the creation down to the flood, and that all the antediluvian patriarchs there recorded, belonged to the high and holy line of election. They were the woman's seed, from Seth down to Noah, and are mentioned in the genealogy of our Lord and Savior, given us in the third chapter of Luke's gospel. Adam and Methuselah lived about two hundred and forty years together. Enoch almost suggested the very year when the deluge would take place. He lived nearly a thousand years before it, and gave his son a name which pointed out when it would be. He also prophesied of the second coming of Christ to judge all flesh, see Jude 14, 15.

Noah seems to be called the eighth from Enos, in 2 Peter ii. 5. in whose time the world began to be corrupt.

When each of the patriarchs' ages are summed up, it is added, that he died; to shew, not only that their long lives were borne down by death, but also that they came to their graves in peace, and were not taken away with the ungodly. Lamech, the father of Noah, gave him a name which pointed him out as a figure and type of Christ; he was as the savior of the world, in building the ark, by which he and his family were saved from perishing by water; also as the restorer of the new world; and in offering a sacrifice in which the Lord smelled a sweet savor. Lamech said on naming him, "This same

shall comfort us concerning our work and toil of our hands, because of the ground which the 'Lord hath cursed." He was born in the year of the world, 1056. He begat three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japhet. Shem was not his first-born, though he is placed first; because he was preferred of God before his brethren. Japhet was the eldest, and was born when his father was five hundred years old. Shem was next, and was born when Noah was five hundred and two years of age: and Ham was the youngest. The flood was in the six hundredth year of Noah's life, and in the year of the world, 1656, the tenth generation from Adam.

The last verse of the fourth chapter of this book, speaks of the profanation of Cain's seed, and how it began to be introduced very awfully in the days of Enos. The beginning of the sixth chapter speaks of this corruption as crept into the family of Seth, the very church itself; and this by their following the cursed example of Lamech, who was the first polygamist in the world. The church of God, the members of the church, the descendants of the patriarchs in the line of Seth, married carelessly and promiscuously with the daughters of men, the descendants of Cain, the first murderer. Hence they also became loose in their manners, and evil and corrupt in their lives and conversations. They became a giant-like race, and as they multiplied

on the face of the earth, they filled it with lust, rapine, and violence. This was the case before God denounced the destruction of the world; and so great was the apostacy of the human race, and so far were they from being reclaimed from their horrible crimes, that they went on after the denunciation and warning given by Enoch, Methuselah, and even Lamech and Noah, in the same acts of open rebellion and defiance of Jehovah. This made way for the Lord to give them another solemn warning by the ministry of Noah, saying, "My Spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh," wholly carnal, notwithstanding all my warnings; yet I will now fix and pronounce the exact space of time, from this my last warning to its execution, it shall be one hundred and twenty years.

The justice of God in his procedure with sinful man, was expressed by the particular notice he took of men.

By the eye of his omniscience and omnipresence, he looked upon the earth, and saw that "the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually." The Holy Ghost adds, "And it repented the Lord that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart:" which words fully imply that there were none on the earth, whom the Lord respected, (Noah, and his family only excepted ;) so

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that it was only on account of the second Adam, the Lord from heaven, in whom Noah believed, or he would have consumed the earth wholly, so as not to renew it after the 'deluge, as he has done. Jehovah being immutable, may will a change, but he cannot change to will; therefore repentance cannot properly be attributed to God and the best explication of these words, is to consider them as expressive of the indignation of God against sin, and sinners out of Christ he hates sin with a perfect hatred, and will damn the sinner who dies in his sins, eternally for it.

Having given these general hints, by way of introduction, I proceed to consider in section the first, the dissolution of the world, by the waters of the flood; but it may be necessary to observe the situation and circumstances of the globe, and also of its inhabitants prior to that event.

I quote the following, which I conceive as very just, and conveying very clear ideas to the mind concerning this subject, from a French author, translated into English, under the title of Spectacle de la Nature; or, Nature Displayed.

"Although the earth before the deluge, as well as now, consisted of several strata of matter, laying one upon another; of mountains, valleys, plains, great collection of waters or seas, and all other parts essentially necessary to the

constitution of an habitable globe; yet notwithstanding, its form then, was probably different from what it is at present; and its atmosphere, or firmament, not exactly the same as now. And this cannot be denied, seeing that God who wrought a change in the life of man, might as easily effect the same in the structure or form of his dwelling. And St. Peter seems plainly to authorise such a supposition, when he says, the ancient world perished by water; the heavens and the earth, which now are, being reserved unto the fire of the last day, 2 Peter iii. 6, 7. Let us suppose now, that the former earth described its annual orbit, or elipsis, round the sun, having its axis perpendicular to the plane of its orbit, that is, without having a greater inclination to one part of it than another. Let us suppose also, that as this earth was designed to be the habitation of a very long lived race of men, who were to multiply exceedingly; the surface of the land was much greater than that of the sea, which, the better to accommodate mankind with room, was partly open, and partly concealed under the earth; so that there were on all sides large magazines of water, or different seas, which held a communication with each other under ground, by means of one common receptacle or rendezvous of water; and the scriptures seem to countenance such a disposition or distribution of waters, by