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are told, that the Gentoo scriptures make no mention of the de- 
luge; and that the Bramins affirm, that the deluge never took 
place in Hindostan. Now, 1 look upon the deluge to be a circum- 
stance of such a singular nature, that, supposing it to have hap- 
pened, the memory of it could never have been extinguished 
amongst the generality of the nations which inhabit the earth. It 
is not, according to the most received chronology, much above 
four thousand years since that great event look place; and if any 
individual had the means of tracing back his pedigree through less, 
perhaps, than an hundred and forty generations, he would find 
either Shem, Ham, or Japhet, to have been his great progenitor. 
It is very possible for a tradition, which has passed through so 
many hands, to have been much altered; yet the tradition of so 
signal a calamity as the destruction of the human race by a deluge, 
could not, I conceive, have been wholly lost, except perhaps 
amongst a few nations utterly buried in barbarism. And, in fact, 
learned men have abundantly proved, that a tradition concerning 
a deluge has prevailed in every quarter of the globe; not only 
amongst the Romans, Grecians, Egyptians, Babylonians, Persians, 
Scythians; but amongst the Iroquoix, Mexicans, Brazilians, Pe- 
ruvians, and other nations of America; and 1 have been informed 
by one of the navigators to the southern hemisphere, that the 
inhabitants of Otaheite being asked concerning their origin, simply 
answered, that their supreme God, a long time ago, being angry, 
dragged the earth through the sea, and their island, being broken 
off, was preserved. Now if a tradition concerning a deluge has 
prevailed in almost every part of the globe, except in India, may it 
not be reasonable for us to hesitate a little, till we know more of that 
