upright towards God, until such time as he had transgressed and broken the commandment of his Creator; and then, like unto the boughs of this tree, he began to bend downward, and stooped toward the earth, which all the rest of Adam's posterity after him have done, rooting themselves therein, and fastening themselves to this corrupt world. The exceeding umbrageousness of this tree he compareth to the dark and shadowed life of man, through which the sun of justice being not able to pierce, we have all remained in the shadow of death, till it pleased Christ to climb the tree of the cross for our enlightening and redemption. The little fruit which it beareth, and which is hard to find among so many large leaves, may be compared, saith he, to the little virtue and unperceived knowledge among so large vanities, which obscure and shadow it over. And as this fruit is exceeding sweet and delicate to the taste and palate, so are the delights and pleasures of the world most pleasing while they dure. But as all those things which are most mellifluous are soonest changed into choler and bitterness; so are our vanities and pleasures converted into the bitterest sorrows and repentances. That the leaves are so exceeding large, the fruit (for such leaves) exceeding little, in this, by comparison, we behold, saith he, the many cares and great labours of worldly men, their solicitude, their outward shows and public ostentation, their apparent pride and large vanities; and if we seek for the fruit, which ought to be their virtuous and pious actions, we find it of the bigness of the smallest pea; glory, to all the world apparent; goodness, to all the world invisible. And furthermore, as the leaves, body, and boughs of this tree, by so much exceed all other plants, as the greatest men of power and worldly ability surpass the meanest; so is the little fruit of such men and such trees rather fitting and becoming the unworthiest shrub and humblest brier, or the poorest and basest man, than such a flourishing stateliness and magnitude. Lastly, whereas Adam, after he had disobeyed God, and beheld his own nakedness and shame, sought for leaves to cover himself withal, this may serve to put us in A mind of his and our sins, as often as we put on our garments to cover and adorn our rotten and mortal bodies; to and maintain which we use so many uncharitable pamper and cruel practices in this world. SECT. IV. Of the name of the tree of knowledge of good and evil; with some other notes touching the story of Adam's sin. NOW, as touching the sense of this tree of knowledge of good and evil, and what operation the fruit thereof had, and as touching the property of the tree itself, Moses BarCephas, an ancient Syrian doctor, (translated by Masius,) giveth this judgment; that the fruit of this tree had no such virtue or quality, as that by the tasting thereof there was any such knowledge created in Adam, as if he had been ignorant before; but as Junius also noteth, Arbor scientiæ boni et mali; id est, experientiæ boni et mali ab eventu; "The tree of knowledge of good and evil; that is, the expe "rience of good and evil by the event," For thus much we may conceive, that Adam being made (according to the Hebrew phrase) by the workmanship of God's own hand, in greater perfection than ever any man was produced by generation, being, as it were, the created plant, out of whose seed all men living have grown up; and having received immortality from the breath or Spirit of God, he could not (for these respects) be ignorant, that the disobeying of God's commandment was the fearfullest evil, and the observation of his precepts the happiest good. But as men in perfect health do, notwithstanding, conceive that sickness is grievous, and yet in no such degree of torment, as by the suffering and experience in themselves they afterwards witness so was it with Adam, who could not be ignorant of the punishments due to neglect and disobedience; and yet felt by the proof thereof in himself another terror than he had forethought or could image. For looking into the glass of his own guilty soul, he beheld therein the horror of God's judgments, so as he then knew, he feelingly knew, and had trial of the late good, which could not be prized, and of the new purchased evil, which could not be expressed. He then saw himself naked both in body and mind; that is, deprived of God's grace and former felicity: and therefore was this tree called the tree of knowledge, and not because the fruit thereof had any such operation by any self-quality or effect; for the same phrase is used in many places of the scriptures, and names are given to signs and sacraments, as to acts performed and things done. In such sort as this tree was called the tree of knowledge, because of the event, as is aforesaid, so was the well of contention therefore called P Esek, and the well of hatred Sitnath, because the herdsmen of Isaac and Gerar contended for them; and the heap of stones, called the 'heap of witness, between Jacob and Laban, not that the stones bare witness, but for a memory of the covenant. So Jacob called the house of God Bethel; and Hagar, the well in the desert, viventis et videntis. S But Adam being both betrayed and mastered by his affections, ambitious of a further knowledge than he had perceived in himself, and looking but slightly (as all his issues do) into the miseries and sorrows incident, and greatly affecting the supposed glory which he might obtain by tasting the fruit forbidden, he was transported and blown forward by the gentle wind of pleasing persuasions unawares ; his progression being strengthened by the subtile arguments of Satan, who laboured to poison mankind in the very root, which he moistened with the liquor of the same ambition by which himself perished for ever. "But what means did the Devil find out, or what instruments did his own subtilty present him, as fittest and aptest to work this mischief by? Even the unquiet vanity of the woman; so as by Adam's hearkening to the voice of his wife, contrary to the express commandment of the living God, mankind by that her incantation became the subject • Numb. xx. 13, r Gen. xxxi. 48. s Gen. xxviii. 19. u Bart. sem. 2. 1. 2. of labour, sorrow, and death: the woman being given to man for a comforter and companion, but not for a counsellor. w But because thou hast obeyed the voice of thy wife, &c. saith God himself, cursed is the earth for thy sake, in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all thy life. It is also to be noted by whom the woman was tempted; even by the most ugly and unworthy of all beasts, into whom the Devil entered and persuaded. Secondly, what was the motive of her disobedience: even a desire to know what was most unfitting her knowledge, an affection which hath ever since remained in all the posterity of her sex. Thirdly, what was it that moved the man to yield to her persuasions? Even the same cause which hath moved all men since to the like consent, namely, an unwillingness to grieve her and make her sad, lest she should pine, and be overcome with sorrow. But if Adam in the state of perfection, and Solomon the son of David, God's chosen servant, and himself a man endued with the greatest wisdom, did both of them disobey their Creator, by the persuasion and for the love they bare to a woman, it is not so wonderful as lamentable, that other men in succeeding ages have been allured to so many inconvenient and wicked practices by the persuasions of their wives, or other beloved darlings, who cover over and shadow many malicious purposes with a counterfeit passion of dissimulate sorrow and unquietness. CHAP. V. Of divers memorable things between the fall of Adam and the flood of Noah. SECT. I. Of the cause and the revenge of Cain's sin; and of his going out THE from God. same pride and ambition which began in angels, and afterwards possessed Adam, Cain also inherited: for Cain w Gen. iii. 17. (envious of the acceptation of his brother's prayer and sacrifice) slew him, making himself the first manslayer, and his brother the first martyr: the revenge of which unnatural murder although it pleased God to mitigate, when Cain cried out that his punishment was greater than he could bear. For the same offence chiefly (wherewith the sons of Adam, as it were, urged and provoked God) he destroyed all mankind, but Noah and his family: for it is written, *The earth also was corrupt before God: of which in the same place Moses giveth a reason; for, saith he, the earth was filled with cruelty: and anon, after God himself made the cause known unto Noah, saying, An end of all flesh is come before me, for the earth is filled with cruelty through them, and behold, I will destroy them with the earth, or from the earth: neither was this cruelty meant to have been in taking away the lives of men only, but in all sorts of injustice and oppression. After this murder of Abel, y Cain went out from the presence of the Lord, and dwelt in the land of Nod, towards the east side of Eden: in which words, the going out of Cain from the presence of the Lord, is not to be understood after the literal sense, God being wholly in all parts of the world. Totus in cœlo est, totus in terra, non alternis temporibus, sed utrumque simul; "God," saith St. Augustine, "is wholly in heaven, and wholly in "earth, and not by interchanged times, but all at once:" and that this is true, David witnesseth. If I be in heaven, saith David, thou art there; if in hell, thou art there also: but what is meant thereby? Exiit a facie Dei, saith Chrysostom, "Cain went out from the presence of the Lord;" that he was left of God, disfavoured and bereaved of his protection. a SECT. II. Of Cain's dwelling in the land of Nod; and of his city Enoch. THIS word Nod, or Naid, St. Jerome and many others |
