89 / 652
GERM.
V.]
OF
TIDE
MORAL LAW, AND.
THE
EVIL
OF
SIN.
'79
that
is,
an
everlasting
loss
of
life
and
all
the
blessings
of
it, which
are eternally
forfeited thereby.
And perhaps
this
is
the lowest
punishment
that
ever
is
inflicted for
the
lowest
degree
of
sin
or guilt, where the
law
of God
is
suffered to
take
its
proper
course in executing the pe-
nalty; for the mere
loss
of
life
is
a
less
punishment than
the
continuance
of
it
in
any
degree
of
misery.
Proposition IV.
"
There
is
scarce any
actual,
that
is,
wilful sin,
but carries
with
it
some
particular
aggrava-
tions,
and
these deserve
such
further
positive
punishments
as
the
wisdom
and
justice of God
shall see
reason to in-
flict.
Hence
arises the penal
continuance
in life with
the
loss
of
all
the comforts
of
it,
that
is
the pains
and
sorrows
of
the
future state
*.
God
is
the
righteous
Go-.
vernor
of
the world, his
justice
weighs
in the
nicest ba-
lances every command
of
his own law,
and
every grain
of
the
sinners
offences,
with
all their circumstances
ofguilt
and aggravation
;
and
strict justice
distributes
sorrows
in
proportion
to
sins
:
This
appears
in
the
punishment
of
Babylon; Rev.
xviii.
6.
"
God bath remembered
the
iniquities of ßabylon, and rewarded her
as
she
rewarded
his
saints: Double
vengeance unto
her,
according
to
her
double
malice
and persecution
:
How
much she
hath
glorified
herself
and
lived deliciously,
so
much
torment
and
sorrow
give
her."
And this
proportion
of
sorrow to
sin
will
terribly appear
'in the
last
judgment
and the
final
punishment
of
sinners
in
the world to
comet.
" This
is
usually called eternal
death,
or
the punishment of
hell.
t
Now
from
the desert of
sin
and the punishment due
to
it
being
set
in
this
light,
I would
humbly enquire whether
we
may
not
better
learn
the
meaning of the apostle
;
Rom. v.
12
-14.
when he says,
"
Death entered
into the
world by sin,
and
passes upon all
men for
that
all have sinned
;"
that
is,
sin
is
imputed
to all,
and
death
reigns over
them,
even over
those
that
have not sinned
after the similitude of Adam's transgression, which
is
generally interpreted concerning infants,
who
have committed
no
actual
personal
sin
as
Adam
did:
Yet
here
is
a
forfeiture of life
and
its
blessings
derived
to
the
children
of Adam, and
they
come
under
a
sentence
of death
by original
imputed
sin,
which we may suppose to be
the
lowest
kind
of
guilt.
But in
Rom. ii. 8, 9.
"
Indignation and wrath, tribulation
and
anguish are denounced against every
soul
of
man
that
doth evil,"
that
is,
that
Both
commit wilful actual sin, because
there
are special
aggravations,
some
of
a
greater
and
some
of
a lesser
kind,
that
belong
to all
actual ini-
quities.
Whether
therefore
sin
has
any partibular aggravation attending it
-Or
no,
there
is
an
everlasting forfeiture of
life
incufred,by,it,
and an eternal
loss
of
the
blessings
of
it
;
and whatsoever
further
aggravations the
sin
carries
6