A. M. 1. A, C. 4004; OR, ACCORDING TO HALES, 5411. GEN. CH. 1. AND PART OF CH. 2. at their first creation, or the immediate and continual | his formation, observe him perform all the operations of direction, of a superior cause. In a word,1 can we be- life, sense, and reason; move as gracefully, talk as hold the spider's net, the silk worms' webs, the bees' eloquently, reason as justly, and do every thing as cells, or the ants' granaries, without being lost in the dexterously, as the most accomplished man breathing: contemplation, and forced to acknowledge that infinite the same was the case, and the same the moment of time, wisdom of their Creator, who either directs their unerring in God's formation of our first parent. But (to give the steps himself, or has given them a genius (if I may so thing a stronger impression upon the mind) we will supcall it) fit to be an emblem, and to show mankind the pose, "that this figure rises by degrees, and is finished pattern of art, industry, and frugality? part by part, in some succession of time; and that, when the whole is completed, the veins and arteries bored, the sinews and tendons laid, the joints fitted, and the liquor (transmutable into blood and juices) lodged in the ventricles of the heart, God infuses into it a vital principle; whereupon the liquor in the heart begins to descend, and thrill along the veins, and an heavenly blush arises in the countenance, such as scorns the help of art, and is above the power of imitation. The image moves, it walks, it speaks: it moves with such a majesty, as proclaims it the lord of the creation, and talks with such an accent, and sublimity of sentiment, as makes every ear attentive, and even its great Creator enter into converse with it: were we to see all this transacted before our eyes, I say, we could not but stand astonished at the thing; and yet this is an exact emblem of every man's formation, and a contemplation it is, that made holy David break out into this rapturous acknowledgment Lord! I will give thee thanks, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; marvellous are thy works, and that my soul knoweth right well: thine eyes did see my substance, yet being imperfect, and in thy book were all my members written.' If from the earth, and the creatures which live upon it, we cast our eye upon the water, we soon perceive, that it is a liquid and transparent body, and that, had it | been more or less rarefied, it had not been so proper for the use of man: but who gave it that just configuration of parts, and exact degree of motion, as to make it both so fluent, and at the same time so strong, as to carry | and waft away the most unwieldy burdens? Who hath taught the rivers to run, in winding streams, through vast tracts of land, in order to water them more plentifully; then throw themselves into the ocean, to make it the common centre of commerce; and so, by secret and imperceptible channels, return to their fountain-head, in one perpetual circulation? Who stored and replenished these rivers with fish of all kinds, which glide, and sport themselves in the limpid streams, and run heedlessly into the fisher's net, or come greedily to the angler's hook, in order to be caught (as it were) for the use and entertainment of man? The great and wide sea is a very awful and stupendous work of God, and the flux and reflux of its waters are not the easiest phenomena in nature. All that we know of certainty is this, that the tide carries and brings us back to certain places, at Nay, so curious is the texture of the human body, and precise hours: but whose hand is it that makes it stop, in every part so full of wonder, that even Galen himself, and then return with such regularity? A little more or (who was otherwise backward enough to believe a God,) less motion in this fluid mass would disorder all nature, after he had carefully surveyed the frame of it, and and a small incitement upon a tide ruin whole kingdoms: viewed the fitness and usefulness of every part, the who then was so wise, as to take such exact measures in many a several intentions of every little vein, bone, immense bodies, and who so strong, as to rule the rage and muscle, and the beautiful composition of the whole, of that proud element at discretion? Even he, who fell into a pang of devotion, and wrote an hymn to his hath placed the sand for the bound thereof, by a per- Creator's praise. And, if in the make of the body, how petual decree, that it cannot pass;' and placed the much more does the divine wisdom appear in the creaLeviathan (among other animals of all kinds) 'therein tion of the soul of man, a substance immaterial, but to take his pastime, out of whose nostrils goeth a smoke, united to the body by a copula imperceptible, and yet and whose breath kindleth coals;' so that he maketh so strong, as to make them mutually operate, and symthe deep to boil like a pot, and maketh the sea like a pathize with each other, in all their pleasures and their pot of ointment,' as the author of the book of Job ele- pains; a substance endued with those wonderful faculgantly describes that most important creature. ties of thinking, understanding, judging, reasoning, choosing, acting, and (which is the end and excellency of all) the power of knowing, obeying, imitating, and praising its Creator; though certainly neither it, nor any superior rank of beings, angels, and archangels, or If now, from the world itself, we turn our eyes more particularly upon man, the principal inhabitant that God has placed therein, no understanding certainly can be so low and mean, no heart so stupid and insensible, as not plainly to see, that nothing but infinite wisdom could, in so wonderful a manner, have fashioned his body, and inspired into it a being of superior faculties, whereby he teacheth us more than the beasts of the field, and maketh us wiser than the fowls of heaven.' Hale's Origination of Mankind. 8 Clarke's Sermons, v. 1. a Galen, in his book, On the Formation of the Embryo, takes notice, that there are, in a human body, above 600 muscles, in each of which there are, at least, ten several intentions, or due qualifications, to be observed; so that, about the muscles alone, no less than 6000 several ends and aims are to be attended to. The bones are reckoned to be 284, and the distinct scopes, or intentions of each of these, are above 40; in all, about 12,000; and thus it is in some proportion with all the other parts, the skin, ligaments, vessels, and humours; but more especially with the several vessels of the body, which do, in regard of the great variety and multitude of those several intentions required to them, very much exceed the homogeneous parts.—Wilkin's Natural Religion. A. M. 1. A. C. 4004; OR, ACCORDING TO HALES, 5411. GEN. CH. 2. FROM VER. 8. the 'whole host of heaven' can worthily and sufficiently do it; for who can express the mighty acts of the Lord, or show forth all his praise ?' Thus, which way soever we turn our eyes, whether we look upwards or downwards, without us, or within us, upon the animate or inanimate parts of the creation; we shall find abundant reason to take up the words of the Psalmist, and say, O Lord, how wonderful are thy works! in wisdom hast thou made them all; the earth is full of thy riches.' 'O, that men would therefore praise the Lord for his goodness, and declare the wonders that he doeth for the children of men! that they would offer him the sacrifice of thanksgiving, and tell out all his works with gladness!' SECT. II. CHAP. I.-Of the state of man's innocence. THE HISTORY. As soon as the seventh day from the creation (the first day, as we said of Adam's life, and consequently the first day of the week) was begun, Adam, awaking out of his sleep, musing, very probably, on his vision the preceding night, beheld the fair figure of a woman approaching him, " conducted by the hand of her almighty Maker; and, as she advanced, the several innocent beauties that adorned her person, the comeliness of her shape, and gracefulness of her gesture, the lustre of her eye, and sweetness of her looks, discovered themselves in every step more and more. It is not to be expressed, nor now conceived, what a full tide of joy entered in at the soul of our first parent, when he surveyed this lovely creature, who was destined to be the partner and companion of his life; when, by a secret sympathy, he felt that she was of his own likeness, and complexion, 'bone of his bone, and flesh of his 'Ps, cvi. 2. Ps. civ. 24. Ps. cvii. 21, 22. a It is the general opinion of interpreters, both Jewish and Christian, that God himself, or, more particularly, the second person in the ever-blessed Trinity, God the Son (who is therefore styled in Scripture, Isa. Ixiii. 9. the angel of God's presence") appeared to Adam, on this and sundry other occasions, in a visible glorious majesty, such as the Jews call the Schechinah, which seems to have been a very shining flame, or amazing plendour of light, breaking out of a thick cloud, of which we afterward read very frequently, under the name of the glory of the Lord, and to which we cannot suppose our first parents to have been strangers. We therefore look upon it as highly probable, that this divine Majesty first conducted Eve to the place where Adam was, and not long after their marriage, conveyed them both, from the place where they were formed, into the garden of Eden.-Patrick's Commentary. Milton has expressed the joy and transport of Adam, upon his first sight of Eve, in the following manner: When out of hope, behold her! not far off; I overjoy'd, could not forbear aloud. 5 C flesh,' his very self, diversified only into another sex; 5 See Gen. i. 28, 29, 30. c The words of Milton upon this occasion are extremely fine. all heav'n, And happy constellations, on that hour Joyous the birds; fresh gales, and gentle airs Nor can we pass by his episode upon marriage, which, for its grave and majestic beauty, is inimitable. Hail wedded love! mysterious law! true source In paradise, of all things common else! Of father, son, and brother, first were known. d The words of the text are, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth:' whereupon some have made it a question, whether this is not a command, obliging all men to marriage and procreation, as most of the Jewish doctors are of opinion? But to this it may be replied. 1. That it is indeed a command obliging all men so far, as not to suffer the extinction of mankind, in which sense it did absolutely bind Adam and Eve, as also Noah, and his sons, and their wives, after the flood: but, 2. that it does not oblige every particular man to marry, appears from the example of our Lord Jesus, who lived and died in an unmarried state; from his commendation of those who made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of God,' Mat. xix. 12.; and from St Paul's frequent approbation of virginity, 1 Cor. vii. command, though it be expressed in the form of a command, as 1, &c. And therefore, 3. it is here rather a permission than a other permissions frequently are. See Gen. ii. 16. Deut. xiv. 4. -Poole's Annotations. e The description which Milton gives us of the garden of paradise, is very agreeable in several places, but in one more especially, where he represents the pleasing variety of it. Thus was this place A happy rural seat of various view. Groves, whose rich trees wept od'rous gums and balm; If true, here only) and of delicious taste. Of some irriguous valley spread her store. A. M. 1. A. C. 4004; OR, ACCORDING TO HALES, 5411. GEN. CH. 2. FROM VER. 8. in the country of Eden, 'which was watered by four | rivers; by the Tigris, in Scripture called Hiddekel, on one side, and by Euphrates on the other, which, joining their streams together in a place where (not long after the flood) the famous city of Babylon was situate, pass through a large country, and then dividing again, form the two rivers, which the sacred historian calls Pison, and Gihon, and so water part of the garden of paradise, wherein were all kinds of trees, herbs, and flowers, which could any way delight the sight, the taste, or the smell. ger, wherein was one tree of a pernicious quality, though all the rest were good in their kind, and extremely salutary, the Lord God conducted our first parents, who, at this time, were naked, and yet not ashamed, because their innocence was their protection. They had no sinful inclinations in their bodies, no evil concupiscence in their minds, to make them blush; and withal, the temperature of the climate was such, as needed no clothing to defend them from the weather, God having given them (as we may imagine) a survey of their new habitation, shown them the various beauties of the place, the Among other trees, however, there were two of very work wherein they were to employ themselves by day, remarkable names and properties planted in the midst,' and the bower wherein they were to repose themselves or most eminent part of the garden, to be always within by night, granted them to eat of the fruit of every tree the view and observation of our first parents, the tree in the garden, except that one, the tree of knowledge of life,' so called, because it had a virtue in it, not of good and evil,' which (how lovely soever it might only to repair the animal spirits, as other nourishment appear to the eye) he strictly charged them not so does, but likewise to preserve and a maintain them in the much as to touch, upon the penalty of incurring his dissame equal temper and state wherein they were created, pleasure, forfeiting their right and title to eternal life, without pain, diseases, or decay ; and the tree of know- | and entailing upon themselves, and their posterity, e ledge of good and evil,' so called, 3 not because it had | mortality, diseases, and death. a virtue to confer any such knowledge, but because the devil, in his temptation of the woman, pretended that it had; pretended, that 4 as God knew all things, and was himself subject to no one's control, so the eating of this tree would confer on them the same degree of knowledge, and put them in the same state of independency and from this unfortunate deception (whereof God might speak by way of anticipation) it did not improperly derive its name. C Into this paradise of much pleasure, but some dan 1 Bible History, by M. Martin. 1 Patrick's Commentary; and see c. iii. ver. 20. Nicholls' Conference, vol. 1. 4 Estius on the more difficult passages. Breathing the smell of fields, and groves, attune Knit with the GRACES, and the HOURS, in dance a Others think, that the tree of life' was so called, in a symbolical sense, as it was a sign and token of that life which man had received from God, and of his continual enjoyment of it, without diminution, had he persisted in his obedience, and as this garden, say they, was confessedly a type of heaven, so God might intend by this tree to represent that immortal life which he meant to bestow upon mankind himself, Rev. xxii. 2. according to which is that famous saying of St. Austin, 'In the other trees he had nourishment, in these an oath.'-Patrick's Commentary. b Others think the 'tree of knowledge' was so called, either in respect to God, who was minded by this tree to prove our first parents, whether they would be good or bad, which was to be known by their abstaining from the fruit, or eating it; or in respect to them, who, in the event, found by sad experience, the difference between good and evil, which they knew not before; but they found the difference to be this, that good is that which gives the mind pleasure and assurance; but evil that which is always attended with sorrow and regret.—Poole's Annotations, and Young's Sermons, vol. 1. c The word 'paradise,' which the Septuagint make use of (whether it be of Hebrew, Chaldee, or Persian original) signifies 'a place enclosed for pleasure and delight:' either a park where beasts do range, or a spot of ground stocked with choice plants, which is properly a garden; or curiously set with trees, yielding all manner of fruit, which is an orchard. There are three places in the Hebrew text of the Old Testament, wherein this word is found. 1. Nehemiah ii. 8. where that prophet requests of Artaxerxes' letters to Asaph, the keeper of the king's forest, or paradise ; 2. in the Song of Solomon, iv. 13. where he says, that the plants of the spouse are an orchard of pomegranates; and | With this small restraint which the divine wisdom thought proper to lay upon Adam, as a token of his subjection, and a test of his obedience, God left him to the enjoyment of this paradise, where every thing was 3. in Ecclesiastes ii. 5. where he says, 'he made himself gardens,' or paradises. In all which senses the word may very fitly be applied to the place where our first parents were to live: since it was not only a pleasant garden and fruitful orchard, but a spacious park and forest likewise, whereinto the several beasts of the field were permitted to come.-Edwards' Survey of Religion, vol. 1. and Calmet's Dictionary on the word 'Paradise.' d The description which Milton gives us of this blissful bower, is extremely fine. - It was a place, Chosen by the sov'reign Planter, when he fram'd Fenc'd up the verdant wall. Each beauteous flower, Rear'd high their flourish'd heads between, and wrought Crocus, and hyacinth, with rich inlay, Broider'd the ground, more colour'd than with stone e The words in our version are, In the day thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die;' which seem to imply, that on the day that Adam should eat of the tree of knowledge, he should die; which eventually proved not so, because he lived many years after; and therefore (as some observe very well) it should be rendered, "Thou shalt deserve to die without remission;' for the Scripture frequently expresses by the future not only what will come to pass, but also what ought to come to pass; to which purpose there is a very apposite text in 1 Kings ii. 37. where Solomon says to Shimei,- -Go not forth hence (namely, from Jerusalem) any whither; for in the day thou goest out, and passest over the brook Kidron, thou shalt surely die,' that is, 'thou shalt deserve death without remission.' For Solomon reserved to himself the power of punishing him when he should think fit; and, in effect, he did not put him to death the same day that he disobeyed, any more than God did put Adam to death the same day that he transgressed in eating the forbidden fruit. This seems to be a good solution; though some interpreters understand the prohibition, as if God intended thereby to intimate to Adam the deadly quality of the forbidden fruit, whose poison was so very exquisite, that, on the very day he eat thereof, it would certainly have destroyed him, had not God's goodness interposed, and restrained its violence. See Essay for a New Translation ; and Le Clerc's Commentary. A. M. 1. A. C. 4004; OR, ACCORDING TO HALES, 5411. GEN. CH. 2. FROM VER. 8. pleasant to the sight, and accommodated to his liking. Not thinking it convenient however for him, even in his state of innocence, to be idle or unemployed, here he appointed him to dress and keep the new plantation, which, by reason of its luxuriancy, would in time, he knew, require his care. Here he was to employ his mind, as well as exercise his body; to contemplate and study the works of God; to submit himself wholly to the divine conduct; to conform all his actions to the divine will; and to live in a constant dependence upon the divine goodness. Here he was to spend his days in the continual exercises of prayer and thanksgiving; and, it may be, the natural dictates of gratitude would prompt him to offer some of the fruits of the ground, and some living creatures, by way of sacrifice to God. Here were thousands of objects to exercise his intellective faculties, to call forth his reason, and employ it; but that wherein the ultimate perfection of his life was doubtless to consist, was the union of his soul with the supreme good, that infinite and eternal Being, which alone can constitute the happiness of man. CHAP. II.-Difficulties obviated, and Objections explained. : THAT learned men should differ in their opinion about a question, which, it must be confessed, has its difficulties attending it, is no wonderful thing at all; but that Moses, who wrote about 850 years after the flood, should give us so particular a description of this garden, and that other sacred writers, long after him, should make such frequent mention of it, if there was never any such place, nay, if there were not then remaining some marks and characters of its situation, is pretty strange and unaccountable. The very nature of his description shows, that Moses had no imaginary paradise in his view, but a portion of this habitable earth, bounded with such countries and rivers as were very well known by the names he gave them in his time, and (as it appears from other passages in Scripture) for many ages after. 3 Eden is as evidently a real country, as Ararat, where the ark rested, or Shinar, where the sons of Noah removed after the flood. We find it mentioned as such in 10! Adam, beyond all imagination happy with uninterrupted health, and untainted innocence, to delight Scripture, as often as the other two; and there is the thee; no perverseness of will, or perturbation of appe- more reason to believe it, because, in the Mosaic tite, to discompose thee; a heart upright, a conscience account, the scene of these three memorable events is clear, and an head unclouded, to entertain thee; a de-all laid in the neighbourhood of one another. lightful earth for thee to enjoy; a glorious universe for thee to contemplate; an everlasting heaven, a crown of never-fading glory for thee to look for and expect; and, in the mean time, the author of that universe, the King of that heaven, and giver of that glory, thy God, thy Creator, thy benefactor, to see, to converse with, to bless, to glorify, to adore, to obey! Moses, we must allow, is far from being pompous or romantic in his manner of writing; and yet it cannot be denied, but that he gives a manifest preference to this 4 spot of ground above all others; which why he should do, we cannot imagine, unless there was really such a place as he describes : nor can we conceive, what other foundation, both the ancient poets and philosophers could have had, for their fortunate islands, their elysian This was the designed felicity of our first parents. Neither they nor their posterity were to be liable to fields, their garden of Adonis, their garden of the Hessorrow or misery of any kind, but to be possessed of a perides, their Ortygia and Toprobane, (as described by constant and never-failing happiness; and, after innum-Diodorus Siculus,) which are but borrowed sketches erable ages and successions, were, in their courses, to from what our inspired penman tells us of the first terbe taken up into an heavenly paradise. For 2 that the restrial paradise. terrestrial paradise was to Adam a type of heaven, and that the never-ending life of happiness promised to our first parents (if they had continued obedient, and grown up to perfection under that economy wherein they were placed) should not have been continued in this earthly, but only have commenced here, and been perpetuated in an higher state, that is, after such a trial of their obed-cerning the primordial state of our first parents, has these reience as the divine wisdom should think convenient, they should have been translated from earth to heaven, is the joint opinion of the best ancient, both Jewish and Christian writers. a 1 Revelation Examined, part 1 Bull's State of Man before the Fall. This same learned writer, (namely, Bishop Bull) has compiled a great many authorities from the fathers of the first centuries, all full and significant to the purpose, and to which I refer the reader, only mentioning one or two of more remarkable force and antiquity, for his present satisfaction. Justin Martyr, speaking of the creation of the world, delivers not his own private opinion only, but the common sense of Christians in his days; "We have been taught," says he, "that God, being good, did, in the beginning, make all things out of an uninformed matter for the sake of men, who, if by their works they had rendered themselves worthy of his acceptance, we presume, should have been favoured with his friendship, and reigned together with him, being made incorruptible, and impassable;" Apol. 2. Athanasius, among other things worthy our observation, con It is not to be questioned then, but that, in the antediluvian world, there really was such a place as this garden of Eden, a place of distinguished beauty, and more remarkably pleasant in its situation; otherwise we cannot perceive, ¿ why the expulsion of our first parents Huetius' Inquiries. * Universal History, b. 1. c. 1. markable words: "He brought them therefore into paradise, and gave them a law, that if they should preserve the grace then given, and continue obedient, they might enjoy in paradise a life without grief, sorrow, or care; besides that they had a promise also of an immortality in the heavens;" On the Incarnation of the Word. And therefore we need less wonder, that we find it an article inserted in the common offices of the primitive church; and that in the most ancient liturgy now extant, that of Clemens, we read these words concerning Adam: "When thou free leave to eat of all other trees, and forbadest him to taste of broughtest him into the paradise of pleasure, thou gavest him one only, for the hope of better things: that if he kept the commandment, he might receive immortality as the reward of his obedience."-Apost. Const. b. 8. c. 12. b Eve's lamentation upon the order which Michael brought for their departure out of paradise, is very beautiful, and affecting, in Milton. O unexpected shock, worse far than death! C A. M. 1. A C. 4004; OR, ACCORDING TO HALES, 5411. GEN. CH. 2. FROM VER. 8. tute of all the marks in the Mosaical description, which ought always to be the principal test in this inquiry. Caucasus: nor does it run from south to north, but directly contrary, from north to south, as some late travellers have discovered. So that, according to this scheme, we want a whole river, and can no ways account for that which (according to Moses's description of it) went out of the country of Eden, to water the garden of paradise.' from that abode should be thought any part of their pun-wrote his book, but more especially, because it is destiishment; nor can we see, what occasion there was for placing a flaming sword' about the tree of life;' or for appointing an host of the cherubims to guard the 2. The second place, wherein "several learned men entrance against their return. The face of nature, and have sought for the country of Eden, in Armenia, bethe course of rivers, might possibly be altered by the tween the sources of the Tigris, the Euphrates, the Araviolence of the flood; but this is no valid exception to xis, and the Phasis, which they suppose to be the four the case in hand: 'because Moses does not describe the rivers specified by Moses. But this supposition is far situation of paradise in antediluvian names. The names from being well founded, because, according to modern of the rivers, and the countries adjacent, Cush, Havilah, | discoveries, the Phasis does not rise in the mountains &c., are names of later date than the flood; nor can we of Armenia (as the ancient geographers have misinsuppose, but that Moses (according to the known geo-formed us,) but at a great distance from them, in mount graphy of the world, when he wrote) intended to give us some hints of the place, near which Eden, in the former world, and the garden of paradise, were seated. Now the description which Moses gives us of it, is delivered in these words. And the Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden; and a river went out of Eden to water the garden; and from thence it was parted, and became into four heads. The name of the first is Pison; that is it which compasseth the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold: and the gold of that land is good there is bdellium, and the onyx-stone. And the name of the second river is Gihon: the same is it that compasseth the whole land of Cush. And the name of the third river is Hiddekel; that is it which goes before Assyria and the fourth is Euphrates.' So that to discover the place of paradise, we must find out the true situation of the land of Eden, whereof it was probably a part, and then trace the courses of the rivers, and inquire into the nature of the countries which Moses here specified. : The word EDEN, which in the Hebrew tongue (according to its primary acceptation) signifies, 'pleasure' and 'delight;' in a secondary sense, is frequently made the proper name of several places, which are either more remarkably fruitful in their soil, or pleasant in their situation. Now, of all the places which go under this denomination, the learned have generally looked upon these three, as the properest countries wherein to inquire for the terrestrial paradise. 1. The first is that province which the prophet 3 Amos seems to take notice of, when he divides Syria into three parts, viz. Damascus, the plain of Aven, and the house of Eden, called Calo-Syria, or the hollow Syria, because the mountains of Libanus and Antilibanus enclose it on both sides, and make it look like a valley. But (how great soever the names be that seem to patronise it) this, by no means, can be the Eden which Moses ineans; not only because it lies not to the east, but to the north of the place where he is supposed to have 1 Which must be mortal to us both! O flowers, My early visitation, and my last At even, which I had bred with tender band From the first op'ning bud, and gave ye names! "Gen. ii. 8, &c. Shuckford's Connection, 1. 1. 9 Amos i. 5. Its chief abettors are Heidegger in his History of the Patriarch; Le Clerc in Gen. ii. 8.; P. Abram in his Pharas Old Testament; and P. Hardouin in his edition of Pliny. 3. The third place, and that wherein the country of Eden, as mentioned by Moses, seems most likely to be seated, is Chaldea, not far from the banks of the river Euphrates. To this purpose, when we find Rabshakeh vaunting out his master's actions," Have the gods of the nations delivered them which my fathers have destroyed, as Gozan, and Haran, and Rezeph, and the children of Eden, which were in Telassar?' As Telassar, in general, signifies any garrison or fortification; so here, more particularly it denotes that strong fort which the children of Eden held in an island of the Euphrates, towards the west of Babylon, as a barrier against the incursions of the Assyrians on that side. And therefore, in all probability, the country of Eden lay on the west side, or rather on both sides of the river Euphrates, after its conjunction with the Tigris, a little below the place where, in process of time, the famous city of Babylon came to be built. Thus we have found out a country called Eden, which, for its pleasure and fruitfulness, a (as all authors agree,) answers the character which Moses gives of it; and are now to consider the description of the four rivers, in order to ascertain the place where the garden we are in quest of was very probably situate. The first river is Pison, or Phison,' (as the son of Sirach calls it,) that which compasseth the land of Ha vilah. Now, for the better understanding of this, we must observe, that when Moses wrote his history, he was, in all probability, in Arabia Petræa, on the east See Bedford's Scripture Chronology. 9 Calvin on Gen. ii. 8. was the first starter of this opinion, and is, with some little variation, followed by Marinus, Bochart, Huetius, Bishop of Auranches, and divers others. 10 See Wells's Geography; and Patrick's Commentary. a Herodotus, who was an eye-witness of it, tells us, that where Euphrates runs out into Tigris, not far from the place where Ninus is seated, that region is, of all that he ever saw, the most excellent; so fruitful in bringing forth corn, that it yieldeth two hundred fold; and so plenteous in grass, that the people are forced to drive their cattle from pasture, lest they should surfeit themselves by too much plenty.-See Herodotus, Clio; and Quintus Curtius, 1. 5. |