, devote him:" for the verb is in the imperative mood. As
if Cain had said himself, May this our beginning be happy and
prosperous. My father Adam cursed me on account of my sin. I am cast
out of his sight. I live alone in the world. The earth does not yield
me her strength; she would be more fruitful to me, had I not thus
sinned. And yet God now shows me uncovenanted mercy in giving me this
son. It is a good and happy beginning.

As in the generation of Cain the corporal blessings begin with Enoch,
so it is another Enoch in the generation of the righteous under whom
religion and spiritual blessings begin to flourish.

257. That which is added by Moses concerning the city Cain thus built
belongs to history. But I have before observed that Cain, when
separated from the true church and driven into banishment, hated the
true church. When, therefore, Cain thus first built a city, that very
act tended to show that he not only disregarded and hated the true
Church, but wished also to oppose and oppress it. For he reflects
thus: Behold I am cast out by my father and I am cursed by him, but my
marriage is not a barren one; therefore I have in this the hope of a
great posterity. What, therefore, is it to me that I am driven by my
father from beneath his roof? I will build a city, in which I will
gather a church for myself. Farewell, therefore, to my father and his
church. I regard them not.

258. Accordingly, it is not through fear, or for defense, that Cain
"built a city," but from the sure hope of prosperity and success, and
from pride and the lust of dominion. For he had no need whatever to
fear his father and mother, who at the divine command had thrust him
out to go into some foreign land. Nor had he any more ground of fear
from their children than from themselves. But Cain was inflated with
pride through this uncovenanted mercy of God, as I have termed it;
and, as the world ever does, he sought by means of his "city" an
opportunity of emerging from his present state into future greatness.
The sons of God, on the contrary, are only anxious about another city,
"which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God," as we have
it described in the Epistles to the Hebrews 11, 10.

V. 18a. _And unto Enoch was born Irad._

259. What opinion to form concerning this name, I really know not, for
its origin is very obscure; and yet I believe the name is not
accidental but prophetic. In the book of Joshua we have a city called