Wesley Corpus

How could all men be, in any sense, constituted sinners by the one, or constituted righteous by the other? * Page 94. To explain this a little further in Mr. Hervey's words: “By Jederal head, or representative, I mean, what the Apostle teaches, when he calls Christ, “the Second Man, and “the last Adam.” (1 Cor. xv. 47.) The last ! How? Not in a numerical sense; not in order of time: But in this respect, that, as Adam was a public person, and acted in the stead of all mankind, so Christ, likewise, was a public person, and acted in behalf of all his people; that as Adam was the first general representative of mankind, Christ was the second and the last; (there never was, and never will be, any other;) that what they severally did in this capacity, was not intended to terminate in themselves, but to affect as many as they seve rally represented. “This does not rest on a single text, but is established again and again in the same chapter. The divinely-wise Apostle, foreseeing the prejudices which men would entertain against this doctrine, as lying quite out of the road of reason’s researches, has inculcated and re-inculcated this momentous point: ‘Through the offence of one, many are dead;--the judgment was by one to condemnation;-by one man's offence death reigned by one;--by the offence of one, judg ment came upon all men to condemnation;’ and that there may remain no possibility of mistaking his meaning, or eluding his argument, he adds, “By one man’s disobedience many were made sinners. All these expressions demonstrate, that Adam (as well as Christ) was a representative of all mankind; and that what he did in this capacity did not ter minate in himself, but affected all whom he represented.” After vehemently cavilling at the terms, you yourself allow the thing. You say, “If what was lost by “the disobedience of one’ person might afterward be recovered by “the obedi ence’ of another, then matters would have stood upon an equal footing.” (Page 113.) And this is, indeed, the truth.