806 
lthough a little misty and confused, yet still direct evidence of the circum- 
stances mentioned in the account of the Noachian Deluge. But, in speaking 
of these customs, or beliefs, or traditions, or whatever you like to call them, 
among the Mexicans, one circumstance has occurred to my mind which 
affords a reason that I think is almost conclusive against the supposition that 
the New Norld was peopled by any people who were conveyed thither direct 
from the heart of Asia, and that is, that the old Indians never thought it 
necessary to invoke what they termed the Great Spirit in aid of good 
works ; they believed that Spirit to be always ready and willing to act for 
good, and therefore that it was not necessary to propitiate Him or to pray to 
Him in support of anything which they considered to be good. Their 
custom, therefore, was to endeavour to propitiate the bad or evil spirit, to 
engage his good offices in behalf of good works. It is a very singular thing 
that, while men in all Christian countries should address prayers to the Good 
Spirit, praying Him to countenance and help them in all good works, they 
should in America have taken the directly opposite course, and, leaving the 
Good Spirit, should have addressed all their prayers and aspirations to the 
evil one, and should intercede with him not to hinder them in their good 
works. The paper as a whole tends, in my mind, very much to confirm the 
liter a scripta of Holy Writ ; and anything which in the way of scientific in- 
vestigation tends to confirm that must be truly gratifying to inquiring minds. 
It is so much the fashion nowadays to obscure with uncertainties the plain 
words of Holy Writ that if we, by ingenuity of thought and consideration, 
can prove that science is not incompatible with the exact words of Scripture, 
it must be a cheering circumstance to the mind of inquirers. I cannot help 
feeling that such a paper as we have heard read is very acceptable, because 
nothing in the world can be plainer than the 19th verse of the 9th chapter 
of Genesis, in which it is said that the three sons of Noah were Shem, Ham, 
and J aphet, and that from them the whole earth was overspread. (Hear, hear.) 
Professor Macdonald. — I cannot help, in this society, expressing my 
opinion that the existence of different characteristics in the various races of 
mankind is not quite consistent either with the ideas of the writer of the 
paper or of the gentleman who has just sat down. That gentleman has 
referred to the account in the book of Genesis where it is stated that the 
whole earth was peopled by the three sons of Noah. Now I think that 
if clergymen and others were to read the whole of the passage from the 
commencement of Genesis, they would be of opinion that there was a very 
different system of distributing the people throughout the world. It has 
been too much the fashion to accept the interpretation which has been 
placed by the clergy upon the books in the Scriptures, which give an 
account of the distribution of mankind amongst the different nations of the 
earth. It must be remembered that for a very long period of time the 
Scriptures were thought to be the sole property of, and that the right to 
explain them was entirely in the hands of, the Church, and therefore any 
attempt, by the aid of science, to explain them beyond the exact teaching 
of the Church was looked upon as heretical and wrong. Now, I think that 
