SIDE ISSUES ELIMINATED 197 



actual teaching does not warrant. The phrase "orig- 

 inal sin" cannot now be banished from the theology of 

 transmitted tendency to sin, but its constant distinction 

 in theology from actual sin ought to preclude its iden- 

 tification with personal guilt. If so, then we ought to 

 treat all the phrases of similar suggestiveness which 

 appear in St. Paul and in theological documents with 

 the same discriminating allowance for rhetorical sym- 

 bolism.^ To take a critical example, if we are said 

 to be "by nature children of wrath," ^ the analogy of 

 the use of language which I have been discussing 

 warrants our understanding this to mean that our 

 natural condition inclines us to conduct that displeases 

 God. It is quite unnecessary to read into the phrase 

 the teaching that God is angry with new-born infants 

 for being what they have had no choice in becoming. 

 The free and partially figurative language of St. Paul 

 was useful for accentuating ideas that needed to be 

 emphasized. But it becomes misleading and perni- 

 cious when in theology it is employed to signify more 

 than he can be shown to have meant by it.^ 



1 Dr. Tennant perceives the metaphorical use to which St. Paul 

 puts the word sin; Origin of Sin, p. 94; but betrays a tendency to 

 regard every acknowledgment by catholic writers that we have 

 sinned in Adam as of itself proving their belief in transmitted guilt. 



2 The Church Catechism. Cf. Ephes. ii. 3, as considered above, 

 p. 145, where references are given. 



3 We can fully sympathize with Dr. Tennant's regret that theol- 

 ogy has technicalized the phrase "original sin" and related terms, 

 without either undertaking to repudiate a terminology so long estab- 

 lished or supposing its use invariably to imply a literal imputation 

 of Adam's sin to his posterity and a transmission of his guilt. 



