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Footnote:
As Jesus explains in Vol. II ("The meaning of Immortality," p. 70) "I do not think that it was ever said that if Adam should eat of the Tree of Life, he would live forever and become as gods, because he was already the recipient of this Tree of Life: in that attribute of his soul which could, by its proper development, make himself like the gods. And here you must understand that "gods" could mean only those who possessed this Divine nature of the Father." Jesus tells us here, that eating of the Tree of Life would not have brought Adam in possession of the soul potentiality to receive the Divine Love, for he was already in such condition prior to The Fall.
But just as The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil represented the knowledge that God had reserved unto Himself of the existence of that which, if known to Adam, would have subjected him to temptations that might cause him to cease to be all good, the Tree of Life symbolized Man's ability to reap of the Spirit Everlasting Life--an ability which was lost with The Fall. With his disobedience, Adam did not lose Eternal Life, for he had not yet acquired a portion of the Divine Love into his soul at the time of his transgression, but he lost the possibility of Eternal Life; he lost, depicted as guarding cherubim and a flaming sword flashing back and forth, "the way to the Tree of Life".
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