The Albany register. [volume] (Albany, Or.) 1868-18??, 1870-01-22
The Chinese Empire-Noah Its Founder
and First Monarch.

Noah and his family were once more
on terra .ftrnaa, the wreck and devasta-
tion of the Deluge (B. c. 234s,) passed
in safety, and the assurance given from
on high, that there should be no other
Deluge while the earth remained.
Noah seems, in the first instance at
least, to have taken up his residence in
the vicinity of Mount Ararat, inasmuch
as no notice is taken of his journeying
hither prior to his commencement of hus-
bandry. And this idea is strengthened
by the fact OF the existence of city or
town at the foot Of that mountain at this
very day, denominated s.Place of Des-
cent which city appears, from this
circumstance, to have been founded by
Noah himself. Very little is said of him
| after his re-settlement in the world, al
though he lived three hundred and fifty
years after the Deluge The circum-
stance of his planting vineyard is mem
toned, and also that of his being, on one
occasion, oyercame with wine, and his
denunciation of Canaan for his exposure
of him at the time. In the opinion of
some be spent the remainder of his days
at the place above mentioned but others
suppose that he emigrated thence to
China. We will briefly consider this
subject.
Mankind are represented as journeying
from the East when they found the plain
of Shinar. Now Mount Ararat, in Ar
menia, is nordaerly from Shinar. It fol-
lows, therefore, that the mountain now
denominated Ararat is not the Ararat
near which Noah settled after the De
luge or, that the posterity of Noah
must have wandered in their journeyings
great distance from that place, in order
to bring them to point whence, by jour-
neying eastward, they would reach Shi-
mar Waving, therefore, the censidera-
ton of the question where the real Ara
rat is situated, we are driven to the con-
/ clusion that the great body of mankind
aoere, some time previous to their arrlv-
/ ing at Shinar, eastward of that country.
/ Noah lived till after the period of the
confusion of tongues. Had he accom-
panied his posterity to Shinar, it is NOR
/ ally certain that person OF his emit
nenee, and of his relation to them, must
have figured conspicuously among them.
| But as no mention is made of him In
connection with the journeying from the
I
conclude that he either continued where
he first settled, viz. at the base of Mount
Ararat, or else that he journeyed IN some
other direction with portion of his de-
scendants, while the remainder journeyed
west to Shinar. The latter is the more
probable supposition-
Two hundred and fifty years before
Minus" says Portius Cato, '.the earth
was oyerfiowed with waters, and mankind
began again in Saga Scythia." Saga
Scythia is in the same latitude with Bac-
trla, between the Caspian Sea and Imaus,
north of Mount Paraponisus. Noah
might have continued his journeying to
Saga Scythia, and formed settlement
there. if the ark did not rest in that
quarter at the subsiding Of the waters ;
and hence there is nothing in the forego-
ing fragment of Portius Cato inconsistent
with the idea, that Ararat is ID Armenia.
That he and some of his posterity did
actually separate from the main body is
rendered still further probable by the
Chaidean tradition that after Xisuthrns,
his wife, his daughter, and the pilot had
LEFT the ark, and sacrificed to the gods,
they disappeared, and were seen no
more although the voice of Xisuthrus
could still be distinguished in the mir,
admon1shing those who remained to pay
due respect to the gods, and directing
them to make their way to Babylonia.
Il seems clear that Noah and some of
his posterity separated from the rest. the
former Journeying eastward, the latter
i westward, before the confusion of tongues