DISCOURSE X. PART II. 8. I COME now to shew, that though it should be granted that the soul of man, the breath of God in him, could not cease to exist; yet that his body being an essential part of him, and not naturally immortal, his immortality must have been a supernatural gift to him from God, to be preserved on a certain condition and by certain means. It is unreasonable to suppose that God made man in such a state, as that immortality was natural to one part of him, and supernatural to the other. His being formed of the dust of the ground, was a sufficient declaration to him, that earthly enjoyments were all he could claim by nature. And to suppose, that had Adam continued innocent, and his posterity increased only as they have done, they would all have enjoyed immortality, that is, an endless state of blessedness, in this world, is absurd. The world could not have contained them. It must, therefore, have been the purpose of God, when they had passed such a trial as he saw good, and were confirmed in habits of obedience beyond the danger of falling, to have translated them to a state of supernatural bliss in heaven. Heaven, therefore, was supernatural to Adam, even with respect to his soul. For if he was created fit for heaven, why was he not placed there at first? why subjected to a hazardous trial, to obtain that happiness for which he was fitted by his creation? But his foundation was in the dust-thence he received his body: and therefore, the immortality of heaven was incongruous to his Cature, till his body became so spiritualised, as to be ca pable of heavenly, and to him, supernatural bliss. It is also to be remarked, that when Adam fell, the sentence which God pronounced on him adverts immediately to his earthly original: 'Dust thou art, and unto dust thou shalt return: Thereby reducing him to that state which was natural to him, by depriving him of those supernatural favours which he had forfeited by his disobedience. It has been said, that Adam was to hold his immortaliThe ty on a certain condition, and by certain means. condition was obedience, and that confined to one prohibition, by which the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, was interdicted to him. I mean not to insinuate, that it would have been no crime in Adam to have acted contrary to any other command or prohibition of God, or in violation of the distinction which he must, from the seeds of virtue planted in his nature, have perceived between truth and falsehood, good and evil. But revelation hath informed us of no other crime by which he would have forfeited his state in the garden of Eden, and involved himself and his posterity in such a depth of ruin and misery, as required the interposition, and even incarnation and sufferings of his Creator to repair. The means by which the body of Adam was to have been preserved from decay, till God saw proper to confer on him the supernatural blessedness of heaven, was his eating of the tree of life, which grew in the midst of the garden. I see no absurdity in supposing that both the tree of life and the tree of knowledge had natural qualities, the one to preserve, the other to destroy the life of Adam. Or, if we suppose the tree of knowledge to have been naturally free from such baneful effects, and to have been, by God's appointment, the symbol of death to him; yet his eating of it under his circumstances, was a declared determination that he would seek his happiness in his own way, by the gratification of his bodily senses, like the irrational animals, and would not be restrained by the will and commandments of God; and therefore it was an act of wilful and deliberate rebellion against God. If, on the contrary, we suppose the tree of life to have been the sacrament of immortality, and its effect to have been to repair the decays of nature, and keep the body in health and vigour; and also to be the sign and pledge of pardon, and peace with God upon any deviations from duty which might have been incurred through surprise or infirmity, its use must be very apparent. That the body of Adam must naturally, in his state of innocence, have been subject to decay, has been shewn. It would, therefore, want something to repair it. And that he was liable to deviations from duty, is highly probable. Every created being must be imperfect, and an imperfect being may come short of his duty through mere weakness of nature. • His angels God charged with folly.'* There was something in them not so good and right, as it ought to have been-some deviation from strict duty; for nothing else in God's sight is folly. Where, then, is the absurdity of supposing that man, who in his best estate was lower than the angels, might be subject to such deviations from duty as they were ? And how gracious was God to provide a remedy for him,. even the sacrament of the tree of life, by which his covenant with God might be renewed, his faith in him strength. ened, his dependence on him acknowledged, his sense of his goodness confirmed, and his hope in his mercy enlivened? David hath informed us that God is not extreme to mark iniquities against us:† Nor could there have been any change in the nature of God, between the time of Adam and David. He is ever the same, and changeth not. The observation which has been already made gives strength to this opinion; namely, that the sentence of death against Adam was restrained to the single crime of eating the forbidden fruit. Two other commands were given to him in his innocency; one enjoining the obser vation of the Sabbath, the other declaring the institution of marriage : but neither of them is sanctioned with death; nor have we a right to suppose that death would have followed every breach of them. It is true, every failure in duty must have been displeasing to God, and would have called for Adam's humiliation and penitence; and would have led him to the tree of life, as the emblem of the Divine mercy, the seal of his pardon, and the means of strengthening him in holiness and dependence on God. Another means of preserving immortality to Adam was the blessed Spirit of God, bestowed on him as a supernatural gift, to enable him to obtain that supernatural bliss which God designed for him. This gift of the Holy Spirit is not indeed expressly mentioned by Moses, but is strongly intimated in his account of the creation of man. What less can be intend. ed by his being created in the 'image of God?" It cannot relate to the form of his body; for God can have no bodily form. The Holy Spirit, though distinct in person, is essential to the Godhead, so that where God is, there the Spirit must be. The image of God, therefore, in Adam, could not be without the Holy Spirit. The dominion over the creatures of the world with which Adam was invested, seems to have been in consequence of the image of God in which he was created: ' And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness : and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea,'* &c. That Adam was created in holiness, and with power to have persevered in holiness, is allowed by all. But there can be no holiness in any creature but from the Spirit of God. Therefore the Holy Spirit must have been given to him, to be the governing principle of his life : for the means must have been in proportion to the end. If immortality was supernatural to Adam-what he could not obtain by the mere energy of his rational nature; then he must have been endued with power which was supernatural; but such power can only come from the Holy Spirit of God. * Genesis i. 26. If, therefore, when God breathed into Adam the breath of lives, he received not only such a soul as made him a living animal, but also such a reasonable, intelligent soul as made him a rational animal; what should hinder but that he received also such virtue and energy of the Holy Spirit of God, as was in him the principle of holiness, immortality, and glory ? Without this gift, he seems to have been incapable of obtaining that perfection and happiness for which his Creator designed him. Should doubts remain on this subject, they will probably be removed by the plainer declarations of the christian revelation, in which the Spirit of God is always acknowledged to be the principle of holiness and immortality : Nay, to him our resurrection from the grave to life eternal is expressly ascribed: 'If the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead, dwell in you; he that raised up Christ from the dead, shall also quicken your mortal bodies, by his Spirit that dwelleth in you.* Unless man, in his first estate, was to have received a supernatural immortality through the energy of the Holy Spirit, it seems hard to assign any good reason why the operation of the Spirit should be necessary to his resurrection, which is intended to restore to him, through Christ, the immortality which he lost in Adam. Christianity teaches us that eternal life is the gift of God:† and reason will teach us that it always was, and ever must be so. No creature can be independent of its Creator, nor can hold either life or happiness but as his gift. Consequently, the life of every creature in favour with God, must be by the agency and operation of the Spirit of God. Therefore is our recovery of the Holy Spirit, as a principle of life through Christ, called our regeneration, new birth, new creation; because we regain through Christ, that presence, energy, inspiration, or life of the Holy Spirit, which human nature received when God breathed into man's nostrils the breath of lives, and which it lost by Adam's apostacy. Therefore also does the scripture teach us that there is no other name |