shall shine; the zephyrs blow; the earth teem with flowers and fruits for your comfort. The productions of all climes shall contribute to your health, your happiness, your usefulness. BUT there stands in your way a single small portion of sparkling, tempting liquid, which you touch at your peril. You need it not to add to your enjoyment; and you taste it at the peril of the body and the soul. Taste it, and your virtue is ruined; your happiness shall be blighted; a frown shall rest forever on you; the heavens shall gather blackness over your head, and the earth shall produce thorns and briers beneath your feet. It is to be the test of your obedience; and is to determine your character and your doom for time and for eternity. It is easy to abstain. It requires no real self-denial. Abstinence will be attended with safety, happiness, heaven.' - Now would not a statement like this be liable to all the objections which have ever been made to the command given to Adam in the garden of Eden? And would not a satisfactory answer to the one be also a satisfactory answer to the other? And is it not a fact that this is the way in which the world is actually governed? And do not laws in themselves simple, and actions in themselves unimportant, in fact, determine the destiny of men in all the relations and walks of life?

What act is more simple than that of crossing the threshold of a gambler? And yet that often determines the destiny of a What act more simple than the act of going to the house of her whose "steps take hold on hell?" And yet this determines the destiny of many a man.

man.

Thus a man's whole life is often determined by some simple circumstance. A slight direction given him at one of the turning points of life often determines all that ever follows, and settles permanently his destiny. What appears more simple than that on which a man's health, or even his life depends. Often, could the law be traced, which really determines a man's health, or life, it would be as simple, and as liable to objection as that in Paradise. Health, and life often depend on some simple article of food. Some subtle poison may lurk where we expected nutriment. A drug-unimportant and odious perhaps, may determine all in regard to the health, or life of an individual, and through him all that is valuable in the liberty and happiness of a nation.

The principle which is established here is, that the destiny of men is often in fact determined by some law that in itself VOL. IX. No. 25.

25

seems to be unimportant, and whose appointment is liable to the same objections as those which are brought against the law of Eden. And if this is the way in which God actually governs the world, we are not to be surprised that we find the embryo of this same scheme in the very commencement of our history, and in the first organization of society.

8. If a simple law was to be given to test the character of the man; if man was thus early to be put to trial; and if his trial was to have so important results, then the only question is, whether the law which was actually given was one which it became the lawgiver to ordain, and which was fitted to the circumstances of the man? It is evident that any rule would answer the purpose intended. It matters not what the rule was provided it was adapted to the powers of the man, and provided it was made known to him. It might have been a prohibition to cross a certain stream, or to go to a designated spot; it might have been a prohibition against looking towards heaven at a certain period of the day; it might have been a command to suffer a certain part of the garden to lie waste, and uncultivated; or it might have been a prohibition against plucking some designated flower, or fruit. The only circumstance which we can suppose would have led to the designation of the object which was to be a test, would be that there should have been some tendency or inclination in the man to that thing; or something in the thing itself, or in his inclination towards it so strong as to constitute a test, or trial of his virtue. For if the thing were wholly impracticable, or if there were no inducement of any kind, or any inclination towards it, to prohibit it would constitute no test, or trial of his virtue. The appointment of a designated fruit, meets all these circumstances. The law was simple and easily understood. It was easy to be obeyed; and therefore adapted to the capacities of one just entering on his existence. The thing that was prohibited was not needful to life, or even to comfort since all his wants were amply provided for and from any thing that appears, other trees in the same garden might have borne in abundance the same kind of fruit. And there was a tendency, or inclination to it, sufficiently strong to make it a test of obedience. There was the allurement of appetite that needed to be gratified, and which would prompt to the participation of this fruit-not exclusively-but in common with the other fruit of the garden. Whatever the infidel may say of the narrative, therefore, there are some points on which

he can urge no objection. They are those which have been specified. Man was bound to obey his Maker; positive laws every where exist; all individuals and communities are subjected to a trial more or less severe; the trial is usually in some matter that is in itself of little importance; and this trial was adapted to the circumstances of the newly created man. It remains only to notice some of the objections which the infidel might allege against this statement.

1. The first is, that it was ridiculous and unworthy of God; that to make the eating or not eating of the fruit of a single tree connected with such results, is ridiculous and absurd; that no man can believe that God would do it; and that it has the appearance of a crude, and foolish story, rather than the aspect of sober and dignified historical truth.

To this I answer, in addition to what has been already observed. 1. That if it was ridiculous it can be shown to be so, and the reason why it was so can be pointed out. It is easy to say of any thing that it is ridiculous, but there is argument neither in a jest, nor a sneer. If any thing is absurd, the absurdity can be specified and seen. Besides, it would be easy to say the same thing of many other laws and facts, which are nevertheless a matter of sober, and melancholy verity. It might be said that it is absurd and ridiculous to make a man's happiness and life depend on so simple a matter as abstinence from a glass of intoxicating drink; and yet nothing is more common than such an occurrence. 2. If it be said that this command was too simple, and too easily obeyed, to constitute a test, I answer (a) that the very fact of its simplicity is an argument in favor of the truth of the narrative. It better evinces the goodness of the lawgiver, than the appointment of a law of greater severity would have done. It was besides adapted to the condition of the Had a law been given to Adam such as might be given to Gabriel, or to a man now, every one sees that it would have been disproportioned to his capacity, and then the objection would have been well founded that the law was unjust. As it was, its simplicity was in favor of the man; and the fact that such a law was violated, serves to vindicate the Creator from all blame. Was a severe trial desirable? Is it not always a circumstance that shows the equity and goodness of the lawgiver when his commands are easily obeyed? But (b) the event showed that the law was severe enough. Notwithstanding its simplicity, it was broken. The slight temptation led to its vio

man.

lation. It was, therefore, a law of sufficient severity to constitute a test; and its simplicity should not be an objection against it. (c) I may add, that the same objection will lie against most of the laws which now determine a man's character. We have seen on what slight circumstances the destiny of men often hangs. And if the simplicity of the law given to Adam is an objection against the probability of its being from heaven, that argument is at once answered by an appeal to facts as they actually occur in the world. A man that was urged to swallow a drug to save his life, and that was told his life depended on it, might, with the same reason, say that it was ridiculous. And yet this would not prove that that was not the law appointed by heaven, on which his restoration might depend, and that only by this could his life be preserved.

2. A more material objection to the statement of Moses may be that it was unjust to make so great consequences depend on an action of so little importance as that of eating or abstaining from the fruit of a single tree; that the punishment of death could not be proportionate to the offence; and that to make the eternal destiny of himself and millions depend on such an action is so unjust and severe that it is impossible to credit the statement of Moses. The death of millions on earth; and the woes which precede death — the train of sorrows here, and the inextinguishable fires of an eternal hell, it is said, are too great interests to be involved in an action so trifling, and in the consequences of a deed which was momentary.

In regard to this objection, I may observe the following things.

First. That the question about pain in this life, and death, and eternal suffering is not to affect the present inquiry. That men suffer here now, and that they die, is a matter of fact about which there is to be no controversy. For the same reason we are to lay out of view just now the justice of future punishment. That men may suffer in a future world is just as proper and as probable as that they suffer here; and that they will thus suffer is a fact which is made known to us by revelation. Whether the command respecting the forbidden fruit was given to Adam or not, these are facts that belong to our melancholy history, and that cannot be called in question.

Secondly. Ir it was designed that the conduct of Adam should have any influence in determining his own future happiness; if it had any bearing on his continuance in life, and in

the circumstances of his departure, then the command, being simple, and easily obeyed, was the most favorable that could have been given. On the supposition that his disobedience in any way would bring death and wo into the world; on the supposition that his conduct could be such as, under the divine arrangement, would be the eternal undoing of himself and his posterity, unless redeemed, then it is not possible to conceive how it could have been arranged in circumstances more favorable to himself and to his posterity than it was. The law was

simple — and this circumstance was actually more favorable to him, and gave a better promise of a happy issue than if it had been obscure, and complicated, and unintelligible. It was easy to be obeyed, and the temptation to disobedience was small and this circumstance is more favorable to a continuance in vir tue than if it had been difficult; than if it had been disproportioned to his powers; than if the temptation had been mighty; and than if it had required angelic powers to resist it.

Thirdly. Change the circumstances of the case, and grant what the objector would seem to demand. We assume here as a matter of fact, and as a matter not called in question by the point of the objection, that the fall of man would involve himself and his posterity in ruin. Now suppose that the law on which these stupendous and eternal results depended had not been of such a character as that stated by Moses. Suppose it had not been simple, easily understood; or easily obeyed. Suppose it had involved temptation up to the full powers of the man; suppose it had required service up to the utmost limit of human ability; suppose that God had required of him a service. that involved every thing but impossibility, does not any one see that this would have had altogether more the appearance of injustice than in the case stated by Moses? Would it not have placed the world under circumstances of positive disadvantage compared with those on which, according to the sacred writer, the affairs of the world were actually commenced? And would not this have been liable to the real objection that there was severity, and harshness in the laws of the Creator; that, so to speak, man had but a slender chance of obedience and happiness?

Fourthly. The greatest events in the universe depend often on causes as liable to objection as this. The planets are bound in their orbits by simple laws. They move regularly and harmoniously. While they thus move every thing is well; and