As a supplement to the cosmogony, comes the legend of the Fall. Of course, the object of this tale is to account for the fancied imperfection of the works of God. The gist of the matter is this: Adam and Eve were commanded to abstain from a certain tree growing in Eden. This abstinence was to be the test of their obedience. The devil tempted Eve to eat of the forbidden fruit, and Eve induced Adam to do the same. In consequence of this disobedience, God cursed the serpent whose form Satan had assumed;—he cursed the ground, causing it to bring forth thorns and thistles; cursed Eve in her instincts of love and maternal functions, and Adam in assigning him the toil of working for his daily bread. Over all came the sentence of death: “By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin” (Rom. v., 12). According to this legend, “death is the wages of sin.” It was Adam’s apostacy that brought both sin and death into the world, but neither sin nor death can possibly be due to such a cause. Adam’s apostacy could not bring “sin” into the world. _The very act of disobedience is a proof that_ “_sin_” _already existed_. The sin preceded the overt act, was the cause of it, and the cause must inevitably exist before its effect. It was sin that produced apostacy, and not apostacy which produced sin. Take the case of Cain: It is said that Cain slew his brother Abel. What would be thought of the logician who should affirm that because Cain slew Abel, hatred was introduced into the heart of man, and that death should follow as a perpetual punishment? Should we not reply, it was because Cain hated Abel that he rose up and slew him? The passion of hatred preceded the act of murder. It was malice aforethought, and if anything resulted from the misdeed, it was not hatred but contrition, not thoughts of evil but thoughts of bitter grief. Hatred was the cause of murder, and murder the parent of sorrow. So with Adam and Eve. If there had not been already “an evil heart of unbelief,” there never would have been an act of disobedience. Eve sinned, not because she was innocent, but because she was sinful. She disobeyed, not because she was obedient, but because her heart “was not right with God.” The bare act was nothing, the sin was there already, and if she had never eaten of the tree, the thought of her heart would have been sin. It is not true, therefore, that sin is the consequence of Adam’s apostacy, inasmuch as it produced the apostacy itself. By one man’s disobedience sin did _not_ enter into the world, neither is it true that death is “the wages of sin.”