The prohibition under which our first parents were placed has been the subject of much ridicule, and the occasion of many a "fool-born jest;" and the whole transaction has been declared to be unworthy of the parties concerned. Where would the test be placed if not in the government of man's own appetites? Social and political relations he had none. We do not suppose that the prohibition under which our first parents were placed was the only rule of their conduct. This precept was made prominent by special injunction, and the result showed that it was a sufficient test. The law was simple and explicit. It was not difficult of observation, and it accorded with the circumstances of those on whom it was enjoined. The immediate visible agent in the seduction of man to sin was the serpent; but the testimony of Scripture is in proof that the real tempter was that subtile and powerful evil spirit whose general appellations are the devil and Satan; the former signifying traducer and false accuser, and the latter, an adversary. That the devil was the real tempter is the uniform teaching of the Scriptures, and that an order of fallen spirits, under the guidance of an arch-leader, are permitted to have influence on earth, to war against the virtue and peace of man, though under constant control and government, and that this entered into the circumstances of the trial of our first parents, and that it enters into ours. It is not our purpose in this connection to discuss either the theory of temptation, or the extent of Satanic influence, but to present man's relation to the Divine government as revealed in the Scriptures. In consequence of the apostasy of Adam, all men have sinned. After Adam had lost the image of God he begat a son in his own likeness. The image of God, in which Adam was created, we have shown to have been _divine knowledge_, _righteousness_, and _true holiness_. The likeness of Adam is, by unquestionable analogy, the _moral character which he possessed after his apostasy_. In this likeness Seth is said to have been begotten. That Cain was _depraved_ will not be denied. The same thing is indirectly, but conclusively, taught concerning Abel; for he is declared to have lived and died in faith; and that faith had reference to a future promised Redeemer. Christ, as a Redeemer, could not have been an object of faith to Abel had he not been a sinner; or, in other words, had he not borne the likeness of apostate Adam. If this was the nature of the immediate children of Adam, it can not be denied that it is equally the nature of his remotest progeny, or that they do not all bear the likeness of their common parent. St. Paul argues this doctrine at length in his Epistle to the Romans, and his conclusions are that all are under sin--that judgment has come upon all men to condemnation. St. Paul teaches the same doctrine by asserting the impossibility of being justified by the works of the law.