he Bible, and philology
comes in with strong corroborative proof. But just as the orthodox
theologian is beginning to congratulate himself on the aid he has
thus received, some of his new friends gravely tell him that, in order
to maintain their view, it is necessary to believe that man has
resided on earth for countless ages, and that it is quite a mistake to
suppose that his starting-point is so recent as the Mosaic deluge.
Nay, some very rampant theorists of some ethnological schools try to
pierce Moses and his abettors with both horns of the dilemma at once,
maintaining that men may be of different species, and yet may have
existed for an enormous length of time as well. The recent prevalence
of theories of evolution has, however, thrown quite into the
background the discussions formerly active respecting the unity of
man, but has, along with geological and archaeological discovery, given
increased prominence to those relating to the date of the origin of
our species and the manner of its introduction.

The Bible gives us a definite epoch, that of the deluge, about 2000 to
3000 B.C., for all existing races of men; but this, according to it,
was only the second starting-point of humanity, and though no family
but that of Noah survived the terrible catastrophe, it would be a
great error to suppose that nothing antediluvian appears in the
subsequent history of man. Before the deluge there were arts and an
old civilization, extending over at least two thousand years, and
after the deluge men carried with them these heirlooms of the old
world to commence with them new nations. This has been tacitly ignored
by many of the writers who underrate the value of the Hebrew history.
It may be as well for this reason to place, in a series of
propositions, the principal points in Genesis which relate to the
questions now before us.

1. Adam and Isha, the woman, afterward called Eve (Life-giver), in
consequence of the promise of a Redeemer, commenced a life of
husbandry on their expulsion from Eden, which, on the ordinary views
of the Bible chronology, may be supposed to have occurred from 4000 to
5000 years before the Christian era; and during the lifetime of the
primal pair, the sheep, at least, was domesticated. The Bible, of
course, knows nothing of the imaginary continent of Lemuria, in which,
according to some hypotheses, men are supposed to have had their birth
from apes. A few generations after, in the time of Lamech, cat