much was Cain affected with this sentence, that he said, my punishment is greater than I can bear.

The divine approbation of virtue was signified in the most emphatical manner in the tranflation of Enoch. Gen. v. 24. And Enoch walked with God, and he was not, for God took him. This would at the same time give men to understand, that there was a reward for virtue in another state than this, into which men might be removed.

In the history of the deluge we fee in the strongest light the divine abhorrence of wickedness in general, when we are told that for that reason alone he destroyed the whole human race. Gen. vi. 5. And God Saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only cvil continually. And the Lord faid, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth. At the same time the Divine Being thewed how pleasing virtue was to him, when on that account he spared Noah and his family. verse 8. But Noah found grace in the eyes of the

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the Lord. Noah was a just man and perfect in his generation, and Noah walked with God, Accordingly, when the ark was built he says to him, " Come thou, and all thy house, into the ark; for thee have I seen righteous before me in this generation."

When after the flood, God gave permiffion to eat animal food, it was with a prohibition to eat the blood, as the feat of life,

accompanied with a stronger prohibition to shed the blood of man, Gen. ix. 4. But

which is the blood And furely your

flesh with the life thereof, thereof, shall ye not eat. bkod of your lives will I require. At the þand of a 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.

The destruction of Sodom and Gomor rah by fire from heaven was an event hardJy less instructive than that of the old world by the deluge, as it was declared to be on account of the wickedness of the inhabitants; because, as God faid to Abraham, (Gen. xviii. 20.) the cry of Sodom and Gomorrah was great, and because their fin was grievous,

!

grievous. Abraham pleading for Sodom, in
which city Lot then resided, faid, Wilt thou
also destroy the righteous with the wicked?
Far be it from thee to do after this manner,
to flay the righteous with the wicked, and that
the righteous should be as the wicked. Shall
not the judge of all the earth do right? By
his interceffion he prevailed so far that the
place would have been spared, if so few as
ten righteous had been in it; but that num-
ber not being found, it was devoted to de-
struction,

The angels who had the commission to execute the fentence being entertained by Lot, say to him, Gen. xix. 12. Whatsoever thou hast in the city bring out of this place, for we shall destroy this place, because the cry of them is waxed great before the face of the Lord, and the Lord hath fent us to destroy it. The next day Abraham, we read, ib. got up early in the morning, and looked toward Sodom and Gomorrah, and toward all the land of the plain; and beheld, and lo, the smoke of the country went up as the smoke of a furpace. What a striking and instructive lesson must this have been to all who were ac

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quainted

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quainted with it, and so great an event as this must have been remembered a long time.

Though it was the wise intention of the Divine Being to distinguish one particular nation in which to preserve the knowledge and worship of himself, when mankind were universally falling into idolatry, not for the fake of that particular nation, but for the benefit of the whole world of man kind, who would derive the most impor tant advantages from that provision, he made choice of a person of the most distingushed virtue for the head of that nation; and to the virtue of Abraham, and other excellent characters in that nation, their pofterity are always referred when they were abandoned to vice.

Idolatry, which it appears to have been the first object of this scheme of revelation to guard against, was by no means, as I have shewn on another occafion, a system of erroneous opinions respecting God, his works, or his providence, but confifted of rites of the most flagitious and horrid kind, which debafed human nature, and reduced man to a state worse than the brutes. Con

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sequently sequently the laws against idolatry, severe as they were, are to be confidered as provisions against the spreading of the worst of vices, the most inconsistent with every idea of dignity and moral excellence.

That there must have been something in the religion of the patriarchs favourable to moral excellence, is evident from the hiftory of Jofeph, (though the same religion had not the same effect on the generality of his brethren,) because it was from religious considerations that he preserved his fidelity to his master in the hour of temptation, when he replied to the folicitations of his mistress, Gen. xxxix. 9. How can I do this great wickedness, and fin against God? He evidently confidered adultery as highly offenfive to God, as well as injurious to fociety. His generosity to his brethren, and the apology he made for their ill behaviour to him, discovers a mind deeply impressed with a sense of the universal providence of God, and the duty of fubmiffion to his will, as always wife and good, when he repeatedly faid, Gen. xlv. Now therefore be not grieved, nor angry with your felves, that ye fold

me