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The first thing that claims our attention in this narrative, is the names of the three sons of Noah. In simple and primitive times, names were not as now, arbitrary and unmeaning terms, but were descriptive of the moral and physical qualities of the persons and things to which they were applied: this was a universal custom among all nations of antiquity. And Iam denoted black or burned. Ham! it is black! We assume the fact then, and we will furnish the reasons immediately—that this name was given to the younger son of Noah because of his color; and we may easily conceive that Noah would exclaim Ham! on seeing his son for the first time. And it could not be expected that Noah would regard this child with the same paternal tenderness with which be regarded the others: and this may go very far to explain, if not palliate, the conduct of Ham in exposing his father’s shame: and the resentment that would be superadded upon Noah’s mortification, on discovering the offender, would well prepare the mind of the father for uttering those imprecations “loud and deep” upon his graceless child.
Permit me here to make a few remarks on the nature and extent of this curse; which may appear too severe to be just, and too cruel to have received the sanction and approbation of Heaven. You must consider that this crime of Ham was the first transgression recorded after the flood, and probably the first committed; and you must remember, in the next place, that Noah now was to the world what Adam was, when created—the official head—the vicegerent of Heaven—and, therefore, the first deliberate and wilful offence, as in the vase of Adam, according to the moral government of God, must be punished with the utmost rigor of law. I do not consider the intoxication of Noah, on this occasion, as criminal, because he must have been ignorant of the nature of wine—never, perhaps, having tasted any before: and, in the last place, you must bear in mind that the crime of disobeying, insulting and mocking parents, is second only to disobeying, insulting and mocking God; and, under the law, such a son or daughter was to be stoned to death.
Next came the names of Shem and Japheth; and that Japheth was white, and Shem red, will appear evident, from the following facts. The three quarters of the globe were divided among the three sons of Noah; to Ham was assigned Africa, to Shem Asia, and to Japheth Europe: and to this day, the three colors of our race are to be found in these three divisions, denoting the origin whence they came.
True, Canaan settled on the eastern coast of the Mediterranean
