Page:Labour - The Divine Command, 1890.djvu/53

Rh others have earned? The solution of this enigma is beyond the limits of reason.

I know that you have already a crowd of objections to make to my ideas, but do not criticise them, I pray, till you have heard me to the end.

7. Did Adam hope for a moment, by means of money that did not yet exist, or by any other subterfuges whatever, to turn over his labor to strange hands, to remain himself under an umbrella, and wait for the results of others' labor, like a beggar or a drone? Thus many do in these days, who regard it as a great crime to take from any one a blade of straw or a grain of corn, but who do not think it a crime to take and eat the food, earned by others, which is served at their tables.

8. But if our father Adam received a punishment in proportion to his crime, and submitted to it willingly,—in other words, if he labored with his hands to the end of his life, as is said, "Thou shalt return to the ground, whence thou wast taken,"—we see that he is now innocent, and has atoned to God for his crime.

9. Holy Scripture again says: "For then Adam will stretch out his hand and eat of the fruit of the tree of life, and will live forever." It has been supposed this means literally the tree on which Christ was crucified. But that is an arbitrary supposition. Can we admit that to the merits of another, of Christ, that man, who