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

In the fifth place, There is this difference between the understanding and the will in relation to its objects, The understanding doth receive the species of the object, to it self, not the objects themselves; and therefore when we know or understand evil as an object, this doth not defile the understanding, but is a perfection of it. Thus God knoweth all the evil committed in the world, yet his knowledge is not polluted thereby, Scire malum, non est malum, but the will that goeth out to the objects as they are in themselves, and thereby loving of them, is what the object is. Thus if we will sin it is sin, and not if we know sin, because the will goeth out to a sinful object as it is in it self, so that above all keepings we are to keep the will, for what that is placed upon, it presently becomes like it; If thou lovest the world, or earth, thou art earth, thou art of the world: Hence all the while sin is kept out from the will, though it be in thy mind, though it be by suggestion to thee, yet because there is no consent, it is not thy sin but thy misery. I speak not of the motus principatus, which are antecedent to our will, but of suggestions only offered from without, but when the will yieldeth, when that consents, it becometh thy evil immediately, as poison while it is in the remote parts of the body may not kill, but when it striketh to the heart, then it is mortal. Thus sin in temptation, sin in suggestion doth not destroy till the will receive it, so great a matter is it to look to this power of the soul. For

In the fifth place, There is this difference between the understanding and the wil in relation to its objects, The understanding doth receive the species of the object, to it self, not the objects themselves; and therefore when we know or understand evil as an object, this doth not defile the understanding, but is a perfection of it. Thus Godknoweth all the evil committed in the world, yet his knowledge is not polluted thereby, Scire malum, non est malum, but the will that goeth out to the objects as they are in themselves, and thereby loving of them, is what the object is. Thus if we will sinne it is sinne, and not if we know sin, because the will goeth out to a sinfull object as it is in it self, so that above all keepings we are to keep the will, for what that is placed upon, it presently becomes like it; If thou lovest the world, or earth, thou art earth, thou art of the world: Hence all the while sinne is kept out from the will, though it be in thy mind, though it be by suggestion to thee, yet because there is no consent, it is not thy sinne but thy misery. I speak not of the motus principatus, which are antecedent to our will, but of suggestions only offered from without, but when the will yeeldeth, when that consencs, it becometh thy evil immediately, as poison while it is in the remote parts of the body may not kill, but when it striketh to the heart, then it is mortall. Thus sinne in temptation, sinne in suggestion doth not destroy till the will receive it, so great a matter is it to look to this power of the soul. For