On the Imputation of Adam's First Sin · §300

Man. Post. Cap. VI: PLAC foedus-condition damnosum / hereditary corruption

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For if He contracts any covenant with man, He does it for man's sake, and because it is good for man. But this covenant, whose condition is what the Learned Man declares, could not but be harmful to Adam's posterity. For far more evil was to be feared from it than good hoped for: since for any utility to return from it to us, Adam had to persevere through the whole course of life in obedience and faith toward God; and yet even then, if the Learned Man is believed, his obedience would not have been imputed to us—he would only have begotten us such as he was; but if he once turned aside from obedience, his first disobedience was to be imputed to us all unto the guilt of eternal death, and not that only, but that we might be punished for that imputed sin there was to be inflicted on us that hereditary corruption which is truly sin, and the fountain of sins. How came it that God, who is goodness itself and loved the human race, did not offer it a fairer condition, and that Adam did not ask God—seeing he was contracting with God as procurator of the whole human race—to obtain from Him a more tolerable condition? For surely such a condition might seem to have sprung from hatred rather than love; nor is it in any way understood how it could of itself contribute to God's glory, as all things God does ought.

Latin

Si quod enim foedus cum homine contrahit, id facit hominis causa, & quia bonum est homini. Hoc vero foedus, cuius ea est, quam Vir Doctus declarat, conditio, non poterat non esse Adami posteris damnosum. Multo plus enim ex eo erat metuendum mali, quam sperandum boni: nam ut inde ad nos aliqua utilitas rediret, opus erat ut Adamus toto vitae curriculo perseveraret in obedientia & fide erga Deum: nec tamen propterea, si Viro Docto fides habetur, nobis eius imputata fuisset obedientia, tantum qualis fuisset, tales nos genuisset: at, si vel semel ab obedientia deflecteret, prima eius inobedientia nobis omnibus imputanda erat ad mortis aeternae reatum, nec id tantum, sed ut ob imputatum illud peccatum puniremur infligenda nobis erat corruptio illa hereditaria quae vere peccatum est, & fons peccatorum. Qui factum est, ut Deus, qui ipsa bonitas est, & genus humanum amabat, aequiorem ei non tulerit conditionem, & qui Adamus non rogavit Deum, quandoquidem contrahebat cum Deo ut totius generis humani procurator, ut ab eo conditionem impetraret tolerabiliorem? Nam certe talis conditio ab odio potius quam ab amore profecta videri possit; nec quid ad Dei gloriam, ut omnia quae facit Deus, per se se conferre possit ullo modo intelligitur.

About this text

Josue de la Place (Placeus) — Capita I–XIV partial of De imputatione primi peccati Adami from the 1661 Saumur Latin, through Man. Post. Caput X (GAR.1–3 Rom. 5.13 tip) / before PLAC on reatus-only. Honest partial; Cap. X Rom. 5:14+ / ~494 pp Disputatio remain.

English follows the locked 1661 Saumur Latin of Capita I–XIV partial through Man. Post. Caput IX (eph-ho / eph-ho pantes) before eph-ho / eph-ho pantes, reconstructed from IA PDF page images with Vision OCR and pdftotext as check. No modern English was copied. Cap. IX deepen+ remain.

Catalogue & scope

IA deimputationepri00lapl. Densify: Capita I–XII + Caput XIV + Man. Post. Cap. II–VI through Cap. X Rom. 5:14 tip. Not whole Disputatio; Cap. X Rom. 5:14+ / ~494 pp Disputatio remain.

Witnesses

This is an AI-assisted study translation. Source fidelity and completeness have not been independently certified. Open Latin on each section (or the Latin source witness link) for the source text. This is not a complete critical edition.