A26923:480
An end of doctrinal controversies which have lately troubled the churches
An end of doctrinal controversies which have lately troubled the churches by reconciling explication without much disputing. Written by Richard Baxter.
London: printed for John Salusbury, 1691
Chapter 12 › Section 1: Of the Law or Covenant of Innocency made to Adam.
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.
§. 19. 1. That the least sin deserveth some degree of Punishment. 2. That God hath various degrees of Punishment, suited to the degrees of Sin. 3. That the least Sin hath a tendency to more, and that still to more, till Man be utterly miserable. And that both in its own Nature, and in the forfeiture of some measure of God's Grace or Help. 4. That if you suppose that vain thought or word to consist still with true Love to God, God could not immediately hate and damn that Soul that so loved him. But if that Person perish, it must be by that idle thought or word producing worse, till it had turned his love from God to the Creature. 5. That antecedently to Gods undertaking to be the Ruler of Man, no doubt but as an absolute Owner, he might have taken away all that he gave him, even his Life and Being, without any fault in Man: for he may do as he list with his own: And therefore he might have done the ⟨p. 118⟩same for the smallest fault, which he might have done without it. And therefore he might have inflicted any Pain, which to Man is not worse than Annihilation, for ever. But whether his three forementioned Acts; 1. Antecedently placing Man as he did. 2. Making him such Duty as he made him. 3. And such Inclination to better, do not imply that God would not punish him unless he sinned, and then but according to the degree of his Sin, I leave to Consideration.
§. 20. But whether God must, and whether he might, punish the least Sin with Hell, are different questions: Whether by the Law of Nature he must do it or be unjust, and so a vain thought was not pardonable by or under that Law, and so Adam was an Heir of Hell when his thought first failed, before he did eat or consent to eat the forbidden Fruit, are questions which I cannot resolve from Nature, and are to me more difficult in Scripture than to wiser men.
§. 21. The supernatural part of the Law is known to us only by Scripture, but perhaps the Fathers before the Flood might know more of it by Tradition, than God hath thought meet to write for our times.