40 
ancient times held very different views respecting man’s 
antiquity. Bishop Newton, in his 14th “Dissertation on the 
Prophecies,” mentions “an old tradition both amongst Jews 
and Christians, that at the end of 6,000 years the Messiah 
should come and the world be renewed,” apparently assigning 
that period to man’s age on earth. This view appears to be 
confirmed by the epistle ascribed to Barnabas, who writes : 
“ Consider, my children, what that signifies — God finished them 
in six days, which means that in 6,000 years the Lord God will 
bring all things to an end.” 
4. Hence the natural anxiety which has been manifested by 
so many to ascertain the age of the human race since the 
creation of our first parents in Paradise; for I dismiss, as totally 
beside the mark, the question of the age of the world, which 
so many confound with the antiquity of man. How wide the 
variations of different chronologers are in respect to this may 
be seen in Hale’s “ New Analysis of Chronology ” ; where 
upwards of 120 different opinions are given, and which the 
writer says “ might be swelled to 300,” while in his own list 
the difference is so great that the first exceeds the last no less 
than 3,268 years. 
5. Although the chronology of Scripture points distinctly 
to a period of about 6,000 years since the creation of man 
I purposely avoid entering upon the difference between the 
Hebrew and the LXX. chronology, though I unhesitatingly 
give my preference to the former), it is to the age of man since 
the Noachian flood that we have now to consider. And the 
arguments in favour of the Hebrew chronology, confirmed, as I 
shall endeavour to show, by that of Egypt, may be summed up 
under the following heads : — 
(a.) The actual number of the present population of the 
world would, according to the calculated rate of increase from 
the three sons of Noah on their exit from the ark be reached 
in between 4,000 and 5,000 years. 
( b .) The comparatively modern date of arts, sciences, and 
inventions. 
(c.) The low date of all authentic history, whether Egyptian, 
Babylonian, Assyrian, Indian, or Chinese, none of which can 
be traced earlier than B.C. 2400. Champollion considered 
that “ no Egyptian monument was really older than B.C. 2200 ; ” 
and certainly Egypt affords the earliest positive evidence of 
man’s existence on earth. * 
* It is a curious fact that in the celebrated letter, which Alexander the 
