His words are in the forecited place: “And therefore we find God told Cain of his brother Abel, his desire shall be subject unto thee, and thou shalt rule over him.” To which I answer,

• These words of God to Cain are by many interpreters, with great reason, understood in a quite different sense than what our author uses them in.
• Whatever was meant by them, it could not be, that Cain, as elder, had a natural dominion over Abel; for the words are conditional. “If thou dost well”; and so personal to Cain: and whatever was signified by them, did depend on his carriage, and not follow his birthright; and therefore could by no means be an establishment of dominion in the firstborn in general; for before this Abel had his “distinct territories by right of private dominion,” as our author himself confesses, O. 210. which he could not have had to the prejudice of the heir’s title, “if by divine institution” Cain as heir were to inherit all his father’s dominion.