The Meeting-Place of Geology and History Part 6

We have in the closing part of the Bible story of the antediluvian age even an intimation of the deterioration of climate and means of subsistence towards the end of the period. Lamech, we are told, named his son Noah--rest or comfort--in the hope that by his means he should be comforted, because of the ground which the Lord had cursed. That curse provoked by the sons of man he may have recognised as fulfilled in the gradual deterioration of the climate toward the close of the palanthropic age. There are here surely some curious coincidences which might be followed farther, did s.p.a.ce permit.

We now come to the close of the whole in the Deluge; and as this has been made in our own time the subject of much discussion, and as it contains within itself the whole kernel of the subject, it merits a separate treatment.

CHAPTER IX

THE DELUGE OF NOAH

To the older men of this generation, who have followed the changes of scientific and historical opinion, the story of the Deluge, old though it is, has pa.s.sed through a variety of phases like the changes of a kaleidoscope, and which may afford an instructive ill.u.s.tration of the modifications of belief in other, and some of them to us more important, matters, whether of history or of religion, which have presented themselves in like varied aspects, and may be variously viewed in the future.

As children we listened with awe and wonder to the story of the wicked antediluvians, and of their terrible fate and the salvation of righteous Noah, and received a deep and abiding impression of the enormity of moral evil and of the just retribution of the Great Ruler of the Universe. A little later, though the idea that all the fossil remains imbedded in the rocks are memorials of the Deluge had pa.s.sed away from the minds of the better informed, we read with interest the wonderful revelations of the bone-caves described by Buckland, and felt that the antediluvian age had become a scientific reality. But later still all this seemed to pa.s.s away like a dream. Under the guidance of Lyell we learned that even the caves and gravels must be of greater age than the historical Deluge, and that the remains of men and animals contained in them must have belonged to far-off aeons, antedating perhaps even the Biblical creation of man, while the historical Deluge, if it ever occurred, must have been an affair so small and local that it had left no traces on the rocks of the earth. At the same time Biblical critics were busy with the narrative itself, showing that it could be decomposed into different doc.u.ments, that it bore traces of a very recent origin, that it was unhistorical, and to be relegated to the same category with the fairy-tales of our infancy. Again, however, the kaleidoscope turns, and the later researches of geology into the physical and human history of the more recent deposits of the earth's crust, the discoveries of ancient a.s.syrian or Chaldean records of the Deluge, and the comparison of these with the ancient history of other nations, rehabilitate the old story; and as we study the new facts respecting the so-called palaeolithic and neolithic men, the clay tablets recovered from the libraries of Nineveh by George Smith, the calculations of Prestwich and others respecting the recency of the glacial period, and the historical gatherings of Lenormant, we find ourselves drifting back to the faith of our childhood, or may congratulate ourselves on having adhered to it all along, even when the current of opinion tended strongly to turn us away.

In ill.u.s.tration of the present aspects of the question I make two extracts, one from Lenormant's _Beginnings of History_, another from a recent work of my own.

'We are,' says Lenormant, 'in a position to affirm that the account of the Deluge is a universal tradition in all branches of the human family, with the sole exception of the black race, and a tradition every-*where so exact and so concordant cannot possibly be referred to an imaginary myth. No religious or cosmogonic myth possesses this character of universality. It must necessarily be the reminiscence of an actual and terrible event, which made so powerful an impression upon the imaginations of the first parents of our species that their descendants could never forget it. This cataclysm took place near the primitive cradle of mankind, and previous to the separation of the families from whom the princ.i.p.al races were to descend, for it would be altogether contrary to probability and to the laws of sound criticism to admit that local phenomena exactly similar in character could have been reproduced at so many different points on the globe as would enable one to explain these universal traditions, or that these traditions should always have a.s.sumed an identical form, combined with circ.u.mstances which need not necessarily have suggested themselves to the mind in such a connection.'[37]

[37] _Les Origines de l'Histoire._ Brown's translation.

On the geological side, the following may be accepted as a summary of facts:[38]

[38] _Modern Science in Bible Lands_, 1888, pp. 244, 245, 251, 252.

'If the earliest men were those of the river gravels and caves, men of the mammoth age or of the palaeolithic or palaeocosmic period, we can form some definite ideas as to their possible antiquity. They colonised the continents immediately after the elevation of the land from the great subsidence which closed the pleistocene or glacial period, or in what has been called the "continental" period of the post-glacial age, because the new lands then raised out of the sea exceeded in extent those which we now have. We have some measures of the date of this great continental elevation. Many years ago, Sir Charles Lyell used the recession of the Falls of Niagara as a chronometer, estimating their cutting power as equal to one foot per annum. He calculated the beginning of the process, which dates from the post-glacial elevation, to be about thirty thousand years ago. More recent surveys have shown that the rate is three times as great as that estimated by Lyell, and also that a considerable part of the gorge was merely cleaned out by the river since the pleistocene age. In this way the age of the Niagara gorge becomes reduced to perhaps seven or eight thousand years. Other indications of similar bearing are found both in Europe and America, and lead to the belief that it is physically impossible that man could have colonised the northern hemisphere at an earlier date. These facts render necessary an entire revision of the calculations based on the growth of stalagmite in caves, and other uncertain data which have been held to indicate a greater lapse of time.

'If we identify the antediluvians of Genesis with the oldest men known to geological and archaeological science, the parallelism is somewhat marked in physical characteristics and habits of life, and also in their apparently sudden and tragical disappearance from Europe and Western Asia, along with several of the large mammalia which were their contemporaries. If the Deluge is to be accepted as historical, and if a similar great break interrupts the geological history of man, separating extinct races from those which still survive, why may we not correlate the two? If the Deluge was misused in the early history of geology, by employing it to account for changes which took place long before the advent of man, this should not cause us to neglect its legitimate uses, with reference to the early human period. It is evident that if this correlation be accepted as probable, it must modify many views now held as to the antiquity of man. In that case the modern gravels and silts, spread over the plateaus between the river valleys, will be accounted for, not by any greater overflow of the existing streams, but by the abnormal action of currents of water diluvial in their character.

Further, since the historical Deluge must have been of very limited duration, the physical changes separating the deposits containing the remains of palaeocosmic men from those of later date would in like manner be accounted for, not by the slow processes imagined by extreme uniformitarians, but by causes of a more abrupt and cataclysmic character.'[39]

[39] See also Howorth, _The Mammoth and the Flood_, and papers by Professor Prestwich in _Journal Geol. Society_ and _Trans. Royal Society_ and by Andrews, Winch.e.l.l, and others in America.

We may proceed to inquire as to whether the position which we have now reached is likely to be permanent, or may represent merely one shifting phase of opinion. For this purpose we may formulate these conclusions in a few general statements, merely referring to the evidence on which they are based, as any complete discussion of this would necessarily be impossible within the limits of this work. We may first summarise the present position of the matter as indicated by historical and scientific research, altogether independently of the Bible.[40]

[40] See articles by the author in _The Contemporary Review_, December 1889, and in _The Magazine of Christian Literature_, October 1890.

1. The recent discovery of the Chaldean deluge tablets has again directed attention to the statements of Berosus respecting the Babylonian tradition of a great flood, and these statements are found to be borne out in the main by the contents of the tablets. There is thus a twofold testimony as to the occurrence of a deluge in that Babylonian plain which the Old Testament history represents as the earliest seat of antediluvian man. As Lenormant has well shown, the tradition exists in the ancient literature of India, Persia, Phnicia, Phrygia, and Greece, and can be recognised in the traditions of Northern and Western Europe and of America, while the Egyptians had a similar account of the destruction of men, but apparently not by water, though their idea of a submerged continent of Atlantis probably had reference to the antediluvian world. Thus we find this story widely spread over the earth, and possessed by members of all the leading divisions of mankind.

This does not necessarily prove the universality of the Deluge, though every distinct people naturally refers it to its own country. It shows, however, the existence of some very early common source of the tradition, and the variations are not more than were to have been expected in the different of transmission.

2. Parallel with this historical evidence lies the result of geological and archaeological research, which has revealed to us the remains and works of prehistoric men, racially distinct from those of modern times, and who inhabited the earth at a period when its animal population was to a great extent distinct from that at present existing, and when its physical condition was also in many respects different. Thus in Europe and Asia, and to some extent also in America, we have evidence that the present races of men were preceded by others which have pa.s.sed away, and this at the same time with many important species of land animals, once the contemporaries of man, but now known only as fossils. These ancient men are those called by geologists later pleistocene, or post-glacial, or the men of the cave and gravel deposits, or of the age of the mammoth, and who have been designated by archaeologists palaeolithic men, or, more properly, palaeocosmic men, since the character of their stone implements is only one not very important feature of their history, and implements of the palaeolithic type have been used in all periods, and indeed are still used in some places.

3. The prevalence among geologists of an exaggerated and unreasonable uniformitarianism, which refused to allow sufficient prominence to sudden cataclysms arising from the slow acc.u.mulation of natural forces, and which was a natural reaction from the convulsive geology of an earlier period, has caused the idea to be generally entertained that the age of palaeocosmic men was of vast duration, and pa.s.sed only by slow gradations and a gradual transition into the new conditions of the modern period. This view long was, and still is, an obstacle to any rational correlation of the geological and traditional history of man.

Recently, however, new views have been forced on geologists, and have led many of the most sagacious observers and reasoners to see that the palanthropic period is much nearer to us than we had imagined. The arguments for this I have referred to in previous pages, and need not reiterate them, here. A few leading points may, however, be noted. One of these is the small amount of physical or organic change which has occurred since the close of the palanthropic period. Another is the more rapid rate of erosion and deposition by rivers in the modern period than had previously been supposed. Another is the striking fact that a large number of mammals, like the mammoth and woolly rhinoceros, seem to have perished simultaneously with the palaeocosmic men, and this by some sudden catastrophe.[41] It has also been shown by Pictet and Dawkins that all the extant mammals of Europe already existed in the post-glacial age, but along with many others now altogether or locally extinct. Thus there seems to have been the removal over the whole northern hemisphere of a number of the largest mammals, while a selected number survived and no additions were made. Again, while at one time it was supposed that the remains of palaeocosmic man and his contemporaries were confined to caverns and river alluvia, it is now known that they occur also on high plateaus and water-sheds, in beds of gravel and silt which must have been deposited there under conditions of submergence and somewhat active current drift, perhaps in some cases aided by floating ice.[42] Lastly, while, as must naturally be the case, in some places the remains of ancient and more modern men are mixed, or seem to pa.s.s into each other, in others, as in the Swiss, Belgian and Lebanon caves and in the superficial deposits, there is a distinct separation, implying an interval accompanied by physical change between the time of the earlier and later men.

[41] Howorth, _The Mammoth and the Flood_.

[42] Prestwich on deposits at Ightham, Kent, _Journal Geological Society_, May 1889.

Such considerations as these, the force of which is most strongly felt by those best acquainted with the methods of investigation employed by geologists and archaeologists, are forcing us to conclude: (1) That there are indicated in the latest geological formations two distinct human periods, an earlier and a later, characterised by differences of faunae and of physical conditions, as well as by distinct races of men. (2) That these two periods are separated by a somewhat rapid physical change of the nature of submergence, or by a series of changes locally sudden and generally not long-continued. (3) That it is not improbable that this greatest of all revolutions in human affairs may be the same that has so impressed itself on the memory of the survivors as to form the basis of all the traditions and historical accounts of the Deluge.

This being the state of the case, it becomes expedient to review our ideas of the ancient Hebrew records, from which our early, and perhaps crude, impressions of this event were derived, and to ascertain how much of our notions of the Deluge of Genesis may be fairly deduced from the record itself, and how much may be due to more or less correct interpretations, or to our own fancy. In connection with this we may also be able to obtain some guidance as to the value to be attached to the Hebrew doc.u.ment as a veritable and primitive record of the great catastrophe.

The key to the understanding of the early human history of Genesis lies in the story of the fall of man, and its sequel in the murder of Abel by his brother Cain, the beginning of that reign of violence which endures even to this day. From this arose the first division of the human race into hostile clans or tribes, the races of Cain and Seth, on which hinges the history, characteristics and fate of antediluvian man; and, as we shall see in the sequel, from this arose profound differences in religious beliefs, which have tinged the theology and superst.i.tions of all subsequent times. Of course, in making this statement I refer to the history given in Genesis, without special reference to its intrinsic truth or credibility, but merely in relation to its interpretation in harmony with its own statements.

It is further evident that this tragic event must have occurred in that Tigro-Euphratean region which was the Biblical site of Eden[43] and that while the Sethite race presumably occupied the original home of Adam, and adhered to that form of religion which is expressed in the worship of Jahveh, the coming Redeemer and the expected 'Seed of the Woman,' the other race spread itself more widely, probably attained to a higher civilisation, in so far as art is concerned, in some of its divisions, and sank to a deeper barbarism in others, while it retained the original worship of G.o.d the Creator (Elohim). Hence the Sethite race is designated as the sons of Adam (Beni ha Adam), the true and legitimate children of the first man, and the Cainites as Beni Elohim, or sons of G.o.d.[44] The mixture of these races produced the G.o.dless, heaven-defying Nephelim, the t.i.tans of the Old Testament, whose wickedness brought on the diluvial catastrophe. These half-breeds of the antediluvian time were in all probability the best developed, physically and perhaps mentally, of the men of their period; and but for the Deluge they might have become masters of the world.

[43] _Modern Science in Bible Lands_, chap. iv.

[44] That this is the true meaning of the expressions in Genesis vi. I cannot doubt. See discussion of the subject in the work cited in previous note.

This question of different races and religions before the Flood is, however, deserving of a little farther elucidation. The names Elohim and Jahveh are used conjointly throughout the Book of Genesis except in its first chapter, and their mode of occurrence cannot be explained merely on the theory of two doc.u.ments pieced together by an editor. It has a deeper significance than this, and one which indicates a radical diversity between Elohists and Jahvists even in this early period. In the earliest part of the human history, as distinguished from the general record of creation, the two names are united in the compound Jahveh-Elohim, but immediately after the fall Eve is represented as attributing to, or identifying with, Jahveh alone the birth of her eldest son--'I have produced a man, the Jahveh,' and which may mean that she supposed Cain to be the promised manifestation of G.o.d as the Redeemer. Accordingly Cain and Abel are represented as offering sacrifice to Jahveh, and yet it is said in a verse which must be a part of the same doc.u.ment, that it was not till the time of Enos, a grandson of Adam, that men began to invoke the name of Jahveh. It would seem also that this invocation of Jahveh was peculiar to the Sethites, and that the Cainites were still worshippers of Elohim, the G.o.d of nature and creation, a fact which perhaps has relation to the so-called physical religion of some ancient peoples. Hence their t.i.tle of Beni ha Elohim.

Thus the division between the Cainite and Sethite races early became accentuated by a sectarian distinction as well. We may imagine that the Cainites, worshipping G.o.d as Creator, and ignoring that doctrine of a Redeemer which seemed confined to the rival race of Seth, were the deists of their time, and held a position which might, according to culture and circ.u.mstances, degenerate into a polytheistic nature-worship, or harden into an absolute materialism. On the other hand, the Sethites, recognised by the author of Genesis as the orthodox descendants of Adam, and invoking Jahveh, held to the promise of a coming Saviour, and to a deliverance from the effects of the Fall to be achieved by His means.

It is clear that, from the point of view of the author of Genesis, the chosen seed of Seth should have maintained their separation from a wicked world. Their failure to do this involves them in the wrath of Jahveh and renders the destruction of mankind necessary, and in this the whole G.o.dhead under its combined aspects of Elohim and Jahveh takes a part. A similar view has caused the Chaldean narrator to invoke the aid of all the G.o.ds in his pantheon to effect the destruction of man.

These considerations farther throw light on the double character of the Deluge narrative in Genesis, which has induced those ingenious scholars who occupy themselves with a.n.a.lysis or disintegration of the Pentateuch to affirm two narratives, one Elohist and one Jahvist.[45] Whatever value may attach to this hypothesis, it is evident that if the history is thus made up of two doc.u.ments it gains in value, since this would imply that the editor had at his disposal two chronicles embodying the observations of two narrators, possibly of different sects, if these differences were perpetuated in the postdiluvian world; and farther, that he is enabled to affirm that the catastrophe affected both the great races of men. It farther would imply that these early doc.u.ments were used by the writer to produce his combined narrative almost without change of diction, so that they remain in their original form of the alleged testimony of eye-witnesses, a peculiarity which attaches also to the Chaldean version, as this purports to be in the form given by Hasisadra, the Chaldean Noah, himself.[46]

[45] See, for a very clear statement of these views, Professor Green in _Hebraica_, January 1889, along with Dr. Harper's _resume_ of the Pentateuchal criticism in the previous number.

[46] Translation of G. Smith and others. With reference to the preservation of this and the Hebrew narrative in writing, we should bear in mind that writing was an art well known in Chaldea and Egypt immediately after the Deluge, or at least between 2000 and 3000 B.C., and that the Chaldean narrator speaks of doc.u.ments hidden by Noah at Sippara before the Deluge.

Let us now inquire into the physical aspects of the Deluge, as they are said to have presented themselves to the ancient witness or witnesses to whom we owe the Biblical account of the catastrophe, and endeavour to ascertain if they have any agreement with the conditions of the great post-glacial Deluge of geology. Let it be observed here that we are dealing not with prehistoric events but with a written history, supposed by some to have been compiled from two contemporary doc.u.ments, and corroborated by the testimony of the ancient Chaldean tablets copied by the scribes of a.s.surbanipal, apparently from different originals, preserved in very ancient Chaldean temples.

The preparation of an ark or ship, and the accommodation therein, not only of Noah and his family, but of a certain number of animals, is a feature in which most Deluge narratives agree. This implies a considerable advance in the arts of construction and navigation, but not more than we have a right to infer from the perfection of these arts in early postdiluvian times, when it can scarcely be supposed that the new communities of men had fully regained the position of their ancestors before the destruction caused by the great Flood. Lenormant, however, remarks here:

'The Biblical narrative bears the stamp of an inland nation, ignorant of things appertaining to navigation. In Genesis the name of the ark, Tebah, signifies "chest," and not "vessel"; and there is nothing said about launching the ark on the water; no mention either of the sea, or of navigation, or any pilot. In the Epopee of Uruk, on the other hand, everything indicates that it was composed among a maritime people; each circ.u.mstance reflects the manners and customs of the dwellers on the sh.o.r.es of the Persian Gulf. Hasisadra goes on board a vessel, distinctly alluded to by its appropriate appellation; this ship is launched, and makes a trial-trip to test it: all its c.h.i.n.ks are calked with bitumen, and it is placed under the charge of a pilot.'

This remark, which I find made by other commentators as well, suggests, it seems to me, somewhat different conclusions. The Hebrews when settled, either in Egypt or in Canaan, were near to the sea-coast, and familiar with boats and with the ships of the Phnicians. If, therefore, they persisted in calling Noah's ark a 'chest,' it must have been from unwillingness to change an old history derived from their Chaldean or Mesopotamian ancestors, or because they continued to regard the ark as rather a great box than a ship properly so called. On the other hand, it is likely that the particulars in the Chaldean account came from later manipulation of the narrative, after commerce and navigation on the Euphrates and Persian Gulf had become familiar to the Chaldeans. Thus in this as in other respects the Hebrew narrative is the more primitive of the two, and is consistent with the necessity of Divine instructions to Noah, which, if he had been familiar with navigation, would not have been necessary.[47]

[47] See also the evidence of an inland position of the writers in the record of creation in Genesis i., as stated in my work cited in previous note.

As in the Chaldean version, the Biblical history begins with the specification of the ark. On this (Elohist) portion it is only necessary to say that the dimensions of the ark are large and well adapted to stowage rather than to speed, and that within it was strengthened by three decks and by a number of bulkheads, or part.i.tions, separating the rooms or berths into which it was divided. Without, it was protected and rendered tight by coats of resinous or asphaltic varnish (_copher_), and it was built of the lightest and most durable kind of wood (gopher or cypress). Only two openings are mentioned, a hatch or window above, and a port or door in the side. There is no mention of any masts, rigging, or other means of propulsion or steerage. The Chaldean history differs in introducing a steersman, thus implying the means of propulsion as in an actual ship.

Noah is instructed, in addition to his own family, to provide for animals, two of every kind; but these very general terms are afterwards limited by the words _uph_, _bemah_, and _remesh_, which define birds, cattle, and small quadrupeds as those specially intended. Noah's ark was not a menagerie, but rather like a cattle-ship, capable perhaps of accommodating as many animals as one of those steamers which now transfer to England the animal produce of Western fields and prairies.

The animals portrayed on the ancient monuments of Egypt and a.s.syria, however, inform us that, in early post-diluvial times, and therefore probably also in the time of Noah, a greater variety of animals were under the control of man than is the case in any one country at present.[48] In the pa.s.sage referring to the embarkation, only the cattle and fowls are mentioned, but seven pairs are to be taken of the clean species which could be used as food.[49] The embarkation having been completed on the very day when the Deluge commenced, we have next the narrative of the Flood itself. Here it is noteworthy that G.o.d (Elohim) makes the arrangements, and Jahveh shuts the voyagers in.

[48] Houghton, _Natural History of the Ancients_, and _Transactions of the Society of Biblical Archaeology_; also representations of tame antelopes, &c., on Egyptian monuments.

[49] This has been considered a later addition; but the practice of all primitive peoples has sanctioned the distinction of clean and unclean beasts, which is merely defined in the Mosaic law, not inst.i.tuted for the first time.

The first note that our witness enters in his 'log' relates to his impressions of the causes of the catastrophe, which was not effected supernaturally, but by natural causes. These are the 'breaking up of the fountains of the great deep' and the 'opening of the windows of heaven.'

These expressions must be interpreted in accordance with the use of similar terms in the account of creation in Genesis i., the more so that this statement is a portion regarded by the composite theory as Elohistic. On this principle of interpretation, the great deep is that universal ocean which prevailed before the elevation of the dry land, and the breaking up of its fountains is the removal of that restriction placed upon it when its waters were gathered together into one place. In other words, the meaning is the invasion of the land by the ocean. In like manner, the windows of heaven, the cloudy reservoirs of the atmospheric expanse, or possibly waterspouts, or even volcanic eruptions, and not necessarily identical with the great rain extending for forty days, as stated in the following clause. The Chaldean record adds the phenomena of thunder and tempest, but omits the great deep; an indication that it is an independent account, and by a less informed or less intelligent narrator. It is worthy of note that our narrator has no idea of any river inundation in the case.

At this stage we are brought into the presence of the question: Is the Deluge represented as a miraculous or a merely natural phenomenon? Yet, from a scientific point of view, this question has not the significance usually attributed to it. True miracles are not, and cannot be, contraventions or violations of G.o.d's natural laws. They are merely unusual operations of natural powers under their proper laws, but employed by the Almighty for effecting spiritual ends. Thus, naturally, they are under the laws of the material world, but, spiritually, they belong to a higher sphere. In the present case, according to the narrative in Genesis, the Flood was physically as much a natural phenomenon as the earthquakes at Ischia, or the eruption of Krakatoa. It was a miraculous or spiritual intervention only in so far as it was related to the destruction of an unG.o.dly race, and as it was announced beforehand by a prophet. Had the approaching eruption of Krakatoa been intended as a judgment on the wicked, and had it been revealed to anyone who had taken pains to warn his countrymen and then to provide for his own safety, this would have given to that eruption as much of a miraculous character as the Bible attaches to the Deluge. In the New Testament, where we have more definite information as to miracles, they are usually called 'powers' and 'signs,' less prominence being given to the mere wonder which is implied in the term 'miracle.' Under the aspect of _powers_, they imply that the Creator can do many things beyond our power and comprehension, just as in a lesser way a civilised man, from his greater knowledge of natural laws and command over natural energies, can do much that is incomprehensible to a savage; and in this direction science teaches us that, given an omnipotent G.o.d, the field of miracle is infinite. As _signs_, on the other hand, such displays of power connect themselves with the moral and spiritual world, and become teachers of higher truths and proofs of Divine interference. The true position of miracles as signs is remarkably brought out in that argument of Christ, in which He says, 'If ye believe not My words, believe Me for the works' sake.' It is as if a civilised visitor to some barbarous land, who had been describing to an incredulous audience the wonders of his own country, were to exhibit to them a watch or a microscope, and then to appeal to them that these were things just as mysterious and incredible as those of which he had been speaking.

Returning to the Deluge, we may observe that such an invasion of the great deep is paralleled by many of which geology presents to us the evidence, and that our knowledge of nature enables us to conceive of the possibility of greater miracles of physical change than any on record, such as, for instance, the explosion of the earth itself into an infinity of particles, the final extinction of the solar heat, or the accession to this heat of such additional fierceness as to burn up the attendant planets. All this might take place without any interference with G.o.d's laws, but merely by correlations and adjustments of them, as much within His power as the turning on or stopping of a machine is in the power of a human engineer. Further, such acts of Divine power may be related to moral and spiritual things, just as easily as any outward action resulting from our own will may be determined by moral considerations. The time is past when any rational objection can be made on the part of science to the so-called miracles of the Bible.

To return to the pa.s.sengers in the ark. This must have been built on high ground, or the progress of the Deluge must have been slow, for forty days elapsed before the waters reached the ship and floated it. It is not unlikely that the ark was built on rising ground, for here supplies of timber would be nearer. It has puzzled some simple antiquarians to find dug-out canoes of prehistoric date on the tops of hills; but they did not reflect that the maker of a canoe would construct his vessel where the suitable wood could be found, since it would be much easier to carry the finished canoe to the sh.o.r.e than to drag thither the solid log out of which it was to be fashioned. So Noah would naturally build his ark where the wood he required could be procured most easily. The Chaldean narrator seems to have overlooked this simple consideration, for he mentions a launching and trial-trip of the ship, a sure mark that he is a later authority than the writer in Genesis.