Richard Baxter's Catholic theology plain, pure, peaceable, for pacification of the dogmatical word-warriors who,…Richard Baxter's Catholick theologie plain, pure, peaceable, for pacification of the dogmatical word-warriours who,…

151. But yet here we must distinguish, 1. Between a necessary and a free agent, 2. Between Adams sinning and ours; 3. And between the sin of a man strongly inclined or but weakly, or that hath many dissuasions or but few. 1. Though a bad man be under a moral necessity of sinning in the general, that is, of not living innocently, yet he is not under a necessity of committing every sin that he committeth: nor is it a valid consequence, He is a bad man: Ergo he will do this, and that, and the other Sin: Because a free agent oft acteth contrary to his habits. 2. And some Sinners have so great impediments in sinning, that they stand long in aequilibrio before the act. 3. And Adam had no more propensity to his first sin, than to the contrary: So that bare permission will not infer the Certainty of all sin, at least; and therefore will not here serve turn.

151. But yet here we must distinguish, 1. Between a necessary and a free agent, 2. Between Adams sinning and ours; 3. And between the sin of a man strongly inclined or but weakly, or that hath many disswasions or but few. 1. Though a bad man be under a moral necessity of sinning in the general, that is, of not living innocently, yet he is not under a necessity of committing every sin that he committeth: nor is it a valid consequence, He is a bad man: Ergo he will do this, and that, and the other Sin: Because a free agent oft acteth contrary to his habits. 2. And some Sinners have so great impediments in sinning, that they stand long in aequilibrio before the act. 3. And Adam had no more propensity to his first sin, than to the contrary: So that bare permission will not inferr the Certainty of all sin, atleast; and therefore will not here serve turn.

152. But saith Rada, it is not common permission, but also a withdrawing of effectual helps against sin. Answ. 1. God did not so by Adam at first. 2. But are sufficient or necessary helps also withdrawn, as well as effectual? If so, then Adam was as much necessitated to sin by God, as he was to dye ⟨p. 26⟩by Gods withdrawing his Vital influx or sustentation, and it would have been as naturally Impossible for him not to sin, as to live without God. But if not so, then while Necessary Grace, called sufficient, is continued, the withdrawing of any other inferreth not a necessity of sinning. But indeed it is an unproved and improbable fiction, that God withdrew from Adam any Grace which he had given him, till Adam cast it away.