e that Eve had ever heard. Barnes states, Her mind was infantile as yet, so far as experience was concerned. The opening mind is naturally inclined to believe the truth of every assertion, until it has learned by experience the falsehood of some. By eating from the tree, it was not really life-threatening, and it really did issue a knowledge of good and evil. It did not make them know good and evil altogether, as God knows it, but in an experimental sense, as the devil knows it. In point of knowledge, they became like God; in point of morality, like the tempter, or Satan. Barnes states, She saw the tree with the eye of fancy, highly excited by the hints of the tempter. Appetite, taste, and philosophy, or the love of wisdom are the great motives in the human breast which fancy assumes this tree will gratify. This tree, not only was exceptionally pleasing to the senses but also to reason. I find it interesting that she did, indeed attach some credit to the bold statement of the serpent, that the eating of the fruit would be attended with the extraordinary result of making them, like God himself, acquainted with good and evil, especially as it did not contradict any assertion of God, and was countenanced by the name, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. She can see nothing though other than that the tree is good for food and pleasant to the eyes, as if there were no other trees in the garden to choose from. However, she desires to be wise like God, as if there were no other way to this wisdom but an unlawful one, and no other likeness to God but a stolen likeness-and therefore takes of the fruit and eats, and gives to her husband, and he eats! Certain effects of the act are immediately known, the most notably being the consciousness of guilt. They feel that every creature has a condemning eye and a great feeling of shame comes over them both. Accordingly, they sewed the leaves of the fig, which we may suppose, they wra...
