On the Imputation of Adam's First Sin · §481 · Josué de la Place (Placeus)

Chapter 9: actual past vs inhering vice — before four proofs

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Adam's first actual sin, committed some five thousand years ago, has passed, and did not remain in the nature of things: inhering vice remained with human nature, and is and thrives today. That is unique in number; of this there are as many individuals as there are humans. That was an action; this stands in the manner of a habit. That is outside us, and it is not possible for it to be in us; this is within us, sticking in us. That you think is ours, but only by God's imputation; this is truly ours, deeply inhering in us: That you will have as fault; this as its penalty. With this ambiguity and confusion removed, let us see by what reasons you prove that the Apostle by the sin which entered into the world understands Adam's actual sin. Which was certainly Pighius's opinion, which Bellarmine himself refuted with some arguments, but I do not wish to press you with prejudices.

Latin

Peccatum primum actuale Adami ante quinque millia annorum commissum praeteriit, nec permansit in rerum natura: vitium inhaerens cum natura humana permansit, estque & viget hodie. Illud unicum est numero, hujus tot sunt individua quot homines. Illud fuit actio, hoc se habet ad modum habitus. Illud extra nos est, nec possibile est esse in nobis, hoc est intra nos in nobis haerens. Illud tu putas nostrum esse, sed imputatione duntaxat Dei, hoc vere nostrum est, nobis penitus inhaerens: Illud vis esse culpam, hoc illius poenam. Hac ambiguitate & confusione sublata, videamus quibus rationibus probes, Apostolum per peccatum quod in mundum introiit peccatum actuale Adami intelligere. Quae certe fuit sententia Pighii, quam ipse Bellarminus aliquot argumentis confutavit, sed nolo te praejudiciis urgere.

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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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