Pseudodoxia Epidemica: Or, Enquiries into Very Many Received Tenents

in it that he would not have done, or desired undone, when he brake forth as desperately, as before he had done uncivilly; My iniquity is greater than can be forgiven me.

Some niceties I confess there are which extenuate, but many more that aggravate this delusion; which exceeding the bounds of this Discourse, and perhaps our satisfaction, we shall at present pass over. And therefore whether the sin of our first Parents were the greatest of any since; whether the transgression of Eve seducing, did not exceed that of Adam seduced; or whether the resistibility of his reason did not equivalence the facility of her seduction, we shall refer it unto the Schoolman. Whether there was not in Eve as great injustice in deceiving her husband, as imprudence in being deceived herself; especially if forestasting the fruit, her eyes were opened before his, and she knew the effect of it, before he tasted of it; we leave it unto the Moralist.

The Thalmudists Allegories upon the History of Adam and Eve's fall.

Whether the whole relation be not Allegorical, that is, whether the temptation of the man by the woman, be not the seduction of the rational, and higher parts, by the inferior and feminine faculties: Or whether the tree in the midst of the garden, were not that part in the center of the body, on which was afterward the appointment of circumcision in males; we leave it unto the Thalmudist. Whether there were any policy in the devil, to tempt them before the conjunction; or whether the issue before temptation might in justice have suffered with those after; we leave it unto the Lawyer. Whether Adam foreknew the advent of Christ, or the reparation of his error by his Saviour; how the execution of the curse should have been ordered, if after Eve had eaten, Adam had yet refused. Whether if they had tasted the tree of life before that of good and evil, they had yet suffered the curse of mortality; or whether the efficacy of the one had not over-powered the penalty of the other; we leave it unto God. For he alone can truly determine these and all things else; Who as he hath proposed the world unto our disputation, so hath he reserved many things unto his own resolution; whose determinations we cannot hope from flesh; but must with reverence suspend unto that great day, whose justice shall either condemn our curiosities, or resolve our disquisitions.

Lastly, Man was not only deceivable in his integrity, but the Angels of light in all their clarity. He that said he would be like the highest, did err, if in some way he conceived not himself so already; but in attempting so high an effect from himself, he misunderstood the nature of God, and held a false apprehension of his own; whereby vainly attempting not only insolencies, but impossibilities, he deceived himself as low as hell. In brief, there is nothing infallible but God, who cannot possibly err. For things are really true as they correspond unto his conception; and have so much verity, as they hold of conformity unto that intellect, in whose Idea they had their first determinations. And therefore being the rule, he cannot be irregular; nor, being truth itself, conceivably admit the impossible society of error.

Chap. II.

A further illustration of the same.

Being thus deluded before the fall, it is no wonder if their conceptions were deceitful, and could scarce speak without an error after. For what is very remarkable (and no man I know hath yet observed,) in the relation of Scripture before the flood, there is but one speech delivered by man, wherein there is not an erroneous conception; and strictly examined, most heinously injurious unto truth. The pen of Moses is brief in the account before the flood, and the speeches recorded are six.