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

These two things thus premised, the plain and obvious Objection is, That if original sin be positive, then it's good, and so of God, because omne ens est bonum, every being is good, and then as Austin, Omne bonum est vel Deus, vel à Deo, all good is either God himself, or of God Would it not then be blasphemy to make God the Author of it, and if it have a positive being, then certainly it must come from God the Author of all being?

THese two things thus premised, the plain and obvious Objection is, That if original sinne be positive, then it's good, and so of God, because omne ens est bonum, every being is good, and then as Austin, Omne bonum est vel Deus, vel à Deo, all good is either God himself, or of God Would it not then be blasphemy to make God the Authour of it, and if it have a positive being, then certainly it must come from God the Author of all being?

But to this several Answers may be returned:

First, That though original sin should be granted to be positive, yet for all that God would not be made the Author of sin, Because as it's sin, it doth arise from man. There are some great Schoolmen, as Cajetan and others, that hold sins of commission have a positive real being, as sins; They deny that the nature of such sins lieth formally in a privation. but in a positive relative contrariety to the Law of God; and when urged with this Argument, That then such sins have their being immediately from God, as all other created beings have: They will answer, That God is indeed the efficient of every being, but not of every modus, or relative respect of that being: As for example, when a man eateth and drinketh, this eating and drinking they are from God, but then take them under this relative respect, as they are vital and formal actions of man, so they cannot be attributed to God, for then we might say, God doth eat and drink, yea in those gracious acts when we do believe and repent, God is the efficient cause of them, yet as they do formally and vitally flow from us, so they are not to be attributed to God, for God doth not repent or believe. Thus it may be said, That though God be efficiently the cause of all positive being, yet as some being hath a relative respect to the second cause working, so it cannot be attributed to God, neither is this any imperfection, but a perfection in God, because Deus non potest supplers vicem materialis, aut formalis causae: Therefore