practises the use of its symbols for numbers ; and
it is impassible that it should have furnished
any increment to the leading tribes of. America,
without some fixed traces of it being left in
their languages, customs, and ritejS. None such
are known to exist.
Palestine, together with Syria and the whole
of ancient Asia Minor, has claims to investigation,
not so .much perhaps from its having been
the original seat of mankind, and the cradle-of
nations, as from the early expressed, and ofhre-
pcated opinion, that the American Indians are
lineal descendants of the Jews. It is not intended
to discuss this subject here, but merely
to name it as one of the topics connected with
vthe oriental origin of the Indians, which are not,
perhaps, exhausted. But if thediseussion be rèr
newed, it requires to be conducted on principles
of more exactness, philologically speaking, and
less likelihood to be swayed by. theory, than it
has yet received. To examine it candidly, we
must have the two elements of comparison,
namely, the Hebrew and Indian, on Aonic, complete.
We not only require to place the languages
side by side, but also the- striking and peculiar
rites, religious cérémonies, and mental
idiocrasy of each. Nor should we hold our judgments
under so easy a rein, as to be satisfied
with identity, where there is only resemblance.
The theory of the Hebrew origin of the Indian
tribes, has been a popular one, from the very
foundation of the colonies. It is as old> as we
are told by Porster,^ in the time of Grotius, who
advanced it. Nor is it, in one respect, namely,
the ge ne f al-question of philology, as destitute of
pte^sibiiiiyi as the weak proofs and over-strained
resemblahces'iof softie writers have really shown
it torbey If not of Jewish, they may be of Persian^
or Mesopotamian origin. Granting that
they are pf the Shemitic family, which appears
quite manifest, they are more likely to have been
cotribes of thei stock from which the Jews were
descended, than lineal descendants of this peculiar
people. We may account for some of the
linguistic coincidences, mentioned by Boudinot;
as being: of a generic character, and shall at the
Same time keep 6n grounds which take in coincidences
of another kind. It is difficult to admit,
that a people, whose history Is, in all its phases,
So peculiar and striking as that' of the Jews,
marked as it«, rites were, with blood, should have
given Origin to . the American tribes, without
having transmitted some unequivocal proofs of it.
The cleaving of the sea—the delivery of the law,
amid thunders and lightnings—the smiting of
the rock for the out-flow of a river in a dry bar-
• ren -—the raising of the brazen serpent—the
guiding pillar of cloud by day and fire by night,
and the standing miracle of the manna, <were
acts and revelations of such a character, as never
to have been likely to be completely obliterated
from tradition. The tribes of Judah and Benjamin,
whoappear to compose all the known Jews
J^onkern Vtiyagfes.' ;