bring on and multiply ten thousand greater Evils.

It may here be proper to take notice of a new Argument, urged in its
full Strength, and with all the Advantage of Rhetorick and
Eloquence, by the most ingenious Dr. _I--c W--s_, in a Book
intituled, _The Ruin and Recovery of Mankind;_ &_c_. We are there
told, that this _covenant_ seems to have been, evidently, calculated
for the best; because _Adam_, in that State of Understanding and
Innocence, was more likely to stand, and maintain his Innocence,
than any of his Posterity, especially when he consider'd himself as
acting for _all_ his Posterity; with which the Doctor supposes him
to have been fully and strongly apprised; as indeed he ought, had
the Case been as the Doctor believes. This Argument I take him to
have mistaken both ways, _viz_. by extolling _Adam's_ Condition, on
the one hand, beyond what in reality it ever was, and setting that
of his Posterity much lower than it really is: and these Errors are
productive of many others. _Adam_ is supposed to have been without
any Pain, or Uneasiness, and that he would so have remained, during
his Innocence: But after Christ has removed the Curse, and taken
away the Sin of his own _Chosen_ Children, bodily Pains and outward
Afflictions are sometimes their Lot, why might not Man, in his
original State of Innocence, be subject, in some Degree, to Pain and
Disease? if _Creation_ were inconsistent with such a mixt
Dispensation of Good and Evil, why not _Redemption?_ If God, for the
Exercise of Man's Fidelity, placed him where he was exposed to the
Evil and Danger of Temptation; why not suffer his Patience to be
exercised, at some Seasons, by Pain and Inquietude? To return to
this _Covenant_, could it be proved to have been as the Doctor
imagines, I see not what could be gained by it: because it would be
trifling to a considerable Degree. And all the Arguments, used by
_Milton_, in his third Book of _Paradise Lost_, to shew the
Absurdity of that Doctrine, which considers _Adam_ as _acting_, or
rather as _being acted, by Necessity_, in that Situation of
Paradise, would be equally applicable to all the Elect, under the
absolute Slavery of the _Fall_.

Where is the Use of _Reason_, or _Moral Agency_, in Man, if another
be substituted to act in his Stead, and not he himself? Man, being
made a _free_ and _moral_ Agent, has Power to act for himself, and
can be accountable for no body's Crimes but his own. The
_Consciousness_ of b