each belief and corresponding emotion, he "prepared an ark." With this mechanical employment, we are told he combined the "preaching of righteousness" to that wicked. and abandoned generation.

"While the ark was preparing." And this mere glimpse of information is all that is given us, of more than a century preceding the most memorable event, except one, of all time; an interval too, during which, doubtless, every thing was in undeviating, unsuspended progress toward the catastrophe. It will often occur to us, in reading of the great events in the sacred history,-how little the divine wisdom judged it necesssary for us to know of things which it would have been inexpressibly interesting to know. For instance,-in what manner Noah's announcement of the divine prediction was received; in what measure and manner he was assisted in his mighty labour by the people, -and with what feeling, on their part. Think of the persons employed asking and receiving from him precise directions, about one part and another, with explanations respecting the purpose of it-and all this in the mere temper of workmen ! Again,-whether the ark, in its construction, was regarded with absolute indifference, (except as an object of scorn,) or, whether it did strike any o them as an ominous spectacle. To the generality, no doubt it afforded endless amusement in their conversations. Whether there were not designs formed and attempted to destroy it, and if so, whether they were frustrated by sudden strokes of divine vengeance. (A fire from heaven on some profane and daring incendiary.) What might be the strain of Noah's addresses to the people; whether, in rebuking their wickedness, he was authorised to enlarge on offers and promises of mercy to repentance; whether the denunciations of the Almighty were by any means made known to the entire population of the earth; whether his

admonitions ceased, or changed their language, when the ark was coming very near its completion. And our imagination will represent his mingled and profound emotions at seeing thus combined in the same fact the assurance of his safety and of their destruction;—his feelings in placing the last timbers on the structure, and in being perhaps assisted to do it by some of these doomed hands; and looking down from the elevation on numbers gazing with idle curiosity and impious mockery, anticipating with what other feelings and language, ere long, surrounding multitudes would look at this structure, closed and inaccessible!

In looking abroad over the region, while the last beams and planks were in adjusting, he would feel that, in effect, he was preparing the whole earth for one grave of all its inhabitants;—that heaven was arraying him as to be the mournful high priest at a stupendous sacrifice, in which all that had the breath of life was to be offered at once;that the time was at hand when, at every breathing of his own, he should be sensible that countless numbers were in the agony of suffocation; and that yet a little while, and he would find himself in the midst of a silent and solitary world!

But, all this while, perhaps nothing unusual was taking place, there were no portentous signs, or extraordinary movements. When all was completed, in the structure and the stores, there might be a short interval of inconceivable suspense and expectation. Imagine the emotion at the first decisive indication! Suppose this to be, the voluntary approach and entrance into the ark of a pair of animals, of a species timidly averse, or destructively hostile, to man,coming without the least appearance of fear or ferocity. The shock of an earthquake would not have produced a more powerful sensation than such a first circumstance. Infallible sign that the decree of heaven had not been

revoked, and was on the very point of being executed !— And this would be followed rapidly, no doubt, by the various animals crowding to the grand receptacle, moved to do so by a supernatural impulse. "They shall come to thee into the ark." This must have been, to the most hardened unbelievers and scoffers, a portentous sight.

But still, all the land continued dry, as usual. When, and whence, was the water to come? This would be a matter of most fearful inquisitiveness and expectation to the inhabitants of the ark. The intensity of this inquiring expectation would prepare them to behold, at length, with an awful emotion, the heavens blackening, over the world, and a rain,-preternatural, perhaps, in its quantity,-and evidently so, after a while, by its unremitting continuance.

Then was the time for all mankind to be "moved with fear," but for Noah to fear no longer. Observe, that fear, entertained effectually at the earlier season, prevents it at the later. The salutary fear of God, of his displeasure, of his future judgment, seriously admitted and acted upon, at his first "warnings," and especially in early life,—what is its consequence, at later seasons, when calamities come, when the end of life approaches? And, on the contrary, what is the consequence at last of the early and persevering rejection of that fear, in thoughtlessness or scorn? How many examples are there at all times, that are analogous to those of Noah and the impious multitude,-especially analogous to the latter!

"The waters prevailed upon the earth;" overwhelmed all the lower tracts-with all the inhabitants that could not escape thence, and gradually rose upon the eminences. But as to the question, in what manner this was accomplished, we are lost in the profoundest mystery. "Whence could this stupendous accession of water come, and whither return ?" is a question which philosophy has in vain tried to

answer;-to answer, that is to say, by anything more than mere conjectural speculation. And the only probable coniecture seems to be, that "the great deep" spoken of, the fountains of which were 66 broken up," is to be understood as a vast reservoir within the globe, and that this water was made to gush out, in mighty eruptions, through the surface, either by an immediate efficacy of the Divine will, or, much more probably, by the effect of some law of nature extraordinarily applied by Him. This seems the only conjecture that affords any rational, or even conceivable notion, of whence such an enormous mass of water could come, and whither retire.

Any actual proof, on the subject, must be utterly beyond the reach of science; and He that knows the whole cause and process has not chosen to inform us. But, at the same time, besides universal tradition, there is demonstrative proof of the fact of such a deluge, confirmatory of the sacred history. This evidence is becoming more palpable every year, latterly, through the researches and inferences of science. There are found, throughout Europe, in Asia and America, and in all parts of the world where the contents of the earth have been explored, both in lower grounds and far up toward the highest, innumerable animal remains (bones, whole skeletons, &c.) in such circumstances as to prove, most evidently, that they were deposited and covered there by an overwhelming flood-with a striking similarity to show that it must have been the same flood, and circumstances indicating there had been but one such flood. We are to set out of view here those animal remains that are found far in the solid depths of the earth, in the state of stones, or in the substance of rocks. These our Christian naturalists are now feeling themselves compelled to refer to some far more ancient period, probably long ages before the globe was made the habitation of man.

But return to Noah-and think how solemn a moment that would be, when the ark was perceived to have left the ground! the decided rending of his tie with the world, with all humanity, with the old accustomed economy under which he had lived more than half a thousand years! The world, and all that was on its ample surface, was gone for him; the dwellings, the plantations, the people he would see no more! He was committed wholly to a Sovereign Providence. Ideas of various, altogether new, and almost infinite hazards, would occur to his mind. But it was enough that he had obeyed the Almighty, and was sure of his care. And —if we may be allowed such an expression-there was a concentration of the cares of Providence on the inhabitants of the ark, since all the other inhabitants of the earth were surrendered to destruction. There converged thither, at that crisis, the providential care which was again to expand with the extension of the human and other races over the now desolated earth.

But, think of the awful scene from which Noah was thus borne aloft! For a while, at the beginning, he would hear the sound of it; the cries of terror and despair from the multitude; his own name loudly called upon by voices imploring to be admitted. How ardently desirous then to share the lot of the man whom they had scorned, and whose God they had defied! But, the door was not his to open; God had closed it. "God shut him in." On some tracts of the earth it is probable that the destruction was comparatively sudden. For, on the supposition of the impetuous breaking forth, through wide openings, from an abyss below, there would be most tremendous torrents which would drive and sweep with inconceivable violence. And it has recently been shown and illustrated in a most striking manner, that there were such torrents-streams of such amazing force as to tear mountain ridges asunder, and