We acquire, at the same time, another knowledge, which cannot but excite the attention of all persons who have a taste and inclination for polite learning; I mean the manner in which arts and sciences were invented, cultivated, and improved. We there discover, and trace as it were with the eye, their origin and progress; and perceive, with admiration, that the nearer we approach those countries which were once inhabited by the sons of Noah, in the greater perfection we find the arts and sciences; whereas they seem to be either neglected or forgotten, in proportion to the remoteness of nations from them; so that, when men attempted to revive those arts and sciences, they were obliged to go back to the source from whence they originally flowed. I give only a transient view of these objects, though so very important, in this place, because I have already treated them at some length elsewhere.(1) But another object of infinitely greater importance, claims our attention. For although profane history treats only of nations who had imbibed all the absurdities of a superstitious worship; and abandoned themselves to all the irregularities of which human nature, after the fall of the first man, became capable; it nevertheless proclaims universally the greatness of the Almighty, his power, his justice, and above all, the admirable wisdom with which his providence governs the universe. If the inherent conviction of this last truth raised, according to Cicero’s observation,(2) the Romans above all other nations; we may, in like manner, affirm, that nothing gives history a greater superiority to many other branches of literature, than to see in a manner imprinted, in almost every page of it, the precious footsteps and shining proofs of this great truth, _viz._ that God disposes all events as supreme Lord and Sovereign; that he alone determines the fate of kings and the duration of empires; and that he transfers the government of kingdoms from one nation to another, because of the unrighteous dealing and wickedness committed therein.(3) We discover this important truth in going back to the most remote antiquity, and the origin of profane history; I mean, to the dispersion of the posterity of Noah into the several countries of the earth where they settled. Liberty, chance, views of interest, a love for certain countries, and similar motives, were, in outward appearance, the only causes of the different choice which men made in these various migrations. But the Scriptures inform us, that amidst the trouble and confusion that followed the sudden change in the language of Noah’s descendants, God presided invisibly over all their counsels and deliberations; that nothing was transacted but by the Almighty’s appointment; and that he alone guided(4) and settled all mankind, agreeably to the dictates of his mercy and justice: “The Lord scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of the earth.”(5)