I
They drove us from the Garden with their swords of flame, the fierce
cherubim. And what had we done? We meant no harm. We were ignorant,
and did as any other children might do. We could not know it was
wrong to disobey the command, for the words were strange to us and
we did not understand them. We did not know right from wrong--how
should we know? We could not, without the Moral Sense; it was not
possible. If we had been given the Moral Sense first--ah, that would
have been fairer, that would have been kinder; then we should be to
blame if we disobeyed. But to say to us poor ignorant children words
which we could not understand, and then punish us because we did not
do as we were told--ah, how can that be justified? We knew no more
then than this littlest child of mine knows now, with its four
years--oh, not so much, I think. Would I say to it, “If thou
touchest this bread I will overwhelm thee with unimaginable
disaster, even to the dissolution of thy corporeal elements,” and
when it took the bread and smiled up in my face, thinking no harm,
as not understanding those strange words, would I take advantage of
its innocence and strike it down with the mother hand it trusted?
Whoso knoweth the mother heart, let him judge if it would do that
thing. Adam says my brain is turned by my troubles and that I am
become wicked. I am as I am; I did not make myself.
They drove us out. Drove us out into this harsh wilderness, and shut
the gates against us. We that had meant no harm. It is three months.
We were ignorant then; we are rich in learning, now--ah, how rich!
We know hunger, thirst, and cold; we know pain, disease, and grief;
we know hate, rebellion, and deceit; we know remorse, the conscience
that prosecutes guilt and innocence alike, making no distinction; we
know weariness of body and spirit, the unrefreshing sleep, the rest
which rests not, the dreams which restore Eden, and banish it again
with the waking; we know misery; we know torture and the heartbreak;
we know humiliation and insult; we know indecency, immodesty, and
the soiled mind; we know the scorn that attaches to the transmitted
image of God exposed unclothed to the day; we know fear; we know
vanity, folly, envy, hypocrisy; we know irreverence; we know
blasphemy; we know right from wrong, and how to avoid the one and do
the other; we know all the rich product of the Moral Sense, and it
is our possession. Would we could sell it for one hour of Eden and
white purity; would we could degrade the animals with it!
We have it all--that treasure. All but death. Death.... Death. What
may that be?
Adam comes.
“Well?”
“He still sleeps.”
That is our second-born--our Abel.
“He has slept enough for his good, and his garden suffers for his
care. Wake him.”
“I have tried and cannot.”
“Then he is very tired. Let him sleep on.”
“I think it is his hurt that makes him sleep so long.”
I answer: “It may be so. Then we will let him rest; no doubt the
sleep is healing it.”