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De la grâce de Jésus-Christ et du péché originel

41.

Non, sans doute,je ne puis vous dépeindre cet heureux état, qui eût persévéré si le péché ne fût point intervenu ; cet état dans lequel le mariage aurait joui d'une tranquillité parfaite au point de vue de la concupiscence, dans lequel enfin tous les membres du corps auraient été complètement soumis à l'empire de la volonté. Mais si je ne puis le dépeindre, les Ecritures sont là pour fixer ma foi sur ce point. Aujourd'hui, s'il s'agit de relations entre époux, partout se trouvent les élans de la concupiscence; s'il' s'agit de l'enfantement, il ne s'annonce que par les gémissements et la douleur; s'il s'agit enfin de la naissance, elle est déjà couverte des ombres futures de la mort. Et cependant les Ecritures nous enseignent que si le péché n'eût pas été commis, l'enfantement eût été joyeux et la mort inconnue. Adam et Eve rougissaient-ils avant le péché? Pourquoi donc, aussitôt le péché, se couvrir de feuillage? Avant le péché leurs yeux n'étaient point fermés, mais ils n'étaient point encore ouverts à ce qui devait les faire rougir; leur corps tout entier leur paraissait le chef-d'oeuvre des mains de Dieu, et ils n'y trouvaient rien dont ils dussent rougir ou qu'ils dussent voiler. Concluons donc que si le crime ne fût pas survenu par la désobéissance, la honte eût été chose inconnue et la pudeur n'aurait eu rien à cacher.

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A Treatise on the grace of christ, and on original sin

Chapter 41 [XXXVI.]--Lust and Travail Come from Sin. Whence Our Members Became a Cause of Shame.

Granted, therefore, that we have no means of showing both that the nuptial acts of that primeval marriage were quietly discharged, undisturbed by lustful passion, and that the motion of the organs of generation, like that of any other members of the body, was not instigated by the ardour of lust, but directed by the choice of the will (which would have continued such with marriage had not the disgrace of sin intervened); still, from all that is stated in the sacred Scriptures on divine authority, we have reasonable grounds for believing that such was the original condition of wedded life. Although, it is true, I am not told that the nuptial embrace was unattended with prurient desire; as also I do not find it on record that parturition was unaccompanied with groans and pain, or that actual birth led not to future death; yet, at the same time, if I follow the verity of the Holy Scriptures, the travail of the mother and the death of the human offspring would never have supervened if sin had not preceded. Nor would that have happened which abashed the man and woman when they covered their loins; because in the same sacred records it is expressly written that the sin was first committed, and then immediately followed this hiding of their shame. ¹ For unless some indelicacy of motion had announced to their eyes--which were of course not closed, though not open to this point, that is, not attentive--that those particular members should be corrected, they would not have perceived anything on their own persons, which God had entirely made worthy of all praise, that called for either shame or concealment. If, indeed, the sin had not first occurred which they had dared to commit in their disobedience, there would not have followed the disgrace which their shame would fain conceal.