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26.

Line only, which contains the Genealogy of our Saviour CHRIST.

But Seth took care to cultivate and spread the true Worship of God; and with that

Succefs, that foon after the Birth of his Gen. iv. Son Enos, Men began to call upon the name of the LORD: The Knowledge of Religion increas'd and was extended, in proportion as his Defcendants were multiplied. To the Cognizance and Observation of this particular Branch of Mankind therefore, the Scripture chiefly confines itfelf; as of those to whom God would, occafionally, make extraordinary Discoveries of Himfelf; and, out of them, in the fulness of time, manifeft Himself in the flesh. From this Root sprung the First of the Four Generations abovemention'd; confifting of these nine principal or Patriarchal Perfons; Seth, Enos, Cainan, Mahalaleel, Jared, Enoch, Methuselah, Lamech, and Noah. In the Days of the laft of which it was, that the righteous Progeny of Seth, called in Gen. vi. Scripture the fons of God, went in unto the daughters of men, took them Wives from athe Defcendants of Cain; Men, by that time, having begun to multiply on the face of the earth.

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From these licentious and improper Marriages, there speedily enfued fo great a Decay of Piety, and the whole Earth grew to be fo generally deprav'd, and abandon'd to all manner of Wickedness, that God thought proper, at once, to put an End to their finful Courfes and their Lives; by destroying them by a Deluge of Waters. Only Noah, who was a righteous Man, and upon that Account spar'd with all his Family, efcap'd in the Ark; which he built for that Purpose, by God's fpecial Direction,

Of the three Sons of Noah, Shem, Ham, and Japheth, fome Part of the Defcendants of Shem only, continued to worship the true God; thofe of Ham and Japheth totally revolting from Him. And therefore, of this fecond Generation, the Scripture takes account of no more than thefe, Shem, Arphaxad, Salah, Eber, Peleg, Reu, Serug, Nabor, Terah.

It is here mention'd once for all, That many of the proper Names are fpelt differently in different Places of Scripture, from the different Languages, or Dialect, in which they were wrote.

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SECT. II.

Whence called HEBREW S.

FROM Eber or Heber, one of the Generation last mention'd, this People began to have the Name of Hebrews. For the Ark, as the Deluge abated, having refted upon the Mountains of Ararat, or Armenia, Noah and his three Sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth, dwelt in the East, as they call'd it; being that Country which lies on this fide the River Tigris, and was afterwards, for the most part, known by the Name of Affyria. There are Critics who moreover conclude, that the whole Family of Arphaxad obtain'd the Name of Hebrews, from their going to fettle in Chaldaa, which was on the other fide of the River; Heber, in their Tongue, fignifying beyond or over. And for this Reason, it is Gen. x. thought that Shem is faid to be the father of all the children of Heber; that is, of all those that went on the other fide of the River.

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After this, the Defcendants of Ham and Japheth, finding it convenient also to

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change their Quarters, came into Chaldæa, in the Days of Heber the Grandson of Arphaxad, and took up their Habitation in the Plains of Shinar. These, at the Inftigation of Nimrod, Grandfon of Ham, who was a mighty one in the earth, and ambitious of fecuring to himself a great Name with After-ages, attempted to build a city and tower whofe top might reach unto heaven. Until that Time, the whole Earth had continued to use the fame Language which they had deriv'd from Adam: When God, offended at their prefumptuous Attempt, thought proper to put a Stop to their fenfeless unreasonable Project, by confounding their language, that they might not understand one another's speech. Hence the Tower was call'd Babel, which fignifies Confufion; and, from that, both the City, and Country round about it, took * their Names.

But the Sons of Heber, not concurring with the reft in their audacious Defign, retain'd the ancient Language which, from the Time of Shem, had been in ufe among

Babylon, Babylonia.

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his Pofterity. And it is very probable that the Hebrews deriv'd their Name from this Heber, fince Abraham, who was but the fixth from him, was call'd Abraham the Gen. xiv. Hebrew, when he dwelt in the Plain of Mamre. Upon the Confufion of Tongues, a Dispersion of Families naturally enfu'd; and the rest of them being scatter'd abroad upon the Face of all the Earth, the Family of Heber ftill continued in Chaldæa and the Eaft; while the Pofterity of Japheth took Poffeffion of the Weft; and that of Ham fat down in the intermediate Country, that lay between the other two.

And here the Sons of Heber continued to live, in Ur, a City of the Chaldees, untill the Time of Terah, the last of this fecond Generation. When Terah, taking with him Abraham his Son, and Lot his Grandfon (by another Son nam'd Haran) and Sarah his Daughter-in-law, his Son Abraham's Wife, remov'd out of Chaldæa, with an Intent of going to fettle in the Land of Canaan; but, inftead of that, took up his Residence at Haran in the Country of Mefopotamia, lying between the Rivers Tigris and Euphrates; and there dwelt the Remainder of his Days.

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