From the June 1878 Herald of the Morning

 Your analysis of this please ...

Q: lf Christ only bestows the spiritual life, then must man not have lost spiritual life by Adam? for Christ counteracts, first of all,  the work of Adam’s transgression, (Rom. 5, 18). Alb.  Jones, Pittsburg, Pa. 

A: Our brother From Pittsburg makes the assertion, based on the old theory, the very one we are contesting, thus “begging the question,” and asks me to reconcile the facts with that false theory; 1 cannot do it;  more is* there anything in Rom. 5: 18, from which to draw a conclusion that Christ does a twofold work, first contracts, and then regenerates, or imparts spiritual life. 

“Therefore, as by the offence of one upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one upon all men unto justification of life.” 

[He misquotes. The verse reads: “Therefore as by the offence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life.”] 

Here is a clear statement of the work of the first in bringing death, and of the second in brining life. And what I want our reader to keep distinctly before them is, that wherever the apostle speaks of life, it, never refers to the physical life; on the contrary, the flesh life is counted as dead; and when God raises the I dead, they never see life, but remain dead, until the come to Christ. Until we recognize this fact, we never shall clearly distinguish between natural and the spiritual. 

As we lose the germ of life in the first Adam by his sin, that is, he lost it, and so could transmit only death to his posterity; so we gain the life that is in the second Adam by his righteousness; that is, he won life for himself, and can therefore transmit that life to his posterity.