not one self-abasing emotion. He knew not what it was to repent himself of his wickedness, humble himself before God, and seek his pardoning mercy. He put himself upon his rights, and God left him. to maintain his rights as best he could. He put himself upon law and justice, and God tried him, and gave him law and justice. His offering was rejected. And when he saw that he was condemned, "his countenance fell." His wrath was kindled against God; his hands were full of blood. He turned away and persevered in his infidelity. The means of grace and salvation were still at his door; but he neglected them, abused them, despised them, and became "a vessel of wrath fitted to destruction." And such is the history of every man who ultimately rejects the salvation of the gospel. He that is not for Christ, is against him. There is no middle ground between believing and disbelieving; no half-way house between Christianity and infidelity.

We dwell on one more thought, before we draw the curtain on the history of these two young men. It is a question of interest, How came they thus to differ in their character and end? I speak not now of the grace that made the Christian differ from the Deist; of that I shall have to speak more largely in our next chapter. I speak of the means, the instrumental causes, the more remote agencies which exerted so powerful an influence.

It was not a difference in their religious education; for they were both the children of the same parents, both beloved, and both enjoying the same religious example, instruction, and prayers. This great fact should ever be borne in mind, and it is among the first things which the early history of our race discloses, that the same religious instruction often produces widely different results.

When we consider the direful effects of the first apostasy, and what a wreck it has made of the heart of man, it is not unnatural to conclude that the truth of God should make impressions, for weal or for woe, on every mind to which it has access. It accords with the method of divine grace, that where it is received, it exerts a progressive influence; while it accords with the intellectual and moral nature of fallen man, that where it is rejected, it gradually loses its force, and hardens the heart. While it becomes the natural aliment of one class of minds, and they live and grow upon it; in the opposite class it excites hostility, provokes resistance, and awakens slumbering wickedness. Those there are who never grow so rapidly in sin, and become so precociously ripe for destruction, as when they become blighted in their youth, and their dry and fruitless branches are spread out under the dews and rains of heaven. Facts, from the days of Cain to the present hour, abundantly illustrate these observations. Truth

is a two-edged sword; it always wounds. It is "a sweet savor of Christ in them that are saved, and in them that perish. To the one it is the savor of death unto death; to the other the savor of life unto life."

Cain was not an uninstructed man. Some of the most wonderful facts, and some of the most amazing truths, had been spread before his mind. He was the first-born of the race, and lived amid wonderful realities. A field of thought was presented to his view, which, if he had not trodden under his feet, would have yielded flowers and fruit; to him it was a barren waste. And this is one of the reasons why, with all his religious instructions, he became a deist. He hated the truth of God.

He had also a strong desire to get rid of moral obligation. This is always one of the motives to infidelity. When men now read the Scriptures, and listen to a preached gospel, they feel the obligation to become Christians; and they can think of no method by which they can so effectually weaken and destroy this sense of obligation, as by disbelieving what they read and hear. They try to disbelieve it; and they often pretend to have brought their minds into this state of unbelief, because it emboldens them to cast off the sense of religious obligation. Men who hate to feel the obligations of true piety, are driven to this resort

for the sake of silencing their own consciences. Cain well knew the religion of his parents; but he was a bold free-thinker, and resolved not to be under any such bonds.

Nor is it at all improbable that he prided himself upon his peculiar way of thinking. It is quite likely that he set himself to oppose the religious views of Abel, and exerted his ingenuity in calling in question the reasonableness of the sacrifice of fered by his believing brother. He took pleasure in contradicting the received religion of his family, in marking out a path for himself, and, instead of following in their steps, setting himself up as the great leader of infidelity.

Cain was moreover a very wicked man; and this was the true source of his deistical views. H13 subsequent conduct shows what he was; and in view of it, it is not unnatural to ask, how could such a man be anything else than a deist? "Light is come into the world, and men have loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds are evil." This is the cause of all the infidelity in the world. Wicked men, if they mean to remain wicked, will not become Christians.

We plead guilty to the charge of uttering no new truths in the present chapter; we do not plead guilty to the utterance of truths that are unimportant. The great object of God's revelation is to disclose the method of acceptance with him. The

fact is a solemn and affecting one, that men are sinners. It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. Angels found it so when they fell, and were thrust down in chains of darkness. Our first parents found it so, when they were doomed to wander in a world that was cursed for their sake, to go down to the grave, and to be righteously exposed to the wrath and curse of God. All have found it so who have lived and died in sin, and now have their abode in the world where "the worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched." Every man will find it so who does not seasonably admit the inquiry, "How shall I find acceptance with God? what hope is there for such a sinner? He may well take heed, in considering this question, how he confides in the tra ditions, or commandments of men, or to the delusions of the adversary, and his own wicked heart. If some there be who say, there is no occasion for solicitude in respect to this matter; they may not be believed. It is an easy thing to be deceived with regard to one's own character. Men are sufficiently inclined to think well of themselves. Cain marvelled that he was not accepted. If there be those who flatter themselves that it is enough to reform their habits of outward sin, and be more attentive to the external duties of morality and religion; we have nothing to say against such reform and such seriousness; they are greatly