254 FOSSIL MEN. 



the Algonquins ; Okee, or Omaha of tlie Mandans ; 

 or approaching more nearly to the familiar Aryan 

 Theos and Deus, he might be the Teo of the Mexi- 

 cans; but in every case there was a Great Spirit, 

 though there might be multitudes of inferior deities. 

 So in all these religions there was a distinct recogni- 

 tion of immortality and a future life beyond the 

 grave. Let us consider these two doctrines sepa- 

 rately ; and first, that of the existence of a supreme 

 God interesting Himself in human affairs. 



The American deity was not a Hindoo Brahma, 

 isolating himself from all inferior beings. That is a 

 later conception of a degenerate faith. He revealed 

 Himself to men, and it was the general American 

 belief that this took place in dreams, in " thoughts 

 from visions of the night, when deep sleep falleth 

 upon men/' and such revelations were usually made 

 to gifted and chosen men, prophets who had, like 

 Balaam, "their eyes open, and heard the words of 

 God, and saw the vision of the Almighty." The 

 absurdly sounding name, " Medicine men," by which 

 these prophets or Shamans are usually known, seems 

 to be a corruption of the Algonquin word Meda or 

 Medawin, by which their art was designated ; a word 

 which, like many others used by these tribes, has its 

 allies in the Greek and other Indo-European tongues, 

 and may be radically the same with our " medicine." 



That these revelations should relate in great part to 

 the weather, is precisely the same fact which we find in 

 the Pelasgic mythology of Zeus, or the Scandinavian 



