On the Imputation of Adam's First Sin · §438 · Josué de la Place (Placeus)

Chapter 8: Hypognosticon — God does not punish infant for unlived time

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Finely the author of the Hypognosticon Against the Pelagians—whether he is Augustine or another: God, he says, foreknowing its evil works which it was going to do in perfect age, said of his people that it would perish. Is it so, mad Pelagian—is God who is just in all his ways and holy in all his works to be believed, for such a reason, to judge an uncircumcised little child so as to punish him as a doer for crimes not done, to impute some time where life was not lived, where willing and nilling were not of the will? Far be this before a just judge, and so on. See how greatly the pious man abhors that thought—that God imputes to a little child some time where life was not lived, although it could have lived—and how much he judges that not to agree with God's justice.

Latin

Praeclare author Hypognosticon Contra Pelagianos, sive is sit Augustinus, sive alius: Deus, inquit, praescius operum eius malorum, quae facturus erat aetate perfecta, periturum dixit de populo suo. Itane, Pelagiane insane, Deus qui justus est in omnibus viis suis & sanctus in omnibus operibus suis, pro huiusmodi credendus incircumcisum puerulum judicare, ut tanquam factorem pro non factis sceleribus puniat, tempus imputet quoddam ubi vita non vixerit, ubi velle & nolle non fuit voluntatis? Absit hoc apud judicem justum &c. Vide quantopere pius vir ab ista cogitatione abhorreat, Deum puerulo tempus imputare quoddam ubi vita non vixerit, quamvis potuerit vivere; quantumque id existimet non convenire Dei justitiae.

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Josué de la Place (Placeus) on the imputation of Adam's first sin: chapters 1 to 12 and 14, and the later disputation up to its chapter on Romans 5:14, from the Latin. The rest is not yet translated.

Josué de la Place (c. 1596–1655), known in Latin as Placeus, was pastor at Nantes and from 1633 professor of theology at the Academy of Saumur, the school of Cameron and Amyraut.

On the Imputation of Adam's First Sin argues the distinctive Saumur thesis: Adam's sin reaches his posterity only mediately, through the inherited corruption — never by immediate reckoning of a sin they did not commit. Fellow Reformed theologians rejected the view, but the book remains its classic statement.

Part only: Chapters 1–12 and 14, and the disputation up to Romans 5:14

Datec. 1645–1655 AD (written after the 1645 Synod of Charenton, and read in draft by Drelincourt by 10 December 1653; printed posthumously at Saumur, 1661; Reformed / Amyraldian circle)

The English is made from the 1661 Saumur Latin of chapters 1 to 12 and 14 and part of the later disputation. No earlier English was copied.

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Translated from Latin (Saumur 1661) (Latin)
Also checked Text extract of Caput Primum (Latin)
Also checked machine-read text of the 1661 volume (Latin)

We have not yet re-checked this work against its source. We made this study translation with AI help. No scholar has yet certified it as faithful and complete. Open Latin on any section, or the Latin source link, to see the source text. It is not a critical edition.

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