GENES. 2. 17.
I Have already handled this Text, as it containeth a law given to Adam by God, as a foveraigne Lord over him; now I shall re-assume this Text, and consider it as part of a Covenant, which God did enter into with Adam and his posterity; for these two things, a Law, and a Covenant, arise from different grounds: The Law is from God as supreme, and having absolute power, and so requiring subjection; the other ariseth from the love and goodnesse of God, whereby he doth sweeten and mollifie that power of his, and ingageth himself to reward that obedience, which were otherwise due, though God should never recompence it. The words therefore being heretofore explained, and the Text eas’d of all difficulties, I observe this Doctrine, That God did (Doctr) not only, as a Law-giver, injoys obedience unto Adam; but as a loving God, did also enter into covenant with him. And for the opening of this, you must take these Considerations:
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That this covenant with Adam in the state of innocency, is more1 obscurely laid down, then the covenant of grace after the fall: for afterwards you have the expresse name of the Covenant, and the solemne entring into it by both parties; but this Covenant made with Adam, must only be gathered by deduction and consequence. This Text cometh the neerest to a Covenant, because here is the threatning expressed, and so by consequent some good thing promised to obedience. We are not therefore to be so rigid, as to call for expresse places, which doe name this Covenant; for that which is necessarily and immediately drawn from Scripture, is as truly Scripture, as that which is expresly contained in it. Now there are these grounds to prove God dealt in these commandements by way of Covenant:
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From the evil threatned, and the good promised. For, while2 there is a meere command, so long it is a law onely; but when it is further confirmed by promises and threatnings, then it becomes a Covenant. And if that position be true of some, which maketh the tree of life a sacrament, then here was not onely nudum pactum, a meer covenant; but a seale also to confirme it. And certainly, being God was not bound to give Adam eternall life if he did obey, seeing he owed obedience to God under the title of a creature, it was of his meere goodnesse to become ingaged in a promise for this. I know it’s a Question by some, Whether Adam, upon his obedience, should have been translated into heaven, or confirmed onely in that naturall life, which was marvellous happy? But either way would have been by meer promise of God, not by any naturall necessity. Life must be extended as farre as death; now the death threatned was not onely a bodily death, but death in hell: why therefore should not the life promised be a life in heaven?
In the second place, another argument to confirme that God3 dealt in a Covenant with Adam is, in that his posterity becomes guilty of his sin, and so obnoxious unto the same punishment which was inflicted upon Adam in his own person. Now we must come to be thus in Adam, either by a naturall propagation, and then Adam should be no more to us then our parents, and our parents sins should be made ours as well as Adams; which is contrary to the Apostle, Rom. 5. who chargeth it still upon one man. And besides, who can say, that the righteousnesse, holinesse and happinesse, which we should have been partakers of in Adams standing, could come by a naturall necessity, but onely by the meere covenant and agreement of God? Adams repentance might then have been imputed to us, as well as his sin.
Lastly, the Apostle Rom. 5. makes all men in Adam, as the godly are in Christ: now beleevers come to receive of Christ, not from a naturall necessity, because they have that humane nature which Christ took upon him, (for so all should be saved) but by a federall agreement.
- Let us consider in the next place, what a Covenant doth imply;4 first in the word, then in the thing signified. For I should deal very imperfectly, if I did not speak something of the generall nature of it, though hereafter more may be spoken of. You may therefore take notice, that there are things among men, that doe induce a publike obligation, that yet doe differ: A Law, a Covenant, and a Testament. Now a Law and a Testament, they are absolute, and doe not imply any consent of the party under them: As a Law requireth subjection, not attending unto, or expecting the consent of inferiours; and so a Testament, or a Will of man, is to bequeath such goods and legacies unto a man, not expecting a consent. Indeed sometimes such goods are bequeathed with a condition, and so a man may refuse whether he will be executor, or no; but this is accidentall to the nature of a Testament. But a Covenant, that differs from the two former, in that it doth require consent and agreement between two parties: and in Divinity, if it be between man entire and upright, it is called by some, A Covenant of friendship; if it be between God and man fallen, it is called, A Covenant of reconciliation. Hence in Covenants, that are not nuda pacta (meer Covenants) but are accompanied with some solemnities, there were stipulations added, which were done by Question and Answer: Doe you promise? I promise. Hence it is called […] and we call it Stipulation, from the Latine word, which comes from the Greek word, […], or […], which is as much as […], or […], because these words did make the Covenant valid. As for Isidorus his etymology of stipulation, à frangendis stipulis, because, when they promised or entred into an agreement, they brake a stick between them, and then joyning it together, so made a promise, and every party kept a piece, as a tally, to maintain their agreement; this is rejected by the learned Salmasius.