197 
bled in the temples ; the confession of sins made- 
by the penitent; those religious associations^, 
similar to our convents of men and women ; the 
universal belief, that white men, with long 
beards and sanctity of manners, had changed 
the religion and political system of nations ; all 
these circumstances had led the priests, who ae*^ 
companied the Spanish army at the time of the 
conquest, to the belief, that at some very distant 
epocha Christianity had been preached in the 
New Continent. Some learned Mexicans^ have 
imagined, that the Apostle St. Thomas was the 
mysterious personage, high priest of Tula, whom 
the Cholulans acknowledged under the name of 
Qiietzalcoatl. It is no way doubtful, that Nes- 
torianism, mingled with the dogmata of the 
Bouddhistes and the Shamans-f-, spread through 
Mantchou Tartary into the north-east of Asia: 
we may therefore suppose, with some appearance 
of reason, that Christian ideas have been com- 
municated by the same means to the Mexican 
nations, especially to the inhabitants of that 
northern region, from which the Toltecks emi- 
grated, and which we must consider as the 
eina virorum of the New World. 
This supposition would be even more admissi- 
* Siguenza, Opera ined. Eguiara, Bibl. Mexicana, p. 78.. 
f Langles, Bitiiel des Tartares Manchoux, p. 9 et 14. 
Georg I Alphab, tibetmiumj p, 298. 
