Wesley Corpus

“(2.) The Psalmist is here charging himself with his own sin.” He is; and tracing it up to the fountain. “(3.) But according to our version, he does not charge himself with his sin, but some other person. He throws the whole load of his sin from off himself, on God who shaped him, and his mother who conceived him.” What you say might have had weight, if he had offered this in excuse of his sin, or even in extenuation of it. But doe he do this? Does he, in fact, “throw the whole blame, or an part of it, from off himself?” Just the reverse. He acknow ledges and bewails his own total iniquity; not to excus but to abase himself the more before God, for his inward a well as outward wickedness. And yet he might, in perfect consistency with this, whe God had caused “the bones which had been broken to re joice,” cry out, “I will praise thee, O God; for I am fearfull. and wonderfully made; ” yea, and repeat all that follows i the same Psalm; which proves so much, and no more, tha every foetus in the womb is formed by the power and wisdon of God. Yet does it not follow, that the sin transmitte from the parent “must be attributed to God.” (Page 137.) “But how could he with pleasure reflect upon his forma tion, or praise God for it?” As I can at this day; thoug I know I was “conceived in sin, and shapen in iniquity. But, “where sin abounds, grace does much more abound. I lose less by Adam, than I gain by Christ. This also perfectly consists with the following verse: “Behold thou desirest truth,” or, It is thy will that we should have truth “in the inward parts;” (page 138;) thou art willing to remov all that “iniquity” wherein “I was shapen;” to “give me clean heart, and renew a right spirit within me;” and in th hidden part thou hast made me to know wisdom; thou has “shown me what was good.” So that I am everyway with out excuse; I knew thy will, and did it not. “But if, after all, you will adhere to the literal sense of thi text, why do you not adhere to the literal sense of that text ‘This is my body, and believe transubstantiation ?” (Ibid.