Adam s Wife 301 



attractive to the eye, delightful to the taste, and 

 good for food: both wholesome and nutritious; but 

 she was forbidden to touch or taste it. Why? 

 Because it would be morally wrong to do so? No; 

 for Eve, not knowing the difference between moral 

 right or wrong until she had eaten of the fruit, 

 could not be influenced by such a consideration. 

 The reason given for the prohibition is "lest ye 

 die" — not as Satan lyingly perverted it, *'ye shall 

 surely die," and which perversion is largely em- 

 ployed in the construction of "systematic" theol- 

 ogy. Elvah did not say that Eve would cer- 

 tainly die if she ate of the fruit, but that the new 

 relation to moral responsibility to which it would 

 bring her was full of danger. She would be liable 

 to die. 



Eve very naturally, we may say inevitably, which 

 is the Calvinistic position, confided in the tempter, 

 plucked and ate, and with wifely devotion shared it 

 with her husband. Eve appears at a moral advan- 

 tage over all the other parties to this transaction. 

 She acted naturally, trustfully, affectionately, and 

 confidingly, as an innocent and guileless child-wife 

 would. But she was surrounded by a bad lot, 

 among them a cowardly husband. It is really a 

 very pretty antique, which neither literature nor art 

 has thus far cleared of theological and scholastic 

 dust and soot. I take it to be an allegory of in- 

 nocence and trustful inexperience, surrounded by 

 superior knowledge and by guile, misled, betrayed, 



