Greek Traditions of the Deluge. 419 



which this account is introduced by Critias, as a Xo>S fi«A« 

 uev ^tottoj W «vT«7r«<7»' ys ^v Mfc, told by his great grand- 

 father, a friend of Solon, there is much reason to believe that 

 if Plato be not altogether feigning, he has at least referred to 

 Solon what may have happened to himsell, and that the al- 

 leged destruction of historical records was designed to prepare 

 the way for the story of the Atlantians and their submerged 

 islands. There is, however, independent ground for believing 

 that the Egyptians really held the doctrine of the periodical 

 destruction of the world by fire and water in which they agree 

 with the Hindoos. In the beginning of the third book ot the 

 Laws, Plato speaks of "many destructions of the human race 

 by floods and diseases, and many other causes, in which only 

 a small remnant of them was left," as the consequence ot 

 which civilization suffered violent interruptions, and mankind, 

 in the case of a flood, only gradually descended from the 

 mountains into which they had fled for safety from the waters. 

 The remark of Cuvier (p. 86. note), therefore, upon the men- 

 tion of the flood of Deucalion in the Timmis, « 11 (Platon) 

 place le nom de Deucalion immediatement apres celui de Pho- 

 ronee, le premier des hommes, sans faire mention d Ugyges: 

 ainsi, pour lui, c'est encore un evenement general, ur, vrai 

 deluge universel, et le seul qui soit arrive," is without founda- 

 tion. Greek tradition spoke only of one flood in Greece, which 

 Plato calls 6 *«™e*X»ffp'fc but he regarded it as only a part ot 

 a system which had operated at intervals through myriads ot 

 years. He took the popular belief, and adapted it to his own 

 theory of the progress of society *. 



Aristotle [MeteorolA. 14.), having mentioned * as Part °f the 

 order of nature that deluges of rain and inundations should trom 

 time to time occur, now in one country now in another* goes 

 on to observe, that of such a kind was the flood, as it is called, 

 in the time of Deucalion : x«l y«g oOro? ^ t*v EKK^ov ey^ro 



tS £ r F uJ, vDv il "EK^s. « Aristote," says Cuvier, ubt 

 supra, "semblele premier n'avoir considere ce deluge que 

 comme une iuondatkm loeaWqu^lplaee pre. ide IJgJJfj 

 du fleuve Achelous, mais pres de I' Achelous e de_la Dotal 

 de Thessalie." It is very true that Aristotle is the fi t 

 author whom we have met with expressly declarmg tha rt 

 was a local flood ; but of the authors who preceded him, which 



iince the war of the Atlantians. 



3 H 2 



