DOCTRINE OF THE FALL OF MAN. While some Rationalistic writers conceded that Moses was the author of the whole or parts of the Pentateuch, his version of the origin of sin was universally rejected. The temptation by the serpent was, with them, one of the most improbable myths ever drawn up from the earliest traditions of nations. Whether Moses wrote much or little of the books attributed to him, his sources of knowledge were monuments and tales which he saw and heard about him. It is likely that he derived his idea of the fall of man from some hieroglyphic representation which he happened somewhere to see. As for the entrance of the serpent into Paradise, it is just as improbable as the rabbinical notion that the serpent of Eden had many feet. In the opinion of some, the whole narrative is only an allegory, or "a poetical description of the transition of man from a more brutish creature into humanity, from the baby-wagon of instinct into the government of reason, from the guardianship of nature into the condition of freedom."[48] Kindred to this theory is Ammon's; that at first man obeyed instinct only, and that his desire to eat the forbidden fruit was the longing of his mind to understand truth. But the great injury which these men thought they had visited on this doctrine was their assumption that man had not fallen, and that instead of being worse than he once was, he is every year growing purer and holier than at any previous stage of his history. This was flattering to their inflated pride, and their wish became father to their creed. With Eichhorn, the narrative of the fall was only a description of Adam's thoughts. MIRACLES. It was no surprise to the wise disciples of Reason that there should be found numerous records of miracles in the Bible. It was just what might be expected from such writers in that gray morning of antiquity. The first chroniclers seized upon tradition; and their successors, seeing how well their fathers had succeeded, merely imitated them by catching up new ones, or enlarging upon the old account. By a sort of infection, therefore, we find what purports to be a revelation. Whatever harmony there is, was the result of an aim which was not lost sight of for a moment. Nature was the first teacher; and though she was competent, we have been poor disciples. She is instructing us all the time, though we have listened less to her than to the other auditors who sit about us. Lichtenberg says in poetical language, that "When man considers Nature the teacher, and poor men the pupils, we listen to a lecture and we have the principles and the knowledge to understand it. But we listen far more to the applause of our fellow-students than to the discourse of the teacher. We interlard the lecture by speeches to the one who sits next us; we supply what has been poorly heard by us; and enlarge it by our own mistakes of orthography and sentiment."