This, as I understand it, is the orthodox doctrine of native depravity. They do not hold, (as some have reported,) that there is a mass of corrupt matter lodged in the heart, which sends off noxious exhalations like a dead body. But they maintain that the soul has entirely lost the image of God, in which it was originally created; that there is nothing pure or good remaining in it; that, in consequence of the withdrawment of those special, divine influences, which were given to our first parents, the proper balance of the powers is destroyed, they have lost their conformity to the law of God, and the holy dispositions, which were at first implanted in the soul, have given place to sinful dispositions, which are the source of all actual transgressions.
American clergyman
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