5 8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



ity, lie insisted that it might "be divine revelation, notwithstanding 

 its immediate source. He said that if God made Balaam's ass 

 speak, it would also be easy for him to provide that the heathen 

 should give correct instruction. The non-existence of Satan is 

 not demonstrable ; so it may be well to examine into subjects on 

 which we have knowledge, such as geology and astronomy. It 

 appears from bricks in palaces at Nineveh that the Mosaic cosmol- 

 ogy was also obtained from the same source as the Satanic doctrine. 

 Any revelation on the subject would in order of time have been 

 given to, and according to all evidence was promulgated by, the 

 cultured Assyrians, not the ignorant captives. The priority, 

 however, is of little moment, as the revolving dish-cover theory, 

 whether as originally noted on clay or on rolls of sheep-skin, is 

 now obsolete. All dependence on revelations practically means that 

 those suiting us are true and all others false. When judgment 

 upon the truth or falsehood of an alleged revelation can be made 

 in accordance with the prejudices of the judge, the subject be- 

 comes too eclectic and elastic to be considered by science, or indeed 

 by common sense. 



The scope of anthropology is to study within the category of 

 humanity. If theology comes from man's conceptions, it is em- 

 braced in anthropology. If theology is of divine origin, anthro- 

 pology may discuss what men think and do about it. But the 

 truth or falsity of revelation can not be dealt with in this ad- 

 dress. To raise that point acts as a cloture, cutting off all debate. 



Religious Opinions. Religious writers have often explained 

 the differences in beliefs among the various peoples of the world 

 on the hypothesis that true religious knowledge was implanted at 

 one time in the ancestors of all those peoples, and that the diver- 

 gence now found is through decay of that supernatural informa- 

 tion. The early missionaries to America, of all denominations, 

 were imbued with this dogma and sought, and therefore found, 

 evidences of the one primeval faith. Sometimes they limited them- 

 selves to the similar beliefs of the Indians and the Israelites, but 

 often they passed beyond that stage to locate the vestiges of Chris- 

 tianity. These they said came by the hands of Christian pre- 

 Columbian visitors, and one explanation was by the importation 

 of the apostle Thomas. The coincidences found were exagger- 

 ated, but when facts were opposed they were not less satisfactory, 

 as the adverse power of Satan then appeared. Such mental prede- 

 termination nearly destroys the value of those missionary accounts. 



The most generally entertained parallel between the Indians 

 and the Israelites, repeated by hundreds of writers, was that they 

 both believed in one overruling God. This consensus, if true, 

 would at once establish a beatific bridge of union between the two 

 peoples, but its iris arch vanishes as it is viewed closely. 



