265-1Haeser,Geschichte der Medicin, pp. 4, 7: Jena, 1845.265-2Schoolcraft,Ind. Tribes, v. p. 440.267-1Carver,Travels in North America, p. 73: Boston, 1802;Narrative of John Tanner, p. 135.267-2Sahagun,Hist. de la Nueva España, lib. x. cap. 20;Le Livre Sacré des Quichés, p. 177;Lett. sur les Superstit. du Pérou, pp. 89, 91.269-1Life of Black Hawk, p. 13.270-1Travs. in North America, p. 74.270-2Journal Historique, p. 362.271-1Sometimes facts like this can be explained by the quickness of perception acquired by constant exposure to danger. The mind takes cognizance unconsciously of trifling incidents, the sum of which leads it to a conviction which the individual regards almost as an inspiration. This is the explanation ofpresentiments. But this does not apply to cases like that of Swedenborg, who described a conflagration going on at Stockholm, when he was at Gottenberg, three hundred miles away. Psychologists who scorn any method of studying the mind but through physiology, are at a loss in such cases, and take refuge in refusing them credence. Theologians call them inspirations either of devils or angels, as they happen to agree or disagree in religious views with the person experiencing them. True science reserves its opinion until further observation enlightens it.272-1Schoolcraft,Indian Tribes, iii. p. 287; v. p. 652.273-1“The progress from deepest ignorance to highest enlightenment,” remarks Herbert Spencer in hisSocial Statics, “is a progress from entire unconsciousness of law, to the conviction that law is universal and inevitable.”273-2The Creeks had, according to Hawkins, not less than seven sacred plants; chief of them were the cassine yupon, called by botanistsIlex vomitoria, orIlex cassina, of the natural order Aquifoliaceæ; and the blue flag,Iris versicolor, natural order Iridaceæ. The former is a powerful diuretic and mild emetic, and grows only near the sea. The latter is an active emeto-cathartic, and is abundant on swampy grounds throughout the Southern States. From it was formed the celebrated “black drink,” with which they opened their councils, and which served them in place of spirits.274-1Martius,Von dem Rechtzustande unter den Ureinwohnern Brasiliens, p. 32.275-1Mr. Anderson, in theAm. Hist. Mag., vii. p. 79.276-1Such spectacles were nothing uncommon. They are frequently mentioned in the Jesuit Relations, and they were the chief obstacles to missionary labor. In the debauches and excesses that excited these temporary manias, in the recklessness of life and property they fostered, and in their disastrous effects on mind and body, are depicted more than in any other one trait the thorough depravity of the race and its tendency to ruin. In the quaint words of one of the Catholic fathers, “If the old proverb is true that every man has a grain of madness in his composition, it must be confessed that this is a people where each has at least half an ounce” (De Quen,Rel. de la Nouv. France, 1656, p. 27). For the instance in the text seeRel. de la Nouv. France, An 1639, pp. 88-94.277-1Schoolcraft,Indian Tribes, v. p. 423.277-2J. M. Stanley, in theSmithsonian Miscellaneous Contributions, ii. p. 38.278-1D’Orbigny,L’Homme Américain, ii. p. 81.279-1See Balboa,Hist. du Pérou, pp. 28-30.281-1D’Orbigny,L’Homme Américain, ii. p. 235.281-2Schoolcraft,Ind. Tribes, v. p. 652.281-3Dr. Mac Gowan, in theAmer. Hist. Mag., x. p. 139; Whipple,Rep. on the Ind. Tribes, p. 35.283-1Hist. des Incas, lib. iii. ch. 22.283-2Travels in the Carolinas, p. 504.284-1Hist. du Pérou, p. 128;Voiages aux Indes Occidentales, ii. p. 97.284-2Beverly,Hist. de la Virginie, p. 266. The dialect he specifies is “celle d’Occaniches,” and on page 252 he says, “On dit que la langue universelle des Indiens de ces Quartiers est celle desOccaniches, quoiqu’ils ne soient qu’une petite Nation, depuis que les Anglois connoissent ce Pais; mais je ne sais pas la difference qui’l y a entre cette langue et celle des Algonkins.” (French trans., Orleans, 1707.) This is undoubtedly the same people that Johannes Lederer, a German traveller, visited in 1670, and callsAkenatzi. They dwelt on an island, in a branch of the Chowan River, the Sapona, or Deep River (Lederer’sDiscovery of North America, in Harris, Voyages, p. 20). Thirty years later the English surveyor, Lawson, found them in the same spot, and speaks of them as theAcanechos(seeAm. Hist. Mag., i. p. 163). Their totem was that of the serpent, and their name is not altogether unlike the Tuscarora name of this animalusquauhne. As the serpent was so widely a sacred animal, this gives Beverly’s remarks an unusual significance. It by no means follows from this name that they were of Iroquois descent. Lederer travelled with a Tuscarora (Iroquois) interpreter, who gave them their name in his own tongue. On the contrary, it is extremely probable that they were an Algonkin totem, which had the exclusive right to the priesthood.285-1Riggs,Gram. and Dict. of the Dakota, p. ix; Kane,Second Grinnell Expedition, ii. p. 127. Paul Egede gives a number of words and expressions in the dialect of the sorcerers,Nachrichten von Grönland, p. 122.
265-1Haeser,Geschichte der Medicin, pp. 4, 7: Jena, 1845.
265-2Schoolcraft,Ind. Tribes, v. p. 440.
267-1Carver,Travels in North America, p. 73: Boston, 1802;Narrative of John Tanner, p. 135.
267-2Sahagun,Hist. de la Nueva España, lib. x. cap. 20;Le Livre Sacré des Quichés, p. 177;Lett. sur les Superstit. du Pérou, pp. 89, 91.
269-1Life of Black Hawk, p. 13.
270-1Travs. in North America, p. 74.
270-2Journal Historique, p. 362.
271-1Sometimes facts like this can be explained by the quickness of perception acquired by constant exposure to danger. The mind takes cognizance unconsciously of trifling incidents, the sum of which leads it to a conviction which the individual regards almost as an inspiration. This is the explanation ofpresentiments. But this does not apply to cases like that of Swedenborg, who described a conflagration going on at Stockholm, when he was at Gottenberg, three hundred miles away. Psychologists who scorn any method of studying the mind but through physiology, are at a loss in such cases, and take refuge in refusing them credence. Theologians call them inspirations either of devils or angels, as they happen to agree or disagree in religious views with the person experiencing them. True science reserves its opinion until further observation enlightens it.
272-1Schoolcraft,Indian Tribes, iii. p. 287; v. p. 652.
273-1“The progress from deepest ignorance to highest enlightenment,” remarks Herbert Spencer in hisSocial Statics, “is a progress from entire unconsciousness of law, to the conviction that law is universal and inevitable.”
273-2The Creeks had, according to Hawkins, not less than seven sacred plants; chief of them were the cassine yupon, called by botanistsIlex vomitoria, orIlex cassina, of the natural order Aquifoliaceæ; and the blue flag,Iris versicolor, natural order Iridaceæ. The former is a powerful diuretic and mild emetic, and grows only near the sea. The latter is an active emeto-cathartic, and is abundant on swampy grounds throughout the Southern States. From it was formed the celebrated “black drink,” with which they opened their councils, and which served them in place of spirits.
274-1Martius,Von dem Rechtzustande unter den Ureinwohnern Brasiliens, p. 32.
275-1Mr. Anderson, in theAm. Hist. Mag., vii. p. 79.
276-1Such spectacles were nothing uncommon. They are frequently mentioned in the Jesuit Relations, and they were the chief obstacles to missionary labor. In the debauches and excesses that excited these temporary manias, in the recklessness of life and property they fostered, and in their disastrous effects on mind and body, are depicted more than in any other one trait the thorough depravity of the race and its tendency to ruin. In the quaint words of one of the Catholic fathers, “If the old proverb is true that every man has a grain of madness in his composition, it must be confessed that this is a people where each has at least half an ounce” (De Quen,Rel. de la Nouv. France, 1656, p. 27). For the instance in the text seeRel. de la Nouv. France, An 1639, pp. 88-94.
277-1Schoolcraft,Indian Tribes, v. p. 423.
277-2J. M. Stanley, in theSmithsonian Miscellaneous Contributions, ii. p. 38.
278-1D’Orbigny,L’Homme Américain, ii. p. 81.
279-1See Balboa,Hist. du Pérou, pp. 28-30.
281-1D’Orbigny,L’Homme Américain, ii. p. 235.
281-2Schoolcraft,Ind. Tribes, v. p. 652.
281-3Dr. Mac Gowan, in theAmer. Hist. Mag., x. p. 139; Whipple,Rep. on the Ind. Tribes, p. 35.
283-1Hist. des Incas, lib. iii. ch. 22.
283-2Travels in the Carolinas, p. 504.
284-1Hist. du Pérou, p. 128;Voiages aux Indes Occidentales, ii. p. 97.
284-2Beverly,Hist. de la Virginie, p. 266. The dialect he specifies is “celle d’Occaniches,” and on page 252 he says, “On dit que la langue universelle des Indiens de ces Quartiers est celle desOccaniches, quoiqu’ils ne soient qu’une petite Nation, depuis que les Anglois connoissent ce Pais; mais je ne sais pas la difference qui’l y a entre cette langue et celle des Algonkins.” (French trans., Orleans, 1707.) This is undoubtedly the same people that Johannes Lederer, a German traveller, visited in 1670, and callsAkenatzi. They dwelt on an island, in a branch of the Chowan River, the Sapona, or Deep River (Lederer’sDiscovery of North America, in Harris, Voyages, p. 20). Thirty years later the English surveyor, Lawson, found them in the same spot, and speaks of them as theAcanechos(seeAm. Hist. Mag., i. p. 163). Their totem was that of the serpent, and their name is not altogether unlike the Tuscarora name of this animalusquauhne. As the serpent was so widely a sacred animal, this gives Beverly’s remarks an unusual significance. It by no means follows from this name that they were of Iroquois descent. Lederer travelled with a Tuscarora (Iroquois) interpreter, who gave them their name in his own tongue. On the contrary, it is extremely probable that they were an Algonkin totem, which had the exclusive right to the priesthood.
285-1Riggs,Gram. and Dict. of the Dakota, p. ix; Kane,Second Grinnell Expedition, ii. p. 127. Paul Egede gives a number of words and expressions in the dialect of the sorcerers,Nachrichten von Grönland, p. 122.
THE INFLUENCE OF THE NATIVE RELIGIONS ON THE MORAL AND SOCIAL LIFE OF THE RACE.
Natural religions hitherto considered of Evil rather than of Good.—Distinctions to be drawn.—Morality not derived from religion.—The positive side of natural religions in incarnations of divinity.—Examples.—Prayers as indices of religious progress.—Religion and social advancement.—Conclusion.
Drawingtoward the conclusion of my essay, I I am sensible that the vast field of American mythology remains for most part untouched—that I have but proved that it is not an absolute wilderness, pathless as the tropical jungles which now conceal the temples of the race; but that, go where we will, certain landmarks and guide-posts are visible, revealing uniformity of design and purpose, and refuting, by their presence, the oft-repeated charge of entire incoherence and aimlessness. It remains to examine the subjective power of the native religions, their influence on those who held them, and the place they deserve in the history of the race. What are their merits, if merits they have? what their demerits? Did they purify the life and enlighten the mind, or the contrary? Are they in short of evil or of good? The problem is complex—its solution most difficult. The author who of late years has studied most profoundly the savage races of the globe, expresses the discouraging conviction: “Their religions have notacted as levers to raise them to civilization; they have rather worked, and that powerfully, to impede every step in advance, in the first place by ascribing everything unintelligible in nature to spiritual agency, and then by making the fate of man dependent on mysterious and capricious forces, not on his own skill andforesight.”288-1
It would ill accord with the theory of mythology which I have all along maintained if this verdict were final. But in fact these false doctrines brought with them their own antidotes, at least to some extent, and while we give full weight to their evil, let us also acknowledge their good. By substituting direct divine interference for law, belief for knowledge, a dogma for a fact, the highest stimulus to mental endeavor was taken away. Nature, to the heathen, is no harmonious whole swayed by eternal principles, but a chaos of causeless effects, the meaningless play of capricious ghosts. He investigates not, because he doubts not. All events are to him miracles. Therefore his faith knows no bounds, and those who teach that doubt is sinful must contemplate him with admiration. The damsels of Nicaragua destined to be thrown into the seething craters of volcanoes, went to their fate, says Pascual de Andagoya, “happy as if they were going to besaved,”288-2and doubtless believing so. The subjects of a Central American chieftain, remarks Oviedo, “look upon it as the crown of favors to be permitted to die with their cacique, and thus to acquireimmortality.”288-3The terrible power exerted by the priests rested, as they themselves often saw, largely on the implicit and literal acceptance of their dicta.
In some respects the contrast here offered to enlightened nations is not always in favor of the latter. Borrowing the pointed antithesis of the poet, the mind is often tempted to exclaim—
“This is allThe gain we reap from all the wisdom sownThrough ages: Nothing doubted those first sonsOf Time, while we, the schooled of centuries,Nothing believe.”
“This is allThe gain we reap from all the wisdom sownThrough ages: Nothing doubted those first sonsOf Time, while we, the schooled of centuries,Nothing believe.”
But the complaint is unfounded. Faith is dearly bought at the cost of knowledge; nor in a better sense has it yet gone from among us. Far more sublime than any known to the barbarian is the faith of the astronomer, who spends the nights in marking the seemingly wayward motions of the stars, or of the anatomist, who studies with unwearied zeal the minute fibres of the organism, each upheld by the unshaken conviction that from least to greatest throughout this universe, purpose and order everywhere prevail.
Natural religions rarely offer more than this negative opposition to reason. They are tolerant to a degree. The savage, void of any clear conception of a supreme deity, sets up no claim that his is the only true church. If he is conquered in battle, he imagines that it is owing to the inferiority of his own gods to those of his victor, and he rarely therefore requires any other reasons to make him a convert. Acting on this principle, the Incas, when they overcame a strange province, sent its most venerated idol for atime to the temple of the Sun at Cuzco, thus proving its inferiority to their own divinity, but took no more violent steps to propagate theircreeds.290-1So in the city of Mexico there was a temple appropriated to the idols of conquered nations in which they were shut up, both to prove their weakness and prevent them from doing mischief. A nation, like an individual, was not inclined to patronize a deity who had manifested his incompetence by allowing his charge to be gradually worn away by constant disaster. As far as can now be seen, in matters intellectual, the religions of ancient Mexico and Peru were far more liberal than that introduced by the Spanish conquerors, which, claiming the monopoly of truth, sought to enforce its claim by inquisitions and censorships.
In this view of the relative powers of deities lay a potent corrective to the doctrine that the fate of man was dependent on the caprices of the gods. For no belief was more universal than that which assigned to each individual a guardian spirit. This invisible monitor was an ever present help in trouble. He suggested expedients, gave advice and warning in dreams, protected in danger, and stood ready to foil the machinations of enemies, divine or human. With unlimited faith in this protector, attributing to him the devices suggested by his own quick wits and the fortunate chances of life, the savage escaped the oppressive thought that he was the slave of demoniac forces, and dared the dangers of the forest and the war path without anxiety.
By far the darkest side of such a religion is that which it presents to morality. The religious senseis by no means the voice of conscience. The Takahli Indian when sick makes a full and free confession of sins, but a murder, however unnatural and unprovoked, he does not mention, not counting itcrime.291-1Scenes of brutal licentiousness were approved and sustained throughout the continent as acts of worship; maidenhood was in many parts freely offered up or claimed by the priests as a right; in Central America twins were slain for religious motives; human sacrifice was common throughout the tropics, and was not unusual in higher latitudes; cannibalism was often enjoined; and in Peru, Florida, and Central America it was not uncommon for parents to slay their own children at the behest of apriest.291-2The philosophical moralist, contemplating such spectacles, has thought to recognize in them one consoling trait. All history, it has been said, shows man living under an irritated God, and seeking to appease him by sacrifice of blood; the essence of all religion, it has been added, lies in that of which sacrifice is the symbol, namely, in the offering up of self, in the rendering up of our will to the will ofGod.291-3But sacrifice,when not a token of gratitude, cannot be thus explained. It is not a rendering up, but asubstitutionof our will for God’s will. A deity is angered by neglect of his dues; he will revenge, certainly, terribly, we know not how or when. But as punishment is all he desires, if we punish ourselves he will be satisfied; and far better is such self-inflicted torture than a fearful looking for of judgment to come. Craven fear, not without some dim sense of the implacability of nature’s laws, is at its root. Looking only at this side of religion, the ancient philosopher averred that the gods existed solely in the apprehensions of their votaries, and the moderns have asserted that “fear is the father of religion, love her late-borndaughter;”292-1that “the first form of religious belief is nothing else but a horror of the unknown,” and that “no natural religion appears to have been able to develop from a germ within itself anything whatever of real advantage tocivilization.”292-2
Far be it from me to excuse the enormities thus committed under the garb of religion, or to ignore their disastrous consequences on human progress. Yet this question is a fair one—If the natural religious belief has in it no germ of anything better,whence comes the manifest and undeniable improvement occasionally witnessed—as, for example, among the Toltecs, the Peruvians, and the Mayas? The reply is, by the influence of great men, who cultivated within themselves a purer faith, lived it in their lives, preached it successfully to their fellows, and, at their death, still survived in the memory of their nation, unforgotten models of noblequalities.293-1Where, in America, is any record of such men? We are pointed, in answer, to Quetzalcoatl, Viracocha, Zamna, and their congeners. But these august figures I have shown to be wholly mythical, creations of the religious fancy, parts and parcels of the earliest religion itself. The entire theory falls to nothing, therefore, and we discover a positive side to natural religions—one that conceals a germ of endless progress, which vindicates their lofty origin, and proves that He “is not far from every one of us.”
I have already analyzed these figures under their physical aspect. Let it be observed in what antithesis they stand to most other mythological creations. Let it be remembered that they primarily correspond to the stable, the regular, the cosmical phenomena, that they are always conceived under human form, not as giants, fairies, or strange beasts; that they were said at one time to have been visible leaders of their nations, that they did not suffer death, and that, though absent, they are ever present, favoring those who remain mindful of their precepts. I touched but incidentally on their moral aspects. This was likewise in contrast to the majority of inferior deities.The worship of the latter was a tribute extorted by fear. The Indian deposits tobacco on the rocks of a rapid, that the spirit of the swift waters may not swallow his canoe; in a storm he throws overboard a dog to appease the siren of the angry waves. He used to tear the hearts from his captives to gain the favor of the god of war. He provides himself with talismans to bind hostile deities. Hefeesthe conjurer to exorcise the demon of disease. He loves none of them, he respects none of them; he only fears their wayward tempers. They are to him mysterious, invisible, capricious goblins. But, in his highest divinity, he recognized a Father and a Preserver, a benign Intelligence, who provided for him the comforts of life—man, like himself, yet a god—God of All. “Go and do good,” was the parting injunction of his father to Michabo in Algonkinlegend;294-1and in their ancient and uncorrupted stories such is ever his object. “The worship of Tamu,” the culture hero of the Guaranis, says the traveller D’Orbigny, “is one of reverence, not offear.”294-2They were ideals, summing up in themselves the best traits, the most approved virtues of whole nations, and were adored in a very different spirit from other divinities.
None of them has more humane and elevated traits than Quetzalcoatl. He was represented of majestic stature and dignified demeanor. In his train came skilled artificers and men of learning. He was chaste and temperate in life, wise in council, generous ofgifts, conquering rather by arts of peace than of war; delighting in music, flowers, and brilliant colors, and so averse to human sacrifices that he shut his ears with both hands when they were evenmentioned.295-1Such was the ideal man and supreme god of a people who even a Spanish monk of the sixteenth century felt constrained to confess were “a good people, attached to virtue, urbane and simple in social intercourse, shunning lies, skilful in arts, pious toward theirgods.”295-2Is it likely, is it possible, that with such a model as this before their minds, they received no benefit from it? Was not this a lever, and a mighty one, lifting the race toward civilization and a purer faith?
Transfer the field of observation to Yucatan, and we find in Zamna, to New Granada and in Nemqueteba, to Peru and in Viracocha, or his reflex Manco Capac, the lineaments of Quetzalcoatl—modified, indeed, by difference of blood and temperament, but each combining in himself all the qualities most esteemed by their several nations. Were one or all of these proved to be historical personages, still the fact remains that the primitive religious sentiment, investing them with the best attributes of humanity, dwelling on them as its models, worshipping them as gods, contained a kernel of truth potent to encourage moral excellence. But if they were mythical, then this truth was of spontaneous growth, self-developed by the growing distinctness of the idea of God, a living witness that the religious sense, like everyother faculty, has within itself a power of endless evolution.
If we inquire the secret of the happier influence of this element in natural worship, it is all contained in one word—itshumanity. “The Ideal of Morality,” says the contemplative Novalis, "has no more dangerous rival than the Ideal of the Greatest Strength, of the most vigorous life, the Brute Ideal” (dasThier-Ideal).296-1Culture advances in proportion as man recognizes what faculties are peculiar to himas man, and devotes himself to their education. The moral value of religions can be very precisely estimated by the human or the brutal character of their gods. The worship of Quetzalcoatl in the city of Mexico was subordinate to that of lower conceptions, and consequently the more sanguinary and immoral were the rites there practised. The Algonkins, who knew no other meaning for Michabo than the Great Hare, had lost, by a false etymology, the best part of their religion.
Looking around for other standards wherewith to measure the progress of the knowledge of divinity in the New World,prayersuggests itself as one of the least deceptive. “Prayer,” to quote again the words ofNovalis,296-2“is in religion what thought is in philosophy. The religious sense prays, as the reason thinks.” Guizot, carrying the analysis farther, thinks that it is prompted by a painful conviction of the inability of our will to conform to the dictates ofreason.296-3Originally it was connected with the belief that divinecaprice, not divine law, governs the universe, and that material benefits rather than spiritual gifts are to be desired. The gradual recognition of its limitations and proper objects marks religious advancement. The Lord’s Prayer contains seven petitions, only one of which is for a temporal advantage, and it the least that can be asked for. What immeasurable interval between it and the prayer of the Nootka Indian on preparing for war!—
“Great Quahootze, let me live, not be sick, find the enemy, not fear him, find him asleep, and kill a great many ofhim.”297-1
Or again, between it and the petition of a Huron to a local god, heard by Father Brebeuf:—
“Oki, thou who livest in this spot, I offer thee tobacco. Help us, save us from shipwreck, defend us from our enemies, give us a good trade, and bring us back safe and sound to ourvillages.”297-2
This is a fair specimen of the supplications of the lowest religion. Another equally authentic is given by FatherAllouez.297-3In 1670 he penetrated to an outlying Algonkin village, never before visited by a white man. The inhabitants, startled by his pale face and long black gown, took him for a divinity. They invited him to the council lodge, a circle of old men gathered around him, and one of them, approaching him with a double handful of tobacco, thus addressed him, the others grunting approval:—
“This, indeed, is well, Blackrobe, that thou dost visit us. Have mercy upon us. Thou art a Manito. We give thee to smoke.
“The Naudowessies and Iroquois are devouring us. Have mercy upon us.
“We are often sick; our children die; we are hungry. Have mercy upon us. Hear me, O Manito, I give thee to smoke.
“Let the earth yield us corn; the rivers give us fish; sickness not slay us; nor hunger so torment us. Hear us, O Manito, we give thee to smoke.”
In this rude but touching petition, wrung from the heart of a miserable people, nothing but their wretchedness is visible. Not the faintest trace of an aspiration for spiritual enlightenment cheers the eye of the philanthropist, not the remotest conception that through suffering we are purified can be detected.
By the side of these examples we may place the prayers of Peru and Mexico, forms composed by the priests, written out, committed to memory, and repeated at certain seasons. They are not less authentic, having been collected and translated in the first generation after the conquest. One to Viracocha Pachacamac, was as follows:—
“O Pachacamac, thou who hast existed from the beginning and shalt exist unto the end, powerful and pitiful; who createdst man by saying, let man be; who defendest us from evil and preservest our life and health; art thou in the sky or in the earth, in the clouds or in the depths? Hear the voice of him who implores thee, and grant him his petitions. Giveus life everlasting, preserve us, and accept this oursacrifice.”299-1
In the voluminous specimens of Aztec prayers preserved by Sahagun, moral improvement, the “spiritual gift,” is very rarely if at all the object desired. Health, harvests, propitious rains, release from pain, preservation from dangers, illness, and defeat, these are the almost unvarying themes. But here and there we catch a glimpse of something better, some dim sense of the divine beauty of suffering, some feeble glimmering of the grand truth so nobly expressed by the poet:—
aus des Busens Tiefe strömt GedeihnDer festen Duldung und entschlossner That.Nicht Schmerz ist Unglück, Glück nicht immer Freude;Wer sein Geschick erfüllt, dem lächeln beide.
aus des Busens Tiefe strömt GedeihnDer festen Duldung und entschlossner That.Nicht Schmerz ist Unglück, Glück nicht immer Freude;Wer sein Geschick erfüllt, dem lächeln beide.
“Is it possible,” says one of them, “that this scourge, this affliction, is sent to us not for our correction and improvement, but for our destruction and annihilation? O Merciful Lord, let this chastisement with which thou hast visited us, thy people, be as those which a father or mother inflicts on their children, not out of anger, but to the end that they may be free from follies and vices.” Another formula, used when a chief was elected to some important position, reads: “O Lord, open his eyes and give him light, sharpen his ears and give him understanding, not that he mayuse them to his own advantage, but for the good of the people he rules. Lead him to know and to do thy will, let him be as a trumpet which sounds thy words. Keep him from the commission of injustice andoppression.”300-1
At first, good and evil are identical with pleasure and pain, luck and ill-luck. “The good are good warriors and hunters,” said a Pawneechief,300-2which would also be the opinion of a wolf, if he could express it. Gradually the eyes of the mind are opened, and it is perceived that “whom He loveth, He chastiseth,” and physicalgiveplace to moral ideas of good and evil. Finally, as the idea of God rises more distinctly before the soul, as “the One by whom, in whom, and through whom all things are,” evil is seen to be the negation, not the opposite of good, and itself “a porch oft opening on the sun.”
The influence of these religions on art, science, and social life, must also be weighed in estimating their value.
Nearly all the remains of American plastic art, sculpture, and painting, were obviously designed for religious purposes. Idols of stone, wood, or baked clay, were found in every Indian tribe, without exception, so far as I can judge; and in only a few directions do these arts seem to have been applied to secular purposes. The most ambitious attempts of architecture, it is plain, were inspired by religious fervor. The great pyramid of Cholula, the enormous mounds of the Mississippi valley, the elaborate edifices on artificial hills in Yucatan, were miniaturerepresentations of the mountains hallowed by tradition, the “Hill of Heaven,” the peak on which their ancestors escaped in the flood, or that in the terrestrial paradise from which flow the rains. Their construction took men away from war and the chase, encouraged agriculture, peace, and a settled disposition, and fostered the love of property, of country, and of the gods. The priests were also close observers of nature, and were the first to discover its simpler laws. The Aztec sages were as devoted star-gazers as the Chaldeans, and their calendar bears unmistakable marks of native growth, and of its original purpose to fix the annual festivals. Writing by means of pictures and symbols was cultivated chiefly for religious ends, and the wordhieroglyphis a witness that the phonetic alphabet was discovered under the stimulus of the religious sentiment. Most of the aboriginal literature was composed and taught by the priests, and most of it refers to matters connected with their superstitions. As the gifts of votaries and the erection of temples enriched the sacerdotal order individually and collectively, the terrors of religion were lent to the secular arm to enforce the rights of property. Music, poetic, scenic, and historical recitations, formed parts of the ceremonies of the more civilized nations, and national unity was strengthened by a common shrine. An active barter in amulets, lucky stones, and charms, existed all over the continent, to a much greater extent than we might think. As experience demonstrates that nothing so efficiently promotes civilization as the free and peaceful intercourse of man with man, I lay particular stress on the common custom of making pilgrimages.
The temple on the island of Cozumel in Yucatan was visited every year by such multitudes from all parts of the peninsula, that roads, paved with cut stones, had been constructed from the neighboring shore to the principal cities of theinterior.302-1Each village of the Muyscas is said to have had a beaten path to Lake Guatavita, so numerous were the devotees who journeyed to the shrine therelocated.302-2In Peru the temples of Pachacamà, Rimac, and other famous gods, were repaired to by countless numbers from all parts of the realm, and from other provinces within a radius of three hundred leagues around. Houses of entertainment were established on all the principal roads, and near the temples, for their accommodation; and when they made known the object of their journey, they were allowed a safe passage even through an enemy’sterritory.302-3
The more carefully we study history, the more important in our eyes will become the religious sense. It is almost the only faculty peculiar to man. It concerns him nearer than aught else. It is the key to his origin and destiny. As such it merits in all its developments the most earnest attention, an attention we shall find well repaid in the clearer conceptions we thus obtain of the forces which control the actions and fates of individuals and nations.
288-1Waitz,Anthropologie der Naturvoelker, i. p. 459.288-2Navarrete,Viages, iii. p. 415.288-3Relation de Cueba, p. 140. Ed. Ternaux-Compans.290-1La Vega,Hist. des Incas, liv. v. cap. 12.291-1Morse,Rep. on the Ind. Tribes, App. p. 345.291-2Ximenes,Origen de los Indios de Guatemala, p. 192; Acosta,Hist. of the New World, lib. v. chap. 18.291-3Joseph de Maistre,Eclaircissement sur les Sacrifices; Trench,Hulsean Lectures, p. 180. The famed Abbé Lammenaais and Professor Sepp, of Munich, with these two writers, may be taken as the chief exponents of a school of mythologists, all of whom start from the theories first laid down by Count de Maistre in hisSoirées de St. Petersbourg. To them the strongest proof of Christianity lies in the traditions and observances of heathendom. For these show the wants of the religious sense, and Christianity, they maintain, purifies and satisfies them all. The rites, symbols, and legends of every natural religion, they say, are true and not false; all that is required is to assign them their proper places and their real meaning. Therefore the strange resemblances in heathen myths to what is revealed in the Scriptures, as well as the ethical anticipations which have been found in ancient philosophies, all, so far from proving that Christianity is a natural product of the human mind, in fact, are confirmations of it, unconscious prophecies, and presentiments of the truth.292-1Alfred Maury,La Magie et l’Astrologie dans l’Antiquité et au Moyen Age, p. 8: Paris, 1860.292-2Waitz,Anthropologie, i. pp. 325, 465.293-1So says Dr. Waitz,ibid., p. 465.294-1Schoolcraft,Algic Researches, i. p. 143.294-2L’Homme Américain, ii. p. 319.295-1Brasseur,Hist. du Mexique, liv. iii. chaps. 1 and 2.295-2Sahagun,Hist. de la Nueva España, lib. x. cap. 29.296-1Novalis,Schriften, i. p. 244: Berlin, 1837.296-2Ibid., p. 267.296-3Hist. de la Civilisation en France, i. pp. 122, 130.297-1Narrative of J. R. Jewett among the Savages of Nootka Sound, p. 121.297-2Rel. de la Nouv. France, An 1636, p. 109.297-3Ibid., An 1670, p. 99.299-1Geronimo de Ore,Symbolo Catholico Indiano, chap, ix., quoted by Ternaux-Compans. De Ore was a native of Peru and held the position of Professor of Theology in Cuzco in the latter half of the sixteenth century. He was a man of great erudition, and there need be no hesitation in accepting this extraordinary prayer as genuine. For his life and writings see Nic. Antonio,Bib. Hisp. Nova, tom. ii. p. 43.300-1Sahagun,Hist. de la Nueva España, lib. vi. caps. 1, 4.300-2Morse,Rep. on the Ind. Tribes, App. p. 250.302-1Cogolludo,Hist. de Yucathan, lib. iv. cap. 9. Compare Stephens,Travs. in Yucatan, ii. p. 122, who describes the remains of these roads as they now exist.302-2Rivero and Tschudi,Antiqs. of Peru, p. 162.302-3La Vega,Hist. des Incas, lib. vi. chap. 30; Xeres,Rel de la Conq. du Pérou, p. 151;Let. sur les Superstit. du Pérou, p. 98, and others.
288-1Waitz,Anthropologie der Naturvoelker, i. p. 459.
288-2Navarrete,Viages, iii. p. 415.
288-3Relation de Cueba, p. 140. Ed. Ternaux-Compans.
290-1La Vega,Hist. des Incas, liv. v. cap. 12.
291-1Morse,Rep. on the Ind. Tribes, App. p. 345.
291-2Ximenes,Origen de los Indios de Guatemala, p. 192; Acosta,Hist. of the New World, lib. v. chap. 18.
291-3Joseph de Maistre,Eclaircissement sur les Sacrifices; Trench,Hulsean Lectures, p. 180. The famed Abbé Lammenaais and Professor Sepp, of Munich, with these two writers, may be taken as the chief exponents of a school of mythologists, all of whom start from the theories first laid down by Count de Maistre in hisSoirées de St. Petersbourg. To them the strongest proof of Christianity lies in the traditions and observances of heathendom. For these show the wants of the religious sense, and Christianity, they maintain, purifies and satisfies them all. The rites, symbols, and legends of every natural religion, they say, are true and not false; all that is required is to assign them their proper places and their real meaning. Therefore the strange resemblances in heathen myths to what is revealed in the Scriptures, as well as the ethical anticipations which have been found in ancient philosophies, all, so far from proving that Christianity is a natural product of the human mind, in fact, are confirmations of it, unconscious prophecies, and presentiments of the truth.
292-1Alfred Maury,La Magie et l’Astrologie dans l’Antiquité et au Moyen Age, p. 8: Paris, 1860.
292-2Waitz,Anthropologie, i. pp. 325, 465.
293-1So says Dr. Waitz,ibid., p. 465.
294-1Schoolcraft,Algic Researches, i. p. 143.
294-2L’Homme Américain, ii. p. 319.
295-1Brasseur,Hist. du Mexique, liv. iii. chaps. 1 and 2.
295-2Sahagun,Hist. de la Nueva España, lib. x. cap. 29.
296-1Novalis,Schriften, i. p. 244: Berlin, 1837.
296-2Ibid., p. 267.
296-3Hist. de la Civilisation en France, i. pp. 122, 130.
297-1Narrative of J. R. Jewett among the Savages of Nootka Sound, p. 121.
297-2Rel. de la Nouv. France, An 1636, p. 109.
297-3Ibid., An 1670, p. 99.
299-1Geronimo de Ore,Symbolo Catholico Indiano, chap, ix., quoted by Ternaux-Compans. De Ore was a native of Peru and held the position of Professor of Theology in Cuzco in the latter half of the sixteenth century. He was a man of great erudition, and there need be no hesitation in accepting this extraordinary prayer as genuine. For his life and writings see Nic. Antonio,Bib. Hisp. Nova, tom. ii. p. 43.
300-1Sahagun,Hist. de la Nueva España, lib. vi. caps. 1, 4.
300-2Morse,Rep. on the Ind. Tribes, App. p. 250.
302-1Cogolludo,Hist. de Yucathan, lib. iv. cap. 9. Compare Stephens,Travs. in Yucatan, ii. p. 122, who describes the remains of these roads as they now exist.
302-2Rivero and Tschudi,Antiqs. of Peru, p. 162.
302-3La Vega,Hist. des Incas, lib. vi. chap. 30; Xeres,Rel de la Conq. du Pérou, p. 151;Let. sur les Superstit. du Pérou, p. 98, and others.