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

The third Proposition is, That whosoever would by the grace of God be delivered from any actual sins, the best remedy is, to endeavour to quench the lust within. He that would dry up the streams, must look to the fountain, to have that dried up. He that would destroy the bad fruit of a Tree, must lay the axe to the root of it. And this is a very necessary Rule to be attended unto in practical Divinity. Observe that the same way sin comes to live, the same way thou must take to kill it. It beginneth at the heart first, before it's in the eyes, or hands; and therefore thou must look to crucify it in the heart first. Thus the Wiseman adviseth, Prov 4. 23. Keep thy heart, for out of it are the issues of life. After this then he exhorteth to look to our mouth and lips, to our eyes and feet; but the foundation must be laid in the heart; if the heart be good, all is good. And this showeth the preposterous way of the Casuists and Confessionists in Popery, from which the late Writer, so often mentioned, doth not much decline in his Treatise of Ecclesiastical Penance; for with such Writers, you have scarce one word to the penitent sinner about Regeneration, whereas external duties of alms, or restitution (which in their way are necessary by Gods ⟨p. 462⟩command) must flow from a spiritual and supernatural life within, as the foundation of all: much less have you one iota or tittle, about faith, laying hold on Christ, by whom alone our persons are justified, and all our duties are accepted. This (I say) is the great neglect and unskilfulness in such writers, that they deal in externals, but for faith, by which the heart is purified, and whereby we please God in Christ, that they make no mention of at all. But the Scripture is herein different from moral Philosophy and Aristotelical precepts, which those Casuists are wholly captivated unto: for that requireth, yea and promiseth first a tender and holy heart, a circumcised heart, and then to walk in the ways of God: whereas moral Philosophers first begin with actions, and then go to acquired habits, Justè agendo sumus justs. This then is a golden Rule, and of perpetual use in Christianity, for a Christian to be mortifying lust within, to watch against the treacherous adversary in thy own breast, and then when the foundation is destroyed, the superstruction must needs fall to the ground.

The third Proposition is, That whosoever would by the grace of God be delivered from any actual sins, the best remedy is, to endeavour to quench the lust within. He that would dry up the streams, must look to the fountain, to have that dried up. He that would destroy the bad fruit of a Tree, must lay the axe to the root of it. And this is a very necessary Rule to be attended unto in practical Divinity. Observe that the same way sinne comes to live, the same way thou must take to kill it. It beginneth at the heart first, before it's in the eyes, or hands; and therefore thou must look to crucifie it in the heart first. Thus the Wiseman adviseth, Prov 4. 23. Keep thy heart, for out of it are the issues of life. After this then he exhorteth to look to our mouth and lips, to our eyes and feet; but the foundation must be laid in the heart; if the heart be good, all is good. And this sheweth the preposterous way of the Casuists and Confessionists in Popery, from which the late Writer, so often mentioned, doth not much decline in his Treatise of Ecclesiastical Penance; for with such Writers, you have scarce one word to the penitent sinner about Regeneration, whereas external duties of alms, or restitution (which in their way are necessary by Gods