(29) What can be said of thee, O Cain? Dost thou suppose that God does not see thee? Thou monstrous Beast, thou shalt stand naked, as the Spirit in the Wonders signifies, that thy Ornament may be made known. How art thou become thus? O Eve! are not all thy Children, which thou hast brought forth, all come out of thy Loins? Was it then the Purpose of God that the Evil should domineer among the Good, and one plague another?

(90) Now when Cain had murdered his Brother, then he went securely as a Lord, and thought, now thou art sole Prince on Earth; but the Voice of the fierce Anger of God came, and said; Where is thy Brother Abel? and he answered, / know not, Shall I be my Brother's Keeper? And he said, What hast thou done? Behold, the Voice of thy Brother's Blood cries to me from the Earth; and now thou art cursed upon the Earth, which has opened its Mouth to receive thy Brother's Blood from thy Hands. When thou shalt till the Ground, it shall not yield its Strength to thee henceforth; thou shalt be a Vagabond and Fugitive upon Earth.

(3) Now when poor fallen Man (viz. Adam and Eve) stood thus in great Fear, Horror, and Trembling, being fast bound with the Bands of the Devil, and of Hell, in great Scorn and Shame before the Heaven and Paradise, then God the Father appeared to them with his angry Mind of the Abyss, into which they were fallen; and his most loving Heart went forth through the Word of the Father in Adam and Eve, and placed itself before the Wrath, highly in the Gate of Man's Life, and enlightened the poor Soul again; yet they could not comprehend it in the Essences of the Soul; but received the Rays of the Almighty Power, whereby Adam and Eve became tglad again; and yet they stood trembling, by Reason of the Wrath [or fierce Horror or Grimness] that was in them, and heard the Sentence which God pronounced; for God said, Because thou hast eaten of the Tree whereof I told thee that thou shouldst not eat, cursed be the Ground for thy Sake; with Care thou shalt maintain thy Life thereon all thy Life long; Thorns and Thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the Herb of the Field, till thou become Earth again, from whence thou wast taken; for thou art now Earth, and to Earth thou shall return again.

(79) We are especially to observe in Cain and Abel, what their Purpose was. Cain was a Plowman [or Tiller of the Ground,] and Abel was a Shepherd [or Keeper of Sheep.] Abel relied upon the Blessing of God towards his Flock, to maintain himself by the Blessing of God. Cain relied upon his own Labour, to maintain himself by his own Skill and Industry. Eve took Part with Cain, and Adam with Abel; for Eve counted him to be the Prince on Earth, to whom the Kingdom did belong, and supposed that he (as a Champion) would chase and hunt away the Devil; although she knew him not.

(54) Behold, when Adam entered into this World, Pride wrought in him; he would be as God, as Moses says, the Serpent (the Devil) persuaded him to it. He [Man] would have the Third Principle working and flowing in him, and thereby he lost God, and the Kingdom of Heaven. But that it is true that the Pride acted in Man, look upon Cain, he would be Lord alone, he would not that his Brother should be accepted before God, fearing that he should then get the Dominion, and therefore he slew him.

Now, afterward she bore Cain, their son, and Cain cultivated the land. Thereupon he knew his wife. Again becoming pregnant, she bore Abel, and Abel was a herdsman of sheep. Cain brought in from the crops of his field, but Abel brought in an offering from among his lambs. God looked upon the votive offerings of Abel, but he did not accept the votive offerings of Cain. And fleshly Cain pursued Abel his brother. God said to Cain, “Where is Abel your brother?” He answered, saying, “Am I my brother’s keeper?” And Adam knew his partner Eve, and she became pregnant and bore Seth to Adam. And she said, “I have borne another man through god, in place of Abel.” Again Eve became pregnant, and she bore Norea. And she said, “He has produced for me a virgin as an assistance for many generations of human beings.” She is the virgin whom the forces did not defile. Then humankind began to multiply and improve.

(44) Now when Adam and Eve went out of the Garden, they kept together, as now married People do, and now would make Trial of their bestial Condition, [to try] what Wonders might proceed from them; and the Spirit of the great World did well enough to teach them, in their Reason, what they were to do. And Adam knew his Wife Eve, and she conceived and bore a Son, and called him Cain; for she said, I have a Man from the Lord. These are sealed Words which Moses writes, that she said, / have a Man from the Lord. [For] then said the Major Mundus, I have the Lord of this World. Eve spoke no otherwise, than as the Apostles thought, that Christ was to erect a worldly Kingdom; so Eve thought that her Son (as a strong Champion) should break the Head of the Devil, and set up a glorious Kingdom; from whence instantly a twofold Understanding [or different Condition] followed, and two Sorts of Churches; the one [built or relying] upon the Mercy of God; and the other, upon their own Might, Authority or Power.] And therefore Cain could not endure his Brother, because Abel pressed hard upon the Mercy of God, and Cain [relied] upon his own Power [Might and Authority.] He thought himself to be the Lord of the whole World, as his Mother had instructed him; and therefore now he would break the Head of the Serpent in his own Might as a Warrior [or Soldier,] and began with his Brother Abel, for his Faith relied not on God, but on his own Power; and here the Serpent stung the Treader upon the Serpent in the Heel the first Time. The Gate of the Mysteries, [or the Explanation of the hidden Secrets.]

(2) Therefore now we can speak or write of nothing else but of his Wonders; for we have a great Example of them in Cain, when the Kingdom of the fierce Wrath (after his Murder) awaked in him, and would have devoured him, that God came to help him; when the divine Justice (in his Conscience) sentenced him to Death, then the divine Answer spoke against it, [saying] No: Whosoever slayeth Cain, it shall be avenged sevenfold; by which Speech the fierce Vengeance of the Abyss of Hell was driven away from him, so that Cain did not despair; and As the Thoughts in the Mind flow or spring up. though he was gone forth from God, yet the Kingdom of Heaven stood towards him, he might turn, and enter into Repentance. God had not yet quite rejected him; but his malicious, murderous, and false Confidence he accursed, and would not nbe therein.

(97) But it was miserable, and all in vain, for Cain (in his tender Humanity) cried. Woe, woe is me. His Sins were greater than he, he could not in his own Power press into God; he trembled, and at length stood amazed before the Abyss of Hell, which had captivated him, and held him in it; he severed himself now also from [the Company of] Men, and said, Now whosoever shall find me will slay me, for I must fly from thy Face.

(101) O Cain! look but upon thy Kingdom, and consider what befell thy great [grand] Father Cain, who built this Kingdom, who cried out, Woe is me! my Sins are greater than can be forgiven me, when he saw himself (with his Kingdom) to be without God, in the Abyss of Hell. And if the loving Word of God had not recalled it, (when it said, No; Whosoever killeth Cain, it shall be avenged sevenfold; and God made a Mark upon him, that none that met with him should kill him) he had been quite lost. Those are wonderful Words, Moses's Face is so very much under the Vail; for the Vail is rightly the Cainish Church, which covers the Kingdom of Christ.

(45) Reason saith, how might that come to pass, that the first Man born of a Woman was [so evil] a malicious Murderer? Behold, thou immodest vile whorish World, here thou shalt find the great Secrets meet us in the Light of Nature, very clearly and plainly to be understood. For Adam and Eve were entered into the Spirit of this World, and the Region of the four Stars, with the Infection of the Devil, had miserably possessed them. And although they did somewhat stick to the Word of the Promise, yet the true Longing and Love towards God was very much extinguished; and on the contrary, the Longing and Desire after this World was kindled in them; and besides, they got (from the Region of the Stars) a bestial Lust [or wanton Desire] towards one another, so that their Tincture thus became a fierce bestial [Lust or] Longing; for they had no Law but the Light of Nature, which they suppressed, and kindled themselves in wanton [Lust,] to which the Devil helped them.

(91) And now when the Anger of God stirred the Sin in Cain, then it became awakened, and he was perplexed [or troubled,] and then his false Faith was seen; for he despaired, and said, My Sins are greater than that they can be forgiven me; behold thou drivest me away from the Lord this Day, and I must bide myself 'c from thy Countenance, and I must be a Fugitive and Vagabond upon the Earth; and it shall so befall me, that whosoever dfindeth me will slay me.

(4) And the Lord reproved Cain because of Abel, because he had slain him, and he made him a fugitive on the earth because of the blood of his brother, and he cursed him upon the earth.

(18) But God came at the time of evening, walking in the midst of Paradise. When Adam saw him, he hid himself. And he said, "Adam, where are you?" He answered (and) said, "I have come under the fig tree." And at that very moment, God knew that he had eaten from the tree of which he had commanded him, "Do not eat of it." And he said to him, "Who is it who has instructed you?" And Adam answered, "The woman whom you have given me." And the woman said, "It is the serpent who instructed me." And he (God) cursed the serpent, and called him "devil." And he said, "Behold, Adam has become like one of us, knowing evil and good." Then he said, "Let us cast him out of paradise, lest he take from the tree of life, and eat, and live forever."

(52) Behold, the guiltless Man Christ was set in our Stead, in the Anger of the Father; he must reconcile not only all that which Adam had made himself guilty of, by his going forth from Paradise into the Kingdom of this World, and so fell foully in the Presence of God, and was scorned of all the Devils; but all that which was done afterwards, and which is still done, or [will be] done by us.

(16) And for this cause, so long as a man is an Adam or his child, he is without God. Christ saith, “He who is not with Me is against Me.”20 Now he who is against God, is dead before God. Whence it followeth that all Adam’s children are dead before God. But he who standeth with Christ in perfect obedience, he is with God and liveth. As it hath been said already, sin lieth in the turning away of the creature from the Creator, which agreeth with what we have now said. For he who is in disobedience is in sin, and sin can never be atoned for or healed but by returning to God, and this is brought to Pass by humble obedience. For so long as a man continueth in disobedience, his sin can never be blotted out; let him do what he will, it availeth him nothing. Let us be assured of this. For disobedience is itself sin. But when a man entereth into the obedience of the faith, all is healed, and blotted out and forgiven, and not else. Insomuch that if the Evil Spirit himself could come into true obedience, he would become an angel again, and all his sin and wickedness would be healed and blotted out and forgiven at once. And could an angel fall into disobedience, he would straightway become an evil spirit although he did nothing afresh. If then it were possible for a man to renounce himself and all things, and to live as wholly and purely in true obedience, as Christ did in His human nature, such a man were quite without sin, and were one thing with Christ, and the same by grace which Christ was by nature. But it is said this cannot be. So also it is said: “There is none without sin.” But be that as it may, this much is certain; that the nearer we are to perfect obedience, the less we sin, and the farther from it we are, the more we sin. In brief: whether a man be good, better, or best of all; bad, worse, or worst of all; sinful or saved before God; it all lieth in this matter of obedience. Therefore it hath been said: the more of Self and Me, the more of sin and wickedness.

(54) Therefore, O Man, consider what thou sowest here, that thou shalt reap; take an Example in Cain. Or dost thou suppose, that it is an invented Fable, [which I here write?] Do but ask thy own Mind, that will convince thee, except thou art too much captivated by the Devil. Behold the horrible Punishments from the Anger of God, since the Beginning of the World; the Flood [or Deluge] was a Punishment for the Unchastity, [or Uncleanness,] whereby God would drown the Matrix of the burning Lust of Lechery; and therefore he punished the World with Water; for the Water is the Matrix of all Things.

(35) And thus you may well believe, that all whatsoever happened in the Fall of Adam, whereby Adam is fallen, the same was the second Adam fain to bear upon his Shoulders, for ohe was fallen into the Anger of God; and now if that must be allayed and reconciled, then the second Adam must set himself therein, and yield his outward Body with all Essences therein; and he must go through Death, into Hell, into the Anger of the Father, and reconcile it with his Love; and so himself must undergo that hard Condition, wherein we must have been in Eternity.

(3) Then the god who created us created a son from himself and Eve, your mother. . . . I knew a sweet desire for your mother. And the vigor of our eternal knowledge was destroyed in us, and weakness pursued us. The days of our life were few. I knew that I had come under the authority of death.

(16) And he and his daughters committed sin upon the earth, such as had not been on the earth since the days of Adam till his time ; for the man lay with his daughters.