Religion & morality > Human nature in its four-fold state ... in several practical discourses

S Man’s Original State I.
the Creature, not to be inclin’d towards God as
his chief End, more than it can allow Man to be
a God to himfelf. The Law was imprefs’d upon
Adam’s Soul: Now this, according to the new
Covenant, by which the Image of God is repaired,
confifts in two Things, (i.) Putting the Law into
the Mind, denoting the Knowledge ot it. (2.) Writ¬
ing it in the Heart, denoting Inclinations in the
Will, anfwerable to the Commands ot the Law,
Heh. viii. 10. So that, as the Will, when we con-
fider it as renewed by Grace, is, by that Grace,
natively inclined to the fame Holinefs, in all its
Parts which the Law requires; fo was the Will
of Man, (when we confider him as God made him
at firft) endowed with natural Inclinations to every
Thing commanded by the Law. For if the Rege¬
nerate are Partakers of the Divine Nature, as un *
doubtedly they are; for fo fays the Scripture,
iPet. i. 4. and if this Divine Nature can import
no lefs than Inclinations of the Heart to Holinefs :
Then, furely Adam’s Will could not want this In¬
clination ; for in him the Image of God was per-
fe£l. It is true, ’cis faid, Pom. ii. 14, 15. That
the Gentiles-r—fhew the Work of the Law written in
their Hearts: But this denotes only their Know¬
ledge of that Law, fuch as it is; but the Apoflle
to the Hebrews, in the Text cited, takes the Word,
Heart, in an other Senfe, diftinguifhing it plainly
from the Mind. And it muft be granted, that,
when God promifcth in the new Covenant, 2o
•write his Law in the Hearts of his People, it im¬
ports quite another Thing than what Heathens
have : For tho’ they have Notions of it in their
Minds, yet their Hearts go another Way ; their
Will has got a Set and a Biafs quite contrary to