, or even older. These
are the first five names we find on the list of Dr. Colenso; and they
belonged to the _third generation_. Their grand-children, therefore,
would belong to the _fifth_. Is it improbable that among five men of
80, some had grand-children who had attained the age of 20?

Again, Nahshon was in the _fifth generation_, counting from the sons of
Jacob: Judah, Pharez, Hezron, Ram, Amminadab, Nahshon (_Ruth_, iv.
18-20.) His sister was the wife of Aaron. Since his brother-in-law was
therefore 83, it is not unreasonable to suppose that he himself may have
been at least 60; if so, his sons might surely have been numbered among
the 600,000 men of 20 years old and upward. This would give us _six_
generations in the family of Nahshon. And yet, strange to tell, this
very family is adduced by our author to prove his theory of "the Exodus
in the _fourth generation_." Lastly, we would invite attention to the
family of Joseph. He saw the children of his son Ephraim to the third
generation (_Gen._, l. 23). Therefore, the fourth generation in that
line had commenced before Joseph's death. But this is an event of which
we can fix the date with accuracy. When Jacob settled in Egypt, Joseph
was about 39, and he lived to the age of 110. His death, therefore, must
have occurred about 71 years after the Descent. Consequently, at that
time the posterity of Joseph had already reached the fourth generation.
One hundred and forty-four years yet remained before the Exodus. Surely
during that period there was abundance of time for at least four
generations more of the same average length.

It was our intention to analyze the argument of Dr. Colenso more fully
by a critical examination of the genealogies from which his examples are
derived. But we fear that we have already overtaxed the patience of our
readers, and we are sure they will pardon us if we forbear to enter into
the complicated details which such an inquiry would involve. We cannot,
however, dismiss the subject without one general observation. It is
assumed by Dr. Colenso that there are exactly the same number of
_descents_ in each family as there are _links in the genealogy_ of that
family as it is recorded in the pages of Scripture. This would indeed be
true if he could prove that _every link_ in the chain of descent is
preserved in the Scriptural genealogies. But it is well known to all
Biblical scholars that such was not the usage among the Hebrew people.
Every on