henceforth yield unto thee her strength. A fugitive and
a vagabond shalt thou be in the earth. And Cain said unto
the Lord, My punishment is greater than I can bear.
Behold, Thou hast driven me out this day from the face
of the earth; and from Thy face shall I be hid; and I
shall be a fugitive and a vagabond in the earth: and it
shall come to pass, that every one that findeth me shall
slay me. And the Lord said unto him, Therefore, whosoever
slayeth Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold.
And the Lord set a mark upon Cain, lest any finding him
should kill him. And Cain went out from the presence of
the Lord, and dwelt in the land of Nod, on the east of
Eden.'
GENESIS iv. 3-16.

Many lessons crowd on us from this section. Its general purport is
to show the growth of sin, and its power to part man from man even
as it has parted man from God. We may call the whole 'The beginning
of the fatal operations of sin on human society.'

1. The first recorded act of worship occasions the first murder. Is
not that only too correct a forecast of the oceans of blood which
have been shed in the name of religion, and a striking proof of the
subtle power of sin to corrupt even the best, and out of it to make
the worst? What a lesson against the bitter hatred which has too
often sprung up on so-called religious grounds! No malice is so
venomous, no hate so fierce, no cruelty so fiendish, as those which
are fed and fanned by religion. Here is the first triumph of sin,
that it poisons the very springs of worship, and makes what should
be the great uniter of men in sweet and holy bonds their great