Part 4

That this race has dwelt on the continent long centuries before the Christian era, all facts testify. If they are not older as a people, than most of the present nations on the Asiatic shores of the Indian ocean, as has been suggested, they are certainly anterior in age, to the various groups of the Polynesian islands. They have, it is apprehended, taken the impress of their character and mental ideocracy from the early tribes of Western Asia, which was originally peopled, to a great extent, by the descendants of Shem. These fierce tribes crowded each other, as one political wave trenches on another, till they have apparently traversed its utmost bounds. How they have effected the traject here, and by what process, or contingency, are merely curious questions, and can never be satisfactorily answered. The theory of a migration by Behring's straits, is untenable. If we could find adequate motives for men to cross thence, we cannot deduce the tropical animals. We cannot erect a history from materials so slender. It may yield one element of population; but we require the origin of many. But while we seek for times and nations, we have the indubitable evidences of the general event or events in the people before us, and we are justified by philology alone, in assigning to it an epoch or epochs, which are sufficiently remote and conformable to the laws of climate, to account for all the phenomena. No such epoch seems adequate this side of the final overthrow of Babylon, or general dispersion of mankind, or the period of the conquest of Palestine. One singular and extraordinary result, in the fulfilment of a very ancient prophecy of the human family, may be noticed. It is this. Assuming the Indian tribes to be of Shemitic origin, which is generally conceded, they were met on this continent, in 1492, by the Japhetic race, after the two stocks had passed round the globe by directly different routes. Within a few years subsequent to this event, as is well attested, the humane influence of an eminent Spanish ecclesiastic, led to the calling over from the coasts of Africa, of the Hamitic branch. As a mere historical question, and without mingling it in the slightest degree with any other, the result of three centuries of occupancy, has been a series of movements in all the colonial stocks, south and north, by which Japhet has been immeasurably enlarged on the continent, while the called and not voluntary sons of Ham, have endured a servitude, in the wide stretching vallies of the tents of Shem.[16]

[16] Genesis, 9. 27.

Such are the facts which lend their interest to the early epoch of our history. They invite the deepest study. Every season brings to our notice some new feature, in its antiquities, which acts as a stimulus to thought and inquiry. It is evident that there is more aliment for study and scrutiny in its obscure periods, than has heretofore been supposed. Vestiges of art are found, which speak of elder and higher states of civilization, than any known to the nomadic or hunter states. And the great activity which marks the present state of antiquarian and philological inquiry, in the leading nations of Europe, adds deeply to our means and inducements to search out the American branch of the subject. Man, as he views these results, gathers new hopes of his ability to trace the wandering footsteps of early nations over the globe. There is a hope of obtaining the ultimate principles of languages and national affinities. Already science and exact investigation have accomplished the most auspicious and valuable results. The spirit of research has enabled us to unlock many secrets, which have remained sealed up for centuries. History has gleaned largely from the spirit of criticism; Ethnology has already reared a permanent monument to her own intellectual labors, and promises in its results, to unravel the intricate thread of ancient migration, and to untie the gordian knot of nations. Shall we not follow in this path? Shall we not emulate the labors of a Belzoni, a Humboldt, and a Robinson?