Page:The rock of wisdom.djvu/64

 flood were of a gigantic stature in comparison with what men now are, but these here spoken of, are called giants, as being not only tall in stature but violent and savage in their dispositions, and were monsters of cruelty and lust. God who is unchangeable, is not capable of repentance grief or any other passion, but these expressions are used to declare the enormity of the sins of men, which were so provoking as to determine their creator to destroy these his creatures, whom before he had so much favored. The ark according to the dimension here set down contained four hundred and fifty thousand square cubits, which was more than enough to contain all the kinds of the living creatures, with all necessary provision, even supposing the cubits here spoken of to have been only a foot and a half each, which was the least kind; however, it appears that Noah finished the ark, and that the waters descended upon the earth forty days and nights : before there was a secession of water Noah opened one of the windows of the ark and sent forth a raven and it did not return into the ark, but as may be gathered from the Hebrews, went to and fro, sometimes going to the mountains where it found carcases to feed upon, and oilier times returning to rest upon the top of the ark; therefore, in the six and first year of the first month, the first day of the month, the waters were lessoned upon the earth; in the second month the seven and twentieth day of the month, the earth was dried. Noah, by drinking of wine was made drunk and was uncovered in his tent. See Gen. 9 c. 21 v. By the judgments, the fathers were not guilty of sin in being overcome by wine, because they knew not the strength of it. Thus, as St. Gregory takes notice, we ought to cover the nakedness, that is, the sin of our spiritual parents and superiors; the curses as well as the blessings of the patriarchs, were prophetical and this in particular is here recorded by Moses for the children of Israel who were to possess the land of Canaan; but why should Canaan be cursed for his father's fault? the Hebrew answers, that he being then a boy first saw his grandfather's nakedness and told his father Shem of it, and joined with him in laughing at it, which drew upon him, rather than upon the rest of the children of Shem, this prophetical curse, not of beast, but