THE HUMAN SPECIES. 183 



both sacred and profane.^ They occur in the traditions of 

 most nations ; and in both hemispheres their physical existence 

 has survived to within late ages ; provided, in considering the 

 question, we reject wild impossibilities and adopt, in their 

 stead, the subdued impressions compatible with the sobriety of 

 nature, reducing them to an admissible stature, and view them 

 more by the brutal ferocity of their manners, coupled with 

 superior physical powers, than as absolute monsters in size 

 and energy. At a period when animal development and mus- 

 cular strength alone gave preeminence, it causes no wonder that 

 the possessors of those qualities should abuse them. They 

 were the source of the first desires of conquest for dominion s 

 sake. They caused nations of more lofty structure, almost all 

 arising among the nomad shepherds of temperate latitudes, — 

 perhaps Shetoe, Kheta, or tribes of milk-eating Scythas, — to 

 wander southward, and establish supremacies over weaker 

 constituted people ; first as conquerors, next as a privileged 

 body, and last, as families, among the subjugated populations, 

 till intermixture, or new conquerors, partially effaced the dif- 

 ference of nationality. Thus, the myrmidons of Achilles may 

 have been identical with the Penestes of Thessaly, the Helots 

 of Sparta, the Charotes of Crete, Gymnetes of Argos, and 

 Conephores of Sicyon, which were all tribes enslaved by 

 foreign conquerors. Thus, with scarce an exception, Giants 

 are ever found in juxtaposition with Dwarfs, who, in reality, 



* The extent of Giant legends is shown, from their having no satisfac- 

 tory interpretation, except in the Scythian (Gothic) mythology ; yet they 

 are interwoven in all the earliest Greek mystical fables, without being 

 intelligible to them. It seems as if there did exist, in Asia Minor, a 

 particular version on this subject, for it is not a Greek mythus which has 

 served the Jewish fabricators of their pretended Book of Enoch, where it 

 treats of the commerce the Egregori, or fallen angels, had with women. 

 The Giants heget Nephilim (Scandinavian Niflem,) and then Eliud 

 (Elfen.) This is almost like the Edda, and may have been forged after 

 the first captivity, when some Jews certainly visited Armenia. See Lac- 

 tam, and Syncell. 



