An Interpretation of Romans 7

FIRST PART

1. THE THESIS TO BE PROVED

1. A description of the terms contained in the Thesis.

2. The reason why the description of the apostle is here omitted.

3. What is meant by "being under the law.

4. What it is to be "under grace."

5. What is meant by "a regenerate man?"

6. Who is "an unregenerate?"

THE apostle, in this passage, is treating neither about himself, such as he then was, nor about a man living under grace; but he has transferred to himself the person of a man placed under the law.

Or as some other persons express it — the apostle, in this passage, is not treating about a man who is already regenerate through the Spirit of Christ, but has assumed the person of a man who is not yet regenerate.

1. To the proof of the thesis, must be premised and prefixed definitions or descriptions of the subjects which it comprises. The subjects are — the apostle himself, a man placed under grace, a man placed under the law, a man regenerate by the Spirit of Christ, and a man not yet regenerate.

2. I have set the apostle apart from those who are regenerate and placed under grace, not because I would take him away from the number of regenerate persons, among whom he holds a conspicuous station, but because some people have thought proper to deduce, from the description of the apostolical perfection, arguments by which they prove, that the apostle could not, in this passage, be speaking concerning himself, as he then was; because those things which he here ascribes to himself are at variance with some things that, in other passages, he writes about himself, and because they are a disgrace to his eminent state of grace, and to his progress in faith and newness of life. But since it is certain, that the apostle has not, in this chapter, treated of himself personally, as distinguished from all other men of whatsoever condition or order they may be, but that he, under his own person, described a certain kind and order of men, whether they be those who are under the law and not yet regenerate, or those who are regenerate and placed under grace, omitting the description of the apostle, we will first see what is meant by being under grace and under the law, and what by being regenerate, and not yet regenerate or unregenerate; yet we will do this in such a man — that, in the subsequent establishment of our own opinion, we may produce arguments drawn from the description given by the apostle.

3. The expression, therefore, to be under the law, does not signify merely that the man is liable to perform it, or that he is bound to obey the commands of the law; in which sense all men generally, both those who are said in the ninth verse of this chapter to be "without law," are reckoned to be under the law by right of creation, and those also who are under grace, are considered to be under the law by the further fight of redemption and sanctification, and yet in such a manner as not to be under its rigor, because they are under the law to Christ, who makes his people free from the rigor of the law. But because the office of the law concerning sinners is two-fold — the one, to conclude sinners under the guilt of that punishment which is denounced by the law against transgressors, and to condemn them by its sentence — the other, first to instruct sinners and to give them assurance about its equity, justice and holiness, and afterwards to accuse them of sin, to urge them to obedience, to convince them of their own weakness, to terrify them by a dread of punishment, to compel them to seek deliverance, and, generally, to lead, govern and actuate sinners according to its efficacy. Therefore, with regard to the first office of the law, all sinners universally are said to be under it, even those who are without law and have sinned without it; "for they shall also perish without law (Romans 2:12) yet they are not to be condemned without a just sentence of the law. In relation to the second office of the law, they are said to be under its dominion, government, lordship and (pedagogy) tutelage, who are ruled and actuated by the efficacy and guidance of the law, in whom it exerts its power, and exercises these its operations, whether some of them or all, whether more or less, in which respect there may be, and really are, different degrees and orders of those persons who are said, in this second view, to be under the law. But in this passage, we define a man under the law to be "one who is under its entire efficacy and all its operations;" the design of the apostle requiring this, as we shall afterwards perceive.

4. This phrase "to be under grace," answers in opposition to the other of being "under the law," since the effect of this grace is two-fold. The first is, to absolve a sinful man from the guilt of sin and from condemnation; the second is, to endow man with the Spirit of adoption and of regeneration, and by that Spirit to vivify or quicken, to lead, actuate and govern him.

Hence, not only are they said to be "under grace" who are free from guilt and condemnation, but likewise they who are governed and actuated by the guidance of grace and of the Holy Spirit. But since we are in this place discussing, not properly the condemnation of sin, but the tyranny and dominion which it violently exercises over those who are its subjects, by compelling them with its own force to yield it complete obedience, and to which are opposed in vain the efficacy and power of the law; and since we are now treating, not about the remission of sins, but about that grace which inhibits or restrains the force of this tyrant and lord, and which leads men to yield it due obedience; therefore we must restrict the expressions, "to be under the law," and "to be under grace," to the latter signification — that he is "under the law" who is governed and actuated by the guidance of the law, and that he is "under grace" who is governed and actuated by the guidance of grace. This will be rendered evident from the fourteenth verse of the sixth chapter, when accurately compared with the preceding and following verses of the same chapter, and from the seventeenth and eighteenth verses of the fifth chapter of the epistle to the Galatians, when they are properly applied to this matter. Yet if any one be desirous of extending these passages to the two-fold signification of each of the expressions, he has my free permission for such extension; for it cannot prove the least hindrance in the inquiry and discovery of the truth of the matter which is the subject of our present discussion.

5. LET us now see about the regenerate and the unregenerate man. That we may define him with strictness, as it is proper to do in oppositions and distinctions, we say that a regenerate man is one who is so called, not from the commenced act or operation of the Holy Spirit, though this is regeneration, but from the same act or operation when it is perfected with respect to its essential parts, though not with respect to its quantity and degree; he is not one

"who was once enlightened, and has tasted of the heavenly gift, and was made partaker of the Holy Ghost, and who has tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the world to come;" (Hebrews 6:4,5)

because the explanation given by most of our divines to this passage, applies only to unregenerate persons. Neither is he one who

"has escaped the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, and who has known the way of righteousness;" (2 Peter 2:20,21)

or they explain this passage also as applicable solely to the unregenerate.

Nor is it a man who

"heareth the law, and has the work of the law written in his heart, whose thoughts mutually accuse or else excuse themselves, who rests in the law, makes his boast of God, knows his will, and approves the things that are more excellent, being instructed out of the law." (Romans 2:13-18.)

Neither is he one who

"has prophesied in the name of the Lord, and in his name cast out devils;" (Matthew 7:22)

and who

"has all faith, so that he could remove mountains." (1 Corinthians 13:2)

Nor is he one who acknowledges himself to be a sinner, mourns on account of sin, and is affected with godly sorrow, and who is fatigued and "heavy laden" under the burden of his sins; (Matthew 11:28) for such persons as these Christ came to call, and this call precedes justification and sanctification, that is, regeneration. (Romans 8:30.) Neither is it he who "knows himself to be wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked;" for this is the man whom Christ "counsels to buy" of him the things necessary for himself. (Revelation 3:17,18.) This interpretation is not invalidated by the fact that the church of Laodicea is said not to know herself; for the "counsel" or advice bestowed will never persuade her to buy those things of Christ, unless she have previously known herself to be such a one as is there described. Nor is he one who knows that a man cannot be justified by the works of the law, and who, from this very circumstance, is compelled to flee to Christ, that in him he may obtain justification. (Galatians 2:16) Nor is he a man, who, acknowledging himself as being unworthy even to lift up his eyes to heaven, and who, smiting on his breast, has exclaimed, God be merciful to me a sinner!

This has been well observed by Beza in his Refutation of the calumnies of Tilman Heshusius, where he makes a beautiful distinction between "the things which precede regeneration" and "regeneration itself" and thus expresses himself: "It is one thing to inquire by what methods God prepares for repentance or newness of life, and it is another to treat on repentance itself. Let, therefore, the acknowledgment of sin and godly sorrow be the beginning of repentance, but so far as God begins in this way to prepare us for newness of life, in which respect it was the practice of Calvin deservedly to call this fear initial. Besides, in the description of penitence we are not so accustomed as some people are, to call these dreadful qualms of conscience the mortification of the flesh or of the old man; though we know that the word of God is compared to a sword, which, in some manner, slays us, that we may offer ourselves for a sacrifice to God; and St. Paul somewhere calls afflictions the death of Christ which we carry about with us in the body. For it is very evident that, by the mortification or death of the flesh and of the old man, or of our members, St. Paul means something far different: He means not that efficacy of the Spirit of Christ which may terrify us, but that which may sanctify us, by destroying in us that corrupt nature which brought forth fruit unto death. Besides, we also differ from some persons on this point, not with respect to the thing itself, but in the method or form of teaching it, that they wish faith to be the second part of penitence, but we say that metanoia [a change of mind for the better,] by which term we understand, according to Scripture usage, renovation of life or newness of living, is the effect of faith," etc. (Opuscula, tom. I, fol. 328.) Such are the sentiments of Beza; but how exactly they agree with those things which I have advanced, will be rendered very apparent to any man who will compare the one with the other.

Consonant with these is that which John Calvin says about initial fear, in the following words: "They have probably been deceived by this — that some persons are tamed by the qualms or terrors of conscience, or are prepared by them for obedience, before they have been imbued with the knowledge of grace, nay, before they have tasted it. And this is that initial fear which some persons reckon among the virtues, because they discern that it approaches nearly to a true and just obedience. But this is not the place for discussing the various ways by which Christ draws us to himself, or prepares us for the pursuit of piety," etc.

But a regenerate man is one who comprises within himself all the particulars which I shall here enumerate:

"has put off the old man with his deeds, and has put on the new man, who is renewed in knowledge, which agrees with the image of him who created him." (Colossians 3:9,10.)

has received from God

"the Spirit of wisdom and revelation through the knowledge of Him, the eyes of his understanding being illuminated" or opened. (Ephesians 1:18.)

He has put off,

"concerning the former conversation, the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts; and he is renewed in the spirit of his mind, and has put on the new man, which, after God, is created in righteousness and true holiness." (Ephesians 4:22-24)

He,

"with open face, beholding, as in a glass, the glory of the Lord, is changed into the same image from glory to glory, even us by the Spirit of the Lord." (2 Corinthians 3:18)

He is "dead to sin; his old man is crucified with Christ, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth he should not serve sin; he is freed from sin, and is alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord?" (Romans 6:2,6, 7,11)

"he is crucified with Christ; nevertheless he lives, yet not he; but Christ liveth in him; and the life which he now lives in the flesh, he lives by the faith of the Son of God." (Galatians 2:20.)

Being one of Christ’s followers,

"he has crucified the flesh with its affections and lusts, and now lives in the Spirit." (v. 24,25)

"By our Lord Jesus Christ, the world is crucified unto him, and he unto the world." (6:14)

"In Christ Jesus the Lord, he is also circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ." (Colossians 2:11.)

"In him, God worketh both to will and to do." (Philippians 2:13.)

"He is not in the flesh, but in the Spirit; the Spirit of Christ dwelleth in him; through the Spirit, he mortifies the deeds of the body; he is led by the Spirit of God, and does not walk after the flesh, but after the Spirit." (Romans 8:4,9,13,14)

Uniting in a brief manner, all the parts and fruits of generation into one summary — A regenerate man is he who has a mind freed from the darkness and vanity of the world, and illuminated with the true and saving knowledge of Christ, and with faith, who has affections that are mortified, and delivered from the dominion and slavery of sin, that are inflamed with such new desires as agree with the divine nature, and as are prepared and fitted for newness of living, who has a will reduced to order, and conformed to the will of God, who has powers and faculties able, through the assistance of the Holy Spirit, to contend against sin, the world and Satan, and to gain the victory over them, and to bring forth fruit unto God, such as is meet for repentance — who also actually fights against sin, and, having obtained the victory over it, no longer does those things which are pleasing to the flesh and to unlawful desires, but does those which are grateful to God; that is, he actually desists from evil and does good — not indeed perfectly, but according to the measure of faith and of the gift of Christ, according to the small degree of regeneration, which, begun in the present life, must be gradually improved or increased, till at length it is perfected after this short life is ended — not with respect to essential parts, but with respect to quantity, as we have already declared — not always without interruption, (for he sometimes stumbles, falls, wanders astray, commits sin, grieves the Holy Spirit, ac.,) but generally, and for the most part, he does good.

6. But an unregenerate man is, not only he who is entirely blind, ignorant of the will of God, knowingly and willingly contaminating himself by sins without any remorse of conscience, affected with no sense of the wrath of God, terrified with no compunctions visits of conscience, not oppressed with the burden of sin, and inflamed with no desire of deliverance — but it is also he who knows the will of God but does it not, who is acquainted with the way of righteousness, but departs from it — who has the law of God written in his heart, and has thoughts mutually accusing and excusing each other — who receives the word of the gospel with gladness, and for a season rejoices in its light — who comes to baptism, but either does not receive the word itself in a good heart, or, at least, does not bring forth fruit — who is affected with a painful sense of sin, is oppressed with its burden, and who sorrows after a godly sort — who knows that righteousness cannot be acquired by the law, and who is, therefore, compelled to flee to Christ.

For all these particulars, in what manner soever they be taken, do not belong to the essence and the essential parts of regeneration, penitence, or repentance, which are mortification and vivification and quickening; but they are only things preceding, and may have some place among the beginnings, and, if such be the pleasure of any one, they may be reckoned the causes of penitence and regeneration, as Calvin has learnedly and nervously explained them in his Christian Institutes. (Lib. 3, cap. 3.) Besides, even true and living faith in Christ precedes regeneration strictly taken, and consisting of the mortification or death of the old man, and the vivification of the new man, as Calvin has, in the same passage of his Institutes, openly declared, and in a manner which agrees with the Scriptures and the nature of faith. For Christ becomes ours by faith, and we are engrafted into Christ, are made members of his body, of his flesh and of his bones, and, being thus planted with him, we coalesce or are united together, that we may draw from him the vivifying power of the Holy Spirit, by which power the old man is mortified and we rise again into a new life. All these things cohere together with each other in a certain order, and must thus also be considered, if any one be desirous of knowing them not confusedly but distinctly, and of explaining them well to others.

But we are not, in this place, treating about all the unregenerate in general, but only about those in whom the law has exerted all its efficacy, and who are, on this account, reciprocally said to be under the law.

2. THE CONNECTION OF THE SEVENTH CHAPTER WITH THE SIXTH

1. The design of the Apostle in the sixth chapter.

2. A short disposition of this argument.

3. Four enunciations of it.

4. This distribution is treated in order [in the seventh chapter].

5. The two former enunciations are contained in conjunction.

6. What therefore is proved by them.

7. The third and fourth enunciations are proposed in the fifth and sixth verses.

8. In the third enunciation lies the principal part of the controversy; its deduction consists of the proposition of the enunciation and of its method of being treated.

9. The proposition of the enunciation.

10. The investigation of the proposition, consisting of a larger explanation, and the rendering of the cause.

11. A larger explanation of the seventh chapter, from the seventh verse to the fourteenth.

12. The rendering of the cause, from the 14th verse to the end of the seventh chapter.

13. The fourteenth verse contains the rendering of a two-fold reason.

14. The proof of this is contained in the fifteenth verse.

15. And a more ample explanation of it.

16. From which two consectaries are deduced — the first in the sixteenth verse, and the second in the seventeenth.

17. From this, the apostle returns to the rendering of the cause, in the eighteenth verse, and to the proof of it.

18. Its more ample explanation follows in the nineteenth verse, from which is deduced the second consectary in the twentieth verse.

19. The conclusion of the thing intended, in the twenty-first verse, and the proof of it is given in the twenty-second and twenty-third verses.

20. A votive exclamation for the deliverance of a man who is under the law, occurs in the twenty-fourth verse.

21. An answer or a thanksgiving reference to that exclamation, is given in the former part of the twenty-fifth verse, and the conclusion of the whole investigation, in which the state of a man who is under the law is briefly defined in the latter part of the twenty-fifth verse.

22. A brief recapitulation of the second part.

1. Having, from necessity of the thing and of order, thus premised these things, let us now proceed to treat on the question and the thesis itself.

But it will be useful, briefly to place before our eyes the sum of the whole chapter, its disposition and distribution; that, after having considered the design of the apostle, and those things which conduce to that design, and which have been brought forward by the apostle as subservient to his purpose, his mind and intention, may the more plainly be made known to us. That this may the more appropriately be done, the matter must be traced a little further backward.

In the 12th and 13th verses, as well as in the preceding verses of the sixth chapter of the epistle to the Romans, the apostle had exhorted all the believers at Rome to contend strenuously against sin, and not to suffer sin to domineer or rule over them, or to exercise authority in their mortal body; but to devote themselves to God, and to yield their members as the instruments of righteousness unto God; and he demonstrated and confirmed the equity of his exhortation by many arguments, especially by those which are deduced from the communion of believers with Christ.

But, in order to animate them the more powerfully to this spiritual contest — the persuasion to enter on which was to be wrought not only by a demonstration of its equity, but also by a promise of its felicitous and successful issue — in the 14th verse of the same chapter, he proposed to them the certain hope of victory, declaring "sin shall not have dominion over you." For nothing can so strongly incite men to engage manfully and with spirit in this warfare, as that certain confidence of obtaining the victory which the apostle promises in these words. But he grounds his promise, in the 14th verse, on a reason drawn from it, and on the power and ability of that [grace] under the guidance and auspices of which they were about to contend against sin, or from that state in which they were then placed it, and through Christ, when he says, "For ye are not under the law but under grace," thus extolling the powers of grace at the expense of the contrary weakness of the law, as though he had said, "I employ these continual exhortations to induce you strenuously to engage in the conflict against sin; and I do this, not only because I consider it most equitable that you should enter into that warfare, while I have regard to your communion with Christ, but also because I arrive at an assured hope, while I view your present condition, that you will at length enjoy the victory over sin, through that under whose auspices you fight; and it can by no means come to pass, that sin shall have dominion over you, as it formerly had; for you are under grace, under the government and guidance of the Spirit of Christ, and no longer under the law. if you were still in that state in which you were before faith in Christ, that is, if you were yet under the law, I might indulge in despair about declaring a victory for you, as placed under the dominion of sin. Such a victory over the power of sin contending within you, you would not be able to obtain by the strength or power of the law, which knows how to command, but affords no aid for the performance of the things commanded, how great soever might be the exertions which you made to gain the battle under the auspices of the law." But this reasoning, in the first place, possessed validity to prove the necessity of the grace which was offered and to be obtained in Christ alone, in opposition to those who were the patrons of the cause of the law against the gospel, and who urged that covenant, the law of works, against the covenant of grace and the law of faith. This reasoning also contributed greatly to the design which the apostle proposed to himself in the principal part of this epistle.

His design was to teach that, not the law, but "the gospel is the power of God to salvation to every one that believeth," both because by the law, and by the works of the law, no man can be justified from the sins which he has committed, and because, by the power and aid of the same law no one can oppose himself to the power of sin to shake off its yoke, and, alter having been freed from its yoke, to serve God, since he immediately falls in the conflict. But in Christ Jesus, as he is offered to us through the gospel, and apprehended by faith we can obtain both these blessings — the forgiveness of sins through faith in his blood, and the power of the Spirit of Christ, by which, being delivered from the dominion of sin, we may, through the same Spirit, be able to resist sin, to gain the victory over it, and to serve God "in newness of life."

These things in the sixth chapter may be perceived at one glance when placed before the eyes in the following order:

THE PROPOSITION OF THE APOSTLE

Dehortatory. — "Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin."

Hortatory. — "But yield your members as instruments of righteousness unto God."

THE REASON

"For sin shall not have dominion over you."

Hence, an enthymeme, whose Antecedent is — "Sin shall not have dominion over you."

Its consequent — "Therefore, neither yield your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin, but yield yourselves unto God," etc.

THE PROOF OF THE ANTECEDENT OR OF THE REASON

"For ye are under grace; therefore, sin shall not have dominion over you."

AN ILLUSTRATION CF THE PROOF FROM ITS CONTRARY

For ye are not under the law."

A BRIEF EXPLICATION OF THE PROOF, AND OF ITS ILLUSTRATION

"If, indeed, you were yet under the law, as you formerly were, sin would have the dominion over you as it once had; and, having followed its commands and impulses, you would not be able to do any other than yield your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin.

"But as you are now no longer under the law, but under grace, sin shall not in any wise have the dominion over you, but by the power of grace you shall easily resist sin, and yield your members as instruments of righteousness unto God."

From the 14th verse, the apostle perseveres in the same exhortation throughout the remainder of the sixth chapter, with a slight intermission of this argument, yet having previously refuted the objection which might be deduced from it; being about to resume the same argument, and to treat it more at large, in the whole of the seventh chapter, and in the former part of the eighth, since, as we have already perceived, the prosecution of this argument contributes very materially to his design.

2. But the apostle treats this subject in the order and method which was demanded by reason itself, and by the necessity of its discussion. For he had said, "Sin shall not have dominion over you, for ye are not under the law, but under grace."

3. In these words, are contained the four following enunciations:

(1.) Christians are not under the law.

(2.) Christians are under grace.

(3.) Sin shall have dominion over those who are under the law.

(4.) Sin shall not have dominion over those who are under grace.

Of these four enunciations, the second and the fourth are necessary and sufficient to persuade in favor of this exhortation; but the first and the third are adduced, both for the sake of illustration, and because they were required by the principal design of the entire epistle. The former of these [pairs of conjoint enunciations] is well known to all who understand the nature of a separated axiom and the mutual relation which exists between its parts; but the latter of them will he rendered very apparent by the deduction of the epistle itself, and on a diligent inspection of its conformation.

4. The apostle, therefore, thought that these four axioms ought to be treated by him in order, and indeed always with the mention of the conclusion which he was desirous to infer from them as from premises; and in which the sum of the exhortation consisted.

5. But the apostle treats those two former enunciations conjointly, such a course being required by their nature. For he gives one thing to those from which he takes another away, and this very properly; because there exists one and the same cause why the one should be attributed and the other taken away, why they are under grace and not under the law. This cause is expressed in the fourth verse of the seventh chapter, in the following words:

"Ye, also, are become dead to the law in the body of Christ, that ye should be married to another."

6. But in the first four verses, the apostle proves that Christians or believers are not under the law, but under grace; which proof may be comprised in this syllogism: They who are dead to the law, and this in the body of Christ, that they may be married to another, even to Christ, are no longer under the law, but are now under grace;

But Christians are dead to the law, that they should he married to another, even to Christ;

Therefore, Christians are no longer under the law, but under grace.

The first part of the proposition — "They who are dead to the law, are no longer under the law," is expressed in the first verse of the seventh chapter in these words: "The law hath dominion over a man as long as he liveth." The latter part of it, "They who are made Christ’s are under grace, — is included in the fourth verse, from which it may be deduced. But a confirmation of the first part of the proposition is added, in the first verse, from the testimony of the consciences of those who are expert in the knowledge of the law; and the same part of the proposition is illustrated, in the second and third verses, by a simile, that of marriage, in which the woman is no longer liable to the law of her husband than "so long as he liveth;" but when he is dead, she is free from the law of her husband, so that she may be allowed to transfer herself to another man without committing the crime of adultery. The application of this comparison is evident, the difference only being observed, that the apostle has declared, by a change in the mode of speaking, that Christians are become dead to the law, and not that the law is become dead to them. This change of speech is attributed by some persons to the prudence of the apostle, who wished to avoid the use of a phrase which he previously knew would be offensive to the Jews. By others it is transferred to the nature of the thing, in which they say that sin, and not the law, sustained the part or person of the husband, because in the sixth verse sin is said to be dead; but this makes nothing to our present purpose.

The assumption, in the fourth verse, is in these words: "we also are become dead to the law in the body of Christ, that ye should be married to another, even to Christ." This assumption is illustrated, First, by the efficient cause of that mortification or death, which is the crucifixion and the resurrection of the body of Christ, and the communion of believers with Christ in that crucifixion and in the rising again of His body.

Secondly. This assumption is illustrated by the final cause of deliverance, which contains the scope or design of the apostolical exhortation, that is, "to bring forth fruit unto God." But he perseveres in the same end in the two subsequent verses, the sixth and seventh, by treating it through a comparison of things similar, as he had also done in the nineteenth verse of the sixth chapter. The parallel is, that we serve God, and since we are not now in the oldness of the letter, but in the newness of Spirit, and are delivered from the law, that thing being dead in which we were held, it is equitable that we bring forth fruit unto God; because when we were in the flesh, the motion of sins, existing through the law, did work in our members to bring forth fruit unto death.

The conclusion is not openly inferred, but is understood, which is a mode of frequent occurrence, because the proposition, or question to be treated, does not differ from the conclusion in the matter, but only in the mode of position.

7. But though these two verses, the fifth and sixth, have such a relation to those things which preceded as has been already explained, yet they are likewise to be referred to those which follow. For the third and fourth enunciations are proposed in these two verses — the third in the fifth verse, and the fourth in the sixth. For, this expression, "The motions of sins, which are by the law, are vigorous, or operate in the members of men who are yet in the flesh," (verse fifth,) is tantamount in meaning to these words: "Sin has the dominion over those who are under the law." These words likewise, "But now we are delivered from the law, that being dead wherein we were held, wse so that we should serve in newness of spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter," (verse sixth,) agree well with the following: "Sin shall not have the dominion over those who are under grace." This will be rendered evident if any one translates the particle wse as an ancient interpreter has done, by the words "so that," and understands it not of the end or intention, but of the issue or event, as the almost perpetual use of that particle requires. For the sense is this: "When we were yet in the oldness of the letter and under the law, then we were held under sin; and when we are now delivered from the law and placed in newness of spirit, we are able to serve God in righteousness and true holiness," agreeably to this state of our newness of living.

8. But let us now more closely inspect how this third enunciation is treated, since in it is laid the principal part of the controversy. The exposition of the whole matter consists of the proposing of the enunciation, and of its investigation, the latter of which is partly an explanation, and partly an application of the cause. Both of these are briefly joined to the proposition, as it is laid down in the fifth verse of this chapter; wherefore they are more copious, and better accommodated to the more prolix investigation, than as they are proposed from the fourteenth verse of the sixth chapter.

9. For that proposition is, "sin," or, as it is more energetically expressed, "The motions of sins have the dominion over those who are under the law." This attribute is likewise more nervously expressed by this method of speech, by which the motions of sins are said to have existence by the law itself.

Two effects of this dominion, therefore, are added to the proposition for the sake of explication. One is, its vigor, and its working in the members; the other is, its bringing forth fruits unto death. The cause why, in men under the law, "the motions of sins work in their members to bring forth fruit unto death," is rendered in these words, "when we were in the flesh." For the reference to the time preceding is taken from the carnal state, which state comprises the cause why, in times past, "the motions of sins did work in our members." As if the apostle had said, "It is not wonderful that the motions of sins have had the dominion over us, and have worked in our members to bring forth fruit unto death; for we are in the flesh; and the law itself is so far from being able to hinder this dominion and to restrain the vigorous growth of sin, that these motions are by the law far more fervid and vehement, not through the fault of the law, but through the wickedness and obstinacy of sin that holds the dominion and abuses its power."

10. This proposition, therefore, is more largely explained, from the seventh verse to the fourteenth; and its cause is fully treated from the fourteenth verse inclusive, to the end of the chapter. The explanation is occupied about this two-fold effect — the working of sin, and its fructification by which it brings forth fruit unto death. The rendering of the cause is continually intent upon what is said in the fifth verse, "When we were in the flesh." But on both these points, we must carefully guard against bringing the law under the suspicion of blame, as though it were of itself the cause of depraved desires in us, and of death; when it is only the occasion, upon which sin violently seizes, and uses it to produce these effects in men who live under the law. In the explanation, both these effects are removed from the law, and they are attributed to sin as to their proper cause; yet this is done in such a way, that it is at the same time added, that sin abuses the law to produce these effects.

11. The former of these effects is removed from the law, in the seventh verse, by these words: "What shall we say then? Is the law sin? God forbid." That is, as if he had said, "Can it, therefore, be attributed to the law that it is itself, or the cause of depraved desires in us, because it is called in the fifth verse, the motions of sin which are by the law?" The apostle replies, that it is very wrong to entertain even the bare thought of such a thing concerning the law. He subjoins a proof of this removal of the first effect, from the contrary effect which the law has; for the law is the index of sin, or that which points it out; therefore, it is neither sin nor the cause of sin. He then illustrates this proof by a special example: "For I should not have known concupiscence, unless the law had said, Thou shaft not desire or covet."

But the same effect is, in the eighth verse, attributed to sin, in these words: "But sin wrought in me all manner of concupiscence," yet so that it abuses the law as an occasion to produce this effect. This is intimated in the words which immediately follow:. "Sin, taking occasion by the commandment, wrought in me," etc. The latter effect [the fructification of sin] is proved in the next verse, in these words: "For, without the law, sin was dead; but, on the approach of the law, sin revived," which is illustrated by its opposite privatives, "For I was alive when sin was dead; but when sin revived then I died;" but, as this was done by the law, it is evident that sin abused the law to produce this effect. But the apostle here joins the second effect to the first, (because they cohere together by nature, and the former is the cause of the latter,) and thus in the tenth and eleventh verses, ascribes death to sin, which abuses the law, yet so as to excuse the law also from the effect of death, as it is expressed in the tenth verse, "the commandment which was unto life;" the cause of death being transferred to sin, in the expression, "for sin, taking occasion by the commandment," etc. But he follows up his exculpation of the law, in the twelfth verse, by a description of the nature of the law, that it "is holy, and just, and good," and, therefore, by no means the cause of death — an insinuation against the law which he indignantly repels in the former part of the thirteenth verse, by saying, "God forbid that that which is good, should be made death unto me." But in the latter part of this verse, he ascribes the same effect to sin, with the addition of a two-fold end, both of them inclining to the disparagement of sin itself, in these words: "That sin might appear sin, working death in me by that which is good; that sin, by the commandment, might become exceedingly sinful." As though he had said — "Sin, by this abuse of the law to seduce and kill us, has produced the effect, that. in return, its own depravity and perverseness be made manifest by the law. This perverse depravity consists in sin working death by the law which is good, and in being made exceedingly sinful by the commandment which is just and holy, and that it might only become as it were a sinner above measure by its own wickedness, but also might be declared to be such by the indication of the law, which it has so shamefully abused to produce these effects." But it is apparent from the whole of this explanation, that the apostle has so attempered his style as to draw a conclusion of the necessity of the grace of Christ, from the efficacy of sin, and from the weakness of the law. This will be still more perspicuous, if we briefly comprise this explanation of the apostle in the following form: "Sin has the dominion over those who are under the law, by working in them all manner of concupiscence through the law itself, and also by killing them through it, yet so that the law is free from all blame in both cases, since, it is holy and good, the index of sin, and was given for life. But sin is so powerful in men who are still under the law, that it abuses the law to produce those effects in a man who is under subjection to it; by which abuse of the law, sin, on the other hand, takes away the reward from the law, that its own perverse and noxious disposition and tendency may be manifested by the indication of the law. From these circumstances a man who is under the law is compelled to flee to grace, that he may by its beneficent aid be delivered from the tyranny of such a wicked and injurious master."

12. The rendering of the cause follows from the fourteenth verse to the end of the chapter; in which, as we have already observed, the utmost care is evinced not to impose any ignominy on the law, or to ascribe any blame to it; and the entire mischief is attributed to the power of sin, and to the weakness of that man who is under the law. But the cause is briefly given in the fourteenth verse, in these words: "For we know that the law is spiritual; but I am carnal, sold under sin." But in order that this rendering of the cause may be accurately understood, we must again consider that proposition, the cause of which the apostle determines in this place to explain, and which is this: "Sin has dominion over those who are under the law;" or, "The motions of sins, which are by the law, work in men who are under the law."

13. That the cause of this may be fully and perfectly rendered, it must be shown why the law cannot weaken the force and tyranny of sin in those who are under the law, and why sin holds those who are under the law bound and obnoxious to itself as by some right of its own. Therefore, this rendering of the cause consists of two parts: The first is contained in these words: "For truly the law is spiritual; but I am carnal." That the particle "indeed" or "truly" must be added, is proved both by its relative de, "but," as well as by the very subject. The second is contained in these words: "For I am sold under sin;" that is, I am under the dominion of sin, as one who is constituted a purchased servant by the right of sale, and like one who becomes the bond-slave of sin. As though the apostle had said, "That the law is incapable of hindering the strength and operation of sin in men who are under the law, arises from this, that men under the law are carnal; in whom therefore the law, though it is spiritual, does not possess so much power as to enable it to restrain the strong inclination of the flesh to things which are evil and contrary to the law. And since sin, by a certain right of its own, exercises dominion over those men who are under the law, therefore it comes to pass that they have been made bond-slaves to sin, and are bound and "fettered like a purchased menial."

14. The apostle immediately subjoins a proof, in the fifteenth verse, not so much of the fact that a man under the law is carnal, as that he is the slave of sin. But the proof is taken from the peculiar adjunct or effect of a purchased servant, in these words: "For that which I do I allow not." For a servant does not do that which seems good to himself, but that which his master is pleased to prescribe to him; because thus is the word "I allow" used in this passage, for "I approve." But if any one thinks that it is here used in its proper signification, the argument will be the same, and equal its validity; "for," as Christ has told us, "the servant knoweth not what his Lord doeth;" (John 15:15;) neither is his Lord bound, nor is he accustomed, to make known to his servant all his will, except so far as it seems proper to himself to employ the services of his menial through the knowledge of that will.

15. But the first signification of the word is better accommodated to this passage, and seems to be required by those things which follow; for a more ample explanation of this argument is produced in the following words: "For what I would, that do I not; but what I hate, that do I;" which is an evident token of a will that is subjugated, and subject to the will of another; that is, to the will of sin. Therefore he is the servant and the slave of sin.

16. The apostle now deduces two consectaries from this, by the first of which he excuses the law, and by the second, he throws on sin all the blame respecting this matter, as he had also done in a previous part of the chapter. The first consectary is, "if, then, I do that which I would not, I consent unto the law that it is good." (16.) That is, "if I unwillingly do that which sin prescribes to me, now, indeed, I consent unto the law that it is good, as being that against which sin is committed. I assent to the law that commands, though, while placed under the dominion of sin, I am unable to perform what it prescribes." The second consectary is, "Now then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me." (17.) That is, "therefore, because I reluctantly do what I do, not at my own option but at that of another, that Is, of my master, who is sin; it follows from this, that it is not I who do it, but sin which dwells in me, has the dominion over me, and impels me to do it."

17. Having treated upon these subjects in the manner now stated, the apostle returns to the same rendering of the cause and the proof of it. The eighteenth verse contains the rendering of the cause, in these words: "For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) dwelleth no good thing:" Wherefore it is not surprising that the law, though it be spiritual, is not able to break the power of sin in a man who is under the law; for that which is good does not dwell, that is, has not the dominion, in a carnal man who is under the law. The proof of this is subjoined in the same verse: "For to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not." Or, "I do not find how I can perform any thing good."

18. The more ample explanation of it is given in the nineteenth verse, "For the good that I would, I do not; but the evil that I would not, that I do;" which is an evident token that no good thing dwelleth in my flesh. For if any good thing dwelt in my flesh, I should then be actually capable of performing that to which my mind and will are inclined. He then deduces once more the second consectary, in the twentieth verse: "Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me."

19. But from all these arguments, in the twenty-first verse he concludes the thing intended: "I find then a law, [which is imposed in this way,] that, when I would do good, evil is present with me." That is, In reality, therefore, I find from the circumstance of "to will being present with me," but of not being capable of performing what is good, that evil or sin is present with me, and not only has it a place in me but it likewise prevails.

This conclusion does not differ in meaning from the rendering of the cause which is comprised in the fourteenth verse, in this expression: "But I am carnal, sold under sin." But in the two subsequent verses, the twenty-second and twenty-third, the apostle proves the conclusion which immediately preceded; and, in proving it, he more clearly explains whence and how it happens, that a man who is under the law cannot have dominion over sin, and that, whether willing or unwilling, such a person is compelled to fulfill the lusts of sin; and he says, "for I delight in the law of God after the inward man; but I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members."

20. At the close, from a consideration of the miserable state of those men who are under the law, a votive exclamation is raised for their deliverance from this tyranny and servitude of sin, in the following terms: "O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver (or snatch) me from the body of this death?" That is, not from this mortal body, but from the dominion of sin, which he here calls the body of death, as he calls it also in other passages the body of sin.

21. To this exclamation he subjoins a reply — "the grace of God, through Jesus Christ our Lord, will deliver thee" — or a thanksgiving, in which the apostle intimates, in his own person, whence deliverance must be sought and expected. In the last place, a conclusion is annexed to the whole investigation, in the latter part of the twenty-fifth verse, in which is briefly defined the entire condition of a man under the law, that had been previously and at great length described; "so then, with the mind, I myself, serve the law of God, but with the flesh, the law of sin." And in this manner is concluded the seventh chapter.

22. But in order that these arguments, after having been reduced to a small compass, may be perceived at a single glance, let us briefly recapitulate this second part likewise, in the following manner: "We have already declared, that sin has dominion over those men who are under the law: But the cause of this is, that, though the law itself is spiritual, and though the men who are under it consent unto it that it is good, and though they will what is good and delight in the law of God after the inward man; yet these very men who are under the law are carnal, sold under sin, have no good thing dwelling in their flesh, but have sin dwelling in them, and evil is present with them; they have likewise a law in their members which not only wars against the law of their mind, but which also renders them captives to the law of sin which is in their members.

Of this matter it is a certain and evident token, that the good which such men would, they do not; but the evil which they hate, that they do; and that when they will to do good, they do not obtain the ability. Hence it is undoubtedly evident, that they are not themselves the masters of their own acts, but sin which dwelleth in them; to which is also chiefly to be ascribed the culpability of the evil which is committed by these men who are like the reluctant perpetrators of it. But on this account, these persons, from the shewing of the law, having become acquainted with their misery, are compelled to cry out, and to implore the grace of Jesus Christ."

VERSE THE FOURTEENTH

1. A closer investigation of this question and a demonstration taken from the text itself, that the apostle is here treating about a man paced under the law, and not under grace.

2. The manner in which Carnal and spiritual are opposed to each other in the scriptures.

3. An objection taken from 1 Corinthians 3:1,2; and a reply to it.

4. The meaning of the phrase, sold under sin. The views of Calvin and Beza on this verse.

1. Having, in the preceding manner, considered the disposition and economy of the whole chapter, let us now somewhat more strictly investigate the question proposed by us, which is this: "Are those things which are recorded, from the fourteenth verse to the end of the seventh chapter, to be understood concerning a man who is under the law, or concerning one who is under grace?"

First of all, let some attention be bestowed on the connection of the fourteenth verse with those which preceded it; for the rational particle gar "for," indicates its connection with the preceding. This connection shows, that the same subject is discussed in this verse, as in those before it; and the pronoun egw I, must be understood as relating to the same man, as had been signified in the previous verses by the same pronoun. But the investigation in the former part of the chapter was respecting a man who is under the law, and the pronoun "I" had previously denoted the man who was under the law: Therefore, in this fourteenth verse also, in which a, cause is given of that which had been before explained, a man under the law is still the subject. If it be otherwise, the whole of it is nothing less than loose reasoning; nor, in this case, have we ever been able to perceive even any probable connection, according to which these consequences that follow can be in coherence with the matters preceding, and which has been adduced by those who suppose that, in the first thirteen verses of this seventh chapter, the discourse refers to a man under the law, but that in the fourteenth verse and those which follow, the subject of the discourse is a man under grace. If any one denies this, let him attempt to make out the connection [between the two portions of the chapter which have just been specified]. Some of those who have entertained that opinion, perceiving the difficulty of such an undertaking, interpret this fourteenth verse as well as those which preceded it, as relating to a man under the law, but the fifteenth and following verses as applicable to a man under grace. This, also, we shall hereafter perceive.

Secondly. In the same fourteenth verse, that man about whom the apostle treats under his own person, is said to be carnal; but a man who is regenerate and placed under grace is not carnal, but spiritual. Therefore, it is a matter of the greatest certainty, that the subject of the apostle in this verse is not a man placed under grace. But a man who is under the law is carnal; therefore, it is plain that the subject of discourse in this verse is a man under the law. I prove that a regenerate man, one who is placed under grace, is neither carnal, nor so designated in the Scriptures. In Romans 8:9, it is said "but ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit." And in the verse preceding, it is said, "so then they that are in the flesh cannot please God:" But a regenerate man, one who is placed under grace, pleases God. In Romans 8:5, it is said "They that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh," but [as it is expressed in the same verse] a man under grace "minds the things of the Spirit." In Galatians 5:24, it is said, "They that are Christ’s have crucified the flesh, with the affections and lusts;" and they that "have crucified the flesh" are not carnal. But men who are regenerate and placed under grace "are Christ’s and have crucified the flesh." Therefore, such men as answer this description are not carnal. In Romans 8:14, it is said, "As many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God." Therefore, they are "led by the Spirit of God;" but such persons are spiritual.

2. But it is here objected, "the same man may, in a different respect, be called carnal and spiritual — ‘spiritual,’ so far as he is regenerate through the Spirit — ‘carnal’ so far as he is unregenerate; for, as long as man is in this mortal body, he is not fully regenerate. From this arises a two-fold signification of the work ‘carnal’: one denotes a man purely carnal, in whom sin has the dominion; the other denotes a man partly carnal and partly spiritual."

Answer: I grant, according to the Scriptures, that man is not fully and perfectly regenerate so long as he is in the present life. But this admission must be correctly apprehended, that is, that such perfection be understood as relating not to the essence and essential parts of regeneration itself, but to the degree and measure of the quantity. For the business of regeneration is not carried on in such a manner, that a man is regenerate or renewed with regard to some of his faculties, but remains with regard to others of them altogether in the oldness of depraved nature. But this second birth is ordered in the same manner as our first nativity, by which we are born human beings — that is, partaking entirely of human nature, but not in the perfection of adult manhood. Thus also, does the power of regeneration pervade all the faculties of man, none of them excepted; but it does not pervade them perfectly at the first moment; for it is carried on gradually, and by daily advances, until it is expanded or drawn out to a full and mature age in Christ Hence, the whole man is said to be regenerated, according to all his faculties, mind, affections and will; and he is, therefore, with regard to these, his regenerated faculties, a spiritual person.

But as in the Scripture, a spiritual man and a carnal man are opposed to each other in their entire definitions, [for the former of them is one who walks according to the Spirit, and the latter is he that walks after the flesh, and as the one is mentioned for the opposite of the other,) in this respect indeed, the same man cannot be said to be at once both spiritual and carnal.

And thus I reject, according to the Scriptures, this distinction of carnal persons, by which some of them are called carnal, in whom sin has dominion on the predominant part, and by which others receive the appellation of carnal men, in whom the flesh contends against the Spirit on the part which is less powerful; for the rejection of this distinction, I have the permission of Scripture, which is not accustomed to reckon the latter of these two classes in the number of carnal persons. This is expressed in a very significant manner by Leo, on the resurrection of our Lord, in the following words: "Though we are saved by hope, and still bear about with us corruption and mortal flesh, yet we are correctly said not to be in the flesh if carnal affections have not dominion over us, and we deservedly lay aside and discard the name of that thing whose will we no longer follow."’ But were this, their distinction, allowed, still, that is not yet proved which they attempt, unless it be demonstrated that this man is called carnal, not in the first of these respects or senses, but in the second — not because sin has the dominion in him, but because the flesh contends against the Spirit, which is a result that can never be deduced from the text itself: For It is evident that, in the man whom the apostle here calls carnal, sin has the dominion, and the party of the flesh is more powerful in him than that of the Spirit. Because "sin dwelleth in him, he does the evil that he would not, and he does not the good which he would; to perform what is good, finds not; but sin, which dwelleth in him, perpetrates that which is evil; he is brought into captivity to the law of sin, or he is a captive under the law of sin." All these are certain and manifest tokens of sin, which has the dominion. Nor is it any valid objection, that the man is compelled, though unwilling and reluctant, to obey sin; for the dominion of sin is two fold — either with the consent of him who sins, or against his conscience, and his consent arising from his conscience. For whether a servant obeys his Lord willingly or unwillingly, he is still the servant of him to whom he yields obedience. This is such a certain truth, that no one is able to come from the servitude of sin to liberty, except through this way — the way of this hatred of servitude, and of this desire of obtaining deliverance.

3. But some one will say,

"Even those who are under grace are called carnal in" 1 Corinthians 3:1,2.

I reply, The question does not relate to the word itself; but to its true meaning and the thing signified by it. We must try, therefore, whether this word has the same signification in this passage as it has in the seventh chapter of the epistle to the Romans. But they [at Corinth] are called carnal with respect to knowledge, and in reference to feeling or inclination.

In this sense, being unskillful and inexperienced in the doctrine of piety, and the knowledge of the gospel, they are called carnal in opposition to those who are spiritual, who know how to "judge all things," (1 Corinthians 2:15,) and who are also called "who are perfect," in (1 Corinthians 2:6,) and, in this sense, "babes in Christ," and those who have need to be fed with milk are called carnal. But with respect to feeling or inclination, those men are called carnal in whom human and carnal affections have the dominion and prevail, and who are said, in other passages, to be in the flesh, and to walk according to the flesh, in opposition to those who are spiritual, who, "through the Spirit, have mortified the deeds of the flesh and have crucified the flesh with its affections and lusts." But the apostle seems here to bestow this appellation on the Corinthians, or on some of them, with this two-fold reference; for he says that, with respect to knowledge, they are "babes in Christ," that is, unskillful and inexperienced in the doctrine of piety, who had to be "fed with milk, and who were not able to bear solid food." But with respect to affections, he says that they "are carnal, and walk as men," on account of the contentions and divisions which prevailed among them, from which it was evident that, in them, the flesh had the predominance over the Spirit. But in whatever sense or manner the word is used in this passage, it brings no advantage to the cause of those who declare that the apostle calls himself a carnal man in Romans 7:14. For if the same word is not used in 1 Corinthians 3:1, in a sense similar to that which it bears in Romans 7:14, then it is adduced in an unlearned and useless manner in elucidation of this question; for equivocation is the fruitful parent of error.

If the word is to be received in the same sense in both passages, then I am at liberty firmly to conclude from this, in favor of my opinion, that the apostle cannot be called carnal in Romans 7, for under that appellation he severely reprehends the Corinthians because he "was not able to speak unto them as unto spiritual persons," since they were such as were still carnal; which he would have done without any just cause, if he were himself also comprehended under that title when understood in the same signification.

4. Thirdly. The same man about whom the apostle is here treating, is also said, in this, the fourteenth verse, to be sold under sin, or, (which is the same thing,) the slave of sin, and become its servant by purchase, which title can, in no sense whatsoever, be adapted to men placed under grace — a misappropriation of epithet, against which the Scriptures openly reclaim in many passages:

"If the Son, therefore, shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed." (John 8:36.)

"For he that is dead" is justified, that is, he "is freed from sin" (Romans 6:7.) "But God be thanked that ye were the servants of sin; being then made free from sin, ye became the servants of righteousness," or those who are completely subject to it. (Romans 6:17,18.) But that the two things here specified [the service of sin, and that of righteousness] are so opposed to each other, as not to be able to meet together at once in the same individual, is evident from the twentieth verse of the same chapter: "For when ye were the servants of sin, ye were free from righteousness." But that the same remark applies to a man who is under the law, is apparent from a comparison of 2 Corinthians 3:17, "Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty," with Galatians 5:18, "But if ye be led of Spirit, ye are not under the law;" therefore, they who are of the Spirit are free. But such persons are not under the law; therefore, those who are under the law are not free, but are the servants of sin. For, whether any one unwillingly, and compelled by the force of sin, obeys it, or whether it willingly — whether anyone becomes the slave of sin by the deed of his first parents, or whether, in addition to this, "he has sold himself to work evil in the sight of the Lord," as it is related concerning Ahab in 1 Kings 21:20. In each of these cases is the man truly and deservedly called the servant of sin.

"For of whom a man is overcome, of the same is he brought into bondage." (2 Peter 2:19.)

And

"whosoever committeth sin is the servant of sin." (John 8:34.) "Know ye not that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey, whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness?" (Romans 6:16.)

For the different mode of servitude does not exempt or discharge [the subject of it] from servitude, but is conclusive that he is under it.

Should any one reply, concerning the man mentioned in Romans 7:14, "that he is not simply called the servant of sin, but that he is so denominated with this restriction — that he is the servant of sin with respect to the flesh, and not with respect to the mind, as is apparent from the last verse of the same chapter, which is an explanation of this verse," I rejoin that this man is simply called the servant of sin, but of the description of those who unwillingly and with a reluctant conscience serve sin. But with respect to the manner in which the last verse of the chapter is to be understood, we shall perceive what it is when we arrive at that part.

But the greater part of the divines of our profession acknowledge that this fourteenth verse must be understood as relating to an unregenerate man, to one who is not placed under grace. Thus Calvin observes on verse, "The apostle now begins to bring the law and the nature of man a little more closely into hostile contact with each other." And on the subsequent verse he says, "He now descends to the more particular example of a man already regenerate." Thus also, Beza, against Castellio, in the refutation of the first argument to the thirteenth and fourteenth calumny, (fol. 413,) says, "St. Paul exclaims that he is not sufficient even to think that which is good; and in another passage, considering himself not within the boundaries of grace, he says, But I am carnal, sold under sin."

VERSE THE FIFTEENTH

1. He does not approve of that which he does, neither does he do that which he would, but he does that which he hates.

2. The nature of the contest carried on in man.

3. The opinion of St. Augustine and Peter Martyr, respecting the conflict in men who are not born again.

1. The fifteenth verse contains a proof of the affirmation in the preceding verse, which is, that the man about whom the apostle is treating, is "sold under sin" or is the bond-slave of sin.

For the argument is taken from the office and proper effect of a purchased servant, and of one who has no legal control over himself, but who is subjected to the power of another. For it is the property of a servant, not to execute his own will, but that of his lord, whether he does this willingly and with full consent, or he does it with the judgment of his own mind exclaiming against it, and with his will resisting it. This is expressed in no unskillful manner by St. Augustine, in his Retractions (lib. I, cap. 1:) "he who by the flesh that lusteth against the Spirit, does those things which he would not, lusteth indeed unwillingly; and in this he does not that which he would; but if he be overcome [by the flesh lusting against the Spirit] he willingly consents to his lusts — and in this he does nothing but what he has willed, that is, devoid of righteousness and the servant of sin." This is confirmed by Zanchius, on the works of Redemption: (lib. I, cap. 3: ) "Undoubtedly Peter, therefore, denied Christ because he would, though he did not that with a full will, but reluctantly." But the proof [which the apostle adduces in the fifteenth verse] is accommodated to the condition of the man about whom he is treating, that is, of a man who is under the law, and who is the servant of sin just so far as to serve it not with full consent, but with a conscience crying out against it. For these are the words of the apostle: "For that which I do, I allow not," that is, I do not approve of it.

This sentiment, he explains and proves more at large in the words which immediately follow in the same verse: "For what I would, that do I not; but what I hate, that I do," from which we frame this syllogism.

He who approves not of that which he does, nor does that which he would, is the slave of another, that is, of sin; But the man about whom the apostle is treating, approves not of that which he does, nor does what he would, but he does that which he hates; Therefore, the man who is in this place the subject of discussion, is the slave of another, that is, of sin; and therefore the same man is unregenerate, and not placed under grace.

2. But perhaps you will say, "In this passage is described a contest in the man about whom the apostle is treating, which contest cannot take place in a man who is unregenerate."

Answer. In this passage, the contest between this man and sin is not described; but the dominion of sin, and the servitude of the man himself under sin, are demonstrated from the proper effect of a servant by purchase, which effect, in reality, is not produced by this man without much reluctance of conscience and great mental struggles, which precede the very production of the act; but this deed is not committed except by a mind which is conquered and overcome by the force of sin. Then I deny the preceding affirmation that, in an unregenerate man, of what description soever he may be, there is discovered no contest of the mind or conscience with the inclinations and desires of the flesh and of sin. Nay, I further assert and affirm, that, in a man who is under the law, there is necessarily a conflict between the mind and conscience on the one part, that prescribe those things which are just and honest, and the inclinations or motions of sin, on the other, which impel the man to things that are unlawful and forbidden. For the Scriptures describe to us a two-fold conflict against sin — the First, that of the flesh, and of the mind or the conscience-the

Second, that of the flesh, or sin, and of the Spirit.

The former of these obtains in all those who have a knowledge of what is righteous and iniquitous, of what is just and unjust, "in whose hearts is written the work of the law, and whose thoughts, in the mean while, either accuse or excuse one another," as it is recorded in Romans 2:15, "who hold the truth in unrighteousness," (1:18) whose consciences are not yet seared as with a hot iron, who are not yet "past all feeling," (Ephesians 4:19,) and who know the will of their Lord, but do it not. (Luke 12:47)

3. This view of the matter is confirmed to us by St. Augustine, in his book "The Exposition of certain propositions in the Epistle to the Romans,"(cap. 3) in which he says, "Before the law, that is, in the state or degree before the law, we do not fight; because we not only lust and sin, but sins have also our approval. Under the law we fight, but are overcome; for we confess that those things which we do, are evil; and, by making such confession, we intimate that we would not do them. But, because we have not yet any grace we are conquered. In this condition it is shown to us, in what situation we be; and while we are desirous of rising up, and still fall down, we are the more grievously afflicted," etc. This is likewise acknowledged by Peter Martyr, who observes, on Romans 5:8, "We do not deny that there is occasionally some contest of this kind in unregenerate men; not because their minds are not carnal and inclined to vicious pursuits, but because in them are still engraven the laws of nature, and because in them shines some illumination of the Spirit of God, though it be not such as can justify them, or can produce a saving change."

The latter contest, that between the flesh and the Spirit, obtains in the regenerate alone. For in that heart in which the Spirit of God neither is nor dwells, there can be no contest — though some persons are said to "resist the Holy Spirit," and, to "sin against the Holy Ghost," which expressions have another meaning.

The difference between these two contests is very manifest from the diversity of the issue or consequence of each: For, in the first, the flesh overcomes; but, in the latter, the Spirit usually gains the victory and becomes the conqueror. This may be seen by a comparison of this passage with Galatians 5:16,17 — a comparison which we will afterwards undertake.

But from the proper effects of the law itself, it may be most certainly demonstrated that a contest against sin is carried on within a man who is so under the law as that it has discharged all its office towards him, and has exerted all its powers in him. For it is the effect of the law to convict a man, already convicted of sin, of the righteousness of God, to incite him to obedience, to convince him of his own weakness, to inflame him with a desire to be delivered, and to compel him to seek for deliverance. It is well known, however, that these effects cannot be completed without a contest against indwelling sin. But we have already said that about such a man as this the apostle treats in this passage — one who is in this manner under the law.

If any man will yet obstinately maintain, that all unregenerate persons in general perpetrate that to the commission of which, sin and the flesh persuade, with full consent and without any reluctance, let him not view it as a grievance if I demand proof for his assertion, since it is made against express testimonies of Scripture, and since many examples may be adduced in proof of the contrary, such as that of Balsam, who, against his own conscience, obeyed the king of Moab — that of Saul, who, against his own conscience, persecuted David — that of the Pharisees, who, through obstinate malice, resisted the Holy Spirit, etc. But even that very common distinction, which sins are distinguished into those of ignorance, infirmity and malice, is likewise by this method destroyed, if all unregenerate persons commit sin with full assent and without any struggle or reluctance.

I am desirous also, on this occasion, to bring to the recollection of the adverse party, the steps or degrees by which God is accustomed to convert his children to himself from wickedness of life, and which, if they will diligently and without prejudice consider, they will perceive that the contest between the mind and the flesh, which is excited by the law, must of necessity be placed among the beginnings and the precursors of regeneration.

VERSE THE SIXTEENTH.

1. He consents to the law that it is good; a consectary deduced.

2. An objection answered.

3. A second objection.

1. From what has preceded, a consectary or consequence is deduced for the excuse of the law, in the following words: "If then, I do that which I would not, I consent unto the law that it is good." In this verse nothing is said, which may not, in the best possible manner and without any controversy, agree with one who is under the law. For unless a man under the law yields his assent to it that it is good, he is not at all under the law: For this is the first effect of the law in those whom it will subject to itself — to convince them of its equity and justice; and when this is done, such consent necessarily arises. It is also apparent from the first and second chapters of the epistle to the Romans, and from the tenth chapter, in which "a zeal of God touching the law" is attributed to the Jews, that this consent is not peculiar to a regenerate man, nor is it the proper effect of the regenerating Spirit.

2. If any one say, "The subject in this passage is that assent by which a man assents to the whole law of God, and which cannot be in those who do not understand the whole law, but none among the unregenerate understands the entire law of God,"

I reply, FIRST, it can never be affirmed with truth, that "none among the unregenerate understands the entire law" while the following passages exclaim against such an assertion:

"That servant who knew his Lord’s will and did not according to it, shall be beaten with many stripes." (Luke 12:47)

"Though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing;" (1 Corinthians 13:2 )

"Knowledge puffeth up, but charity edifieth;" (1 Corinthians 8:1)

"For it had been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than, after they have known it, to turn from the holy commandment delivered unto them." (2 Peter 2:21.)

Secondly. Neither can this affirmation be truly made in every case: "No man assents to the entire law unless he understands the whole of it;" for he assents to the whole law who knows it to be from God and to be good, though he may not particularly understand all things which are prescribed and forbidden in the law. And where, among the regenerate, is that man to be found who dares to claim for himself such a knowledge of the whole law?

Thirdly. That which is appropriately subservient to this purpose, is, a denial that this passage has any reference to that consent by which a man assents to all the precepts Of the law as being specially understood; for neither do the words themselves indicate any such thing, nor does the analogy of the connection permit it. Because it is concluded from the circumstance of his doing what he would not, that he "consents unto the law that it is good "which conclusion cannot be deduced from this deed if it be said, that this expression relates to the consent which arises from a special acquaintance with and an understanding of all the precepts of the law. For that which this man here says that he does, is a particular deed; it is, therefore, prohibited by some special precept of the law, the knowledge and approval of which is the cause why he who does that deed does it with reluctance. Hence, as from a consequent, it is concluded from this deed thus performed, (that Is committed with a mind crying out and striving against it,) that he who commits the deed in this manner, consents to the law that it is good.

3. But some one will perhaps rejoin and say, "This passage does not relate to the consent of general estimation, which may be possessed, and is so, in reality, by many of the unregenerate. But it has reference to the consent of particular approbation, which is the peculiar act of the regenerating Spirit." Such an objector ought to know that those things which are confidently uttered without any attempt at proof, may, with equal freedom, be rejected without offering the smallest reason. The thing itself, however, evinces the contrary; for, to consent to the law that it is good, is not to approve in particular a deed which has been prescribed by the law; for this consent of particular approbation cannot consist with the perpetration of a deed which is particularly disapproved. But the commission of such an act agrees well with the consent about which the apostle here treats.

VERSE THE SEVENTEENTH

1. He no longer himself perpetrates this evil, but it is done by sin that dwelleth in him, a second Consectary deduced.

2. From this verse are drawn two arguments for the contrary opinion, both of which are refuted — the first argument, and a reply to it.

3. The second argument and a reply.

4. An argument from this verse in favor of true opinion.

5. On the word dwelling, or inhabiting, according to its signification, and the usage of Scripture, with quotations from Zanchius, Bucer, Peter Martyr, and Musculus.

1. From the preceding verses is deduced another consectary, by which this man transfers to sin all the blame of this matter — not to excuse himself, that be far from him, for the law has been given and written on his heart, that "his thoughts may accuse or else excuse one another, but to point out his servile condition under the dominion of sin. In this consectary, therefore, nothing can be contained which does not agree with a man who is under the law. If it were otherwise, the consectary would contain more than was to be found in the premises, which, it has been demonstrated, agree extremely well with a man who is under the law.

2. But let us see the words of the consectary: "Now then, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me," that is, sin that dwelleth in me, does this." From these words, the opposite party seem capable of eliciting two arguments in support of the opinion which affirms that the apostle is here treating about a regenerate man and one who is placed under grace.

The First of these arguments is of this kind: —

"It cannot be said of unregenerate men when they sin, that they do not commit it themselves, but that it is committed by sin which dwells in them.

But this is most appropriately said about the regenerate:

Therefore, the man about whom the apostle here treats, is "not an unregenerate man, but one who is regenerate."

Answer. The antecedent must be examined; for, when it is either granted or denied, the consequence is also granted or denied.

(1.) It is evident, that it cannot simply be affirmed concerning any man, whatever his condition may be, that he does of himself commit the sin which he commits; for this is a contradiction in the adjunct; and the apostle declares, that this man "does evil." Therefore, if this can be said with truth, the expression must be understood relatively and in a certain respect. But this relation or respect ought to be founded either in the man himself who perpetrates the offense, or in the perpetration itself.

(i.) If this respect be founded in the man himself, it must be thus generally explained and enunciated — "The sin which this man commits, he does as he is such a one; and he does not as he is such a one."

(ii.) If the respect be founded in the perpetration and the effecting of the sin, then it must be taken from the varied relation of causes of the same kind to the effect. But in this passage, the apostle is treating on the efficient cause of sin, which is here allowed to be two-fold — The man, and sin dwelling in him, but so as this may be said to be effected by indwelling sin, and not by the man. Wherefore, this effect must be taken from the distribution of the efficient cause, by which it is distributed into that which is primary and principal, and that which is secondary and less principal.

(2.) It can by no means be said by him who is inspired with a sincere love of truth, that this two-fold respect is applicable only to a man who is regenerate and placed under grace, but that it does not at all appertain to a man placed under the law or does not in the least agree with him. For as this respect or relation is two-fold in the regenerate, On account of the imperfection of regeneration in this life, and the remains of "the old man," according to which respect it may be said concerning a regenerate man, that "as he is regenerate he does this, and as he is not regenerate he does it not or does not do it perfectly;" so, likewise, in a man under the law, the respect is two-fold on account of the coming in of the law; for he is "carnal" and "the servant of sin," and is under the law, that is, "he consents to the law that it is good," which consent is neither of the flesh nor according to the flesh, that is, it is not from depraved nature.

Wherefore, it may be said concerning a man under the law, that he commits sin, not as he is under the taw, nor as he consents to the law that it is good, but as he is carnal and the servant of sin.

(3.) The second respect (according to which the effect, that has simply proceeded from two concurrent causes, is taken away from one of them and ascribed to the other) seems to hold the chief place in this passage, as it does also in this saying of the apostle,

"I labored more abundantly than they all; yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me." (1 Corinthians 15:10.)

For it is well known to be a very general practice to ascribe the effect to the principal and primary of two concurrent causes, at the same time taking away the same effect from the secondary cause; especially if by some means, either beyond nature, or against the will and by the force of the superior cause, the secondary one has been drawn forth to efficiency.

Thus, an ambassador who manages the cause of his prince, is not said himself to act, but his prince, who makes use of his services. Thus, much more appropriately, if a servant, who is oppressed by a tyrannical lord, does something against his own will at the command and through the compulsion of his lord, he will not himself be said to do this, but his lord who has the dominion over him. And it is most manifest, to every one who will look upon these words of the apostle with unjaundiced eyes, that they convey this meaning; as is apparent from the epithet which is attributed to sin, the perpetrator of this evil, and by which the dominion of sin is denoted, that is, "sin that dwelleth in me does it."

(4.) It is no matter of wonder, that "he does it not, but sin does it;" for "when the law came, sin revived and he died." (Romans 7:9) Therefore, the cause of actions, is that which lives, and not that which is dead.

It is apparent, then, that the first part of the antecedent in this argument is false, and on this account the second part is not reciprocal; therefore, the conclusion cannot be deduced from it by good consequence, which consequence concludes [that the apostle is here treating] about a regenerate man, to the exclusion of the unregenerate,

3. The second argument is drawn from the adverbs of time, "now," and "no more," which are used in this verse; and from which a conclusion is thus drawn in favor of the same opinion: "These adverbs have respect to time antecedent; but the time antecedent is the time when the man was not regenerate. As though he had said, Formerly, when I was not yet regenerated, I committed sin; but now I no longer do this, because I am regenerated. Therefore, it is apparent that this present time, which is signified by the adverb "now," must be understood concerning the state of regeneration, since it cannot be said concerning an unregenerate man, that "though he formerly committed sin, he commits it no more."

Answer. — I grant it to be a great truth, that these adverbs denote relation to time antecedent, and that in fact the passage is thus commodiously explained: Formerly indeed perpetrated evil, but now I no longer do this.

But I deny that the time antecedent embraces the entire state before regenerations; for the state of unregeneracy, or that which is prior to regeneration, is distinguished by our author, the apostle himself, into another twofold state — before or without the law, and under the law, as it is expressed in the ninth verse of this very chapter. And the antecedent time, in reference to which it is said "now" and "no more," comprises the state without the law; but the present time [described by the two adverbs] comprises the state under the law. As if he had said, "Formerly, when I was without the law, I committed sin, but now, when I am under the law, I no longer commit it, but sin that dwelleth in me." This is in unison with what is said in the ninth verse: "For I was alive without the law once," or formerly; "but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died." For, while "he was alive without the law," he committed evil without any reluctance of mind or of will. Therefore, at that time, he did evil; but now, being placed under the law, he undoubtedly commits sin, but he does it against his conscience and not without resistance on the part of his will.

Wherefore, the cause and culpability of sin must be ascribed, not so much to the man himself, as to the violent impulse of sin.

4. Thus far we have perceived, that this verse contains nothing which can afford support to the opposite opinion. Let us further see whether an argument may not be elicited from it, for establishing the truth of the other opinion, which declares that it must be understood concerning an unregenerate man, and one who is placed under the law: The apostle says that "sin dwelleth in this man." But sin does not dwell in those who are regenerate.

Therefore, the apostle is not, in this passage, treating about the regenerate or those who are placed under grace, but about the unregenerate and those who are under the law.

One of the premises of this syllogism is in the text: the other must be demonstrated by us. I am aware indeed, that this seems wonderful to those who are accustomed to the distinction of sin, by which one kind is called ruling or governing, and another receives the appellation of sin existing within us, or of indwelling and inhabiting sin, and who suppose that the former of these epithets is peculiar to the unregenerate, and the latter to the regenerate. But if any one require a proof of this distinction, those who ought to give it will evince a degree of hesitation. But is not one kind of sin ruling or reigning, and another existing within and not reigning, and is not the former peculiar to the unregenerate, and the latter to the regenerate? Who can deny, when the Scriptures affirm, that there are in us the remains of sin and of the old man as long as we survive in this mortal life? But what man, conversant with the Scriptures, shall distinguish reigning from indwelling or inhabiting sin, and will account indwelling sin to be the same as the sin existing within? Indeed, indwelling sin is reigning sin, and reigning is indwelling, and therefore sin does not dwell in the regenerate, because it does not domineer or rule in them. I prove the first part of this, both from the very signification of the word to inhabit or dwell, and from the familiar usage of the Scriptures.

5. Concerning the signification of the word, Zanchius observes, in his treatise On the Attributes of God, "God is not said to dwell in the wicked, but he dwells in the pious. For what is it to dwell in any place? It is not simply to be there, as people are at inns and places of entertainment during journeys; but it is to reign and have the dominion at his pleasure as if in his own residence." (Lib. 2, cap. 6, quest. 3.) On Ephesians 3:17, the same Zanchius says, "In this proposition, Christ dwells in your heart by faith, the word to dwell is undoubtedly put metaphorically; the metaphor being taken, not from those persons who, as tenants or lodgers, and as strangers or travelers, tarry for a season in the house or inn belonging to another; but it is taken from masters of families, who, in their own proper dwelling houses live at liberty, work, govern the family, and exercise dominion." Bucer observes, on the very passage which is the subject of our meditation, "He says that this destructive force or power dwells in him, that is, it entirely occupies him and has the dominion, as is the manner of those who are at their own house, in their proper dwelling and domicile.

The apostle Paul, and all Scripture, frequently employ this metaphor of inhabitation or residing; and by it they usually signify the dominion and the certain presence, almost perpetually, of that which is said to inhabit." And this is one of his subsequent remarks: "When, in this manner, sin resides in us, it completely and more powerfully besieges us and exercises dominion."

Peter Martyr says, on Romans 8:9,

"The metaphor of habitation, or indwelling, is taken from this circumstance — that they who inhabit a house, not only occupy it, but also govern in it and order [all things in it] at their own option." The subjoined remark is from Musculus on this passage: "And that he may evidently express this tyranny and violence of sin, he does not say, ‘Sin exists in me,’ but ‘Sin dwells in me.’ For by the word to dwell or inhabit, he shows that the dominion of sin is complete in him; and that sin has, as it were, fixed his seat, or taken up his residence, in him. Evil reigns in no place with greater power than in the place where it has fixed its seat; that is what we see in the case of tyrants. Thus, in a contrary manner, God is said to have dwelt in the midst of the children of Israel; because among no other people did he declare his goodness with such strong evidence, as he did among them, according to this expression of the Psalmist — He hath not dealt so with any nation. (147:20) In this sense, the word to inhabit or to dwell, is very often used in the Scriptures. When, therefore, the apostle wished to declare the power and tyranny of sin in him, he said that it dwelt in him, as in its proper domicile, and thus fully reigned." Calvin, in his Institutes, says (lib. iv, cap. 6, sec. 11,) that we are circumcised in Christ, with a circumcision not made by hands, having laid aside the body of sin which dwelt in our flesh; which he calls the circumcision of Christ.

(2.) What I have said, in accordance with Bucer, about the usage of Scripture, is plain from the following passages:

"My Father and I will come unto him, and make our abode with him." (John 14:23.)

"But 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." (Romans 8:11.)

"For ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people." (2 Corinthians 6:16.)

"That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith." (Ephesians 3:17.)

"When I call to remembrance the unfeigned faith that is in thee, which dwelt first in thy grand-mother Lois, and thy mother Eunice; and, I am persuaded, in thee also." (2 Thessalonians 1:5.)

"That good thing which was committed unto thee, keep by the Holy Ghost which dwelleth in us." (1:14.)

"Do ye think that the Scripture saith in vain, The Spirit that dwelleth in us lusteth to envy? (James 4:5.)

"Nevertheless, we, according to his promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness?’ (2 Peter 3:13.)

"Thou has not denied my faith, even in those days wherein Antipas was my faithful martyr, who was slain among you where Satan dwelleth." (Revelation 2:13.)

According to this usage, the saints are said to be "a habitation of God through the Spirit." (Ephesians 2:22.)

It is manifest, therefore, from the signification of the word and its most frequent usage in the Holy Scriptures, that indwelling sin is exactly the same as reigning sin.

But it is easy now, likewise, to demonstrate the second premise in the syllogism, (p. 53,) which is, "Sin does not dwell in those who are regenerate." For [according to the passages of Scripture quoted in the preceding paragraph] the Holy Spirit dwells in them. Christ, also, dwells in their hearts by faith; and they are said to be "a habitation of God through the Spirit;" therefore, sin does not dwell in them; because no man can be inhabited by both God and sin at the same time; and when Christ has "overcome the strong man armed," he binds him hand and foot and casts him out, and thus occupies his house and dwells in it. Sin does not dwell in those who are "dead to sin," and "in whom Christ liveth." But the regenerate "do not live in sin," but are "dead to it;"(Romans 6:2) and in them Christ dwelleth and liveth; (Galatians 2:20) therefore, sin does not dwell in the regenerate.

Let the two subjoined passages of Scripture be compared together:

"Now then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me:" (Romans 7:17)

"I live; yet no more I, but Christ liveth in me." (Galatians 2:20.)

We shall be able by this comparison most fully to demonstrate, that in this verse the apostle has not been speaking about himself, but has taken upon himself to personate the character of a man who lives to sin, and in whom sin lives, dwells and operates. Yet it does not follow from this, that no sin is in the regenerate; for it has already been shown, that to be in any place, and there to dwell, to have the dominion, and to reign, are two different things.

THE EIGHTEENTH AND NINETEENTH VERSES

1. "In this man, (that is, in his flesh,) dwelleth no good thing," etc.

2. An argument for the contrary opinion is proposed from the eighteenth verse — the answer to it.

3. A reply and its rejoinder.

4. Another reply and its rejoinder.

5. An argument from the same words in favor of the true opinion.

6. The second part of the eighteenth verse, "To will is present with this man, but how to perform that which is good, he finds not."

7. An argument for the contrary opinion from the second part of this verse — the answer to it, with distinctions between each kind of willing and nilling, with extracts from St. Augustine, Zanchius and Bucer.

8. An argument for the true opinion, from the eighteenth and nineteenth verses — the proof of the major proposition, which alone can be called in question.

9. An objection and the answer to it.

10. Another reply and its rejoinder — not only some other things, but likewise those which precede things, that are saving, have a place in some of the unregenerate, with extracts in confirmation from St. Augustine, and references to Calvin, Beza and Zanchius.

11. The dissimilar appellations by which the Scriptures distinguish those who are under constraint through the law, from those who are renewed or regenerated by the grace of the gospel.

1. Let the eighteenth verse now be brought under consideration, in which the apostle follows up the same rendering of a cause, and the proof of it.

The rendering of the cause is, "For I know that in me, (that is, in my flesh,)dwelleth no good thing;" by which words the same thing is signified, as by the following: "I am carnal." For he is carnal, in whom no good thing dwelleth. The proof is contained in these words: "For to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good, I find not."

2. From this rendering of the cause, some persons have instituted an argument for the support of their opinion, in the following terms: "In this man, about whom the apostle is treating, are the flesh, and some other thing either distinct or differing from flesh; otherwise, the apostle would not have corrected himself by saying, In me, that is, in my flesh.

"But in unregenerate persons, there is nothing else but the flesh; Therefore, the man about whom the apostle here treats, is a regenerate person.

Answer. I grant, that, "in this man is some other thing diverse or distinct from the flesh;" for this is to be seen in the apostolical correction. But I deny, that "in unregenerate persons is nothing else beside the flesh" — in those unregenerate persons, I say, who are under the law, and about whom we are engaged in this controversy.

I adduce this reason for the justness of my negation; because in men who are under the law is a mind which knows some truth concerning God and "that which may be known of God," (Romans 1:18,19) which has a knowledge of that which is just and unjust, and whose "thoughts accuse or else excuse one another," (2:1-15,) which knows that the indulgence of carnal desires is sinful, (7:7) which says that "men must neither steal nor commit adultery," (2, 21,22)etc., etc. To certain of the unregenerate, also is attributed some illumination of the Holy Ghost, (Hebrews 6:4,) a "knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ,", a "knowledge of the way of righteousness," (2 Peter 2, 20,21) some acquaintance with the will of the Lord, (Luke 12:47,) the gift of prophecy, etc., etc. (1 Corinthians 13.) That man who is bold enough to style such things as these "the flesh," inflicts a signal injury on God and his Spirit. And indeed how, under the appellation of "the flesh" can be comprehended that which accuses sin, convinces men of sin, and compels them to seek deliverance?

There is, then, in men who are under the law, "the flesh, and something beside the flesh," that Is a mind imbued with a knowledge of the law and consenting to it that it is good; and in some unregenerate persons there Is beside the flesh, a mind enlightened by a knowledge of the gospel. But to the "other thing which is distinct from the flesh," the apostle does not, in this chapter, give the title of the Spirit, but that of the mind.

The remark of Musculus on this passage is as follows: "Behold how cautiously the apostle again employs the word to dwell. He does not say, "I know that in me is no good thing;’ for, whence could he otherwise approve of good things and detest those which are evil, consenting to ‘the law of God, that is holy, and just, and good,’ if he had in himself nothing of good? But he say, ‘I know that in me dwelleth no good thing;’ that Is, it does not reign in me, does not possess the dominion, since it has seized upon sin for itself, and since the will earnestly desires that which is good, though it is not free, but weak and under restraint, enduring the power of a tyrant."

3. But some one will here reply, "Not only is something different from the flesh attributed to this man, but the inhabitation or residence of good is likewise attributed to that which is different from the flesh; for, otherwise, that part of the verse in which the apostle corrects himself, would not have been necessary; but in an unregenerate man, or one who is under the law, there is nothing in which good may reside. Therefore, this is a regenerate man," etc.

Rejoinder. While I concede the first of these premises, I deny the second which affirms, "In an unregenerate man, or one who is under the law, there is nothing in which good may dwell or reside." For in the mind of such a man dwells some good thing, that is, some truth and knowledge of the law.

The signs of habitation or residence are the works which this knowledge and truth in the mind unfold or disclose. For instance — a conscience not only accusing a man of sin, but also convincing him of it — the delivering of a sentence of condemnation against the man himself — the enacting of good laws — careful attention to public discipline — the punishment of crimes — the defense of good people — despair of obtaining righteousness by the law and by legal works the impelling necessity to desire deliverance and to seek for it. These works, indeed, are most certain signs of the law dwelling and reigning in the mind of such a man as has been described.

On this point, I entreat, that no one will condemn as heresy that which he has yet either not heard, or not sufficiently considered. For I do not assert that good dwells and reigns in a man under the law, or in any of the unregenerate. For to reign in the mind, and, simply, to reign in the man, are not the same thing. Because, if this knowledge were simply to dwell and reign in the man, this very man would then live in a manner agreeable to his knowledge, the resistance of the flesh being repelled by that which would simply obtain the first and principal place in a man.

If any one closely considers this rendering of the cause, and accommodates it to the design of the apostle, he will understand that the apostolical correction was both necessary and produced for this purpose — that, notwithstanding the indwelling of something good in the mind of a man who is under the law, a proper and adequate cause might be given why, in such a man as this, "the motions of sins" flourish, and work all concupiscence; which cause is this: In the flesh of this man dwelleth no good thing. For if any good thing dwelt in his flesh, he would then not only know and will what is good, but would also complete it in actual operation, his passions or desires being tamed and subdued, and subjected to the law of God. In reference to this, it is appositely observed by Thomas Aquinas on this very passage — "And by this, it is rendered manifest that the good thing [or blessing] of grace does not dwell in the flesh; because if it dwelt in the flesh, as I have the faculty of willing that which is good through the grace that dwells in my mind, so I should then that of perfecting or fulfilling what is good through the grace that would dwell in my mind."

4. But some one will object — "In the Scriptures, the whole unregenerate man is styled flesh. Thus, For that he also is flesh. (Genesis 6:3.) That which is born of the fish, is flesh. (John 3:6.)"

REPLY. — First. This mode of speaking is metonymical, and the word carnal "flesh," is used instead of carnal, by a usage peculiar to the Hebrews, who employ the abstract for the concrete. This is clearly pointed out by Beza, on the passage just quoted, (John 3:6,) on which he observes — "Flesh is here put for carnal, as, among the Hebrews, appellatives are frequently employed as adjectives. This was also a practice among the Greeks and Romans, as in the words, kaqarma etc.

Secondly. Though the word flesh, in the abstract, be urged, yet the whole man may be called flesh, but not the whole of man; for the mind which condemns sin and justifies the law, is not flesh. But this very same mind may in some degree be called carnal, because it is in a man who is carnal, and because the flesh, which fights against the mind, brings the whole man into captivity to the law of sin, and by this means has the predominance in that man.

5. But from these remarks may be constructed an argument in confirmation of the true sentiment, in the following manner:

In the flesh of a regenerate man dwells that which is good; therefore, the man about whom the apostle discourses is unregenerate.

I prove the proposition from the proper effect of the indwelling Spirit; for the Holy Spirit crucifies the flesh with its affections and lusts, mortifies the flesh and its deeds, subdues the flesh to Himself, and weakens the body of the flesh of sin: And He performs all these operations by his indwelling. Therefore, good dwelleth in the flesh of a regenerate man. The assumption is in the text itself; therefore, the conclusion follows from it.

6. Let us now examine the proof of the affirmation — that in the flesh of this man "dwelleth no good thing." This is contained in the words subjoined: "For to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good, I find not." From a comparison of the question to be proved, and the argument produced to prove it, it is apparent that the argument is contained in these words: "For I find not to perform that which is good," that is, I attain not to the performance of that which is good. This proof is taken from the effect; for as, from the indwelling in the flesh of that which is good, would follow the performance of good; so, from "no good thing dwelling in the flesh," arises the impossibility of performing that which is good. For these words, "for to will is present with me," are employed through a comparison of things that differ; which was necessary in this place, because the proof was to be accommodated to the man about whom the apostle was treating: And this is the way in which the proof is accommodated — "To will is indeed present" with a man who is under the law; but the same man "does not find to perform that which is good," because he is carnal. From this it is apparent, that "he is carnal," and that "in his flesh dwelleth no good thing." If any good thing resided in his flesh, it would in that case restrain the strong force and desires of the flesh, and prevent their being able to hinder the performance of the good which he might will.

But let the whole proof be stated in the following syllogism:

In the flesh of him who has the power to will, but who "does not find to perform that which is good," dwelleth no good thing;

But the man about whom the apostle is treating, has indeed the power of willing, but "does not find to perform that which is good; "

Therefore, in the flesh of such a man as this, "dwelleth no good thing."

It will not be denied by any one who is in the least degree acquainted with logic, and who has accurately considered the eighteenth verse, that this is the syllogism of the apostle. But from this proposition I may conclude the proposition of the syllogism which I have already adduced for confirming my opinion, and which is, "In the flesh of a regenerate man dwelleth some good thing," by this argument, "Because a regenerate man finds to perform that which is good." For the contrary would be a consequence from things contrary. That this may the more plainly appear, let us now see this proposition, with others which are deduced from it by inversion. The proposition is, "No man who is incapable of performing that which is good, has any good thing dwelling in his flesh;" therefore, by inversion, "No man who has that which is good dwelling in his flesh, is incapable of performing what is good." To this, is equivalent the following:

"Every man who has any thing good dwelling in his flesh, is capable of performing what is good; in fact he is capable, because he has good dwelling within him," therefore, by simple Inversion in a necessary and reciprocal matter,

"Every one who is capable of performing what is good, has good dwelling in his flesh." This is the major, from which I assume, "But a regenerate man can perform that which is good." (Philippians 2.)

"Therefore, a regenerate man has good dwelling in his flesh;" which was the major of the syllogism that I had previously adduced.

7. But the defenders of the contrary opinion seem to think, that, from this proof, they are able, for the confirmation of their own opinion, to deduce an argument, which they frame thus: He is a regenerate man, with whom to will that which is good is present: But to will that which is good, is present with this man; Therefore, this man is regenerate.

Answer. Before I reply to each part of this syllogism, I must remove the ambiguity which is in this phrase, "to will that which is good," or the equivocation in the word "to will." For it is certain, that there are two kinds of this volition or willing; since it is here asserted of one and the same man, that he is occupied both in willing and in not willing that which is good, concerning one and the same object; in willing it, as he [merely] wills, it but in not willing it as he does not perform it; for this is the reason why he does not perform it, because he does not will it, though [he acts thus] with a will which is, as it were, the servant of sin and compelled not to will [that which is good]. Again, he is occupied both in not willing and in willing that which is evil concerning one and the same object — in not willing it, as he does not will it and hates it — in willing it, as he performs the very same [evil] thing; for he would not do it, unless he willed it, though [he acts thus] with a will which is impelled to will by sin that dwelleth in him.

St. Augustine gives his testimony to the expressions which I have here employed, in his Retractions. (Lib. I, cap. 13.)

The remarks of Bucer on this passage are: "Hence it came to pass that David did, not only that which he willed, but also that which he willed not.

He did that which he willed not, not indeed when he committed the offense, but when the consideration of the divine law still remained, and when it was restored. He did that which he willed, just at the time when he actually concluded and determined about the woman presented to his view. So Peter," etc. (Fol. 368.)

Zanchius, also, in his book, On the Works of Redemption, observes —

"This was undoubtedly the reason why Peter denied Christ, because he willed so to do, though not with a full will, neither did he willingly deny Him." (Lib. I, cap. 3, fol. 25)

Wherefore, since it is impossible that there should be only a single genus of volition and nolition, or one mode of willing and not willing, by which a man wills the good and does not will the same good, and by which he does not will the evil and wills the same evil; this phrase, "to will that which is good" and "not to will that which is evil," must have a twofold meaning, which we will endeavor now to explain.

(1.) Because every volition and every nolition follows the judgment of the man respecting the thing presented as an object, each of them, therefore, is also different according to the diversity of the judgment.

But the judgment itself, with reference to its cause, is two-fold: For it either proceeds from the mind and reason approving the law that it is good, and highly esteeming the good which the law prescribes, and hating the evil which it forbids; or, it proceeds from the senses and affections, and (as the expression is) from sensible knowledge, or that which is derived from the senses, and which approves of that which is useful, pleasant and delightful, though it be forbidden; but which disapproves of that which is hurtful, useless, and unpleasant, though it be prescribed. The former of these is called "‘ the judgment of general estimation," the latter "the judgment of particular approbation or operation." Hence, one volition is from the judgment of general estimation; the other is from the judgment of particular approbation, and thus becomes a nolition. On this account, the will which follows the judgment of general estimation wills that which the law prescribes, and does not will that which the law forbids. But the same will, when it follows the judgment of particular approbation, wills the delectable or useful evil which the law forbids, and does not will the troublesome and hurtful good which the law prescribes.

(2.) This distinction, when considered with respect to one and the same object contemplated in various ways, will be still further illustrated. For that object which is presented to the will, is considered either under a general form, or under one that is particular. Thus adultery is considered either in general, or in particular; considered in general, adultery is condemned by reason as an evil and as that which has been forbidden by the law; considered in particular, it is approved, by the knowledge which is derived from the senses, as something good and delectable. Bucer, when treating on this subject, in his remarks on the same verse, says: "But there is in man a two-fold will — one, that by which he consents to the law — another, that by which he does what he detests. The one follows the knowledge of the law by which it is known to be good; The other follows the knowledge which is derived from the senses, and which is concerning things present."

(3.) This volition and nolition may likewise be distinguished in another manner. There is one volition and nolition which follow the last judgment formed concerning the object; and another volition and nolition which follow not the last but the antecedent judgment. In reference to the former of these, volition will be concerning good; in reference to the latter, volition will be concerning the evil opposed to it, and contrariwise. Thus, likewise, concerning nolition. And with respect to the former, it will be volition; in respect to the latter, it will be nolition, concerning the same object, and the contrary. But the volition and nolition which follow not the last judgment, cannot so well be simply and absolutely called "volition" and "nolition," as velicity and nolicity. Those, however, which follow the last judgment, are simply and absolutely called efficacious volition and nolition, to which the effect succeeds.

(4.) Thomas Aquinas, on this very passage in Romans 7, says, that the former is not a full will, the latter is a complete will. But let this same distinction be considered as it is employed concerning God. For God is said to will some things approvingly as being good in themselves, but to will other things efficaciously, as simply conducing to his glory.

We must now consider the kind of willing and nilling about which the apostle is here treating. He is treating, not about the volition and nolition of particular approbation, but about those of general estimation — not about the volition and nolition which are occupied concerning an object considered in particular, but concerning one generally considered — not about the volition and nolition which follow the last judgment, but about those which follow the antecedent judgment — not about simple, absolute and complete volition, but about that which is incomplete, and which rather deserves to be called velicity. "For the good that he would, he does not; but the evil which he would not, that he does." If he willed the good prescribed by the law, with the will of particular approbation, which follows the last judgment, he would then also perform the good which he had thus willed. If, in the same manner, he did not will the evil forbidden by the law, he would then abstain from it. This is explained, in a learned and prolix manner, by Bucer on this passage.

(I.) I now come specially to each part of the syllogism, in which the Major Proposition seems to me to be reprehensible on two accounts:

(1.) Because "to will that which is good, "which is here the subject of the apostle’s argument, is not peculiar to the regenerate; for it also appertains to the unregenerate — for instance, to those who are under the law, and who have in themselves all those things which God usually effects by the law;

(2.) Because, even when used in that other sense, [as applicable to the regenerate,] it does not contain a full definition of a regenerate man; for a regenerate man not only wills that which is good, but he also performs it; because "it is God who worketh in" the regenerate "both to will and to do." (Philippians 2:13.) And "God hath prepared good works," that the regenerate "might walk in them;" or, "he hath created them in Christ Jesus unto good works." (Ephesians 2:10.) They are "new creatures;" (2 Corinthians 5:17) are endued with that "faith which worketh by love;" (Galatians 5:6) and to them is attributed the observance, or "keeping of the commandments of God;" (1 Corinthians 7:19; ) they "do the will of God from the heart;" (Ephesians 6:6) "have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine to which they were delivered." (Romans 6:17) etc, etc. From these observations, it is apparent that the particle "only" must be added to the proposition; for when this is appended, it will, at first sight, betray the falsehood and insufficiency of the proposition in this manner: "He is a regenerate man, with whom only to will that which is good is present."

(2.) To the assumption, I reply that it is proposed in a mutilated form.

For this, "to will is present with me," is not the entire sentence of the apostle; but it is one part separated from another. without which it is not consistent. For this is a single discrete axiom: "To will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good, I find not." But nothing can be solidly concluded from a passage of Scripture proposed in a form that is mutilated. I add that, when this latter part of the apostle’s sentence is omitted, the reader is left in doubt concerning the kind of volition and nolition which is here the subject of investigation.

But when the omission is supplied from the text of the apostle, it plainly signifies that the subject of discussion is inefficacious volition and that of general estimation, but, as has already been observed, this kind of volition is not peculiar to the regenerate.

But the assumption may be simply denied, as not having been constructed from the context of the apostle. For St. Paul does not attribute to the man about whom he is treating, that he wills that which is good and does not will that which is evil, but that he does that which is evil, and does not perform that which is good, to which attributes, something tantamount to a description is added — "That which I would not," and "that which I would." This description is added in accommodation to the state of the man about whom the apostle is treating, and it is required by the method of demonstrative investigation. For he had determined to produce the proper and reciprocal cause, why the man about whom he is treating "does not find to perform that which is good;" and therefore all other causes were to be removed, among which were the nolition of good and the volition of evil, also ignorance of that which is good and that which is evil, etc. Thus, in that other disjunctive axiom, "to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not," the principal thing which is attributed to the man about whom the apostle is treating, or that which is predicated concerning him, is that "he does not find to perform that which is good;" for the illustration of which, is produced that differing attribute, "to will indeed is present with me." This is a remark which must be diligently observed by every one who engages in the inquiry, about the most correct manner in which this very difficult passage is to be understood.

8. But the preceding observations make it evident that a contrary conclusion may be drawn from these two verses in the following manner: He is not a regenerate man, with whom to will is indeed present, but not to perform, and who does not perform the good which he would, but who commits the evil which he would not; (this is from the description of regeneration and its parts; )

But to will is present with this man, but not to perform; and the same man does not perform the good which he would, but commits the evil which he would not;

Therefore, the man about whom the apostle is treating, is unregenerate.

The assumption is in the text of the apostle; the proposition alone, therefore, remains to be proved. Regeneration not only illuminates the mind and conforms the will, but it likewise restrains and regulates the affections, and directs the external and the internal members to obedience to the divine law. It is not he who wills, but he who performs the will of the Father, that enters into the kingdom of heaven. (Matthew 7:21.) And, at the close of the same chapter, he is called a wise or prudent man "who doeth the sayings of Christ," not he who only wills them. Consult what has already been remarked in the negation of the proposition in that syllogism which was produced for the establishment of the contrary opinion; and

Those persons who fulfill the will of the flesh in its desires, are unregenerate;

But this man fulfills the will of the flesh; Therefore, he is unregenerate.

But these [attributes] agree most appropriately with a man who is under the law — to will that which is good and not to will evil, as agreeing with one who "consents to the law that it is good," but not to do that which is good and to do evil, as agreeing with one who is "carnal and the servant of sin."

9. But perhaps some one will here reply, "From this man is not simply taken away the performing of that which is good, but the completion of it, that is, the perfect performance of it — a view of the matter which has the sanction of St. Augustine, who gives this explanation of the word." Answer. Omitting all reference to the manner in which the opinion of these persons agrees with that of St. Augustine, which we shall afterwards examine, I affirm that this is a mere evasion. For the Greek verb katergazomai does not signify to do any thing perfectly, but simply to do, to perform, to dispatch, as is very evident from the verb poiw "to do," which follows, and from this word itself as it is used in the fifteenth verse, where, according to their opinion, this verb cannot signify completion or perfect performance — for the regenerate, to whom, as they understand it, this clause in the fifteenth verse applies, do not perfectly perform that which is evil. Let those passages of the sacred writings be consulted in which this word occurs, and its true meaning will be easily understood from Scripture usage.

I add that, in this sense, "the completion," that is, "the perfect performance" of that which is good, can no more be taken away from a regenerate man, than "the willing" of that which is good. For while the regenerate continue in this state of mortality, they do not "perfectly will" that which is good.

10. But some one will further insist, that "to will good" and "not to will evil," in what mode and sense soever these expressions are taken, is "some good thing;" and that, to an unregenerate man can be attributed nothing at all which can be called GOOD, without bringing contumely on grace and the Holy Spirit.

To this I reply, We have already understood the quality and the quantity of this "good thing." But I am desirous to have proof given to me, that nothing at all which is good can be attributed to an unregenerate man, of what description soever he may be. According to the judgment which I have formed, the Scriptures in no passage, openly affirm this; neither do I think that, by good consequence from them, it can be asserted. But the contrary assertion may be most evidently proved, "The truth" which is mentioned in Romans 1:18, is good, as being opposed to "unrighteousness;" but this "truth" is in some unregenerate persons.

"The work of the law," which is mentioned in Romans 2:15, is a good thing; but it is: written in the hearts" of heathens, and that by God.

"The taste of the heavenly gift, of the good word of God, and of the powers of the world to come," (Hebrews 6:4,5,)

is good; and yet it is in the unregenerate.

"To have escaped the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, and to have known the way of righteousness," (2 Peter 2:20,21)

are good things; yet they belong to the unregenerate.

"To receive the word of God with joy," (Matthew 13:20,

is good; and it appertains to the unregenerate. And, in general, all those gifts of the Holy Spirit which are for the edification of the church, and which are attributed to several of the reprobate, are good things. (1 Corinthians 12 & 13.)

To acknowledge themselves to be sinners, to mourn and lament on account of personal transgressions, and to seek deliverance from sin, are good things; and they belong to some who are unregenerate. Nay, no man can be made partaker of regeneration, unless he have previously had within him such things as these. From these passages, it is evident that it cannot be said with truth, that nothing of good can be attributed to the unregenerate, what kind of men soever they may be.

If any one reply, "But these good things are not saving in their nature, neither are they such as they ought to be "I acknowledge the justness of the remark. Yet some of them are necessarily previous to those which are of a saving nature; besides, they are themselves in a certain degree saving.

That which has not yet come up to the point toward which it aims, does not immediately lose the name of "a good thing" The dread of punishment, and slavish fear are not that dread and fear which are required from the children of God; yet they are, in the mean time, reckoned by St. Augustine among those good things which precede conversion. In his thirteenth sermon on these words of the apostle, have not received the spirit of bondage again unto fear, (Romans 8:15) he says, "What is this word again? It is the manner in which this most troublesome schoolmaster terrifies.

What is this word again? It is as ye received the spirit of bondage in Mount Sinai. Some man will say, The Spirit of Bondage is one, the spirit of liberty another. If they were not the same, the apostle would not use the word again. Therefore, the spirit [in both cases] is the same; but, in the one case, it is on tables of stone in fear, in the other, it is on the fleshly tables of the heart in love," etc. In a subsequent passage he says, "You are now, therefore, not in fear, but in love, that you may be sons, and not servants. For that man whose reason for still doing well is his fear of punishment, and who does not love God, is not yet among the children of God. My wish, however, is that he may continue even to fear punishment.

Fear is a bond-servant, love is a free man; and, if we may thus express ourselves, fear is the servant of love. Therefore, lest the devil take possession of the heart, let this servant have the precedence in it, and preserve a place within for his Lord and Master, who will soon arrive. Do this, act thus, even from fear of punishment, if you are not yet able to do it from a love of righteousness. The master will come and the servant will depart; because, when love is perfected, it casts out fear."

Calvin likewise numbers initial fear among good things; and Beza, from the meaning attached to it by Calvin and himself, makes it to be preliminary to regeneration, as we have already perceived.

But these things, and others, (if any such there be,) are attributed to the unregenerate, without any injury to grace and the Holy Spirit; because they are believed to be, in those in whom they are found, through the operation of grace and of the Holy Spirit. For there are certain acts which precede conversion, and they proceed from the Holy Spirit, who prepares the will; as it is said by Zanchius, in his Judgment on the First and Second Tome of the objections and answers of Pezelius, which judgment is subjoined to the second tome. Consult likewise what we have cited in a preceding page from Beza against Tilman. Heshusius.

11. What man is there who possesses but a moderate acquaintance with theological matters, and does not know, that the Holy Spirit employs the preaching of the word in this order, that he may first convict us of sin, by the law, of whose equity and righteousness he convinces the mind — may accuse us of being obnoxious to condemnation — may place before our eyes our own impotency and weakness — may teach us that it is impossible to be justified through the law, (Romans 3:19-21) — that he may compel us to flee to Christ, using "the law as a schoolmaster, to lead us by the hand to Christ," who is "the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth"? (Galatians 2:16-21; 3:1-29.) On this account, also, the unregenerate receive certain names or appellations, in the Scriptures: They are called sinners, as they are contra-distinguished from the righteous that boasted themselves of their righteousness, which sinners Christ came to call — Laboring and Heavy-Laden, to whom Christ came to afford refreshment and rest — sick and infirm, and such as stand in need of a Physician’s aid, that they may be distinguished from those who supposed themselves to be "whole," and not to require the services of a Physician — poor and needy, to whom Christ came to preach the gospel — captives and prisoners in bonds, who acknowledge their sad condition, and whom Christ came to deliver — contrite in spirit and broken hearted, whom Christ came to bind up, etc.

Secondly. Having completed these effects by the law, the same Spirit begins to use the preaching of the gospel, by which he manifests and reveals Christ, infuses faith, unites believers together into one body with Christ, leads them to a participation of the blessings of Christ, that, remission of sins being solicited and obtained through his name, they may begin further to live in him and from him. On this account likewise, the very same persons are distinguished by certain other appellations in the Scriptures. They are called believers, justified, redeemed, sanctified, regenerated, and liberated persons, grafted into Christ, concorporate with him, bones of his bones, flesh of his flesh, etc.

From this order, it appears that some acts of the Holy Spirit are occupied concerning those who are unregenerate, but who are to be born again, and that some operations arise from them in the minds of those who are not yet regenerate, but who are to be born again. But I do not attempt to determine whether these be the operations of the Spirit as He is the regenerator. I know that, in Romans 8:15-17, the apostle distinguishes between the Spirit of adoption and the spirit of bondage. I know that, in 2 Corinthians 3:6-11, he distinguishes between the ministration of the law and of death, and the ministration of the gospel and of the Spirit. I know the apostle said, when he was writing to the Galatians, that the Spirit is not received by the works of the law, but by the faith of the gospel of Christ. And I think that we must make a distinction between the Spirit as he prepares a temple for himself, and the same Spirit as He inhabits that temple when it is sanctified. Yet I am unwilling to contend with any earnestness about this point — whether these acts and operations may be attributed to the Spirit, the regenerator, not as He regenerates, but as He prepares the hearts of men to admit the efficiency of regeneration and renovation. Hence, I think it is once generally clear, that this opinion is not contumelious to the Holy Spirit, nor can it take away from the Spirit any thing which is attributed to Him in the Scriptures; but that it only indicates the order according to which the Holy Spirit disposes and distributes his acts. I am not certain whether, on the contrary, it be not contumelious to the Spirit of adoption who dwells in the hearts of the regenerate, if he be said to effect in them a volition of this description from which no effect follows, but which fails or becomes defective in the very attempt, being conquered by the tyranny of sin that dwelleth within — and this in opposition to the declaration in 1 John 4:4, "Greater is HE that is in you, than he that is in the world." Neither do I think it to flow as a consequence from this, that in Romans 7:18,19, the subject under investigation is a man faced under grace; for it is one thing to feel or perceive some effect of preparing grace; and it is another to be under grace, or to be ruled, led and influenced by grace.

VERSE THE TWENTIETH

If he does that which he would not, then it is no more he that does it, but sin that dwelleth in him.

We have already taken the twentieth verse into consideration. But I here briefly remind the reader, that in this passage, likewise, is manifestly discovered the truth of our exposition which has been adduced; because, in this verse, he says, both that he does what he would not, and yet that he does not do it himself, but sin that dwelleth in him. He does it, therefore, and he does it not; because he does it as a servant who is under compulsion by his master, and who does not execute his own will so much as that of his master, though it is also his own, otherwise he would not perform it; for he consents to the will of his master before he performs it, because he does it without co-action or force; for the will cannot be forced.

VERSE THE TWENTY-FIRST

He finds that, where he would do good, evil is present with him.

The twenty-first verse contains a conclusion from the preceding, accommodated to the purpose of the apostle upon which he is here treating. For, from the circumstance of this man knowing that "to will is present with him" but not to perform it, he concludes, that "when he would do good, evil is present with him." But it must be observed, that, in the eighteenth verse, the apostle employs the same phrase about willing, as he here uses about evil; and thus he says, that both to will good, and to will evil, are present with him, or lie close to him. And as "to will that which is good is present with him" through his inclination for the law, and through his mind which approves of it as "just and good," so "to will evil is likewise present with him" through a certain law of sin, that is, by the force and tyranny of sin, assuming to itself the power, and usurping the right or jurisdiction over this man.

We must now consider whether the essence and adjacency of each (if I may employ such a word) are of equal power; or whether the one prevails over the other, and which of them it is that acquires this ascendancy. It is manifest that the two are not equally potent, but that the one prevails over the other, and that, in fact, "evil is present" in a more powerful and vehement manner: For that obtains and prevails in a man, through the command, instigation and impulse of which he is found to act and to cease from acting. But I wish to see it explained from the Scriptures, how such an assertion as this can be made with truth concerning a regenerate man who is placed under grace; for, in every passage, the sacred records seem to me to affirm the contrary.

THE TWENTY-SECOND AND TWENTY-THIRD VERSES

1. HE delights in the law of God, or he finds a kind of con, delectation with it, after the inward man; but he sees another law in his members, warring against the law of his mind, etc.

2. An argument, from the twenty-second verse, for the contrary opinion.

3. An answer to the PROPOSITION in this argument. The inward man signifies the MIND, as the OUTWARD Man signifies the BODY.

(1.) This is shown from the etymology of the word, and from the usage of Scriptures, especially in 2 Corinthians 4:16, and in Ephesians 3:16,17.

(2.) Proofs of this are given at great length from the ancient Christian fathers.

(3.) Similar proofs are adduced from modern divines

4. The meaning of the phrase, "to delight in the law of God after the inward man."

5. An answer to the assumption, which is shown to be proposed in a mutilated form, by the omission of those things which are mentioned in the twenty-third verse.

6. An argument, from the twenty-third verse, for the contrary opinion.

(1.) An answer to the proposition in it.

(2.) And to the assumption.

7. A most irrefragable argument deduced from these two verses.

(1.) To the refutation of the contrary opinion.

(2.) To the establishment of the true one, which at first is proposed in an ample manner, and afterwards in an abridged form.

(3.) The proposition is proved by three reasons, which are confirmed against all objections.

(4.) It is proved from the Scriptures, that, in the conflict against sin, the regenerate usually obtain the conquest

8. A special consideration of the text, Galatians 5:16-18, and a collation of it with this passage.

9. An objection, and a reply to it.

10. An objection to the third reason, and a reply.

11. A consideration of Isaiah 64:10.

1. In the twenty-second and twenty-third verses is adduced a clearer explanation and proof of the conclusion which had been drawn in the twenty-first verse, and which agrees with the very topic that the apostle had, in this part, proposed to himself for investigation. But the proof is, properly, contained in the twenty-third verse; because that verse corresponds with these words, "When I would do good, evil is present with me," an affirmation which was to be proved. The proof is taken from the effect of the evil which is present with the man, and it is the warfare against the law of his mind, the victory obtained over him, and, after such victory, the captivity of the man to the law of sin. The twenty-second verse has reference to these words, "When I would do good;" and it contains a more ample explanation of this willing, from the proper cause, and an illustration of the following verse from things diverse and disjunctive. But in these two verses is contained one axiom, which is appropriately called a discrete or disjunctive axiom; as is apparent from the use of the particle, de "but," in the twenty-third verse, which is the relative of men though the latter is omitted in the twenty-third verse. It is likewise apparent from the very form of opposition. The antecedent and less principal part of this axiom is contained in the twenty-second verse; the consequent and principal part, in the twenty-third. For the antecedent is employed for the illustration of the consequent, as is very manifest in all axioms. Thus, as in many similar instances,

"I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance; but He that cometh after me, shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with life." (Matthew 2:11.)

"Though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day." (2 Corinthians 4:16.)

For the particles, indeed, though, since, when, etc., denote the antecedent and less principal part of the axiom; while the particles, but, yet, then, etc., denote the consequent and principal part. "To delight in the law of God," or, "to find a sort of condelectation in it," "after the inward man," is the cause that to will is present with this man. "The evil which is present with him," is "the law of sin in his members." The effect, by which the presence of this evil is proved, is contained in these words, "Warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members."

I have considered it proper to offer these remarks to assist in forming a right judgment about a discrete or disjunctive axiom, lest any one should separate the one part from the other, and should account the less principal to be the principal one. Let us now further see what conclusion can be drawn from these two verses, in proof of the one opinion or of the other.

2. Those who hold sentiments contrary to mine, draw the following conclusion, from the twenty-second verse, for the establishment of their view of the subject:

He who delights in the law of God after the inward man, is regenerate and placed under grace;

But this man about whom the apostle is treating delights in the law of God after the inward man;

Therefore, this man is regenerate and placed under grace.

They suppose that, in the proposition, they have a two-fold foundation for their opinion:

(1.) Because "the inward man" is attributed to this person.

(2.) Because that same individual is said "to delight in the law of God after the inward man? For, they say, both these adjuncts can appertain to regenerate persons alone. The First agrees with them only, because, in the Scriptures, "the inward man" has the same signification as that of "the new man and the regenerate;" the Second, because it is declared concerning the pious, that "they meditate in the law of the Lord, and that their delight is in it, day and night?

3. To the proposition, I reply, first, that the inward man is not the same as the new man or the regenerate, either from the etymology of the word, or from the usage of Scripture; and the inward man is not peculiar to the regenerate, but that it also belongs to the unregenerate. Secondly, that to delight in the law of God, or, rather, to find a sort of condelectation in the law of God after the inward man, is not a property peculiar to the regenerate and to those who are placed under grace, but that it appertains to a man placed under the law.

(1.) With regard to the first, I say, from the etymology of the epithet, he is called the inward man, relatively and oppositely to the outward man. For there are two men in the same individual, the one existing within the other, and the one having the other first within himself. The first of these is the hidden man of the heart, (Peter 3:4,) the second is the outward man of the body; the former is he who inhabits or dwells in, the latter, he who is inhabited; the former is calculated or adapted to invisible and incorporeal blessings, the latter, to those which are earthly and visible; the former is immortal, the latter is mortal and liable to death. In these two words, not a single syllable occurs which can afford even the least indication of regeneration, and of the newness arising from regeneration. But these three epithets, the inward man, the regenerate Man, and the new man, hold the following order among each other, which the words themselves indicate at the first sight of them.

The inward man denotes the subject, the regenerate man denotes the act, of the Holy Spirit who regenerates; and the new man denotes the quality which exists in the inward man through the act of regeneration.

(2.) The sense and usage of Scripture are not adverse to this signification, but, on the contrary, are very consentaneous to it. This will be apparent from a diligent consideration of those passages in which mention is made of "the inward man." One of them is the text now under discussion; the second is 2 Corinthians 4:16; and the third is Ephesians 3:16,17. Let us at present take into consideration the last two passages.

2 CORINTHIANS 4:16

The former of the two is thus expressed: "for which cause we faint not; but though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day." From this verse itself, I shew that the inward and the outward man are not in this passage taken for the new and the old man; but that the inward man is to be understood as that which is incorporeal and inhabiting, so denominated from the interior of man, that is, his mind or soul; and that the outward man is here taken for that which is corporeal and inhibited, so denominated from the body, the exterior part of man. This I shew,

First. Because, if the outward and the inward man were to be taken for the old and the new man, then this disjunctive mode of speech could not attain in this verse. For these two could not then be distinguished in this following manner from each other: "Though our old man perish, yet the new man is renewed day by day;" for [as there stated] they are necessarily cohering, and mutually consequent on each other; because whatever is taken away from the old man, is so much added to the new. The absurdity of such a distinction will be still more manifest, if the same thing be thus proposed: "Though our old man be crucified, destroyed and buried, yet the new man rises again, is quickened or vivified, and is renewed still more and more." And, "Though we lay aside our former oldness, yet we make greater and still greater proficiency in newness of life." Let any one that pleases render himself ridiculous by employing the following language: "Though this youth unlearns and lays aside his ignorance, yet he daily makes a greater proficiency in the knowledge of necessary things."

Secondly. The solace which the apostle produces, in opposition to those oppressions and distresses to which holy people are liable, while they remain in this world, consists in the following words: "The inward man is renewed day by day;" and not in these, "though our outward man perish." This is shown by the mode of speech adopted by the apostle, indicating that this very "perishing of the outward man," which is effected through oppressions and distresses, is that against which the consolation, comprehended in the following words, is produced by the apostle. The afflicted person says, "But our outward man is perishing." The apostle replies to him, "Do not grieve on this account; for our inward man is renewed day by day, in the renewal of which consists our salvation. For we must not have regard to external and visible blessings, which conduce to the life of the outward man; because they are liable to perish. But we must highly estimate and regard internal and invisible things, which appertain to the life of the inward man; because these are eternal, and will never perish." But if, by this word, "the outward man" were to be understood "the old man," then the apostle must have produced this in the place of consolation, in the following manner: "Do not lament that you are liable to many afflictions and oppressions, for those are the very things by which your old man perishes, and by which the inward man is the more renewed." But that the perishing of the outward man, and that of the old man, are not the same, is evident from this circumstance, that the former of these is against the very nature of man and the good of natural life, but that the latter is against depraved nature, and is contrary to the life of sin in man.

Thirdly. From the word "renewed," it is apparent that "the inward man" is the subject of renovation or renewal, and of the act of the Holy Spirit.

I confess indeed, that it may be correctly said, "The new man is daily renewed more and more," both because it is needful that this newness, which has been produced in a man by the act of the regenerating Spirit, should increase and be augmented day by day, and because the remains of the old man ought by degrees to be taken away and weakened yet more and more. But even in this case the subject is the inward man, that is called new from the newness which now begins to be effected in him by the regenerating Spirit; for the subject of increasing and progressive renovation, and that of commencing renovation, are the same.

But the subject of incipient or commencing renovation is not the new man, (for he is not called new before the act of renovation, and prior to the quality impressed by that act,) but it is the inward man. Therefore, though the new man be said to be renewed, (a phrase which I am not aware that the Scriptures employ,) yet the subject is the inward man, which subject may receive the appellation of the new man from the quality impressed.

As we say that a white man becomes whiter every day, whiteness being communicated to a white man not as he is white, but as he is a man who has still some dark shades remaining, and who has not yet attained to that degree of whiteness which he desires. ConsonantIy with this view, the Scriptures themselves use these words: "Be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness," (Ephesians 4:23,24.) In this passage the subject of renovation is called "the spirit of our mind," that is, the inward man, or the mind; and "the new man," in the same passage, is not the subject itself, but it is the quality which the subject ought to induce: This quality is there called "righteousness and true holiness."

I have said that I am not quite certain whether the Scriptures use this phrase in any passage: I have felt this hesitation on account of Colossians 3:10, in which it seems to be so used; the apostle saying, "and ye have put on the new man, which is renewed in knowledge after the image of Him who created him." But it will be obvious to every one who consider, the passage with diligence, that these words, "which is renewed," or ton anakainoumenon must be joined with what preceded, "and ye have put on the new man," that is, "that which is renewed," or, "the renewed," "in knowledge," etc., so as to be a description of the new man, not some new attribute of this new man. But to this criticism no great importance is attached; and I have said, I do not deny that the new man is renewed more and more.

The same thing is manifest from the rest of this passage. (2 Corinthians 4:16.) For, "the outward man," (16,) "an earthen vessel," (7,) "our body," (10,) "our mortal flesh," (11,) are all synonymous terms; as are also, "troubled," "perplexed," "persecuted," "bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus," "delivered unto death," and "perishing." This may be rendered very clear to the studious inquirer after the truth, who will compare the preceding and the succeeding verses with the 16th.

EPHESIANS 3:16,17

The latter of the two passages is thus expressed: "That he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man; that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith." From these verses, it is plain, that by the inner man is denoted the subject about which the Holy Spirit is occupied in his act and operation; and this operation is here denominated "a corroboration," or "a being strengthened." This is also plain from the synonym mentioned in the following verse, "that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith;" for "the heart," and "the inner man," are taken from the same thing. In this view of the subject I am supported by the very learned Zanchius, who writes in the following manner upon this passage: "We have asserted, and from 2 Corinthians 4:16, we have demonstrated, that by the term inner man is signified the principal part of man, that is, the mind, which consists of the understanding and the will, and which is usually denoted by the word heart, in which the affections or passions flourish; as, on the contrary, by the term outward man, no other thing can be understood than the corporeal part of man, which grows, possesses senses, locomotion," etc. And in a subsequent passage, he says, "Therefore, by this particle, in the inner man, the apostle teaches, that as the gift of might or strength, so likewise the other virtues of the Spirit, have not their seat in the vegetative or growing part Of man, but in his mind, heart, spirit," etc.

(3) Because it is not only held for a certainty by some persons, that "the inward man" is the same with the new and the regenerate man, from which they venture to assert, "that the regenerate alone possess the inward man;" but because this is also urged as an article of belief, let us therefore see what a great portion of the divines of the Christian church here understood by the epithet, "the inward man." thus it is the inward man. (On Romans 7:22.)

THE ANCIENT FATHERS

CLEMENT 0F ALEXANDRIA

The apostle gives two appellations to the man — his person and his mind. (Strom. lib. 3, fol. 194.)

TERTULLIAN

"BUT," says the apostle, "though our outward man be destroyed," that is, the flesh, by the force of persecutions, "yet the inward man is renewed day by day," that is, the mind, by the hope of the promises. (Against the Gnostics, cap. 15.)

Having, therefore, obtained the two men mentioned by the apostle — the inward man, that is, the mind, and the outward man, that is, the flesh — the heretics have in fact adjudged salvation to the mind, that is, to the inward man, but destruction to the flesh, that is, to the outward man; because it is recorded 2 Corinthians 4:16, "for though our outward man perish," etc. (On the resurrection of the Body, cap. 40.)

From without, wars that overcome the body; inwardly, fear that afflicts the mind. So, "though our outward man perish," perishing will not be understood as losing our resurrection, but as sustaining vexation; and this, not without the inward man. Thus it will be the part of both of them to be glorified together, as well as to be fellow-sufferers. (lbid.)

For though the apostle calls the flesh "an earthen vessel," which he commands to be honorably treated; yet it is also called, by the same apostle, "the outward man," that is, the clay which was first impressed and engraved under the title of man, not of a cup, of a sword, or of any small vessel; for it was called "a vessel" on account of its capacity, which holds and contains the mind. But this flesh is called "man," from community of nature, which renders it not an instrument in operations, but a minister or assistant, (Ibid. cap. 16.) "For I delight in the law of God after the inward man." he says that his mind delights in those things which are delivered by the law; and thus it is the inward man. (On Romans 7:22.)

"Though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day." The flesh perishes or wastes away by afflictions, stripes, famine, thirst, cold and nakedness; but the mind is renewed by the hope of a future reward, because it is purified by incessant tribulations. For the mind is profited in afflictions, and does not perish; so that when additional temptations occur, it makes daily advances in worthiness; because this "perishing" is profitable also to the body for its immortality through the excellence of the mind. (On 2 Corinthians 4:16.)

"I delight in the law of God after the inward man." Our inward man is that which was made after the image and likeness of God; the outward man is that which was formed and shaped from clay. As therefore there are two men, there is likewise a two-fold course of conduct — one is that of the inward man, the other that of the outward man. And, indeed, most of the acts of the inward man extend to the outward man. As the chasteness of the inward man also passes to the chastity of the body. For he who is ignorant of the adultery of the heart, is likewise unacquainted with the adultery of the body, etc. It is, therefore, the circumcision of the inward man; for he who is circumcised has stripped off the enticements of his whole flesh, as his foreskin, that he may be in the Spirit, and not in the flesh; and that in the Spirit he may mortify the deeds of his body, etc., etc. When our inward man is in the flesh, he is in the foreskin. (Letter 77th, to Constantius.)

BASIL THE GREAT

"Let us make man according to our image." He means the inward man, when he says, "Let us make man," etc., etc. Listen to the apostle, who says, "Though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day." How do I know the two men? One of them is apparent; the other is hidden in him who appears, it is the invisible, the inward man. We have then a man within us; and we are twofold; and what is said is very true, that we are inward. (Homily 10th, on the six days of Creation.) "Thy hands have made me, and fashioned me." God made the inward man, and fashioned the outward man. For "the fashioning" belongs to clay; but "the making" appertains to that which is after his own image. Wherefore the thing which was fashioned is the flesh, but that which was made is the mind. (Ibid. Homily 11.)

Since there are, indeed, two men, as the apostle declares, the one outward and the other inward, we must also, in like manner, receive the age in both, according to him whom we behold, and according to him whom we understand in secret. (Discourse on the beginning of the Proverbs of Solomon.)

CYRIL OF ALEXANDRIA

"But though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day." If any one, therefore, says that our inward man dwells in the outward man, he repeats an important truth; yet he will not on this account seem to divide the unity of man. (On the incarnation, of the only begotten Son, cap. 12.)

MACARIUS

The true death consists in the heart, and is hidden, when our inward man is dead. If therefore any one has passed over from death to the hidden life, he in reality lives forever, and dies no more, etc., etc. Sin acts secretly upon the inward man and the mind, and commences a conflict with the thoughts. (Homily 15.)

The members of the soul are many: such as the mind, the conscience, the will, the thoughts which accuse or else defend. But all these have been collected together into one reason; yet they are the members of the soul. But the soul is single, that is, the inward man. (Homily 7.)

"The inward man" and "the soul" are taken for the same thing, in his 27th Homily.

CHRYSOSTOM

"But though our outward man perish," etc. How does it perish? While it is beaten with stripes, is driven away, and endures innumerable evils. "Yet the inward man is renewed day by day." How is it renewed? By faith, hope and alacrity, that it may have the courage to oppose itself to evils.

For, the more the evils which the body endures, the greater is the hope which the inward man entertains, and the more bright and resplendent does it become, as gold which is examined or tested by much fire. (On 2 Corinthians 4:16.)

Let us now see what is said by one who stands higher than many:

AUGUSTINE

But who, except the greatest mad man, will say that in the body we are, or shall afterwards be, like God, That likeness, therefore, exists in the inward man, "which is renewed in the knowledge of God, after the image of him that created him." (Tom. 2, Epist. 6.)

By this grace, righteousness is written in the inward man, when renewed, which transgression had destroyed. (On the Spirit and the Letter, cap. 27.) As he called him the inward man when coming into this world, because the outward man is corporeal as this world is. (On the Demerits and Remission of Sin, lib.1, cap. 25; Tom. 7.)

As the eyes of the body derive no aid from the light, that they may depart from it with eyelids closed and turned in another direction, but in order to see, they are assisted by the light, (nor can this be done at all, unless the light lends its aid,) so God, who is the light of the inward man, assists the drowsiness of our mind, that we may perform something that is good, not according to our righteousness, but according to his own. (Ibid. lib. 2, cap. 5.)

If, in the mind itself, which is "the inward man," perfect newness were formed in baptism, the apostle would not declare, "Though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day." (Ibid. cap. 7.) As that tree of life was placed in the corporeal Paradise, so this wisdom is in the spiritual Paradise, the former of them affording vital vigor to the senses of the outward man, the latter to those of the inward man, without any change of time for the worse. (Ibid. cap. 21.)

Behold, then, of how many things are we ignorant — not only such as are past, but also of those which are present, concerning our nature, and not only in reference to the body, but likewise I, reference to the inward man; yet we are not compared to the beasts. (Tom. 7. 0n the Soul and its Origin, lib. 4, cap. 8.)

Because the thing is either the foot itself, the body, or the man, who hobbles along with a lame foot; yet the man cannot avoid a lame foot, unless he have it healed. This can also be done in the inward man, but it must be by the grace of God through Jesus Christ. (On Perfection against Caelestius, fol. I, letter f.)

Thus also the mind is the thing of the inward man, robbery is an act, avarice is a vice, that is, a quality, according to which the mind is evil, even when it does nothing by which it can render any service to avarice or robbery. (Ibid.)

Beside the inward and the outward man, I do not indeed perceive that the apostle makes another inward of the inward man, that is, the innermost of the whole man. (On the Mind and its Origins, lib. 4, cap. 4.) He confesses in the same passage, that the mind is the inward man to the body, but he denies that the spirit is the inward man to the mind.

Some persons have also made this supposition, that now the inward man was made, but the body of the man afterwards, when the Scripture says, "And God formed man of the dust of the ground." (Tom. 3. On Genesis according to the letter, l. 3, c. 22.)

The apostle Paul wishes "the inward man" to be understood by the spirit of the mind, "the outward man" in the body and this mortal life. Yet it is sometimes read in his epistles, that he has not called both of these together "two men," but one entire man whom God made, that is, both that which is the inward man, and that which is the outward. But he does not make him after his own image, except with regard to that which is inward, not only what is incorporeal, but also what is rational, and which is not within beasts. (Tom. 6. Against Faustus the Manichee, lib. 24, cap. 1.) Behold God is likewise proclaimed, by the same apostle, as former of the outward man. "But now hath God set the members every one in the body as it hath pleased him."(Ibid.)

The apostle says that "the old man" is nothing more than the old [course of] life, which is in sin, and in which men live according to the first Adam, concerning whom he declares, "By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin, and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned." Therefore, the whole of that man, both in his outward and inward part; has become old on account of sin, and is sentenced to the punishment of mortality, etc. (Ibid.)

And therefore, by such a cross, the body of sin is emptied, that we may "not now yield our members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin;" because this inward man also, if he be really renewed day by day, is certainly old before he is renewed. For that is an inward act of which the apostle speaks thus: "Put off the old man, and put on the new man." (Tom. 3. On the Trinity, lib. 4, cap. 3.)

But now the death of the flesh of our Lord belongs to the example of the death of our outward man, etc. And the resurrection of the body of the Lord is found to appertain to the example of the resurrection of our outward man." (Ibid.)

Come now, let us see where is that which bears some resemblance to the confines of the man, both the outward and the inward; for, whatever we have in the mind in common with the beasts, is correctly said still to belong to the outward man; For not only will the body be accounted as "the outward man," but likewise certain things united to its life, by which the joints of the body and all the senses flourish and grow, and with which it is furnished for entering upon outward things. When the images of these perceptions, infixed in the memory, are revisited by recollection, the matter is still a transaction which belongs to the outward man. And in all these things we are at no great distance from the cattle, except that in the shape of our bodies we are not bending downwards, but erect. (On the Trinity, lib. 12, cap. 1.)

While ascending, therefore, inwardly by certain degrees of consideration through the parts of the mind, another thing begins from this to occur to us, which is not common to us with the beasts; thence reason has its commencement, that the inward man may not be known. (Ibid. cap. 8.) Both believers and unbelievers are well acquainted with the nature of man, whose outward part, that is, the body, they have learned the lights of the body; but they have learned the inward part, that is, the mind, within themselves. (Ibid. lib. 13, cap. 1.)

Besides, the Scriptures thus attest it to us in this that, when these two things also are joined together and the man lives, and when likewise they bestow on each of them the appellation of man, calling the mind "the inward man," but the body "the outward man," as though they were two men, while both of them together are only one man. (Tom. 5. On the City of God, lib. 13, cap. 24. See also lib. 11, cap. 27 & 3.)

As this outward and visible world nourishes and contains the outward man, so that invisible world contains the inward man. (Tom. 8. On the First Psalm.)

He who believes in Him, eats and is invisibly fattened, because he is also invisibly born again. The infant is within, the new man is within; where young and tender vines are planted, there are they filled and satiated. (On John, Tract 26.)

THEOPHYLACT

Moreover, "the outward man," that is, the body, "perishes." How is this? While it is beaten with stripes, while it is driven about. "But the inward man," that is, the spirit and the mind, "is renewed." By what means? When it hopes well, and freely acts, as though suffering and rejoicing on account of God. (On 2 Corinthians 4:16.)

VIGILIUS

Let us spiritually advert to the spiritual expressions of the apostle, by which he testifies, that he has seen and handled the word of God, not with his bodily eyes and hands, but with the members of the inner man. (Against Eutychus, lib. 4.)

PROCOPIUS OF GAZA

The substance of man, if you consider his inward man, is this image of God; if you take his outward man into consideration, his substance will be the earth, or the dust of the ground. Yet one and the same is the man in the composition which is completed from both of them. (0n Genesis, cap. 1.)

BERNARD

As the outward man is recognized by his countenance, so is the inward man pointed out by his will. (Sermon 3, On Ascension Day.)

LEO THE GREAT

When the outward man is slightly afflicted, let the inward man be refreshed; and withdrawing corporeal fullness from the flesh, let the mind be strengthened by spiritual delights. (Sermon 4, On Quadragesima Sunday.)

GREGORY NAZIANZEN

But in this, our nature, every care is towards the inward man of the heart, and every desire is directed to it. (Apology for his flight.)

GREGORY NYSSEN

Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. God speaks thus respecting the inward man. "But," you will say, "you are giving a dissertation upon reason. Shew us man after the image of God. Is reason the man?" Listen to the apostle: Though your outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day. By what means? I own that man is two-fold, one who is seen, another who is hidden, and whom he that is seen does not perceive. We have, therefore, an inward man, and in some degree are two-fold. For I am that man who is inward; but I am not those things which are outward; but they are mine. Neither am I the hand, but I am the reason which is in the mind; but the hand is a part of the outward man. (On Genesis, 1:26.)

Thus, when the inward man, whom God denominates the heart, has wiped off the rusty filth which, on account of his depraved thirst, had grown up with his form; he will once more recover the likeness [of God] with his original and principal form, when he will become good. (On the Beatitudes.)

MODERN DIVINES

Let us now see the opinions of certain divines of our own age and religious profession, on the inward man.

CALVIN

Though the reprobate do not proceed so far with the children of God, as, after the casting down of the flesh, to be renewed in the inner man, and to flourish again. (Instit. lib. 2, cap. 7, sect. 9.)

But the reprobate are terrified, not because their inward mind is moved or affected, but because, as by a bridle cast upon them, they refrain less from outward work, and inwardly curb their own depravity, which they would otherwise have shed abroad. (Ibid. sect. 10.) Besides, since we have already laid down a two-fold regimen in man, and as we have, in another place, said enough about the other, which is placed in the mind, or the inward man, and which has reference to life eternal, etc. (Ibid. lib. 4, cap. 20, sect. 1.)

Though the glory of God shines forth in the outward man, yet the proper seat of it is undoubtedly in the mind. (Ibid. lib. I, cap. 15, sect. 3.) Some persons perversely and unskillfully confound the outward man with the old man. For the old man, about whom the apostle treats in Romans 6:6, is something far different. In the reprobate, also, the outward man perishes, but without any counterbalancing compensation. (On 2 Corinthians 4:16.)

BEZA

— Is renewed, that is, acquires fresh strength, lest the outward man, who is sustained by the strength of the inward man, should be broken when assaulted with fresh evils, for which reason, the apostle said, in the 12th verse, "So, then, death worketh in us." (On 2 Corinthians 4:16.)

BUCER

In holy persons, likewise, there are two men, an inward and an outward one. St. Paul says, "Though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day." As, therefore, man is two-fold, so, likewise, are his judgment and his will two-fold — a fact which our Lord himself was not ashamed to confess, when he said to his Father, "nevertheless, not my will, but thine, be done." By saying this, "not what I will, but what thou willest, be done," he undoubtedly shewed that he willed what the Father willed; and yet, at the same time, he acknowledges that this was his will: "Remove this cup from me." Our Lord, therefore, acknowledges the existence within himself of two wills, one of which was apparently at variance with the other. (On Romans 5. Fol. 261.)

FRANCIS JUNIUS

The outward man hears the word of God outwardly, but the inward man hears it inwardly. (On the Three Verities, lib. 3, cap. 2. fol. 182.) But then, as in ecclesiastical administration, not only the inward man is informed in the knowledge of God, but as aids and services are also sought by the outward man, so far as the external signs of the communion of saints are required to feed and promote the inward communion, in this cause, likewise, we acknowledge that God has delegated his authority to the magistrate. (On Ecclesiast. lib. 3, cap. 5.)

PISCATOR

The outward man, that is, the body, as he had previously called it. The inward man, that is, the soul or mind. (On 2 Corinthians 4:16.)

THE CHURCH OF HOLLAND

When, indeed, from the depraved heart, and from the inward man, evil fruits do proceed, a necessary consequence of this is that he who is desirous of boasting that he is pure, must demonstrate the truth of his assertion by a spontaneous approval of the commands of Christ, and by a willing obedience to them. (A pamphlet, in which they give a reason for the excommunication of Koolhaes. Fol. 93.)

JOHN DRIEDO

The inward man is the rational mind unfolded in its powers, which never perishes. But the body, adorned with its senses, is called "the outward man," or "our man who is outward and corruptible," as the apostle says in 2 Corinthians 4:16," though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day." Again, he says, in Romans 7:22, "I delight in the law of God after the inward man." (On Grace and Free Will. Fol. 262.) The apostle Paul frequently does not understand the same thing by "the old man" and by "the outward man," nor has he signified the same thing by "the new man" and by "the inward man;" but in the inward man are found both the old and the new man. For, in the mind, oldness of this kind is formed at the same time as newness. In it, the likeness is either heavenly or earthly, that is, either a carnal will, living according to the exciting feel of Sin, or a Spiritual will, living according to the Spirit of God. (Ibid.)

I AM aware that the divines of our profession frequently take "the inward man" for the regenerate and this new man; but then they do not consider "the inward man," except with a certain quality infused into it by the Holy and Regenerating Spirit, with which quality, when the inward man is considered, he is then correctly called regenerate and a new man. If any one urges that the very designation of "the inward man" possesses, of itself, as great a value with those divines as do the titles of "the regenerate" and "the new man," I shall desire him to demonstrate, by sure and stable arguments, that the meaning adopted by those divines is conformable to truth.

4. Let us now approach to the other foundation, which is that this man, to whom it is attributed that "he delights in the law of God," is regenerate; and that this attribute can agree with no other than a regenerate person.

That we may be able to clear up this matter in a satisfactory manner, we must see what is meant by this phrase, "to delight in the law of God;" or "to feel a joint delight with the law of God," as it appears the Greek text is capable of being rendered, and as an ancient version has it; for the verb, sunhdomai seems to signify the mutual pleasure which subsists between this man and the law, and by which not only this man feels a joint delight in the law, but the law also feels a similar delight in him.

"I feel a joint delight with the law of God," that is, I delight with the law: the same things are pleasing to me as are pleasing to the law. This interpretation may be illustrated and confirmed by a comparison of similar phrases, which frequently occur in other passages of the New Testament; Sunagwnisasqai moi "that ye strive together with me in your prayers to God for me" — Sunanapauswmai umin "that I may with you be refreshed, (Romans 15:30,32) — Sunhqlhsan moi "those women who labored with me in the gospel," (Philippians 4:3) — Summarturei tw pneumati umwn "the Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit that we are the children of God," (Romans 8:16,) from which St. Chrysostom not inappropriately explains, "I feel a joint delight with the law," by this paraphrase, "I assent to the law that it is well applied, as the law, also, in return, assents to me, that it is a good thing for a man to will to do it." He takes this explanation of the phrase from the text itself, which kind of interpretation not only may obtain, but likewise ought to be employed, in this passage, since there is no other in the whole of the Scriptures in which this same phrase is used.

If any one wishes to attach the same meaning to the phrase as to that which is used in Psalm 1:2, "But his delight is in the law of the Lord;" let him who says this, know that it is incumbent on him to produce proof for his assertion. This is not unreasonably required of him, because the antecedents and the consequences which are attributed to the man who is denoted in the first Psalm and described as being blessed, are not only vastly different from those things which are attributed to the man on whom we are now treating, but are likewise quite contrary to them.

Conceding, however, this for the sake of argument, but by no means absolutely granting it, (which I am far from doing,) we must observe, that this man [in Romans 7:22] is said, not simply "to delight in the law of God," or "to feel a joint delight with the law of God," but he does so with restriction and relatively, that is "according to the inward man." This restriction intimates that "the inward man" has not obtained the pre-eminence in this man, but that it is weaker than the flesh; as the latter is that which hinders it from being able, in operation and reality, to perform the law, to which it consents, and in which it delights.

He who will compare the following verse with this will perceive that the cause of that restriction is the one which we have here assigned. For in the subsequent verse, (the 23rd,) it is not said, "But I see another law in my members, according to which I do not delight in the law of God," such as the opposition ought to have been, it, by that restriction, the apostle wished only to ascribe this "delighting" to the man according to one part of him, and to take it away according to the other part of him. But since the apostle not only takes this "delighting" from the other part of him, but likewise attributes it to the power of warring against that inward man and overcoming him, it is evident that the restriction has been added on this account — to shew that, in the man who is now the subject of discussion, "the inward man" has not the dominion, but is, in fact, the inferior.

Let him who is desirous to contradict these remarks, shew us, in any passage in which regenerate persons are made the subject of investigation, a similar restriction employed, and adduced for another purpose. From these observations, therefore, it appears that the proposition is most deservedly denied. Let us now attend to the assumption.

5. l say that the assumption is proposed in a mutilated form, as it was previously in the argument produced from the eighteenth verse. For with it, the apostle joins the following verse, in such a manner that the twenty-third verse may be the principal part of a compound and discrete axiom, employed for the purpose of proving what the apostle intended. But that which is now placed in the assumption, is a less principal part, conducing to the illustration of the other by separation. From this, it follows that the conclusion cannot be deduced From the premises, because the proposition is destitute of truth, the assumption mutilated, and the conclusion itself, beyond the purpose of the apostle and contrary to his design.

6. Let us see whether any thing further can be brought from the twenty-third verse for the demonstration of the contrary opinion.

The man who has within him, beside the law of his members, the law of his mind, which is contrary to the other, is a regenerate man.

Such a man is the one mentioned in this passage; Therefore, he is a regenerate man.

(1.) The defenders of the contrary opinion believe the proposition in this syllogism to be true, because "the law of the mind" is opposed to "the law of the members," as it consents to the law of God — a quality which they suppose to belong only to the regenerate. This, they think, is confirmed from the circumstance that the same apostle expressly calls a certain mind, in Colossians 2:18, "a fleshly mind," which he likewise calls in Romans 8:7, "the carnal mind."

But the proposition cannot be supported by these passages; for it is simply false, and those arguments which are produced in proof of it are inappropriate. For to some of the regenerate also, (that is, to those who are under the law, who have some knowledge of the law, who have thoughts accusing or else excusing them, and who know that concupiscence is sin,) belongs something beside "the law of the members," ‘"a fleshly mind," and one that is "carnal," which is opposite and repugnant to these: And this is "the work of the law written in their hearts;" which is neither "the law of the members," "a fleshly mind," nor one that is "carnal," but it contends with them. For a conscience or consciousness of good and evil, which compels a man, though in vain, to good, and deters him from evil, is directly opposed to "the law of the members" impelling to evil, and "to the carnal affections which cannot be subject to the law of God." For this conscience consents to the law of God, and is the instrument of the same law even in an unregenerate man to accuse and convict him. We may, therefore, be permitted to deny that proposition, and to demand stronger proofs for it.

(2.) With regard to the assumption, we may say the same as we did about the assumption in the previous syllogism — that it is not fully proposed, as it ought to have been, and it omits those things which were joined together in the text of the apostle. But those things are of such a description, as, when added to the assumption, will easily point out the falsity of the proposition; that is, such is the opposition in this man between this law of the members and that of the mind, that the former not only "wars against" the latter, but likewise obtains the conquest in the fight; that is, "it brings man into captivity under the law of sin." From these observations also it is evident, that no good consequence can ensue from the assumption.

7. But let us now try, whether something cannot be deduced from these two verses for the establishment of our opinion. It appeals indeed to me, that I can from them deduce an invincible argument for the refutation of the contrary opinion, and for the confirmation of my own.

(1.) The argument in refutation of the contrary opinion may be stated in the following manner:

The law of the mind which wars against the law of the members, is conquered by the law of the members, so that the man "is brought into captivity to the law of sin which is in his members;" (as it occurs in this very passage; )

But the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus, when warring against the law of the members, overcomes the latter; so that it liberates the man, who had been brought into captivity under the law of sin, from the law of sin and death: (Romans 8:2.)

Therefore, the law of the Spirit is not the law of the mind; neither is the law of the mind, the law of the Spirit.

This is evident from simple inversion, and from this very syllogism, the premises being so transposed, as for the assumption to take the place of the proposition, and vice versa: and, therefore, the word "mind" is not used in this passage for "the Spirit."

This argument is irrefragable. Let him who is desirous of proving the contrary, make the experiment, and he will find this to be the result. But its peculiar force will be more correctly understood towards the close of this investigation, in which is more fully explained the whole of the matter about which the apostle is here treating.

(2.) For the confirmation of my own opinion, I deduce the following argument from these verses:

That man, who delights indeed in the law of God after the inward man, but who, with the law of his mind warring against the law of his members, not only cannot prevail against the latter, but is also conquered by it and brought into captivity under the law of sin, while the law of his mind fruitlessly contends against it, is an unregenerate man, and placed, not under grace, but under the law;

But though this man delights in the law of God after the inward man, and though with the law of his mind he wars against the law of His members; yet not only is he unable to prevail against the law of his members, but he is likewise brought into captivity under the law of sin by the law of his members, the law of his mind maintaining a strong but useless contest; Therefore, the man [described] in this passage is unregenerate, and placed, not under grace, but under the law;

Or, to state the argument in a shorter form, omitting whatever it is possible to omit —

That man in whom the law of the members so wages war against the law of the mind, as, when the latter is overcome, or at least while it offers a vain resistance, to bring the man himself into captivity under the law of sin, is unregenerate, and placed under the law;

But in this man, about whom the apostle is treating, the law of the members so wages war with the law of the mind, as, when the latter is overcome, or at least while it offers a vain resistance, to bring the man himself into captivity under the law of sin; Therefore, this man is unregenerate and placed under the law.

(3.) The truth of the proposition rests on these three reasons: 1. Because a regenerate man not only with the law of his mind wages war against the law of his members, but he does this principally with the law of the Spirit, that is, by the strength and power of the Holy Spirit; for it is said in Galatians 5:17:

"The flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh."

2. Because far different is the result of that contest which, by the strength and power of the Spirit, or by "the law of the Spirit," a regenerate man maintains against the law of the members and against the flesh. For the law of the Spirit always obtains the victory, except when the man ceases from employing it in the battle, and from defending himself with it against the invading temptations of the flesh, Satan, and the world.

3. Because it is not an attribute of a regenerate man, of one who is placed under grace, to be brought into captivity under the law of sin; but that, rather, is his which is ascribed to him in the second verse of the following chapter — "The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death." For when he was formerly placed under the law, he was in captivity under the strength and power of sin.

I will now confirm these reasons against the objections which are, or which can be, made against them.

Against the first it may be objected — "Since ‘the law of the mind,’ and ‘the law of the Spirit,’ are one, they are in this argument unskillfully distinguished; both because no one lights against the law of the members except by the law of the Spirit, or by the strength and power of the Holy Spirit; and therefore the law of the mind is the law of the Spirit." To this I reply, it has already been proved, that the law of the mind, and the law of the Spirit, are not the same, and that the conscience also wages war against the law of the members in those men who are under the law.

Against the Second reason it may be objected, "Even the regenerate themselves ‘offend in many things.’ (James 3:2.) There is on earth ‘no man that sinneth not.’ (1 Kings 8:46.) The regenerate cannot say with truth ‘that they have no sin.’ (1 John 1:8.)" With other objections similar in their import.

To these, I reply, that I heartily acknowledge all these things, but that I do not perceive how by means of them the second reason can be weakened.

For these expressions are not repugnant to each other — "In many things the regenerate offend," and "The regenerate most generally gain the victory in the contest against sin," that is, when they use the arms with which they are furnished by the Holy Spirit.

(4.), any one says, "In this contest, the regenerate are more frequently the conquered than the conquerors," I shall request him to explain how then it can be declared concerning the regenerate, "that they walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit;" for, "to be the conquered" is "to fulfill the desires of the flesh;" and he who usually does this, "walks after the flesh." But many passages of Scripture teach that this contest, which the regenerate maintain against sin by the strength and power of the Holy Spirit, has generally a felicitous and successful termination;

"for whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world; and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith. Who is he that overcometh the world, but he that believeth Jesus to be the Son of God," (1 John 5:4,5.)

"Submit yourselves therefore to God; resist the devil, and he will flee from you." (James 4:7.)

Greater is He that is in you, than he that is in the world." (1 John 4:4.)

"Put on the whole armor of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. Wherefore, take unto you the whole armor of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and, having done all, to stand." (Ephesians 6:11,13.)

"I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me." (Philippians 4:13.)

"All things are possible to him that believeth." (Mark 9:23.)

This truth also is proved, by various examples, through the whole of Hebrews 11.

"Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us, unto him be glory," etc. (Ephesians 3:20,21.)

"Now unto Him that is able to keep you from falling," "and to present you, faultless, before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy, to the only wise God our Savior, be glory," etc. (Jude 24, 25.)

"They that are after the Spirit, do mind the things of the Spirit. If ye, through the Spirit, do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live. Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him that loved us." (Romans 8:5,13,37.)

By many other passages of Scripture, this may also be proved.

GALATIANS 5:16-18

8. But let us now consider Galatians 5:16-18, and let us compare it with Romans 7:22,23, the passage at present under investigation, that it may also clearly appear, from such consideration and comparison, that the result of the contest between the Spirit and the flesh is generally this: the Spirit departs from the combat the conqueror of the flesh, especially as, in this seventh chapter to the Romans, we perceive an entirely contrary issue or result is described and deplored. The passage may be thus rendered: "This I say then, Walk in the Spirit and fulfill not that after which the flesh lusteth," or "ye shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh." "For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary the one to the other; that ye may not do the things that ye would. But if ye be led of the Spirit, ye are not under the law?

The exhortation of the apostle occurs in the sixteenth verse; and, on account of the ambiguity of the Greek word, it may be read in two different ways, "fulfill not," or "ye shall not fulfill." If the former rendering be adopted, then the exhortation consists of two parts, of which the one teaches what must be done, and the other what must be omitted; that is, we must walk in the Spirit, and the desires of the flesh must not be fulfilled." But if the clause be rendered in the second manner, then the sixteenth verse contains an exhortation in these words: "Walk in the Spirit;" and a consectary subjoined to the exhortation in these words: "And ye shall not fulfill the desires or lusts of the flesh." The latter mode of reading the passage seems to be more agreeable to the mind of the apostle; for he had previously, in the thirteenth verse, exhorted the Galatians not to abuse their Christian liberty for carnal licentiousness and lasciviousness. But now, in the sixteenth verse, he produces a remedy, by which they will be able to restrain and curb the assaults and the power of the flesh, and which is, if they walk in the Spirit, it shall then come to pass, that they shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh.

In the seventeenth verse a reason is added, that is deduced from the contrariety or contest which subsists between the flesh and the Spirit, and from either the end or the result of this contest.

(1.) The contrariety or contest is described in these words: "For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh." From which is manifest the necessity both of the exhortation, not to abuse their Christian liberty to carnal licentiousness, and not to fulfill the lusts of the flesh; and of the remedy, by which alone the lusts of the flesh can be curbed and restrained, and which is this: "if they walk in the Spirit, that lusteth against the flesh." For it is from this enmity and contrariety which subsists between the flesh and the Spirit that the conclusion is drawn, "If ye walk in the Spirit, ye shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh." From this it is also manifest, that this latter mode of rendering is better adapted to the meaning of the apostle.

(2.) The end or result of this contest is described in these words: "And these are contrary the one to the other, that ye may not do the things that ye would." I have said that the end or the issue of the contest is here described; because some persons suppose that its issue, and not its end, is pointed out in this passage.

(i.) But the particle, ina "that," which is used by the apostle, signifies the end or intention, and not the result or issue; and this interpretation is entirely agreeable to the mind of the apostle. "For the Spirit lusteth against the flesh" for this purpose, "that we may not do those things" which we lust according to the flesh, and "which we would," the consequence of which is, "if we walk in the Spirit, we shall not fulfill the desires of the flesh." And, on the contrary, since "the flesh also lusteth against the Spirit" for this purpose, "that we may not do those things which we lust according to the Spirit," it follows that if we walk in the flesh or according to the flesh, we shall not fulfill the desires of the Spirit. But this rendering is agreeable to the scope or design of the apostle, "that ye may not do what things soever ye would according to the flesh."

(ii.) If we assert that the result or issue is here signified, then the meaning will likewise be two-fold. For it will be possible for it to be as follows: "The flesh and the Spirit are contrary the one to the other, so that ye cannot do those things which according to the Spirit ye would." It may likewise be this: "So that ye cannot do these things which, according to the flesh ye would." That is, this contest obtains the following result, "that ye cannot do those things which, according to the Spirit, ye would;" or, "that ye cannot do those things, which, according to the flesh, ye would." But let us see which of these two meanings is the more suitable: Truly, the latter of them is. It is not only more suitable, but likewise necessary, if the apostle is here treating about the issue or result. This will be still more apparent from the absurdity of the admonition, if the passage be explained in the other sense: The apostle admonishes the Galatians, "to walk in the Spirit, and not to fulfill the desires of the flesh;" (for we will now retain this rendering of the latter clause, as that which is more consentaneous with the meaning that explains the passage concerning this issue or result;) and the persuasion to this will then be: "For the flesh and the Spirit are contrary the one to the other, by this result, that ye cannot do those things which, according to the Spirit, ye would." This indeed is not to exhort, but to dissuade and dehort by a forewarning of the unhappy result.

Besides, reason itself requires, according to [logical] scientific usage, that what has been proposed be drawn out in the conclusion; otherwise the parts of connection will be broken. But the proposition was either this — "Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh," or it was this: "Walk in the Spirit, and fulfill not the lusts of the flesh." I am desirous to have it demonstrated to me, by what means this proposition can be concluded from the eighteenth verse understood about the issue or result, by which the flesh hinders the Galatians from doing that which, according to the Spirit, they would. But it has been already shown, that each of these propositions may be fairly concluded from the passage, when understood as relating to the end or intention of the conflict, nay, when also understood as referring to the issue or result when the Spirit is the conqueror. It is apparent, therefore, not only that this is the end or design of the contest which is here mentioned from the lusting of the Spirit, but that this is likewise its issue or result from the strength and power of the Spirit — that, when the flesh is subdued, the Spirit comes off as the conqueror; and that the man who, by the Spirit, wages war against the flesh, and who walks in the Spirit, does not fulfill the lusts of the flesh.

From these is inferred a consectary in the eighteenth verse: "But if ye be led of the Spirit, ye are not under the law;" that is, if ye walk in the Spirit, if under the guidance of the Spirit ye contend against the lusts of the flesh, and contend so as not to fulfill them, from these circumstances you may assuredly conclude that ye are not under the law.

In this consectary, we see, that the phrases, "to be under the law," and "not to fulfill the lusts of the flesh," are opposed to each other; for the latter of them is descriptive of the proper effect of the guidance of the Spirit. Wherefore, the phrases, "to be under the law," and "to fulfill the lusts of the flesh," are consentaneous and of the same import. But this is the very thing which is asserted in Romans 6:14:

"For sin shall not have dominion over you; for ye are not under the law, but under grace."

From this, it is apparent, that the dominion of sin, which is the cause why the lusts of the flesh are fulfilled, prevails in those persons who are under the law. But since the dominion of sin does not obtain in those who are under grace, (and, in fact, on this account, because they are under grace,) it is therefore evident that these phrases, "to be under grace," and "to be led by the Spirit," are consentaneous, nay, that they are exactly the same. For the effect of each of them is one and alike, and that is, to prevent sin from having dominion over a man, and to hinder man from fulfilling the lusts of the flesh, which is also explained at great length in Romans 8, in a manner agreeable to that which is briefly laid down in this seventeenth verse, that is, "The Spirit is contrary to the flesh for this purpose — that men may not do those things which, according to the flesh, they would." But, from Romans 7 it is very plain, that the result of that contest is different from the one upon which the apostle is here treating: For, in that chapter, the man does that which, after the flesh, he would, and does not what he is said to will after the inward man; the law of God, the law of the mind, and the inward man, vainly attempting to restrain the power of sin and to hinder the lusts of the flesh, because all these [strive as they may] are debilitated through the flesh.

9. If any one urge this as an objection, "It likewise befalls the best of the regenerate, that they do not the things which, according to the Spirit, they would, but that they fulfill the lusts of the flesh;" I perfectly assent to the truth of this, if the small addition be made, that "this sometimes happens to the regenerate." For if such be their general practice, they do not now walk in the Spirit; though this is a property of the regenerate. I say, that Romans 7 does not describe what sometimes befalls the pious, and that it contains a description of the state of that man about whom the apostle is there treating, that is, of a man who is under the law, before he is led by the guidance of grace, and is governed by the motions of the Holy Spirit.

This is confirmed by the passage in Galatians 5:16-18.

Then I reply, such a case as this does not occur from the circumstance of the Spirit, who has for a long time maintained a strenuous contest with the desires of the flesh, being at length conquered, and yielding on account of impotence or weakness: But it happens, because the man is either overtaken with temptation and overcome, before he begins to oppose to it the arms of the Spirit and of grace; or, in the progress of the conflict, he throws out of his hands those arms which, at the commencement, he began to use; or he uses them no longer, having begun the battle in the Spirit, but ending in the flesh. In no other way than in this can it happen, that the flesh, the world and Satan can overcome us; because "greater is He who is in us, than he that is in the world "as has already been pointed out in several passages. Without manifest ignominy and contumely poured on divine grace and on the Spirit of Christ, no other cause can be assigned why the pious, and those who are placed under grace, should sometimes be conquered by the flesh, the world and Satan; for either the Spirit that is in us is not the stronger of the two; or, while lusting and fighting against the flesh, He overcomes. And how can it possibly come to pass, that He who has conquered the flesh while it was still in its full strength, and has thus subjected us to Himself, should not be able to gain the victory over the flesh when it is crucified and dead in the body of Christ?

10. To the Third reason it is objected, "Even the regenerate may in some degree and relatively be said to be captives under sin, that is, so far as they are not yet fully regenerated, and still feel within themselves the motions of the flesh lusting against the Spirit, from which they are not completely delivered while they continue in this mortal body." I grant the antecedent, but I deny the consequence; for so far are the scriptures from ascribing the detention of the regenerate as captives under sin, to the imperfection of regeneration and to the remains of the flesh, that they are said with respect to this very regeneration to be freed from the yoke and slavery of sin and from the tyranny of the devil. "The remains of sin survive in the regenerate," and, "The regenerate are detained as captives by the remains of sin," are contradictory affirmations: For the former of the two is a token of sin conquered and overcome; the latter attributes victory and triumph to sin. After the Holy Spirit has commenced the mortification and death of sin, what is the act of the same Spirit respecting sin? Undoubtedly it is the persecution of the remains of sin, that He may subdue and extinguish them until they no longer exist; "and when their place is sought after, it is no more to be found," as St. Augustine has elegantly observed, when treating on this matter in a passage of his works.

But the cause why such an opinion as this is entertained, is because "deliverance from sin" and "slavery under its tyrannical power," "a being loosed from the chains of Satan" and "captivity under his tyranny," are so accounted as if they can concur together, as the phrase is, in remiss degrees, and meet together in one subject, in much the same manner as the color of white and that of black meet together in green, and heat and cold meet together in lukewarmness. Yet this matter stands in a situation vastly different; for liberty cannot consist with even the smallest portion of servitude or captivity; though it may labor under great difficulties in resisting its assaulting foes, and though it may occasionally come out of the conflict with something like a defeat. But if the matter stood in the relation of similes which have been adduced, yet even then it could not be said, "This man is partly free from sin, and partly its slave and captive;" but a necessity would then arise for the existence of a third thing from these two, which might obtain the name of "a medium between the extremes," belonging neither to this nor to that. But I am desirous to see some passage of Scripture adduced, where that is said about the regenerate, and about those who are placed under grace, which is ascribed to the man about whom the apostle is treating, or what is equivalent to it.

ISAIAH 64:6

But a passage is produced from the prophet Isaiah to prove that pious persons, and those who are placed under grace are, by the law of their members, brought into captivity under the law of sin. The degree of correctness with such an affirmation is made, will be very manifest from a comparison of the two passages. That in Isaiah (64:6) says,

"But we are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousness are as filthy rags; and we all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away."

The passage in Romans, (7:23,) now under investigation, is this. "But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members." Let us now approach and institute a comparison. The subject of the first of these passages is, the captivity by which the children of Israel were led away into exile on account of their sins; the subject of the latter is, captivity under sin; therefore, this is to pass over to a different genus, contrary to the method observed in every approved discussion.

In the former of these passages, the subject is the punishments which that people deservedly suffered on account of the actual sins which they had committed against God; but, in the latter, the subject is the cause whence it arises that the man who consents to the law of God, and who, with the law of his mind, wages war against the law of his members, is conquered and overcome, so that he actually commits sin, to which he is instigated and impelled by sin which dwelleth in him. Wherefore, the latter passage treats upon the CAUSE of actual sin, and the former upon the PUNISHMENTS of actual sins. For this phrase, "We all do fade as a leaf, and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away," does not signify that those men were impelled to some kind of sin through the depraved lusts of the flesh, as by a vehement wind, or that they melted away, as it were, into sins; but it signifies, that, on account of actual sins, which are distinguished by the appellation of "our iniquities," they are driven away into banishment as by a wind, and were scattered about as leaves. Let this passage be compared with the first Psalm, in which similar declarations are made concerning the wicked. Consult our interpreters of holy writ, such as Calvin, Musculus, Gualther, etc., and it will be evident, even with respect to the things which precede it, that the whole of this passage is unaptly cited by many persons to prove what they are desirous to establish.

For the plainer and more obvious explanation of this matter we must observe, that there is a two-fold captivity under the tyranny of sin — the one, that of our primeval origin from Adam, according to which we are all born "children of wrath" and the servants of sin — the other, that of our own particular act, when, by actual transgressions, we subject and bind ourselves still more to sin, and engage in its service. Some persons will have this two-fold servitude to have been allegorically typified by the Egyptian and Babylonian captivities. For the Israelites, in their parents, entered into Egypt; and while there, after a lapse of years, they began to be oppressed and to be regarded as servants. The same people, on account of their sins, were led away, by the violence of their enemies, into captivity in Babylon.

But the captivity about which the apostle is here treating, is posterior to the first of these two kinds; for the law of the members, which we have from our primeval origin, waging war with the law of the mind, when the latter is overcome, brings a man who is under the law into captivity to the law of sin, that very man who was formerly conceived in sin and born in iniquity. And, to express the whole in one word, he who was born in sin and originally under captivity to it, is brought into captivity under the law of sin by means of actual sins.

From these observations, therefore, it is apparent, that the proposition of our syllogism is true, and stands unshaken against all these objections. The assumption stands in the very text of the apostle, from which the conclusion follows, that the man about whom the apostle treats in this passage, is an unregenerate man, and not placed under grace, but under the law.

VERSE THE TWENTY-FOURTH

1. The lamentable exclamation, O wretched man that I am! — a two-fold reading of it.

2. The body of death is the body of sin.

3. By four reasons it is proved that the body of death is not our mortal body.

4. This is confirmed by the testimonies of St. Augustine and Epiphanius.

5. An argument in favor of the true opinion.

6. Another argument in its favor.

1. From the condition of this man, when accurately considered by himself, follows the mournful lament and exclamation, "O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death, or from this body of death?" Of this, a two-fold explanation is produced, according the double meaning of the words — either "from the body of this death," or "from this body of death," which some people interpret by "this mortal body that we bear about with us," and others, by "that body of sin which has the dominion in a man who is under the law, and which renders him liable to death." The latter interpretation, however, is more agreeable both to the phrase and to the context; for the pronoun, toutou must not be referred to Swmatov "the body," but to Qanatou "death," to which it is most nearly conjoined; and the clause ought to be rendered thus: "Who shall deliver me from the body of this death," [which is sin not only existing within me, but dwelling and reigning]? as it is expressed in the 17th and 20th verses.

2. For the apostle attributes a body to sin in the sixth verse of the sixth chapter of this epistle: "Our old man is crucified with him, that The Body of Sin might be destroyed," the destruction of which is followed by a deliverance from the servitude of sin, as it is expressed in the same verse.

The phrase also occurs in Colossians 2:11:

"In putting off the Body of the Sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ."

Wherefore, according to this mode of reading it, the meaning of the exclamation is, "Who shall deliver me from this tyranny of sin, which, reigning in me and dwelling in my flesh, bringing me into captivity and subjecting me to itself, brings certain death to me?"

3. Some other persons are urgent about a different rendering, and give this meaning to the words, "Who shall deliver me from this mortal body?" That is, as the apostle speaks in another passage, "I desire to be dissolved, and to be with Christ." But this meaning does not agree with the exclamation,

(1.) On account of the construction, which declares that the pronoun, toutou "this," must not be referred to the body, but to death.

(2.) Because the preceding verses do not permit this meaning to be entertained. For the force and tyranny of sin, dwelling in this man, and impelling him to fulfill his desires, is the subject on which the apostle is here treating. But "the deliverance" which is earnestly sought in this 24th verse, opposed to "the captivity" which is the subject of the verse.

(3.) On account of the thanksgiving which is appended to it, and which ought not to be subjoined to a desire which was not then fulfilled [if the meaning of the phrase were, this mortal body].

(4.) Because the grace of Christ is not simply to deliver out of this mortal body, but to free us from the body of sin and from its dominion. It is true indeed, that, through the blessed analusin "dissolution" or "departure," for which we are waiting in the faith and hope of Christ, rest is granted to us from all our labors, and from the conflict of lusts with which we are inwardly attacked. But in this passage the apostle is treating, not about the conflict and impulse of lusts which exist within us, but about the fulfilling of those lusts by that impulse to which "the law of the mind" opposes itself in vain.

4. St. Augustine is one of my supporters, who says, in his treatise On Nature and Grace (cap. 53,) "The saints most certainly do not pray to be delivered from the substance of the body, which is good, but from carnal vices; from which no man is delivered without the grace of the Savior, nor at the time of his departure from the body, when it dies." It is no injury to my interpretation, that St. Augustine here says, that, according to his interpretation, "Saints or holy persons pray for deliverance from carnal vices" etc.; I only point out what he understood by "the body of death? On the verification of Justice, against Celestius, St. Augustine also says, "It is one thing, therefore, to depart out of this body, which the last day of the present life compels all men to do; but it is another thing to be delivered from the body of this death, which divine grace alone, through Jesus Christ, imparts to his saints and believers?

Epiphanius, On the 64th Heresy, (lib. 2, tom. I,) from Methodius, says, "Wherefore, O Aglaophon, he does not call this body death, but sin which dwells in the body through the lust of the flesh, and from which God has delivered him by his coming?

5. Wherefore, from the 24th verse, when rightly understood, I argue thus for the establishment of my own opinion:

Those men who are placed under grace are not wretched; But this man is wretched;

Therefore, this man is not placed under grace.

The assumption is in the text, and thus placed beyond all controversy.

In reference to the proposition, perhaps some one will say, "Men, placed under grace, are partly blessed, and partly wretched — blessed, as they are regenerate and partakers of the grace of Christ — wretched, as they still have within them the remains of sin, with which they ought to maintain a constant warfare. This is a sure sign of a felicity which is not yet full and perfect." I confess that, while the regenerate continue as sojourners in this mortal life, they do not attain to a felicity that is full, complete in all its parts, and perfect. But I do not recollect ever to have read [in the Scriptures] that they are, on this account, called "wretched" with regard to the "spiritual life which they live by faith of the Son of God," though, in reference to this natural life, "they be of all men most miserable." (1 Corinthians 15:19.) The opposite to this may be easily proved from the Scriptures: "Blessed are the poor in spirit — they that mourn — that hunger and thirst after righteousness," etc. (Matthew 5:3-12.)

"But," some one will rejoin, "Is it not wretched to contend with the remains of sin, to be buffeted by the messenger of Satan, sometimes to be overcome, and to be grievously injured?" It is undoubtedly desirable that this were not necessary, that it never occurred, that they might be delivered from the messenger of Satan; but the contenders, and those who are thus buffeted, cannot be called "wretched" on account of that contest and buffeting. But it is wretched indeed, to be overcome; yet neither are they called "wretched," who, though they be sometimes conquered, more frequently obtain the victory over the world, sin and Satan.

6. He who desires to be delivered from the body of this death, that is, from the dominion and tyranny of sin, is not placed under grace, but under the law. But this man desires to be delivered from the dominion and tyranny of sin; therefore, this man is not placed under grace, but under the law.

The proposition is true, because regenerate men, and those who are placed under grace, are free from the servitude and tyranny of sin — not indeed perfectly free, but yet so far as to render it impossible for them to be said to be under the dominion and servitude of sin, if the person who speaks concerning them be desirous of talking in accordance with the Scriptures.

But it has been already proved, that this man is desirous of being freed from the body of sin which dwells and reigns within him; therefore, the conclusion regularly follows.

VERSE THE TWENTY-FIFTH

1. Various readings of the first clause, from the ancient fathers.

2. In the latter clause, this man is said "to serve the law of God with his mind, but with his flesh, the law of sin."

3. "To serve God," and "to serve the law of God," are not the same thing.

4. The various kinds of law mentioned in this chapter, with a diagram, and the explanation of it.

5. From this verse nothing can be obtained in confirmation of the contrary opinion.

1. St. Chrysostom reads the former part of this verse thus: "I thank," etc., which is also the reading of Theophylact.

This is the reading of St. Ambrose: "The grace of God through Jesus Christ." St. Jerome, also, against Pelagius, adopts the same reading.

St. Augustine renders the clause thus: "By the grace of God through Jesus Christ." (Discourse 5. On the Words of the Apostle. Tom. 10.)

Epiphanius renders it, "The grace of God through Jesus Christ." (From Methodius against Origen, Heresy 64. Lib. 2, tom. 1.)

But this clause contains a thanksgiving, in which St. Paul returns thanks to God that he, in his own person, has been delivered from this body of sin, about which he had been treating, and to which that man was liable whose character he was then personating. In this, thanksgiving is contained, by implication, an answer to the preceding interrogatory exclamation; that is, "The grace of God will deliver this man from the body of this death, from which he could not be delivered by the law." This is directly and openly explained by some copies of the Greek original, in which this verse is thus read: "The grace of God, through our Lord Jesus Christ," that is, "This grace will deliver me, or the man whose character I have been personating, from the body of this death" — a thing which it was the chief purpose of the apostle to prove in this investigation.

2. In the latter part of the same verse, is something resembling a brief recapitulation of all that had been previously spoken, in which the state of the man about whom the apostle is here treating, is briefly defined and described in the following words: "So then, with the mind, I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh, the law of sin." In the correct explanation of these phrases, lies an important key for the clear exposition and dilucidation of the whole matter; these phrases must, therefore, be subjected to a diligent examination.

3. Those persons who interpret this passage as relating to a regenerate man and to one placed under grace, are desirous to intimate, by these phrases, that St. Paul, so far as he was regenerate, "served God," but that so far as he was unregenerate, and still partly carnal, "he served sin." They also take "the mind" in the acceptation of the regenerated portion of man, and "the flesh" for that portion of him which is not yet regenerate; and they suppose that "to serve the law of God" is the same thing as "to serve God," and that "to serve the law of sin" is the same thing as "to serve sin." But neither of these suppositions can be proved by this text or by other passages of Scripture.

(1.) For the apostle is not accustomed to bestow on man, as he is regenerate, the epithet of "the mind," but that of "the Spirit." And this he does for a very just reason; for "the mind" is the subject of regeneration, "the Holy Spirit" is the effector of it, from communion with whom a participation also with his name arises. Besides, "the mind" is attributed to the flesh:" Vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind." (Colossians 2:18.) The gentiles are said to have "walked in the vanity of their mind." (Ephesians 2:17.) Idolaters are "given over to a reprobate mind;" (Romans 1:28; ) and the apostle mentions "men of corrupt minds." (1 Thessalonians 6:5; 2 Thessalonians 3:8.)

(2.) But that "to serve God" is not the same as "to serve the law of God," and "to serve sin" is not the same as "to serve the law of sin," is evident,

First. From the difference of the words themselves. For it is very probable, that different phrases denote different meaning. If any one denies this, the proof of his position is incumbent on himself.

Secondly. From the words of Christ, who denied the possibility of any man serving two masters, God and Mammon, God and sin. If any one say that "it is possible for this to be done in a different respect, that is, to serve God with the mind, and to serve sin with the flesh," I reply that, by such a petty distinction as this, the general affirmation of Christ is evaded, to the great detriment of piety and divine worship, and that a wide door will thus be opened for libertines and Pseudo-Nicodemites. But some one will say, "The apostle expressly affirms this, which I deny, and my denial will be supported by the phrases themselves, when correctly explained, as they will soon be; for this man serves sin, and not God.

Thirdly. From the perpetual usage of the Scriptures, which are not accustomed to employ these restrictions when any man is said to serve God, or to serve sin. Wherefore, since they are employed in this passage, it is exceedingly probable that the same thing is not signified by these different phrases.

4. But the subject itself, upon which the apostle here treats, when placed plainly before the eyes, may disclose to us the true meaning of these phrases; so that the man who will inspect it with honest eyes, and with eyes desirous to investigate and ascertain the truth alone, may have that with which to satisfy himself.

The apostle, therefore, here makes mention of four laws.

(1.) The law of God.

(2.) The law of sin.

(3.) The law of the mind.

(4.) The law of the members. They are opposed to each other and agree together in the following manner:

"The law of God," and "the law of sin," are directly opposed; as are likewise "the law of the mind," and "that of the members."

"The law of God," and "the law of the mind," agree together; as do likewise "the law of sin," and "the law of the members.

From this, it follows that "the law of God," and "the law of the members," are indirectly opposed; as are also "the law of sin," and "that of the mind." But it will be possible to render these things more intelligible by the subjoined diagram:

"The law of God" and "the law of sin," obtain in this place the principal dignity. "The law of the mind" and "that of the members" are placed as hand-maids or assistants to them, rendering due service to their superiors; for

"the mind delights in the law of God," and "the law of the members brings a man into captivity to the law of sin." (Romans 7:22,23.)

These things being premised, I proceed to the explanation.

The apostle here lays down two lords, who are completely contrary to each other, and directly opposed, God and sin — the former of these, the lawful lord; the latter, a tyrant, and, by violent means, usurping dominion over man, by the fault indeed of man himself, and by the just judgment of God. Both of them impose a law on man. God imposes his law, that man may obey him in those things which it prescribes; and sin Imposes its law, that man may obey it in "the lusts thereof," which it proposes by a certain law of its own. The former is called "the law of God;" the latter, "the law of sin." By the former, God endeavors to lead the man, who is placed under the law, to yield obedience to him; by the latter, sin strives and attempts, by every kind of violence, to compel the man to obey him. By his law, God prescribes those things which are "holy, and just, and good;" by its law, sin proposes those things which are useful, pleasant, and agreeable to the flesh. Now both of them, God and sin, have, in this man who is under the law, something which favors their several causes and purposes, and which assents to each of these laws. God has the mind, or "the law of the mind;" sin has the flesh, or the. law of the flesh, or "of the members." The mind, consenting to the law of God, that it "is holy, and just, and good;" the flesh, assenting to the law of sin, that it is useful, pleasant and agreeable; "the law of the mind," which is the knowledge of the divine law, and an assent to it; "the law of the members," which is an inclination and propension towards those things which are useful, pleasant, and agreeable to the flesh, that is, towards these mundane, earthly and visible objects.

In the twenty-third verse of this chapter, these two laws are said to be, antisrateuomenoi "waging war together," like soldier, who are in the field of battle, and drawn up in hostile array against each other, that the one army may overcome that which is opposed to it, and may gain the victory for its lord and general. "The law of the mind" fights for "the law of God," and "the law of the members" marches under the banner of "the law of sin;" the former, that, after having conquered the flesh and the law of the members, it may bring man into subjection to the law of God, with this design — that man may serve God; the latter, that, after having overcome the law of the mind, it may sentence man to bondage, and "bring him into captivity to the law of sin," with this design — that man may serve sin.

The conflict between these two contending parties, is about man, whom God wishes to bring into subjection to himself; and sin eagerly indulges the same wish. The former of these prescribes his own law to him; the latter also prescribes its law; and both of them employ their own military forces, that they severally have in the man, each to obtain the victory for himself.

From these explanations it will now appear what the phrases signify; "With the mind to serve the law of God," is, with a mind consenting to the law of God, to perform its military services to that law, for the purpose of bringing man into subjection to God; "With the flesh, to serve the law of sin," is with the flesh assenting to the desires of sin, to render its military services to the law of sin, in order to bring man into captivity to that law and to subject him to sin.

The end, therefore, or the intention of the battle is, that man may be brought into subjection either to the law of God, or to the law of sin; that is, that he may walk either according to the flesh, or according to the mind.

The act tending to this end, is the waging of war, which is indeed actual hostility, and an inimical encounter between the parties; but it is also the employment of persuasion towards man, without whose assent neither party can obtain this its end. The mind, adverse to the flesh, persuades the 343 will of man to do that which is holy, and just, and good, and to reject what is merely delectable. The flesh, repugnant to the mind, persuades the same human will to set aside and disregard that which is holy, and just, and good, and to embrace that which is capable of affording present delight and usefulness.

The effect produced by the mind on the will, is the volition of good and the hatred of evil; the effect which the flesh produces on the same will, is the volition of evil and the nolition of good. This is a change of the will, first to one party, and then to the other.

But the issue or result declares which of the parties in this man has produced the stronger and more powerful effect. But this is the result of the conflict, [as it is described in the twenty-third verse,] the nonperformance of good, the nonomission of evil, a token of the impotence of the mind, which commanded good to be done, and forbade the commission of evil, which approved of the performance of good, but disapproved of the perpetration of evil; and it is the commission of what is evil, the omission of what is good, the captivity of man under the law of sin, plainly demonstrating that, in this man, the party of sin and of the flesh is the more powerful of the two, the law of the mind fruitlessly striving against it.

The cause of this result is the weakness of the law, which has been debilitated by the flesh, (Romans 8:3,) and the force and pertinacious power of the flesh in this man, the effect of which is, that the man does not walk according to the law but according to the flesh, and does not march according to the law of the mind but according to that of the members.

But if to this conflict be added a stronger force of the Spirit of Christ, who does not write the letter of the law on tables of stone, but impresses the love and fear of God on the fleshly tables of the heart — then are we permitted not only to hope for a different result, but it is also given us assuredly to obtain a successful issue. This is indicated by the apostle in Romans 8:2:

"For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me tree from the law of sin and death."

For it comes to pass, by means of the power of this Spirit, that the man, who had previously been "brought into captivity to the law of sin," is delivered from it, and "no longer walks after the flesh, but after the Spirit;" that is, in his life, he follows the motion, the influence, and the guidance of the Holy Spirit, which motion, influence and guidance tend indeed to the same end as that to which the law of God, and the law of the mind, endeavored to lead the man, but with an energy not equal; as not being able to complete their attempt, on account of the hindrance of the law of sin and of the members. This is likewise the cause why this man is said to walk not according to the law of the mind, but according to the Spirit, [a phrase frequently employed by the apostle in Romans 8,] and "to be led of the Spirit, and not to be under the law," (Galatians 5:18.) Not indeed because the man who lives according to the Spirit, does not live according to the law of God; but because the Spirit of Christ, and not the law, is the cause why the man regulates his life according to the law of God. For the law knows how to command, but cannot afford any assistance — a doctrine which St. Augustine frequently inculcates.

5. From these observations, it may now be evident, that even from this (25th) verse, nothing can be adduced in proof of the contrary opinion; but that the opinion which explains the passage as referring to a man under the law, is also established by this verse. For this man, as he is under the law, "with his mind serves the law of God;" but, as he is carnal, "with his flesh he serves the law of sin," and he serves it so as to bring himself into captivity to the law of sin — his mind and conscience vainly struggling against it.

Nor is it of the least service for the establishment of the other opinion, that the apostle says, "I myself;" for he had previously used the word "I" in many instances in this chapter, even when he said, "Sin wrought in me all manner of concupiscence;" (verse 8) "for I lived," or I was alive, "without the law once; but, when the commandment came, I died;" (9) "I found the commandment to be unto death to me;" (10; ) "Sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it slew me," (11) and other passages.

But the pronoun, autov [in our English version, translated "myself,"] which is an adjunct to the pronoun "I," indicates that this pronoun "I" must be referred to the person about whom he had been previously treating. For it is the demonstrative [pronoun] of the nearest antecedent; as though he had said, "I am he about whom I have already been discoursing." This is likewise evident, because he concludes from the preceding verses, that the man whose character he took on him self to personate, (the prudence of [him who was under the influence of] the Holy Spirit requiring such personation,) "with his mind serves the law of God, but with his flesh the law of sin." Let those things be taken into consideration which, in his epistle, the apostles writes concerning himself, and let them be compared with the particulars of the description here given; and it will then clearly appear, that the apostle, in this passage, was by no means treating about himself, such as he was at that time.

3. RECAPITULATION

1. What distinctly belongs to the man described in this chapter, both as he is under the law, and as he is carnal and the slave of sin.

2. The inconsistent state of a man who is under the law.

3. The manner in which God leads a sinner to penitence, faith in Christ, and the obedience of faith.

4. This representation of it confirmed by St. Augustine and Musculus — How far this is the work of the regenerating Spirit.

5. To this it is objected that a three-fold state of man is thus laid down — A reply to this objection.

1. But now, if not disagreeable, let all these things be collected together, and in a compendious form be exhibited before the eyes, that they may at one glance be examined, and a judgment formed concerning them.

THE MAN ABOUT WHOM THE APOSTLE IS HERE TREATING, DO FAR AS HE IS: UNDER THE LAW.

He allows not, or approves not of, that which he does;

He wills indeed that which is good;

He hates evil;

He consents to the law of God that it is good;

He has it [in him] to will that which is good;

It is no longer himself that does evil;

He truly delights in the law of God after the inward man;

According to the law of his mind he wages war with the law of his members;

This causes him to exclaim, Who shall deliver me With his mind, therefore, he serves the law of God;

AS HE IS: CARNAL AND THE SLAVE OF SIN.

He does that which he allows not, or of which he disapproves.

But he does not what is good.

And yet he does that which is evil.

Yet he does that which he would not.

But he finds evil present with him,

and he finds not [how] to perform what is good.

But the evil is done by sin which dwelleth in him..

But he has another law in his members.

But the law of his members wages war against the law of his mind, so as to bring the man into captivity to the law of sin.

From this misery, and the body of this death? But with his flesh he serves the law of sin.

The things which are thus opposed to each other must not be disjoined, while they are attributed to the man about whom the apostle here treats; but they ought both to be united together, and jointly attributed to him.

For this is required by the analogy of the subject itself that is under the law and the dominion of sin — as he is under the law, the particulars enumerated in the first column belong to him — as he is under the dominion of sin, those in the second column are his attributes.

But the mode by which the apostle joins these things with each other, and attributes them to this man in a conjoint form, is that of a disjunctive enunciation. This is indicated by the frequent use of the particle, de which is the post-positive of men itself, or what immediately follows it. The one without the other does not render a sentence complete; but men "indeed, truly," denotes that something will follow, and de "but, yet, then," that something has preceded, with which the former or the latter part of the sentence ought to be joined. This remark must be diligently observed in the consideration of Romans 7, as must likewise the following — that both parts are not of the same order and dignity, but that the latter clause [in which de is used as the connecting word] is the chief and principal one, for whose explanation, illustration and amplification, the former clause [in which men occurs] is employed; as a proposition, or the first part of a sentence, is for its rendition or concluding part. Those latter particulars, therefore, [which are here inserted in the second column,] belong to the more ample explanation and proof of the proper cause, on account of which a man who is under the law cannot resist sin, but sin has the dominion over him. But the former particulars [enumerated in the first column] belong or conduce to the excusing of the law, lest the blame of this crime could be justly ascribed to it. From all which things united together the conclusion may be drawn that the man about whom the apostle is treating, must, on account of the predominant flesh and of sin which dwells in his flesh, be still reckoned in the number of carnal persons. But, because he is under the law, and so under it that it has effected in him whatever is usually effected by the law in transferring and conducting man as a sinner to the grace of Christ, he must, [almost at any hour], speedily be taken out from the number of carnal persons, and placed in a state of grace; in which higher state, he will no longer be put to the necessity of fighting, under the auspices and guidance of the law, against the vigorous and lively "motions of sins;" but, by the power of grace and under the guidance and influence of the Holy Spirit, he will contend against his crucified and mortified inclinations, till he obtain over them, when they are nearly dead and buried, a complete victory.

The man who will reflect upon this inconsistent state, if I may so denominate it, will easily perceive, that the things which the apostle has here written, must be referred to this state. For, diligently, and as if purposely, he exercises caution over himself not to employ the word "Spirit" in any passage in his description of this state; yet this word, the use of which he here so carefully avoids, is that which he employs in almost every verse of the next chapter, (Romans 8) and which is so familiar to this apostle in all his epistles, as to seem to be perpetually before his eyes and his mind, especially when he is treating about the regenerate and their duty to God and their neighbor, and also when he treats upon the contest which the pious still have with the flesh and the remains of sin. The thoughtful consideration of this single matter is able and ought to cause doubts in the minds of those who interpret this portion of holy writ as applicable to regenerate persons and those who are placed under grace, if they only be animated with a sincere desire of ascertaining the truth, and love the truth for its own sake, even when it does not agree with their own preconceived opinions.

3. I am also desirous that all men seriously consider how God leads us to faith, in his Son, and to the obedience of faith, and what means he uses to convert a sinner. We know that God employs his holy word to produce this effect; we know that this word consists of two essential and integral parts, the law and the gospel; we know, also, that the law must first be preached to a sinner, that he may understand and approve it, that he may explore and examine his life by it when it is known and approved, that, when such examination is completed, he may acknowledge himself to be a sinner, and by his demerits, deserving of damnation, that he may mourn and be sorrowful on account of sin, and may detest it, that he may understand himself to be in urgent need of a deliverer, and that he may be instigated and compelled to seek him.

To a man who is thus prepared by the law, the grace of the gospel must be announced, which, being manifested to the mind by the Holy Spirit, and by the same Spirit sealed on the heart, produces faith within us, by which we are united to Christ; that, holding communion with him, we may obtain remission of sins in his name, and may draw from him the vivifying power of his Spirit. By this quickening power, the flesh is mortified with its affections and lusts, and we are regenerated to a new life, in which we not only will or resolve to bring forth the fruits of gratitude to God, but we are likewise capable to bring them forth, and actually do so by this same Spirit, "who worketh in us both to will and to do."

Let any man now describe to me out of the Scriptures the proper effects which flow from the preaching of the law, in the minds of those whom God has decreed to convert to a better life; and I will instantly present to him a man, such as he who is described to us by the apostle, under his own person, in this chapter, (Romans 7.)

"But are these effects through the preaching of the law produced in this man, without the grace of Christ, and the operation of the Holy Spirit?"

What man can have the audacity to affirm this, unless he be one of the prime defenders of Pelagian doctrine, He who, by the preaching of the law, (the Holy Spirit blessing such preaching, and co-operating with it,) is compelled to flee to the grace of Christ, is not instantly, or at once, under grace, or under the influence, guidance and government of the Spirit. For, "the law is our schoolmaster [to bring us] unto Christ." (Galatians 3:24.) "Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth." (Romans 10:4.) "By the law is the knowledge of sin." (3:20.)

4. St. Augustine, when treating upon the use of the law, says, in his Reply to the two epistles of the Pelagians to Boniface, "The law, as a schoolmaster, leads and conducts a man to this grace of God, by terrifying him concerning his transgressions of the law, that something may be conferred on him which it was not able to bestow." And in a subsequent passage, "We do not, therefore, make void the law through faith, but we establish the law,’ which, by terrifying men, leads them to faith. Therefore, ‘because the law worketh wrath,’ that grace may bestow, on the man who is thus terrified and turned to fulfill the righteousness of the law, the mercy of God through Jesus Christ our Lord, who is the wisdom of God, and concerning whom it is written, He beareth in his tongue law and mercy.

Law, by which he may terrify — Mercy, by which he may afford relief; law by a servant — mercy, by himself" etc., etc. (Lib. 4, cap. 5.)

Let St. Augustine also be consulted, in his treatise on corruption and grace, in the first chapter of which he speaks thus appropriately to the matter under discussion: "The Lord himself has not only shown us from what evil we may turn aside, and what good we may perform, which the letter of the law alone is able to shew; but he also assists us, that we may turn aside from evil and may do good, which no one can do without the Spirit of grace. If this grace be wanting, the law is present for this purpose — to bring us in guilty and to kill us, on which account, the apostle says, The letter killeth, but the Spirit giveth life. (2 Corinthians 3:6.) He, therefore, who lawfully uses the law, learns in it evil and good; and, not confiding in his own strength, he flees to grace, by the aid of which he ceases from evil and does good. But what man thus flees to grace, except when his steps are directed by the Lord, and he delighteth in his way? (Psalm 37:23.) And by this also, the act of desiring the assistance of grace is the beginning of grace."

Consult also the fifth chapter of the same treatise, in which the following passage occurs: "You are not willing to have your faults pointed out. You are unwilling that they should be smitten, and that you should feel useful grief, which may induce you to seek a physician. You are not desirous to have yourself shown to yourself, that when you perceive your own [mental] deformity you may be very importunate for a reformation of yourself, and may supplicate God not to suffer you to remain in this foul and deformed condition."

And in the sixth chapter, he says: "Therefore, let the damnable origin be reprehended, that a willingness for regeneration may arise out of the sorrow consequent on such reprehension; yet, if he who is thus chastised be a son of the promise, that, when the noise of the correction sounds outwardly and the strokes of the whip are heard, God may work inwardly in him also to will by his secret inspiration."

Musculus says, in his Common Places, in the chapter On Laws, (fol. 124,) "The law causes me not only to understand, but likewise with anguish and remorse of conscience to feel and experience that sin is in me. The proper effect of the law is, that it convicts us of being inexcusably guilty of sin, subjects us to the curse, and condemns us, (Galatians 3,) and when we are deeply affected with the smart of sin and condemnation, it renders us, anxious and earnest in our desires for the grace of God. Hence, arises that of the apostle, which is the subject of his investigation in Romans 7, and at the close of which he exclaims, O wretched man that l am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death? THE GRACE OF GOD THROUGH JESUS CHRIST."

"But is this, therefore, the work of the regenerating Spirit?" With regard to the END, I confess that it is; but with regard to the EFFECT itself, I dare not make any assertion. For mortification and vivification, which, as integral parts, contain the whole of regeneration, are completed in us by our participation of the death and resurrection of Christ. (Romans 6.) In Romans 8:15, the apostle distinguishes between "the Spirit of bondage to fear," and "the Spirit of adoption." Many persons denominate the former of these, "a legal Spirit," and the latter "the Spirit of the gospel of Christ." I, therefore, make the service of the Spirit of bondage to precede that of the Spirit of adoption, though both of them tend to one design. Whence, it appears that this my explanation of the seventh chapter is not contrary to the true doctrine concerning the law and its use, and the necessity of the grace of Christ; but that the doctors of the church, who give a different interpretation of it, have not reflected on this matter when they entered on an explanation of the chapter. For, since they teach, from the Scriptures, the very same thing as I suppose the apostle here to make the subject of his investigation, we do not differ from each other in our opinion of doctrines, but only in this single circumstance — that they do not think this passage relates to that head of doctrine, which, I affirm, is professedly treated in it: Yet, in this opinion, I do not stand alone, but I have many others with me, as we shall afterwards perceive.

5. Some one may here object, "that by this, my explanation, a three-fold state of man is laid down, when the Scriptures acknowledge but a two-fold state; and that three kinds of men are introduced, when no more than two are known to the Scriptures — that is, the state of regeneration and that which precedes regeneration, believers and unbelievers, regenerate and unregenerate men," etc.

To this I reply,

(1.) that in my explanation three consistent states of men are not laid down, neither are there three distinct and perfectly opposite kinds of men; but that it teaches how much the law has the power of effecting in a man, and how the same individual is compelled by the law to flee to the grace of Christ.

(2.) I say that the state of the man described in this chapter is not a consistent one, but is rather a grade or step from the one to the other — from a state of impiety and infidelity to a state of regeneration and grace — from the old state in Adam to the new state in Christ.

According to this grade or step, the man is denominated by some persons renascent, [or in the article of being born again]. And, truly, the distance of the one of these states from the other is far too great, for a man to be able to pass from one to the other without some intermediate steps.

(3.) I deny that there is any absurdity in laying down a three-fold state of man, regard being had to the different times; that is, a state before or without the law, one under the law, and another under grace. For the apostolical Scriptures make mention of such a three-fold state in the two chapters now under consideration, and in Romans 6 and 7, and Galatians 4 and 5.

St. Augustine says, in his book, The Exposition of certain Propositions in the Epistle to the Romans, (Cap. 3) "Therefore we distinguish the four conditions of man, into that BEFORE the law, UNDER the law, under grace, and in peace. In the state before the law, we follow the lusts of the flesh; under the law, we are drawn along with them; under grace, we neither follow those lusts, nor are drawn by them; in peace, there is no lusting of the flesh. Before the law, therefore, we do not fight; under the law, we fight," etc., etc.

Consult also Bucer, in his commentary on this passage. For he lays down a three-fold man,

(1.) a profane man who does not yet believe in God,

(2.) a holy man who loves God, but who is weak to prevail against sin, and

(3.) lastly, a man furnished with a stronger portion of the Spirit of Christ, so that he is able, not only to repress and condemn the flesh, but likewise to live, in reality, the life of God, with pleasure, and with confirmed and perpetual diligence. Let, therefore, the whole of his commentary on this passage be perused, and it will appear that, with respect to the substance of the matter, the difference is very slight between his explanation of it, and that which I have now given. This I shall also clearly prove in the following chapter, by passages cited from the same commentary.

But let us see whether the Scriptures themselves do not, in many places, propose three kinds of men, and give us a description of a three-fold state.

In Revelation 3:15,16, some persons are described, as being neither hot nor cold, but lukewarm. Christ says that he came not to call to repentance "the righteous," that is, those who esteemed themselves as such, but "sinners," that is, those who owned themselves, or who, on his preaching, would own themselves to be of that description. (Matthew 9:13.) Christ calls to himself those who are fatigued, weary, heavy-laden, and oppressed with the burden of their sins, (Matthew 11:28,)but drives away from him those who are proud and puffed up with arrogance on account of their own righteousness. (Luke 18:9.) "Jesus said unto them, If ye were blind, ye should have no sin; but now ye say, We see; therefore, your sin remaineth." (John 9:41.) In the parable of the Pharisee and the Publican, is intimated to us a three-fold description of men — one kind in the Pharisee, two kinds in the Publican, one before his justification, the other after it.

But who can enumerate all the similar instances, Indeed, such enumeration is unnecessary. It is rather a matter of surprise, that, as the books of our divines are filled with such distinctions, they did not occur to their minds when meditating on this passage, in which this matter [of the different conditions or states of man] is professedly treated.

4. THE CONNECTION BETWEEN THE SEVENTH AND THE EIGHTH CHAPTERS

1. The truth of the interpretation of the seventh chapter, as it has been so far deduced by the author, is proved from some of the early verses of the eighth chapter when compared with those which precede them.

2. The first verse.

3. The second verse, and an explanation of the phrases used in it.

4. The third verse. A comparison of the former part of it with Romans 7:5 and 14, and of the latter part of it with the sixth verse of the same chapter.

5. The fourth verse, and a comparison of it with Romans 7:4. A paraphrastical recapitulation of those things which are taught in the first four verses of the eighth chapter, and their connection with the preceding chapter.

1. But I may now be permitted to confirm this my interpretation from some of the first of the verses of the next chapter, provided they be diligently compared with those in the seventh chapter.

2. For, in the first verse, a conclusion is inferred from verses of the preceding chapter, which is agreeable and accommodated to the principal design proposed by the apostle through the whole of this epistle. The words are these: "There is, therefore, now no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit." That this verse contains a conclusion, is evident from the illative particle "therefore," and indeed a conclusion not deduced from the former part of the last verse in the seventh chapter, but from the entire investigation, which consists of these two parts: "Men do not obtain righteousness, and power to conquer sin and to live in a holy manner, by means either of the law of nature or that of Moses; but, through the faith of the gospel of Jesus Christ, those very blessings are gratuitously bestowed on them who work not, but believe on Christ." But these two things, JUSTIFICATION which consists of remission of sins, and The Spirit of Holiness by which believers are enabled to overcome sin and to live in a holy manner, are parts of the gracious covenant into which God has entered with us in Christ:

"I will put my laws into their minds, and write them in their hearts, etc.; for I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more." (Hebrews 8:10,12.)

Therefore, when the apostle had proceeded so far with the proof of this thesis, (having in the first five chapters treated on righteousness and remission of sins, and in the sixth and seventh chapters, on the power to conquer sin and live in a holy manner,) he now infers this conclusion: "There is, therefore, now no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit." The emphasis of the conclusion lies in these words: "Who are in Christ Jesus, who walk, not after the flesh, but after the Spirit," to the exclusion of those who are under the law, and for whom is prepared certain condemnation, as being persons out of Christ, and subjected to the dominion of sin — as if the apostle had said, "From all these things, therefore, it is apparent that condemnation impends over all those who are under the law, because they neither perform the law, nor are able to perform it; but that freedom from condemnation granted only to those who are in Christ, and who walk according to the Spirit." But that the emphasis lies in these words: "Those who are in Christ Jesus," to the exclusion of the others, is apparent,

(1.) From the fact, that this very part is repeated. though in other words, which are these, "who walk after the Spirit."

(2.) Because the exclusion of other persons is openly placed in the repetition, "who walk not after the flesh."

(3.) From the subject, itself, of the apostle’s investigation, which is this: "The gospel and not the law, is the power of God to salvation to those who believe and do not work." Wherefore, in order that the conclusion may correspond with the proposition, it ought to be read and understood with the opposition here produced.

(4.) From other conclusions in this epistle, inferred in similar cases — "therefore, we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law," (Romans 3:28) also, in the twenty-seventh verse of the same chapter, "Where is boasting then, It is excluded. By what law? By that of works? No; but by the law of faith." "But it was written for us also, to whom it shall be imputed," that is, to those who "believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead." (4:24) And it appears that these things are spoken in opposition, to the complete exclusion of another opposite, thus: "But to him that worketh not, but believeth on Him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is accounted for righteousness." (4:5.) "For the promise was not made to Abraham through the law, but through the righteousness of faith." (13.) "Ye are become dead to the law, that ye should be married to Christ." (7:4.) As, likewise, in the passage at present under consideration, "There is, therefore, now no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit," From these remarks, it is apparent that the words after the flesh, but after the Spirit," do not belong to the description either of the subject or of the attribute of the preceding conclusion, as if they were described who are in Christ, but that they are the consequent or the antecedent itself of the same conclusion, though enunciated in a form somewhat different. This is likewise evident from the very words; for the pronoun, toiv "those," which is properly subservient to this matter, is not used in this clause.

3. The same thing is taught in the second verse, in which these two things are united, "the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus," that have reference to these two things in the preceding verse, "Those in Christ Jesus," and walking after the Spirit." But let us inspect the verse itself, which reads thus: "For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death."

Before we compare this verse with that which preceded it, we must give a preliminary explanation of the phrases used in it. "The law of the Spirit" is, therefore, called the right, the power, and the force or virtue of the Holy Spirit; for the apostle continues in the mode of speaking which he had previously adopted in the seventh chapter, where he attributes a law to sin, to the mind and to the members, that is, the power and force of commanding and impelling. The Spirit is here called that "of life," that is, "the vivifying Spirit" by a phrase familiar to the Hebrews, who employ the genitive cases of substantives instead of adjectives; as "the city of God," "the man of God," "the God of justice," etc. But the Spirit is thus designated in opposition or distinction to the law of the letter, or the letter of the law, which is weak for the work of vivification, and knows nothing more than to kill — according to this passage, "The letter killeth, but the Spirit giveth life," (2 Corinthians 3:6) and according to this:

"for if there had been a law given which could have given life, verily righteousness should have been by the law." (Galatians 3:21.)

But this "law of the Spirit of life" is said to be "in Christ Jesus," not because it is only in the person of Christ Jesus, but because it can be obtained in Jesus Christ alone; according to this declaration:

"Believers receive the Spirit, not by the works of the law, but by the hearing of faith." (Galatians 3:2,5.)

This phrase, "in Christ," is very often used in the same manner in the apostolical writings. But that the phrase is to be received in this sense also in the present passage, is manifest,

(1.) From the scope or design of the apostle, which is to teach, that not through the law, but through the grace of Christ, believers obtain righteousness and the Holy Spirit, by whose power they may be enabled to have dominion over sin, and to yield their members instruments of righteousness unto God.

(2.) From comparing this passage with the first verse. For, "to those who are in Christ Jesus," is attributed freedom from condemnation, because "the vivifying Spirit in Christ Jesus has made them free from the law of sin and death."

(3.) Because this "vivifying Spirit" does not "deliver from the law of sin and death," except as it is communicated "to those who are in Christ Jesus."

But to this "Spirit of life" is attributed that "it makes those who are in Christ Jesus free from the law of sin and death;" that is, from the power and tyranny of sin reigning, and killing by means of the law. This deliverance or emancipation is opposed to "the captivity unto the law of sin," of which mention is made in Romans 7:23, and to "the body of death" which is mentioned in verse the twenty-fourth. From this "law of sin," and from this "body of death," a man who is under the law could be delivered neither through the law of Moses, nor through "the law of the mind" which "consents to the law of God." But from this is also most admirably proved the conclusion deduced in the first verse from those which preceded it [in the seventh chapter]. For "deliverance from the law of sin and death" is opposed to "condemnation;" and, therefore, when the former of those is laid down, the latter is removed.

This deliverance is attributed "to those who are in Christ Jesus," and "who walk according to the Spirit," from which it follows, that they are made free from condemnation. But the reason why this deliverance is attributed to that subject, arises from the cause of deliverance, that is, the vivifying Spirit, which Spirit, as it exists in Christ and is to be obtained in him, is likewise in "those who are in Christ Jesus." Wherefore, it is not at all wonderful, that this Spirit exercises his own proper force and efficacy in those persons in whom he dwells; and since this force or virtue is so peculiar to him, that he has it not in common with the law of Moses, it follows from this, that those only "who are in Christ Jesus" and are partakers of his Spirit, or that those who, being in Christ Jesus, are partakers of his Spirit, are delivered from condemnation, while those who are under the law remain under condemnation, as being those who are overcome by "the law of the members," and have been "brought into captivity under the law of sin," no successful resistance being offered by "the law of the mind," which "consents to the law of God."

We have already said that, from a comparison of this verse with the twenty-third verse of the preceding chapter, an unanswerable argument is deducible in proof — that, in the two verses now specified, the apostle is not treating about the same man; but that, in the twenty-third verse of the seventh chapter, he treats about a man who is under the law, and in this second verse, about one who is under grace; because the man described in the former of these verses is "brought into captivity under the law of sin and death," and this by "the law of the members," "the law of the mind" offering fruitless resistance; but the man who is mentioned in the second verse, by the power of the life-giving Spirit, whom he has obtained in Christ Jesus, is "made free from the same law of sin and death."

4. Let us consider the third verse, in which the same thing may appear still more plainly to us; for in it the cause is explained why men who are under the law, cannot be made free from the dominion and condemnation of sin; but it is shown that this is obtained for them and effected by Christ. But the cause is this, because deliverance from the law of sin and death, or freedom from condemnation, could not be obtained except by the condemnation of sin, that is, except sin had been previously despoiled of the [assumed] right which it possessed, and of its power which it exercised over men who were subject to it. But it possessed the right and power of exercising dominion and of killing. But sin could not be despoiled of its right, and deprived of its power, by the law; for the law was rendered "weak, through the flesh," for the performance of such an arduous service.

When God saw this state of things, and was unwilling the unhappy race of men should be perpetually detained under the tyranny and condemnation of sin, "he sent his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and indeed for sin," that is, for destroying it, and he condemned sin in the flesh of his Son, who bore sin in his own body [on the tree] and took away from it that authority over us which it possessed, and weakened its powers.

From these remarks it appears that this passage, which has hitherto been accounted one of great difficulty, is plain and perspicuous, provided each part of it be arranged aright, in the following manner: "For God, having sent his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh; which was a thing impossible to the law, because it was weakened through the flesh." For "that which the law could not do" is, "the condemnation of sin in the flesh?’

Hence it is manifest, that this verse briefly explains the whole cause why sin reigns unto death over men who are under the law, and why it possesses neither the authority nor the power of reigning over "those who are in Christ Jesus" and under grace. This may be briefly shown from a comparison of those things which had been previously said, with this verse. For these words, "what was impossible to the law because it was weakened by the flesh," agree with the following declaration, contained in the fifth verse of the preceding chapter: "When we were in the flesh, the motions of sing, which are by the law, did work in our members;" and with these words in the fourteenth verse, "We know that the law is spiritual, but I am carnal;" they also agree with the eighteenth verse, "I know that in me, [that is, in my flesh,] dwelleth no good thing."

But these words, "God, in the flesh of his Son, condemned sin," agree with what is said in the sixth verse, of the preceding chapter: "But now we are delivered from the law, that being dead wherein we were held;" that is, sin being condemned which held us bound and in subjection to it. But, in this passage, the cause is more fully explained, that in the flesh of Christ such condemnation was effected.

5. From these observations is deduced the meaning of the fourth verse, plainly agreeing with those which preceded. It is this, after it had come to pass, that sin was condemned in the flesh of the Son of God, the right or authority of the law was completed and consummated in those who are in Christ Jesus, and who walk after the Spirit; so that they are no longer under the guidance and government of the law, but under the guidance of Him who has delivered us from sin, and who has claimed us for his own people.

This is plainly expressed by the apostle, in the fourth verse of the preceding chapter, in these words:

"Ye also are become dead to the law in the body of Christ, that ye should be married to another, even to Him who is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit unto God."

For these phrases agree with each other: "Ye are become dead to the law," and, "the right or authority of the law is fulfilled or completed in you." And, "in the body of Christ ye are become dead to the law," is the same as, "sin was condemned in the flesh of Christ, that the right or authority of the law might be fulfilled in us." But when the right of the law is completed and consummated by the condemnation of sin which was effected in the flesh of Christ, we belong or are married to another, that is, the right is transferred from the law to Christ, that we may be no longer under the law, but under Christ, and may live under grace and the guidance of his Spirit.

For these words, "that the right or authority of the law might or may be fulfilled in us," must not be understood as if, when sin had been condemned in the flesh of Christ, the right or authority of the law was still to be completed; but that after the condemnation of sin in the flesh of Christ, the right of the law was actually fulfilled. Several forms of speech, similar to this, are used in this manner in the Scriptures. For instance: "All this was done, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet: (Matthew 1:22) "He came and dwelt in a city called Nazareth, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophets, He shall be called a Nazarene." (2:23.) "He came and dwelt in Capernaum, which is upon the sea coast, in the borders of Zabulon and Nephthalim, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Esaias the prophet, saying, The land of Zabulon, and the land of Nepthalim, etc., light is sprung up to them who sat in the region and shadow of death." (4:13-16.) "He cast out the spirits With His word, and healed all that were sick, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Esaias the prophet, saying, Himself took our infirmities," etc. (8:16,17.) See also Matthew 12:17; 13:35; 26:56. In all these examples, the phrase, "that it might be fulfilled," evidently means that the prediction was actually fulfilled by those acts which are mentioned in the several passages. This is also signified by a phrase different from the preceding, in Matthew 27:9, "Then was fulfilled that which was spoken by Jeremy the prophet." It is lawful also to change the mode of speech in this verse, (Romans 8:4,) into another exactly of the same import: "Then was fulfilled the right or authority of the law in us." In addition to these, consult Matthew 27:35; Luke 21:22; John 13:18; 17:12; 18:9; and innumerable other passages.

From this explication it is apparent, that this portion of holy writ, (Romans 8:1-4,) is plain and perspicuous, though, without this interpretation, it is encompassed with much obscurity, as almost all interpreters have confessed, while they have labored hard to explain it.

We will now, by permission, compress all these remarks into a small compass, and briefly recapitulate them; what I have advanced will then become far more evident. Let us do this in the following manner: "Since, therefore, we have already seen, that men under the law are held captive under the dominion and tyranny of sin, we may easily conclude from this, that those only who are in Christ Jesus, and who walk after the Spirit and not after the flesh, are free from all condemnation; because the law, the right, the power, the force or virtue of the vivifying Spirit, which is and can be obtained in Jesus Christ alone, has liberated persons of this description from the law, the power and this force of sin and death, from the empire and dominion of sin, and of its condemnation. Christ Jesus could lawfully do this by his Spirit, as being the person in whose flesh sin was condemned, that it has no longer any right, neither can have any, over those who are Christ’s; in which flesh, indeed, He was sent by his Father, because this very thing was impossible to the law, weakened as it was through the flesh. And thus it has come to pass, that the right of the law, which it had over us when we were still under the law, is completed or fulfilled in persons of this description, who have become Christ’s people through faith, that they might hereafter live, be influenced, and governed by his grace and according to the guidance of the Holy Spirit. From these things we may certainly conclude that sin cannot have dominion over them, and therefore, that they are able to yield their members instruments of righteousness to God, as those who have been translated from the death of sin to the life of the Spirit."

But these topics the apostle pursues as far as the sixteenth verse of this eighth chapter, in a manner accommodated to the same scope or design as we have hitherto pointed out; and he seems always mindful of the exhortation which he had given in Romans 6:12,13; from the conjoint reason in which he descends into the succeeding long investigation.

These observations, however, may suffice, lest we be too operose in demonstrating a matter that is so plain and perspicuou