219 
resent the injury done them by a people, who 
struck them with terror by such an excess of 
ferocity. The immolated victim is placed 
among the Aztech divinities, under the name 
of Teteionan mother of the gods, or Tocitzin, 
our grandmother ; a divinity which we must not 
confound with Eve, or the serpent-woman, call- 
ed Tonantzin. 
In the Old Continent, wherever we find traces 
of human sacrifices, their origin is lost in the 
night of time. The history of the Mexicans,, 
on the contrary, has handed down to us the 
narrative of events, which have given a fero- 
cious and sanguinary character to the worship 
of a people, among whom animals and first 
fruits were the only primitive offerings. I have 
thought fit to relate these traditions, undoubted- 
ly founded on historical truth : intimately con- 
nected with the study of the manners, and the 
moral improvement of our species, they appear 
to me more interesting, than the puerile tales 
of the Hindoos respecting the numerous in- 
carnations of their divinities. I shall not how- 
ever decide the question, whether the sacrifice 
of the four Xochimilcks was really the first 
offered to the god Mexitli: or whether the 
Aztecks had not preserved some old tradition, 
according to which they imagined, that the god 
* Clavigero, vol. 1, p. 166, 168, 172 j vol. 2, p. 22. 
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