it is not warrantable, on the assumption that he
would have refused, to deny that he was commanded to undertake the
duties of a federal head.

The interests of men were better provided for on the principle of
representation than they would have been, had it been given to every
member of the human family individually to undergo a trial, on which
would have pended their eternal condition. Had the whole human family
been together when sin entered into the world, they had all been as
liable to seduction by the enemy as the first of men. But the resistance
of him by Adam would have been equal to the resistance of the whole
human race. Had all the human family at once been present in the very
circumstances of temptation in which Adam was placed, would they have
acted differently from what he did? They could have done so; but what
evidence have we that they would? God did not vouchsafe an extraordinary
power in order to keep Adam from falling: such would have interfered
with his state as a free moral responsible being. Would he have done so,
then, to the whole human race, had they been then present together? But
had Adam continued for an appointed period to obey, life to all his
posterity would have been the result, and thus benefits through one as a
representative would have come to the many with certainty, without all
having individually, by being put into a state of probation, in the
midst of temptation, to endeavour to secure a title to life for
themselves. It is sinful for men to arraign the procedure according to
which men come into the world in a state of condemnation, or to deny it.
The Scriptures reveal it, and it is a necessary effect of the operation
of Divine justice. Had it not been right, God would not have instituted
such a relation between Adam and his descendants as would have admitted
of the fact; nay, had not that arrangement in itself been preferable to
every other, Divine wisdom would not have made it. It therefore has a
reason for it the most satisfactory, however little we may be able to
apprehend it. Nothing that we know is inconsistent with that
arrangement, but it may be but a small part of its reason that we yet
observe. Man was not doomed, but permitted to fall. It was not necessary
that he should be prevented from sinning, and his fall was the necessary
effect of his transgression. Is it urged--Is it not dreadful to think of
man being brought into existence in a state of sin and misery?--of a
natur