am utterly unable to do so, not understanding what Mr. Poiret says nor whereof he affirms. I give it to the reader therefore in its original and transcendental costume. It is a summary of his theory in respect to the nature of sin.

Cap. IV. § 14. "Si itaque ego, qui per Deum cogitatio sum spontanea, (at nihil a me), maneam in nihilo, quod est non-determinatio a me, ad me, per me, pro me, sumque mihi ut qui ex me, ad me, et per me nihil sum, volo, opto, eligo, operor, etc., tum non pecco. Sed si illud NIHIL absit, id est, si ego, res sponte cogitans (qui tamen nihil a me) deficiam a nihilo, a non-determinatione a me, ad me, per me, etc., adsitque aliqua realitatis larva inanis, quâ ego, qui nihil sum, mibi is videar qui a me aliquid sim, sciam, bene optem, velim, operer, tunc eo ipso pecco. Unde patet, peccatum, non cogitationem spontaneam ejusve positionem actualem esse, sed esse ABSTINENTIAM NIHILI in mente debiti, sive nihili privationem, ipso nihilo longe imperfectiorem et deteriorem ; etiamsi id vel Dei proxima imitatio interdum esse videatur."

I have my doubts, whether even Coleridge himself, in the most transcendental of all his flights, (which are sometimes counted lofty or sublime by his admirers, as one cannot well avoid believing, because they lose sight of him and think he must of course be soaring aloft),-would have been able, with all his invention and boundless fecundity of words, to go beyond the once admired, but now long-forgotten Peter Poiret. But all this is by the by; let us resume the important topic before us.

I wish to draw the particular attention of the reader to the main positions of Vitringa, in the passage which I have now translated. These are,

(1) Law is the rule of moral actions. It is the command of a superior, which regulates the voluntary actions of an inferior. See under No. 10 above.

Of course the author means to describe here the moral law, i. e. the law of God which regulates our moral actions. We may speak of the laws of nature, i. e. of matter animate and inanimate; of the laws of our physical being, etc.; but whenever we employ the term law in this way, we merely designate the arrangement or order which the divine being has prescribed to physical nature, an arrangement which it has no power to transgress, and never does violate.

Let the reader note well here, that Vitringa specificates voluntary actions, and those only, as being the proper objects of

moral law. This will be made still clearer, by the next sentiment of his, which I am now going to particularize.

(2) "Law," he says, "involves the idea of a rational subject, i. e. of a free agent, furnished with, the faculties necessary for action." Nor is this all; he is more explicit still. This subject or agent must be "adequate to determine for himself, deliberately and voluntarily from internal principles [quod se ex interno principio deliberaté et έxovolws • possit determinare], in respect to the doing or not doing of any particular thing.” No. 11 above.

After shewing that the relation of dependence in some sense must exist between lawgiver and subject, and that both the matter and manner of actions may be proper subjects of law, he goes on to say:

must No. 20.

(3) A law, in order to be equitable, just, and good, not exceed the ability and strength of the subject."

(4) "Inasmuch as no one can be obligated by a law to do or omit any thing, unless the pleasure of the law-giver be made known to him, and expressed in language that is plain and intelligible; it is clear that the notion of law and of sin supposes or involves the idea, that the pleasure of the lawgiver, as expressed in the law, should be made known to the subject by the clearest indications, or at least publicly promulgated; so that ignorance of the law cannot be pleaded by way of extenuating guilt." No. 21.

(5) "All these conditions being presupposed, then sin may take place; which is nothing more than the transgression of the law, or something done contrary to law." No. 22.

Putting now these considerations together, we may make out the following definition of sin, as laid down by Vitringa, viz., The voluntary transgression or violation of a known law of God, by a rational, free, moral agent.

I trust that no one will assert this to be an incorrect view of Vitringa's sentiments, because of what he says respecting vitium, in Nos. 1, 2, of the above extract from his work. His defini

tion of vitium is, that it is a habit or habitude of sinning, by which he plainly means a habitual inclination to sin. This is clear from the last paragraph under No. 2, in which he says, that "habitual sin, in the order of nature and time, precedes sin in the act;" i. e., if I rightly understand him, the inclination, in the order of nature and time, precedes the external development by outward actions. Yet this is not all, perhaps, which

he means to say; for he probably intends to convey the idea, that sinful men possess an inclination to sin which is abiding, constant, or (as we commonly say) habitual. It is plain, however, from a comparison of this part of his Essay with what follows, that he did not bestow any considerable time or pains on what he has here said of the distinction between vitium and peccatum. If the reader will take the trouble to look back and compare Nos. 10, 11, 20, 21, and 22 above, he will see at once that Vitringa means, beyond a doubt, to comprehend within his definition all which he calls sin, whether vitium or peccatum. Indeed the vitium which he defines, or rather names, appears to be nothing more nor less than the frequently repeated, i. e. habitual, desire to sin which leads to the commission of what he calls sinful acts, and which is itself, (in the sense in which it is here understood by him), forbidden by the law of God.

In a way like to this the apostle James appears to speak, when he says, that "lust, when it has conceived, bringeth forth sin," James 1: 15. It might be a question here, (for such questions have been often raised), whether the lust which conceives and then brings forth sin, is itself a sin. But whatever may be said in order to shew that there must be some ultimate bounds in the genealogical series of sin, beyond which we cannot trace it without running into absurdity or else charging it upon our Maker, yet it is quite plain, at least it is so to my apprehension, that this reasoning will not apply to the lust of which the apostle here speaks. In the context (v. 14) he says: "Every man is tempted when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed." I acknowledge, indeed, that some objects which may tempt us, are not in themselves sinful. The tree of knowledge of good and evil, for example, which tempted our first parents, was not sinful. But this was an external object, and not a psychological part or passion of our progenitors. In the case before us, on the contrary, it is our own lust that tempts us and entices us; and this, as the apostle expressly avers, not in such a sense as God tempts men, i. e. tries them or subjects them to trial (see vs. 2, 13), but in an evil sense, viz. entices us to sin. Is it then a forbidden passion voluntarily indulged, which the apostle here characterizes under the name of lust? I see no other aspect of the case, which seems to be rational and consistent with scriptural views of the nature of sin. We are not sinners because our nature has a susceptibility of being impressed

or excited by objects that may lead us to sin. Adam had evidently such a nature before his fall; the holy Redeemer himself possessed such a nature, else he could not have been

tempted in all points as we are." The point where sinful lust begins, is the point where voluntary encouragement or cherishing of such excitement begins. It is such a lust which "draws away and entices to sin ;" and such which the apostle seems plainly to have had in view. And this in itself is sinful; it plainly is, moreover, the parent of actual and outward sins, as they are commonly named.

Vitringa's meaning, then, seems to be of the same general nature as that of James. Although in strictness of speech, as Vitringa has abundantly asserted elsewhere, all sin is an act of disobedience or a violation of law, and so lust itself when voluntarily cherished, and therefore sinful, is such a violation, yet in common parlance we speak of a disposition to sin, or a habit of sinning, or a habitual inclination to sin, as something which the mind is prone to separate from the act itself, and to regard as its antecedent. It is in accordance with this common usage of speech, that Vitringa expresses himself in the extract on which I am remarking. But at the same time, if the matter be thoroughly examined according to the whole of his views compared together, nothing will be found plainer or more certain, than that his vitium is as really a transgression of the divine law (and of course an act of the mind), as his peccatum is. And such is evidently the case with the declaration of the apostle James. In both these cases the modes of speech adopted in common parlance are employed, without any special regard to a choice of words which metaphysical nicety or the stricter laws of diction in casuistry would demand.

I may proceed then to remark, that no one, as I trust, will venture to assert that I have not given a fair and legitimate summary of Vitringa's principles and definitions, in what I have said above. And if this be so, the question then arises: Who comes nearest to Vitringa's views, the man who believes that all sin consists in voluntary transgression of known laws by intelligent, rational, free, moral agents; or he who maintains, that sin may be and is a part of our physiological nature since the fall, and therefore may and does exist antecedent to all thought, knowledge, action, or voluntary exercise of the mind? This question may be fairly raised; and it ought to be fairly and candidly answered.

The allegation of new divinity ought not to serve, in the present case, as a satisfactory answer to views like those of Vitringa. He was no new-divinity man, no New England theologian, but an honest, pious, learned, orthodox Dutchman of the next generation after the men of the Synod of Dort itself; a masterly critic, moreover, a noble linguist, a universal scholar, and a profound theologian. Here then is Vitringa, with all his orthodoxy and in all his glory, differing as much, in respect to the point before us from what is now called a man of New England divinity, as one grape differs from its mate on the same

stem.

The reader who is not in unison with the sentiments of Vitringa, may of course regard them as he pleases; but he will generously concede at least so much as this, viz., that such a view of sin as leads one to define it as being a voluntary transgression of a known law, by a rational, free, moral agent, is not new divinity, and is not appropriate merely to New England. The time is coming, I trust or at least hope that it is not far distant, when mere expressions of alarm on this subject, and charges of heresy and of forsaking the great standards of Protestantism in regard to the nature of sin, will not pass for sound argument. It surely does not need proof, that such modes of rebuking or of convicting are not kind, brotherly, and rational discussion. Above all, these methods of urging on the efforts of party, and of kindling into a flame its odium theologicum, ought not to have currency with the thinking, sober, candid, and judicious part of our community. I may be permitted to add here, what I would do in the spirit of meekness and without polemic asperity, that such as have not for themselves fully examined the opinions of the Reformers and their successors, ought especially to refrain from hereticating others for a merely supposed difference of opinion. How easily an error may be committed in this respect, has been strikingly shewn in the learned and excellent exhibition of the sentiments of the Reformation made by the Rev. Mr. Landis, in the Bibl. Repos. Vol. XII., with regard to several points of doctrine concerning which great confidence and much positive assertion have lately been exhibited by some polemic writers of our day. Every one deeply versed in the theology of the Reformation and of the succeeding age, knows well that the leaders of that day dif fered as often and as much on some speculative points, which are of inferior practical interest, as theologians do now; how then