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

Therefore in the third place, there are three or four Interpretations, that are competitors about this Text.

The first is of those, who by uncleanness do mean a spurious bastard-brood, and by holy, a civil sanctity, as it were, that is true and legitimate; as if the Apostles meaning was, in answering the doubt of a believer, Whether they might continue in marriage with unbelievers (for in Ezra's time, all the Jews that had so married, were commanded to put away their wives?) did inform them, that their marriage would be lawful, otherwise their children would be bastards, but they were legitimate. Thus the Lutherans generally some of the Ancients are alleged also, and Musculus upon second thoughts cometh off to this Interpretation, confessing he had formerly abused it against Anabaptists. But this might easily be rejected, if it were our business in hand: For,

The first is of those, who by uncleanness do mean a spurious bastard-brood, and by holy, a civil sanctity, as it were, that is true and legitimate; as if the Apostles meaning was, in answering the doubt of a believer, Whether they might continue in marriage with unbelievers (for in Ezra's time, all the Jews that had so married, were commanded to put away their wives?) did inform them, that their marriage would be lawful, otherwise their children would be bastards, but they were legitimate. Thus the Lutherans generally some of the Ancients are alledged also, and Musculus upon second thoughts cometh off to this Interpretation, confessing he had formerly abused it against Anabaptists. But this might easily be rejected, if it were our business in hand: For,

1. Marriage even among Heathens, is true lawful marriage, and their children are legitimate; for although their very marriage, as all things else are unclean to them in a sanctified sense, because they are impure, yet marriage in it self is a lawful thing to them, so that it is not to be judged fornication. And