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there must be a regard to God and his duty implanted in him at his first existence; otherwise it is certain he would have done nothing from a regard to God and his duty; no, not so much as to reflect and consider, and try to obtain such a disposition. The very supposition of a disposition to right action being first obtained by repeated right action, is grossly inconsistent with itself; for it supposes a course of right action, before there is a disposition to perform any right action.

These are no invented quibbles or sophisms. If God expected of Adam any obedience or duty to him at all, when he first made him, whether it was in reflecting, considering, or any way exerting the faculties he had given him, then God expected he should immediately exercise love and regard to him. For how could it be expected, that Adam should have a strict and perfect regard to God's commands and authority, and his duty to him, when he had no love nor regard to him in his heart, nor could it be expected he should have any? If Adam from the beginning did his duty to God, and had more respect to the will of his Creator than to other things, and as much respect to him as he ought to have; then from the beginning he had a supreme and perfect respect and love to God; and if so, he was created with such a principle. There is no avoiding the consequence. Not only external duties, but internal duties, such as summarily consist in love, must be immediately required of Adam, as soon as he existed, if any duty at all was required. For it is most apparently absurd, to talk of a spiritual being, with the faculties of understanding and will, being required to perform external duties, without internal. Dr. Taylor himself observes, that love is the fulfilling of the law, and that all moral rectitude, even every part of it, must be resolved into that single principle. Therefore, if any morally right act at all, reflection, consideration, or any thing else, was required of Adam immediately, on his first existence, and was performed as required; then he must, the first moment of his existence, have his heart possessed of that principle of divine love; which implies the whole of moral rectitude in every part of it, according to our author's own doctrine; and so the whole of moral rectitude

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there must be a regard to God and his duty implanted in him at his first existence; otherwise it is certain he would have done nothing from a regard to God and his duty; no, not so much as to reflect and consider, and try to obtain such a disposition. The very supposition of a disposition to right action being first obtained by repeated right action, is grossly inconsistent with itself; for it supposes a course of right action, before there is a disposition to perform any right action.

These are no invented quibbles or sophisms. If God expected of Adam any obedience or duty to him at all, when he first made him, whether it was in reflecting, considering, or any way exerting the faculties he had given him, then God expected he should immediately exercise love and regard to him. For how could it be expected, that Adam should have a strict and perfect regard to God's commands and authority, and his duty to him, when he had no love nor regard to him in his heart, nor could it be expected he should have any? If Adam from the beginning did his duty to God, and had more respect to the will of his Creator than to other things, and as much respect to him as he ought to have; then from the beginning he had a supreme and perfect respect and love to God; and if so, he was created with such a principle. There is no avoiding the consequence. Not only external duties, but internal duties, such as summarily consist in love, must be immediately required of Adam, as soon as he existed, if any duty at all was required. For it is most apparently absurd, to talk of a spiritual being, with the faculties of understanding and will, being required to perform external duties, without internal. Dr. Taylor himself observes, that Jove is the fulfilling of the law, and that all moral rectitude, even every part of it, must be resolved into that single principle. Therefore, if any morally right act at all, reflection, consideration, or any thing else, was required of Adam immediately, on his first existence, and was performed as required; then he must, the first moment of his existence, have his heart possessed of that principle of divine love; which implies the whole of moral rectitude in every part of it, according to our author's own doctrine; and so the whole of moral rectitude

or righteousness must begin with his existence; which is the thing taught in the doctrine of Original Righteousness.

And let us consider how it could be otherwise, than that Adam was always, in every moment of his existence, obliged to exercise such regard or respect of heart towards every object or thing, as was agreeable to the apparent merit of that object. For instance, would it not at any time have been a becoming thing in Adam, on the exhibition to his mind of God's infinite goodness to him, for him to have exercised answerable gratitude, and the contrary have been unbecoming and odious? And if something had been presented to Adam's view, transcendently amiable in itself, as for instance, the glorious perfection of the divine nature, would it not have become him to love, relish and delight in it? Would not such an object have merited this? And if the view of an object so amiable in itself did not affect his mind with complacence, would it not, according to the plain dictates of our understanding, have shewn an unbecoming temper of mind?

To say that he had not had time, by culture, to form and establish a good disposition or relish, is not what would have taken off the disagreeableness and odiousness of the temper. And if there had been never so much time, I do not see how it could be expected he should improve it aright, in order to obtain a good disposition, if he had not already some good disposition to engage him to it.

That belonging to the will and disposition of the heart, which is in itself either odious or amiable, unbecoming or decent, always would have been Adam's virtue or sin, in any moment of his existence; if there be any such thing as virtue or vice, by which nothing can be meant, but that in our moral disposition and behavior, which is becoming or unbecoming, amiable or odious.

Human nature must be created with some dispositions; a disposition to relish some things as good and amiable, and to be averse to other things as odious and disagreeable; otherwise it must be without any such thing as inclination or will : It must be perfectly indifferent, without preference, without choice or aversion towards any thing as agreeable or disa

greeable. But if it had any concreated dispositions at all, they must be either right or wrong, either agreeable or disa greeable to the nature of things. If man had at first the highest relish of those things that were most excellent and beautiful, a disposition to have the quickest and highest delight in those things that were most worthy of it, then his dispositions were morally right and amiable, and never can be decent and excellent in a higher sense. But if he had a disposition to love most those things that were inferior and less worthy, then his dispositions were vicious. And it is evident there can be no medium between these.

II. This notion of Adam's being created without a principle of holiness in his heart, taken with the rest of Dr. Taylor's scheme, is inconsistent with what the history, in the beginning of Genesis, leads us to suppose of the great favors and smiles of heaven, which Adam enjoyed while he remained in innocency. The Mosaic account suggests to us that till Adam sinned he was in happy circumstances, surrounded with testimonies and fruits of God's favor. This is implicitly owned by Dr. Taylor, when he says, page 252. "That in the dispensation our first parents were under before the fall, they were placed in a condition proper to engage their grati tude, love and obedience." But it will follow on our author's principles, that Adam, while in innocency, was placed in far worse circumstances than he was in after his disobedience, and infinitely worse than his posterity are in ; under unspeakably greater disadvantages for the avoiding of sin, and the per formance of duty. For by his doctrine, Adam's posterity come into the world with their hearts as free from any propensity to sin as he, and he was made as destitute of any propensity to righteousness as they; and yet God, in favor to them, does great things to restrain them from sin, and excite them to virtue, which he never did for Adam in innocency, but laid him, in the highest degree, under contrary disadvantages.

God, as an instance of his great favor, and fatherly love to man, since the fall, has denied him the ease and pleasures of Paradise, which gratified and allured his senses, and bodily

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