14. All these particulars Moses omits to record, both because they could not be described on account of their infinite variety of detail and because the revelation of them is reserved for that great day of deliverance and glory!

15. Likewise the flood, in spite of its horror, is described with the greatest brevity because he wished to leave such things to the meditation of men.

16. For the same reasons Moses has purposely given us, in these first five chapters, as briefly as possible, a picture of the original and primeval world. It was an admirable condition of life, and yet that primeval age contained a multitude of the worst of men, in consequence not more than "eight souls" were saved from the destroying flood! What then, may we conclude, will be the state of things before the last day shall come, seeing that even now, under the revealed light of the Gospel, there is found so great a host of despisers of it that there is cause to fear that they will fill the world ere long with errors and prevail to the extinction of the Word altogether.

17. Awful is the voice of Christ when it utters the words, "Nevertheless, when the Son of man cometh, shall he find faith on the earth?" Lk 18, 8. And in Matthew 24, 37-38, our Lord compares the last days with the days of Noah. These utterances of our Lord are indeed most awful. But the world, in its security and ingratitude, is a despiser of all the threats as well as all the promises of God. It abounds in iniquities of every kind and becomes daily more corrupt. From the time that the popes ceased to rule among us, who had ruled the whole world by means of the mere dread of their vengeance, sound doctrine has been despised, and men have degenerated into all but brutes and beasts. The number of holy and godly preachers of the Word is becoming less and all men are indulging their desires. The last day, however, shall assuredly come upon the world as a thief, and will overtake these men in all their security, and in the indulgence of their ambition, tyranny, lust, avarice, and vices of every kind.

18. And let it be remembered that it is Christ himself who has foretold these things, and we can not possibly imagine that he would lie. If the primitive world, which contained so mighty a multitude of the greatest patriarchs, was so wholly corrupted, what may we not have cause to dread in the weakness of our nature? May the Lord our God grant that we may be gathered, as soon as possible, in the faith and confession of his Son Jesus Christ, unto these our fathers; yea, if it please him, that we may die within the next twenty years, and not live to see the miseries and calamities, both temporal and spiritual, of the last time! Amen!

II. ADAM AND HIS SON SETH.
1. The name Adam, and why given to the first man [19].
2. The Jews' fables of Adam's cohabitation with Eve [20].
* Purity of doctrine cannot be expected from the Jews [20].
3. Why Moses so carefully describes the times of Adam [21].
4. Why it is said of Adam that he was created in the likeness of God [21-23].
* The likeness of God.
a. The difference between "Zelem" and "Demuth" [22-23].
b. How the likeness of God was lost and how it is restored [24].
c. Whether it can be fully restored in this life [25].
5. The prating of the rabbins about the name Adam [26].
* Why Moses here mentions the blessing [27].
* Why he did not refer to the blessing in the descriptions of Cain and Abel [28].
6. How long it was before Adam begat Seth [29].
* Abel's age when murdered [29].
7. How and why Adam mourned so long for his son Abel, and therefore refrained from bearing children [29-30].
8. The Jews' fable of Adam's vow of chastity refuted [30].
9. How we are to understand that Adam begat a son in his own likeness [31].
10. Whether Adam's son Seth had God's likeness [31].
11. How Adam acquired again the lost image [32].
12. How Seth secured the likeness of God [32].
13. Why Adam gave his son the name Seth; its meaning [33].
* The long lives of the first men.
a. Longevity a part of the happy state of the first world [34].
b. The causes of such long lives [34-35].
* Men's bodies were much stronger and healthier than ours [35].
c. Whether the climate, food and holy living contributed to this end [36-37].
* The creatures given to man for food after the flood were inferior to those before, and they injured the body more than nourished it [37].
d. Luther's thoughts on this theme [38].
14. Which is the first or chief branch born from Adam and Eve [39].
15. How long Adam lived after Seth's birth [39].
* The glory of the first world [40].
* The histories of the first world were most excellent, but they were destroyed in the flood [41].
* Eve's age and experiences [42].
* The age of the first world is called the golden age [43].