t

parison, great and populous city. In the confusion arising from hence, and in length of time growing inexplicable, we may reasonably allow that all knowledge of the true channels of these rivers, Pison and Gihon, has been lost; and we should greatly trifle, were we now to pretend, through curiosity, to find them. The material point is, whether we have not enough left, indisputably certain, to convince us that Moses' description is not such a romance as our modern allegorists suppose.

The garden of Eden bordered upon a river made up of a confluence of four streams, one of which was the Euphrates, the other Hiddekel." The question is, Is there a place in the world where these two rivers and other streams join? I answer, there is; viz. at the south-cast extent of the province of the now Irak Arabi of the Turkish empire, which was the ancient Chaldæa ; at the place where the Turks now have a fortification, called Korna; at which place, the Hiddekel, or Tigris and Euphrates, with some other lesser streams, fall in and make one river. Let us enquire further, do these rivers, thus joined, continue to run in one stream, as

;

↑ Qualis facies Euphratis fuerit, priusquam manu factis fossis et alveis distraheretur, difficile est delineare; nam et illæ fossæ antiquiores pleræque sunt, quam Græci, a quibus et naturæ rerum, aut ab hominibus gestarum memoriam habemus, ad scribendum et historias componendas, aut res naturæ tradendas se composuerunt. Cellarii Geogr. lib. 3. c. 16.

Strabo makes many complaints of the incorrectness of the Greek geographers in many parts of his work.

Gen. ii. ubi sup.

Moses mentions that his river of Eden ran down from Eden to the garden of God? I answer, they run in one undivided channel down to Bassora; from whence they are parted, and run in streams, navigable even by large ships, in different channels into the Persian gulf. An inspection of the map, which I have here inserted, will exhibit what I offer in the clearest view.

Whether these rivers were so large in Moses' time as they are now, I do not pretend to say; though it is ob vious, that Hiddekel was a great river in Daniel's days, and the Euphrates was reputed eminently so in the times of Abraham. It was the taste in the days. of Moses to think a ground well watered, which lay, as the land of Egypt did, upon the confines of some great and overflowing river; so that a man might water it with his fool, might trace out furrows, or channels, which might be filled with the flow of it, and convey water to the plants wherever he might design lines for its conveyance. But, leaving the reader to consider and determine, as he thinks fit, whether, in the first world, there were any snows covering, in their season, the hills or mountains whence these rivers take their rise; and, if there were not, whether their flow might not be less, and their channels not so wide and deep. in Adam's days, as they became afterwards, when greater currents made their way through them; I might remark, that this augmentation of their waters

* Daniel, ubi sup.

y Gen. ubi sup.

z Deut. xvi. 10,--Thus Ezekiel hints, a vine so planted in a good soil by great waters, that it might be watered by the furrows of her plantation. Ezek. xvii. 7.

may, in the band of Providence, have been one mean of keeping their channels open and known even until now, and likely to continue so to the end of the world.

The course of the Euphrates may be traced in all noted writers of geography; and is plainly to be seen, in all the tracts of country through which it passes, that in no point, but that one which I have mentioned, can it be found to form a confluence with other rivers, to make one stream, as Moses describes; and to part again, before it runs into the sea. And if, as I measure it from Korna to Bassora, be not above sixty miles, our enquiry after the earthly paradise is brought within a narrow compass; and however inconsiderately some may be disposed to ridicule the enquiry, we may reasonably conclude, that we cannot be far from the spot which was the garden of Eden, any where in the confines of the flow of this river, between Korna and Bassora.

CHAP. IX.

Concerning the temptation of Eve by the Serpent; and her and Adam's eating of the forbidden tree.

WE left Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden; the day after their creation was a Sabbath, to be employed in considering the bounty and goodness of their Creator; what expectations he had given them; what duties were enjoined them, and how they might perform them,

Now, when this day was over, and they began to employ themselves in what God had appointed them to do, namely, to dress the garden and to keep it it is very natural to think that they went out to their work desir ous to see and consider the creation of God, and fully purposing to revere and obey him, in every thing he had said, or should farther speak to them. Dr. Burnet supposes, that the temptation befel them instantly on the very day of their creation; but it is observable, that, although the narration of Moses is very concise,

Semper ad eventum festinat

-HOR.

although he has related to us only a few events, upon which all the whole affairs of the first world turned; and relates them in their order as they were done, omitting all that was intermediate between the particulars recorded by him; yet the intervals of time between the facts recorded, must have been filled up in a manner reasonably agreeing to the nature of the things related, and the character of the persons concerned in them. Both a just writer, and a judicious reader, will know Reddere personæ scit convenientia cuique- -HOR.

1

Isthoc die creavit omnia pecora, omnes feras, et omnia reptilia-denique creavit Adamum,--finitâ hac operâ fabrifecit fœminain; eodem die conjugium ineunt mas et fœmina recens nati:-eodem die nova nupta, nescio quo proposito, vagata inter arbores nemoris, incidit in serpentem: ille serpens colloquium instituit cum fœminà: argumenta jactant hâc illûc de quâdam arbore aut quodam fructu, edendo, vel non edendo: illa tandem rationibus aut lenociniis victa fructum comedit;

how to say, and, where it is not necessary to be ex pressed, how to think what is suitable to every cha racter. But it is hard to think that God should permit a temptation, of so great consequence, to break forth upon our first parents, before they had had time to form any sort of thoughts of things about them. And we give Adam and Eve no character at all, if we suppose, that, whilst the voice of God, strictly charging them not to eat of the tree, had scarce ceased speaking to them, they would eat, because they heard a serpent say they might safely do it. If Moses had expressly told us, that they thus instantly fell into the sin which caused their ruin, he had, I think, laid before us a great rock of offence against his narration. For to suppose, that as soon as God gave the prohibition, Adam and Eve would immediately transgress it; implies not only a total want of all consideration in our first parents, but something incredibly prone not to regard Him, who had shewed himself to be the only proper person to be regarded. But Dr. Burnet takes up the sentiment only that he may tragically complain of Moses' narration:

neque id tantum, seo eundem defert marito, qui pariter comedit. Archæol. p. 295.

Intra unius diei spatiolum hæc omnia confecta legimus: magna et multifaria negotia. Sed ardeo dolore, cum tantillo tempore omnia inversa et perturbata video, totamque reruni naturam vix dum compositam et adornatam ante primi solis occasum, ad interitum ruere et deformari. Mane diei Deus dixit, omnia esse bona: sub vespere omnia sunt execrabilia. Quam fluxa est rerum creatarum gloria! Opus elaboratum per sex dies, idque omnipotenti manu, infamis besti totidem horis perdidit. Achæol. p. 295.