1. FIRST, let us note its _moral cause_――the reason why God swept off the living from the face of the earth by a deluge of waters.――――It was essential to the moral results which God sought that this reason should be given very definitely. So we find it given (Gen. 6: 5–13): “God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thought of his heart was only evil continually.” “The earth was corrupt before God; and the earth was filled with violence.” These points are reiterated in most distinct and emphatic terms, showing that, outside of the household of Noah, the whole living race had deeply apostatized from God and were boldly and even defiantly irreligious. Eliphaz in Job (22: 15–17) gives the tradition current in his time, thus: “Who said unto God, ‘Depart from us,’ and, ‘What can the Almighty do for them’”――_i. e._ for Noah and his godly associates? Despite the words of Noah who bore to them God’s awful forewarnings and preached the righteousness of repentance, they pressed on in their sins unmoved and reckless――“till mercy reached its bound and turned to vengeance there”! It was a whole generation hopelessly corrupt, daring the Almighty to make good his awful words of warning! The result is on record that all sinners of every age, tempted to like hardihood and defiance of God, may study it with profound consideration. 2. The _antecedent occasions_ of this deep apostasy from God as given in the narrative, next demand our attention. They are (1.) _The pious families intermarry with the godless._―――― (2.) _The Spirit of God, persistently resisted, is withdrawn._ (1.) “The sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair, and they took them wives of all which they chose.” The “sons of God” were his professed children of the godly race of Seth, Enos and Enoch. The “daughters of men” were of the Cainites, cultured probably in music (Gen. 4: 21); attractive in person, fascinating in manners――but alas, all corrupt in heart as toward God!――――The Jews have a tradition that these “sons of God” were fallen angels, once first-born sons of God, who by intermarriage with man’s fair daughters, intensified this fearful corruption of the race. This tradition we must reject for the following as well as other reasons: (a.) Nothing is said here about angels. The record gives us no word which legitimately designates angels――least of all, the fallen angels. (b.) According to the Scriptures, angels “neither marry nor are given in marriage.” The tradition is therefore not only _without_ Scripture authority but _against_ it.