We have no difficulty in arriving at a conclusion that considerable progress had been made in the art of government, in the political and social world, in the arts and sciences, and also in the moral and religious departments of life. As to whatever myths and fables they had, of their origin we know very little, or I may say nothing. The story of the creation and the deluge is in all probability native to the soil. The deluge was in all likelihood a local affair--an overflow of the river Euphrates or the Gulf of Persia. Whether it rained forty days and nights or more, water enough could not fall to the ground to do any serious damage, beyond the locality where it occurred. It would be not amiss even for the most pious, God-fearing man to understand that the rainwater that falls to the surface of the earth was originally taken from the waters that are found on the surface of the earth. The actual quantity of water on the earth was no more after the flood, or after any flood, than before. The water changes position from one locality to another; it does not increase or diminish in quantity, whether it consolidates, evaporates, or liquefies. Whatever elementary form it may assume, the law of gravitation holds its elements down to mother earth. The idea entertained by many theologians, that the whole earth was covered with water, is absurd. We have not water enough on the surface of this earth to serve any such purpose. This problem is just as feasible as trying to drown a man in two inches of water--attempting to cover the entire earth with the water that is upon it. From historical evidence we gather that the people that inhabited this region occupied their time chiefly with raising cattle, and were prone both to the observation of nature and to superstition. The nervous system had at this time undergone considerable training and culture. Their faculties were already developed. They discussed and reasoned about current subjects, especially about those subjects which were nearest and dearest to them--religion and politics. And we are still discussing the same subjects with as much eagerness, acrimony, and hate as these Chaldean shepherds did. They were adorers of nature, which was perfectly in harmony with their occupation. The beauties, the phases, the phenomena of nature, these they could not explain. Ignorant of their character and composition, not understanding the natural, they reasoned themselves into conclusions that there must be a power beyond that sets all these things in motion. They knew nothing of God. In all probability they created nothing new, but may have modified whatever was handed down to them by their fore-fathers--notions, customs, well-outlined rules of conduct, observances, policy, government, etc.