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 840 with any being off the planet. Slowly their courage weakened, their spirits drooped, and sometimes their faith almost faltered.

And this is the true picture of the consternation of these two noble souls as they pondered the tasks which confronted them. They were both keenly aware of the enormous undertaking involved in the execution of their planetary assignment.

Probably no Material Sons of Nebadon were ever faced with such a difficult and seemingly hopeless task as confronted Adam and Eve in the sorry plight of Urantia. But they would have sometime met with success had they been more farseeing and patient. Both of them, especially Eve, were altogether too impatient; they were not willing to settle down to the long, long endurance test. They wanted to see some immediate results, and they did, but the results thus secured proved most disastrous both to themselves and to their world.

Caligastia paid frequent visits to the Garden and held many conferences with Adam and Eve, but they were adamant to all his suggestions of compromise and short-cut adventures. They had before them enough of the results of rebellion to produce effective immunity against all such insinuating proposals. Even the young offspring of Adam were uninfluenced by the overtures of Daligastia. And of course neither Caligastia nor his associate had power to influence any individual against his will, much less to persuade the children of Adam to do wrong.

It must be remembered that Caligastia was still the titular Planetary Prince of Urantia, a misguided but nevertheless high Son of the local universe. He was not finally deposed until the times of Christ Michael on Urantia.

But the fallen Prince was persistent and determined. He soon gave up working on Adam and decided to try a wily flank attack on Eve. The evil one concluded that the only hope for success lay in the adroit employment of suitable persons belonging to the upper strata of the Nodite group, the descendants of his onetime corporeal-staff associates. And the plans were accordingly laid for entrapping the mother of the violet race.

It was farthest from Eve's intention ever to do anything which would militate against Adam's plans or jeopardize their planetary trust. Knowing the tendency of woman to look upon immediate results rather than to plan far-sightedly for more remote effects, the Melchizedeks, before departing, had especially enjoined Eve as to the peculiar dangers besetting their isolated position on the planet and had in particular warned her never to stray from the side of her mate, that is, to attempt no personal or secret methods of furthering their mutual undertakings. Eve had most scrupulously carried out these instructions for more than one hundred years, and it did not occur to her that any danger would attach to the increasingly private and confidential visits she was enjoying with a certain Nodite leader named Serapatatia. The whole affair developed so gradually and naturally that she was taken unawares.

The Garden dwellers had been in contact with the Nodites since the early days of Eden. From these mixed descendants of the defaulting members of Caligastia's staff they had received much valuable help and co-operation, and through them the Edenic regime was now to meet its complete undoing and final overthrow.