junction and awful sentence; she disbelieved her God, and believed the lie of the Devil. "She saw that the tree was good for food, and a tree to be desired to make one wise.' It is highly probable that, as the serpent had the audacity to declare the truth of God to be a lie, he would also show the woman that there was nothing hurtful in the tree by eating of the fruit in her presence, and she might attribute his knowledge and the faculty of speech to this very thing. She might reason, if this fruit had such a wonderful and beneficial effect upon the serpent, it might have a still more powerful effect upon herself and her partner, in raising them to the rank of gods, and endowing them with equal knowledge. "She therefore took of the fruit and did eat." It does not appear that she felt any thing unpleasant in its flavour, and no injurious effects followed; she sought out her husband, persuaded him to follow her example, and "he did eat." The Scriptures say nothing respecting the argument she used to induce him to be her companion in guilt. We are indeed informed, that "Adam was not deceived; but the woman being deceived was in the transgression." She was first caught in the snare, and no sooner did she become a sinner than she became a tempter. Adam was not deceived; he sinned with his eyes open; such was the force of example in her whom he loved, that

he became her companion in iniquity; in doing which he acted a criminal part in hearkening to the enticing persuasions of his wife in preference to the express command of his God.

M. Here, my dear children, observe that the crime lay not in simply eating, but in gratifying the desire of eating that which God had expressly prohibited. The woman coveted a forbidden object; and she took what was not her own.

H. Still, mother, I think that an apple or a peach was no great matter.

M. Perhaps you imagine if she had coveted and taken some jewels of gold or silver, it would have been a great crime?

H. Oh, certainly it would have been a much greater crime than taking some fruit ; because you know jewels of gold or silver are of much greater value than a little fruit.

M. No doubt in our estimation jewels are much more valuable than the fruit of a tree, but in the circumstances in which our first parents were placed, they were of no value whatever. And in the sight of God, to whom "the earth belongs and the fulness thereof," the one is of no greater account than the other. It was the evil desire, and the indulging of it, that were so offensive to God, and so awfully ruinous to the transgressors.

F. We read in the first epistle of John, of "the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and

the pride of life:" all these were evidently indulged by the woman; she looked upon the tree; its fruit was beautiful; she wished to have it as her own; for what purpose? That she might gratify her appetite; and, above all, that she and her partner might be elevated in their circumstances,-that they might "be as gods." All the evil that is in the world springs from the lusts which John has mentioned, and this one transgression of our first parents, of which many think so lightly, was the opening of the fountain of corruption, which has deluged the world with crime, misery, disease, and death.

CONVERSATION III.

ON THE CONSEQUENCES OF THE FIRST TRANSGRESSION.

F. Reflecting men among the heathen, in beholding the evils that are in the world, have been totally at a loss to account for them. They have acknowledged that this world has been created by a beneficent, as well as a powerful Being; they have admitted that mankind are the most perfect and the most privileged among all the creatures in

this world, but they have acknowledged that there are none among all the creatures so depraved, so vicious, and so perverse as they are, and that there are none so unhappy and wretched. They were subjected to pain, disease, sickness, and to death, in every form. But they could not say what was the cause of all these dismal effects; some had an idea that mankind are not what they once were; they talked of a golden age, in which men were once innocent and happy; of an iron age, in which they became corrupt and wretched; various reasons were assigned for the change, but these were fabulous and unsatisfactory.

E. It is solely to the Scriptures that we are indebted for information respecting the state of mankind in this world, is it not?

F. Yes, they give a simple and satisfactory account of the cause of all the evils that af flict the human race, "by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin, and so death hath passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned." When God first blessed man, the blessing included his posterity as well as himself; the enjoyment of the blessing was conditional upon his obedience; when he sinned he became not only a guilty creature, liable to the punishment of death, but a corrupt creature, under the influence of base propensities and evil passions.

H. But, father, our first parents did not die when they ate of the fruit.

F. If all that is meant by death was the separation of the soul from the body, they did not immediately die; but sin and death are intimately connected, though not always immediate. The first transgressors had enough immediately to convince them that they would suffer the full extent of the threatening which God denounced. "The tempter had flattered them with the hope that the consequences of their eating the fruit would be immediate. They were so, but how differently from his description! He had said their eyes should be opened. To mark their disappointment, the narrative emphatically says, the eyes of them both were opened." Were they now as gods knowing good and evil? An accession of knowledge is indeed mentioned, but it is equally limited and humbling. They knew that they were naked. This consciousness was a deplorable contrast to the innocent and happy ignorance which belonged to their former state.

No longer had they confidence in their own minds; the condition even of their bodies made them uneasy. Instead of being exalted, as they had fondly hoped, they probably felt a degradation in their feelings; and this was perhaps the first intimation of the sinfulness and folly of what they had done. In these circumstances they had recourse to an expedient which served only to