5-2 



rowed many of the Phenlcian traditrons, make any men- 

 lion of the flood ; yet the Greeks, as I already noticed, must 

 have had another tradition much less corrupt ; for Ovid, 

 Metaniorph. Lib. 1. v, 144, &c. mentions the extreme 

 wickedness of mankind before the flood, and particularly 

 the impiety of the giants, who even made war on the Gods, 

 which drew upon them the vengeance of Heaven ; almost 

 the whole race being exterminated by an universal 

 deluge. 



The description of the deluge given by Ovid is certainly 

 very remarkable, and evidently a fragment of a tradition 

 of the highest antiquity ; but that given by Lucian is 

 more particular, and agrees almost perfectly with the Mosaic 

 account. Ovid tells us that Deucalion and his wife Pi/rrha 

 alone survived it, by taking refuge on the summit of Mount 

 Parnassus ; but Lucian states that Deucalion, a man of 

 eminent virtue and piety, and his wife and children were 

 saved in an ark, into which they introduced pairs of various 

 animals;* but both erred most grossly, in confounding the 

 flood, which deluged Thessaly, with the universal deluge, that 

 covered the whole eartli. Ovid seems to have purposely 

 mutilated the ancient tradition, in order to introduce his 

 favourite object, the metamorphoses of stones into men and 

 •women, grounded probably on the affinity betwixt Aa;«r, a 

 stone, and Aaos, jx^ople. 



The Greek poets were equally mistaken and inconsistent 



Avith 



* De dea Syria, p. 660. 



J 



