While _Noah_ was thus employ'd he was safe, the _Devil_ himself could no where break in upon him; and we may suppose very reasonably, as he found the old Father invulnerable, he left him for some Years, watching notwithstanding all possible Advantages against his Sons and their Children; for now the Family began to encrease, and _Noah_'s Sons had several Children; whether himself had any more Children after the Flood or not, that we are not arriv'd to any Certainty about. Among his Sons the _Devil_ found _Japhet_ and _Shem_, good, pious, religious, and very devout Persons; serving God daily, after the Example of their good old Father _Noah_, and he could make nothing of them or of any of their Posterity; but _Ham_ the second, or according to some, the younger Son of _Noah_, had a Son who was nam'd _Canaan_, a loose young profligate Fellow, his Education was probably but cursory and superficial, his Father _Ham_ not being near so religious and serious a Man as his Brothers _Shem_ and _Japhet_ were; and as _Canaan_'s Education was defective, so he prov'd, as untaught Youth generally do, a wild, and in short a very wicked Fellow, and consequently a fit Tool for the _Devil_ to go to work with. _Noah_, a diligent industrious Man, being with all his Family thus planted in the rich fruitful Plains of _Armenia_, or wherever you please, let it be near the Mountains of _Caucasus_ or _Arrarat_; went immediately to work, cultivating and improving the Soil, encreasing his Cattle and Pastures, sowing Corn, and among other Things planting Trees for Food, and among the Fruit Trees he planted Vines, of the Grapes thereof he made no doubt, as they still in the same Country do make, most excellent Wine, rich, luscious, strong, and pleasant. I cannot come into the Notion of our Criticks, who to excuse _Noah_ from the guilt of what followed, or at least from the Censure, tell us, he knew not the Strength or the Nature of Wine, but that gathering the heavy Clusters of the Grapes, and their own weight crushing out their balmy Juices into his Hand, he tasted the tempting Liquor, and that the _Devil_ assisting he was charm'd with the delicious Fragrance, and tasted again and again, pressing it out into a Bowl or Dish, that he might take a larger Quantity; till at length the heady Froth ascended and seizing his Brain, he became intoxicate and drunk, not in the least imagining there was any such Strength in the Juice of that excellent Fruit. But to make out this Story, which is indeed very favourable for _Noah_, but in it self extremely ridiculous, you must necessarily fall into some Absurdities, and beg the Question most egregiously in some particular Cases, which way of arguing will by no means suppose what is suggested; at first you must support there was no such Thing as Wine made before the Deluge, and that no Body had been ever made drunk with the Juice of the Grape before _Noah_, which, I say, is begging the Question in the grossest Manner.