This was the primeval religion. It was not
monotheism, for there were many other gods; it was not pantheism, for
there was no blending of the cause with the effects; still less was it
fetichism, an adoration of sensuous objects, for these were recognized
as effects. It teaches us that the idea of God neither arose from the
phenomenal world nor was sunk in it, as is the shallow theory of the
day, but is as Kant long ago defined it, a conviction of a highest and
first principle which binds all phenomena into one.
One point of these legends deserves closer attention for the influence
it exerted on the historical fortunes of the race. The dawn heroes were
conceived as of fair complexion, mighty in war, and though absent for a
season, destined to return and claim their ancient power. Here was one
of those unconscious prophecies, pointing to the advent of a white race
from the east, that wrote the doom of the red man in letters of fire.
Historians have marvelled at the instantaneous collapse of the empires
of Mexico, Peru, the Mayas, and the Natchez, before a handful of Spanish
filibusters.
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