DELUGE. 



603 



Deluge, soon after rested/ when he disanbarked with his fami- 



— T"** ly, adored the earth, built an altar, and sacrificed to 

 the gods. Xisuthrus having suddenly disappeared, 

 his family heard a voice in the air, which informed 

 them, that the country in which they were was Arme- 

 nia, and directed them to return to Babylon. Syncelli 

 Chronolog. p. 30. Eusebii Prwp. Evang. lib. ix. c. 12. 

 and Joseph. Antiq. Jud. 



reek. Still more coincident even than this with the Mosaic 



account, is the Grecian history of the deluge, as pre- 

 served by Lucian, a native of Samosata on the Euphra- 

 tes : and his authority is the more incontrovertible, on 

 account of his being an avowed derider of all religions. 

 The antediluvians, according to him, had gradually be- 

 come so hardened and profligate, as to be guilty of eve- 

 ry species of injustice. They paid no regard to the 

 obligation of oaths; were insolent, inhospitable, and 

 unmerciful. For this reason they were visited with an 

 awful calamity. Suddenly the earth poured forth a 

 vast quantity of water, the rain descended in torrents, 

 the rivers overflowed their banks, and the sea rose to a 

 prodigious height ; so that " all things became water," 

 and all men were destroyed, except Deucalion. He alone, 

 for the sake of his prudence and piety, was reserved to 

 a second generation. In obedience to a divine moni- 

 tion, he entered, with his sons and their wives, into a 

 large ark, which he had built for their preservation ; 

 and immediately swine, and horses, and lions, and ser- 

 pents, and all other animals which live on earth, came 

 to him by pahs, and were admitted into the ark. There 

 they became perfectly mild and innoxious, their na- 

 tures being changed by the gods/ who created such a 

 friendship between them, that they all sailed peaceably 

 together, so long as the waters prevailed over the sur- 

 face of the globe. Lucian further adds, that, according 

 to an ancient tradition at Hierapolis in Syria, there was 

 once in that country a great chasm, through which the 

 Waters of the flood descended, and that Deucalion erect- 

 ed altars, and built a temple to Juno over its mouth. 

 This aperture under the temple, he declares he had seen, 

 though it was then but of small size: and he relates a 

 ceremony which took place twice every year, in memo- 

 ry of this catastrophe. Vessels full of water were brought 

 from the sea, not only by the priests, but by the inhabi- 

 tants of all Syria and Arabia ; often attended also by 

 multitudes from beyond the Euphrates. The water 

 thus brought, was poured on the floor of the temple, 

 and speedily sunk into the chasm ; which, small as it 

 was, received without difficulty the greatest quantity of 

 water. And when they did this, the people said that 

 •„' Deucalion himself had appointed it as a memorial of 

 the deluge, and of his own deliverance from it." Lu- 

 cian, de Ded Syria. 



Scarcely less remarkable is the Hindoo tradition, 



indu. with which we shall conclude this induction of testimo- 

 nies to the reality of the deluge. It is contained in the 

 ancient poem of the Bhagavat ; and forms the subject 

 of the first Purana, entitled Matsya, or the Fish. The 

 following is Sir William Jones's abridgment of it, and 

 the identity of the event which it describes, with that 

 of the Hebrew historian, is too obvious to require any 

 particular illustration. " The demon Hayagriva having 

 purloined the Vedas from the custody of Brahma, while 

 he was reposing at the close of the sixth Manwantara, 

 the whole race of men became corrupt, except the Seven 

 Rishis, and Satyavrata, who then reigned in Dravira, a 

 maritime region to the south of Carnata. This prince 

 was performing his ablutions in the river Critamala, 



when Vishnu appeared to him in the shape of a small 

 fish, and after several augmentations of bulk in differ- 

 ent waters, was placed by Satyavrata in the ocean, 

 where he thus addressed his amazed votary : In seven 

 days, all creatures who have offended me shall be de- 

 stroyed by a deluge, but thou shalt be secured in a ca- 

 pacious vessel miraculously formed ; take therefore all 

 kinds of medicinal herbs, and esculent grain for food, 

 and together with the seven holy men, your respective 

 wives, and pairs of all animals, enter the ark without 

 fear : then shalt thou know God face to face, and all 

 thy questions shall be answered. Saying this, he dis- 

 appeared; and after seven days, the ocean began to 

 overflow the coasts, and the earth to be flooded by con- 

 stant showers, when Satyavrata, meditating on the dei- 

 ty, saw a large vessel moving on the waters. He en- 

 tered it, having in all respects conformed to the instruc- 

 tions of Vishnu ; who in the form of a vast fish, suffer- 

 ed the vessel to be tied with a great sea serpent, as 

 with a cable, to his measureless horn. When the de- 

 luge had ceased, Vishnu slew the demon, and recover- 

 ed the Vedas, instructed Satyavrata in divine know- 

 ledge, and appointed him the seventh Menu, by the 

 name of VaivasAvata." (Asiat. Res. vol. ii. on Chronol. 

 of the Hindus.) And " according to the Pauranics, and 

 the followers of Buddha," says Capt. Wilford, " the ark 

 rested on the mountain of Aryavarta, Aryarvart, or In- 

 dia ; an appellation which has no small affinity with 

 the Ararat of Scripture." Ibid. vol. vi. p. 521. 



When we thus meet with some traditions of a deluge 

 in almost every country, though the persons saved from 

 it are said, in those various accounts, to have resided 

 in different districts widely separated from each other, 

 we are constrained to allow that such a general concur- 

 rence of belief could never have originated merely from 

 accident. While the mind is in this situation, scripture 

 comes forward, and presenting'a narrative, more simple, 

 better connected, and bearing an infinitely greater re- 

 semblance to authentic history, than any of those my- 

 thological accounts which occur in the traditions of Pa- 

 ganism, immediately flashes a conviction upon the un- 

 derstanding, that this must be the true history of those 

 remarkable facts, which other nations have handed down 

 to us, only through the medium of allegory and fable. 

 By the evidence adduced in this article, indeed, the mo- 

 ral certainty of the Mosaic history of the flood appears 

 to be established on a basis sufficiently firm to bid de- 

 fiance to the cavils of scepticism. " Let the ingenuity 

 of unbelief first account satisfactorily for this universal 

 agreement of the Pagan world ; and she may then, with 

 a greater degree of plausibility, impeach the truth of 

 the scriptural narrative of the deluge." 



Besides the authorities already quoted, see Purchas's 

 Pilgrim, b. ix. c. 5. 8. 10 ; Willbrd on Egypt; Aiiat. Res. 

 vol. iii. ; Maurice's Indian Antiq. ; Ancient Universal 

 History, vol. i. ; Faber's Horas Mosaicce ; and Cuvier's 

 Essay on the Theory of the Earth, (d) 



DELUGE, or Debacle, in Geology. Some wri- 

 ters have attempted to prove that traces of a de- 

 luge are apparent on the surface of the earth. Im- 

 mense blocks of stone are found at a great distance 

 from their native rocks ; the bones of animals and the 

 remains of plants, are found buried in regions far re- 

 moved from what is supposed to be their native cli-- 

 mate ; and even in solid rock, both animal and vege- 

 table substances abound, proclaiming mighty changes 

 in the arrangement of the materials which compose the 

 crust of the globe. 



Deluge. 



