Digitale Ausgabe

Download
TEI-XML (Ansicht)
Text (Ansicht)
Text normalisiert (Ansicht)
Ansicht
Textgröße
Originalzeilenfall ein/aus
Zeichen original/normiert
Zitierempfehlung

Alexander von Humboldt: „Remarks on the Union of the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, by a Canal across the Isthmus of Darien or Panama“, in: ders., Sämtliche Schriften digital, herausgegeben von Oliver Lubrich und Thomas Nehrlich, Universität Bern 2021. URL: <https://humboldt.unibe.ch/text/1810-Pittoreske_Ansichten_in-19-neu> [abgerufen am 29.03.2024].

URL und Versionierung
Permalink:
https://humboldt.unibe.ch/text/1810-Pittoreske_Ansichten_in-19-neu
Die Versionsgeschichte zu diesem Text finden Sie auf github.
Titel Remarks on the Union of the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, by a Canal across the Isthmus of Darien or Panama
Jahr 1824
Ort Montreal
Nachweis
in: The Canadian Magazine, and Literary Repository 2:12 (Juni 1824), S. [547]–556.
Sprache Englisch
Typografischer Befund Antiqua; Auszeichnung: Kursivierung.
Identifikation
Textnummer Druckausgabe: III.3
Dateiname: 1810-Pittoreske_Ansichten_in-19-neu
Statistiken
Seitenanzahl: 9
Zeichenanzahl: 26807

Weitere Fassungen
Pittoreske Ansichten in den Cordilleren (Stuttgart; Tübingen, 1810, Deutsch)
Alexander von Humboldts Ansichten über Amerika, und dessen eingeborne Völkerstämme (Stuttgart; Tübingen, 1814, Deutsch)
Über Amerika und dessen eingeborne Völkerstämme (Wien, 1814, Deutsch)
View of America and its native tribes (London, 1814, Englisch)
Researches Concerning the Institutions and Monuments of the Ancient Inhabitants of America; with descriptions and views of some of the most striking scenes in the Cordilleras (London, 1815, Englisch)
Travels in South America (Ipswich, 1815, Englisch)
Ueber die Lage, Form u. s. w. des Kotopaxi, dieses kolossalen Feuerberges (Frankfurt am Main, 1817, Deutsch)
Natuurlijke brug over den Icononzo, een dal in het cordillerisch gebergte (Amsterdam, 1818, Niederländisch)
Gang der Völkercultur der neuen Welt, verglichen mit jenem europäischer Natur, Kunst und Sitte (Brünn, 1819, Deutsch)
The works of god displayed (London, 1820, Englisch)
Cotopaxi (London, 1820, Englisch)
[Über die Anden-Kordillera] (Frankfurt am Main, 1820, Deutsch)
Description of the volcano at Cotopaxi (Chillicothe, Ohio, 1821, Englisch)
Description of the volcano at Cotopaxi (Cincinnati, Ohio, 1821, Englisch)
Cotopaxi (Hartford, Connecticut, 1822, Englisch)
[Researches Concerning the Institutions and Monuments of the Ancient Inhabitants of America; with descriptions and views of some of the most striking scenes in the Cordilleras] (Boston, Massachusetts, 1822, Englisch)
Ancient mexican cities and pyramids (Shrewsbury, 1823, Englisch)
Chimborazo and Cotopaxi (London, 1823, Englisch)
Remarks on the Union of the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, by a Canal across the Isthmus of Darien or Panama (Montreal, 1824, Englisch)
The works of God displayed in the history of Cotopaxi a mountain in South America (New York City, New York, 1825, Englisch)
Cotopaxi (Black Rock, New York, 1825, Englisch)
[Pittoreske Ansichten in den Cordilleren] (London, 1827, Englisch)
Extrait de l’ouvrage de M. de Humboldt sur les monumens de l’Amérique (London, 1831, Französisch)
Traditions du nouveau monde, en conformité avec nos croyances (Paris, 1832, Französisch)
Calendrier mexicain (Paris, 1833, Französisch)
Cargueroes, or Man-Carriers of Quindiu (Edinburgh, 1836, Englisch)
Extrait des Vues des Cordillières et monuments des peuples indigènes de l’Amérique (Paris, 1836, Französisch)
Cargueroes, or man-carriers of Quindiu (New York City, New York; Boston, Massachusetts; Cincinnati, Ohio, 1837, Englisch)
Humboldt on the Heads of the American Indians (Edinburgh; London; Glasgow; New York City, New York, 1843, Englisch)
Cotopaxi (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Boston, Massachusetts; New York City, New York, 1851, Englisch)
Extinct Species (Wells, 1852, Englisch)
Extinct Species (Sligo, 1852, Englisch)
Extinct Species (Belfast, 1852, Englisch)
Extinct Species (Armagh, 1852, Englisch)
The Volcano of Cotopaxi (Hertford, 1853, Englisch)
The Volcano of Cotopaxi (Wells, 1853, Englisch)
Antediluvian America (Hertford, 1853, Englisch)
Antediluvian America (Wells, 1853, Englisch)
Mexique (Paris, 1853, Französisch)
Cotopaxi (Hartford, Connecticut, 1856, Englisch)
Visita del Chimborazo, desde la mesa de Tapia (Panama City, 1858, Spanisch)
|548|

VIEW OF AMERICA AND ITS NATIVE TRIBES,BY ALEXANDER VON HUMBOLDT.

It cannot but excite astonishment, that, at the conclusion, of thefifteenth century, there should have been found, in a world which wedenominate the new, the very same kind of antiquarian remains, thesame religious notions, and forms of architecture, as seem to belongto the earliest ages of civilization in Asia. It is with the characteris-tics of nations, as with the internal structure of the plants that arespread over the face of the earth. The stamp of the original stockremains indelible, notwithstanding the numberless modifications pro-duced by climate, soil, and various other incidents. In the first period after the discovery of America, the attention ofthe Europeans was more particularly directed to the gigantic edificesof Corzco, to the high roads through the midst of the Cordilleras, tothe lofty graduated pyramids, to the religious rites, and symbolicalwritings of the Mexicans. Descriptions of different provinces ofMexico and Peru were then as frequent as are, in our days, the ac-counts of the vicinity of Port Jackson, in New Holland, or the Islandof Otaheite. It is absolutely necessary to have been upon the spot,in order to appreciate justly the noble simplicity and the character oftruth and fidelity which pervade the narrations of the earliest Spanishtravellers: and, in perusing their works, we lament only the want ofgraphic illustrations, which would have given us more satisfactoryideas of many monuments, partly demolished by fanaticism, and partlyfallen to decay through culpable neglect. The ardor for those American investigations diminished after thecommencement of the seventeenth century. The Spanish colonies,whose territory alone had been inhabited by civilized nations, wereshut against foreigners; and when, more recently, the Abbé Clavigeropublished, in Italy, his work on the ancient history of Mexico, doubtswere raised concerning many facts which were formerly confimed bynumerous eye-witnesses, frequently persons by no means amicablydisposed towards each other. Celebrated writers, who received lesspleasure from the harmony of nature than from her contrasts, haverepresented America as one vast swamp, unfavourable to the propaga-tion of the animal species, and not till of late inhabited by races ofmen not surpassing the South Sea islanders in civilization. An unli-mited scepticism had banished sound criticism from the historical dis-quisitions on the Americans. The fictions of a Solis and some othertravellers who had never quitted Europe, were blended with the faith-ful and simple relations of the earliest visitors of the New World; andit was deemed the duty of a philosophic historian to protest, in thefirst place, against all that the missionaries had observed. Towards the end of the past century, a happy alteration took placein regard to the opinions entertained respecting the civilisation of na-tions, and the causes that alternately promote and obstruct its progress.We became acquainted with nations whose manners, institutions, andarts, are almost as different from those of the Greeks and Romans, asthe original forms of the extinct species of animals from those which |549| at present engage the attention of naturalists. The society of Cal-cutta has thrown a brilliant light over the history of the Asiatic na-tions. The monuments of Egypt have, of late, been partly describedwith admirable correctness, and partly compared with those of themost distant regions; and my researches concerning the native tribesof America appear at an epoch, when that which does not approachto the style and manner of which the Greeks have left us inimitablemodels, is nevertheless deemed well worthy of attention. In the description of the historical monuments of America, I haveendeavoured to observe a due mean between two routes alternatelypursued by those literati who have entered into the discussion of suchmonuments, languages, and national traditions. The one adoptinghypotheses which, though brilliant, rest on tottering foundations, havededuced general conclusions from a small number of insulated facts.They found, in America, Chinese and Egyptian colonies, Celticdialects, and the alphabet of the Phœnicians. While we yet remainin the dark respecting the origin of the Osci, the Goths, and theCelts, they pretended to pronounce decisively on the origin of thetribes of the New World. Other writers, on the contrary, amassedmaterials, without ever raising themselves to any general notions: aproceeding from which the history of nations can derive as little bene-fit as the different branches of the natural sciences. I shall deemmyself fortunate if I shall be thought to have equally avoided boththese extremes. A small number of tribes, far distant from one ano-ther, as the Etruscans, the Egyptians, the Tibetians, the Aztekians,exhibit striking co-incidences in their buildings and religious institu-tions, in their division of the year, in their returning periods of time,and in their mystical representations. The historian ought not tooverlook these coincidence, for which it is just as difficult to accountas for the resemblance between the Sanscrit, Persian, Greek, andGerman idioms; but while he rises to general ideas, he should knowhow to stop at the point where we are abandoned by certain facts.Agreeably to these principles, I will attempt to state the results de-duced from the data which I have been enabled to collect concerningthe native tribes of America. An attentive examination of the geological relations of the NewWorld, and a consideration of the equilibrium of the waters spread overthe surface of the earth, forbid the assumption that the new and theold continents rose at different times from the bosom of the deep.On both hemispheres we perceive the like series of rocky strata lyingone above another, and probably the granite, gypsum, and sand-stoneformations in the mountains of Peru, had their origin at the same pe-riod as the corresponding strata in the Alps of Switzerland. Thewhole globe has apparently been visited by the same catastrophes.On the summits of the Andes, at an elevation exceeding that ofMont Blanc, are found the petrified muscles of the ocean. Fossilebones of elephants are scattered over the equatorial regions, and,what is remarkable, they are met with, not only under the palms inthe torrid valleys of the Oronoko, but on the highest and coldestplains of the Cordilleras. In the new as in the old world, whole crea- |550| tions and whole species of organic bodies have become extinct, togive place to those which now people the earth, the air, and thewaters. No grounds exist for presuming that America was first peopled bymen at a much later period than the other continents. The luxuriantvegetation, the breadth of the rivers, and the partial in-undations arepowerful obstacles to the migration of nations in tropical countries.Extensive tracts of northern Asia are as thinly peopled as the savan-nahs of New Mexico and Paraguay, and we should by no means pre-suppose that the countries first inhabited must necessarily be the mostpopulous. The question relative to the origin of the population of America canno more belong to the province of history, than those concerning theorigin of plants and animals, and on the distribution of organic germs,to the natural sciences. History, when it goes back to the most an-cient periods, exhibits to us almost all the parts of the globe inhabitedby people who look upon themselves as aborigines, because their an-cestry is unknown to them. Amidst a variety of tribes who succeed-ed and intermingled with one another, it is impossible to decide withcertainty from which of them the population first proceeded, and todefine the limits beyond which the empire of cosmogonal traditioncommences. The tribes of America, with the exception of those that are nearestto the polar circle, belong all to one single race, which is distinguish-ed by the form of the skull, complexion, very scanty beard, andstraight hair. The American race exhibits striking analogies withthat of the Mongol tribes, which comprehends the descendants of theHiong-nu, so famous under the denomination of Huns, the Kalkases,the Calmucks, and the Burattes. Recent observations have even de-monstrated, that not only the inhabitants of Oonalashka, but severalSouth American tribes also, denote, by the osteological characters ofthe skull, a transition from the American to the Mongol race. If thesable African race, and the numberless tribes which inhabit the in-terior of Asia and its north-eastern regions, and to which systematicgeographers have given the indefinite appellation of Tartars orTschoudes, should ever become better known to us, the Caucasian,Mongol, American, Malay, and Negro races will be less widely se-parated than they have been, and we shall recognize, in this greatfamily of man, one single original, which has undergone various modi-fications from circumstances that we shall, perhaps, never be able topenetrate. The native tribes of the new world, though all of them are alliedby very essential characteristics, yet, on the other hand, present, intheir moveable features, in their more or less dark complexion, intheir shape and size, varieties not less striking than the differencewhich we perceive between the Arabs, Persians, and Slavonians ofthe Circassian race. The hordes, however, which rove about in theburning plains of the equinoctial regions are by no means of a darkercolour than the mountaineers, or the inhabitants of the temperatezone; whether it be that in man, as in most animals, there is a cer-tain period of life beyond which the influence of climate and food is |551| insignificant, or that the deviation from the original mode is not per-ceptible till the expiration of many centuries. From all that hasbeen observed, however, it results, that the Americans, like the Mon-gol tribes, have a less flexible organization than the other Asiatic andEuropean nations. The American race, though less numerous than any other, is dis-persed over the greatest portion of the globe. It extends, throughboth hemispheres, from 68° N. L. to 55° S. L. It is the only onethat, at the same time, inhabits the scorching vallies bounded by theocean, and the ridges of mountains elevated more than 200 fathomsabove the Peak of Teneriffe. The number of the languages which distinguish the indigenous na-tions from one another seems to be still greater in America than inAfrica, where, according to the recent researches of Messrs. Seetzenand Vater, they exceed 140. In this respect the whole of Americaresembles the Caucasus, Italy before the conquest of the Romans,and Asia Minor at the time when the Cilicians, of Semitic origin, thePhrygians, of Thracian descent, the Lydians and the Celts dwelthere together within a small compass. The formation of the earth,the extreme luxuriance of the vegetable kingdom, and the dread ofthe intense heat of the vallies entertained by the inhabitants of thetropical regions, impede mutual intercourse and create an astonish-ing diversity of American dialects. This diversity is not so great inthe savannahs and forests of the north, which are traversed by hunters,on the banks of the great rivers, along the coasts of the ocean, andwherever the Incas have introduced their theocracy by force of arms. When we speak of more than a hundred languages, on a continentwhose total population is not equal to that of France, we term thosedifferent languages which have the same affinity to one another as,I will not say the German to the Dutch, or the Italian to the Spanish;but as the Danish to the German, the Chaldee to the Arabic, theGreek to the Latin. As a person becomes more and more familiarwith the labyrinth of American languages, he perceives that many ofthem belong to one and the same family, while a great number ofothers remain insulated like the Basque among the Europeans, andthe Japanese among the Asiatic languages. This insulation is per-haps only apparent, and it may be presumed that those languageswhich seem to defy all ethnographic classification, are allied to otherseither long extinct, or peculiar to nations whom no travellers havehitherto visited. Most of the American languages, even those whose groups differfrom one another in the same manner as the dialects of German,Celtic, and Slavonian origin, exhibit a certain resemblance in theirgeneral organization, which if it does not indicate one common stock,at least denotes a very close analogy in the intellectual faculties ofthe American nations from Greenland to the streights of Magellan. Very minute enquiries, conducted according to a method beforeunknown in etymological studies, have proved, that there is a smallnumber of words common to the language of the Old and NewWorld. In 83 American languages, examined by Messrs. Bartonand Vater, have been found about 170 words which seemed to have |552| the same roots; and we may easily convince ourselves that these re-semblances are by no means accidental or an imitative harmony, andperhaps resulting only from the uniform structure of the organs whichrenders the first articulated tones of children pretty nearly the samein all parts of the world. Out of 170 words, in which this similarityis perceived, three fifths seem to claim affinity with the languages ofthe Mantchous, Tungusians, Mongols, and Samojedes, and the othertwo-fifths with Celtic and Tschoudian dialects, and with the Basque,Coptic, and Congo languages. Those words were found out on acomparison of the whole of the American languages, with the wholeof the languages of the Old World; for as yet we know not of anyAmerican dialect which can be deemed more nearly allied than therest to any of the numerous groups of Asiatic, African, or Europeanlanguages. The assertions of some scholars, proceeding upon abstracttheories, respecting the supposed poverty of all the American langua-ges, as well as the extraordinary scantiness of their system of num-bers, are as rash and unfounded as the statements of others who con-tend for the imbecility and stupidity of the human race in the NewWorld, the diminution of organic bodies, and the degeneracy of theanimals transported thither from our hemisphere. Various dialects at present spoken by barbarous nations alone,seem to be relics of copious and flexible languages, which denote aconsiderable progress in civilization. I shall not here enter into anexamination of the question—whether the original condition of man-kind was a state of rudeness and stupidity, or whether the savagehordes are descended from nations whose mental powers, as well asthe language in which they are reflected, were previously both equallydeveloped: but I shall merely observe that the little which we knowof the history of the Americans seems to demonstrate that thosetribes which migrated from north to south, possessed in their northernabodes that variety of languages which we discover in the tropicalregions. Hence we may draw the analogical inference that the rami-fication, or to use an expression independent of all systems the diver-sity of the languages is a very ancient phenomenon. Perhaps thelanguages which we term American originally belong no more to thisquarter of the globe than the Madjarian or Hungarian, and theTschoudian or Finnish do to Europe. It must be admitted that the comparison of the languages of theOld and New World has led as yet to no general results; but weought not on this account to relinquish our hopes that this study willprove more productive when the sagacity of scholars shall possess alarger stock of materials. How many languages of America, as wellas of the interior and eastern part of Asia may there still be, whosemechanism is as unknown to us as that of the Tyrrhenian, Oscian,and Sabine dialects! Of the nations which disappeared from theOld World, there may perhaps still exist some petty detached tribesin the vast wilds of America. If, however, the early intercourse between the two worlds can bebut very imperfectly proved by the languages, it is on the other handunequivocally demonstrated by the cosmogonies, the monuments,hieroglyphics, and institutions of the American and Asiatic nations. |553| I think that to the evidences already adduced on this point, I have ad-ded no small number that were hitherto unknown. I have everywhere endeavoured to discriminate that which denotes a common ori-gin from what must be considered as the result of analogous relations,subsisting between nations which have attained the highest degree ofcivilization. To determine the period of the ancient connexion between the twoworlds was previously impracticable, and it would be too presumptuousto pretend to designate the group of nations in the Old World, towhich the Toltekes, Aztekes, Muyscas, or Peruvians, are nearest al-lied, since the relations here alluded to are founded upon such tradi-tions, monuments, and usages, as may possibly be of higher antiquitythan the present division of the Asiatics into Mongols, Hindoos,Tongouses, and Chinese. At the time of the discovery of the New World, or to speak morecorrectly, at the period of the first Spanish invasion, the American na-tions, which had made the greatest progress in civilization weremountaineers. People born in the valleys of a temperate regionclimbed the ridges of the Cordilleras, which become more elevated asthey approach the equator; and on these heights they found a tempera-ture and vegetation similar to those of their native land. All those situations in which man has to struggle with natural ob-stacles on a soil of inferior fertility, and is not absolutely vanquishedin too unequal a conflict, are most favourable to the development ofhis energies. On the Caucasus and in the centre of Asia the barrenmountains afford an asylum to independent and savage tribes. In theequinoctial regions of America, where ever verdant savannahs rise abovethe region of the clouds, the Cordilleras alone are inhabited by polish-ed tribes; the first advances in science were there coeval with theextraordinary institutions by no means favourable to individualliberty. We perceive in the New World, as in Asia and Africa, variouscentres whence spread an original civilization, whose mutual relations,however, we are as incapable of discovering as those of Meröe, Tibet,and China. Mexico derived its civilization from a more northern re-gion. In South America it was the extensive structures of Tiahuana-ko that furnished the models of those monuments which the Incaserected at Coutzko. Ramparts of considerable extent, bronze weapons,and engraved stones found in the vast plains of Upper Canada, inFlorida, and in the wilds bounded by the Oronoko, Cassiquaire, andGuainia, attest that these regions now traversed only by hordes ofsavage hunters were once the abode of nations who had made someproficiency in the arts. The unequal distribution of the different species of brute animalsover the earth, had a powerful influence on the condition of nations,and on their more or less rapid progress in civilization. In the OldWorld, it was the pastoral life that formed the link between the hunterand the husbandman. The ruminating animals, so easily naturalizedin every climate, were the companions of the African Negro, as wellas of the Mongols, the Malays, and Caucasian race. Now, thoughseveral quadrupeds, and very numerous species of vegetables, are |554| common to the northernmost parts of both worlds, yet the only kindsof horned cattle possessed by America are the buffalo and the bison,two varieties which it is very difficult to domesticate, and the femalesof which, notwithstanding the richness of the pastures, yield but littlemilk. The American hunter, therefore, was not prepared, by the careof flocks and herds, and the occupations of a pastoral life, for the pur-suits of agriculture. Never did the inhabitants of the Cordilleras at-tempt to milk the lama, alpaca, or guanaco; and milk diet was form-erly as unknown to the Americans, as it is to many of the tribes ofeastern Asia. There is no instance of the savage living in the forests of the temperatezone, having voluntarily exchanged the chase for agriculture. Thistransition, the most important and the most difficult in the history ofhuman society, cannot be effected but by compulsory means. Whenin their great migrations troops of hunters, persecuted by other war-rior hordes, reach the plains of the equinoctial zone, the impenetrablecloseness of the woods, and the luxuriant growth of the vegetablespecies, produce an essential change in their character and way oflife. Between the Oronoko, Ukajale, and the river of Amazons, thereare tracts where man finds scarcely any thing but streams and lakes.Here on the banks of the rivers, even the most savage inhabitants sur-round their huts with the fig of Paradise, the jatropha tree, and someother vegetables, which contribute to their subsistence. Neither historical facts nor popular tradition record that any con-nexion ever subsisted between the South American nations and thosedwelling to the north of the isthmus of Panama. The annals of theMexican empire seem to go back to the sixth century of our æra.They state the periods of the migrations which took place, the causeswhich occasioned them, the names of the leaders belonging to theillustrious family of the Citins who conducted northern tribes from theunknown regions of Aztlan and Teocolhuacan to the plains of Anahuac.The founding of Tenochtilan happens like that of Rome in the heroicage, and it is only from the 12th century that the Aztekian chronicles,like those of the Chinese and Tibetians, contain the almost uninter-rupted record of the secular festivals, the succession of the kings, thetributes imposed upon the conquered, the foundation of cities, meteo-rological phenomena, and many trivial incidents which have an influ-ence on society in infant states. But though no traditions denote any immediate connexion betweenthe nations of the two grand divisions of America, their history on theother hand exhibits striking coincidences in the political and religiousrevolutions which led to the civilization of the Aztekes, Muyscas andPeruvians. Bearded men of a lighter complexion than the natives ofAnahuac, Cundinamarca, and the plain of Couzco, make their appear-ance, without its being known from what country they come. As highpriests, legislators, friends of peace, and of the arts and sciences,which it promotes, they accomplish a change in the state of the na-tions, from whom they experience a respectful reception. Quetzal-coat, Bochica, and Mango Capac, are the sacred names of thesemysterious beings. Quetzalcoat comes in black priestly attire fromPanuco and the shores of the Mexican Gulf: Bochica, the Buddha of |555| the Muyscas appears on the elevated plains of Bogota advancing fromthe savannahs situated on the east side of the Cordilleras. The historyof these lawgivers is full of marvellous stories, religious fictions, andsuch circumstances as betray an allegorical meaning. Some scholarshave conjectured that these foreigners might have been shipwreckedEuropeans, or descendants of the Scandinavians, who as early as the11th century visited Greenland, Newfoundland, and perhaps evenNova Scotia; but the slightest reflection on the period of the firstToltekian emigrations, on the monastic institutions, the religious sym-bols, the calendar and the forms of the monuments of Cholula, Soga-mozo, and Couzco, will lead to the conviction that the codes of Quet-zalcoat, Bochica, and Mango Capac, could not possibly derive theirorigin from the north of Europe. Every thing, on the contrary, seemsto point to eastern Asia, and to people connected with the Tibetians,the Shamanists, the Tartars, and the bearded Ainos of the islands ofJesso and Sachalin. When I employ the terms—Monuments of the New World—progressin the imitative arts—cultivation of the understanding, in my inquiries respecting America, it is by no means my intention to denote a stateof things which is rather vaguely denominated a higher degree of cul-ture and civilization. Nothing is more difficult than to institute com-parisons between nations who have advanced by different roads to so-cial improvement. The Mexicans and Peruvians must not be judgedby such principles as are deduced from the history of the nations ofwhom our studies are continually reminding us. They differ fromthe Greeks and Romans in the same ratio as they resemble theEtruscans and Tibetians. The theocratic government of the Peruviansfavoured on the one hand the progress of industry, public works, and,if I may be allowed the expression, whatever relates to civilization ingeneral and in mass: on the other hand it prevented the developmentof individual energies. Among the Greeks it was just the reverse,and till the time of Pericles the free and rapid mental development ofindividuals bore no proportion to the slow advance of national cultiva-tion. The empire of the Incas might be likened to a vast monasticinstitution, in which every member had prescribed to him what he wasto do for the general benefit. Whoever makes himself acquainted onthe spot with those Peruvians, who for ages retained their nationalphysiognomy without alteration, will be enabled duly to appreciatethe code of Mango Capac and its influence on morals and the publicweal. There was general prosperity, but no individual happiness;resignation to the will of the sovereign usurped the place of patriotism;for great enterprizes there was patient obedience, but no genuinecourage; a spirit of order, which by petty laws for regulating the con-duct in the most indifferent transactions, extinguished at once all free-dom of thought and all greatness of character. The most complicatedof all political institutions recorded in history had nipped the bud ofindividual liberty; and the founder of the empire of Couzco, whoflattered himself that he should render men happy through restraint,in fact transformed into mere machines. The Peruvian theocracywas indeed less oppressive than the government of the Mexican |556| monarch, but both contributed essentially to impart to the monu-ments the religious worship and mythology of these mountaineers thatdismal and gloomy air, which forms so striking a contrast with thearts and the pleasing fictions of the people of Greece.