hicken, in comparison with
the primeval patriarchs of India. Buckle tells us that, according to the
Hindoos, common men in ancient times lived to the age of 80,000 years,
some dying a little sooner and some a little later. Two of their kings,
Yudhishther and Alarka, reigned respectively 27,000 and 66,000 years.
Both these were cut off in their prime; for some of the early poets
lived to be about half a million; while one king, the most virtuous as
well as the most remarkable of all, was two million years old when he
began to reign, and after reigning 6,800,000 years, he resigned his
empire and lingered on for 100,000 years more. Adam is not in the hunt
with that tough old fellow. On the principle that it is as well to be
hung for a sheep as a lamb, faithful Christians should swallow him as
well as Adam. When the throat of their credulity is once distended
they may as well take in everything that comes. What followed the Curse
clearly shows that man was not originally created immortal. Adam and Eve
were expelled from the Garden of Eden expressly in order that they might
not become so. God "drove them forth" lest they should "take also of the
tree of life, and eat, and live for ever." Many orthodox writers, who
have to maintain the doctrine of our natural immortality, preserve a
discreet silence on this text. Our great Milton, who has so largely
determined the Protestant theology of England, goes right in the face of
Scripture when he makes God say of man,

"I at first with two fair gifts
Created him endowed, with happiness
And _immortality_."

The fact is, the Book of Genesis never once alludes to any such thing,
nor does it represent man as endowed with any other soul than that
"breath of life" given to all animals. It is also certain that the
_ancient_ Jews were entirely ignorant of the doctrine of a life beyond
the grave. The highest promise that Moses is said to have made in the
Decalogue was that their "days should be long in the land." The Jews
were a business people, and they wanted all promises fulfilled on this
side of death.

Nor is there any real _Fall_ implied in this story. God himself says
that "the man," having eaten of the forbidden fruit, "is become as one
of us." That could scarcely be a fall which brought him nearer to God.
Bishop South, indeed, in a very eloquent passage of his sermon on "Man
Created in God's Image," celebrates the inconceivable perfection of
the first man, and conc