from Cedrenus and Antiochenus will set this matter in its true light. Deucalion taught the Greeks religion, and the great argument which he used to persuade his people to the fear of the Deity, was taken from the accounts which he had received of the universal deluge; some hints of which were handed down into all nations. But as the Greeks were in these times not skilled in writing, so it is easy to imagine, that Deucalion and the deluge might, by tradition, be mentioned together, longer than it could be remembered, whether he only discoursed of it to his people, or was himself a person concerned in it. It is remarkable, that whenever the profane writers give us any particulars of either the flood of Ogyges, or that of Deucalion, they are much the same with what is recorded of Noah's deluge. Solinus and Apollonius hint, that the flood of Ogyges lasted about nine months,' and such a space of time Moses allots to the deluge.' Deucalion is repre sented to have been a just and virtuous man, and for that reason to have been saved from perishing, when the rest of mankind were destroyed for their wickedness; and this agrees with what Moses says of Noah." Deucalion preserved only himself, his wife, and his children; and these were the persons saved by Noah. Deucalion built an ark, being forewarned of r See Prideaux Not. Hist. ad Chron. Marm. Gen. vii. viii. See vol. i. book 1. & 2. 'Lucian. de Dea Syria. Ovid. Metam. lib. 1. "Gen. vi. 5, 9. * Ovid. ub. sup. Lucian in Timone. 'Gen. vii. 7. το the destruction which was coming upon mankind; * and this Moses relates of Noah." The taking two of every kind of the living creatures into the ark; the ark's resting upon a mountain when the waters abated; < the sending a dove out of the ark, to try whether the waters were abated or not; all these circumstances are related of Deucalion, by the heathen writers, almost exactly as Moses remarks them in his account of Noah. Moses relates, that Noah, as soon as the Flood was over, built an altar, and offered sacrifices; so these writers say likewise of Deucalion; affirming that he built to agxaιov legov, or an altar (for these were the most ancient places of worship) to the Olympian Jupiter. Upon the whole, the circumstances related of Noah's Flood, and of Deucalion's, do so far agree, that our learned countryman Sir W. Raleigh professed, that he should verily believe, that the story of Deucalion's flood, was only an imitation of Noah's Flood devised by the Greeks, did not the times so much differ; and St. Augustine, with others of the fathers and reverend writers, approve the story of Deucalion. As to the difference of the times, certainly no great stress can be laid upon it. The Greeks were so inaccurate in their chronology of what happened so early as Deucalion, that it is no wonder if they were imposed C * Apollodorus, lib. 1. Lucian de Deâ Syriâ. * Gen. vi. 13, 14. b Lucian Deâ Syria. Stephanus Etymolog. in Пapvass. Suidas in Voc. ead. Ovid. Metam. lib. 1. Plut. in lib; de solertiâ Animalium. e Pausan. in Atticis. c. 18. upon, and ascribed to his days, things done above seven hundred years before him; and I cannot but think, that St. Austin, and the other learned writers, who have mentioned either the flood of Ogyges or of Deucalion, would have taken both of them to have been only different representations of the deluge; if, besides what has been offered, they had considered, that we read but of one such flood as these having ever happened, in the country either of Deucalion or Ogyges. If the floods called by their names, were not the one universal deluge brought upon the ancient world, for the wickedness of its inhabitants; then they must have proceeded from some causes, which both before and since might, and would in a series of some thousands of years, have subjected these countries to such inundations. But we have no accounts of any that have ever happened here, except these two only, in each country one, and no more; so that it is most probable that in Attica, and in Thessaly, they had a tradition that there had anciently been a deluge. Their want of chronology had rendered the time when extremely uncertain; and some circumstances not duly weighed, or not perfectly understood, determined their writers in after-ages to call this deluge in the one country the flood of Ogyges, in the other the flood of Deucalion. f According to the Parian Chronicon, a person named Mars was tried at Athens for the murder of Halirrothius, the son of Neptune, in the reign of Cranaus the successor of Cecrops, about A. M. 2473. It is f Epoch. 3. remarked, that the place of trial was named Arius Pagus, which was the beginning of the senate or court of Areopagus at Athens, instituted, according to this account, soon after the death of Cecrops, in the very first year of his successor. Eschylus had a very different opinion of the origin of the name and time of erecting this court. He says, the place was named Areopagus from the Amazons offering sacrifices there to Agns, or Mars; and he supposes that Orestes had been the first person tried before the court erected there." But it is evident from Apollodorus," that Cephalus was tried here for the death of Procris, who was the daughter of Erechtheus, the sixth king of Athens.' And the same author says, that Dædalus was also tried here for the death of Talus, and Dædalus lived about the time' of Minos king of Crete. From both these instances it appears, that Eschylus was much mistaken about the antiquity of the court of Areopagus; we may therefore conceive that he was ill informed about the true origin of its name. Cicero hints that Solon first erected this court; and Plutarch was fond of the same opinion," even though he confessed that there were arguments against it, which, I think, must appear unanswerable. For he himself cites a law of Solon, in which the court of Areopagus is expressly named in such a manner as to evidence, that persons Eumenid. v. 690.. i Pausanias in Phocicis, c. 29. k h Lib. 3. p. 200. m De Offic. lib. 1. c. 22. had been convened before it before Solon's days. So, lon, indeed, by his authority, made some alterations in the ancient constitution of this court; both as to the number and quality of the judges in it, and the manner of electing them. All this Aristotle remarks of him expressly, saying at the same time, that So lon neither erected nor dissolved this court, but only gave some new laws for regulating it. Eschylus thought this court more ancient than the times of Solon; but Apollodorus carries up the account of it much higher than Eschylus, to the time of Minos, and to Erechtheus, who reigned about one hundred years after the time when the Marble supposes the trial of Mars; and the trial of Mars there for the death of Halirrothius is reported by many of the best ancient writers. The number of judges in this court at its first origin were twelve,' of whom the king was always one. Their authority was so great, and by their . Plut. in Solon. his words are, o de тpioxidexaтos α wr Το Σόλωνος τον ογδρον έχει τον νόμον όπως αυτοίς ονομασι γεγραμμένον Ατιμων όσοι ατιμοι ησαν πριν η Σολωνα αρξαι, επιτιμές είναι, πλην όσοι εξ Αρειος παγος καταδικασθέντες-Quyor N. B. The party accused in the court of Areopagus had leave to se cure himself by flight, and go into voluntary banishment, if he suspected judgment would be given against him; provided he made use of this liberty before the court entered into the proofs of the merits of his cause; and by Solon's law, a person who claimed this privilege, was to be for ever infamous. P Aristot. Polit. 1, 2, c. 12. 4 Pausan. in Atticis. Stephanus, Suidas, & Phavorinus in Aguas Mayes. Apollodor. 1. 3. p. 193. |