P A R T V.
“Adam, ante mortem ejus, convocavit omnesfilios suos, qui erant in numéroXV
milia virorum absque mulieribus.”
(Vita Ade et Eve, Anon., A. D. 1460).446
According to the Hebrew and the Samaritan Texts,446 Adam was
only 130 years old at the birth of Seth, his third son; according to
the Septuagint Version, and to Josephus, his age was then 230.447
In either case, the precise year is fixed by Archbishop Usher at B. c.
3874.448 “And the days of Adam after he ■ ■ ; | ' h ad b^egotten Set•h were
445 P h il o m n e s t e , p . 37 .
446 R e v . E . B . E l l io t t , A . M., Horoe Apocalypticoe, London, 8vo, 1 8 4 6 ; IV , p . 2 5 4 :—H ay wood’s
V on B o h l e n , Introduction to Genesis, I I , p p . 9 7 - 9 .
447 King lames’s version, Genesis, V, 3, 4, 5.
448 We have seen (supra, note 263) that Tubal-Cain is the God- Vulcan, ; and now in Seth
it is easy to recognize, through Josephus (Antiq. Jud., I, 2, &c.), and the.dialectic mutation
of S into T aspirated, the God TeT of the Egyptians, “ author of le tte r s - ’ (B u n s e n , Egypt’s
Place, I, pp. 393-5), otherwise Tautus, or Thoth; not to be any longér confounded, as he
has been by some, with SET or Typhon. See the argument of A l f r e d M a it r y (“ Personage
de la Mort,” Revue Archéologique, 15 Août, 1847, pp. 325-6). It had been formerly indicated
(Types of Mankind, p. 562) that the mother of Seth, before she was named Eve (i. e. “ KAiUaH,
because she was the mother of all living,” KAala; /Gen. I ll, 20) had been called AiSAaH,
ISE, or fsis, who was famed as “ the universal mother.” It has been likewise shown previously
(Types of Mankind, p. 544), why the patriarch E nos is only the “ God of the vulgar.”
If etymologies are to be sanctioned in the explanation of primitive myths, the above fpur
examples of Vulcan, Thoth, Isis, and Enos, now identified among the antediluvian progenitors
of mankind, will be found more susceptiblè of historic and palæographical justification than
the learned Mr. Osburn’s unique discoveries {Monumental History of Egypt, London, 1854,
I, pp. 239-40, 245, 339-44) of Adam, Noah, Ham, and Mizraim, in Egyptian hieroglyphics!
Not merely (p. 222) are “ Scripture Patriarchs identified with Egyptian Deities,” but, in
his ingenious and pious book, the very “ names of Goddesses recorded upon the monuments,”
are declared to be “ those of the wives of the patriarchs although this excellent critic
allows that “ they are not preserved in the Bible.”
To the same class,-engendered by a similar monomania for “ confirmations,” in defiance
of reason and historical truth, belongs the alleged discovery of the name and exploits of
Moses in contemporaneous hieratic scrolls (R e v . D. J. H e a t h , M. A., The Exodus Papyri,
London, 1855),—as if the English translation itself, utterly foreign to ancient or modem
Egyptian ideas, did not sufficiently betray an Englishman’s imposition during the present
century! As for the R e v . C. F o r s t e r ’s last {A Harmony. of Primceval Alphabets), wherein
there is not a single hieroglyphic drawn with even childish correctness, nor a solitary phonetic
value exact, they fall (together with his Himyaritic, Sinaic, and Assyrian interpretations,
&c.) into a simpler category,—that of downright imposture. The self-deceptions, or perhaps
“ canards,” of M. B a r r o is {Dactylogie et Language Primitif restituée d’après les Monuments,
Paris, 4to, 1850), have hoaxed even His Holiness the Pontiff {Lecture littérale des
Hiéroglyphes et des Cunéiformes, Paris^ 4to, 1853; p. 36) : but being harmless pasqninadcs
of a gentleman who pays liberally for the publication of his own books, as well as for any
clever cheat (Pulszky’s paper, supra, note 17, Chap. II) that “ Chevaliers d’industrie” may
foist upon his credulity, they really become sublime, viewed in comparison with some of the
instances of fraud or hallucination above cited.
eight hundred [LXX, 700] years; and he begat sons and daughters;
and all the days that Adam lived were nine hundred and thirty
years; and he d ie d le a v in g a rather large family, if we eredit the
biography, above cited, that his children numbered 15000 men besides
the women. From what sources his second biographer gathered these
statistics ¡does not appear, any more than whence the so-called Mosaic
compiler obtained the other Adamic particulars recorded in Genesis.
The earlier biography, assuming Archbishop Usher’s dates to he incontestable,
must have been written (Deuter. XXXT, 9, 26,) about b. c.
1451; or some 1623 years after Adam’s decease,—an event which'
taking- place 930 years after the Creation, ascertained to he b. c.
4004, occurred in b. cl 3074. The author of the “ Life of Adam and
Eve lived, it is true, in a. d. 1460, of 4534 years after Adam’s death;
but any one who believes that anecdotes of the protopatriarch’s long
life could have been preserved, for incorporation into the Pentateuch,
during 1623 years, cannot reasonably deny extension of the same
possibility (1451 + 1460) for 2911 years longer.449
We need not be astonished either at the number of Adam and
Eve’s children during 800 years; because, while, on the one hand
Cardinal Wiseman450 and the Rev. J. Pye Smith451 teach how physical
causes were in -more vehement operation before the 44 Flood” than
after; on the other, the multiplication of the Jews in Egypt, during the
430, or 400, or 215, years of their sojourn, when post-diluvial physical
causes were precisely the same as at present,, is equally formidable,
and possesses equal claims upon credence. Jacob and his family, in
number 70,418 or 75, persons, settle in the land of Goshen; and their
descendants issue forth 44 about 600,000 men on foot, without the
children, and a mixed multitude”453—or GouM-AaRaB, Arab levy or
horde. Commentators vary in their estimates of the number of souls
from 1,800,000 to 3,000,0*00 ; nor is the duration of the sojourn itself
at all settled;454 but the latter point is unimportant to my present
argument. So is also the disproportionate area in Eastern lower
In making these assertions upon my own responsibility, there are two courses left open
to the reader who cares about verification; 1st, to inquire of the hierologists in charge of
the Pans, Berlin, London, or Turin Museums, whether they do not support these repudiations
; or 2d, to defray the printing expenses of a thorough qnalysis of each work by myself
although I think “ le je,u ne vaut pas la chandelle.”
449 1 am merely following, with a little more minuteness, the orthodox example of Db. Ha l l
■Analytical Synopsis, London ed. of P i c k e r i n g ' s Races, 1851, p. xxxv.
450 Connection between Science and Revealed Religion.
451 Relation between the Holy Scriptures and Geological Science, 3d. ed., London 12mo 1843-
PP- 185, 243, 301, 340. ' ’ ’
452 Genesis, XLVI, 27:—Ca h e n , La Bible, trad. nouv. I, pp. 162-4, notes.
463 Exodus, XII, 37, 38:—Op. eit., II, p. 50, note 87.
464 L e p s i u s , Chron. der ¿Egypler, I, pp. 3 1 5 - 1 7
36