These several theories all were originated to escape from the inevitable deduction of reason, that God, as the author of a depraved constitution of mind, is himself depraved.
And yet neither of them avails but one of the two pre-existent theories, that makes man himself the author of this ruin of his own mind, either in Adam or before Adam, while neither of these is supported either by reason or revelation.
Moreover, neither of these theories could be established by revelation for want of means to prove a revelation to beings who find themselves endowed with miscreated minds, as has been shown on pages 287 and 288 of this volume.
Another effort to change the hard features of Calvinism was by the New Haven school of theologians. These gentlemen maintained that a holy nature and a sinful nature were not what could be created, inasmuch as all sin implies a knowledge of what a morally right choice is and power to make such a choice, while it consists not at all in a wrong nature or constitution, but solely in wrong voluntary action.
This is precisely what, as the author supposes, was the doctrine of Pelagius in opposition to that of Augustine, and for the propagation of which, popes, emperors, and councils drove Pelagius and his followers from their churches.
A similar penalty seemed for a while to await the New Haven innovators; for, as professors in a theological seminary connected with the most influential university in the nation, their doctrine on this subject occasioned a controversy that agitated all the New England as well as the Presbyterian churches.
At the same time, an earnest controversy was in progress with the Unitarian sect, which had adopted this tenet of Pelagius as a part of their creed. Of course, the charge, both of Pelagianism and Unitarianism, was rife all over the land against these innovators on the established creed of the churches.
To meet this, these gentlemen maintained that they had not essentially departed from the system of New England divinity as exhibited in the writings of President Edwards. Thus they had two labors to perform—the one to maintain the doctrine that sin consisted solely in wrong action and not at all in nature, and the other to show that in this they did not differ from Edwards.
In attempting the first, at one time and another, they have maintained that mankind since the fall are as truly created in God's image as Adam was; that the nature of man is still like the nature of God; that a corrupt, depraved, or unholy nature can not be affirmed of the human mind in any proper use of these terms.
The inquiry, then, must arise, in many minds that are familiar with the writings of President Edwards, how it is possible that men so intelligent and so honest should maintain that on this subject they had not departed from the system of New England divinity as exhibited by Edwards.