142 GEOLOGY AND HISTORY 



within His power as the turning on or stopping of 

 a machine is in the power of a human engineer. 

 Further, such acts of Divine power may be related to 

 moral and spiritual things, just as easily as any out- 

 ward action resulting from our own will may be 

 determined by moral considerations. The time is 

 past when any rational objection can be made on the 

 part of science to the so-called miracles of the Bible. 



To return to the passengers in the ark. This 

 must have been built on high ground, or the progress 

 of the Deluge must have been slow, for forty days 

 elapsed before the waters reached the ship and floated 

 it. It is not unlikely that the ark was built on rising 

 ground, for here supplies of timber would be nearer. 

 It has puzzled some simple antiquarians to find dug- 

 out canoes of prehistoric date on the tops of hills ; 

 but they did not reflect that the maker of a canoe 

 would construct his vessel where the suitable wood 

 could be found, since it would be much easier to carry 

 the finished canoe to the shore than to drag thither 

 the solid log out of which it was to be fashioned. So 

 Noah would naturally build his ark where the wood 

 he required could be procured most easily. The 

 Chaldean narrator seems to have overlooked this 

 simple consideration, for he mentions a launching and 

 trial-trip of the ship, a sure mark that he is a later 

 authority than the writer in Genesis. 



The inmates of the ark now felt that it was moving 

 on the waters, a new and dread sensation which must 

 have deeply impressed their minds, and they soon 



