Chap. I.] THEIR RELIGIOUS BELIEF. 39 



The religious belief of the Algonquins — and 

 the remark holds good, not of the Algonquins only, 

 but of all the hunting tribes of America — is a 

 cloudy bewilderment, where we seek in vain for 

 system or coherency. Among a primitive and sav- 

 age people, there were no poets to vivify its images, 

 and no priests to give distinctness and harmony to 

 its rites and symbols. To the Indian mind, all 

 nature was instinct with deity. A spirit was em- 

 bodied in every mountain, lake, and cataract ; every 

 bird, beast, or reptile, every tree, shrub, or grass- 

 blade, was endued with mystic influence ; yet this 

 untutored pantheism did not exclude the conception 

 of certain divinities, of incongruous and ever shift- 

 ing attributes. The sun, too, was a god, and the 

 moon was a goddess. Conflicting powers of good 

 and evil divided the universe : but if, before the 

 arrival of Europeans, the Indian recognized the ex- 

 istence of one, almighty, self-existent Being, the 

 Great Spirit, the Lord of Heaven and Earth, the 

 belief was so vague and dubious as scarcely to de- 

 serve the name. His perceptions of moral good 

 and evil were perplexed and shadowy ; and the be- 

 lief in a state of future reward and punishment 

 was by no means universal.^ 



Of the Indian character, much has been written 

 foolishly, and credulously beHeved. By the rhap- 

 sodies of poets, the cant of sentimentalists, and the 



a quantity of snakes ; and the latter faUing to the earth, caused the 

 appearance of hghtning. " Voila une philosophie bien nouvelle ! " 

 exclaims the astonished Jesuit. 



1 Le Jeune, Schoolcraft, James, Jarvis, Charlevoix, Sagard, Bre'beuf, 

 Mercier, Vimont, Lallemant, Lafitau, De Smet, &c. 



