THE REV. THOMAS CONNELLAN, - The Gospel Magazine

The Gospel Magazine. 545
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tempted. The place was that in which God put him; he was walking
in his providential path.. I believe there is nothing concerning which
God's people make greater mistakes than this matter of temptation.'
We are always ready to say, If I had not been there, or there, such or
such temptation would not have occurred to me; I must have been in
a wrong place, or in a wrong position. When God's people are in their
providential path, when they are in the very place where God would
have them to be, I believe the enemy is often most busy with them.
The next point for our consideration is the instrumentality which
Satan used. This is a deep subject; we shall have to say more of it
when we come to the history of Eve. The instrumentality that was
used was his own wife. Satan tempted this man through the intimate
friend and help-meet that God had raised up for him. And I am sure
of this, there is often great danger in the social intercourse that God's
people have, the one with the other. I believe that when God's people
are providentially brought in contact with a world that hates Christ;
they are then much more upon their guard; they are much in prayer,
much on the alert; they feel that on every side they need to be
guarded; but when they are in their own little family circle, when
they have intercourse with those who are really the Lord's servants,
too often the armour is laid aside. I ask the people of God, if they
have not felt this ~ I ask the people of God, if they have not had
serious temptations presented to their minds, when they have been in
Christian society ~ I ask, if at such seasons, they have not had to
mourn over the things they have done and the things they have said,
when they have afterwards come into secret communion with God ~
So much for the temptation of Adam.
Another particular we have to observe is, his weakness. And in
reading this history, it appears to me to be one of the most amazing
parts of it, that the very instant the cup is presented to the lip of Adam,
that instant, without hesitation, he takes it. You find no reasoning,
no questioning about it; he does not gaze upon the temptation till he
becomes intoxicated, and falls down the precipice; but quietly and
calmly his wife takes of the fruit, gives it to her husband, and he took
it, and" did eat."
But there is a lesson in this, which you and I ought never to forget;
and one loves to consider Adam in this point of view. Look at all the
powers which Adam possessed. When he came from the Lord's hand,
his desires were regular; there seemed to be no disturbance of the
powers of his mind. How came he, then, to fall ~ How did he happen
to be weak ~
Let us turn our attention for a moment to that class of intelligences­
I mean angels. We cannot conceive of beings more happy than the
angels-we cannot conceive of a higher order of intellectual beings
than the angels; and there were angels that fell, and there were angels
that stood. When I read in Scripture of the angels that stood, I am
told the cause of their standing; I am told that they were" elect
angels." There was nothing wrong in Adam when he came from the
presence of God. But the angels that fell, and the angels that stood,
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