few points of contact with the calendars of the Old World, if not
accidental, must have taken place at an exceedingly remote period
of time. In fact, whatever may have come from the Old World was
engrafted upon a system itself still older than the exotic shoots.
But, if it still he contended that astronomy was imported, why did
not the immigrants bring an alphabet or Asiatic system of writing,
the art of working iron, mills, wheel-harrows (all, with remembrance
even of Oriental navigation, unknown in America) ? Or at least the
seeds of millet, rice, wheat, oats, barley, &c., of their respective botanical
provinces or countries ? Alas! sustained of the ZTmiy-doctrine
will he puzzled to find one fact among American aborigines to support
it.
In conclusion, we have hut to sum up the facts briefly detailed,
and these results will he clearly deducible, namely: —
1. That the continent of America was unknown not only to the
ancient Egyptians and Chinese, but to the more modern Hebrews,
Greeks, and Romans.
2. That at the time of its discovery, this continent was populated
by millions of people, resembling each other, possessing peculiar
moral and physical- characteristics, and in utter contrast with any
peopie of the Old World.
3. That these races were found surrounded everywhere by animals
and plants specifically different from those of the Old World, and
created, as it is conceded, in America.
4. That these races were found speaking several hundred languages,
which, although often resembling each other in grammatical structure,
differed in general entirely in their vocabularies, and were all radically
distinct from the languages of the Old World.
5. That their monuments, as seen in their architecture, sculpture,
earth-works, shell-banks, &c., from their extent, dissemination, and
incalculable numbers, furnish evidence of very high antiquity.
6. That the state of decomposition in which the skeletons of the
mounds are found, and, above all, the peculiar anatomical structure
of the few remaining crania, prove these mound-builders to have been
both ancient and indigenous to the soil; because American crania,
antique as well as modern, are unlike those of any other race of ancient
or recent times.
7. That the aborigines of America possessed no alphabet or truly-
phonetic system of writing—that they possessed none of the domestic
animals, nor many of the oldest arts of the Eastern hemisphere; whilst
their agricultural plants were indigenous.
8. That their system of arithmetic was unique — that their astronomical
knowledge, in the main, was indubitably of cis-Atlantic
origin; while their ealendarwas unlike that of any people, ancient or
modem, of the other hemisphere. I
Whatever exception may he taken to any of these propositions
separately, it must he conceded that, when viewed together, they form
a mass of cumulative testimony, carrying the aborigines of America
hack to the remotest period of man’s existence upon earth.
The entire scope of argument on these subjects may be presented
in the vigorous language of LordEAiMES; expressing ideas entertained
by himself and the authors in common, although more than seventy-
nine years interlapse between their respective writings:
“ The frigidity of the North Americans, men and women, differing in that particular from
all other savages, is to me evidence of a separate race. And I am the more confirmed in
that opinion, when I find a celebrated writer, whose abilities no person calls in question,
endeavoring in vain to ascribe that circumstance to moral and physical causes. St Pergama
dextra defendi posset. T i ~
“ In concluding from the foregoing facts that there are different races of men, I reckon
upon strenuous opposition; not only from men biassed against what is new- or uncommon
but from numberless sedate writers, who hold every distinguishing mark, internal as well
as external, to be the effect of soil and climate. Against the former, patience is my on y
shield; but I cannot hope for any converts to a new opinion, without removing the arguments
urgedlby the latter. . ' , ,, .. .
• “ Among the endless number of writers who ascribe supreme efficacy to the climate,
Vitruvius shall take the lead.SM . . . gf
“ Upon summing up the whole particulars mentioned above, would one hesitate a moment
to adopt the following opinion, were there no counterbalancing evidence: viz., g That
God created many pairs of the human race, differing from each other both externally and
internally that he fitted these pairs for different climates, and placed each pair in its
proper climate; that the peculiarities of the original pairs were preserved entire m their
descendants-who, having no assistance but their natural talents, were left to gather
knowledge from experience, and in particular were left (each tribe) to form a language for
itself- that signs were sufficient for the original pairs, without any language but what
nature suggests ; and that a language was formed gradually, as a tribe increased in numbers
and in different occupations, to make speech necessary t ’ But this opinion, however
plausible we are not permitted to adopt, being taught a different lesson by revelation: viz.,
That God created but a single pair of the human species. Though we cannot doubt of the
authority of Moses, yet his account of the creation of man is not a little puzzling, as it
seems to contradict every one of the facts mentioned above. According to that account,
different races of men were not formed, nor were men framed originally for different climates
All men must have spoken the Same language, viz., that of our first parents. And
what of all seems the most contradictory to that account, is the savage state: Adam, as
Sloses informs us, was endued by his Maker with an eminent degree of knowledge; and he
certainly must have been an excellent preceptor to his children and their progeny, among
whom he lived many generations. Whence then the degeneracy of all men unto the savage
state ? To account for that dismal catastrophe, mankind must have suffered some terrible
convulsion. >_
I That terrible convulsion is revealed to us in the history of the Tower of Babel. 385 •
Babylon’s Tower (it is known to cuneiform students of the present
day) did not exist before the reign of H e b u c h a d n e z a e ; who built it
during the seventh century b . c.388. A s the edifice does not concern
Ethnology, we pass onward.