The second son of Adam and Eve. His name is mentioned by the Holy Ghost with peculiar honour, in that illustrious list of Old Testament saints, who all died, as they had lived, by faith. (Hebrews 11:4.) "By faith, Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain." By which we derive full authority to conclude, that Abel's faith in Christ, the promised seed, gave a blessedness in the acceptance of his sacrifice, which Cain's had not. Abel came to the Lord as a sinner; and, by the lamb he offered in sacrifice, testified the sense he had of sin, and his hopes of salvation by Christ. Cain came to the Lord, not under the apprehension of sin, but to present an offering of tribute. He therefore slighted the promised seed, and redemption by, Christ: and stands in the front of the Bible, the first desit the world ever knew. (Genesis 4:3-5.) It may be not amiss to add, that the word Abel signifies vanity, a vapor, emptiness, and the like.