, 22,
compared with Gen. 2:17; 3:19, 22. The story of Cain and Abel, Gen.
4:3-12, is repeatedly referred to by the Saviour and his apostles as a
historic truth: Matt. 23:35; Luke 11:51; Heb. 11:4; 12:24; 1 John 3:12;
Jude 11. So also the narrative of the deluge: Gen. chs. 6-8, compared
with Matt. 14:37-39; Luke 17:26, 27; Heb. 11:7; 1 Peter 3:20; 2 Peter
2:5; and of the overthrow of Sodom and Gomorrah, Gen. ch. 19, compared
with Luke 17:28, 29; 2 Peter 2:6; Jude 7. It is useless to adduce
further quotations. No man can read the New Testament without the
profound conviction that the authenticity and credibility of the
Pentateuch are attested in every conceivable way by the Saviour and his
apostles. To reject the authority of the former is to deny that of the
latter also.

2. For the authenticity and credibility of the Pentateuch we have an
independent argument in the fact that it lay at the foundation of the
whole Jewish polity, civil, religious, and social. From the time of
Moses and onward, the Israelitish nation unanimously acknowledged its
divine authority, even when, through the force of sinful passion, they
disobeyed its commands. The whole life of the people was moulded and
shaped by its institutions; so that they became, in a good sense, a
peculiar people, with "laws diverse from all people." They alone, of all
the nations of the earth, held the doctrine of God's unity and
personality, in opposition to all forms of polytheism and pantheism; and
thus they alone were prepared to receive and propagate the peculiar
doctrines of Christianity. Chap. 8, No. 2. If now we admit the truth of
the Mosaic record, all this becomes perfectly plain and intelligible;
but if we deny it, we involve ourselves at once in the grossest
absurdities. How could the Jewish people have been induced to accept
with undoubting faith such a body of laws as that contained in the
Pentateuch--so burdensome in their multiplicity, so opposed to all the
beliefs and practices of the surrounding nations, and imposing such
severe restraints upon their corrupt passions--except upon the clearest
evidence of their divine authority? Such evidence they had in the
stupendous miracles connected with their deliverance from Egypt and the
giving of the law on Sinai. The fact that Moses constantly appeals to
these miracles, as well known to the whole body of the people, is
irrefragable proof of their reality. None but a madman would thus appeal
to miracles which