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the moral and intellectual faculties with which man was endowed, and by which he was capacitated, not only for purity and a station of dominion over the inferior creatures, but for the acquisition of the knowledge, and the enjoyment of the presence, of his Maker. For though the "Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground,” he "breathed into him the breath of life,” so that man became, "a living soul,"-language sufficiently indicative of the spiritual being of which his material frame was the residence, and of the distinction made between his imperishable existence, and the being of the animals who were placed beneath his controul. When the earth was formed, and the ocean was poured into its capacious bed; when planets began to roll, and suns to shine; God said, "Let them be," and they were created-but when man was made, the Almighty Power seemed to make a solemn pause; a new form of expression was adopted; and the model by which this exquisite piece of workmanship was framed, was alone to be discovered in the nature of God.

With what sacred institution was the work of Creation closed?

"The heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. And on the seventh day, God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it; because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made." Thus the completion of the glorious work of creation was commemorated by an institution, beyond all others the most inestimable and merciful-the institution of the Sabbath-which since the deplorable event of the fall, and especially since the change of the day appointed for its celebration, subsequently to the resurrection of Christ, has been the means, in a most important degree, of perpetuating the knowledge of the only true God among a race of fallen and depraved beings, and the medium of communicating blessings, of incalculable and everlasting value, to innumerable multitudes of the souls of men. What was the original condition of Man?

For the residence of the ancestors of the human race,

called Adam, either in allusion to the earth of which he was created, or to the likeness which he bore to his Maker, the paradise of Eden was prepared by the great Author of nature, and made to bloom with un rivalled fertility and loveliness. In this delightful abode of holiness and peace, every fragrant and beautiful plant gratified the senses of its occupant; every animal did homage at his feet; he was permitted to exercise an unbounded sovereignty over the globe; and in all the majesty of perfect reason, in all the felicity of immaculate innocence, with every corporeal and mental endowment, his happy existence was devoted to the service of his God. That he was capable of dying, sad experience proved; but while innocent, he was immortal; not from any indestructible principles of everlasting existence, naturally inherent in himself, but from the gracious appointment and sustaining power of his Creator; and exclusive of the influence of sin, no distemper from within, and no accident from without, would have impaired the vigour of his frame, or opened for him the gloomy and appalling grave. The cultivation of the flower, the shrub, or the tree, furnished him with agreeable employment; the bril liant luminaries of the heavens were exhibited in an unclouded sky for his enraptured contemplation; and all the other pleasures of his existence were enhanced by his intimate communion with his heavenly Father and his everlasting Friend.

What is the scriptural account of the Fall of Man from his original happiness and holiness?

The measure of the joy of Adam was filled up, and that of his paradise was completed, by the crea tion of Eve, by his union with her as the partaker of his happiness, and by the hallowed delights of con jugal complacency and love. But the beauty of this garden of purity and felicity was soon blasted; the brightness of the scene was soon eclipsed; and that deed was perpetrated which brought "death into our world and all our woe." To remind our first parents of their dependance upon God, and of their continued responsibility to Him, the Author of their existence and the Source of their blessedness, one single pro hibition, that they were not to eat of the fruit of the

tree of the knowledge of good and evil, was enjoined upon them; and it was announced, that the violation of the command would be punished with death. That awful and malignant spirit, whose personality and power are so clearly revealed in the Sacred Volume, the arch enemy of God and man, who "kept not his first estate," and is reserved for the tremendous judgment of the final day, inflamed, by seductive arts and detestable falsehoods, in the woman, first of all, the passion of curiosity-that passion, which has been justly denominated, the investigator of truth and the mother of invention, but at the same time the prompter to rashness, the parent of danger, the guide to ruin. Pride and ambition being aroused, Eve was easily induced, by the devil, occupying the form of a serpent, an animal of peculiar sagacity and penetration, to approach, to pluck, to eat the fruit of the forbidden tree. Adam followed her example, either under the influence of her motives, or from a determination to be a partaker in her fate. Awful were the results; the temptation which seduced him, deceived. It offered to him happiness, but he found it woe-it proffered serenity, dignity, glory, but it made him turbulent, gloomy, miserable it promised to elevate him to the station of a God, but it degraded him beneath the original character of man-it allured to the knowledge of good, but it communicated the knowledge of evil-it involved the diseases of the body, the horror of the mind, the defacing of creation, the curse of God, and the ruin of the world. As the grandeur of a once magnificent, but dilapidated, building, can but faintly be ascertained by its shattered and crumbling remains; so human nature, now in ruins, presents a melancholy contrast, in its disorder and degradation, to the splendour of its primeval perfection and glory.

How were the disastrous consequences of the Fall alleviated?

Divine mercy interposed. A ray of glorious light mitigated the horrors of the gloom. A Deliverer was promised in the person of the Seed of the woman, who was to bruise the head of the serpent; and when our first parents departed from Eden, they were cheered with the hope of pardon and restoration to the favour

of their God. To enliven their faith in this glorious promise, and continually to direct their attention to the advent of the Messiah, it seems that the significant rite of sacrifices was instituted. Adam and Eve were clothed in the skins of beasts, which, as they could not be slain for food, (for the grant of animals for this purpose, was not made until after the flood) it is reasonable to conclude were presented in sacrifice, emblematic of the offering of the atoning blood of "the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world." From this time therefore, if the annals of the world form the history of human suffering and crime, they at the same time form THE HISTORY OF REDEEM

ING LOVE.

SECTION II.

THE ANTEDILUVIAN WORLD AND THE DELUGE.

DESCRIBE a mélancholy event which took place in the family of Adam soon after the Fall?

Soon after the expulsion of Adam and Eve from Eden, two sons were given to them, Cain and Abel; and both were devoted, when they had arrived at the age of reason and activity, to the employments which were now necessary for their support. Cain cultivated the ground, which no more spontaneously produced a supply of food; and Abel tended the flocks, which furnished the sacrifices to God, and the clothing which protected from the inclemency of the seasons. In process of time, the brothers presented their sacrifices before the Lord-Cain offered the fruits of the ground, and Abel the firstlings of his flock. But very different were the dispositions of the sons of Adam, in performing this act of religion. An inspired writer informs us that, "By faith Abel offered a more excellent sacrifice than Cain," whose motives seem either to have been confused from ignorance, or improper from selfishness. The sacrifice therefore of Cain was rejected, while that of Abel was approved. It is impossible to say how the divine approbation or displeasure were signified; but it seems to have been instan

taneously and sufficiently evident to them both. The ferocious resentment and ungovernable fury of Cain, were excited by the distinction which had been made between his offering and that of his brother; and instead of investigating the cause of the displeasure of his God, and humbling himself in penitence and prayer, he perpetrated a deed of guilt, attended with the darkest and most awful aggravations. In spite of the condescending expostulation of God, "Why art thou wroth? and why is thy countenance fallen? If thou doest well shalt thou not be accepted? and if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door"-in spite of this expostulation, which sufficiently explained to him, why he had not obtained the approbation of his Maker, he resolved to murder his innocent and inoffensive brother. Under the specious pretext of indulging his fraternal love by the intercourse of familiarity and friendship, Cain enticed his brother into the solitary field; and while he conversed with him, he treacherously assassinated the victim of his vengeance, and thus commenced that series of deeds of blood, which has run parallel with the line of human existence to the present hour.

What was the punishment of Cain?

His guilt-murder-the murder of a friend of God--the murder of a brother-murder, arranged with deliberation, conducted with craft, and perpetrated without remorse—was soon discovered; the eye of the omniscient God was upon him; nature itself, made vocal by his crime, accused him before the dread tribunal of his judge; "The voice of his brother's blood, cried against him from the ground;" he was doomed to be a vagabond and a fugitive upon the earth; the horror of his mind, peopled even the uninhabited deserts, with the imaginary avengers of Abel; and he trembled lest, though there was only one family upon the surface of the globe, he should meet with some minister of vengeance to destroy him. But this was prevented by a signal dispensation of providence; he was to remain to the day of his death a visible monument of the atrocity of his crime; a mark was set upon him: either, according to the commonly received no tion, he bore upon his brow some distinctive brand

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