Outside the Eden Gate.


The story of what took place outside that guarded gate makes clear the
love, the wise farsighted love that showed the man the way out that day.
To tell the story one must use a pen made of the iron that has entered his
own soul, and though the pen be eased with ball point, it scratches and
sticks in the paper for sheer reluctance. And only the tears of the heart
will do for ink.

That was a costly meal. That first bite must have been a big one. Its
taste is still in the mouth of the race. If that fruit were an apple it
must have been a crab. There has been a bad case of indigestion ever
since. If you think there were no crab-apples in Eden, then the touch of
those thickening lips must have soured it in the eating--man's teeth are
still on edge. The fruit became tough in the chewing. It's not digested
yet. That Garden of Eden must have been on a hill, with lowlands below,
and high hills above, and roads both ways. The man seems to have gotten
into the lowland road, and after a bit, struck some marshes and swamps,
with a good bit of thick gray fog.

The first result of the break with God was _in the man himself_. Man has
two doors opening into himself from God--the eye and the ear. Through
these God comes into the man and makes Himself known. Through these comes
all man knows of God. Both have their hinges in the will, the heart. Man
gave both doors a slam shut that day in Eden. Yet they went shut
_gradually_. That was the God-side of their shutting. He quickly slipped