ABSTRACT
What was Adam like? Eighteenth-century authors spent a lot of time thinking about their ‘first parents’ in the Garden of Eden and the doleful effects of Adam’s disobedience there. Physician Nicholas Robinson described him:
He shone out, with a peculiar Splendor, appeared like the Sun in its full Strength and meridian Glory; and at once stood up a glorious Piece of divine Workmanship: The Lustre of his Body, though earthy, was bright and luminous … [he had] a god-like Shape, a princely Dignity, and surrounded with the Rays of a transcendent Glory, infinitely excelling all that is human, in this fallen State of Nature.1
