Having shown that man commenced his earthly career on a low moral and intellectual plane, and that therefore the assumption of his original moral perfection is a fallacy, the correlative dogma of his fall into a state of moral depravity falls to the ground of its own weight. It would be a work of supererogation to attempt to show that man never fell in a moral sense, after having shown that he never occupied an elevated moral position to fall from. It is self-evident that he could not fall if there was no lower position for him to fall to; and this has been shown. Nevertheless we will expose its absurdity from other logical stand-points. According to the Westminster Catechism, "God placed man in the garden of Eden, and forbade him to eat of the fruit of the tree of knowledge; and, because he disobeyed, he became the victim of God's eternal wrath, an accursed and totally depraved being." Such doctrine is not only morally revolting, but replete with logical absurdities. We will recount some of them:-- 1. God formed and fashioned man, according to the Bible, after his own image, the product of his infinite wisdom; and if he had not possessed infinite wisdom, which must enable him to do every thing to perfection, he had had an eternity to study the matter, and get it fully matured, so as to make every thing work in harmony, and endow every sentient being with happiness. 2. And, as happiness is the highest end and aim of every living being, it is hence evident that, where there is a want of happiness, there is a want of perfection in the being who established such a state of things; and such a being could not by any possibility be infinitely good and infinitely wise. 3. A few points considered will show very clearly, that, if man sinned and fell, God has to sustain the responsibility of it. We are told that God made man; and, being all-wise, he would, of course, endow him with exactly such faculties and inclinations and appetites as were best adapted to his situation, and calculated to make him happy. But, according to orthodoxy, God had planted a tree near the spot where he placed Adam, and furnished it with some beautiful and luscious fruit, and implanted in man an appetite and relish for it, and, as if to tantalize him with perpetual hanger, forbade him to eat the fruit; and apparently, for fear Adam would obey his command and abstain from eating the fruit, he created a serpent-devil to persuade him (or rather his wife) with bland smiles (assuming that a snake can smile, which is rather doubtful) to partake of the fruit, and satisfy their appetites. All this appear's to have been the work of their Creator, and not theirs. But the conspicuous features of the absurdity do not stop here.