The third argument is, that the Hebrew computation is inconsistent with the co-existence of idolatry and the worship of the true God, in the same family, and within so short a period from the flood. This argument has been partly anticipated; but it receives additional strength from the following considerations. If the short account of the building of Babel, Gen. xii. 1–9, be critically examined, there can be no doubt that this politico-religious project, which was headed by Nimrod, the “_Great Intolerant_ before the Lord,” was the earliest attempt on record to establish the Zabian system of idolatry. For the arguments in favour of this opinion, we must, for brevity’s sake, refer to a work recently published, alike remarkable for the novelty of its views and the Scriptural simplicity of its style, entitled the “Religious History of Man,” by Mr. D. Morison, pp. 157–168. Mr. Clinton sees “nothing wonderful” in the fact that “idolatry should have sprung up during the lives of Noah and Shem;” and he accounts for it on the principles of the fecundity of mankind and their dispersion at the confusion of tongues. It is very strange, however, that Terah, who is mentioned in Joshua xxiv. 2, as the only idolater among the Postdiluvian Patriarchs, should have dared to follow the practices of the Heathen, while all his pious ancestors were yet alive! And, that, as Mr. Cuninghame justly remarks, “the Scriptures should tell us nothing” of the matter, seeing that the sacred historians invariably record such awful apostacies in the families of the righteous, as a warning to all future generations. Idolatry, in fact, sprang up in the family of Ham, in the _third_ generation; but, not in that of Shem, till the _ninth_; shewing that the example and the memory of pious ancestry had the effect of so long retarding the influence of surrounding evil among their descendants. The whole history of the period, indeed, indicates that ages not a few, had elapsed between the flood and the Call of Abraham; and, that during that interval, the remembrance of the judgment of the old world was almost obliterated, the worship of the true God virtually superseded, and the memory of the early Patriarchs practically forgotten. Moreover, the remarkable interposition of Providence in the confusion of tongues and the dispersion of mankind, calculated so deeply to renew in the minds of men the recollection of former judgments, and to put a stop to farther progress in idolatry, appears in the lapse of time to have shared the common oblivion, and to have failed in producing that striking impression which was sure to be felt among contemporaries and their immediate successors. 4. Argument founded on the inconsistency of the accounts of Sacred and Profane History—Remark of Sir Walter Raleigh—Sir Isaac Newton’s objection refuted—Epoch of the Foundation of the kingdom of Egypt.