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“the agreement of men,” by which they have been ratified and confirmed in all ages. The Baron seems to have overlooked the information we have received from Scripture, that men inherit a divine attribute from their parents, I mean that knowledge of good and evil which they took upon themselves contrary to the express command of God, and thereby unhappily entailed sin and Death on all their posterity; for that divine knowledge necessarily engages and includes our agreement or assent to the “the Laws of Nature,” whether we obey them or not, and thereby renders us answerable for our imperfect conduct in this world, and consequently guilty before God! And from hence arises the necessity of a redemption to relieve mankind from that unhappy effect of the Original Sin; for, as “the strength of Sin is the Law,” [1] so the guilt of every criminal action is with justice imputed to us, because we have wilfully offended against this natural light or Law in our Hearts, by which we ought to have known how to refuse the Evil and choose the Good.
- ↑ “The sting of Death is Sin; and the strength of Sin is the Law.” I Cor. xv, 56.
