literal narrative, imply a local personal presence. If on this occasion, when the delinquent parties were successively arraigned and questioned, and the sentence of condemnation was pronounced in words addressed personally to each, he was locally present, the otherwise seeming paradox, that the same style and manner of address to the subtle adversary should be employed as to Adam, disappears. So the words addressed to Cain can hardly be thought to have been literally spoken, but upon the supposition that the Divine speaker was locally present, and that his presence was matter of previous and familiar recognition to Cain. A like inference may be made from the statement that Elohim came to Abimelech, and spake to him in a dream, and from his address to Jehovah, Gen. xx.; and also from the statement that Elohim came to Laban in a dream, and his mention of the fact, and of the caution he renewed to Jacob, Gen. xxxi. Nor is there in any respect any thing improbable in the supposition that he was locally and visibly present in the likeness of man at that period, any more than at subsequent periods. On the contrary, the statement (John i. 1) that the WORD--the delegated Person who in due time assumed our nature and was visibly on earth--_was_ in the beginning, and created all things, implies that he was then recognized in his official character, which implies relations and acts of which place and visibility were indispensable conditions. Such must undoubtedly have been the case when he was seen, if not uniformly when his voice was heard. He may have been often locally present when, though heard, he was not seen. Such, with respect to Daniel's companions, was the case in his vision, chap. x. He saw one in the form of man, whose face was as the appearance of lightning, and heard his words; but the men that were with him saw not the vision. And when Paul saw his person so unequivocally as to constitute him a witness of his resurrection, the men accompanying him heard his voice, but saw him not. When it is simply said that he appeared to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, or others, and the narrative proceeds to relate what he said, and what answers were made, the language plainly implies his local personal presence, though no mention is made of his being seen. The occasions and objects of his appearance in such instances were, so far as we can judge, as important and as appropriate to such local and visible manifestations, as those in relation to which it is expressly recorded that he was seen in the likeness of man.