Jones on Article IX: Of Original or Birth-sin

” ’ Lo in iniquity am I born, and in sin Lath my mother conceived me.’ He (David) doth signify by his words what he had inherited of his parents — of Adam namely, sin and wickedness ; and he speaketh not of himself only, but of all mankind. He painteth us out in our own colour ; showing that all we, be contaminate, from our birth, with sin, and so should justly be firebrands in hell, world without end

’ Whatsoever is born of the flesh is flesh,’ that is to say, is sinful, wicked, and so, destitute of the glory of God, and the child of the devil.” — Ser. on St. Stephen’s Day.

” By original sin and evil custom, the image of God in man was so, at the beginning, darkened, and the judgment of nature so corrupted, that man himself doth not sufficiently understand what difference is between honesty and dishonesty, right and

wrong And forthwith the image of God was defaced in

them ; and the most beautiful proportion of righteousness, holiness, truth, and knowledge of God was confounded, and in a manner utterly blotted out. Hereof grew the weakness of our flesh ; hereof came this corruption and disorder of lusts and affections ; hereof came that pestilence ; hereof came that seed and nourishment of sins wherewith mankind is infected, and it is called sin original.” — Catechism.

” Men that be out of the favour of God, walk from one sin to another, do the lusts of their flesh, and of their own will, con- trary to the will of God. Here we may learn what we can do of ourselves, left to our own might and power, if we lack the grace of God ; surely we can do nothing else but sin, and follow the desires of our corrupt flesh, of the which come death and eternal damnation.” — On Ephesians.

” Touching ourselves, we teach with the blessed apostles and prophets, ’ that by nature we are the children of wrath,’ that corruption is bred and settled within our bones ; that we are both born and begotten in it ; that with it all the powers and faculties of our nature are infected ; that still it cleaveth fast unto our souls, and although the deadly sting be taken from it, yet there it sticketh as long as life doth endure, so irksome, and to grievous, that it forceth the most upright and perfect to cry.

” miserable man, who shall deliver me ?’ By this inbred cor- ruption our understanding is so darkened, that naturally we cannot perceive the things which are of God ; no, we count them foolishness ; our will is in such thraldom and slavery unto sin, that it cannot like of any thing spiritual and heavenly, but is wholly carried unto fleshly desires.” — Sermons.

” The sin of Adam, the only occasion of all man’s misery, was derived unto all his posterity, and made it subject unto

death and the ire of God for ever Man fallen from his first

dignity and original perfection, is now the creature that fighteth with the law of God ; full of darkness, ignorancy, and of the contempt of God, without obedience, fear, and love of God ; oppressed, and subject unto all calamities and wilful concu- piscence both of body and soul.” — Declaration.

” Hereby you perceive, good children, how our first parents Adam and Eve, poisoned with the venom of the serpent, were cast into four horrible vices. And as our first parents were

infected and corrupted, even so be we that be their children

And as they loved not God, so their children love him not ; and as they followed their own concupiscence, lust, and appe- tites, and not the will of God, even so do all their issue. So that all their posterity upon earth be sinners, even in their mother’s womb.” — Catechism of 1548.

” This is a great feebleness, or rather, a horrible sickness, leprosy, corruption, and pestilent contagion of original sin, by means thereof, they that be most holy here in earth, be not perfectly just and righteous, but even they, want many things that belong to their perfection.” — Ibid.

” No man shall be damned for the offences of Adam, but for his own proper offences, either actual or original.” — Annota- tions.

” Although our heavenly Father doth most mercifully for- give us our offences, yet he doth not take sin clean away, but during this life we fight against sin until we die, and so be tried and proved whether we love him and his commandments better than our own wills and pleasures.” — Catechism of 1548.

” The words of the prophet are these, ’ All we are become as an unclean man, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags.’

In your Latin ye read the text thus, ’ All we are unclean,

and as filthy rags.’ So that ye leave out all our righteousnesses. Now if the text may stand still for you, as the Holy Ghost left it, that all our righteousness and best works are unclean, and not without some blemish ; then happily you will have little thank, not only for holding against it, but also for minishing the text. As touching the Germans, (to whom ye impute error in this behalf,) their doctrine is, that when the ser- vants of God have done all that is commanded them, they must acknowledge themselves to be unprofitable, to have occasion continually to cry unto God, and to say, ’ O forgive us our trespasses,’ to acknowledge ’ that in their flesh dwelleth no good thing ;’ yea, and to confess, that though they ’ delight in the law of God after the inward man, yet there is another law in their members, which striveth against the law of their mind, and taketh them prisoners in the law of sin, which is in their members ;’ that ’ there is no man but he sinneth,’ that ’ the whole life upon earth is a very battle,’ where ’ the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh ;’ so that Christian men cannot bring every thing to such a perfection as

they feign would.” Thus taught also St. Augustine.” —

Confutation of Standish.

” Concupiscence, which showeth itself by its evil fruits, even in a man that is baptized, is sin of itself. (Rom. vii.) Here the Apostle saith, ’ Now, I mine own self do not this, but

the sin which dwelleth and remaineth in me.’ The Apostle doth not here speak in the person of wicked men ; for wicked men do not consent to the law, they serve and obey not the law of God with their mind. Of its own nature indeed it is evil ; but a man truly regenerate, and not walking after the flesh, doth repress and hold down sin with the spirit of grace, that it reign not, nor have the over hand ; that there be no damnation unto them that be grafted in Christ.” (Rom. viii.) — Old Learn- ing and New.

” What is original sin ? It is the poison and corruption that we have in our birth, through the infection of our nature in Adam, which doth bring forth in us the fruit of incredulity, and all wickednesses, and maketh us unable to the works of the law, as the law requireth them to be done of us, until Christ and his word hath made us a new creature.” — Demands of Holy Scripture.

” Adam (I say) being made after God’s image which he received for us all, to have derived the same unto us all, by natural propagation ; by transgressing the commandments, lost and mangled so the same image of God in himself, and in us all, that for immortality came death ; for wisdom came foolish- ness ; for righteousness came unrighteousness ; for holiness

came corruption, the which all we by propagation do from

our mother’s womb receive, so that we may well see our state now to be far from the state we had before Adam’s fall.” — On Election.

” A man that is regenerate consisteth of two men, (as a man may say,) namely of the old man and of the new man. The old man is like to a mighty giant, such a one as was Goliath, for his birth is now perfect ; but the new man is like unto a little child, such a one as was David, for his birth is not perfect until the day of his general resurrection.” — Letters.

See also Articles X. XI. XIII.