Sermons Volume 1-2 (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1811 edition. Excerpt: ...advantages of man over the venomed reptile. "The serpent," says he, " is told, that, for the extent of his natural powers and enjoyments, he holds his rank with the lowest of the brute creation, --that serpents, by the make of their bodies, are necessitated to crawl upon the ground, --that, although they have a poison in their mouths, the greatest mischief they can do to men is to bite them by the heels; whereas men, by the foresight of their danger, and by their erect posture, have greatly the advantage, and knock serpents on the head wherever they chance to find them." This would be our heathen's exposition; nor could the most subtle criticism draw any farther meaning from the terms of this denunciation. But, now, let our heathen be made acquainted with the particulars of the story of the fall; and let him understand that these words were addressed to the individual serpent which had tempted Eve, by the Omnipotent Creator, when he came in person to pronounce the dreadful doom upon deluded ruined man;--our heathen will immediately perceive that this was no season for pursuing a useless speculation on the natural history of the serpent; nor was so obvious a remark upon the comparative powers of the serpent kind and man better fitted to the majesty of the great Being to whom it is ascribed, than to the solemnity of the occasion upon which it was introduced: and he could not but suspect that more must be meant than meets the ear. He would observe, that the words were addressed to the serpent, in the character of the seducer of our first parents, --that the denunciation made a part of a judicial procedure, in which a striking regularity appears in the distribution of the several branches of the business.--Three delinquents stand...