Sin is imputed to none, where there is no Law.
But to Infants there is no Law:
Therefore Sin is not imputed to them.
The Proposition is the Apostle’s own Words; the Assumption is thus proved:
Those who are under a Physical Impossibility of either hearing, knowing, or understanding any Law, where the Impossibility is not brought upon them by any Act of their own, but is according to the very Order of Nature appointed by God; to such there is no Law.
But Infants are under this Physical Impossibility:
Therefore, &c.
Secondly, What can be more positive than that of Ezek. xviii. 20. The Soul that sinneth, it shall die: The Son shall not bear the Father’s Iniquity? For the Prophet here first sheweth what is the Cause of Man’s Eternal Death, which he saith is his Sinning; and then, as if he purposed expresly to shut out such an Opinion, he assures us, The Son shall not bear the Father’s Iniquity. From which I thus argue:
Infants bear not Adam’s Transgression.If the Son bear not the Iniquity of his Father, or of his immediate Parents, far less shall he bear the Iniquity of Adam.
But the Son shall not bear the Iniquity of his Father: