"In the creation and death of Adam, we have a vivid account of the building up and the unbuilding of a human being;
---and this case, being the first and most illustrious, must furnish the precedent and establish the rule for all the other members of the human family.
Of the creation of Adam and the elements of which he was 
composed., sufficient, perhaps, has already been said. The record brings to view a formation made wholly of the dust of the ground. “And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground.” This body was endowed with a high and noble organization, and was quickened into life by the breath which the Lord breathed into its nostrils.
The body, before it was made alive, had no power to act; the breath before it was breathed into the body, had no power of voluntary action.
But when these two elements were brought together, when this breath was breathed into this body, the body was quickened, the machinery was set in motion, by this vital principle, and all the phenomena of physical life and mental action at once resulted.
The Author of this creative work would necessarily, as the ruler over all, require the creatures of his hand to obey him. But he would not convey them to do so; for only a spontaneous love, and a voluntary and willing obedience can constitute true service. He therefore placed the man whom he had formed, as was meet, upon a state of probation, to test his loyalty to his Maker.
“Of every tree of the garden thou may freely eat. But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shall not eat of it. For in the day that thou eats thereof thou shall surely die.”
Adam and Eve could not mistake the requirement of this law, nor fail to understand the intent of the penalty.
And before Satan could cause his temptation to make any impression on the mind of Eve, he had to contradict this threatening, assuring her that they should not surely die." Uriah Smith