Tbe purpose of the Ark was to preserve Noah and his family, altogether eight souls (vii. 7, 13 ; i Pet. iii. 20), with certain animals, from perishing in the Flood sent on account of the sins of mankind. The animals were spared to replenish the desolated lands, as well as for the after-sustenance of Noah and his household. The beasts were taken, of the clean kinds, by seven pairs each, and of the unclean, by single pairs ; the birds, by seven pairs each, and the creeping things, apparently by single pairs. Thus of the more useful creatures there were larger numbers, shewing that the advantage of man was a primary object in their preservation. When it was held that the Deluge was universal, great pains were taken to shew how all the species of animals could have been contained in the Ark. The discovery of new species has, however, long since rendered any more such computations needless, unless, perhaps, theirauthors would be willing to accept to the fullest extent some theory of development, and to carry back the Deluge to an unreasonably remote age. The progress of geology has tended to shew that there is nat distinct physical evidence of one great deluge, universal as to the earth, and the advance of Hebrew criticism has led to a very general admission among scholars that the Biblical narrative does not require us to hold such an event to have occurred. The destruction of the children of Adam, and the animals of the tract they inhabited, is plainly declared in the narrative, but beyond this we cannot draw any positive conclusions from it. The word rendered ' earth' in the authorized version may as well mean ' land,' and the want of universal terms in Hebrew must make us cautious in laying much stress upon what would seem to imply the universal character of the Flood. We have indeed reason to infer its partial nature from the statement that the waters rose fifteen cubits and covered the mountains (Gen. vii. zo), which appears to mean either that the whole height of the flood was fifteen cubits, or that when the waters had covered the high hills (ver. 19), they rose still fifteen cubits further, until the mountains also were covered : mountains, it must be remembered, in Semitic phraseology, often being no more than small emi nences (See The Genesis of the Earth and of Man, 2d ed. pp. 91 seqq.) We must, however, be careful
not to underrate the importance of this great catas trophe, the character of which is shewn by the strong recollection of it that the descendants of Noah have preserved in all parts of the world.
The traditions respecting the Ark may be ranged under two classes, those which agree in relating that it rested where the Bible states that it did so, or not far from thence, and those which place both Deluge and Ark in distant countries. At the head of the first class stands the narrative of Berosus the Babylonian historian, which may be thus epito mized. In the time of Xisuthrus, the tenth king of the there occurred a great deluge. He was warned by Cronus of the approaching destruction of mankind, and ordered to construct a vessel, and take with him into it his relations and friends, and to put in it food and drink, and birds and quadrupeds. He accordingly built a vessel, five (Syncellus) or fifteen (Eusebius) stadia long, and two stadia broad, and put everything into it, and his wife and children and friends to enter. When the flood had abated, Xisuthrus sent forth birds, which twice returned, but did not so on the third occasion : then, having broken or divided a part of the ship's covering, he found that it had rested on a certain mountain. He then came forth, and with some who had been in the vessel disappeared. Of his ship a portion remained, or was said to remain, on a mountain of the Cordimans in Armenia, in the time of Berosus, and some scraped off bitumen from it to serve for charms (Ejus navigii, quod demum substitit in Armenia, fragmentum aliquod in Cordimorum Armeniaco monte nostra adhuc Mate reliquum esse aitmt. Quin et erasum bitumen quidam inde referent remedii amuletique causa ad infausta qumque averruncanda, Euseb. Arm. Tar 2-Xoiou Tcorov KaraatOevTos rfl 'Apnevig grt nips TL