as that he multiplied the dialects of the original tongue and although our knowledge is far from being complete on this subject, it may be asserted, that so far as facts have been ascertained, the plain and obvious signification of the passage, is supported by the radical and total diversity existing between some of the languages of the earth.

Here, again, the Bible becomes a key to explain an important phenomenon in the history of man.

5. The greatest of all difficulties to natural reason, is the existence and extensive prevalence of natural and moral evil, in our world. Why is the race of man subjected to so many grievous calamities? And why are all men, the good as well as the bad, doomed to inevitable death? If from any necessity of nature man must die, why is his death so painful, and often lingering? In this respect, all other animals have greatly the advantage of him. But a greater difficulty than this, is, the general and prevailing wickedness of men, in all ages, as is attested by all history, sacred and profane, and by all laws and governments, the sole object of which is, to set up barriers against the injustice and violence of wicked men.

Did God create man in this state of moral corruption? or did he make them so frail, that in the circumstances in which they are placed, all become sinners, and the greater number fall into egregious acts of iniquity? These facts, on the principles of natural religion, have no solution; and they have been the means of driving many speculative men from theism to atheism.

But in the Bible, we have a key to this mystery, also; not that every thing relating to the origin of evil is fully explained, for this would require a knowledge of the whole plan of the universe, which is too vast for our comprehension but we have here explained as much as it is needful for us to know on this subject. From this ancient and sacred record we learn, that God made man upright, and

stamped upon him his own image; and giving him an equitable law, placed him in a state of probation. Life and death were set before him; and he had every reasonable motive to induce him to continue in obedience: but he sinned, and thus lost his innocence, corrupted his whole race, and incurred for himself and them the penalty of death. It was distinctly threatened, in the day thou eatest of the forbidden fruit, thou shalt die. And after the transgression, the sentence was repeated in this form, "Until thou return to the ground, for out of it wast thou taken; for dust thou art and unto dust shalt thou return."

The deist may invent many objections and cavils against this account of the origin of sin and death; but every candid rationalist must acknowledge, that it is the only explanation of natural and moral evil, which has the least plausibility. And the more we contemplate the principles, on which God now governs the world, the more shall we become reconciled to the history of the fall of the first man, and in him, the ruin of all his race; and if we are sincere lovers of truth, after exploring every other hypothesis, we will finally adopt the theory of Paul the apostle, “That by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death hath passed upon all men, because all have sinned." "In Adam all die." "The wages of sin is death." If the first man had never sinned, death would have been unknown in the world.

6. It is an universal fact, that females of the human race bring forth their offspring with excruciating pain. Now, these distressing pangs of parturition, are not experienced by other species of animals; or, in so small a degree, that this remarkable peculiarity in the human species needs to be accounted for, by some special reason. Mere men of reason have failed in assigning any satisfactory cause for this event. It is felt to be a heavy calamity on our race, which is always attended with danger, and often takes away

the life of the sufferer. To prevent this evil, no remedy, of any efficacy, has ever been discovered. It continues unaltered and unmitigated from generation to generation, and is submitted to, as one of the inevitable calamities of human existence. And, commonly, for evils so uniform and universal, men do not trouble themselves to inquire the reasons. But in this as in other similar cases, the Bible affords the requisite, and, indeed, the only information. In this extraordinary book, so much neglected by Philosophers and despised by infidels, we read, that this was a special curse inflicted on the female sex, in consequence of the transgression of the first woman. "And to the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow shalt thou bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee."

And it is worthy of remark, that the latter part of this minatory prediction has been universally verified by the fact; for in all countries, and in all ages, except so far as Christianity has relieved them from the curse, the female sex have been ruled over by the males in a most tyrannical manner. They have, in all heathen and Mohammedan countries, been mere slaves, held in a state of abject subjection which degraded condition is not improved by their being made subservient to the gratification of the stronger sex; since those who are selected to administer to the pleasures of their Lords, are in that state which of all others is the most degrading to rational beings."

7. The antipathy felt by most men to the serpent, which leads them to take pleasure in bruising its head, is a fact which ought not to be passed over without some notice, as the origin of such a feeling can be traced directly to the transaction recorded in the Bible, in which the serpent was made to bear so remarkable a part. It will not be in place to refer, here, to the degradation of the serpent from the high station which he held in the animal creation,

to go upon his belly, and necessarily to swallow the dust, as this would be to assume a fact, which all deists, and many Christians, would not receive. And although the curse denounced against the serpent, had doubtless a mystical and much more important meaning; yet that is no reason why it may not also have had a literal accomplishment. The whole passage is worthy of profound consideration. "And the Lord God said unto the serpent, because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle, and above every beast of the field: upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life. And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel."

8. Another phenomenon in the natural history of the earth, for the explanation of which we must look to the Bible, is the abundant and spontaneous production of thorns, briers, thistles, and other useless and noxious weeds and shrubs, while those grains and fruits needful for the sustenance of man, are obtained only by much care and toil. For while the ground teems with the former, without any aid, and, indeed, in opposition to all the efforts of man to subdue and extirpate them, the latter can be acquired, commonly, in no other way than by "the sweat of the face," from day to day. Why is this? The naturalist will answer, it is one of nature's laws. But I ask, why was such a law established? Would it not have been as easy for the Author of nature to make a law that the earth should spontaneously and copiously produce those things which are necessary for the subsistence of man? To this question, reason makes no reply. She cannot tell, why such an order of things should exist. Sometimes, indeed, a feeble answer is attempted, by saying, that it is beneficial to man to gain his bread by the sweat of his brow; but this comes with a bad grace from the mouth of an unbeliever, since the only reason why it is useful for him to be under the necessity of constant and severe labor, is that it re

strains his tendency to iniquity. With this explanation, I am willing to admit the validity of the reason; but still it is an awful curse upon man-a being naturally capable of high mental improvement, and of sublime pleasure in the contemplation of his Maker and of his works-to be doomed to wear out his life, in digging the ground for the subsistence of his body.

Let us then hear what the Bible says on this subject; "And unto Adam he said, because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, of which I commanded thee, saying thou shalt not eat of it: cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life: thorns and thistles shall it bring forth to thee, and thou shalt eat the herb of the field. In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground."

If the Bible is not a record of truth, these numerous striking coincidences between its declarations and the phenomena with which we are conversant every day, must be considered the most extraordinary thing in the world. But the Bible is true, and its truth is demonstrated by the fact, that it exactly corresponds with all other known truth. Every family, every field, every laborer, and every thistle and thorn, bears testimony to the authenticity of the Mosaic history.

9. If time would permit, I might show that the almost universal prevalence of bloody sacrifices, with their accompaniments of flour, and salt, and frankincense, and libations of wine; together with the apparatus of priests and pontifical robes, of altars, and temples, and adyta inaccessible to profane inspection, were all derived from the divine institution of sacrifices in the family of Adam, and from the sacred institutions by Moses, in the wilderness. The attempts of some learned men to account for this widely-spread practice, from mere principles of reason; or rather from the grossness of