is of the seed of the Serpent; is rejected of God. Their second, their lovely Abel, is murdered because he bears the image of God. What multiplied sorrows! far greater than the loss of Eden. What fruits from merely eating an apple! Was that all? Is any sin little? "Sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death :" and "the wages of sin are death."2

We have no account of the manner of Abel's burial. The first burial of which we have an account is that of Sarah, in the Cave of Machpelah, which was bought for a burial place by Abraham. A favorite mode of burial with the Jews was in sepulchers hewn out of the rocks-our Lord was thus buried. Deborah and Rachel, having died while Jacob was journeying, were buried by him in graves. A pillar or tombstone was placed by Jacob over Rachel's grave for a memorial of her. Both modes of burial were, doubtless, used from the beginning.

Cain was

The punishment of a murderer forms a part of the history as well as of the law which God has given to us. fool enough to think he could hide his crime even from God. When "the Lord said unto him, Where is Abel thy brother?" he had the audacity to reply, "I know not: am I my brother's keeper?" The family of our first parents were spared the additional sorrow of being compelled to put their son and brother to death as a murderer. The Lord himself became the avenger. The Lord said to Cain, "The voice of thy brother's blood crieth unto me from the ground. And now art thou cursed from the earth." A curse passed upon his occupation, the fruit of which he had brought as an offering. "When thou tillest the ground, it shall not henceforth yield unto thee her strength; a fugitive and a vagabond shalt thou be in the earth." Cain knew that his doom was sealed. In agony he exclaimed, "Thou has driven me out from the face of the earth; and from thy face shall I be hid; and I shall be a fugitive and a vagabond in the earth; and it shall

'James i. 15. 2 Rom. vi. 23. 3 Gen. xxiii. 9. 4 Gen. xxxv. 8, 19, 20.

come to pass, that every one that findeth me shall slay me. My punishment is greater than I can bear." It appears the Lord gave him a special mark or token, "lest any finding him should kill him."

:

1

It is remarkable that after the flood, when God blessed Noah and his sons, and gave all things into their hands, and for the first time gave them permission to eat flesh, saying, "Every moving thing that liveth shall be meat for you; even as the green herb have I given you all things," he adds: "the blood thereof, shall ye not eat. And surely your blood of your lives will I require; at the hand of every beast will I require it, and at the hand of man; at the hand of every man's brother will I require the life of man. Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed for in the image of God made he man." This law was given to Noah as the second head of the race. Since then, in all places and in all ages of the world, the murderer has been pursued with death; even where there has been no law, the relatives of the murdered one, or a lawless mob, have always been constrained to carry God's sentence into execution. No human law can abrogate the death-penalty for murder. Woe to the community that attempts it! For the people have taken, and always will take the law in their own hands and while the murderer will certainly be slain, violence and bloodshed will be increasing, until God's law is again honored.

1 Gen. ix. 3 6.

CHAPTER XVIII.

CAIN-FIRST CITY-POWER OF THE SEED OF THE SERPENT

A

FIRST POLYGAMY.

FTER "the Lord had set a mark upon Cain, lest any

finding him should kill him; Cain went out from the presence of the Lord and dwelt in the land of Nod, on the east of Eden." The land of Nod was so called from Nada vagabond, which Cain was thenceforth to be. Like all places, the resort of vagabonds, its population increased rapidly; for nearly all of Adam's children were of that class. In the childhood of the world, as we have before noticed, the Lord manifested his presence in many ways. Cain went away from the place where the Lord was worshiped; and where He thus revealed himself.

The first city in the world was built by Cain. Violence and fear banded men together, and led them to fortify places to defend themselves, or from which they could go out to attack others. The pride of the bloody men called conquerors, also caused them to build the first cities, before and after the flood, and gave names to them. Cain called his city after the name of his son Enoch.

It is worthy of remark, that for thousands of years the seed of the serpent, though under a curse, built the great cities, furnished the kings of the earth, and had the power of the world; while the seed, to whom all blessings of this life and that to come were promised, had to live by faith; as heirs of an inheritance not yet received. Cain, under a curse, became a ruler and built a city. The first great cities

1 Gen. iv. 16.

66

after the flood, Babylon, Nineveh, etc., were built by Nimrod, the mighty hunter, a mighty one in the earth, although Nimrod was descended from Ham, who was under a curse; and was, with his descendants, to be a servant of servants, unto his brethren."2 The descendants of Esau, who was hated of God and was to serve Jacob, furnished generations of dukes ruling cities; while the descendants of Jacob, the seed of the promise, from whom kings were to be born, were in slavery in Egypt. There was some truth in the assertion of the Devil, while tempting our Lord, when he said, “All the power of the kingdoms of the world is delivered unto " but he lied when he added, “And to whomsoever I will I give it."3 Pilate boasted to our Lord," Knowest thou not that I have power to crucify thee?" Jesus answered, "Thou couldest have no power against me, except it were given thee from above." Pharaoh, while holding the chosen people in slavery, is told by the Lord, "Even for this purpose have I raised thee up, that I might shew my power in thee." Happy are we that we know and can say to our Father in heaven, "Thine is the kingdom and the power."

me;

195

66

How long Cain lived we are not told. As the ground was not henceforth to yield her strength to him, like a vagabond he lived on others. According to Josephus, " He did not accept of his punishment in order to amendment, but to increase his wickedness; for he only aimed to procure every thing that was for his own bodily pleasure, though it obliged him to be injurious to his neighbors. He augmented his household substance with much wealth by rapine and violence; he excited his acquaintance to procure pleasure and spoils by robbery; and became a great leader of men into wicked courses. He also introduced a change in that way of simplicity wherein men lived before, and was the author of measures and weights. And whereas they lived inno

'Gen. x. 8, 10, 11.

4 John xix. 10.

2 Gen. ix. 25.
3 Luke iv. 6.
Exod. ix. 16; Rom. ix. 17.

cently and generously while they knew nothing of such arts, he changed the world into cunning and craftiness. He first of all set boundaries about lands; he built a city and fortified it with walls, and he compelled his family to come together to it." An old Jewish tradition represents him as having at last become insane, in which state he wandered about more like a wild beast than a man. As in those days men lived nearly a thousand years, Cain doubtless had many descendants. Several of them became celebrated, as we shall see hereafter, for their inventions.

Lamech, one of these descendants, is the first who is mentioned as having taken unto him two wives. The changing of God's plan of marriage, and introducing polygamy and all its evils in its place, was a fit invention for a descendant of Cain. The natural fruits of polygamy we have already noticed.