stars-glittering in the radiant succession of their march over a cloudless firmament - they sighed at the convictions of their own unworthiness, and subdued by the impulse of a sublime veneration, they worshipped in their hearts the Almighty Father, and fell upon their faces to the earth.

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Days rolled on, and their new mode of life became familiar. New sources of subsistence and enjoyment were discovered, and new attachments rose up on every side. The rock goat and the fallow deer became their inmates, and the flocks and herds seemed to place themselves at Adam's nod. The ring-dove tenanted their bower-the jackdaw and green wood-spite lodged in the oakwood sloping down the opposite bank of the stream; and the nightingale, from the olivegroves lining the distant hill, never failed to charm the darkness with the plaintive melody of her song.

Often, as our first parents reclined together in the cool of the day, would they recall their splendid birth of existence, when morning was without night, and life without death. How often would

they re-paint the lustre of that Eden which they were no more to behold, and clothe it in the celestial hues of the divine original. How vainly would they sigh for the return of that dawn of pure being, and mourn, in tears, that it was now eclipsed for ever. Then, as the convulsive sobs of Eve recorded each silent sorrow that rushed unbidden to the eye of Adam, how would he hasten to assuage her pains of memory, and to combat his own!

"Ah!" would he exclaim, " our brief page of happiness is soon read; but duty ordains that we bow to our Father's will. Yet, Eve, do not our hearts avouch that we became ungrateful rebels to his love? Does not truth confess that a baneful, and destructive, and every way profitless curiosity poisoned the purity of duty and estranged our affections? Was it not for this empty gratification that we violated the sanctuary of righteous and rightful obedience, and took up arms against our Creator? And yet, contemplate his mercy in the midst of his provocations! At once, he might have consumed us with his lightningshave crushed us with his thunders! But, Eve, this he has not done! At once, too, might he have consigned us to that dust of which we are

formed-but, behold, he spares us! We live, still live; different, indeed, (ah, how different!) but, by his all-perfect pity, yet we live. True, suffering and toil are ours-true, our rugged mother, the Earth, strictly exacts from us unwearied labour for any favours she may yield us now; but be of good cheer, thou sweet solace of my days-that God, be assured, will yet allow us to redeem our crimes by the homage of our future years to him. Think on the beneficence of his love to us, while we continued sinless!-think, too, of the forbearance of his omnipotence, when we had challenged his anger! Yes, Eve, that God does even now pity us-may yet forgive us— perhaps, will bless us !"

Thus would he console her with the importunities of affection, and seek to soothe the anguish of remorse with the balm of hope; until she united in grateful praises to her Creator, that they had not been farther bereft of all.

Nor was it long before a voluntary adoration swelled their souls to the high and unsearchable Jehovah. Soon did they acquire that habitual grandeur of devotion, which throws a sunshine on the gloomiest paths of life. They confessed his merciful forbearance-they supplicated his

continual care they besought his pardon—they sacrificed to his Holy Name: and, led by reason and instructed by heaven, they proceeded to guard against the changeableness of the seasonsthe sadly altered seasons,—by making for use warmer vestments of the skins of the victims of sacrifice.

God is said in the Bible to have cursed the ground from which man was taken, because of man's disobedience and ingratitude. But, when God is so mentioned to have cursed the ground, for Adam's sake, it is not meant literally to imply that God would actually curse the ground itself. It is true that, to punish man, he laid his Almighty interdict upon its future fertility being spontaneous-against its treasures being reaped without laborious culture. This he effected by changing the hitherto uniform temperature and serenity of the air-thus rendering the seasons variable and thereby dissolving, at once, that universal summer of the year which had prevailed in Eden. This was all. The ground itself, correctly speaking, was not cursed. The ground could endure no correction, and feel no pain. To it, abstractedly, the produce of briars and thorns. was just as easy as of figs and citrons. No: the

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curse was affixed to the tiller of the ground, not to the innocent ground he tilled. The truth of this Adam soon knew-soon felt: for, by the sweat of his brow was the soil made to yield its increase; and, extracted by perpetual and severe labour, was he now to ensure its cultivation and command its stores.

Adam did not murmur. He knew his lot was, to suffer. Painful was his toil, but it was not quite barren; it had its reward. The Divine denunciation was indeed heavy-he dared not call it unjust. He had sinned! He is punished!