more.

founded, if duly confidered, will fuggeft any fuch thing. The text fhall be quoted once "All thefe [kings] were joined together in the vale of Siddim, which is the falt fea."-The facred writer is relating a piece of ancient history. At the time the hiftory refers to, ma ny places were called by different names from what they were in after times. And left his readers fhould be in doubt what particular places were intended by thofe obfolete names, he informs them by what appellations they were Thus, in this fame xiv.

called in his own time.

chapter of Genefis, he tells us, that En-mishpat is the fame with Kadesh; and that the ancient name of Zoar was Bela. So by Siddim, he acquaints us, is to be understood that collection. of waters, which in after times went by the name of the falt fea. This I take to be the true import of the text. So that the vale of Siddim means nothing more or less, than the vale of the falt fea or lake of Sodom. The vale was denominated from the name of the fea, juft as the plain on each fide of Jordan was, from the name of that river, called the plain of fordan. Thus, for aught appears from the facred history, the

fea or lake of Sodom may have existed even from the creation.

Having now taken proper notice of that opinion refpecting the overthrow of Sodom and Gomorrah, which, however generally received, I can by no means efteem defenfible; I proceed to show what I apprehend was the true state, to which these abandoned cities were reduced, as a mark of the divine difpleasure against the unnatural vices of their inhabitants.

The angels, commiffioned to effect their overthrow, firft inform Abraham, "the friend of God," of the defign of their miffion. Abraham sojourned,* at that time, in the plains of Mamre, which are in Hebron, a country about twenty-two miles fouth of Jerufalem. The country about Hebron is mountainous, and is generally supposed to be the fame with what is called in the New-Teftament "the hill-country of Judea." The Patriarch having entertained these divine strangers, with his ufual hofpitality, conducts them on their way towards Sodom, probably as far as fome lofty eminence, whence he could point them to the city itfelf. The an

*Gen. xviii. 1-21. 1 Josh. xx. 7. Luke i. 65.

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gels arrive at Sodom in the evening of the fame day. Abraham is anxious to know the iffue. Early the next morning* he betakes himself to the fame eminence, whither he had conducted the angels. Thence " he looked toward Sodom," or more literally, "took a view over the "face of Sodom and Gomorrah, and over all "the face of land of the plain ;" which expreffions, by the way, feem to import, that those places were within fight: "And he beheld, "and lo, the smoke of the country went up as "the fmcke of a furnace." This was the dif tant profpect Abraham had of that terrible overthrow. He difcovered nothing but the effects of fire. Lot had a nearer view. By him probably the following account was given. As foon as Lot had entered Zoar, which, though à city on the fame plain, and in the neighbourhood of Sodom, was, at the interceffion of " that

righteous man" faved from the common ruin; "The Lord rained upon Sodom and Gomorrah "brimftone and fire from the Lord out of hea "ven. And he overthrew those cities, and all

the plain, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and that which grew upon the ground."

* Gen. xix. 17, 28.

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Neither here can, I difcover any traces of the plain finking, or of a deluge of waters over-t spreading it. The word () here rendered to overthrow, cannot by itself convey fuch an idea. This is evident from the use of the word in other places; a few of which fhall now be quoted. The first is in the twelfth chapter of Job, verse 15th. "Behold he withholdeth the

waters, and they dry up: alfo he fendeth "them out, and they overturn the earth." There is another paffage, fomewhat fimilar to this, in the 14th Pfalm." Tremble, thou "earth, at the prefence of the Lord,-who "turned the rock into a standing water, the flint "into a fountain of waters." In the former text, the kind of overthrow the earth underwent is determined folely by the caufe, which was water. The general deluge is therefore probably intended by it. In like manner, the fpecies of tranfmutation the rock and flint paffed through, mentioned in the latter paffage, is afcertained by the exprefs naming of their after qualities, being thofe of a pool and fountain. But that the idea of liquefaction, or of deluging, is not fignified by the word, without fome fuch concomitant circumftances, as we have seen in

the two paffages quoted above, is plain from this, that it is ufed to denote a directly oppofite change; as in Pfal. xxxii,4. “My moisture is turned into the drought of fummer." In short, the word, when applied to a country, a city, or the like, fignifies to overthrow, overturn, demolish and destroy. I thall content myself with pros ducing but one proof of it at prefent. It is in the tenth chapter and third verfe of the second book of Samuel. Upon the demife of the king of the Children of Ammon, to whom David was under obligations of gratitude, David fent a number of his court to prefent his compliments of condolence to Hanun, the fon and fucceffor of the late king. The Ammonitish princes, fulpecting the Ambaffadors of hoftile intentions, addrefs themselves thus to their fovereign "Hath not David fent his fervants unto thee, to fearch the city, and to fpy it out, and to overthrow it ?" It would be a wild fuppofition, that the Ammonites apprehended David had an intention to deluge their royal city. That he had fent thefe ambaffadors, under the pretext of friendship, to reconnoiter the city, and dif cover how he might most easily batter down the * See Judges vii. 13.