Romans 5:13. For until the law, sin was [counted] in the world] The Apostle's doctrine, that all have received the reconciliation through Christ, being founded on the fact, that all have been subjected to sin and death through Adam, he immediately enters on the proof of that fact, by appealing to the death of infants and others, who, not being capable of actual sin, cannot be thought to die for their own transgression. But to see the argument in its full force we must supply the word counted or imputed in the first clause, which is inserted by the Apostle in the second: sin was counted in the world to all men: that is, all men without exception suffer death, the punishment of sin.
But sin is not imputed, when there is no law— By law Mr. Locke understands a revealed positive law threatening death for every offence. But on that supposition, no sin could be punished before the law of Moses was given, contrary to what happened to the antediluvians. And after it was given, none but the sins of the Jews could be punished. Whereas the Apostle affirms, chap. Romans 1:32 that the Gentiles know, that they who sin against the law written on their heart, are worthy of death. I therefore think that the expression, Where there is no law, is general, and means, where no law of God is known; and that the Apostle had in his eye the case of infants and idiots, to whom certainly there is no law, as they are not capable of the knowledge of law; consequently they are not capable of sinning actually like Adam. Wherefore since death reigns over them, equally as over others, it is evident, that, having nosin of their own, they die through Adam's sin alone.