Genesis 3:1-6 Now the serpent was more subtle than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made. And he said to the woman, Yes, has God said… Should it occur to any to ask, how it can be consistent with the Divine wisdom and goodness to place creatures in the beginning of their life in a condition of such exposure and peril, we must allow that the question is not unattended with difficulty. We know it, however, to be a fact, imperfectly as we may be able to reconcile it with the acknowledged character of God, that the beginning or early part of every human life, and probably of the life of every moral being, is especially fraught with temptations and dangers. The sacred writer may have had this idea in his mind when he said, "Better is the end of a thing than the beginning thereof." Childhood and youth are, in most cases, seasons of temptation. The entrance on early manhood is a time of temptation. Principles are then to be settled and habits to be formed, which will do much toward shaping the character for all the future life. Viewed in relation to God and religion, the first part of life is important. It is the period of moral formation; and the principles which then gain an ascendency are likely to be permanent. Hence the solicitude which parents feel in relation to their children, and especially their sons, when they go from them to enter on a course of study in a public institution, or to engage as clerks and apprentices in the employment of others, or to begin life for themselves. The young cannot wholly escape these trials and dangers; and they greatly resemble the temptations through which Adam and Eve passed. They are inseparable from the responsibilities of self-government, until a stable and well-tried character is formed. Men are put into the world to meet its duties, and to discipline themselves, amidst difficulties and moral hazards, for a better state. The sooner in life they learn this truth, the better will it be for them. The plan of God is not to shield any of us from temptation; but to teach us to pass through it undamaged and with advantage. But it may help somewhat to reconcile us to this part of the Divine government, if we inquire whether it is possible for us to conceive of a better constitution? All creatures must begin to exist. They must therefore either be as perfect as they ever can be at first, or they must have scope to grow and to unfold themselves. Would we, any of us, choose to be created so perfect at the beginning, as to preclude the idea of any improvement, or even of any change? Would we be in favour of a constitution, supposing it possible, which would permit no increase of knowledge, of virtue, or of happiness? Would we prefer to be wholly without hope? Would we account a dead, stagnant monotony, an unvarying sameness of existence, an improvement on our present state? I cannot think we should any of us so elect, were the election in our power. And yet all these ideas belong to the notion of a creature made at the outset as perfect as he ever can be. (D. N. Sheldon.) Parallel Verses KJV: Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made. And he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden? |
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