570 CONCLUSION.
to admit, and I observe that the ancient Hebrews seem to - have been
of the same opinion, since the scriptural 'writers have always avoided
the attempt to compute the period in question! They go back, as we
have seen in the instance of St. Pawl’s computation, to the age of
Abraham, at the same time using expressions plainly denoting that
they made no pretension to accurate knowledge, and could only approximate
to the true dates of events; but they have in no instance,
as far as I remember, attempted to carry the computation of time,
further back, nor has any one;writer alluded to the age of the world.
An immediate revelation on such a subject was as little to be expectecL
as it was that Joshua should be momentarily inspired with a knowledge
of the ~Copemican system when he issued that celebrated command
which caused the sun to remain visible on Mount Gibeon and
the moon jn the valley of Ajalon. The Hebrew chronology may be
computed with accuracy to the era of the Building of the Temple, dr
at least to that of the Division of the Tribes. In the interval between
that date and the arrival of-Abraham in Palestine it cannot be ascertained
with exactness, but may be computed with a near approxima-
.tion to truth. Beyond that event we can never know how many
centuries nor even how many chiliads of years may have elapsed since
the first man of clay received the image of God and the breath of life.
Still, as the thread of genealogy has been traced, though probably
with many and great intervals, the whole duration of time from the
beginning must apparently have been within moderate hounds and
by no means so wide and vast a space as the great periods of the
Indian and Egyptian fabulists.*
* This general conclusion, as to the extent and limits of chronology (Reducible
from the Hebrew Scriptures, coincides with the result of the Chevalier
Bunsen’s researches, though the views entertained by that great scholar are,
so far-as they have yet been explained, different from my own. But that
portion of M. Bunsen’s work which is devoted to the Sacred Records is
not yet complete. When it shall appear, we have reason, from the immense
teaming of the excellent writer and from his known warm attachment to
the cause of revealed religion, to expect a great accession to Biblical
Literature.