173 



exod, (except Joshua and Caleb,) so that those who allow but 

 six or seven years to Joshua, and as many to the el-ders, will 

 have that generation to be cut off much sooner than the re- 

 gular course of human life determines. Whereas, my calculus 

 admits some of them to attain an advanced age, those who 

 were fifteen at the delivery of the la\v^, above eighty years, 

 and the others in proportion ; thus affording a full and 

 satisfactory answer to the uncandid and disingenuous insi- 

 nuations of modern infidelity, " that the contemporaries of 

 Moses and Joshua beheld with careless indifference, and 

 contemptuous neglect, the amazing miracles which were 

 continually demonstrating the presence of their divinity ; a 

 conduct that on every known principle of the human mind, 

 is irreconcileable to any reasonable belief of their reality and. 

 performance," (Gibbon,* — I quote from memory,) fortified 

 and grounded, as it should appear to be, by the mistaken 

 calculation of chronologists, in allotting so small an interval 

 to Israel's perseverance in the faith of their religion. This I 

 consider as no small advantage. 



But this will be more evident, from a short synopsis which I 

 here subjoin : — 

 The passage of the lied Sea, 430 years after the promise. 



Jordan, 470 40 years after. 



Conquest of the land, 476 6 years after. 



Conquest 



• Tlie passage of the eloipent histoiiao, which I here subslanliaUy paraphrase, is 

 Chap. XV. p. 270. 271. Octavo, Loudon, 1802. I have thought it better, lor obvious 

 reasons, to leave the passage as it was, although a miserable siiccailaneum for the grace, 

 the spirit, and the ironical insinualioii of the original. 



