Depravity ~ Various

The following is taken from the work [i]Christ Exalted[/i] by Jonathan Edwards

III. Corruption and wickedness of heart is another thing that has risen to an exceeding height in the world. Sin has so far prevailed that it has become universal. All mere men are become sinful and corrupt creatures. Let us attend to St. Paul’s description of the world (Rom. 3:9-18), “Jews and Gentiles are all under sin. As is written, There is none righteous, no not one; there is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God. They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable, there is none that doeth good, no not one.”

And not only is every one corrupt, but they are all over corrupt, in every power, faculty, and principle. Every part is depraved. Which is here represented by the several parts of the body being corrupt, as the throat, the tongue, the lips, the mouth, the feet. “Their throat is an open sepulchre, with their tongues they have used deceit, the poison of asps is under their lips; whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness: their feet are swift to shed blood.”

And not only is every part corrupt, but exceeding corrupt, being possessed with dreadful principles of corruption. horribly evil dispositions and principles of sin, that may be represented by the poison of asps, which makes men like vipers and devils, principles of all uncleanness, pride, deceit, injustice, enmity, malice, blasphemy, murder. Here their throats are compared to an open sepulcher, and their mouth is said to be full of cursing and bitterness, and destruction and misery are said to be in their ways.

And there are those principles of sin not only that are very bad, but every kind. Here is no sort of wickedness, but there is a seed of it in men. And these seeds and principles have not only a being in men’s hearts, but are there in great strength. They have the absolute possession and dominion over men so that they are sold under sin. Yea, wicked principles, and those only, are in the heart. The imagination of the thoughts of their heart is evil only. There are bad principles only, and no good ones. “There is no fear of God before their eyes.” Thus the hearts of all men are deceitful and desperately wicked (Jer. 17:9).

And if we look, not only at the natural corruption of the heart, but at the contracted habits of sin, by wicked education and customs, how full shall we find the world of wickedness, in this respect! How have men, by bad customs in sinning, broken down all restraints upon natural corruption, and as it were abandoned themselves to wickedness! So far has corruption and wickedness prevailed in the world, and so high has it risen, that it is become a great and universal deluge, that overtops all things, and prevails with that strength, that it is like the raging waves of the tempestuous ocean, which are ready to bear down all before them.

And if we look

Excerpts from [b]Moral Insanity[/b] by Aaron Hills...

"The heart of the sons of men is full of evil, and madness is in their heart while they live" (Eccle. 9:3).

"...madness is a derangement of the intellectual powers. The judgment is dethroned. Reason does not act normally. Power of reflection is at least temporarily lost."

"Sinners waste themselves in efforts to procure trifles, and neglect treasures infinitely valuable."

"They chase after the baubles of time, honors, popularity, applause, wealth, pleasure, which a breath of trouble will blow away, and neglect character and salvation, the eternal treasures of the soul. They profess to believe in God's existence, but they pay more attention to Peter Smith or Bill Jones! They confess that God has infinite power: but they treat Him with utter contempt. They know that sin is dangerous; but they pursue and practice it with mad eagerness."

"This spiritual insanity is seen by the way sinners treat their best friends. It is a strange fact that insane people are almost universally inclined to injure those most dear to them."

"Think how the sinners treat God who loves them, and gives them every blessing they enjoy; and added to all the rest, gave His Son to die that they might live. They scorn all the pleadings of divine mercy, treat Christ himself with contemptuous neglect."

"The moral insanity of sinners is seen by their treatment of fiction as if it were reality, and their treatment of reality as if it were fiction. If you ever have visited an insane asylum you certainly did not fail to notice what strange absurdities had taken possession of the minds of the inmates. And no two of them alike. It is precisely so with sinners. The eternal truths of God, which have brought salvation to millions, through the ages, they treat as if fiction and idle tales; while every foolish fad of modern infidelity and every empty ism that Satan can invent to delude and damn souls is run after with the most eager avidity. God's truths are set at nought and Satan's lies are welcomed and adopted. It proves to a certainty that their moral reason is dethroned, and madness is in their hearts."

"The moral madness of sinners is seen in their disregard of their spiritual possessions."

"Men show their madness of heart by absurd attempts to achieve impossibilities...

...They are seeking blessedness by defying the holy laws of God. They try to get life in a career of sin, forgetting that the wages of sin is death! They try to bridge the impassable gulf between them and heaven, by false hopes, false doctrines, and worse practice."

"Madmen are uninfluenced by counsel. They take no advice. They laugh at danger and heed no warning."

'How is such conduct to be explained? What malign cause produces such a havoc of destiny? It is not any want of intellect; for noble minds are among the wicked. Nor is it from lack of knowledge. Men have the law of God written in their very hearts. It is from no lack of natural endowments, or a proper balance of faculties. Oh no! The text gives the explanation. "The hearts of the sons of men are full of evil, and madness is in their hearts while they live."'

[b]The Nature of Man[/b] by Robert S. Candlish

"Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips..." (Isa. 6:5).

Ah! It is high time for me to place myself where Isaiah was, and to prostrate myself as Isaiah did. And let it not be as if this uncleanness of my own lips and tolerance of the uncleanness of the lips of the world were a casual infirmity, an outward excrescence upon my character and life. Ah, no! It is myself; my very self! I am a man of unclean lips! The unclean lips constitute my very manhood, my very nature. They are the sign and index of what I am. It is not that I have them, hanging as an uncongenial burden around me. But I am what they express. They proceed out of my heart. They are what my inner man, my whole inner man, truly is. It is my nature that I feel to be so deeply, thoroughly, hopelessly vitiated. Not only are my lips unclean, I am myself a man of unclean lips! That is my very nature. That is myself. Myself as I see myself, when mine eyes see the King, the Lord of Hosts.