A candid perusal of these works must lead to the inevitable conclusion that the name of the _Second Cainan_ ought not to have been rejected from the Sacred Text. It is strange, however, to observe that in our authorized version of the Scriptures, this generation has been excluded from the Old Testament, while it has been admitted into the New. Such a manifest inconsistency should have been avoided in a version intended for public use in all the churches, and sanctioned by royal authority! The Latin Vulgate, published by the “supreme authority” of the Roman Pontiff, is equally liable to the same charge of inconsistency; while Theodore Beza, in his Latin version of the New Testament, has omitted this generation altogether! For this bold step, Beza had no other authority than the “Codex Græcolatinus,” which, from having been in his possession, bears his own name; and which, while reckoned of “little critical value,” is the only manuscript of the New Testament discovered to be deficient in this respect. The _Second Cainan_ is, moreover, found in all the Greek manuscripts of the Old Testament, both in Genesis x. 24, and xi. 13; and, also in many copies, in 1 Chronicles i. 18 and 24,—this chapter being imperfect in the Vatican Codex, but complete in the Codex Alexandrinus. In confirmation of our argument, it is proper to state, that there exists a fragment of a very ancient codex, which lays claim even to a higher antiquity than either of these codices, being described in the words of Usher, “Syntagma de Septuaginta,” cap. ii. p. 18, as “omnium qui uspiam hodie extant vetustissimus,” and known by the name of the “Codex Cottonianus.” Of this codex, unfortunately, a certain portion of Genesis only remains; but it is of immense “critical value,” as it confirms the true readings of the Ante and Post Paidogonian ages of Methuselah, and of the passages relating to the second Cainan. In the collation of this fragment “cum editione Romanâ,” that is, with the Vatican edition, by Dr. Grabe,—posthumously published by Dr. H. Owen,—there are two _fac simile_ engravings of a portion of the manuscript, exhibiting the old, uncial Greek letters, unaccented and unspirited, like the codex Alexandrinus, and (curious to remark) exhibiting also the effigies of four of the Postdiluvian Patriarchs, spoken of in the adjacent text,—one being the very identical personage, whose existence is not recognized by the Masorete and Samaritan texts, and is therefore so stoutly denied by the defenders of the _Hebrew verity_! We copy from the preface, the explanation of one of the pictures, the plates of which were engraven at the expence of the Antiquarian Society of London, in 1744:—“Figurarum Explicatio.—Tabula Prima. Fig. II. Arphaxadus, Semi filius, cum uxore sua et filio Cainane. Gen. xi. 12, 13.”[13]