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ACTIVITY OF THE FAMILY CONSTITUTION.

capabilities, and that by so doing he has unfolded his own capabilities and relations. "Property is nothing else than the application of man's individuality to external things; or the realization and manifestation of man's individuality in the material world."* And, here, as civilization has advanced, he has laid his hand on object after object, ever seeking to multiply his image and enlarge his power. Those cultivated fields and numerous herds; those mechanical devices, and that substitution of brute strength, by which human labor is economized; those toys by which childhood is amused, and those symbols by which love is expressed those lines drawn by the hand of justice around property, and those walls and fences which speak of insecurity; those clustering tents and more substantial houses, those tombs built by bereaved affection, and those altars reared by piety-what are they in relation to our present subject but a great hieroglyphic writing, in which man has inscribed his history on the surface of the globe, he himself being the great Hieroglyph. For by these means, each man, each family, each generation, has disclosed its own character, has influenced that of others, and by reaction. molded its own.

In this scene of man's self-manifestation, we behold, as far as it proceeded according to original law, the scene and means of the Divine manifestation. This is its highest, its ultimate relation. Man was revealing his own nature in every movement of his activity, and in every impression which it produced. But God was revealing Himself in every spring and power inclosed in human nature. As far, therefore, as man's free nature was rightly evolved, it was a manifestation of the Divine Nature. Here, God manifested himself by man that he might be manifested to him.

*Lieber's Political Ethics, book ii. sec. 9.

CHAPTER VI.

THE CONTINUITY OF THIS DEVELOPMENT AND ACTIVITY IN

THE MEANS OF DIVINE MANIFESTATION.

THE whole of the progress made in the unfolding scheme of Divine manifestation during the antediluvian period was continuous; so that, whatever the advance made by the eve of the deluge, it was either the growth and expansion of all the past, or else in perfect harmony with it. During each successive stage of that period, every department of art and science, of morals and religion, existed in this sense, in an all-related connection; and this, owing to the fact. that the scheme of Providence consists, not of detached parts, but is one continuous and ever-evolving whole. Man himself, individually considered, is a continuous being, both as to his constitutional and his historical development;* and the history of the individual is only, in this respect, a foreshadowing of the continuous development of the family, and of the community or tribe.

Material civiliza

This is true of the material civilization of

tion continuous. that period. "Who then educated the first human pair? (asks the elder Fichte, in a burst of common sense too strong for the bonds of an infidel philosophy.) A spirit bestowed its care upon them, as is laid down in an

* Man Primeval, p. 190, etc.

ancient and venerable original record, which, taken altogether, contains the profoundest and the loftiest wisdom, and presents those results to which all philosophy must at last come." With the precise amount of the information directly imparted by the Divine parent to the first members of His human family, we have not now to do. For even if we could determine every thing which relates to it, the manner of its communication, the subjects to which it referred, and the advantages derivable from it, we should still be ready to assume that, for the most part, it would be only gradually applied and adopted. And then, having received its appropriate practical application, the skill which that application would impart, the hints and analogies which it would suggest, and the means it would supply, would ask for a wider sphere, and gradually lead to experiments and new discoveries.

Traces of pro

age.

Now, the fragmentary history of antedilugress from age to vian improvements in the arts of life, as recorded in Scripture, harmonizes with this law. In the second generation we find a division of labor, and the recognition of the rights of personal property. "Abel was a keeper of sheep,” and brings of “the firstlings of his flock." Cain, the husbandman, becomes in course of time, the builder of a city; or of a group of structures more permanent than the nomadic tent. Ancient tradition represents Seth, about a century later, as "possessed of a knowledge of astronomy." The third generation is signalized by the statement, "Then began men to call upon the name of the Lord." That the popular interpretation

* Jos. Ant. I. c. 2..

*

This phrase may be rendered-"Then was a beginning made for calling by the name of Jehovah," that is, 1Iis name was in some way

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of this language, that "now piety began to prevail," or that public worship began to be general," is not the correct one is evident, from the fact that about this time the great religious apostacy began to develop itself in forms unusually monstrous and gigantic. Probably the correct interpretation is that which reconciles both extremes, by representing the two great parties, the Sethites and the Cainites, as drawing off more widely from each other; the irreligious more openly avowing their impiety, and the religious, more unitedly and definitely than before, came out from among them," avowed themselves the “

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sons of God" (a Hebrew

adopted by his worshipers; or, "a beginning was made for calling upon the name of Jehovah," that is, in public worship; or, "a beginning was made for preaching in the name of Jehovah." The authority of great names can be adduced for each. I prefer the first chiefly because, if the clause be taken in connection with Genesis, vi. 1, as it should be (the fifth chapter which is interposed being a genealogical table), it immediately receives the explanation, that those spoken of were actually called the sons of God. In the text, however, I have united the three senses inasmuch as they who took the appellation sons of God, would also, if consistent, publicly call upon His name, and in His name call others to repentance. There is, indeed, a fourth interpretation of which the phrase is capable, directly opposed to what we have given, and sustained by Onkelos and the chief Jewish expositors, as well as by Selden and many other learned Christian interpreters. It is this, "then men began profanely to call themselves by the name of Jehovah;" applying the Divine name to themselves; just as the Selucidæ impiously took the name Theos. And it is not a little remarkable, though I have not seen the fact noticed in this connection, that in the fifth and sixth generations we find two Cainites, Mehajael and Methusael, in whose names one of the Divine names (not indeed Jehovah, but El, whence Elohim), is incorporated-the first name probably meaning according to Gesenius, smitten of God, and the second man of God. For the reason stated, however, I prefer the previous view, as harmonizing best with the context.

idiom for disciples), separated themselves to the worship and service of God, and began to "preach in the name of the Lord." In proportion as men ceased to worship God in their family capacity, it became necessary that the pious individuals and parts of families should associate, and form a separate community or Church. If we choose to have recourse to the Phoenician annals,* and to the Indian Puranas, we might show how one discovery is supposed to have followed another, generation after generation. But the Scriptures, true to their high religious aim, occupy themselves for the next three generations in recording only Patriarchal names, and the growing dissoluteness of the times, leaving the material progress which that very dissoluteness implied, to be imagined or inferred. In the seventh generation we have a development of evil in the polygamy of Lamech, and of piety in the history of Enoch. During this generation, according to the Chaldean records copied by Berosus, reigned Alorus, the first of the antediluvian kings. And the Scriptural account of the period warrants the conclusion that the Patriarchal form of government was about this time invaded, and, in some localities displaced, by the "mighty men," and "men of renown," who then appeared. In the eighth generation, Jabal gave an impulse to a nomadic life; Jubal became famous for his improvements and inventions in music; and Tubal Cain, as a skilful artificer in metals. The cotemporaneousness of these latter advances reminds us how constantly an impulse given to improvement in one direction communicates itself in others; and as it arises partly from division of labor, so it tends to multiply such division.

*Cory's Ancient Fragments. + Asiatic Researches, vol. v. p. 241.