fudden, the manner how fuch a thing came to pafs, yet this is certain, that his reafon alone will be able to fatisfy him whether the thing happened in that manner which the relation of it imports; he need but confult the rules of probability, to be determined in this matter. Adam had not only the advantage of being formed at a perfect age, of being acquainted, by the mouth of God himfelf, about the creation of the world, &c. and of living fo many ages, which gave him leifure enough to confider the probability of what God had revealed to him, to examine the grounds and certainty of it, and, in a word, to judge whether the faid reflexions were to be rejected as fabulous, or to be relied on as of most certain and evident truth; but over and above all this, Adam could rationally affure himself of the manner how the things (which he had not feen) were done, by the experience he had of other matters which were comprehended in the Divine revelation. The manner how his body had been formed of the earth, was, I confefs, a thing difficult to be conceived; but the production of an infant like to himself, by the way of generation, which he afterwards was affured of by experience, was fufficient to confirm his mind in the belief of the Divine revelation; the way of generation being at least as much, if not more difficult to comprehend, as the manner of his creation. We have great reafon to fuppofe that, as it was Adam's duty, fo he did really make those reflexions I have attributed to him, if we conTider that God gave him a law proportioned to the ftate in which he was created; for this law fuppofes that Adam owned himself God's fubject, that he confidered God as his great benefactor, that he hoped for rewards from him, and feared to be punished by him. And lastly, if I fhould grant that these reflexions did not at first make fo deep an impreffion in his heart, yet at least it cannot be denied, but that after his fall he was in a manner neceffitated to meditate on these truths. God appeared to him in a vifible manner; God paffed fentence upon him, his wife, and the ferpent; God condemned the ferpent, and afforded his grace to man; God made him a promife proportioned to the evil into which he was fallen. The woman had deceived her husband, which did naturally tend to difunite them; but God uniting himself again with Adam, made the effect of his promife to depend upon Adam's reunion with his wife, having affured him that the offspring of his wife fhould be his Redeemer. God threatened the woman with extreme pains in child-bearing; he drave them out of the garden of Eden, and placed a flame of fire to guard the entrance there. All this, without doubt, would never fuffer Adam flightly to pass over matters of fo great importance as his creation, and the manner of his being formed out of the earth. Things being thus ftated, it is easy to judge whether we have fuppofed Adam too fubtle and contemplative, by attributing the aforefaid reflexions to him, CHAP. X. CHA P. X. That the CHILDREN of ADAM had reason to be convinced of the Creation. IT T is apparent, that as foon as the children of Adam were arrived to' years of understanding, they were in a condition to make reflexions on the manner of their production, according to the information received of their parents. They were able to compare the twofold original of man; the one, in which the body was immediately taken from the earth; the other, in which it was produced by generation; and were able to judge if either of them were improbable; and in particular, whether the formation of their parents, with other matters confequent, and depending on it, could be fufficiently proved and confirmed. For it was easy for them to judge, that their parents, of whofe tenderness and care they had fo great experience, could not have had the leaft defign to deceive them in what they had delivered to them concerning the creation. They had alfo leifure enough, during the long lives they enjoyed, to examine the folidity of those reasons which perfuaded their parents of the truth of their creation. For instance, they could eafily inform themfelves whether there were any more men and women than their father and mother, that had been before them; whether they were produced from the earth, or by a fortuitous concourse of atoms; whether there were any other language befides that which they fpake; whether there were any ruins of buildings, or other remains, which fignified that arts had been formerly cultivated; and in a word, whether there were any reafon to perfuade them, that the world had not its beginning at the time which their parents affigned for it. Neither were they only in a condition to judge of the truth of these things but their fenfes were able to convince them of it; as, for inftance, by feeing the first trees, the production of others from them, and the different degrees of their growth. But befides all this, they could experience most of these things in their own perfons; they could know whether God had affigned to man the fruit of trees, and grain for their food, as Mofes has recorded, only by examining their own mouths, which were formed to chew fruits, and not to tear the raw flesh of animals, which requires fharper and ftronger fets of teeth than thofe they found themfelves provided with, the eating of flesh not being introduced till after the deluge. Thus, after the act of generation, they faw their children born, as it was reprefented to them that they themselves had been formed. They had alfo before their eyes fenfible figns of the truth of the matters related to them: as, for inftance, the continual miracle of a flame of fire, which kept them from entering into Paradife, was a certain argument of the first fin, of which they had not been eye-witneffes. The pains of a woman in child-bearing did the more confirm the truth of the Divine fentence, because it was not obvious for them to apprehend fuch confequences from an act which was pleafing to their fenfual appetites. And lastly, Forafmuch as they kept a folemn day to celebrate the memory of the world's nativity, on which feventh day their parents repeated to them no less than two and fifty times a year the fame thing, informing them of the manner of their formation; it is impoffible to fuppofe that they fhould let these things pafs without making any reflexion on the truth of them, and the rather because we cannot rationally conceive that they fhould have been ferious in any duties of religion, without having firft examined the truth of the creation, and of the promife of a Redeemer, which are the true grounds of all religious acts whatfoever. CHA P. XI. That the CHILDREN of ADAM were actually convinced of the Truth of the Creation, and the Promife of the MESSIAH. SUPPOSE it is fufficiently evident that the immediate pofterity of Adam could easily be affured of the manner how their parents had been produced, from whom they derived their beings. They could likewife be fully fatisfied about the truth of their fin, and the promife God had made them, That one of their pofterity fhould deftroy the enemy of man kind. My bufinefs therefore next, is to fhew that they were actually a fured of the truth of these matters: this will appear, if we confider two things. The first is, that as these matters were the chief objects of their meditation, because of their extraordinary importance, fo it is evident that they acted as perfons fully fatisfied of the truth of them. The other is, that as they had been inftructed in thefe truths by their parents, fo they delivered the fame to their pofterity, to whom they tranfmitted the belief of thefe matters, as of things altogether unquef tionable. I fay then, that they acted as thofe who were fully affured of the truth. of thefe matters, which appears throughout the whole course of their lives, not only when they did that which was good, but when they were overtaken with fin: and this alone, methinks, is fufficient to evidence the deep impreffion the belief of the creation, and the promife of the Meffiah, had made on their hearts. Sacrifices are acts of religious worship; and this custom therefore of facrificing, which we find amongst the Children of Adam, was an evident mark of their piety; and this their religious inclination was, without doubt, doubt, the effect of their being perfuaded of the truth of the creation, and first promife. The fin of Cain in killing his brother, fhews the fame perfuafion: the Divine oracle, the feed of the woman fhall bruife the ferpent's head, being expreffed in very general terms, was applicable either to the first fon of Eve, or to his pofterity; or elfe to fome other who might be called her feed, because born from one of her pofterity. It is natural for us to pass from one meaning to another, when we are in fearch for the true fenfe of fuch general propofitions as thefe. Now it appears, from the name which Eve gave to Cain, that she took the words of this oracle in the first sense, that is, fhe looked upon Cain to be the fon that had been promifed her, as appears from her own words. I have (faith fhe) gotten a man from the Lord (k). And it cannot be doubted, that being in this opinion herself, fhe was not wanting to cherish and flatter this hope in her fon, that he was to fulfil the first prophesy or Divine oracle neither is it any whit ftranger to fuppofe this, than to imagine that Mandane did inftil into her fon Cyrus afpiring rthoughts fo the empire of Afia, from the dream of his father Afyages, which fhe looked upon as a divine foreboding. When we read therefore that Cain flew his brother, feeing him preferred of God by a very diftinguishing mark in the act of their facrificing, through the jealoufy and hatred he had conceived against him, may we not very naturally conclude from thence, that as he had never doubted of the truth of the promife, fo he could not endure to fee another come, to difpute his pretenfions of being the fulfiller of that first oracle? A like reflexion we may make upon the name which Eve gave to Seth; and indeed the Jews, in their ancient, commentaries on Genefis, lead us to it: She called his name Seth, for God (faid the) has appointed me another fied (1). R. Tanchumah, following the notion of R. Samuel, faith, That the had regard to that feed which was to proceed from another, or a ftrange place; and what feed is that? faith he. It is the King, the Meffiah. pretend not to maintain the folidity of the reflexions they make upon the words, another feed. They feem rather to have pleafed themselves in fporting with a word which admits of both fignifications, other and frange, then to give us an exact and diftinct notion of the importance of that word. Thus much, at least, we cannot deny, but that Eve confidering her fon Seth as him whom God has given her inftead of Abel, the could do no less than acquaint him with her hopes; and indeed, this information was that which not only difpofed Seth and his pofterity for piety and the spirit of religion, but did also in a particular manner incline them to feparate from the race of Cain, as from thofe whom God had bereft of the right of fulfilling the firft oracle, to which naturally they might pretend. It appears from the example of Enoch, that the children of Adam lived in the exercise of religious worship: and we know that the faid worship fuppofeth the creation of the world, and promife of the Miah, and that all the acts of religion are employed either in commemorating thefe truths Q4 (k) Gen. iv. 1. every every seventh day, or in unfolding the wonders therein contained, or in teftifying our thankfulnefs to God for the fame. We may add here, that the inftance of Lamech's polygamy does in fome fort make out to us the force of this perfuafion. Cain being rejected by God, and diftinguished by an exemplary punishment, for killing his brother Abel, it is evident that no man could any longer interpret that promife in the first fenfe, by applying it to Adam's first fon, or his pofterity. This being fo plain, as none could be ignorant of it, it was therefore natural to feek for another meaning of that promife, and to place the fulfilling of it in a pofterity at a greater diftance, or more numerous. And indeed fo it happened; for the exemplary punishment which God inflicted on Cain during the feven firft generations, according to those words, That he should be punished fevenfold, made his pofterity apprehend, that God (for the fin he had committed) had juftly debarred him of the right he might otherwife have had of fulfilling the promife. But yet at the fame time they conceived also, that this right, which belonged more properly to the eldest or firft-born than to the younger brothers, was now to return to his pofterity after the feventh generation; and in this view it feems, that Lamech affected polygamy, as if by multiplying his pofterity he had hoped to fee that promife fulfilled by fome one or other of them. It cannot be denied but that he imitated the crimes of Cain, and therefore may well be fuppofed to have been leavened alfo with his false maxims. But how greatly foever he was corrupted, yet forafmuch as he had been educated in the hopes of his father, and in converfe with the family of Seth, who many ages before had formed public affemblies for religious exercifes, we cannot well imagine but that he must have had the fame pretenfions. It appears therefore that the polygamy of Lamech may justly be efteemed an effect of his mifapprehenfions concerning the fenfe of the first promife; thofe means which he conceived mot likely, he made choice of, to give him a fhare in the fulfilling of that promife which pointed at a fon to be born. So that the irregularity he was guilty of in marrying two wives at the fame time, may pafs for a proof of his being perfuaded not only of the promife, That the feed of the woman should break the ferpent's head, but alfo of the creation of the world. It feems that, according to thefe principles, we may give a very plaufible account, as well of thofe violences which were exercifed in the old world, and of their strong inclinations to fenfuality, as of those alliances between the family of Seth and that of Cain, which did not happen till feven generations after Cain; that is to fay, at a time when the family of Cain pretended to be restored again to his ancient right, from which he had been fufpended during feven generations: the family of Seth, by these alliances with the family of Cain, feeming defirous to fecure their hopes and pretenfions. It will not be thought ftrange that I look upon the jealousy of Cain towards his brother (as thinking himself fupplanted by him of his right to accomplish the promife), and the polygamy of Lamech, as an effect of this perfuafion, if it be confidered, that in all likelihood |
