daughter of Eli, he gives nineteen generationsin all seventy-four to Mary the mother of Jesus. Jesus is, then, the seventy-fifth in a direct line from God through Adam the first terrestrial son of God; provided only, that in transferring. the issue of second marriages by those who tock the wives of deceased brothers, according to the law of Moses, transcribers have not sometimes confounded the legal with the natural progenitors, and have made the chain some three or four links longer than the actual number of true and proper ancestors. To say that this has never happened, would be rather a marvellous affair; and yet there is no clear and authentic evidence that it has.

How curious and interesting the contemplation of the ancestry of our Lord! Of earth's ancestorial lines his is the only one faithfully preserved through the long series of four thousand years, and whose particular character in all its prominent elements may still be ascertained. Amongst his progenitors are found some of almost every cast, condition, and character of human kind. Before the flood there are Seth, Enoch, and Noah, the most renowned of all the antediluvians; Methuselah, the oldest of mankind; and Lamech, the Prophet. After the flood Shem takes the precedence of all mankind, the high priest of the New World, the oracle of twelve postdiluvian generations, with whom he conversed face to face, as well as with Methuselah, Lamech, and Noah, before the flood. Then we have Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, the most illustrious three princes of our race; their renowned descendants Boaz, Jesse, David, Solomon, Asa, Jehoshaphat, Hezekiah, Joisah, Zerubbabel,

are amongst earth's noblest princes. But amongst his ancestors were all the mixtures of our race, in all senses of the word. Phares, of incestuous birth; Ruth, of Moabitish blood; Solomon, from the adulterous Bathsheba; Rehoboam, from Naamah, of Ammonitish extraction; and by the wives of Israelitish kings, some of whose offspring intermarried with the kings of Judah, he partook of almost all the varieties of race and nation in the Asiatic world. We also find some of the worst of mankind as well as of the best in his family. There is Rehoboam, Abijah, Amaziah, Manasseh, and the monstrous Athaliah, who, but for a singular providence, would by one fell effort have annihilated the whole seed royal of David, but for the apparently accidental interference of a king's daughter and a priest's wife. Tell me who was this, William ?

William. I suppose you allude to Joash, then an infant seized by the daughter of Jehoram, called Jehoshabeth, and the solitary remnant of David's progeny in that line and by her hid for six years, in the house of the Lord.

Olympas. The moral of the whole matter of the genealogical tables and roll of Christ's lineage is, that he partook with the sons of men in every sense of the word. He was of noble and ignoble blood, as respected family, nation, and character; but he ennobled humanity by assuming it into such intimate union with the Divinity, and that too under all the conditions of poverty, imbecility, and degradation, to which it had been most justly subjected because of its apostacy from God.

A few questions on the chronology of the world relative to the age of the Messiah: How do you make it out, Reuben, down to Abraham's time

Reuben. The birth and age of the Patriarchs from Adam to Noah, make the world 1656 years old at the flood; and the postdiluvian register places Abraham's birth in the year 2008. When he was called out of Ur of Chaldea he was seventyfive years old, at which time the covenant confirmed of God concerning the Messiah was given to him. That covenant, Paul says, was just four hundred and thirty years before the giving of the law; which sums of seventy-five and four hundred and thirty, or five hundred and five added to 2008, makes the world 2513 years old at the giving of the law. Forty years after the law they entered Canaan; that was in the year of the world 2553. They were under Judges four hundred and fifty years. Saul and David reigned each forty years: and that makes the world 3083 years old, when David died. Thence to the seventh of Artaxerxes it was four hundred and seventy years; and thence to Messiah's birth, four hundred and fifty-sevenin all, four thousand years.

Olympas. I cannot question you farther on this subject at present; but we shall hear you again on this chronology. Thomas, does the Septuagint age of the world coincide with the Jews' Bible and our common text?

Thomas. No, sir. According to the Greek version of the Seventy the world was 5872 years old when Jesus Christ was born, and is now 7719 years old.

William. And the Samaritan age of the world at Christ's birth was 4700, making the world now 6546 years old.

Eliza. How comes it to pass that the Septuagint differs so much from the Hebrew 2

Olympas. From the creation to the flood the Septuagint gives two thousand nine hundred and sixty-two years, and from the flood to Abraham's birth, ten hundred and seventy-two. These two discrepancies make a great difference. Indeed, the matter is not susceptible of a full and satisfactory development so far as we have yet seen. The Protestants take the Hebrew text, according to which we make the interval from the first to the second Adam four thousand years only. Repeat, William, the six ages of the world, of which I have sometimes spoken to you.

William. 1st. From Adam to the deluge, 1556. 2nd. From the deluge to Abraham's entrance into Canaan, four hundred and twenty-seven years, 2083.

3rd. From Abraham's induction to the Pro'mised Land to the Exodus, four hundred and thirty years, 2513.

4th. From the Exodus to the founding of the Temple, four hundred and eighty years, 2993. 5th. From the foundation of the Temple to the Babylonish captivity, four hundred and twentyfour years, A. M. 3416.

6th. Thence to the birth of Christ, five hundred and eighty-four years, 4000.

Olympas. We must reserve something on chronology for another lesson. Meanwhile, as time had a beginning it must have an end; and that is infinitely more interesting to us than its commencement.

CONVERSATION XXVIII.

Thomas. I have been thinking much upon the nge of the world since our last meeting. Having to choose amongst three I am at a loss to decide. According to the Septuagint it is now seven thousand seven hundred and fourteen years old. According to the Samaritan it is six thousand five hundred and forty-two. According to the Hebrew, five thousand eight hundred and forty-six.

Reuben. And I am as much perplexed with the common era as you are with the three; for according to the common Bible, I can only make the world three thousand nine hundred and fortysix years old at the Christian era.

Olympas. Let us have your date.

Reuben. Abraham was born in 2008, called in 2088; thence to the law, four hundred and thirty; thence to the building of the temple, four hundred and eighty; thence to the captivity, four hundred and twenty-six; captivity, seventy; thence to the Messiah, four hundred and fifty-seven-in all, three thousand nine hundred and forty-six. I find from 1 Kings vi. 1, the temple was builded in the four hundred and eightieth year from the exodus from Egypt. And we are certain that the exodus was, according to our common Bible, in the year 2513. To which add four hundred and eighty, and we have 2993, to the fourth year king Solomon. Now all the reigns from the fourth of Solomon to the Captivity are as follows:

of

-Solomon thirty-six; Rehoboam, seventeen;