing which God hates, "Oh do not this abominable thing that I hate," faith the Lord, Jer. xliv. 4. The natural state of man is, upon the account of this filthiness, compared to a wretched infant that is caft out, "in all its natural pollutions," Ezek. xvi. and to every thing else that is filthy, to puddle, mire, and dirt, and to a menftruous cloth; but yet all of them are not fufficient to give a juft idea of its filthiness.

2. Sin, as it is attended with filth, so it is attended with guilt. It makes the finner guilty; it obliges him to undergo the penalty which God has annexed to his law; it car rics ever along with it a title to the curfe of God. When the law of God is confidered as that which reprefents his. holiness and spotlefs purity, whereby it becomes the meafure and standard of all beauty, glory, and purity, to us; then fin, as it ftands oppofed to it in this respect, is looked

upon

upon as a stain, a blot, a defilement: but as the law to God carries on it the impreffion of his royal authority, the breach of it binds over to just punishment for the reparation of the honour of that contemned authority.

Thus we fee what it is that all men are charged with. God here lays home to them a breach of law, reprefents them as condemned and guilty, deformed and defiled crea. tures. "All men have finned," every one has broken the holy, juft, good, and fpiritual law of the great Sovereign of the world; all are guilty of a contempt of his authority, all are defiled with that abominable thing which his foul hates. Left any one frould take occafion to clear himself, and fay, O I am not the perfon spoken of, I never contemned God, I never defiled myself, and to I am not guilty of that which is charged upon mankind. Left any fhould fay, I am clean, God has put a bar upon this door, by extending the charge to all without exception.

And fo I come, in the

Fourth place, to inquire into the import of this univerfal particle all in my text; and it imports,

ift, That persons of all ages are involved in the fame common mifery. Young and old have finned. The fuck. ling upon the breaft, as well as the old man that is stooping into the grave. None needs envy another. The old man needs not envy the innocency of the infant of days, for the youngest carries as much fin into the world as renders it ugly, deformed, and guilty. Indeed there are who have not finned at the rate that others have done. Children have not finned "after the fimilitude of Adam's tranfgref fion," Rom. v. 14. their age would not allow them ; but fin enough they have derived to them from Adam to damn, to defile them.

2d, Perfons of all profeffions, Jew and Gentile, whatever their religious profeffion be. This evil is not confined to thofe of one religion, but is extended to all: the apoftle fums up all mankind, as to religion, under two heads, Jew and Gentile; and at large, in the foregoing part of this epistle, proves them both to be finners.

3d, All ranks of perfons, high and low, rich and poor. This is not an evil of which the prince can free himself more than the peafant. Thofe who may be fhining in gliftering apparel are upon this account vile and filthy

as

as the toad they cannot endure to look upon: thefe who may condemn or abfolve others, may themselves be under a fentence of condemnation; nay, it really is fo with all who are not faved from their fins. Even these very men who have fometimes forgot them felves fo far, as to advance themfelves above the laws, are yet not only fubject to God's law, but lying under an obligation to punishment on account of their breaches of this holy, juft and good law.

4. Perfons in all generations are guilty. It was not only fome poor wretches in the old world which God swept off the face of the earth by a flood, that have finned, but perfons of all ages, ranks, and qualities, in all generations. There is not one exception among all the natural defcendants of Adam, man nor woman, great nor (mall, rich nor poor, king nor beggar, all have finned, from the greatest to the least. None can justly upbraid another with what he has done in this matter, fince all are in the provocation : All have finned, and come fhort of the glory of God.

And this leads us to that which we did, in the next place, propofe to difcourfe of to you, viz.

Fifth, The import of this coming short of the glory of God. And this takes in or implies,

It, That man has fallen fhort of that glory which he had by the conformity of his nature to God. Man is faid, 1 Cor. xi. 7. to be "the image and glory of God;" and indeed fo was he in his first and best estate. O what of God was there in innocent Adam! A mind full of light; how wonderfully did it reprefent that God who is light, and in whom there is no darkness at all! A pure foul, the exact tranfcript of the divine purity! The rest of the creatures had in them fome darker reprefentations of the glory of God's wildom and power, but only man, of all the creatures in the lower world, was capable to reprefent the holiness, righteousness, and purity, and other rational perfections, of the ever-bleffed Deity; and upon this account man was "the glory of God." God, as it were, gloried in him as the mafter-piece of the visible creation, in whom alone more of God was to be feen than in all the rest befide. This man has now loft; he has fallen fhort of the beauty and glory, which made him "the glory of God."

2d, Man has loft the glory he had, as he was the deputy

of

of the great God in this lower world. He was made lord of God's handy works upon earth; and all the creatures in it paid their homage to him, when they came and receiv ed their names from him in paradife; but now the "crown is fallen from his head ;" he has come fhort of this glory; the creatures refuse subjection to him.

3d, Man is come fhort of the glory he had in the enjoyment of God in paradife. It was man's glory, honour, and happiness, to be allowed a more than ordinary familiarity with God. God and Adam converfed together in pa radife. He was allowed the company of God: that made his ftate happy indeed. What could man want, while the all-fufficient God kept up fo clofe, fo bleffed and comfortable a familiarity with him, and daily loaded him with his favours? But this he has come fhort of.

4th, Man has come fhort of that glory he had the prospect of God fet him fairly on the way, and did furnish him fufficiently for a journey to eternal, unchangeable, neverfading glory; but this he has come fhort of; and this indeed follows natively upon the former. This is indeed much, but we conceive this is not all that the expreffion has in it; nay, certainly there is more in it: this falling fhort, though it only feems to point at the negative, yet certainly it takes in the positive; and we therefore fay, that this expreffion, in the

5th place, implies not only man's lofs of his original beauty and glory, in a conformity to the image of God, but that he has fallen in the mire, and is defiled by fin. He who fometime a-day was the image and glory of God, is now more filthy than the ground he treads on, than the mire of the street, than the loathefome toad,

6th, Not only has he loft the dominion he had, but he is become a fave to fin. He who fometime a-day looked like a god in the world, is now debased down to hell. He to whom the creatures once veiled as to their fovereign, now daily ftands in danger of his life by them, and lies open to the infults of the meanest of them,

7th, Not only has he loft the fweet and foul-ravishing communion he had with God, but now he is, as it were fcarce capable to look towards him; the fight of God, which once was his life, is now to him as death..

8th, Not only has man forfeited his title to future hap

pinefs, but, which is worfe, he is, by fin, entitled to future, eternal, inconceivable mifery and woe. A dreadful coming fhort this is indeed. From how high a hope, into what an inconceivable abyss of mifery and woe, is poor man fallen by fin! "The crown is fallen from his head." He was a little hence all beauty, glory, excellency, and comelinefs; but now, alas! we may groan out an Ichabod over him! where is the glory?

We come now, in the

Sixth place, to inquire into the fource and Spring of all this mifery and woe. How and whence is it that all are involved in the guilt of fin; and that this fad and afflicting calamity flows?

ft, From the guilt of Adam's first fin. Adam, by the holy, wife, juft, and good appointment of God, stood in the room of all his pofterity. Had he stood, in him we all had stcod, and retained the innocency and integrity of our natures, the favour, love, and kindness of heaven; but he falling into fin, in him we all finned; and by the difobedience of this one man, we all were made finners; as the apostle doth at large difcourfe, Rom. v. from the 12th verfe and downwards. This, this is the poifoned spring whence all our fin, all our forrow and mifery flows.

2d, This flows from the natural depravity of the mind of man, that is tranfmitted to us from our progenitors. "We are hapen in iniquity, and in fin did our mother conceive us." We received a fatal stroke when first formed in the womb, as the Pfalmift complains, Pfal. li. 5. And indeed there is none can bring a clean thing out of an unclean. Our infected parents transferred to us the infection of fin. Sin runs in our blood, and our natures have a natural inclination to "evil, only to evil, and that continually," Gen, vi. 5.

3d, This flows from abounding temptations. As our hearts are wicked, and fet only on evil; fo every thing, in this prefent diforder on account of fin, is fuited to carry on the infection. The creatures, by reafon of fin, are made fubject to vanity. They are made fubfervient to the lufts of men; the devil and our corrupt hearts daily abuse them to this end; and by these means it is that all men have finned, and thereby come short of the glory of God

The