vocable fentence, condemns, without farther enquiry, the devil, when he was taken in the very fact, which hecould neither deny nor transfer to another: fo thofe bleflings or privileges, which are made over to the elect in this condemnation of the devil are made over to them, by the last and immutable will of God, which does not depend on any uncertain condition.

VII. Now let us take a more diftinct view of the things, contained in this fentence. And they are the following: I. The bleffings or benefits promised to man. II. The author of thofe good things. III. Their meritorious caufe. IV. The manner of acquifition. V. The heirs. VI. The mean of acquifi

tion.

VIII. The evils which God pronounces against the serpent, are fo many BENEFITS, or bleffings to man: and they are four. The firft is the "curfe of the ferpent; because thou haft done this, thou art curfed above all cattle, and above every beast of the field." All beafts are fubject to deftruction: "natural brute beafts, made to be taken and deftroyed," 2 Pet. ii. 12. And it is for man's fin, that beafts, as the property of man, are made more miferable for they cannot be excluded from being a part of this world, which is not willingly fubject to vanity, Rom. viii. 20. and among them there are thofe, called evil beafts. But the curfe threatened against the ferpent, is such as renders him inferior to, viler and more miferable than all beasts: importing, 1ft, An invincible folly and malice; fo that he can be neither wife nor good: worfe than a "horfe or mule, which have no understanding," Pl. xxxiii. 9. 2dly, The very worst degree of vilenefs, whereby he, who impiously attempted to be equal to God, and feemed to have acquired a dominion over man, the nobleft of God's creatures, is depreffed below the beafts of burden. 3dly, A ftate of never ending mifery. The beafts die and perish, and never come into judgment. But the ferpent accurfed above the beafts, cannot efcape judgment; " everlafting fire is prepared for the devil and his angels," Matt. xxi. 41. It could not but be acceptable to man, to hear that fentence pronounced, by which that enemy, who had made him obnoxious, is himfelf doomed to be accurfed.

IX. The fecond benefit is the deftruction of bis power; expreffed by three feveral phrases. The firft, " upon thy belly fhalt thou go" that is, thou shalt be constrained to creep on the ground, nor fuffered any longer to fly at man, twift thyself round him, and kill him with thy envenomed embraces. Pareus fays judiciously; He himself alfo is forced to creep on his breast; be

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cause being once thrown headlong down from heaven, he is now condemned to creep for ever on the ground amidst earthly filth, nor able any more to raise his head to heaven." Thus Rev. xii. 9. " the judgment of the old ferpent, the devil, by which he is now bound faft, is called his cafting out into the earth; where, in a hostile manner, he perfecutes, but cannot overpower the woman."

X. The other expreffion duft shalt thou eat, doubtlefs denotes a ftate of the greatest degradation. For, the scripture phrase, to lick the duft, is applied to conquered enemies, who lie proftrate at the conqueror's feet; Pfal. Ixxii. 6. " his enemies fhall lick the duft;" Micah vii. 17. " they fhall lick the dust like a ferpent;" Ifa. xlix. 23. " they fhall bow down to thee with their face towards the earth, and lick up the duft of thy feet.” But there seems a much greater emphafis in thefe words, when the ferpent is commanded to eat duft; as also when it is faid, Ifa. Ixv. 25. " and duft fhall be the ferpent's meat." Which, if I' mistake not, fignifies in general three things. Ift, The reftraining the devil's power to earthly minded men, who are glued to the earth, and seek their good and happiness in earthly things. Thofe alone he shall be able to devour, without having any right over others. And this tends much to the great benefit of the church. For, when the wicked are devoured by the devil, offences are removed out of the way of righteoufnefs, the church is delivered from their vexations, and Satan's kingdom diminished in this world. 2dly, As to the elect, it fignifies the restricting the power of the devil to their bodies, which, on account of fin, is faid to be dust, and to return to duft. That body the devil will devour, that is, bring down to death, and keep under the power thereof, till the refurrection : he fhall have no power over the fouls of the elect. And even that deftruction of the dufty body is of benefit to believers: for, at the fame time the old man is destroyed, who had hitherto harboured in their members. 3dly, It denotes that wicked pleasure, which the devil takes in drawing the reprobate to fin, and confequently to eternal destruction, and in vexing the godly as much as he can. It was the meat, that is the delight, of the Lord Jefus," to do the will of him that sent him," and to turn men to God, John iv. 34. On the contrary, it is the delight of Satan to push on the wicked to evil, and to vex the beloved children of God. Which as it is the greatest wickednefs, fo alfo the highest degree of misery.

XI. Least any one fhould hifs this expofition off the stage, as if it was new and never heard of before, I fhall fubjoin the

comments

comments of Fagius and Pareus. Fagius writes thus, "If we "now, as we certainly ought, refer these things to that spiritual "ferpent, I mean Satan, whom the Hebrews call

the old ferpent, who acted in the ferpent, a brute animal, as "in an inftrument, they fignify, that this our old crafty enemy, "who before walked, as it were in ftate, is now thrown down "and confounded; to eat duft fignifies to confume earthly "minded men, who are enflaved to their affections. Satan is a fpirit, fuch therefore must be his food; here are fins to "ftay his hunger. For, as the ferpent creeps on the earth, "lives on the earth, broods on the earth; fo the difpofition of "Satan is to entice men to the earth, to hurry them to earthly " things, and draw them afide from those that are heavenly." Thus far, Fagius: from whom Pareus does not greatly differ. His words are thefe. "He is alfo condemned to eat earth, "that is to feed on the earthly naftiness of vice and wickedness as the filthy fwine feed on excrements. Which that impure "fpirit does, when he not only pollutes and delights himself "with the defilements of the world, as fwine with wallowing "in the mire; but alfo plunges the reprobate into the fame, "and destroys them with himself: this is Satan's fweetest food. "For, wherewith any one is delighted, that he accounts his "meat and his pleasure, according to that saying, envy is the "beft food: again envy feeds on the living, &c. Auguftine "advances no unelegant doctrine; where he fays, the finner "is earth; the finner therefore is given up to the devil for food. "Let us not be earth, if we would not be devoured by the "ferpent:" thus far Pareus. Ambrofe, Lib. 1. de pœnitentia, c. 13. quoted by Rivet, Exerc. 35. in Gen. explains duft by the flesh of men, and maintains, that the devil is permitted by God to feed on this flesh, that is, to torment and tear the bodies of believers, but not to have any power over the foul.

XII. The third expreflion, by which the deftruction of the devil is fet forth, is the bruifing his head. In the head of the ferpent are his poison, craft, ftrength and life. The head of the ferpent therefore fignifies the crafty subtilty of the devil, his venomous power, and all that tyrannical dominion, which, by fin, he has acquired over man. The bruifing his head is the abolishing of all his power, according to the Apoftles explication, Rom. xvi. 20. " and the God of peace fhall bruise Satan under your feet fhortly." The fymbol of this bruifing was that extraordinary power granted to the difciples of Chrift, mentioned Luke x. 19. "Behold, I give unto you power to tread on ferpents and fcorpions, and over all the power of the VOL. II.

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enemy;

enemy; and nothing fhall by any means hurt you. And Mark xvi. 18. " they fhall take up serpents ;" namely, without being hurt, as appears from the history of Paul, Acts xxviii. 5. Which power of depriving ferpents of their venom, and of bruifing their heads without harm, Tertullian as quoted by Grotius on Luke x. 19. teftifies was not quite extinct in his time among Chriftians. Though the devil imitated this miracle in the temple of Ifis in Egypt, as Bochart has remarked from Allian Hierozoic, lib. 1. c. 4. at the clofe; yet our Lord exprefsly declares, that the destruction of his kingdom was thereby fignified, when to ferpents and fcorpions, he adds, "all the power of the enemy." Thus the devil was conftrained, by his juggling tricks and delufions, to give a prelude of his own de

ftruction.

XIII. The third benefit, God promifes here, is " the putting enmity between the ferpent and the woman and her feed:" thefe words include man's fanctification. For, when man becomes an enemy to the devil, then he abhors and avoids all intercourfe with him, hates and detefts his works, endeavours to deftroy him and his kingdom in himself and others, and most willingly does, what he knows fhall mortify the devil. And though the devil, on that account, wages war against him, because he endeavours after godlinefs: yet he is fo far from fuffering himself to be thereby diverted from that which is good, that, on the contrary he goes on, with the greater alacrity to oppofe him. While a man continues unfanctified, he cultivates - peace with the devil, and calmly fubmits to his dominion: enmity and hoftility against the devil can only proceed from an infufed principle of holinefs. And this is what God promifes to man, when he fays, " I will put enmity, &c. ;" he not only commands the woman, to have no intimacy or friendship with the devil, or to have any commerce with a sworn enemy; nor, by this fanction, did he again open a door of repentance for our first parents, as Pareus obferves on this place; but he alfo promifes, that, by the unfurmountable efficacy of his power, he would perform and bring it about: namely, that he would put that enmity against the devil, which cannot fubfift, where there is not the love of God. Rivet fays well, Exerc. 36. in Gen. "When a state of enmity is foretold, in the fame breath "it is alfo foretold, that men fhall return to fuch foundness of "mind, as difpleafed with that grievous yoke of Satan's tyranny, "to feek the fhaking it off: and having once happily fucceeded, "afterwards to watch by a continual ftruggle against being " entangled therein again." But fulleft of all, Cloppenbergius,

Schol.

Schol. Sacrific. p. 75. "There could have been no enmity be"tween the woman and the devil, without removing, by jufti"fication, the enmity with God, which the devil, by his fe "duction, had brought the woman and her pofterity to; and "without conquering and subduing, by fanctification, the do"minion of fin in the woman. Putting therefore that enmity against the devil, he appoints a covenant of peace and friend"fhip, whereby he promises to the woman the grace of justifi"cation and fanctification."

XIV. The fourth benefit is the refurrection of the body, which was brought to duft, by his means who hath the power of death: this is more obfcurely intimated, when it is faid, that "the ferpent shall eat dust all the days of his life;" which we have fhewn, fect. V. to be the days preceding the last judgment. From which we concluded, that the time of the devil's power, and of his going about to devour, is limited, and to have a final period. And, when that is elapfed, the bodies of the righteous fhall be raised from the duft, and all the effects and remains of the power of the devil, and of fin, by which he acquired his power, be entirely abolished; that he may not detain, under his power, the duft of our bodies, which ought to be temples of God, and of his Holy Spirit, in a state of glorious holiness. Nor was this, indeed, altogether unobferved by Fagius, who thus fpeaks: "the days of Satan's life are the whole time to the confummation of the world, and the coming of Chrift.. For, then he and all his fervants shall be thrown headlong into everlasting fire," Mat. xxv. 41.

XV. JEHOVAH GOD, who speaks to the ferpent, and declares, that he would put that enmity, of which we have been speaking, takes the honour to himself of being the AUTHOR of all those benefits. Though we are not to deny, that the conferring fo great a benefit is to be afcribed to the whole undivided Trinity; yet, in the economy of our falvation, the Father, who is first in order, holds the principal place. And whereas the eternal furetyship of the Son, according to the tenor of the covenant between the Father and the Son, on the fuppofition of fin, began immediately to exert its efficacy, these words are not improperly referred primarily and immediately, to the Father, who, on account of the furetyfhip of the Son, appoints his grace to the finner; and who exprefsly enough diftinguishes himself from the Mediator, or the feed of the woman. And indeed, "God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself," 2. Cor. v. 19. that is, the Father in the Son, the Mediator. XVI. The MERITORIOUS CAUSE of those benefits is the SEED