in the habit of coming to the garden and communing with Adam, for he did not now find him as he was wont to do. Adam then must have been a holy creature, like his Creator, or he would not have held immediate intercourse with him; for whenever he became a transgressor, God gave up immediate communion with him, for he was no longer holy as God is holy.

E. But are there not Scriptures that say what the image of God is?

M. Yes; if you turn to the 24th verse of the 4th chapter of the Ephesians, and 10th verse of the 3d chapter of Colossians, you will find what the image of God is.

E. I shall read these passages. "And that ye put on the new man, which after God, is created in righteousness and true holiness." "And have put on the new man, which is renewed in knowledge, after the image of him that created him."

F. These passages show us that the resemblance which man originally bare to God consisted chiefly in holiness and righteousness, similar in nature, though infinitely inferior in degree, to the holiness and righteousness of his heavenly Father.

M. You are not to imagine, because Adam was made in the image of God, and had dominion over all the creatures inferior to himself, that he was to live without God, or be independent of him. He was created happy ;

but this was in connexion with all holy obedience to the will of his Creator. You recollect, Henry, the commandment which God gave to man in paradise?

H. Yes, mother; "God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil thou shalt not eat of it, for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die."

M. In this God displayed great kindness in allowing our first parents to eat of every tree, with the exception of one, and they were restricted from that one because it would be their destruction.

C. But what kind of tree was that, mother? I have heard Betty say that it was an apple

tree.

M. The Bible does not inform us what kind of fruit tree it was; but God expressly charged them not to eat it or death would be the consequence.

H. Oh, I think it must have been a very poisonous tree.

M. But, Henry, supposing that it was not a poisonous tree, but a tree bearing wholesome fruit like apples, do you not think that disobedience to the commandment of God deserves punishment?

to disobey

H. It certainly was very wrong God; but it was only taking a little fruit, and it was a sad thing to die for that.

M. It was in the sad disregard which they showed to the divine authority, and their disbelief of his word, that their sin lay. Your manner of speaking is very common among men. He that takes the name of the Lord God in vain, will tell you that he intended no harm by it; another, that breaks the Sabbath day, by thinking, speaking, and doing what is agreeable to his own inclinations, says that he has done no great evil. Every sinner will excuse his own sins, and heartily disapprove of the punishment affixed to his crime; and we may rest assured that the threatening of death was not greater than the crime of disobedience deserved.

C. But, mother, you know they were tempted to eat of the fruit of the tree.

M. Certainly they were; and the greater sin was his who tempted them; but temptation is no excuse for disobedience, for it was a temptation that they were fully able to resist and overcome. Many, in falling into sin, excuse themselves because they were seduced to it by others: but such persons are conscious, that if they had at first resisted, they would not have been overcome, but by listening to the insinuating and flattering representations of their seducers, they were "drawn away of their own lust and enticed, then when lust had conceived, it brought forth sin, and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death."

H. But why did they suffer themselves to be seduced by such a creature as a serpent?

F. Serpents had not been such odious creatures to our first parents as they have generally been to their children. The very name given to it by Adam, describes it as a creature of great sharpness, cunning, and artifice, and this is its character to this day. Some kinds of serpents are also very beautiful; this, with its other properties, might draw the attention and excite the admiration of our unsuspecting parents.

E. It is said to be a subtle creature. I shall read the passage, Genesis. iii. 1: “Now the serpent was more subtle than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made." But here is the difficulty with me: "And he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said, ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden?" How did he know what God had said? and how he was able to speak? I never hear of serpents speaking now.

F. No; and I believe they were not formed with the faculty of speech; but you know, Eliza, that several creatures have been taught by man to articulate words, and even sentences, who otherwise are mute, or only cry; and in this case, a Being of far superior ingenuity than man, employed the serpent as his instrument to accomplish his malignant and cruel purpose against the innocence and happiness of Adam and his partner. The Scrip

tures speak of a malignant being, under the name of the devil, which signifies the tempter; he is also styled Satan, which signifies adversary, being opposed to God and man. This same person is repeatedly called the Serpent. In the 12th of Revelation, and also in the 20th chapter, he is called "the great dragon, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan ;" and the Apostle Paul, in the 11th of second Corinthians, says: "I fear lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtilty, so your minds shall be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ."

H. It was Satan, then, under the form of a serpent, that tempted them.

F. It was this malignant spirit, in the body of a real serpent, that seduced the woman; for while the destruction of Satan is the import of the doom denounced by God, the serpent, as the instrument, suffers in the doom, being "cursed above all cattle, and above every beast of the field."

H. Was not Satan once a happy being himself?

F. Yes; but along with many other angels which kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation, God hath reserved him in everlasting chains under darkness, unto the judgment of the great day.

E. What was the crime of which these angels were guilty?

C