the fact, in beholding a third humanity beside herself and Adam, but leaving some excuse unto the woman, which afterward the man took up with lesser reason, that is, to have been deceived by another like herself. Again, there is no inconvenience in the shape assumed, or any considerable impediment that it might disturb that performance in the common form of a serpent. For whereas it is conceived the woman must needs be afraid thereof, and rather fly than approach it, it was not agreeable unto the condition of paradise and state of innocency therein; if in that place, as most determine, no creature was hurtful or terrible unto man, and those destructive effects they now discover succeeded the curse, and came in with thorns and briars; and therefore Eugubinus (who affirmeth this serpent was a basilisk) incurreth no absurdity, nor need we infer that Eve should be destroyed immediately upon that vision. For noxious animals could offend them no more in the garden. than Noah in the ark; as they peaceably received their names, so they friendly possessed their natures, and were their conditions destructive unto each other, they were not so unto man, whose constitutions then were antidotes, and needed not fear poisons; and if (as most conceive) there were but two created of every kind, they could not at that time destroy either man or themselves, for this had frustrated the command of multiplication, destroyed a species, and imperfected the creation; and therefore also if Cain were the first man born, with him entered, not only the act, but the first power of murder, for before that time neither could the serpent nor Adam destroy Eve, nor Adam and Eve each other, for that had overthrown the intention of the world, and put its Creator to act the sixth day over again. Moreover, whereas in regard of speech, and vocal conference with Eve, it may be thought he would rather assume an human shape and organs, than the improper form of a his crafte to deliver his wile by a face suitable to the voice of man, and since we believe the one, we may without error beleive the other. But itt is safest to believe what we finde recorded of the human voyce, and leave the other to Him who thought not fit to reveale any more. Wee see the fathers differ in opinion, and there is enough on either side to refute the scorne of Julian, who payd deare inoughe for his atheistical, or rather antitheisticall blasphemye.-li'r. serpent, it implies no material impediment. Nor need we to wonder how he contrived a voice out of the mouth of a serpent, who hath done the like out of the belly of a Pythonissa, and the trunk of an oak, as he did for many years at Dodona. Lastly, whereas it might be conceived that an human 4 conceived.] Itt might wel bee conceived (and soe it seemes itt was) by St. Basil, that a virgin's head (hee does not saye a humane shape) was fittest for this intention of speakinge, itt being most probable Eve would be more amazed to heare such a creature as a serpent speake with a humane voyce, then to heare a human voyce passe through the mouth of a virgin face. To hear a voice without a head must needs (as the subtile serpent knew full well) have started in Eve either the supposition of a causeles miracle, or the suspition of an imposture; therefore to cut off those scruples, which might have prevented and frustrated his ayme, tis most probable the subtile tempter assumed the face as well as the voice of a Virgin to conveigh that temptation which he supposed Eve would greedily entertain. Julius Scaliger, that magazin of all various learninge, in his 183rd exercitation and 4th section, speaking of certaine strange kinds of serpents, reports that in Malabar, there are serpents 8 foote long, of a horrible aspect, but harmless unless they bee provoked. These he cals boylovers (pæderotas,) for that they will for manye houres together stand bolt upright gazing on the boyes at their sportes, never offring to hurte any of them. These, saithe he, while they glide on the ground are like other serpents or eeles (like conger eeles,) but raising themselves upright they spread them selves into such a corpulent breadthe, that had they feet they would seeme to be men, and therefore he cals them by a coigned name, xλav@gwπous, eelelike men, though hee might more properly call them piavegurous, dragonNow though we can yeeld noe greater beleefe to this story then the Portuguez that traffique thither deserve, yet bycause the world owes many excellent discoveryes of hidden truths to his indefatigable diligence and learned labors, seldome taxed for fabulous assertions, why may we not think that itt like men. was this kinde of serpent, whose shape Satan assumed when he spake to Eve.* For since Moses tels us that God permitted the serpent to deceive our grandmother by faigning the voyce of man, wee may reasonably acquit St. Basil of error, or offring violence to trueth, that hee tooke it as granted by a paritye of like reason, that the serpent would rather assume such a face and appearance of humane forme as might sute with a humane voyce, at least would frame a humane visage as well as a human tounge, which is but a parte in the head of man, for which the head (rather then for any other sense) seemes to have been made by God, that the spirits of men (which till they discover themselves by language cannot bee understood) might by the benefit of this admirable instrument, have mutual commerce and intelligence, and conveighe their inwarde conceptions each to other. Surely yf every such a strange serpent as this which Scaliger describes were scene in the world, we must perforce grant that they are some of that kinde which God at first created soe, and that Satan subtily choose to enter into that kinde which before the curse naturally went upright (as they say the basiliske now does,) and could soe easily, soe nearly represent the appearance and shew of man not only in gate but in voyce as the Scripture speakes. That they have no feete makes soe much the more for the conjecture, and that however itt seemes this kinde of serpent (which Satan used as an instrument of his fraud) did originally goe upwright, and can yet frame himselfe into that posture, yet by God's just doome is now forced to creep on his belly in the duste; where though they strike at our heele, they are liable to have their heade bruised and trampled on by the foote of man.-Wr. Respecting the basilisk, see note 9, vol. ii. p. 414. In one of the illustrations to Cædmon's Paraphrase, mentioned p. 99, I find the serpent standing "bolt upright" receiving ⚫ See what I noted long since on Gen. iii, 14, to this purpose in the Geneva Bible. VOL. III. shape was fitter for this enterprise, it being more than probable she would be amazed to hear a serpent speak ; some conceive she might not yet be certain that only man was privileged with speech, and being in the novity of the creation, and inexperience of all things, might not be affrighted to hear a serpent speak. Besides, she might be ignorant of their natures, who was not versed in their names, as being not present at the general survey of animals when his sentence, and another figure of him lying on the ground, to indicate his condemnation to subsequent reptility. Some critics have complained of the painters for representing him without feet in his interview with Eve, whereas, say they, his creeping on his belly was inflicted on him as a punishment. Had those critics been acquainted with professor Mayer's assertion, that rudimental feet are found in almost all the serpent tribe, they would doubtless have regarded it as a confirmation of their opinion, and would have contended that these imperfect and unserviceable rudiments of feet were all the traces left to them of those locomotive powers which this, as well as other vertebrated animals, had originally enjoyed. Dr. Adam Clarke gives a very long and elaborate article on the temptation of Eve. His opinion is that the tempter was an ape; he builds his hypothesis on the fact that the Hebrew word (nachash, Gen. iii, 1,) is nearly the same with an Arabic word, signifying an ape and THE DEVIL! He thus sums up: "In this account we find, 1. That whatever this nachash was, he stood at the head of all inferior animals for wisdom and understanding. 2. That he walked erect, for this is necessarily implied in his punishment-on thy belly (i. e. on all fours) shalt thou go. 3. That he was endued with the gift of speech, for a conversation is here related between him and the woman. 4. That he was also endued with the gift of reason, for we find him reasoning and disputing with Eve. 5. That these things were common to this creature, the woman no doubt having often seen him walk erect, talk, and reason, and therefore she testifies no kind of surprise when he accosts her in the language related in the text." Granting, for a moment, the Doctor's five positions, I would ask, does he mean that the ape is a creature which now answers the description? Most certainly it does not, any more than the serpent. If on the other hand he means that the creature, through whom Satan tempted Eve, had previously possessed those advantages, but lost them as a punishment of that offence, then why not suppose it to have been a serpent, or any other creature, as well as the ape? The theory itself stultifies any attempt to discover the tempter among creatures now in existence, because we are required to suppose their nature and habits to have totally changed. The serpent certainly has one claim, which the ape has not, namely, that its present mode of going is (in accordance with the Scriptural description) on its belly; which, with deference to the learned Doctor, "going on all fours" is not, unless he can justify what he in fact says, that quadrupeds and reptiles move alike! Moreover, his selection is specially unfortunate in this very respect, that of all animals the ape now approaches most nearly to the human mode of walking, and exhibits therefore the most incomplete example of the fulfilment of the curse-"on thy belly shalt thou go." Hadrian Beverland, in his Peccatum Originale, 12mo. 1676, has published his strange speculations as to the NATURE of the temptation, to which our mother yielded. But after all, neither as one point nor another, which has not been clearly revealed, shall we be likely either to obtain or communicate any useful information. The indulgence of a prurient and speculative imagination on points which, not having been disclosed, cannot be discovered, and the knowledge of which would serve no good purpose, were far better restrained. We know, alas, that what constituted sin originally, has ever been and ever will be its heinous feature in the sight of the Great Lawgiver-viz. disobedience to his known and understood commands. Adam assigned unto every one a name concordant unto its nature. Nor is this only my opinion, but the determination of Lombard and Tostatus, and also the reply of Cyril unto the objection of Julian, who compared this story unto the fables of the Greeks. CHAPTER V. Of the Picture of Adam and Eve with Navels. ANOTHER mistake there may be in the picture of our first parents, who after the manner of their posterity are both delineated with a navel; and this is observable not only in ordinary and stained pieces, but in the authentic draughts of Urbin, Angelo, and others.5 Which notwithstanding cannot be allowed, except we impute that unto the first cause, which we impose not on the second, or what we deny unto Nature, we impute unto naturity itself, that is, that in the first and most accomplished piece, the Creator affected superfluities, or ordained parts without use or office. 5 and others. It is observable in the rude figures of Adam and Eve, among the illuminations of Cædmon's Metrical Paraphrase of Scripture History engraved in the 24th vol. of the Archæologia. But worse mistakes have been committed in depicting "our first parents." In the gallery of the convent of Jesuits, at Lisbon, there is a fine picture of Adam in paradise, dressed (qu. after the fall?) in blue breeches with silver buckles, and Eve with a striped petticoat. In the distance appears a procession of capuchins bearing the cross. It 6 Which notwithstanding, &c.] seems to have been the intention of our author, in this somewhat obscure sentence, to object, that, in supposing Adam to have been formed with a navel, we suppose a superfluity in that which was produced by nature (naturity,) while in nature herself we affirm there is nothing superfluous, or useless. It is, however, somewhat hazardous to pronounce that useless whose office may not be very obvious to us. Who will venture to point out the office of the mamma in the male sex? or to say wherefore some of the serpent tribes are provided with the rudiments of feet which can scarcely, if at all, be of any use to them?—a fact which has been asserted recently by a German naturalist of distinction, Dr. Mayer, as the result of long and very extensive anatomical examination of the principal families of the serpents. He thereon proposes a new division of the order,-into PHENOPTERA, those snakes whose rudimental feet are externally visible, and comprising Boa, Python, Eryx, Clothonia, and Tortrix; CRYPTOPODA, in which the bony rudiments are entirely concealed beneath the skin, containing Anguis, Typhlops, and Amphisbæna; and CHONDROPODA and APODA, in which the rudiments are scarcely, or not at all, observable.-Nova Acta Acad. Cæsar. Naturæ Curiosorum, tom. xii, p. 2. Respecting the singular subject of discussion in this chapter; it appears to me that not only Adam and Eve, but all species, both of the animal, vegetable, and nineral kingdoms, were created at once in their perfect state; and therefore all exhibiting such remaining traces of a less perfect state, as those species, in their For the use of the navel is to continue the infant unto the mother, and by the vessels thereof to convey its aliment and sustentation. The vessels whereof it consisteth, are the umbilical vein, which is a branch of the porta, and implanted in the liver of the infant; two arteries likewise arising from the iliacal branches, by which the infant receiveth the purer portion of blood and spirits from the mother; and lastly, the urachos or ligamental passage derived from the bottom of the bladder, whereby it dischargeth the waterish and urinary part of its aliment. Now upon the birth, when the infant forsaketh the womb, although it dilacerate, and break the involving membranes, yet do these vessels hold, and by the mediation thereof the infant is connected unto the womb, not only before, but awhile also after the birth. These therefore the midwife cutteth off, contriving them into a knot close unto the body of the infant; from whence ensueth that tortuosity or complicated nodosity we usually call the navel; occasioned by the colligation of vessels before mentioned. Now the navel being a part, not precedent, but subsequent unto generation, nativity, or parturition, it cannot be well imagined at the creation or extraordinary formation of Adam, who immediately issued from the artifice of God; nor also that of Eve, who was not solemnly begotten, but suddenly framed, and anomalously proceeded from Adam. And if we be led into conclusions that Adam had also this part, because we behold the same in ourselves, the inference is not reasonable; for if we conceive the way of his formation, or of the first animals, did carry in all points a strict conformity unto succeeding productions, we might fall into imaginations that Adam was made without teeth; or that he ran through those notable alterations in the vessels of the heart, which the infant suffereth after birth: we need not maturity, retain. If so, Adam was created with the marks of an earlier stage of existence, though he had never passed through that stage. Sir Thomas's opinion is cited and adopted by Dr. John Bulwer, in his mcst curious work, entitled Anthropometamorphosis: Man Transformed: or the Artificial Changling, Historically Presented, &c. 4to. 1653. p. 401. In the same work (p. 492,) Dr. B. also discusses at some length Sir Thomas's chapter on pygmies, (c. xi, book Iv.) See Rel. Med. p. 2. § 10, where Adam is called, "the man without a navel."-Ross deems the part in question to have been intended by the Creator merely for ornament; in support of which opinion he cites Canticles vii, 2!! |