Monarq. Ind., tom. i., p. 35; Acosta, Hist. de las Ynd., pp. 67-8; Montanus, Nieuwe Weereld, p. 13.
59
In a work entitled Fenix del Occidente.
60
Felicidad de Mej., Mex. 1685, fol. 55.
61
Boturini, Catálogo, in Idea, pp. 43, 50-2. Although the opinion that Quetzalcoatl was St Thomas, 'appears to be rather hazardous, yet one cannot help being astonished at the extent of the regions traversed by St. Thomas; it is true that some writers do not allow of his having gone beyond Calamita, a town in India, the site of which is doubtful; but others assert that he went as far as Meliapour, on the other side of the Coromandel, and even unto Central America.' Domenech's Deserts, vol. i., p. 50. 'Apud Iaiaobæ Indos in Occidenti tradita per avos viget memoria S. Apostoli Thomæ, quam retinent a transitu ejus per illas plagas, cujus non levia extant indicia: præcipuè quædam semita in illis solitudinibus hactenus perseverat, in quâ non oritur herba nisi valdè humilis et parvula, cum utrumque latus herbescat ultra modum; eo itinere dicunt Apostolum incessisse, et inde profectum in Peruana regna. Apud Brasilienses quoque traditio est, ibi prædicasse. Apud alios barbaros, etiam in regionem Paraguay venisse, postquam descendit per fluvium Iguazu, deinde in Paranam per Aracaium, ubi observatur locus in quo sedit defessus Apostolus, et fertur prædixisse, ut a majoribus acceptum est, post se illuc adventuros homines qui posteris eorum annuntiarent fidem veri Dei, quod non leve solatium et animos facit nostræ religionis prædicatoribus, ingentes labores inter illos barbaros pro dilatione Ecclesiæ perpetientibus.' Nieremberg, Historiæ Naturæ, lib. xiv., cap. cxvii.
62
Following are a few points of Lord Kingsborough's elaborate argument: 'How truly surprising it is to find that the Mexicans, who seem to have been quite unacquainted with the doctrines of the migration of the soul and the metempsychosis, should have believed in the incarnation of the only son of their supreme god Tonacatecutle. For Mexican mythology speaking of no other son of that god except Quecalcoatle, who was born of Chimalman the Virgin of Tula, without connection with man, and by his breath alone, (by which may be signified his word or his will, announced to Chimalman by word of mouth of the celestial messenger, whom he dispatched to inform her that she should conceive a son,) it must be presumed that Quecalcoatle was his only son. Other arguments might be adduced to show, that the Mexicans believed that Quecalcoatle was both god and man, that he had previously to his incarnation existed from all eternity, that he had created both the world and man, that he descended from heaven to reform the world by penance, that he was born with the perfect use of reason, that he preached a new law, and, being king of Tula, was crucified for the sins of mankind, as is obscurely insinuated by the interpreter of the Vatican Codex, plainly declared in the traditions of Yucatan, and mysteriously represented in the Mexican paintings.' If the promise of the angel Gabriel to the Virgin Mary, – The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee: therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God – be couched in the language of ancient prophecy, 'it is not improbable that the head of the dragon which forms the crest of three of the female figures (in one of the Mexican pieces of sculpture), as it may also be presumed it did of the fourth when entire, (if it be not a symbol which Chimalman borrowed from her son's name,) was intended to denote that she had been overshadowed by the power of Huitzilopuchtli, whose device, as we are informed by Sahagun in the first chapter of the first book of his History of New Spain, was the head of a dragon.' Kingsborough's Mex. Antiq., vol. vi., pp. 507-8. See, more especially, his elaborate discussion of Quetzalcoatl's crucifixion and identity with the Messiah, vol. viii., pp. 5-51. As we have seen in a preceding volume, Quetzalcoatl is compared with the heathen deities of the old world, as well as with the Messiah of the Christians. See vol. iii., chap. vii.
63
See vol. iii., p. 450, et seq.
64
Though the presumption may be in favor of communication by Bering Strait, yet the phenomena in the present state of our knowledge, favors the Aleutian route. Latham's Comp. Phil., p. 384. The Aleutian archipelago is 'probably the main route by which the old continent must have peopled the new. Behring's Straits, though … they were doubtless one channel of communication, just as certainly as if their place had been occupied by solid land, were yet, in all likelihood, only of subordinate utility in the premises, when compared with the more accessible and commodious bridge towards the south.' Simpson's Nar., vol. ii., p. 225. 'There is no improbability that the early Asiatics reached the western shores of America through the islands of the Pacific.' The trace of the progress of the red and partially civilized man from Oriental Asia was left on these islands. Willson's Amer. Hist., pp. 92-3. The first discoveries were made along the coast and from island to island; the American immigrants would have come by the Aleutian Isles. Brasseur de Bourbourg, Hist. Nat. Civ., tom. i., p. 10. To come by Aleutian islands presents not nearly so great a difficulty as the migrations among Pacific Islands. Prescott's Mex., vol. iii., p. 374. Immigration from Asia 'appears to have taken place mostly by the Aleuthian islands.' Smith's Human Species, p. 238.
65
Some of the early writers were of course ignorant of the existence of any strait separating America from Asia; thus Acosta – who dares not assume, in opposition to the Bible, that the flood did not extend to America, or that a new creation took place there – accounts for the great variety of animals by supposing that the new continent is in close proximity to if not actually connected with the Old World at its northern and southern ends, and that the people and animals saved in the ark spread gradually by these routes over the whole land. Hist. de las Ynd., pp. 68-73, 81; West und Ost Indischer Lustgart, pt i., pp. 8-9. See also Montanus, Nieuwe Weereld, pp. 38-42; Gottfriedt, Newe Welt, p. 4; Villagutierre, Hist. Conq. Itza, pp. 26-8. Clavigero produces instances to show that upheavals, engulfings, and separations of land have been quite common, and thinks that American traditions of destructions refer to such disasters. He also shows that certain animals could have passed only by a tropic, others only by an arctic road. He accordingly supposes that America was formerly connected with Africa at the latitude of the Cape Verde islands, with Asia in the north, and perhaps with Europe by Greenland. Storia Ant. del Messico, tom. iv., pp. 27-44. The great objection to a migration by way of the cold latitude of Bering Strait, says a writer in the Historical Magazine, vol. i., p. 285, is that tropic animals never could have passed that way. He apparently rejects or has never heard of the theory of change in zones. See farther, concerning joining of continents, and communication by Bering Strait: Warden, Recherches, pp. 202, 221; Humboldt, Exam. Crit., tom. ii., p. 68, et seq.; Snowden's Hist. N. and S. Amer., p. 198; Taylor, in Cal. Farmer, Sept. 12, 1862; Priest's Amer. Antiq., pp. 62-3, 82-3; Valois, Mexique, p. 197; Adair's Amer. Ind., p. 219. Bradford denies emphatically that there ever was any connection between America and Asia. 'It has been supposed,' he writes, 'that a vast tract of land, now submerged beneath the waters of the Pacific Ocean, once connected Asia and America… The arguments in favor of this opinion are predicated upon that portion of the Scriptures, relating to the "division" of the earth in the days of Peleg, which is thought to indicate a physical division, – upon the analogies between the Peruvians, Mexicans and Polynesians … and upon the difficulty of accounting in any other manner for the presence of some kinds of animals in America.' After demolishing these three bases of opinion, he adds: 'this conjectured terrestrial communication never existed, a conclusion substantiated, in some measure, by geological testimony.' Amer. Antiq., pp. 222-8. Mr Bradford's argument, in addition to being thoughtful and ingenious, is supported by facts, and will amply repay a perusal.
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