(2.) The blessing promised in this covenant, namely, life. This, in scripture, is used sometimes to signify temporal, and, at other times, spiritual and eternal blessings: we have both these senses joined together in the apostle’s words, where we read of _the life that now is, and that which is to come_, 1 Tim. iv. 8. Moreover, sometimes life and blessing, or blessedness, are put together, and opposed to death, as containing in it all the ingredients of evil, Deut. xxx. 19. in which scripture, when Moses exhorts them to choose life, he doth not barely intend a natural life, or outward blessings, for these there is no one but chooses, whereas many are hardly persuaded to make choice of spiritual life. In this head we are upon, we consider life, as including in it, both spiritual and eternal blessedness; so it is to be understood, when our Saviour says, _Strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life_; Matt. vii. 14. and elsewhere, _If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments_, chap. xix. 17. We must therefore conclude, that Adam having such a promise as this made to him, upon condition of perfect obedience, he was given to expect some privileges, which he was not then possessed of, which included in them the enjoyment of the heavenly blessedness; therefore this dispensation, that he was under, may well be called a covenant of life. But, since this is so necessary a subject to be insisted on, we shall offer some arguments to prove it. Some have thought that it might be proved from Hos. vi. 7. which they choose to render, _They, like Adam, have transgressed the covenant_; from whence they conclude, that Adam was under a covenant; and so they suppose that the word Adam is taken for the proper name of our first parent, as it is probable it is elsewhere, _viz._ when Job says, _If I covered my transgressions, as Adam_, Job xxxi. 33. alluding to those trifling excuses which Adam made, to palliate his sin, immediately after his fall, Gen. iii. 12. And there are some expositors who conclude, that this is no improbable sense of this text:[46] yet I would not lay much stress on it; because the words may be rendered as they are in our translation, _They, like men_, &c. _q. d._ according to the custom of vain man, they have _transgressed the covenant_; or, they are no better than the rest of mankind, who are disposed to break covenant with God. In the same sense the apostle uses the words, when reproving the Corinthians, he says, _Are ye not carnal, and walk as men_, 1 Cor. iii. 3.