evil: and now lest he put forth his hand and take also of the Tree of Life, and eat, and live for ever. Therefore the Lord God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from whence he was taken. So he drove out the man; and He placed at the east of the garden of Eden,* Cherubim and a flaming sword, which turned every way to keep the way of the tree of life."

* Gen. iii. 24. “And the Lord God ɔw caused to dwell, or placed in a tabernacle, at the east of the garden of Eden, the Cherubim." The word w', here expresses that there was a tabernacle (resembling doubtless the Mosaic) in which the Cherubim, and emblematic fire or glory, were placed from the fall; (see Wisdom ix. 8. Solomon addressing God in prayer, says :-"Thou hast commanded me to build a temple upon thy holy mount, and an altar in the city wherein Thou dwellest, a resemblance of the holy tabernacle which Thou hast prepared from the beginning." Miμnua ΣΚΗΝΗΣ ΑΓΙΑΣ ην προητοίμασας ΑΠ' ΑΡΧΗΣ) and which perhaps continued in the believing line of Seth. Whether this same sacred tabernacle was preserved by Noah in the ark, and remained in the family of Eber, till the descent of the children of Israel into Egypt, and was brought up by them from hence, is hard to determine. Certain it is from Exodus xxxiii. 7. 9. (compare Exodus xvi. 33, 34. 1 Samuel iv. 8.) that the Israelites had a tabernacle or tent (see 2 Samuel vii. 6.) sacred to Jehovah, before that erected by Moses; and it appears from Amos v. 26. and Acts vii. 42, that soon after the Exodus, the idolaters and apostates had such likewise for their idols.-Parkhurst's Heb. Lex. vox .

Now in this account of the inspired historian, there appear four grand and leading features, accompanied with some particulars of comparatively minor import. We have displayed before us the garden of Eden, with its trees in the centre, too important to be ever forgotten; and the whole watered by a river, of which many vestiges will be discovered in the memorials of mythology: all this is only, however, the scene of transactions the most awfully. interesting of any which have affected the race

of man.

The shameful defection from their covenant of obedience to God, is then laid before us in the narrative of the fall of our first parents, from their original righteousness, whereby they and all their posterity were involved in the guilt of sin; while death and sorrow entered the world, together with the necessity of manual labour for the future subsistence of the sons of Adam. But scarcely is this dark shade of horror thrown over the picture, when the gloom is gilded by the delivery. of that great promise of a future Saviour, "who should bruise the serpent's head;" con, nected with which, is all the following institution of the mysterious Cherubim, and the sacrifices typical of an atonement to be thereafter made by the blood of the Redeemer.

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Intimations are also given of man's perfect happiness and state of intellectual knowledge prior to the dreadful catastrophe of the fall, together with the creation of woman, and the institution. of the marriage state.

Now if, upon surveying a considerable portion of heathen mythology, it shall be found that the most ancient religion of the pagans consisted mainly of worship paid in groves, gardens, or sacred enclosures, with one or more symbols in the centre, identified with traditionary ideas of the Tree of Life, and the tree of knowledge, which grew in the midst of Eden; if there shall be discovered a general notion of some blissful state, wherein mankind once lived free from crime and sorrow, and where labour was unnecessary to support existence; if, on proceeding further, we find an acknowledgment that mankind fell from this happy state, with here and there some obscure intimations of the circumstances attending such fall, and that the image of God, in which our primary ancestors were created, became gradually defaced; if, wherever we turn, some striking memorial meets us of a promised Deliverer, looked forward to, who was to overthrow the great serpent which had beeen the source of all mischiefs happening to man; and if these

several traditions shall be discovered not only connected one with another, but with certain symbolic figures manifestly analogous to the cherubic exhibition on the east of Eden; and if, throughout the bright galaxy of sacrificial rites and ceremonies, shining amid the darkness of the night of heathenism as it were from one side of heaven to the other, there shall be tacitly recognized the necessity of an atonement for man's sin by the voluntary blood-shedding of some pure and propitiatory victim expected to be offered:-I say, if all these singular vestiges of paradise be found so analogous the one to the other, as to appear but parts of one vast whole, surely they will be allowed to exhibit most remarkable collateral proof of the authenticity of this part of the Mosaic history; and that the narrative of the inspired penman of the pentateuch is at once consistent, genuine, and perfect. Let us examine how far this supposed mythological testimony to the truth of what Moses has written, is borne out by actual matter of fact.

It was in paradise that man first enjoyed communion with his Maker; and most probably it was the morning of the first sabbath which dawned upon Adam newly created, and awakening in the midst of Eden, to all the bliss of

his as yet sinless existence. This circumstance, it may be conjectured, was the reason why the sacred sabbatic number became frequently connected with grove and garden worship, both amongst the believers in the true God, and the heathen in their paradisaical memorials, as will be seen in the course of the present investigation. After the fall of man and his expulsion from paradise, still dear to him, and all his posterity, was the recollection of Eden. A description of it was carried down the stream of time, by traditions descending from one generation to another; and hence we find that before temples were ever erected, a sacred garden, grove, or enclosure was the scene of worship. It was so common, moreover, that the custom seems to have prevailed throughout the world. The Canaanites and Phoenicians were especially addicted to the mode of idolatry arising out of these traditions; and from the Scriptures we learn how soon the children of Israel apostatized into the abominations of the natives of the country they conquered. It

* See a fine passage in Seneca's forty-first epistle, remarkably illustrative of this; and to the same effect, Tacit. Germ. cap. ix. Plin. Nat. Hist. xii. cap. i. Apuleius i. Florid. Tacit. Ann. xiv. Hieron. ad Jerem. cap. vii.-xxxii. Lucan. Phar. iii. 398.

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