A26786:39
The four last things viz. death, judgment, heaven, hell, practically considered and applied in…
The four last things viz. death, judgment, heaven, hell, practically considered and applied in several discourses / by William Bates.
London: printed for Brabazon Aylmer, 1691
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
And then apply it.
I. The Scripture gives an account of Death's entrance into the World, in a threefold Respect.
1. As the Desert of Sin. 2. As the Effect of the divine Decree. 3. As the Sentence of the Law.
1. As the Desert of Sin. The first Design of the Creator was his own Glory in conjunction with the Happiness of Man. He was made accordingly holy in Perfection, placed in Paradise, and his State contained all the Ingredients of Felicity proper to his Nature. He was capable of dying, as sad Experience proves, yet no Accident from without, no Distemper from within had impaired his Vigour, and made him actually subject to Death without Sin. Whilst innocent he was immortal, not from everlasting Principles of Nature, but by Divine Preservation, of which the Tree of Life was the ordained Means and sacramental Pledge. For God unchangeably loves his ⟨p. 10⟩own Image: and though by his Sovereignty and absolute Power he may resume the Being he gives, yet his Goodness and Covenant were a sacred assurance that Mans happy Life should run parallel with his perseverance in his Duty. This Immortality was not the singular Privilege of Adam's Person, but had been the Inheritance of all his Progeny. But he soon revolting from his just Obedience, of Immortal became Mortal, and according to the original Establishment of Propagation, transmitted his Nature with the guilt and poison of Sin to all his Posterity. Thus by one Man Sin entered into the World,