# Second Helvetic Confession
## Chapter 8 - Of Man’s Fall; Sin, and the Cause of Sin
Man was from the beginning created of God after the image of God, in righteousness and true holiness, good and upright; but by the instigation of the serpent and his own fault, falling from the goodness and uprightness, he became subject to sin, death, and divers calamities; and such a one as he became by his fall, such are all his offspring, even subject to sin, death, and sundry calamities.

And we take sin to be that natural corruption of man, derived or spread from our first parents unto us all, through which we, being drowned in evil concupiscence, and clean turned away from God, but prone to all evil, full of all wickedness, distrust, contempt, and hatred of God, can do no good of ourselves—no, not so much as think any ([Matthew 12:34-35](/get-passage/Matthew+12:34-35)).

And, what is more, even as we do grow in years, so by wicked thoughts, words, and deeds, committed against the law of God, we bring forth corrupt fruits, worthy of an evil tree: in which respect we, through our own desert, being subject to the wrath of God, are in danger of just punishment; so that we had all been cast away from God, had not Christ, the Deliverer, brought us back again.

By death, therefore, we understand not only bodily death, which is once to be suffered of us all for our sins, but also everlasting punishments due to our corruption and to our sins. For the Apostle says, ‘We were dead in trespasses and sins, and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others; but God, who is rich in mercy, even when we were dead in sins, quickened us together with Christ’ ([Ephesians 2:1-5](/get-passage/Ephesians+2:1-5)). Again, ‘As by one man sin entered into the world, and by sin, death, and so death passed upon all men, forasmuch as all men have sinned,’ etc. ([Romans 5:12](/get-passage/Romans+5:12)).

We therefore acknowledge that original sin is in all men; we acknowledge that all other sins which spring therefrom are both called and are indeed sins, by what name soever they may be termed, whether mortal or venial, or also that which is called sin against the Holy Spirit, which is never forgiven.

We also confess that sins are not equal ([John 5:16-17](/get-passage/John+5:16-17)), although they spring from the same fountain of corruption and unbelief, but that some are more grievous than others ([Mark 3:28-29](/get-passage/Mark+3:28-29)); even as the Lord has said, ‘It shall be easier for Sodom’ than for the city that despises the word of the Gospel ([Matthew 10:15](/get-passage/Matthew+10:15)). We therefore condemn all those that have taught things contrary to these; but especially Pelagius, and all the Pelagians, together with the Jovinianists, who, with the Stoics, count all sins equal. We in this matter agree fully with St. Augustine, who produced and maintained his sayings out of the Holy Scriptures. Moreover, we condemn Florinus and Blastus (against whom also Irenæus wrote), and all those who make God the author of sin; seeing it expressly written, ‘Thou art not a God that loveth wickedness; thou hatest all them that work iniquity, and wilt destroy all that speak leasing’ ([Psalm 5:4-6](/get-passage/Psalm+5:4-6)). And, again, ‘When the devil speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own; because he is a liar, and the father of lies’ ([John 8:44](/get-passage/John+8:44)). Yea, there are even in ourselves sin and corruption enough, so that there is no need that God should infuse into us either a new or greater measure of wickedness.

Therefore, when God is said in the Scripture to harden ([Exodus 7:13](/get-passage/Exodus+7:13)), to blind ([John 12:40](/get-passage/John+12:40)), and to deliver us up into a reprobate sense ([Romans 1:28](/get-passage/Romans+1:28)), it is to be understood that God does it by just judgment, as a just judge and revenger. To conclude, as often as God in the Scripture is said and seems to do some evil, it is not thereby meant that man does not commit evil, but that God does suffer it to be done, and does not hinder it; and that by his just judgment, who could hinder it if he would: or because he makes good use of the evil of men, as he did in the sin of Joseph’s brethren; or because himself rules sins, that they break not out and rage more violently than is meet. St. Augustine, in his Enchiridion, says, ‘After a wonderful and unspeakable manner, that is not done beside his will which is done contrary to his will; because it could not be done if he should not suffer it to be done; and yet he doth not suffer it to be done unwillingly; neither would he, being God, suffer any evil to be done, unless, being also almighty, he could make good of evil.’ Thus far Augustine.

Other questions, as whether God would have Adam fall, or whether he forced him to fall, or why he did not hinder his fall, and such like, we account among curious questions (unless perchance the frowardness of heretics, or of men otherwise importunate, do compel us to open these points also out of the Word of God, as the godly doctors of the Church have oftentimes done); knowing that the Lord did forbid that man should eat of the forbidden fruit, and punished his transgression; and also that the things done are not evil in respect of the providence, will, and power of God, but in respect of Satan, and our will resisting the will of God.
