that families were generally more numerous than the supposition states; that simple manners, rural employments, temperature of climate, and largeness of room, are circumstances inconceivably more favorable to population, than modern facts and European customs give us an idea of, we shall have no reason to think it strange, that Cain, under the pressure of conscious guilt, and harrowed with fear, which always both multiplies and magnifies objects far beyond their real number and size, should be alarmed and intimidated at the numbers of mankind, who, he supposed, were ready, and were concerned to execute vengeance upon him. "He went out," the history informs us, "from the presence of the Lord." Some interpreters have, from this expression, concluded, that even after the fall, God continued to reside among men, in some sacred spot adjoining to Eden, and in some sensible tokens of his gracious presence: that thither gifts and sacrifices were brought, and were there offered up; and that from thence, Cain, for his heinous transgression, was banished, and excluded from the society and privileges of the faithful. Whatever be in this, we know for certain, that wicked men naturally shun God, and drive him as far from their thoughts as they can: and in the phrase of scripture, God is said to "hide his face " from wicked men, to "turn his back" upon them, "to give them up," to denote his displeasure with them. "And he dwelt," it is added, "in the land of Nod." It is the same word which is rendered in the twelfth and fourteenth verses, a vagabond. Why our translators, in the two former verses, give the meaning, or import of the word, and in the sixteenth verse the letters of it merely, is not easily comprehensible. Let it be translated throughout, the sense is perfectly clear, and all ground of idle inquiry taken away. In the twelfth verse, God denounces his punishment, Thou shalt not die, but be Nod, a vagabond in the earth. In the fourteenth verse, Cain recognizes the justice of his sentence, and bewails it: "I shall be

Nod, a vagabond in the earth." And in the sixteenth, Moses gives us the history of its being put in execution," he went out from the presence of the Lord, and dwelt in the land of Nod," a vagabond flying from place to place, skulking in corners, shunning the haunts of men, pursued incessantly by the remorseful pangs, and tormenting apprehensions of an ill conscience. Though you remove all external danger, yet "the wicked is as the troubled sea, which cannot rest, whose waters cast up mire and dirt:" he is "major missabib," a terror to himself. To live in perpetual fear, to live at discord with a man's self, is not to live at all.

The posterity of Cain are represented, in scripture, as the first to build a city. The mutual fears and wants of men drive them into society; put them upon raising bulwarks, devising restraints, cultivating the arts which afford the means of defence against attacks from without, or which amuse and divert within. The invention of music, and of manufactures in brass and iron, are, accordingly, likewise ascribed to his descendants.... When men are got together in great multitudes, as their different talents will naturally whet each other to the invention of new arts of life, and the cultivation of science; so their various passions, mingling with, and acting upon one another, will necessarily produce unheard-of disorders and irregularities. Hence, in Enoch, the city of Cain, and in Lamech, the sixth from Cain, we first read of that invasion of the rights of mankind, polygamy, or the marrying more wives than one. In a great city, as there will be many who omit doing their duty altogether, so there will be some, wh will take upon them to do more than duty prescribes. The unvarying nearness, or equality which Providence has preserved from the creation of the world, of male and female births, is full demonstration, independant of all statute law, that the Governor of the world means every man to have his own wife, and every woman her

own husband; that to neglect his intention in this matter, is an attempt to counteract his providence; and that to outrun it is an effort equally vain, presumptuous, wicked, and absurd, to mend his work.

How long Cain lived, and when, or where, and in what manner he died, we have no information. And little satisfaction can it yield, to attend the footsteps of a wicked and unhappy man, through a life of guilt and remorse, to a latter end of horror. Better for him he had never been born, than to have lived a sorrow to her that bare him, detested and shunned of all men, “a fugitive and a vagabond in the earth," a burthen and a terror to himself. Better for him his name had never been mentioned among posterity, than to have it transmitted to latest generations, stained with a brother's blood. But it is of high importance to know, that God, in his good time, supplied the place of righteous Abel, preserved alive the holy seed, and secured a succession, which should at length terminate in that "promised seed," who was "to bruise the serpent's head," who was "to destroy the works of the devil." Adam knew his wife again and she bare a son, and called his name Seth; for God, said she, hath appointed me another seed, instead of Abel, whom Cain slew."

" And

This wicked man's history is a loud admonition to. all, to watch over their spirits; and carefully to guard against the first emotions of envy, anger, hatred, contempt, malice, or revenge. And the words of Jesus Christ confirm and enforce the solemn warning, “I say unto you, that whosoever is angry with his bro ther without a cause, shall be in danger of the judgment; and whosoever shall say unto his brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council: but whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire. Therefore, if thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there rememberest that thy brother hath aught against thee; leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy way;

first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift," Matt. v. 22, 23, 24.

Hold thy bloody hand, son, daughter of murderous Cain! Why should a brother, a sister fall by it! That furious look is a dagger; that unkind word has made the blood, the heart's blood to follow it. Daughter of murderous Cain! A female hand armed with a sword, lifted up to slay, dipped in blood! No, she wields a more deadly weapon, she brandishes an envenomed tongue: poison more fatal than that of asps is under her lips; it is not the body that suffers, when that unruly member moves; it is the spirit, it is the spirit that bleeds: the man dies, and sees not who it was that hurt him; he perishes in the best part of himself, his good name is blasted; and what has he left worth possessing? The sight of a little material blood makes her faint a dead corpse terrifies and shocks her; but she can calmly, and with delight, sit down to that horrid human sacrifice, a murdered, mangled reputation!

But the history, also, in its connection, inspires holy joy and confidence in God, by representing the constant, seasonable, and suitable interpositions of his providence, according to the various exigencies of mankind Devils and wicked men are continually aiming at defacing his image, at marring his work; but they cannot prevail. The purposes of the divine wisdom and mercy are not to be defeated by the united efforts of earth and hell. Abel dies, but Seth starts up in his roon. Jesus expires on the cross, but "through death destroys him that had the power of death, that is, the devi.' Surely, O Lord, the wrath of man shall prake thee, and the remainder of wrath thou shalt restrain."

History of Enoch.

LECTURE VI.

And Enoch walked with God, and he was not; for God took him...GEN. v. 24.

THE

HE regular and uniform dominion of the laws of nature, or the occasional suspension and alteration of them, are equally a proof of the being and providence of God. Whether the sun with uninterrupted speed continues to perform his daily and annual course; or whether he "stands still in Gibeon," or "goes back on the dial of Ahaz;" the interposition of the Most High is equally apparent, and equally to be adored. And why may not He, who "has appointed unto all men once to die," in order to make his power known, and his goodness felt, exhibit here and there an illustrious exemption from the power of the grave, and thereby vindicate his sovereign rights as the great arbiter and disposer of life and death.

To fallen Adam it was denounced, "Dust thou art, and to dust thou shalt return;" by one man "sin entered into the world, and death by sin, and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned:" But, behold the mortal sentence is remitted in favor of Enoch, the seventh from Adam; behold the order of nature is altered, the decree of Heaven is dispensed with; he is "translated without tasting of death." When an event, so entirely out of course, takes place, it is natural, and not unprofitable, to inquire into the causes of it; for when the issue is singular and uncommon, we justly conclude that the circumstances