A treatise of original sin ... proving that it is

SECT. II.

Secondly, This original sin may be proved by reason, yea and experience thus, If you consider all the miseries, troubles and vexations man is subject unto, and at last death it self; and that not only men grown up, who have actual sins, but even new born Infants, will not this plainly inform us, That all mankind hath sinned, and is cast out of the favour of God: How can it enter into any mans heart to think, that God the wise Creator, so full of goodness to man, that he made him little lower than Angels, should yet make him more miserable than all creatures? It was Theophrastus his complaint, when he lay a dying, That man had such a short time of life prefixed him, who yet could have been serviceable, and by long age and experience found out many observable useful things, when Crows and Harts, and other creatures of no consideration have a long life vouchsafed to them: Yea, all the Heathens, even the most learned of them, complained much concerning this Theme of mans misery, being never able to satisfy themselves in the cause of it; But now by the Scripture we see it's no wonder, the race of mankind is thus adjudged to all misery, seeing it's all guilty of sin before God; so that if there had been no actual sins committed by the sons of men, yet the ground would have been cursed to bring forth briers and thorns, man would have been miserable and mortal: So that this doth not only teach us, there is such a sin, but that it was so heinous and abominable in the eyes of God, that no sin hath ever been punished like this.

SEcondly, This original sinne may be proved by reason, yea and experience thus, If you consider all the miseries, troubles and vexations man is subject unto, and at last death it self; and that not only men grown up, who have actual sinnes, but even new born Infants, will not this plainly inform us, That all mankind hath sinned, and is cast out of the favour of God: How can it enter into any mans heart to think, that God the wise Creator, so full of goodness to man, that he made him little lower than Angels, should yet make him more miserable than all creatures? It was Theophrastus his complaint, when he lay a dying, That man had such a short time of life prefixed him, who yet could have been serviceable, and by long age and experience found out many observable usefull things, when Crows and Harts, and other creatures of no consideration have a long life vouchsafed to them: Yea, all the Heathens, even the most learned of them, complained much concerning this Theme of mans misery, being never able to satisfie themselves in the cause of it; But now by the Scripture we see it's no wonder, the race of mankind is thus adjudged to all misery, seeing it's all guilty of sinne before God; so that if there had been no actual sinnes committed by the sonnes of men, yet the ground would have been cursed to bring forth bryers and thorns, man would have been miserable and mortal: So that this doth not onely teach us, there is such a sin, but that it was so hainous and abominable in the eyes of God, that no sin hath ever been punished like this.