338 FOSSIL MEN. 



were ' ' very religious " because they had an altar to 

 the unknown God; and so in every human heart 

 there is an altar to God as known or unknown, as 

 a father and a friend, or as an equitable ruler. So 

 the missionary can find everywhere some response to 

 the proclamation of Christ, the substitute of sinful 

 man, the Revealer of the will of God, and to the doc- 

 trine of the Divine Spirit, the Comforter, dwelling in 

 and renovating the human soul. Let us not despise 

 this precious testimony to God written by Himself in 

 the heart of man, and let us endeavour to cultivate it 

 to its highest point of Christian spirituality, and to 

 rescue it from the scathing hand of superstition and 

 the frosty breath of materialism. 



My object, as stated in the first chapter of this 

 work, has been to bring the testimony of facts relating 

 to the existing or recently extinct tribes of America, 

 to aid in correction and counteraction of the crude 

 views prevalent among European archgeologists as to 

 the origin and antiquity of the pre-historic men of the 

 caves, gravels, and peats of the Eastern continent. 

 The treatment of the subject has necessarily been 

 meagre and imperfect ; but it will have served its 

 purpose if it has been suggestive of lines of thought 

 in harmony with higher views as to the origin and 

 destinies of men than those which spring from monistic 

 and materialistic hypotheses of the spontaneous evo- 

 lution of consciousness, reason, and morality from 

 merely animal instincts. Perhaps they may also serve 

 to widen our sympathies with the men of all times 



