had for a long time preached in vain to the careless infidels among whom he lived, and had completed, according to the instructions of the Most High, the ark which was destined to be the safe refuge of him and his; seven days before the breaking forth of the great flood of waters, he was commanded to bring into it a specified proportion of clean and unclean animals, together with food for their subsistence, and finally to enter it himself, accompanied by his immediate family, and to await the result with confidence in God. The fate of those who had despised his warnings may be briefly related in our Saviour's words: "They did eat, they drank, they married wives, they were given in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark, and the flood came and destroyed them all."* The manner in which it took place is thus related—“In the six hundredth year of Noah's life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened, and the rain was upon the earth forty days and forty nights." The opening of the windows of heaven expresses here the vast masses, or, as it were, cataracts of water which came down from the sky; while the fountains of the great deep being broken up, seems to imply, either that by some convulsion of nature immense quan. tities of the same fluid were forced up out of the interior of the earth, or else that a change was effected in the level of the ocean, so as to discharge its waters upon the land. In either case the destruction of all that breathed would be equally produced. As the waters prevailed, and increased greatly upon the earth, they bare up the ark, which floated upon their surface, passing over the summits of the highest hills,

*Luke xvii. 27.

+ Gen. vii. 11, 12.

covered as they then were to the depth of fifteen cubits, or rather more than two-and-twenty feet. For a hundred and fifty days this state of things continued without variation: the little remnant of mankind remained shut up in their dreary confinement, cheered only amid the universal desolation by the thought that they were remembered and watched over by that Almighty Being who had brought it upon the world. The cessation of the rain from heaven, the drying wind which God caused to blow, and the consequent diminution of the waters, would all tend to nourish and keep alive in their hearts this confidence in himtill, on the seventeenth day of the seventh month, being five months from the commencement of the flood, the ark rested upon the mountains of Ararat, doubtless upon the highest peak, for it was not till the first day of the tenth month that the waters had so far subsided as to suffer the tops of the mountains to be seen. Noah waited after this forty days, and then sent forth a raven, which, however, brought him back no intimation of the condition of the earth his next messenger was a dove, whose first excursion was equally fruitless, but which, when dismissed a second time, brought back a sprig of olive in her mouth, a circumstance which proved the increasing dryness of the earth, and caused the olive to be esteemed in after ages as an emblem of reconciliation and peace. In seven days' time the dove was again sent out upon a third flight, and returned no more, being now able to provide for her own subsistence. Another month elapsed, and then on the first day of the new year, and of the month which we call September, "Noah removed the covering of the ark, and looked, and behold, the face of the ground was dry."* That is, it was cleared of water, though, probably, still in a

Gen. viii. 13.

E

wet and swampy condition, unfit for the habitation of man so that it was not until the seven-and-、 twentieth day of the second month, that Noah and his family, and the living creatures which were with him, came forth by God's command out of the ark, in which they had been confined a year and ten days. He was grateful for that great mercy, and his first occupation after quitting the ark was to offer a sacrifice of thanksgiving to the Author of his preservation. It was a sacrifice well-pleasing unto the Lord, and as its sweet savour rose to heaven, He who abode there condescended to express his purposes of mercy,. which he had in store for the rescued generation of mankind. He gave them, first, the blessing of fertility-" be fruitful and multiply, and replenish the earth;"* the blessing of authority over the brute creation" into your hand are they delivered;"† the blessing of increased means of subsistence-" 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." And if the life of the beast was to be thus respected, much more the life of man: much more were they to be cautious in abstaining from shedding his blood, whom God had made in his own image, and whose violent death he pledged himself to punish. Surely your blood of your lives will I require at the hand of every man's brother will I require the life of man."§ The first prohibition here recited was repeated to the Jewish nation in the Law of Moses, and appears to have been continued with respect to Christians also by the council of apostles and elders assembled at Jerusalem, though how far this latter decree was intended to be either universally or perpetually binding, has been made matter of

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question. It is violated manifestly at this day by the savage cannibal, who, having long lost sight of it devours his fellow man; by the half- civilized Abyssinian, whose practice it is to feed on flesh cut from the living animal; and perhaps is too little thought of by some among ourselves, when we indulge in either luxurious or cruel gratifications at the expense of the brute creation, which it seems to have been partly the intention of this commandment to repress. And as to the second, or repetition of the original law against murder, which seems here to be introduced as enforcing the former, by reference to a known law existing from the first, accompanied by a more express declaration of its penalty: this also is but too often violated by the so-called civilized and christian man, who, for the sake of some miserable gain, for the gratification of some wicked malice, for the satisfaction of some fancied demand of honour, lifts up his hand to slay his neighbour. Thus is the earth again filled with violence, and herein do many rest their title to be thought men of renown: the imagination of man's heart continues evil from his youth, as in the time before the deluge; and "as it was in the days of Noah, even so shall it be in the day when the Son of Man is revealed." But though destruction will come upon the earth in God's own time, in that awful day of which the very angels in heaven are ignorant, yet it will not come in the same manner. "The world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished: but the heavens and the earth which are now, by the same word of God which first created them, are kept in store, reserved unto fire, against the day of judgment, and perdition of ungodly men." That a flood of waters like the first shall never again overwhelm the earth, was the solemn covenant of God to Noah, and formed the conclusion of his blessing. 2 Pet. iii. 6, 7.

As a token of that covenant to all future generations, God gave the rainbow; that brilliant and many-coloured arch, formed by the passage of the sun's light through drops of rain, of which the son of Sirach speaks in such high terms of merited admiration. "Look the rainbow," he "and upon says, praise Him that made it: very beautiful it is in the brightness thereof: it compasseth the heaven about with a glorious circle, and the hands of the Most High have bended it."* The rainbow exists only when rain falls in drops; and if that opening of the windows of heaven which caused the flood let fall the waters not in drops, but in one continuous sheet, or torrent, every appearance of the rainbow becomes a natural token that the rain which it accompanies is different from the rain of the deluge, and need not therefore be expected to produce its destructive effects. This security from perishing by water, which God has thus promised and ratified by a conspicuous token to the world at large, he has transferred in a spiritual sense to his afflicted Church, to which he has given a solemn promise by his prophet Isaiah, that in like manner he will preserve her from all such evils as might, without his ever-watchful providence, swallow up and overwhelm her. For this," he says, "is as

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the waters of Noah unto me: for as I have sworn that the waters of Noah should no more go over the earth; so have I sworn that I would not be wroth with thee, nor rebuke thee. For the mountains shall depart, and the hills be removed; but my kindness shall not depart from thee, neither shall the covenant of my peace be removed, saith the Lord, that hath mercy on thee." And we may remark, also, that as he hath transferred the covenant to this spiritual object, so also hath he its token; assuming the rainbow both in the prophetical and Christian visions to * Ecclus. xliii. 11, 12. + Isaiah liv. 9, 10.