was deserved by sin, and the death which the Redeemer was to suffer as a ransom-price for its guilt, it was also appointed that a part of the sacrifice should be eaten, to teach men that their life was only continued through the death of the promised Mediator. This idea is Scriptural, and was enunciated by Christ himself with great force: "I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread he shall live for ever: and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world. Except ye eat of the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you. Whoso eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day. For my flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed. John vi, 51, 53-55. As sacrifices typified the Saviour's passion and death, did not the eating of the flesh of those animals signify the spiritual blessings which were to result from his atonement? We think this to be a just deduction; and if so, then it appears reasonable to conclude that this significant practice was coeval with the institution of sacrificial rites.

If it be objected, that on these principles there could be no reason for the enlarged grant of animal food to man generally in the time of Noah; we reply, that a circumstance of an analogous kind took place afterward, which may illustrate to some extent the divine government in primitive times: When the Israelites commenced their journey through the wilderness, placed, as they were, under the special guidance and teaching of God, they were not allowed to eat any animal food unless a part had been offered in sacrifice. The command ran thus: "What man soever there be of the house of Israel, that killeth an ox, or lamb, or goat, in the camp, or that killeth it out of the camp, and bringeth it not unto the door of the tabernacle of the congregation, to offer an offering unto the Lord before the tabernacle of the Lord; blood shall be imputed unto that man." Lev. xvii, 3, 4. This was intended at once to prevent idolatry, and to make all the animal food which was eaten, in some sense, typical of the promised blessings of redemption. Yet, when these tribes obtained possession of their promised inheritance, this law was relaxed, and they were told, "If the place which the Lord thy God hath chosen to put his name there be too far from thee, then thou shalt kill of thy herd and of thy flock, which the Lord hath given thee. Only be sure that thou eat not the blood: for the

blood is the life; and thou mayest not eat the life with the flesh." Deut. xii, 21, 23.

It will not be denied that the Israelites, in their journeying, were in circumstances very similar to those of the first families that existed upon the earth. They stood in immediate connection with divine teaching; they were not associated with any other human population; they had among them a special residence of Deity, and a place of sacrifice. Shall we err, then, in believing that the families which first lived on our earth were, like these, allowed only to eat the flesh of animals offered in sacrifice? and that, when, in the days of Noah, a mode of proceeding was adopted, which resulted in the dispersion of mankind over the face of the earth, this law should be relaxed in the grant already mentioned nearly in the very words, and involving precisely the same injunction, as that which has been already quoted from the Book of Deuteronomy? God said unto Noah, "Every moving thing that liveth shall be meat for you; even as the green herb have I given you all things. But flesh with the life thereof, which is the blood thereof, shall ye not eat." Gen. ix, 3, 4. We do not expect that these facts and arguments will secure universal assent to our proposition; we do not think the case proved, or that it is capable of proof. But we consider that what has been advanced is sufficient to make it appear probable, that, from the fall to the flood, the flesh of animals offered in sacrifice was eaten, and this flesh only. We add, in order to complete the parallel, that it is known that our first parents were clothed in skins; and, in all probability, these skins were those of animals offered in sacrifice. It is also certain that, in after times, the skin of the victim, as well as part of the flesh, belonged to the priest.

We have now discussed the most important circumstances connected with the religion of the antediluvian world; and should at once proceed to apply the conclusions which we have elicited to the several generations that lived in this portion of time. But, before we enter upon this, we call attention to what has been urged in the Preliminary Dissertation, and incidentally noticed in the preceding pages, respecting the intellectual position and mental cultivation which these people enjoyed.

If what has been placed before the reader on this subject be candidly considered, it will be admitted that men in those early days possessed mental advantages nearly, if not quite, equal to those which have been enjoyed in any subsequent age. To

strengthen this opinion without referring to our own pages, we give the following extract from a learned author, who speaks explicitly on the point :

"The first created divine institutor of all philosophy was Adam, who, without all peradventure, was the greatest, among mere mortals, that ever the world possessed; concerning whom the Scripture tells us, (Gen. ii, 19, 20,) that he gave names to every living thing, &c.; which argues his great sagacity and philosophic penetration into their natures. For, look, as our conceptions, if true, so also names, if proper, should be, and, as we may presume, at first were, no other than images of things. So both Aristotle and Plato call names 'imitations of things.' Adam could by his profound philosophy anatomize, and exactly pry into, the very natures of things, and there contemplate those glorious ideas and characters of created light and order, which the increated Light and divine Wisdom had impressed thereon; and thence he could, by the quickness of his apprehension, immediately collect, and form the same into a complete system or body of philosophy, as also most methodically branch forth the same into particular, sciences, &c. Whereas, all philosophers since Adam having lost, by his fall, this philosophic sagacity of prying into the natures of things, they can only make some poor conjectures from some common accidents, and the external superficies or effects of things; and therefore cannot receive conceptions, or give names exactly suited to the natures of things, as Adam before them did.

"And that Plato had received some broken tradition touching this philosophy of Adam, is evident from what he lays down in his Politicus, and elsewhere, touching the golden age, or the state of innocence; wherein, says he, our first parent was the greatest philosopher that ever was. And Baleus (De Script. Brit., cent. x. præfat.) tells us, 'that from Adam all good arts and human wisdom flowed, as from their fountain. He was the first that discovered the motions of the celestial bodies, the natures of plants, of living and all other creatures; he first published the forms of ecclesiastic, politic, and economic government; from whose school proceeded whatever good arts and wisdom were afterward propagated by our fathers unto mankind. So that whatever astronomy, geometry, and other arts, contain in them, he knew the whole thereof.' The like Hornius, (Hist. Philosoph., lib. i, cap. 2.) 'Adam, therefore, being constituted in this theatre of the universe, he was ignorant of nothing that pertained to the mystery of nature.

He knew exactly, and that without error, the natures of all animals, the virtues of herbs, and the causes of things. The light of reason, which we call "logic," altogether unspotted and without cloud, overcame the obscurity of things, and dispelled darkness, if there were any. Now, there was the highest exactness of the economics and politics; for man was never so much as then a sociable creature: which the ancient mythologists are wont to adumbrate under the golden age, wherein

'Sponte suâ sine lege fidem rectumque colebant."

OVIDII Metamorph., lib. i, 90.

"The seat of this most noble philosophy is, in the sacred Scriptures, styled the garden of Eden. For there is nothing more excellent given, by the great God, to mankind, than that pleasure which ariseth from the contemplation of things. The Chaldees call this garden of pleasure 0775, and the Greeks, following them, Пapádeloos, Paradisos. Thus Hornius (cap. xi) repeats the same in these words: 'All arts, as mankind, had their beginning from Adam, who among the pleasures of Paradise learned philosophy even from God himself.' And Keckerman (Tract. ii, Præcogn. Logic., cap 2) says, that he 'doubts not but that our first parents delivered over to posterity, together with other sciences, even logic also; specially seeing they who were nearest the origin of all things had an intellect so much the more excellent than ours, by how much the more they excelled us in length of life, firmitude of health, and, lastly, in air, food, &c.'

"From Adam sprung Seth, who, according to Josephus, (Antiq., lib. i, cap. 3,) followed his father in the pursuit of wisdom, specially that part thereof which concerns the heavenly bodies, their wáoŋ καὶ συμπτώματα, in which kind of philosophy he proved a very eminent doctor. So Hornius, (Hist. Philos., lib. vii, cap. 2.) The first mention of letters falls upon Seth's times; who being mindful of his father's prophecy, foretelling the universal dissolution of things, the one by the deluge, the other by fire, being not willing to extinguish his famous inventions of astrology, he thought upon some monument, to which he might concredit these mysteries. At length it seemed good unto him to engrave arts and disciplines on two great pillars of brick, thereby to preserve them from destruction.' And that this tradition is not vain, is proved by the authority of Josephus; who witnesseth, that one of these pillars remained in Syria even to his time, and was seen by him.

"The learned also reckon Enoch among the first divine phi

losophers, specially for his supposed skill in astrology and astronomy. So Eusebius, (De Præpar. Evan., lib. ix,) and out of him Bochart, (Phaleg, lib. ii, cap. 13, p. 101 :) I cannot but add,' says he, 'what is found concerning the same Enoch in Eusebius, out of Eupolemus Of the Jews. He says that Abraham, when he taught astrology and other sciences at Heliopolis, affirmed that the Babylonians attributed the invention of the same to Enoch, and that he was the first inventor of astrology. It follows, not far after, that the Grecians attribute the invention of astrology to Atlas; and that Atlas was the same with Enoch, &c. In which words we may note that Enoch and Atlas are reputed for the same: perhaps from hence, that as Atlas by the Carthaginians is called Duris and Dyris, so Enoch is by the Arabians Idris.' Thus the author of the book called Juchasin, (p. 134:) ‘Hanoch, who is called Edris, began to compose astronomic books. They say that Enoch was first called Edris by Muhammed, who had it from his master Abdalla the Talmudist. For Enoch, according to the ancient tradition, was called Metator, or, as Jonathan, in his Chaldaic Paraphrase on Gen. v, 24, Do, the great scribe; which name Muhammed could not more aptly render for his purpose than by the Arabic, Edris, which signifies, a learned, sage disputer, and investigator of accurate things; from the Arabic word which signifies, properly, to winnow corn; thence, metaphorically, to dispute. Whence Beidavi, an Arabic commentator, saith, that Enoch was called Edris by reason of his manifold study. For the Most High delivered him down thirty volumes. It is also said that he was the first calamographer, as also studious of astronomy and arithmetic. How far these traditions deserve assent, as also those other of the engraving of prophecies and astrology on pillars which, they say, continued after the flood, it concerns us not to debate: only thus much we are assured by Jude, (verse 14,) that Enoch had certain prophecies, touching the world's dissolution by fire, and the last judgment, &c.' And that the Stoics derived their ¿Túρwσiç, or purification of the world by fire, from some broken idea of this prophecy of Enoch, is not without ground conjectured by Grotius and other critics. Baleus (De Script. Brit., cent. x, p. 3) tells us, that Enoch, a man famous for prophecy, is supposed to have written, before the flood, of divine matters, &c." -Gale's Court of the Gentiles, vol. ii, pp. 7-10.

In referring to a mass of traditional lore, handed down from extreme antiquity, even although selected and arranged