23 ly fecured and' preferved. So, hereafter, the laff of GOD's Ele& fhall be -happiily received to Glory, either through Death, or a momentary Tranfmutation from Corruptibility and Sin ; before the Almighty will dif folve the prefent Harmony of the Elements, fuffer them to rufh into their primitive Confufion, or commit the polluted World to an all-devouring Flame. Noah was the only Exception to the general Depravity of Senti- ment and Praftice, which had covered the Earth with a worfe Deluge than that of Water ; and undoubtedly, as the great Preacher of Righteoufnefs, he handed down the true Religion to the fucceeding Generation. But GOD permitted, for fome wife Ends beft known to Himfelf, that the falle Religion fhould alfo find an Ad- vocate in one of Noah's immediate Offspring, who mutt have derived his Acquaintance with it from what he had feen before the Flood, in his common Intercourfe with Mankind. So true is it, as a good Man often obferved, that " Grace does not run in the Blood ;" or, as fr'er- tullian remarked in his Time, Fiunt, non nafcuntur Chrif- tiani, People are not born Chriftians, or Believers, but made fuch. This Initrumentof Evil was Ham or Cham. He was a fhamelefs, undutiful Son, and therefore a fit Subje t for Satan to work upon in his great Bùfinefs of pervert- ing the World. Every Body knows, that, for his Im- pudence and his Wickednefs, he received (and doubt- lefs by the Ordinance of GOD) the prophetic Male- dit`tion of his Father: And this, however lightly he thought of the Matter, feems to have entailed both tem- poral Dereli6tion and eternal Wretchednefs upon him. Ham is fuppofed to have planted hmfelf in Elyria or (as Latlantius * rather fuppofes) in llrabia; and it is be- * De orig. error. L. is. e. 13. It is óbfervable, that mofe of the Terms, or Titles, ufed in Idolatry, came from Chaldea and other oriental Parts into Egypt and Greece. From this Circumftance it is na- tural to conclude, that Idolatry, particularly that Species of it ítyled Zabarfm, originated at 1,Ir, or the Regions abounding with Bitumen and Fire, adjacent to Bahylon,andthat the trueReligion wascorrupted there. BRYANT'S Anal. Ant. Myth. Vol. r. p. 208. lieved
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