Origen

“ Why should we not rather admire a structure which resembled an extensive city, if its measurements be taken to mean what they are capable of meaning, [4] so that it was nine myriads of cubits long in the base, and two thousand five hundred in breadth? [5] And why should we not admire the design evinced in having it so compactly built, and rendered capable of sustaining a tempest which caused a deluge? ”

“ And is it not a subject of admiration, that by the providential arrangement of God, the elements of all the races were brought into it, that the earth might receive again the seeds of all living things, while God made use of a most righteous man to be the progenitor of those who were to be born after the deluge? ”