Whilft young children are under their parents government and care, they are folicitous about nothing; they are not concerned about their meat, drink and fafety, any farther than to call to their parents for them when they want them: nor are they afraid while they are near them: but if they should withdraw themselves, and leave their children in the dark, or in a wilderness, their eyes would foon be opened; they would foon fee and feel their impotence to help and defend themfelves; concern and terror would feize them, and take away the use of the little reason they have. We may imagine this to be the condition of our first parents, when God withdrew his influence and protection from them upon their deserting him. Their eyes were opened as foon as they were left to themfelves. They found their neceffities and wants. They found the shortnefs of their own power to help them, and infufficiency of their own understanding to direct them. They found themselves incompetent judges of what was good or evil for them, and they then in earnest, to their coft, knew evil, that is, felt it. This was a natural confequence of their fetting up to be their own afters, and to judge for themfelves: no finite understanding being fufficient to foresee or know, what in the infinite variety of our circumstances may hurt us; and tho' it did foresee them, yet nothing lefs than an Almighty Power is able to prevent the mifchief. The opening therefore of our firft parents eyes to fee their impendent miferies, and their impotency to help themselves, was the firft effect of their fin.

The 2d was their sense of their being naked, and shame that they were fo. Shame proceeds from a confciousness of weakness, or of guilt, and from a fecret pride that makes us unwilling to own it, left we should be defpised for it. Man could not be confcious of either before his fall, because he was innocent from guilt, and was covered by the power of God againft all the defects of his natural weaknefs; but being now left to himself, he felt both. He had offended God, and had no defence against his fellowcreatures: the fun fcorched him, the rain wet him, and the cold pierced him. He found an inconveniency in expofing his body, and was afhamed of the effects of it.

He

He found himfelf moved with luft and other irregular paffions, and his reafon unable to curb them. Whereas the power of God, whilft he was under the divine government, had kept all his faculties in perfect order. He saw therefore now great hurt in nakedness, which no way incommoded him whilft covered in innocency.

The 3d effect of this tranfgreffion of our first parents was averfion to God. ch. iii. 8. And Adam and his wife hid themselves from the prefence of the Lord God amongst the trees of the garden: ver. 10. I was afraid, because I was naked, and I hid myself. This was a very natural effect; for fince they were concerned to fee their nakednefs, fince they were afhamed of it, and it now difpleafed their eyes, they could not think it could be pleafing to God. There was a visible prefence of God in Eden, and man no doubt was taught to come before him with decency and reverence: and being now blotted and stained with fin in his foul, and naked in his body, he must needs be afraid to appear in fuch circumftances before his Maker. When he was ashamed to fee himself, he might well be afraid to be seen of God. A child that has dirtied and hurt himfelf in difobeying his parent's command, will naturally fly his prefence. Thus it fared with man in Paradife, and thus it continues with us his pofterity to this day. We are afraid of that commerce, and flee that communion with God that was the great comfort and fecurity of man in his innocency. The 4th confequence of man's tranfgreffions, was God's pronouncing fentence on each of the tranfgreffors; on the ferpent, on the woman, and laftly on Adam.

First on the Serpent, And the Lord God faid unto the ferpent, thou art curfed above all cattle, and above every beaft of the field; upon thy belly fhalt thou go, and duft fhalt thou eat all the days of thy life; and I will put enmity between thee and the woman, between thy feed and her feed, it fall bruife thy head, and thou shalt bruife his beel. To be curfed is to become abominable and miferable; to be defigned and devoted to deftruction; to be under the displeasure of God and the execration of men. The ferpent carries ftill the marks of this curfe, and is forced to cover and hide its head on all occafions, as being offenfive to the

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eye,

eye, and obnoxious to the revenge of any that can furprife it. We kill other creatures for food or diversion, but ferpents are declared enemies; we equally hate and fear them, and therefore destroy them with pleasure and eagerness.

The 2d part of the ferpent's punishment is to go on his belly, and feed on duft. How he was framed at first we know not, but fee now that he crawls on the ground, and cannot lift up his head. This was a juft punishment for his high attempt in oppofing himself to God, and teaching man to question the goodness and veracity of his Maker. As to his food which God has here decreed to be dust, it was very congruous that the ferpent who had tempted our first parents by the loveliness of the fruit of the tree of good and evil, fhould be condemned to the vileft of meat, and be obliged to feed on filth and dirt; that his fault might in fome measure be seen in his punishment.

The 3d part of the fentence paffed on the ferpent, is enmity between him and man his Lord, which continues to this day, their very natures being contrary and deftructive to one another. There is a perpetual war between them, and though he fometimes hurts or wounds his mafter by furprise in his more ignoble parts; yet he has the worst of it: for man bruises his head and effectually deftroys him. All this is literally true, and without an allegory. But if it be enquired why the ferpent was thus fentenced, when he committed no fault, but was acted by the devil? It must be answered, that he was the only vifible tempter that appeared to man, and therefore the punifhment was firft to fall on him, for example fake, and to beget in us an abhorrence of the guilt. The ferpent of himself was no more capable of being punished than of finning; but these marks of God's difpleasure were left on him for our fake, that we might have a visible remembrancer of what fin deferves. If the inftruments of the temptation were thus ufed, we may be sure the principal actor did not escape the vengeance of God.

But 2dly. If we fuppofe the devil poffeffed the ferpent, and was as it were incarnate in it; we may have leave to think that the power of God could unite them as clofely as

our

our fouls and bodies are joined, and cause the punishment inflicted on the literal ferpent to affect fatan in it, as well as the injuries done our bodies do reach our fouls; at leaft while that very ferpent was in being.

3dly. Inafinuch as the literal fenfe does not exclude the myftical, the curfing of the ferpent is a fymbol to us, and a visible pledge of the malediction with which the devil is ftruck by God, and whereby he is become the most abominable and miferable of creatures. The ferpent's being confined to go on his belly, points out to us the wretchednefs of that condition to which the devil is reduced: his eating duft, the blafting of all his enjoyments, and debarring him from all thofe pleasures that flow from the right hand of God; being thrown below the feet of all other creatures, to be trampled by them; that is to be confined to the lowest, vileft, and most miserable, as well as most contemptible eftate. As to the ferpent's enmity with man, it needs no great pains to apply it to the devil. It is plain he is continually laying fnares for us; he lies in ambush and furprifes us; he wounds us in our paffions and lower faculties, and by these fometimes reaches our fouls though that can never be, if we don't confent to it, and by that make it our own act. But man by the help of the Seed of the woman, that is by our Saviour, fhall bruife his head, wound him in the place that is most mortal, and finally confound and deftroy him with eternal ruin. In the mean time, the enmity and abhorrence we have of the ferpent, is a continual warning to us of the danger we are in from the devil, and how heartily we ought to hate and abhor him and all his works,

2dly. As to the woman, her punishment confifts of two parts, ift, in the pains of child-bearing, ver. 16 .of ch.iii. And to the woman he faid, I will greatly multiply thy forrow and thy conception. In forrow thou shalt bring forth children. This was a very juft and proper punishment. She had brought forrow and death on all her pofterity, and in bringing them forth it was but reasonable she should fuffer fomething of what they were to fuffer all their lives: And it is continued on all thofe that defcend from her, as an item and memorandum of the mischief brought on mankind

kind by fin. By this she and her defcendants may learn, how much God abhors difobedience, and it is a pledge to them of God's anger against the guilty.

The 2d part of her punishment is in thefe words in the fame verfe, Thy defire fhall be to thy husband, and be shall rule over thee. This too was a most reasonable sentence, and proportionable to her fin. Her offence was an attempt to be a judge of good and evil for herfelf, to be her own mistress, and depend no more on God for her government. Inftead of attaining her design, God makes her fubject to her husband; places thofe defires and inclinations on him which fhe had withdrawn from God, and conftitutes him her ruler and head. By this fhe and her whole fex became fubjects, and dependent on the froward will of thofe hufbands fhe had corrupted; being obliged to endure not only the miseries of her own choice, but likewise a share in those of her husband's. This is a demonftration to us of the folly of an attempt to judge of good and evil for ourfelves, and the great abhorrence God has of fin; fince he avenges it not only on the perfon immediately guilty, but extends the punishment to the whole fex.

As to the man, his punishment confifts in the following particulars, Ift, ver. 17. Becaufe thou haft bearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and haft eaten of the tree of which I commanded thee faying, Thou shalt not eat of it; Curfed is the ground for thy fake. In forrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life. This punishment is rightly adapted to man's fin. He would not be content with the meat God had provided for him, which the earth of itself furnished him by God's appointment, therefore God decreed that it fhould do fo no more, but man fhould be put to force his food out of it, and provide for himself with labour and toil, with the sweat of his brows and the anguish of his heart. By this we may understand how much better it had been to have left the provifion of fuftenance for us to God, and to depend on him for it, as well as for the government of our actions. Since we would not do the latter, God has refufed to do the former for us.

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