Abel brought of the firstlings of his flock, which was a proper type of Christ.  His offering pleased God, Cain’s niggardly gift displeased God.  The selfish man wreaked his vengeance in the usual way.  He slew his brother, who was better than himself.  The heavens are black with gathering gloom.  Murder is in the air.  The shock is felt everywhere.  God comes, and sternly asks, “Where is thy brother?” Cain impudently replies, “Am I my brother’s keeper?” Then comes the curse.  It is a self-invited curse, for the gift he gave to God is the harvest in future for himself.  Ah, what a lesson.  How early it is taught.  If you hate God, if you regret what you give, if you make it small, if you see to it that you give the leavings rather than the firstlings, then beware.  Cain said his punishment was greater than he could bear.  He is getting back what he gave.  The command is, Give, and it shall be given back.  The converse is true—­Keep, and it shall be kept back.

The hopes of Eve were centred in the victory to be achieved over the enemy of her life, by means of the triumph to be won by her children.  Her trials really began when she saw that sin was not an accident.  It was rebellion which bore fruit.  Her treachery to God came back to her in this treachery of her first born to her second child, whom she loved with maternal tenderness.  Thus the gates of evil were thrown open, and they filled the land with violence, and the flood became a necessity.

What was true of Eve was more or less true of woman until Christ came.  She inherited sorrow, and was born to a life of humiliation and wretchedness.  The history of woman in the olden time and at this hour, wherever Christ is not known, is full of sorrow.  In Christ she finds an emancipator from sorrow.

There is another strange fact.  In the Old Dispensation, the first born son is the child of promise.  But wherever the influence of Christ’s gospel rules, there the rule of the first born disappears, and all, both sons and daughters, share in the patrimony of the house and in the honors of the household.  Despite this, it is natural for a father to love his first born son the best, and for the mother to find her heart clinging involuntarily to the younger and weaker.  From the unfortunate the father may turn, but the mother never.  She will bind her love tightest about the birdling that, from some misfortune, is unable to leave the maternal nest.

Turn we to the Old Testament, we find that whenever man was brought near to God, as was Abram, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, and others, woman was held in respect, and was permitted to exercise an elevating influence in the home; and yet it remains true, that in nearly every instance she failed to prove herself a helpmeet.

Sarah introduced Abraham to polygamy, Rebekah was a pattern of lying, and Rachel of deception.  The three celebrated women of history are destitute of those characteristics which make of a wife a companion, counsellor, and friend.