Fourth Argument. Fifth Argument.

agreement that subsists between the observations of natural philosophers, and the assertion of the most ancient historian Genesis 3:16. FOURTH ARGUMENT.

If we advert to mankind, even before they burst the womb of their tortured mothers, they afford us a new proof of their total degeneracy. For reason dictates that if they were not conceived in sin, the Father of mercies could not, consistently with his goodness and justice, command the cold hand of death to nip them in the unopened, or just-opened bud. This nevertheless happens every hour. Who can number the early miscarriages of the womb? How many millions of miserable embryos feel the pangs of death before those of birth, and preposterously turn the fruitful womb into a living grave! And how many millions more of wretched infants escape the dangers of their birthday, and salute the troublesome light only to take their untimely leave of it, after languishing a few days on the rack of a convulsive or torturing disorder? I ask again, Would a good and righteous God seal the death warrant of such multitudes of his unborn, or newly born creatures, if their natural depravity did not render them proper subjects of dissolution?

It is true, the young of beasts suffer and die, as well as infants; but it is only because they are involved in our misery. They partake of it as the attendants of a noble traitor share in his deserved ruin. Sin, that inconceivable, virulent, and powerful evil, drew down God’s righteous curse upon all that was created for man’s use, as well as upon man himself. Hence only spring the degeneracy and death that turn beasts to one promiscuous dust with mankind. Compare Genesis 3:17; Romans 5:12; and 8:22. We may then justly infer, from the sufferings and death of still-born or new-born children, that man is totally degenerate, and liable to destruction, even from his mother’s womb.

FIFTH ARGUMENT.

But take your leave of the infant corpse, already buried in the womb, or deposited in a coffin of a span long; fix your attention on the healthy sucking child. See him stupidly staring in his nurse’s lap, or awkwardly passing through childhood to manhood. How visible is his degeneracy in every stage!

Part of the Divine image, in which he was made in Adam, consisted in purity, power, and knowledge; but now he is naturally the least cleanly, as well as the most helpless and ignorant of all animals. Yes, if the reader could forgive the indelicacy of the assertion for the sake of its truth, I would venture to show that there is no comparison between the cleanliness of the little active animals which suck the filthy swine; and of helpless infants, who suck the purer breasts of their tender mothers. But, casting a veil over the dribbling, loathsome little creatures, without fear of being contradicted, I aver, that the young of those brutes, which are stupid to a proverb, know their dams, and follow them as soon as they are dropped; while infants are months without taking any particular notice of their parents, and without being able, I shall not say to follow them, but even to bear the weight of their swaddled body, or stand upon their tottering legs. With reference to the knowledge necessary for the support of animal life, it is undeniable that brutes have greatly the advantage of mankind. Fowls and fishes immediately, and with amazing sagacity, single out their proper nourishment among a thousand useless and noxious things: but infants put indifferently to their mouth all that comes to their hand, whether it be food or poison, a coral or a knife; and what is more astonishing still, grown-up persons scarce ever attain to the knowledge of the quantity, or quality of the meat and drink which are most suitable to their constitutions. All disordered dogs fix at once upon the salutary vegetable that can (in some cases) relieve their distress: but many physicians, even after several years’ study and practice, hurt, and sometimes kill their patients by improper medicines. Birds of passage, by mere instinct, find the north and the south more readily than mariners by the compass. Untaught spiders weave their webs, and uninstructed bees make their combs to the greatest perfection: but fallen man must serve a tedious apprenticeship to learn his own business; and with all the help of masters, tools, and patterns, seldom proves an ingenious artist.

Again: other animals are provided with a natural covering that answers the double end of usefulness and ornament; but indigent man is obliged to borrow from plants, beasts, and worms, the materials with which he hides his nakedness, or defends his feebleness; and a great part of his short life is spent in providing, or putting on and off garments, the gaudy tokens of his shame, or ragged badges of his fall.