pose, sprang from the uninterrupted work of God; we have, on the contrary, every reason to suppose that it did not, having been, from the first, apprised of the extreme subtlety and of the hostile intentions of Satan against the new creation. And we again find, in this chapter, that by the means of an evil race of people, the sons of God in Adam's uncontaminated line were seduced into offensive alliances, which eventually proved so fatal to the good order and peace of the world, that the deluge was determined upon, to sweep away, by one Almighty judgment, the mingled and greatly corrupted race of men.

But, notwithstanding, as it was denounced at the commencement of the world that Satan's seed should ever be at enmity with the woman's seed, it follows that they must still be contemporary; and accordingly we find, by the figure of the metallic image in Daniel, which prefigures the four successive empires, that there will be, at the latest period of time, which it represents, a mixture or mingling of a certain people with the seed of

men.

Daniel, chap. ii. 43. « And whereas thou sawest

iron mixed with miry clay, they shall mingle themselves with the seed of men: but they shall not cleave one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay."

The above is a clear corroboration of the information given in the sixth chapter of Genesis concerning two distinct sorts of people, and evidently without design, by a prophet long subsequent to Moses. It is prefaced, at the 28th verse, by the declaration, that "There is a God in heaven that revealeth secrets, and maketh known to the king Nebuchadnezzar what shall be in the LATTER

DAYS."

This shows to what a late period the men, emphatically so called, remain upon the earth. And in the Revelations they are several times mentioned, being there also emphatically termed men.

As a common reader, I cannot but apprehend the 43d verse of Daniel (chap. ii.) as a literal explanation of that foregoing part of the prophecy which relates to two different sorts of people upon earth. The sixth chapter of Genesis clearly described a race of men who were positively adverse

to God, and striving against him; also a corrupted world, although the sons of God were evidently intermixed in it. And as we are apparently allowed to scan all the information that is avowedly given to us, may we not, without presumption, conjecture that our Creator and Preserver, having purged the earth from its extreme corruption, by the flood, would not again permit of such a preponderance of evil as brought it on; but that the Satanic race, which was still to contemporate with the posterity of Adam and Eve, would be more restricted: and we find, that of the three sons of Noah, who were to replenish the earth, two of them were, according to his paternal blessing and prophecy, to be within the pale and ordinance of the blessed God of Shem; while Ham, the third son, remains unnoticed by his father; and there rises up in his family a youth who, bearing a name somewhat similar to that of Cain (Canaan), like Cain also goes forth into the new world, under a curse: Cursed be Canaan.

Is there not reason to pause upon these recorded events, and to consider whether the origin of this youth may not be the cause of the malediction?

E

for all commentators have found it a subject of unrequited inquiry, why Noah should curse Canaan for the fault of his father. Also it becomes a question, why Canaan alone should receive the curse, when he had three brothers apparently under the same circumstances as himself? for certainly he does appear to be abruptly, mysteriously, and exclusively marked by it. Nevertheless, as we proceed to further times described in Scripture, and corroborated by profane history, we shall find, that although his brothers were not marked by a curse, yet that the descendants of Cush, in Nimrod and the Babylonians, and those of Misraim, in the Egyptians, prove to be nations and people of a spirit and religion totally differing from, and to this day inimical to, that ordained of God to take its course in the two elder brothers, Shem and Japhet, who are evidently favoured of God. And why the brothers of Canaan, so as to include Ham's whole progeny, should be excluded from that favour, and continue without the pale of the blessed God of Shem, remains to be accounted for.

Genesis, chap. ix. 18. " And the sons of Noah, that went forth of the ark, were Shem, and Ham, and Japhet: and Ham is the father of Canaan."

The 22d verse also begins with the same notification: " And Ham, the father of Canaan." Thus Ham appears to be more noted, upon account of being Canaan's father, than on his own account. None of the sons of Japhet or Shem are mentioned in such a remarkable manner; and as it occurs in two separate places, there must be some particular cause for it. Noah himself is carefully mentioned at the ninth verse of the sixth chapter, as perfect in his generations; that is, as we must suppose from the whole tenor of the chapter, unmixed by his forefathers with those reprobate daughters of men described therein.

But had his sons kept perfect from that society of the old world from which they were so recently separated? Ham is shown to have been devoid of all respect to his father; he, therefore, had little to deter him from falling into the antediluvian transgression, of taking a wife in the forbidden line. And when we find Canaan cursed, we know not why,