Sinfulness of sin - Venning - III - Section 2 continued

Required reading
Sinfulness of sin by Ralph Venning (available from Amazon or free on the internet, here for example).  Continue reading Section Two, Point 2, by reading all of the subpoint, 'In a moral sense'.

My summary
Venning continues looking at sin's contrariety to man and today examines how sin is against man's present good in this life in a moral sense.  He does this by showing that sin has:
(i) degraded man;
(ii) darkened man's understanding;
(iii) made man a fool;
(iv) made man a beast;
(v) separated man from God.

What grabbed me
To make the point that sin in man has made him a beast, Venning broke it up into three sections: (i) that man is made like a beast; (ii) like the worst of beasts; (iii) worse than beasts.  I thought the last section, that man is worse than beasts, was very helpful: 'The beasts do not transgress the law of their nature, but man has done and does so over and over again.  The instinct of these creatures is their law, and they constantly observe it.  The characteristic of a beast, which is condemnable in man, is not condemnable in the beast: ignorance and stupidity is no crime in an ox or ass, but it is in man.  It is no fault in a lion to be devouring, but it is sin in man to be like a devouring lion.  The beasts fulfil the law of nature, but men transgress it when they act like beasts.  So sinful man is worse than the beasts.'

To compare sinful man to beasts is not very kind to the poor creatures.  A vicious dog is still lawful and good.  But a vicious man is unlawful and therefore worse than a dog.

Next week's reading
Read to the end of Section Two: the whole point that 'Sin is against the good of man in the life to come'.

Now it's your turn
Please post your own notes and thoughts in the comments section below.