As no solution can be
accepted not equally applicable to the same myth as it appears in
Yucatan, Peru, and the hunting tribes, and to the exactly parallel
teachings of the Edda,[216-2] the Stoics, the Celts, and the Brahmans,
both of these must be rejected. And although the Hindoo legend is so
close to the Aztec, that it, too, defines four ages, each terminating by
a general catastrophe, and each catastrophe exactly the same in
both,[216-3] yet this is not at all indicative of a derivation from one
original, but simply an illustration how the human mind, under the
stimulus of the same intellectual cravings, produces like results. What
these cravings are has already been shown.
The reason for adopting four ages, thus making the present the fifth,
probably arose from the sacredness of that number in general; but
directly, because this was the number of secular days in the Mexican
week. A parallel is offered by the Hebrew narrative. In it six epochs or
days precede the seventh or present cycle, in which the creative power
rests.
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