Chapter V: The Augustinian Theory in Creeds

The preceding chapters have presented the Augustinian theory of “the origin of evil,” and certain questions connected with it which have been debated by theologians; also the difficulties involved in the theory, and the modes of meeting these difficulties.

The next aim will be to verify these statements by extracts from the creeds and theologians of the great Christian sects.

Creed of the Catholic Church.

It is well known that the Catholic organization preceded that of the Protestant sects. It is also well known that this church maintains that the decisions of her pope and councils are _infallible_.

The following extracts, then, from the decisions of the celebrated Councils of Trent at the period of the Reformation, exhibit the theory of Augustine incorporated as a part of the Roman Catholic creed:

_Extract from a decree of the Council of Trent._

“Infants derive from Adam that original guilt which must be
expiated in the laver of regeneration in order to obtain eternal
life. Adam lost the purity and righteousness which he received
from God, not for himself only but also for us.”

The catechism of the Council of Trent says:

“The pastor, therefore, will not omit to remind the faithful that
the guilt and punishment of original sin were not confined to
Adam, but justly descended from him, their source and cause, to
all posterity. Hence a sentence of condemnation was pronounced
_against the human race_ immediately after the fall of Adam.”

John Calvin.

The celebrated John Calvin, one of the greatest Protestant theologians at the period of the Reformation, wrote a complete _system_ based on the Augustinian theory. This system has been perpetuated in all the various sects which from him are named _Calvinistic_. The following extract gives his views on this subject:

_John Calvin._

“It is a hereditary depravity and corruption of our nature,
diffused through all parts of the soul, which, in the first place,
exposes us to the wrath of God, and then produces in us those
works which the Scripture calls the works of the flesh.”

Of infants, he says:

“They bring their condemnation with them from their mother’s womb,
being liable to punishment, not for the sin of another, but for
their own. For although they have not as yet produced the fruits
of their iniquity, yet they have the seed inclosed in themselves;
nay, their whole nature is, as it were, a seed of sin; therefore
they can not but be odious and abominable to God. Whence it
follows that it is properly considered sin before God, because
there could not be liability to punishment without sin.”

“The corruption of nature precedes and gives rise to all sinful
acts, and is in itself deserving of punishment.”

Westminster Assembly.

The Westminster Assembly represented the Calvinistic sects of Great Britain near the period of the Reformation.

The confession of faith and catechisms prepared by them have ever since been received as a true statement of the system of religious doctrine, as held by the Presbyterian, Congregational, and Calvinistic Baptist denominations in Great Britain and America. The following presents the Augustinian theory, as contained in their creed:

“A _corrupted nature_ was conveyed from our first parents to all
their posterity. From this original corruption, whereby we are
utterly indisposed, disabled, and made opposite to all good, and
wholly inclined to all evil, do proceed all actual transgressions.
Every sin, both original and actual, being a transgression of the
righteous law of God, and contrary thereunto, doth in its own
nature bring guilt upon the sinner, whereby he is bound over to
the wrath of God and curse of the law, and so made subject to
death, with all miseries, spiritual, temporal and eternal.”

The Episcopalians.

The following from the Thirty‐nine Articles of the Church of England presents the same doctrine, as held by the Episcopalians of Great Britain and America:

“Original sin is the fault and corruption of the nature of every
man, that naturally is engendered in the offspring of Adam;
whereby man is very far gone from original righteousness, and is
of his own nature inclined to evil—and this infection of nature
doth remain in the regenerated.”

“The condition of man after the fall of Adam is such, that he can
not turn and prepare himself (by his own natural strength and good
works) to faith and calling upon God. Wherefore we have _no power_
to do good works pleasant and acceptable to God, without the grace
of God by Christ preventing us; that we may have a good will, and
working with us when we have that good will.”

The Methodists.

In the Methodist Quarterly Review for July, 1857, the editor, in speaking of the works of Arminius, says, p. 345, “Our denomination, _whose creed agrees so completely with the teachings of this learned, accomplished and holy man_, is bound to maintain the freshness of his precious memory.”

Arminius.

In the same article are the following extracts from the works of Arminius, which, on so good authority, may be received as the views of the Methodist churches on this topic:

“The will of man, with respect to true good, is not only wounded,
bruised, crooked and attenuated, but is likewise captivated,
destroyed and lost, and has _no powers whatever_, except such as
are excited by grace.

“Adam, by sinning, corrupted himself and all his posterity, and so
made them obnoxious to God’s wrath.”

“Infants have rejected the grace of the gospel _in their parents
and forefathers_, by which act they have deserved to be deserted
by God. For I would like to have proof adduced how all posterity
could _sin in Adam_ against law, and yet infants, to whom the
gospel is offered _in their parents_ and rejected, have not sinned
against the grace of the gospel.”

“For there is a permanent principle in the covenant of God, that
children should be comprehended and adjudged in their parents.”

Watson, the leading Arminian theologian, says that in the doctrine of the corruption of our common nature and man’s natural incapacity to do good, the Arminians and Calvinists so well agree, “that it is an entire delusion to represent this doctrine, as is often done, as exclusively Calvinistic.”

Various Protestant doctrines.

The following extracts from the creeds of various European bodies of Protestant Christians show the same doctrine. The Synod of Dort was a great council of Protestant divines at the period of the Reformation. It contained representatives from most of the large bodies of Protestants in Europe. The following gives their views on this subject:

_Synod of Dort._

“Therefore all men are conceived in sin and born the children of
wrath, disqualified for all saving good, propense to evil, dead in
sins, the slaves of sin; and without the grace of the regenerating
Holy Spirit, they neither are willing nor able to return to God,
to correct their depraved nature, or to dispose themselves to the
correction of it.”

_Confession of Helvetia._

“We take sin to be that natural corruption of man derived or
spread from those our parents unto us all; through which we, being
not only drowned in evil concupiscences and clean turned away from
God, but prone to all evil, full of all wickedness, distrust,
contempt and hatred of God, can do no good of ourselves—_no, not
so much as think of any_.”

_Confession of Belgia._

“We believe that, through the disobedience of Adam, the sin that
is called original hath been spread and poured into all mankind.
Now original sin is a corruption of the whole nature, and an
hereditary evil wherewith even the very infants in their mother’s
womb are polluted: the which also, as a most noisome root, doth
branch out most abundantly all kinds of sin in men, and is so
filthy and abominable in the sight of God, that _it alone_ is
sufficient to the condemnation of all mankind.”

_Confession of Bohemia._

“Original sin is naturally engendered in us and hereditary,
wherein we are all conceived and born into this world.... Let the
force of this hereditary destruction be acknowledged and judged of
by the guilt and fault involved, by our proneness and declination
to evil, by our evil nature, and by the punishment which is laid
upon it.

“Actual sins are the fruits of original sin, and do burst out
within, without, privily and openly, by the powers of man; that
is, by all that ever man is able to do, and by his members,
transgressing all those things which God commandeth and
forbiddeth, and also running into blindness and errors worthy to
be punished with all kinds of damnation.”

_French Confession (Protestant)._

“Man’s nature is become altogether defiled, and being blind in
spirit and corrupt in heart, hath utterly lost all his original
integrity. We believe that all the offspring of Adam are infected
with this contagion, which we call original sin, that is a stain
spreading itself by propagation. We believe that this stain is
indeed sin, because that it maketh every man (not so much as those
little ones excepted which as yet lie hid in their mother’s womb)
deserving of eternal death before God. We also affirm that this
stain, even after baptism, is in nature sin.”

_Moravian Confession._

“This innate disease and original sin is truly sin, and condemns
under God’s eternal wrath all those who are not born again through
water and the Holy Ghost.”

The preceding is sufficient to establish the unanimous agreement of Catholic and Protestant creeds and confessions in maintaining the Augustinian theory of the depraved nature of all mankind consequent on the sin of Adam, as it has been set forth in the preceding chapters.