chapter sixty-nine.)

We will notice a few other points.

60. As God declared eating the fruit would make Adam "like one of us," that is, Godlike (and all men are enjoined to become Godlike), was not Adam, therefore, justified in eating the fruit in order to become Godlike?

61. In chapter sixty-nine it is shown, that, as Adam and Eve got their eyes open by eating the inhibited fruit, the act of disobedience turned out to be a great blessing, inasmuch as it saved the earth from being filled with a race of blind human beings.

62. And, as this blessing was obtained through the agency of the serpent-devil, we must admit "the father of lies" was a great benefactor of the human race, as shown in chapter sixty-nine.

63. As Adam could not very well exercise "dominion over every living thing that moveth upon the earth" (Gen. i. 26) while shut up in a little eight-by-ten garden, we can observe here another practical benefit of the act of disobedience which drove him from the garden.

64. Is it not a strange piece of moral incongruity to set Adam to tilling the soil in the garden as a _blessing_, and then doom him to till it _outside_ as a curse? (Gen. iii. 23.) He first embarked in the business as a blessing, and then as a curse. How the same act could be both a blessing and a curse is a "mystery of godliness" which swamps us.

65. The Jews tell us the original tempter was a serpent (Gen. iii. 1); The Mexicans say it was a demon; the Hindoos call him a snake; the Greeks declare it was a dragon; Josephus supposes it was an ape; some of the East-India sects speak of him as a fish; but the Persian revelations make it a lizard. Which is right?

66. The Mosaic or Hebrew cosmogony represents the serpent as dealing out the fruit to the _genus homo_; while the Mexicans, the Egyptians, and the Persians set the serpent or "evil genius" to guarding the tree to protect the fruit. Which is right?

67. When God Jehovah announced to the trinity of Gods, "Behold, the man has become as one of us to know good and evil" (Gen. iii. 22), exactly as the serpent had predicted, instead of dying as Jehovah had predicted, does it not prove that the serpent was the best and most reliable prophet?

68. As Adam and Eve could know nothing of the nature of right and wrong until they attained that knowledge by eating the fruit, does not this fact prove it to be a justifiable if not a righteous act?

69. How could Adam and Eve know that any act was sinful before an act of any kind had been committed by which they could learn the character or consequences of human conduct?

69. Is it not a logical conclusion, that, if God created every thing, he can control every thing, and hence, strictly speaking, is alone responsible for the right performance of every thing?

70. The Christian Bible tells us the first pair of human beings sewed fig-leaves together for clothing; but the Chinese revelation say palm-leaves. Which is right? Who can tell?

71. As it is declared the voice of God was heard "walking in the garden" (Gen. iii. 8), we beg leave to ask, what kind of a thing is a "walking voice"?

72. We also beg leave to ask, who took charge of "the house of many mansions" while Jehovah was down among the bushes hunting and hallooing for Adam?

72. And who took charge of creation, and kept the machinery of the universe running during the thousand years' rest of God Almighty, if the one day he rested means a thousand years?

73. Was it necessary for an omnipresent God to come down from heaven to find Adam when he hid among the bushes? And what would have been the result if he had not been found?

74. Must we not conclude that the command to "multiply and replenish the earth" was rather superfluous, inasmuch as nations who never heard of the command perform the duty faithfully?

75. If the River Gihon, one of the four rivers of Paradise, "encompassed the whole land of Ethiopia" (Gen. ii. 13), which is in Africa, how did it manage to cross the Red Sea, so as to get into Eden, which is in Asia?

111. As Bishop Colenso shows the territory lying between the four rivers in Eden, as mentioned in Gen. ii. comprised an area of several hundred miles, we would suggest that father Adam, while in Eden, had rather a large garden to cultivate.

112. How could fig-leaves be sewed together for clothing before needles were invented? (see Gen. iii. 7.)

113. How did Eve see the tree as stated in Genesis ("she saw the tree") before she ate the fruit which caused her eyes to be opened?

114. Is it not calculated to destroy all ideas of justice in the minds of man and woman to believe that God cursed and ruined the happiness of the whole human race merely for one simple act prompted by a being destitute of moral perception or moral accountability?

115. And what should we think of a being who would suffer a grand scheme, on which is predicated the happiness of his innumerable family for untold ages, to be defeated by the wily machinations of a brainless creature of his own creation?

116. Why should Adam hide from God because he was naked, when, if God made him, he must have become accustomed to seeing him in that condition?

117. If God in the morning pronounced every thing good, and in the evening every thing bad, does it not imply not only a serious blunder in the job, but a serious mistake in his views either in the morning or in the evening?

118. As we are told "the Lord God made clothing for Adam out of goat-skins," the question naturally arises, Who caught and killed the animals, and dressed the skins? Does it not imply that God was both a butcher and a tanner? Rather plebeian employment for a God.

119. And the statement that "the Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden" (Gen. ii. 8) seems to imply that he was a horticulturist also.

120. It is pretty hard to believe that Adam could sleep while God Almighty (Moses' God) was digging amongst his ribs, as stated in Gen. ii. 21.

121. How could Adam know what the word "die" meant before there had been any deaths in the world, when the Lord told him he should _die_ if he ate the forbidden fruit?

122. As Eve was pronounced "the mother of all living" when there were no human beings in existence but she and Adam, the inference seems to be that she was the mother of herself, her husband, and all the animal tribes.

123. "In the image of God created he them" (Adam and Eve, see Gen. i. 27). If Adam and Eve were both created in the image of God, it would seem to follow that he was constituted of two genders, male and female.

In concluding this section, we ask the reader to think of an infinitely wise God being defeated in his grand scheme of creation or salvation by a crawling serpent, and a frightful hell and all its horrors originating from this act. How sublimely ridiculous is the thought!

II. THE SCIENTISTS ACCOUNT OF CREATION.

1. Millions of years ago the sun in its revolution threw off, as it had done on previous occasions, a sort of fire-mist, or nebulous scintillations, which floated and rolled through space for countless ages, gradually accumulating from the atmosphere in its revolution, thus swelling in size until it became a conglomeration of gas; and, continuing to grow and progress, it ripened into a fiery, liquid mass possessing the most intense heat.

2. After innumerable ages this fiery liquid mass began to cool, and finally formed a crust upon its surface.

3. As its interior elements began to evolve or emanate from its bosom, it formed a dense, heavy, murky atmosphere, almost as heavy as water, in which no living thing could have breathed or lived for a moment.

4. This atmosphere contained moisture, which in the course of time became condensed into globules forming drops, which descended to the earth in the shape of rain.

5. This rain, descending to the earth, cooled its surface, and eventually filled its vast cavities with water, and thus formed lakes, seas, and oceans. The boiling, heaving mass in the bowels of the earth made it very irregular in shape.

6. As soon as the surface of the earth became sufficiently cool, small swellings began to appear upon its surface, presenting the appearance of blisters, or boils. These outgrowths finally began to exhibit vegetable life; but for a long period of time they presented the appearance of rocks or stones.

7. In the mean time the washings from the surface of the earth were deposited in the seas and oceans, and, sinking to the bottom, in the course of time formed rocks.

8. These rocks, as they hardened, gave off an element of life, which in the course of time supplied the waters with various forms of animal or finny life, and thus originated mollusks, fishes, &c.

9. As the surface of the earth cooled and grew thicker, the elements of life diffused through the liquid mass finally made their appearance on the surface in the character of the lowest forms of vegetable life? such as mosses, lichens, ferns, &c.

10. As the surface of the earth thickened, and consequently accumulated the elements of vitality gave forth higher and still higher forms of vegetable life, finally the most matured forms of matter began to exhibit animal life.

11. The first species was the zoophite, a compound of vegetable and animal life, but possessing scarcely any of the functions of animal life except those of absorption and respiration, and these functions were but slightly manifested.

12. Succeeding the zoophite came the mollusks and various hard-shelled animal forms, which at first clung to the rocks, then fed on seaweeds and other vegetable substances, absorbing also from the atmosphere.

13. In this way various species of animals and birds and reptiles sprang up, ran their course, and then perished, to give place to higher forms.

14. And finally, when all the elements of life became sufficiently matured, they formed a combination, and turned loose upon the earth the animal man, who at first was nearly as ugly, clumsy, and awkward as a baboon, possessed of but little more sense or intelligence.

15. Each one of these changes and outgrowths of the new forms of vegetable and animal life constituted an epoch of innumerable ages, thus showing the age of our planet to be beyond computation. We submit to the reader whether this is not a more rational, beautiful, and satisfactory solution of the great problem of mineral, vegetable, animal, and human existence, than the jumbled-up medley presented by Moses.