EARLIEST PEOPLE.

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congregated together, it may be pronounced all butcertain, that some degree of refinement, and a regardfor learning, had been arrived at by the antediluvian■world, particularly so when the general belief of theMosaic account gives a period of 2000 years durationto the earth prior to the deluge.

Of the mode adopted in the earliest times totransmit to after generations the records of the pre-ceding ones, an impenetrable darkness hangs around;and in attempting any description, conjecture alonecan be the foundation. And if this uncertainty as tothe very existence of their records is the case, howmuch more difficult becomes the path by which wecan draw any conclusion as to the material of whichthey were composed, or of the manner of preservingthem. That the antediluvians did arrive at a con-siderable degree of proficiency in many of the arts,has been shown, and we may fairly conclude thatsome method had been invented, by which thethoughts and opinions of the learned might be com-municated in some more durable manner than oraltestimony. But nothing exists to prove this to beso; we, therefore, are left to draw the inference, fromwhat has been transmitted relative to later times,that a similar mode had been adopted, and progres-sion made, in periods anterior to them. Taking thisas our guide, and allowing that there is much on thesubject we must be content to remain ignorant of,it will be necessary to ascertain what has reached usrelative to the materials on, and form in, whichb 2