many to-day who, surrounded by the comforts and inventions of man could scarcely

believe that there is truth in the record of the curse on the ground. The products of the

earth and sea are brought to their door, no thought passes through their mind as to the

sorrow and the toil that someone, somewhere, must endure to provide them with the

necessities of life. Lamech knew no such deadening influence; the toil of his hands was

hard and wearying because of the ground that the Lord had cursed. A friend writing

recently gave an unconscious echo of Lamech's words, saying, "When one, from the

back of the land, sees the toil of man and beast, there come to the lips no more fitting

words than, `Even so, Come, Lord Jesus'. "

Harps and organs, however, melodious and charming, brass and iron, modeled and

designed into the most wonderful of machines and inventions, though they may "prove"

to the natural man the upward development of man's attainments, afford no rest for those

in whose hearts the truth of God abides.  Rest for them is found in the true Noah, whose

witness and whose experiences testify of the resurrection, and a new heavens and a new

earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness.

Our last paper led on to the days of Noah by way of the line of promise and blessing,

namely, through Seth. Where details of any of these sons of Adam are given, they are

seen to be men of God; Enoch walks with God, Lamech looks for comfort, not from the

civilization spread by the sons of Cain, but from the type of Christ, Noah. The last verse

of chapter 5: gives the names of the three sons of Noah, but the generations of Noah and

the building of the ark do not commence with the opening verses of chapter 6: The first

eight verses are a continuance of the book of the generations of Adam, and takes us back

to the period indicated in 5: 4, "and the days of Adam after he had begotten Seth were

eight hundred years; and he begat sons and daughters". Chapter 6: differs from

chapter 5: in one or two important respects. Chapter 5: tells us of Adam "in the day that

God created man. . . . and blessed them". Chapter 6: 1-8 does not speak of the line of

blessing ­ it tells of the curse.

It is necessary to point out that the word "men" in 6: 1, 2 is in the singular, carrying

the article, and indicates, not men, but the man Adam. We must be on our guard,

however, of hurriedly forming a hasty conclusion from the presence or absence of the

article; there is no article in 5: 1 before the word Adam, yet inasmuch as this is the first

of a series of ten generations of individuals, it must mean the man Adam; the same is true

of the opening of verse of I Chronicles 1: It is the individual man Adam that is meant in

5: 3, for he alone could be the father of Seth, so also verses 4, 5; thus it will be seen that

while the presence of the article would generally indicate the man Adam, the absence of

it does not necessarily refer to mankind in general. Just as in these verses Adam without

the article can mean none other than the first man Adam himself, so in 6: 3, "My spirit

shall not always remain in Adam, for that he also is flesh", simply tells us that the man