and References which cluster round the neglected and uncivilized. Authorities. The absence of virtues was counterbalanced by the absence of vices." God directed man to the sphere of work. In Eden God directed the first man to the soil soil for his and the domestic creatures, as providing the spheres for his work. It is not sufficiently apprehended that Adam's duties in the Garden of Eden must have concerned weeding, digging for lightening the soil, and the various round of duties which the changing seasons demanded; and that, within Eden, What did he carried on the usual agricultural labour under at in Eden? exceptionally favourable conditions; and, outside Eden, under the barely natural and very unfavourable ones. Adam work of division of labour. At first the two branches of farm labour-labour in the soil, and labour with the domestic animalswere united, and the first sign of that "division First signs of labour," which is one of the most fruitful causes of civilization, we have when Adam's two sons come to man's estate, exhibit different dispositions, and show fitness for specific pursuits. Then the care of the cattle is separated from the tillage of the land, and the distinction between pastoral and arable farming is established. Note from Kitto says:"As the lads grew up, distinctive walks in life were chosen by them or were assigned to them by their father, doubtless in conformity with their tastes and habits of body and mind. Cain became a tiller of the ground, and Abel a keeper of sheep. The two first-born of men took up different and distinct pursuits, and doubtless applied all the distinctive force of their minds to the improve- References ment of their respective arts. "Adam had brought no small knowledge of animals from Eden, and this, imparted to Abel, must have availed him much in the commencement of his pursuit as a keeper of sheep. He does not appear, however, to have gone further than the domestication of sheep, and perhaps of dogs as the guardians of the flock. The domestication of the larger cattle appears to have been the unaided invention of a later age." From and Authorities. Kitto, "Daily Bib. Illus.." i. 73. Farmer the first trade. All new wealth the soil. The first of all trades is that of the farmer. the soil man gets all his fresh wealth. By commerce and exchange he passes wealth from one hand to another; and by manufacture he makes new products and combinations; but from the soil must come all actual additions to his substance, and the comes from world waits now on God's yearly harvest gifts just as truly as it did in the most primitive ages. This truth modern trade seems to put in the background, and it needs again and again to be set in the forefront, that man may be kept rightly "humble under God's mighty hand." Soil dealt with in The soil may be dealt with by man in three ways. 1. The soil itself its stones, coal, minerals, and three ways. chemicals, may be put to various practical uses: and the civilization of particular districts has always depended greatly on the mineral treasures of its soil. 2. Food may be won directly from the soil by cultivating those possibilities of growth, seeding, and fruitage which God has put in it. Or, 3. Wealth, and are included progress in ing. tillage. References and comforts for man may be gained (and also food) Authorities. by feeding and breeding the domestic creatures that live on the products of the soil that cannot be directly used by man, such as the grasses and the Two of these herbs. The two latter of these are included in the in the term term "agriculture," and it is important to notice "agriculture." that Cain's department demanded, and always still demands, more thought, wisdom, skill, and good Little judgment than Abel's. Races that keep to cattle shepherd- breeding and shepherding remain for ages on the Much in same level of civilization. Races that gain fixture to the soil, and develop the possibilities of the soil, are on the high-road to advancement, progress, and the highest forms of civilization. We may, therefore, realize that Cain was under greater temptations than Abel, because his daily work tended to Progress in develop self-reliance, and to encourage self-will. It is a remarkable fact that the advancement, both in agriculture and in the arts, should in the Scripture be directly traced to Cain, and the race of Cain, as if the very energy, wisdom, and activity of Cain forced undue developments of self-will, and started man's effort to win the satisfaction of his needs and his pleasures independently of God. Civilization traced to Cain's race. Abel's flock of both goats. NOTE. It should be added, that Abel's flock probably consheep and sisted of sheep and goats. In the East these two kinds of creatures are blended in flocks, because the goat will eat kinds of food which the more delicate sheep would leave, and so larger numbers of the united kinds can be supported on the same pasturage. "He only can the cause reveal, Why, at the same fond bosom fed, Aliens in heart so oft should prove ; One lose, the other keep, Heaven's clue; One dwell in wrath, and one in love."-Keble. "Diversities of disposition in offspring of the same parents are a standing wonder in the wide world's history-or, rather, too common, and too universally recognised, to admit of real wonder at all."-F. Jacox. and Authorities. Too much made of Abel's story Cain and by theolo gians. Too much has, perhaps, been made out of the narra- References tive of Cain and Abel's offerings by theologians. Instead of taking the account of their acts as given in great simplicity, and trying to set forth those great universal principles which gain in it such striking illustration, men have taken the elaborated doctrines of atonement and propitiation, gathering round the sublime sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ, and have endeavoured to find that sacrifice too and References precisely foreshadowed in the offering of Abel, as a Authorities. bloody sacrifice. There is no need that we should con The Lamb the founda tion of the world. slain from trovert that view. There is a most true sense in which "the Lamb was slain from the foundation of the world," but this is not the first and universal teaching of the narrative; and we shall be losers if in the interest of a secondary and indirect inference, however important, we lose sight of the direct teaching, and fail adequately to be impressed by those first truths which are embodied in these incidents. Abel. It is singular that Scripture gives us so little aid towards connecting our Lord's sacrifice with Abel's offering. Jesus himself spoke of Abel; but He draws our attention to his character, not to the nature of Righteous his offering, calling him "righteous Abel." The writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews says that "by faith he offered a more excellent sacrifice than Cain:" and refers to his blood only as calling for Divine vengeance upon his murderer. And the apostle John tells us simply that Abel's works were righteous. Endeavouring, then, to gain the first meaning of this ancient story, and to understand its place in the Divine revelation to our race, we find that it sets The first before us the first beginnings of religion among men. beginnings of religion It is the narrative of the first religious acts. We need not say that these were the first religious acts done in our world, only that they are the first which God has thought fit to preserve the account of, because these illustrate the essential distinctions. among men. Without discussing the meaning of the word "religion," we may define it for our present purpose, |