Secondly, it is also true that contraries are not necessarily consistent contrarieties in every respect. For the form of contrarieties is multiplex, as logicians teach. Some things are opposed to others relatively, others privatively, and others by contradiction. Thus the natural father by whom we are begotten and the father of lies are opposed to each other. Although we should grant the Jews their interpretation of this passage that Moses is here speaking of the natural serpent, yet the text itself evidently contains a synecdoche when we compare it with the words of Christ. The words of Moses are, "And Jehovah God said unto the serpent, Because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle." What then did the serpent do? He deceived Eve and thus murdered her. So the words of Moses therefore only hold up the light of the Gospel, "The devil was a murderer from the beginning," John 8:44. Is it not by this light at once manifest that God so speaks with the natural serpent as recorded by Moses, that his words are intended to apply to the devil, concealed under the form of the natural serpent, who having assumed that form under it hurled man into sin and death, and laid him under the wrath of God? Wherefore by the seed of the serpent in this passage is not to be understood the natural seed of the natural serpent, but the seed of the devil; as Christ also represents the same in the Gospel, using the same appellation of "seed," where he says, "An enemy came and sowed among the wheat evil seed," Math. 13:25. This evil seed is contrary to the spiritual seed, even as flesh and spirit are wholly contrary to each other. But it is not necessary as we have said, that contraries should contain that contrariety to each other throughout in all respects; just in the same manner as similarities do not respond to each other in every particular. Thus for instance, Adam is a figure of Christ; which similarity consists in the great truth that as sin hath abounded towards all men by Adam, so the righteousness of Christ also abounds towards all those who believe in him. These particulars of Adam and of Christ agree with each other. In all other respects Adam and Christ do not agree. Wherefore let this their error be left to the Jews, to content themselves with it. We believers in Christ know that the serpent, to whom God speaks in this text, is the devil. And this we know from the interpretation of Christ himself. PART VI. NAME ADAM GAVE HIS WIFE. GOD REMINDS MAN OF THE FALL. THE CHERUBIM. I. V. 20. _And the man called his wife's name Eve; because she is the mother of all living._