[A golden chaine: or The description of theologie containing the order of the causes of saluation and damnation, according to Gods word; (Printed by Iohn Legat, printer to the Vniuersitie of Cambridge, 1600)]
William Perkins, born in the year of our Lord 1558 in Marston Jabbett, Warwickshire, did rise from modest origins to become a shining luminary in the reformed Church of England. Educated at Christ’s College, Cambridge, where he attained the degrees of Bachelor and Master of Arts, Perkins was elected Fellow of that College, a station in which he diligently exercised his gifts in the sacred discipline and did greatly profit the students in sound doctrine and holy conversation. Ordained within the ecclesiastical polity of the Church of England, Perkins served faithfully as lecturer at the renowned Church of Great St. Andrew’s, Cambridge. There, by the power of the Spirit, he did powerfully expound the Scriptures, laboring to reform men’s lives and to bring them into the obedience of Christ. His ministry was marked by an extraordinary zeal for experimental divinity, wherein he pressed upon men the necessity of true conversion, effectual calling, and a sanctified walk. Perkins excelled in the art of casuistry, providing godly counsel for tender consciences perplexed with the weight of sin, as demonstrated in his manifold treatises, among which The Golden Chaine and The Arte of Prophesying are eminent. He contended earnestly for the doctrines of grace, upholding predestination, the sufficiency of Christ’s atonement, and the authority of Scripture, all in the service of God’s glory and the edification of His elect. He departed this life in Cambridge in 1602, leaving a legacy both deep and wide, whereby his writings continue to guide souls in the straight and narrow path of godliness.
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Adam’s fall, was his willing revolting to disobedience by eating the forbidden fruit. In Adam’s fall, we may note the manner, greatness, and fruit of it.
The manner of Adam’s fall, was on this sort:
I. First, the devil, having immediately before fallen himself, insinuateth unto our first parents, that both the punishment for eating the forbidden fruit was uncertain, and that God was not true in his word unto them.
II. Secondly, by this his legerdemain, he blinded the eyes of their understanding.
III. Thirdly, being thus blinded, they begin to distrust God, and to doubt of God’s favor.
IV. Fourthly, they thus doubting, are moved to behold the forbidden fruit.
V. Fifthly, they no sooner see the beauty thereof, but they desire it.
VI. Sixthly, that they may satisfy their desire, they eat of the fruit, which by the hands of the woman, was taken from the tree: by which act they become utterly disloyal to God.
Gen. 3:1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8.
Thus without constraint, they willingly fall from their integrity, God upon just causes leaving them to themselves, and freely suffering them to fall. For we must not think that man’s fall was either by chance, or God not knowing it, or barely winking at it, or by his bare permission, or against his will: but rather miraculously, not without the will of God, but yet without all approbation of it.
The greatness of this transgression must be esteemed, not by the external object, or the baseness of an apple, but by the offense it containeth against God’s majesty. This offense appeareth by many trespasses committed in that action:
I. The first is Doubting of God’s word.
II. The second; Want of faith.
For they believe not God’s threatening, [In that day ye eat thereof, you shall die the death:] but being bewitched with the devil’s promise, [ye shall be like gods] they cease to fear God’s punishment, and are inflamed with a desire of greater dignity.
III. Their curiosity, in forsaking God’s word, and seeking other wisdom.
IV. Their pride, in seeking to magnify themselves, and to become like God.
V. Contempt of God, in transgressing his commandments against their own conscience.
VI. In that they prefer the devil before God.
VII. Ingratitude, who, in as much as in them lieth, expel God’s spirit dwelling in them, and despise that blessed union.
VIII. They murder both themselves and their progeny.
Out of this corrupt estate of our first parents, arose the estate of infidelity or unbelief, whereby God hath included all men under sin, that he might manifest his mercy in the salvation of some, and his justice in condemnation of others.
Rom. 11.32. God hath shut up all men in unbelief, that he might have mercy on all. Gal. 3.22. The Scripture hath concluded all under sin, that the promise by the faith of Jesus Christ should be given to them that believe.
In this estate, we must consider sin, and the punishment of sin.
I. Sin is threefold:
(I.) The first, is the participation of Adam’s both transgression and guiltiness: whereby in his sin, all his posterity sinned.
Rom. 5.12. As by one man sin entered into the world, and by sin death: so death entered upon all men, in that all men have sinned.
The reason of this is ready. Adam was not then a private man, but represented all mankind, and therefore look what good he received from God, or evil elsewhere, both were common to others with him.
1 Cor. 15.22. As in Adam all men die, so in Christ all men rise again.
Again, when Adam offended, his posterity was in his loins, from whom they should by the course of nature, issue: and therefore take part of the guiltiness with him.
Heb. 7.9,10. And to say as the thing is, Levi &c. paid tithes to Melchizedek: for he was yet in the loins of his father Abraham, when Melchizedek met him.
(II.) [The second is Original Sin; (spoken of in its own place).]
(III.) [The third is Actual Sin; (spoken of in its own place).]
II. [The Punishment of Sin; (spoken of in its own place).]