and Scripture over again. This has just been done, in reference to the account of the six days of creation, as opposed to the facts of geology;—and we know what a severe struggle it was. Truth, however, has at length won the victory; and it is now generally admitted, that whatever interpretation we are to put upon the Mosaic account of the creation of the earth in six days, it certainly cannot be taken in its literal acceptation. A similar struggle is still going on in regard to the narrative of the Deluge,—as to whether it can be supposed to have been an actual flood of waters covering the whole earth,—or whether, as according to Dr. Pye Smith's theory, it should be considered as only a partial or local inundation merely,—or whether, in fact, it is rather to be received in an allegorical sense, as a flood of sin and wickedness.
So, now, the subject of Biblical Chronology has been of late years brought under examination; for it has been found difficult to reconcile the chronology commonly received, with certain pretty well ascertained facts in regard to the antiquity of the human race. "If," says Kitto, "we are to date from the Noachian Deluge, it is evident that such considerations [certain views before presented] with regard to the antiquity of the human race, must at least claim our serious attention, in connection with the Scripture narrative. As to the data simply, the great discrepancy in the chronology of the patriarchs between the existing Hebrew, the Samaritan, and the Septuagint versions, has, with many, tended to throw doubts upon all the computations alike, as more or less corrupted or interpolated. Again, there are circumstances connected with the early history of several nations which have
