pains. Adam and his partner Eve dwelt peacefully in the garden of Eden, which they were employed to cultivate. All nature fmiled around them, and was dreft, no doubt, in its most beautiful attire. Every thing was exactly fuited to afford them happiness; and this favored pair, without angry paffions, without undue felfifhnefs, without anxiety or diftruft, and without murmur or complaint, enjoyed the good which God had given them, and lived in favour with their Maker.

But we have now to defcribe a moft melancholy change in their condition. It had pleased the all-wife Creator, when he made man, to appoint a certain trial for him, which was meant to ferve, no doubt, as a teft of his love and obedience. His trial confifted in his being forbidden to eat of one tree ftanding in the middle of the garden of Eden, which was called, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, while the fruit of all the reft of the trees might be freely eaten.

We have all of us our trials fomewhat in the fame manner now; thus, for inftance, we may eat the food which is our own, and which is wholesome for us; we may take the reft which is neceffary to refrefh the body; we may indulge our natural affections and inclinations in the manner which God has ordained; but then we must not carry any thing to excefs; and there are a number of things which we must in no cafe do, Oh! let us remember when we

fee fome forbidden pleasure within our reach, that we are not to touch it; but that it is placed there for the trial of our faith, just as the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was placed within the fight of Adam's eye, and within the reach of his arm,

"And God faid to Adam, In the day that thou eateft thereof thou fhalt furely die."

The Scriptures proceed to tell us, that Eve was firft tempted by the ferpent, (namely, by the devil, as is commonly fuppofed) who faid to her, in direct contradiction to God, that if fhe and her husband fhould eat of the forbidden fruit, "they fhould not die, but should become as gods, knowing good and evil."-She then feeing that the fruit was fair, and much to be defired to make one wife, gathered fome of it, and gave it to her husband, which he did eat."

Oh! wretched Adam, how art thou now fallen! thou haft believed the enemy of God, instead of God himfelf, being tempted to this crime by her who was made to be a help-meetfor thee! how is thy gold become drofs, and thine honor laid in the duft, and thy glory departed from thee!

Adam, by this act, renounced his allegiance to God, and broke the condition on which the favor of his Maker had been fufpended; and, therefore, the curfe which had been threatened remained now to be executed-" In the day that thou eateft thereof, it has been faid, thou fhalt furely die." Thofe words muft neceffarily be

understood to imply, that he fhould forfeit his natural life, and be deprived of that happy state of existence, which, while obedient, he was entitled to enjoy; and that, inftead of this, he fhould come under the curfe of God. Here alfo the New Teftament comes in aid, and teaches us that "fin having thus entered the world, and death by fin, death in this manner paffed upon all men, for that all have finned; and that through this one man, judgment came upon all men to condemnation."

Thus did Adam fall; by aiming to be as God, he loft even his former rank as man, and by wickedly liftening to the temptation of the devil, he appears to have become a fharer in his guilt, and confequently alfo in his condemnation.

Soon after this event, our firft parents are defcribed as afhamed to meet the eye of God when he appeared to them, as he was wont to do, in the garden; they hid themselves among the trees, and faid that they had felt afhamed, because they were naked. Sin and fhame, it may be remarked, entered into the world together.

"And the Lord God faid, Haft thou eaten of the tree whereof I commanded thee that thou fhouldft not eat? And the man faid, the woman whom thou gaveft to be with me, the gave me of the tree, and I did eat."

It feems as if Adam, by this expreffion, meant partly to caft the blame on God who had given him the woman that had proved his tempter, and he certainly cafts the blame partly on Eve, while

fhe in the fame felf-juftifying fpirit, replies to God, when he charges her with the guilt." The ferpent beguiled me and I did eat."

Our first parents, as we may plainly fee, were now become poor guilty finners; they were dif pofed to palliate and justify their crime, and thus to add fin to fin, juft as is the way with all wicked people now. They alfo became, after this time, full of the dread of God, instead of the love of Him, and difpofed to fay to him, as Peter did to our Saviour when first called to by Him, "Depart from me, for I am a finful man O Lord."

God immediately proceeds to pronounce the following curfe on them: "Unto the woman he faid, I will greatly multiply thy forrow, and thy conception; in forrow fhalt thou bring forth children, and thy defire fhalt be to thy husband, and he fhall rule over thee."-And unto Adam he faid, "Because thou haft hearkened to the voice of thy wife, and haft eaten of the tree whereof I commanded thee that thou fhouldft not eat, curfed is the ground for thy fake; in forrow fhalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life; thorns alfo and thistles fhall it bring forth to thee, and thou fhalt cat the herb of the field. In the fweat of thy face fhalt thou eat bread till thou return unto the ground, for out of it waft thou taken, for duft thou art, and unto duft fhalt thou return.” "And the Lord fent him forth from the land of Eden to till the ground from whence he was taken. So he drove out the man, and he placed

at the eaft of the garden of Eden, cherubims and a flaming fword, which turned every way to keep the way of the tree of life."

Such is the hiftory of the fall; and O how has iniquity ever fince prevailed in the world. Cain, the first born fon of Adam, became the murderer of his brother. The whole earth is faid, prefently after, to have been "filled with violence." "God looked down on the children of men, to see if there were any that were righteous, but all flesh had corrupted his way before the Lord, and every imagination of man's heart was only evil continually, infomuch that the Almighty is faid (fpeaking after the manner of men) to have grieved him at his heart, and to have repented that he had made man."

After bearing with the rebellious offspring of Adam for about two thoufand years, it pleafed God to drown the world with a flood, the family of Noah alone being excepted, who was found righteous. The great cities of Sodom and Gomorrah were, after this, deftroyed for their wickedness; and fo were Tyre and Sidon in ftill later times.

In order that true religion might be maintained, at least among one people, God feparated to himfelf the fingle nation of the Jews, and made a covenant with them, and gave them his laws, and wrought many miracles among them. But fo corrupt is every where the nature of man, that even the Jews provoked him to wrath, and proved rebellious and unbelieving.