It is of course idle to compare the civilization of the two continents at that period; widely separated as they were, and each ignorant of the very existence of the other. European society emerged from the barbarism of the dark ages was, according to its interpretation of them, based upon the teachings of the faith of Christ. No such advantages, as yet, had reached the plateau of Anahuac. The most elevating influence shed over its people was from the traditional Quetzalcoatl, whose teachings of mild and gentle manners left a deep and pervading impression. Otherwise, the struggle for life, rude contact with the lower instincts of the less developed with the better informed, gave an always downward tendency to the institutions of their society.
It is all very obscure, now more than ever, because new information is disturbing the accepted theory of Aztec culture given by writers of Mexican history up to nearly the present time. For a true knowledge of early life in Mexico, we must wait till explorers and archæologists have fully established their discoveries by facts. Such an exposition, which is pretty sure to come, will be of great importance to those interested in the future, as well as the past, of the native races of Mexico.
Meanwhile, in a book like this, which is permitted to gather up legend as well as fact, in order to present the attractive, even romantic, side of its subject, it would be a pity to wholly set aside the accounts of the Aztecs, as they have hitherto been given in current history, as worthless and superseded. This would be to leave a gap at the very beginning of authentic story, to take away the lowest step of the ladder we wish to climb. If the "Last of the Montezumas" is to be reduced to a chieftain of a sedentary tribe, we, in this story of Mexico, may regard him as one once invested with the glories of an empire. Our chief object in examining the early periods written of in the preceding chapters, is to gather clear impressions of the character of the people we are reading about. For this end it is of vast importance to know whether the native races now forming a large part of the population of Mexico, are descended from a cultivated line of kings, or whether they merely inherit the manners and customs of illiterate tribes. The reader must for himself create from the stories drawn from Spanish accounts, and evidences given by picture-writings, and the description of monuments and ruins, his own idea of the Aztec character, giving due weight to the substance of the legends about Mexican greatness, while he brushes off with modern ruthlessness the cobwebs which obscure the truth of the story, however brightly they may sparkle, and adorn the tale.
XI.
AZTEC CHARACTER.
It is impossible with our present knowledge to form an estimate of the civilization of the Aztecs at their highest point. The reports given by the Spaniards at the time of the conquests are not to be relied upon, as they paint in the exaggerated colors they thought most likely to give glory to their own achievements. Unfortunately they felt called upon to destroy most of the picture-writings they found, which would have been as valuable in forming an opinion of the manners and customs of the race they depicted, as the volumes we find in European libraries are to enlighten us upon the manners and customs of contemporary races in Europe.
The Aztecs knew no alphabet, but instead of letters they used certain signs or hieroglyphics by which they wrote on every subject—religion, history, geography, poetry, feasts, famines, wars, and the arts of peace. This fashion of writing was handed down from father to son, and taught in colleges or by the priests. The artists who executed the manuscripts were treated with general consideration, and the sovereign even paid them honor. They worked on paper made of the fibre of the maguey, or on linen cloth, with a sort of pen like the stylus of the Romans. The colors were procured from vegetable dyes, in general. They had little variety of tint, but were vivid and permanent.
These paintings, of which several of the small remnant in existence of the great quantity destroyed by the Conquistadores are in the museum at Mexico, are extremely interesting, both as works of art from a point of view entirely different from our European prejudices, and also as recording events with wonderful simplicity and directness.