cycle, suppose to have been in the year B. c. 2356, or A. M. 1650. I cannot, therefore, agree with those authors who suppose Fo-hi to be Noah, and reject the Hebrew for the Septuagint text, in a hope to obviate the absurdity of having professed, that a prince, who was placed seven reigns and ten generations antecedent to the one, whose reign, they admit, commenced A. M. 1650, was Noah. A very little attention to dates will enable us to reconcile all oriental chronology with real time, in opposition to those authors, who have no hesitation in ascribing all to oriental vanity and fiction, or by introducing a system subversive of reason, would reduce the age of the antediluvian patriarchs below the level of the present race of men. We are told by Maurice, vol. II, p. 51. " that with any exactness to arrange a system of chronology boundless in its retrospect, and perfectly devious from the known and established principles of chronology, in other kingdoms of the habitable earth, would be a task impracticable to any historian, however indefatigable." And the same author, determined to give himself the utmost possible latitude in chronology, adopts that of the Septuagint, which he says "gives nearly 1500 years more to the age of the world than the Hebrew text, and the Vulgate; and supposes, with the learned Doctor Jackson, that the oldest and most renowned Belus, the founder of the Chaldean dynasty, began his reign at Babylon;

2233* years before Christ." This author, indeed, admits that the system he has adopted is attended with difficulties, that he shall not attempt to reconcile; but he considers it so far "justifiable, as it afforded that prolonged space for the grand events recorded in the Asiatic histories to have taken place, on the theatre of the world;" for he adds, by these means we obtain an addition of nearly a thousand years between the deluge and the birth of Abraham."

While the relaters of Hindu history wrote rather to amuse, than to instruct, it was of little moment how they related events, or what latitude they took in point of time. But now that we are instigated by an ardent desire to promulgate the tenets of Christianity among, perhaps, 60000000 of our brethren, let us be cautious not to excite their contempt, where it is our interest to raise their admiration. What must an enlightened Hindu think of that religion, whose priests admit of an excess of nearly 1000 years, in a period which their most sacred books state at only 352 years? The Hebrew Pentateuch informs us, that Abraham was born 352 years after the deluge:

*Ham is supposed to have first arrived in Babylon B. C. 2246, and to have returned after the confusion of tonguês, and founded the first regular dynasty B. C, 1238. Vide Table xxv.

the Septuagint adds 886 years thereto; neither the Hebrew, nor Hindu chronology, will be benefited by such an unwarranted latitude; but were it otherwise, it would be difficult to understand, where the difference is stated at above 4000000 of years, what advantage our author proposes to himself by the assumption of 1000. Of this I am sure, that the most scrupulous attention to truth is necessary, on all religious subjects, with the Hindus; who are wonderfully well informed both in chronology and theology; I mean the learned church Brahmans; and I can affirm, from personal knowledge, that they are anxious to be informed on all matters relative to the cosmogony and theology of Europeans. I have frequently read with them the Old and New Testament. The truth of the former they readily admitted, and considered Christ as a prophet; yet, adhering to the belief, that no incarnation of the Deity would appear in the Cali age, until that period when the Divine Spirit should appear at Calsi, to judge the world; they readily admitted that we had, in common, traditions of the same events; and that we worshipped the same God, under a different name. The prophecies of Isaiah they read with great interest, but were convinced that they alluded to the coming of the Calsi, or last Avatar. Nevertheless, but for local circumstances, many of the

Brahmans I am convinced had become proselytes. How detrimental to Christianity, how repugnant to reason is that system, which ascribes to oriental vanity, all that is not perfectly clear to the limited comprehensions of a few individuals. Those numbers, which give such offence to moderns, were received by the ancients as orthodox: and, when they are properly understood, nothing can be more simple. In these numbers Berosus recorded the dates of the antediluvian dynasties; and we shall find them to correspond also with the dates of the Mosaic account. The same author (Maurice) that so confidently rejects the boasted millions of the Hindus, proceeds to enforce his hypothesis by informing his readers, that "Arrian affirms, that there was a regular succession of Indian kings from the reign of Bacchus to Sandrocallus that they amounted in number to 53 sovereigns, and their reigns continued during a period of 6042 years." He adds, that "the Indians compute 15 ages to have elapsed between Bacchus and Hercules*. In the same manner we read in Pomponius Mela, that the ancient Egyptians boasted

* Rama Chada, the Bacchus of the Hindu Mythology, was born in the fifth century. Pharaoh Asses, termed Hercules Egyptias, or the Phenecians' Hercules, in the 21st century; consequently 15 centuries elapsed between them. Vide p. 325.

to have had trecentos et triginta reges ante Amasin, or 330 kings, who swayed the sceptre before Amasis was conquered by Cambyses; whose reigns took up a period of tredecim millibus annorum, or 13000 years. Both these dynasties and the extensive periods of their reign, may safely be referred to the same origin-oriental vanity and fiction."

If we understand these assertions literally, we . must, indeed, consider them as fictitious. But we have the authority of Bishop Cumberland, strongly corroborated by Scripture, for saying that the most ancient Egyptian dynasties were not in succession, but the several reigns of petty kings, or fathers of tribes, contemporary with each other; the descendants of Ham. Consequently, if these descendants, and their issue, amounted to 330 rulers, and we have good proof that they greatly exceeded that number, then may we admit that the aggregate of the reigns of 360 kings, most of them contemporaries with each other, might amount to 13000 years; which is not allowing 40 years to a reign; a very inconsiderable period when the life of man was protracted so far beyond it's present duration. We know that the pastors were termed kings. Josephus calls them royal ones, and informs us, that they were so termed from Hyesi, which has that meaning; and he adds, in those days a considerable number of children, servants, and cattle, caused a