of a different and more rudimentary and presumably older type; they were, in addition to this, just those races amongst whom we find no recollection of a universal flood, or, at the best, but a borrowed tradition. Are we not, then, justified in supposing that these races were descended from ancestors other than the sons of Noah, and were therefore antediluvian? If so, we have a complete harmony between the deductions of Scripture and the researches of science through the adoption of the theory that the flood was partial, not only in respect to the earth, but also in respect to man. This theory resolves every difficulty, even those which otherwise seem inexplicable. Eusebius of Cæsarea inclined to this view, and St. Jerome speaks of it as being known and discussed in his day.

Let us, then, in conclusion turn again to the Scriptural narrative. We find ourselves placed as we commence Genesis vi. in the presence of an event belonging specially to the country dwelt in by Noah. It was here that the fatal alliances were made by which the God-fearing race of Seth was corrupted, and it was this country and its inhabitants which was overwhelmed; this country alone was necessarily involved in the catastrophe. The only individuals who were able to tell the story of the great judgment of God were Noah and his sons.

May we not, then, read the history from their standpoint as an event which, according to the plan of the Book of Genesis, concerned a fraction only of the human race? Look at the 5th chapter of Genesis. It is with this that Moses passes from the general history of mankind to the special history of the ancestors of the Chosen People, the history of the line of Seth. He omits the secondary branches; he has nothing more to say as to Cain and his race, save to mention the probable part played by it in the corruption of the Sethites. We are thus no longer in the presence of the general history of mankind-only in that of the race of Seth, in the midst of which dwelt Noah and his family. We can hardly suppose that at this time all the human race were still collected together in one single region of the earth; "for more than twenty centuries"—and how many more who shall say? Men had multiplied on the face of the earth, and it is not likely they could have remained stationary. Everything points the other way. Noah, then, has cognizance only of those around his home; whilst the distant members of the human family would, in their far-off dwellings, know nothing of the threatened judgment, nor of the ark. The patriarchal world concerned in this history would be that portion of the race of Seth to which the patriarchs belonged, who were dwelling side by side with a branch of the evil race of Cain. The corrupt influence of the Cainites threatened to ruin those whom God had chosen for the fulfilment of His designs, and therefore the flood was sent. Noah was chosen to preserve the primitive traditions of Redemption, which otherwise would have been lost. He was, it is justly said, the only one who could keep alive the truth of God, and thus be the seed of life in a moral sense, being the ancestor of those great white races to which the world owes all its best civilization and moral goodness.

Moses personally may have had no very precise idea as to the actual scope of the flood. It was not its scientific history he was inspired to write, but its moral history; and he relates the story of the flood as conveyed by tradition, either written or unwritten, derived in the first instance from either Noah or his son Shem, who would have described the course of events from his own standpoint in the ark. To him the world would be bounded by the horizon embraced from his point of view. As he looked forth upon the wide expanse of waters, to him the whole world would have appeared to have been submerged, and he would naturally make use of universal terms. He could not have done otherwise. As far as he could see, extended a waste of water under the whole heaven of his vision, in the midst of which the sole living beings appeared to be those within the ark. Is not this a possible, not to say a probable, account of the flood? If so, it meets every difficulty that has been suggested, and brings about absolute harmony between the sacred narrative and the various deductions from the latest researches, whether in physical, ethnological, or philological science. Day by day, year by year, man's studies are pursued, and advances in knowledge made in all directions; old views and theories are either confirmed or discredited as new light breaks in upon them; but, amidst all changes and shiftings of human opinions, Truth remains victorious. "The word of the Lord endureth for ever."

One other point only remains to be noticed, and that is the objection which some have urged against the restriction of the flood to a portion only of the human race-that this theory is opposed to that doctrine of the faith which holds forth the ark as the type of salvation, a figure of Christ, out of Whom none could be saved. But the hypothesis in question does not affect the symbolism of the ark. Why should not the representatives of a single race be set forth as prefiguring all the nations who should be saved in Christ? Have we not instances of a similar nature? The house of Rahab the harlot represented all nations, which the Church should enfold. It is amongst the little people of Israel, it has been well pointed out, that the prophetic types of the whole Christian world are found. "The brazen serpent, seen but by the Israelites-the means of physical salvation to them alone-was, for all that, the type of the world's salvation. This type did not require that all mankind should be bitten by the serpents, nor even that all the Israelites should have been bitten. To see a single race, a single people, typifying the universal Church is not more astonishing than to see one man, whoever that man may have been-Joseph, Isaac, or Jonah— prefiguring Christ. The universality of the flood as regards man is not necessary to the perfection of the type" (Ch. Robert).

But it has again been argued that, "as baptism is the necessary and indispensable means of justification for all men, that means of salvation. which is according to St. Peter its type, must have been in a similar way the sole means of safety for mankind when the flood came." M. Motais has ably replied to this objection. "We allow," he says, "that the flood was, in the Divine mind, prophetic of baptism." St. Peter's thought appears

to be this. When the flood took place, those few persons who, entering the ark, were saved by water, represent those who shall enter the Church by baptism, and who shall alone be saved by water. There are, as the Fathers have observed, two figures here-the water of the flood (a figure of that of baptism), and the ark (a figure of the Church as well). The water plays a double part in the flood. It destroys some and saves others. It is the water as a saving element that is the type. St. Peter says, simply, "As there were but eight persons saved by the water-the eight who entered the ark— so there now will be saved, by the water of baptism, those only who by it shall enter the Church." Whether the flood was universal or not, we say that only those eight who entered the ark were saved by the water of the flood. St. Peter does not say that the only ones saved in the world were those who were in the ark. He says that those only who were saved by water were those who entered the ark-an absolute truth, independent of the scope of the flood. The water is a figure only so far as it was a means of safety. Under this aspect only it prefigured baptism; but those who we suppose were saved from the flood because its waters never reached them, would these have been saved by water? No; they would have been saved from the water-a very different thing. St. Peter, then, does not even say that when the flood came there were none saved by the water, except the eight in the ark, but only that the ark saved eight.

Suppose that it were actually stated in Scripture that the flood was of a very limited character, why should not God have used it as an image of a general Christian fact? The Paschal lamb was only eaten by the Jews, yet it was a type of that Eucharist to which all the world is called, as it is also to the waters of baptism. There is, then, nothing in Scripture which forbids our considering the flood to have destroyed a portion only of the human race, others, besides Noah and his family, having been spared. (Cf. M. Motais, Le deluge biblique.)

Rationalists, it is observed, in the name of science tell us that the story of the flood is a myth, an idle legend. Why? Because the old interpretation of the Scripture narrative is, they say, opposed to the teachings of all modern scientific discovery. But what if the old interpretation is wrong? What if the Bible story bears a different meaning? What if the hypothesis we have maintained, limiting the scope of the flood, is correct? Then surely the very ground is cut from beneath the feet of the objectors, and once again we say truth is victorious. "The word of the Lord endureth for ever."

MR. MOULTON'S ZOROASTER AND ISRAEL.

BY REV. DR. L. H. MILLS, HON. M.A., Oxford.

lr is with no small gratification that I welcome at last an article on Zoroaster by one who has made Zend a special study. Nothing could be fairer or more useful than Mr. Moulton's essay on the whole, and I

must express my indebtedness to him for it. There are, however, not unnaturally, some particulars as to which he has made oversights, as all others do; or perhaps it is better to say that he has inade regrettable omissions through haste.

Referring to the former division in the schools of Zend philology, Mr. Moulton makes what I think is an exaggerated statement when he says that the only continuous translations of the "whole Avesta belong to the traditional school, either wholly or with a very marked bias, even while using the other method." But what has become of Haug, whom Mr. Moulton does not mention? Haug did not translate the whole of the Avesta; but he gave us a very energetic (if now antiquated) treatment of the Gâthas, with an elaborate commentary (some 500 or 600 pages); and as the Gathas are by far the most important part of the Avesta, his work, with commentary, was fully equivalent to a continuous translation of a much larger portion of the whole. But Haug was the most prominent representative of that old (and non-) comparative school. Then, Hübschmann is placed by Mr. Moulton on the wrong side-if there is any side remaining, which there is not. I fear I must call Mr. Moulton's remarks in this direction almost, if not quite, out of date. There is no longer any defined distinction between schools, I am happy to say, although there is between cliques, which I am sorry to say; and there are extremists at both poles. There was once, however, a chasm, and one deep enough to cause disaster. Haug scarcely cited a Pahlavi word in his elaborate work; and no one anywhere will be in the least degree offended when I state that it is evident that he had no knowledge at the time of the Pahlavi language. He even treated Neryosangh practically as if he were an original expositor. That was the old school that compared only the Sanskrit language. This treatment continued, as Mr. Moulton knows, in some valuable but smaller works where no Pahlavi is cited, till about 1885, when the two "schools" began slowly to merge into one. As to the expression "comparative," we did not use it in Germany-that is to say, not before five years ago. Such a term would not have suggested itself there in this connection. It was French usage, however, and I suppose still continues to be. There is no serious student in Zend philology, as Mr. Moulton well knows-nor has there been one since the days of Burnouf - who denies the quasi-identity of Zend and Vedic etymology and grammar. I have myself even written out my translation of the Gâthas into Vedic Sanskrit almost to their full extent;1 while every word has been approximately translated by me into that language over and over again (so with all Zend specialists, as I suppose, without exception). Where, however, I really differ from Mr. Moulton, and where I must say that he is more seriously behind the times, is in speaking of the "ascertained" meaning of the equivalent Sanskrit. What is more "ascertained" in Vedic Sanskrit than in Gâthic? We are rolling the subject over and over every

1 I may ultimately publish this translation, as it is a very great convenience to have the Sanskrit forms before the eye.

decade. And as to a comparison of definitions restricted to Sanskrit, we must not forget that the dearest principle to a modern critic is to snub etymology.

"Etymologizing" is laughed at in Germany as in France, notably by Darmesteter. To expect the same words always to mean the same things even in the same language is contrary to modern methods. How, then, can we expect the old Iranian Aryan and the old Indian Aryan terms to be identical in meanings? Look at the immense difference in the meanings of identical words in the Vedic and the Classic Sanskrit (see the Sacred Books of the East, xxxi.; Introduction, p. xlvi). All the more suggestive writers now vie with each other in catching meanings from every imaginable analogy, and it is this which has destroyed the old and so-called comparative (better the non-comparative) school; and Mr. Moulton will find that the gentleman whom he especially commends as a representative of the "comparative " school will repudiate entirely in the future all exclusion of hints from tradition, just as all others now repudiate such neglect. As the scholar chosen by Darmesteter and Max Müller to treat the Gâthas in the Sacred Books of the East, I may be pardoned for hoping that my own efforts have helped to bring on this happy union of the once opposing parties. My Gâthas presented the Pahlavi texts as for the first edited with the collation of MSS., for the first deciphered (which is the crux), and for the first translated in their entirety into an European language, while Neryosangh and the Persian text were added. Humble as the work may have been, it was the first attempt ever made anywhere to discuss the Gâthas with their ancient commentaries exhaustively, but this did not make me a traditionalist. My texts were tentatively printed to four-fifths of their extent so early as 1882, when they were eagerly requested of me by the first writers then existing in Germany, France, and elsewhere.

Forced by circumstances to place them in the hands of a great authority, I was openly thanked for them by him at the most important lectures then delivered in Germany; and it would be casting a slur upon the written acknowledgments of this eminent friend if I should affect to deny that my unworthy book, widely distributed in its unfinished condition and without its commentary, has yet had some influence in bringing about the desired change.1

Here I diverge for a moment from the immediate purpose before me to notice, at the request of Professor Cheyne, what Mr. Moulton advances as to the obscurities of the Gâthas. Mr. Moulton, with others who, unlike him, have made no beginning in Zend philology, overlooks the fact that the obscurities in the Gâthas very seldom indeed affect the nature of their theological conclusions. They do so indeed in one, and in more than one place, but that is not "often." As to the one important passage, I am indeed much gratified that Mr. Moulton agrees with me in utterly repudiating the suggestion of the Pahlavi commentator, which was followed in this instance by a writer in the Zeitschrift D.M.G.,

1 A new version of it to the extent of 410 pages out of 650 is now in the binder's hands, and will be on sale, and to be had of Brockhaus, by the time that this is read.