According to the well-authenticated legend of the martyrdom of Saint Lawrence, the Saint, as he lay upon the grid-iron, conscious that he had been sufficiently done on one side, begged the cooks, if it were a matter of indifference to them, to turn him on the other. Common humanity demanded compliance with so reasonable a request. We fancy that we hear Mr. Wilson, preferring a similar petition; and we hope we are too good-natured to be insensible to the appeal. We cannot, at this moment, indeed, think of him otherwise than good-naturedly. With many things in his book we have been highly pleased. The number, the novelty, and the variety of his blunders have given us a very favorable impression of his ingenuity, and have afforded us constant entertainment in what we feared was to be a drudgery and a task. We had intended to cull some of these beauties for the amusement of our readers and the personal gratification of Mr. Wilson himself. But, as children, gathering shells on the sea-shore, resign, one after another, the treasures which they have collected, and grasp at newer, and, therefore, more pleasing specimens, which are abandoned in their turn, so we, finding our stores accumulate beyond our means of transportation, and tantalized by a richness that made the task of selection an impossible one, have been forced to relinquish the prize and come away with empty hands. If there be, in the compass of what the author calls "these volumes,"—though to us, perhaps from inability to distinguish between unity and duality, his work appears to be comprised in a single tome,—a sentence decently constructed, a foreign name correctly spelt, a punctuation-mark rightly placed, a fact clearly and accurately stated, or an argument that is not capable of an easy reduction to the absurd, we have not been so unfortunate as to discover it. Mr. Wilson is a man who, to use Carlyle's favorite expression, has "swallowed all formulas." The principles that have generally been held to govern the use of language appear to him mere arbitrary rules, invented by the "sevenfold censorship" and the Spanish Inquisition, for the purpose of preventing the free communication of ideas. All such trammels he rejects; and, accordingly, we have to thank him, so far as mere style is concerned, for an uninterrupted flow of pleasure in the perusal of his book, adorned as it is with "graces" that are very far indeed "beyond the reach of Art."
We come now to those important questions which Mr. Wilson was not, indeed, the first to agitate, but which he has awakened from their profound slumbers in the bosom of the Hon. Lewis Cass and the pages of the "North American Review." We are not to be tempted into writing another "New History of the Conquest of Mexico"; but we shall endeavor to state with clearness those points on which the world has had the temerity to differ from the "high authorities" we have named. It has been, then, commonly asserted, and is, we fear, by the great mass of our readers still superstitiously believed, that, at the time of the discovery of this continent, there existed, in certain portions of it, nations not wholly barbarous, and yet not civilized, according to our notions of that term,—nations which had regular governments and systems of polity, many correct notions in regard to morals, and some acquaintance with Art and with the refinements of life,—but which were yet, in a great measure, ignorant of the true principles of science, little skilled in mechanics, and addicted to the practice of idolatrous rites. This assertion would seem to have some primâ-facie evidence in its favor. The regions in which these nations are said to have existed lie within the tropics; and it is a well-established principle, that a genial climate, a fertile soil, the consequent facilities for obtaining a subsistence, and the stimulus thus given to the increase of population, are the first elements of an advance from a savage to a civilized state, of the abandonment of rude freedom and nomadic habits, and of the development of a regular social system. This principle is clearly set forth and elaborately illustrated by Mr. Buckle; and we the more readily refer to this author, because he stands high in the esteem of Mr. Wilson, who, in order to prove his own especial fitness for historical composition, and the incompetence of all who have preceded him in the attempt, refers to a passage in Buckle, containing an enumeration of the qualifications which he considers indispensable for the historian. This enumeration includes all the attainments that have ever been in the common possession of the human family. Mr. Buckle remarks, with indisputable truth, that one historian has lacked some of these qualifications, another historian has lacked others of them. Mr. Wilson states that "each and every writer" who has preceded him has lacked them all. Mr. Buckle, by implication, excepts one person, as uniting in himself all the qualifications he demands. Mr. Wilson thinks he is the exception; but we are quite sure that the exception intended by the author was—Henry Thomas Buckle.
In the Old World, civilization, as all admit, had its origin in tropical regions. Across the whole extent of the Eastern Continent, races are found inhabiting the warmer latitudes, which are now, or formerly were, in what is popularly called a semi-civilized condition. No one, we believe, has ever been foolish enough to account for this fact by supposing that a single people or tribe, having attained some degree of culture, had diffused the germs of knowledge over so large a portion of the globe. Chinese civilization differs almost as much from that of Hindostan as from that of England or of France. The Assyrian civilization was indigenous on the borders of the Euphrates, and the Egyptian on the borders of the Nile. What is remarkable in these and in all the other cases that might be cited is, that in those regions civilization never reached the high point which it has attained in other parts of the world, less favored at the outset; that it exhibited a grotesque union of refined ideas and strangely artificial institutions, with customs, manners, and creeds that seem to the European mind abhorrent and ridiculous; and that, the internal impulse with which it started having been exhausted, it either remained stationary, without further development, or sank into decay, or fell before the hostile attacks of races that had never yielded to its influence. Now the civilization which is described as having once existed in America exhibits these general characteristics, while it has, like each of the others, its own peculiar traits. If the discoverers had made a different report, we might have been led to suppose that some such state of things as we have described had previously existed, but had perished before their arrival.
Mr. Wilson, however, does not reason in this manner. He has found, from his own observation,—the only source of knowledge, if such it can be called, on which he is willing to place much reliance,—that the Ojibways and Iroquois are savages, and he rightly argues that their ancestors must have been savages. From these premises, without any process of reasoning, he leaps at once to the conclusion, that in no part of America could the aboriginal inhabitants ever have lived in any other than a savage state. Hence he tells us, that, in all statements regarding them, everything "must be rejected that is inconsistent with well-established Indian traits." The ancient Mexican empire was, according to his showing, nothing more than one of those confederacies of tribes with which the reader of early New England history is perfectly familiar. The far-famed city of Mexico was "an Indian village of the first class,"—such, we may hope, as that which the author saw on his visit to the Massasaugus, where, to his immense astonishment, he found the people "clothed, and in their right minds." The Aztecs, he argues, could not have built temples, for the Iroquois do not build temples. The Aztecs could not have been idolaters or offered up human sacrifices, for the Iroquois are not idolaters and do not offer up human sacrifices. The Aztecs could not have been addicted to cannibalism, for the Iroquois never eat human flesh, unless driven to it by hunger. This is what Mr. Wilson means by the "American standpoint"; and those who adopt his views may consider the whole question settled without any debate.
But there are some slight difficulties to be overcome, before we can embrace these views. Putting human testimony aside, there are witnesses of the past that still give their evidence to the fact, that parts of this continent were once inhabited by races who had other pursuits besides hunting and fishing, and whose ideas and manners differed widely from those of the "red men" of the North. Ruined cities, defaced temples, broken statues,—relics such as on the Eastern Continent, from the Straits of Gibraltar to the shores of the Ganges, mark the sites of fallen empires and extinct civilizations,—relics such as we should have expected, from a priori reasoning, to meet with in the corresponding latitudes of the New World,—lie scattered through their whole extent, proclaiming themselves the works of men who lived in settled communities and under regular forms of government, who had some knowledge of architecture and some rude notions of the beautiful and the sublime, who had strong feelings and vivid conceptions in regard to the agency of supernal powers in the control of human affairs, but who clothed their conceptions in uncouth forms, and worshipped their deities with absurd and debasing rites. Some of these remains being known to Mr. Wilson, on the evidence of the only pair of eyes in the universe which, in his estimation, have the faculty of seeing, he cannot treat them, according to his usual method in such cases, as fabrications of Spanish priests and lying chroniclers. How, then, does he account for them? He unfolds a theory on the subject, which he has stolen from the "monkish chroniclers" whom he treats with so much contempt, and which has long ago been exploded and set aside. He tells us, that these relics have no connection with the history of the American Aborigines,—that they have a different origin and a far greater antiquity,—that they are proofs, not to be gainsaid, of the discovery of this continent, at a very early date, by Phoenician adventurers, and of the establishment, in the regions where they are found, of Phoenician colonies. These ruins, he tells us, were Phoenician temples, these statues are the representations of Phoenician gods. In the comparison of facts by which he endeavors to support this theory, we have been surprised to find him admitting the testimony of other explorers. But they are, it seems, reluctant witnesses. Their inferences from the facts which they have themselves collected are directly opposite to his. "Proving our case," he says, "by such testimony, we have admitted their statement of fact, only rejecting their conclusions." Their proper business, it would appear, was to amass the materials which our author alone was competent to use. He encountered, indeed, a solitary difficulty; but this, in the most astonishing manner, has been removed. "Thus far," he writes, "had we carried the argument, but had here been compelled to stop, for want of further evidence; and the very stereotype plate that at first occupied this page, expressed our regrets that we were not able more completely to identify the Palenque statue as Hercules. At our publishers', however, the eyes of that distinguished Orientalist, the Rev. Mr. Osborn, chanced to fall upon a proof of the American goddess in the fourth note to this chapter, which he at once recognized as Astarte, represented according to an antique pattern. Her head-dress, he insisted, was in the ancient form of the mural crown, without the crescent, the prototype of that worn by Diana of the Ephesians, and so too, he insisted, was her necklace of 'two rows.'" Thus the chain of evidence was complete, and, for once, Mr. Wilson derived assistance from eyes not placed in his own head.
But, whatever distinguished Orientalists may say, undistinguished Occidentalists may be pardoned for inquiring when it was that this stream of Phoenician emigration flowed to the American shores, in what manner such an enormous body of colonists as the hypothesis necessarily supposes were conveyed hither, and what has become of their descendants. With an uncommon indulgence to our weakness of faith, Mr. Wilson condescends to meet these obvious questions. The time he cannot exactly fix; but it was "thousands of years ago,"—"before the time of Moses." To the query in regard to the means of conveyance, he answers, that at that remote period sailing ships were in common use,—as is proved by representations of them found in Egyptian tombs,—although they were afterwards superseded by galleys propelled by oars alone. The reason assigned by Mr. Wilson for this change makes a valuable addition to the stores of Biblical commentary. "The Greeks," he says, "appear to have been selected from their imitative powers, to perpetuate such of the arts and civilization of the elder world, as were to be preserved from that decree of extermination, pronounced by the Almighty against its nations. Commerce had been the chief cause of the total demoralization of antiquity, and of this, they were permitted to preserve only a boat navigation." Coeval with the decline of commerce and the extermination of sailing ships was the cessation of this Phoenician emigration to America. The colonists, having no longer any communication with the mother country, soon dwindled away and perished, in accordance with a well-known law of Nature. "Extinction is the doom of every immigrant population in an uncongenial climate (habitat) when migration ceases to keep up and renew the original stock." The same fate is impending over us. "In our own country various causes have been assigned for the recognized delicacy, which is steadily advancing in what may be called the pure American. The growing smallness of the hands and feet, the shortening of the jawbones, the diminution in the number of the teeth and their rapid decay, are matters of daily comment." In like manner, the Caucasian race is melting away in the colonies of Great Britain, in South Africa, Australia, and the West Indies. "In these uniform consequences the most obtuse cannot fail to recognise the operation of a universal law, whose primary effects are to diminish migration, and whose ultimate results are the extinction of the exotic population." We suppose none of our readers are obtuse enough not to be aware of the gradual shortening of their jawbones, a phenomenon especially noticeable in members of Congress and popular lecturers. As for the diminution in the number of our teeth, and their rapid decay, we need, alas! no Wilson to remind us of these melancholy facts.
What we may call the physical evidence in favor of the Aztec civilization having been thus disposed of by Mr. Wilson, we come now to his treatment of the written and traditional testimony, the accounts that have been handed down to us of the Spanish conquest of Mexico, and of the condition of the country at the time when that conquest was made. Mr. Wilson opens his "Chapter Preliminary" with the statement, that, "in this work, the standard Spanish authorities have been followed as long as they followed the truth." This declaration excited, we confess, painful misgivings in our mind; for, if Mr. Wilson was already in possession of the truth, independently of historical research,—whether by communications from the spirits of the Conquistadores, or by any other of the easy and popular methods of solving obscure problems,—what need was there of his consulting the standard authorities at all? But we were somewhat cheered, when, a little farther on, we found him stating, that the writer who enters into these discussions must "con musty folios innumerable"; that "it will not do to denounce in general terms the venerable precedents [?] so constantly quoted by our annalists," but that "their defects and their errors must be shown in detail." For it does appear to us, that, if a great historical question is to be opened,—if a series of extraordinary events, hitherto believed by the world to have really happened, are to be denounced as fabulous,—if numerous writers, whose statements and relations have been regarded in the main as worthy of credit, are now to be rejected as liars and impostors,—it is indispensable that the works containing these relations should be carefully examined, that the statements should be compared and subjected to the severest scrutiny, and that the refutation should proceed, step by step, inch by inch, over the whole field of debate. Has Mr. Wilson taken this course? Has he met with clear and resolute argument the accounts which he denounces as "fabrications"? Has he diligently and carefully examined the "standard Spanish authorities"? Has he "conned musty folios innumerable"? Has he read all the works in question? Has he ever seen them?
We may divide these works into three classes,—not with reference to their different degrees of merit and importance, but as regards their accessibility and the relative ease with which they may be consulted. The first class comprises two or three works which have been translated into English; and these translations may be procured with facility and read by any one who has some acquaintance with the English language, though not acquainted with any other. In the second class we may place a considerable number of works which have been published indeed, but only in the original Spanish, or, in a few instances, in French or Italian translations. Some of them are rare, and difficult to meet with; others may be found in several of our best libraries. The third class embraces relations and documents which have never been translated, which have never been published, of which the originals repose in the Spanish archives at Simancas or the Escorial, or in private collections, jealously guarded, in Mexico or Madrid, and of which the only copies known to exist in this country are in the collection formed, with so much trouble and at so great cost, by Mr. Prescott. Now the writings which come under our first category Mr. Wilson has both seen and read,—to what purpose and with what profit we shall hereafter show. The publications comprised in the second class we feel very confident he has never read. The manuscripts, which come under the last head, we are morally certain he has never seen. That he has not seen them is capable of the strongest proof, short of absolute demonstration. That he had no acquaintance with Mr. Prescott's collection is a matter within our personal knowledge. Had he been in a position to obtain copies for himself, and had he availed himself of that circumstance, he would not have failed to proclaim the fact in his loudest and shrillest tones. Nor does he pretend that he has ever visited Spain, and had access to the originals. Indeed, we do not think he would have ventured upon such a step. He tells us, that, "besides the reasons already given for distrusting the correctness of Spanish statements, there is another, more secret in character, but not less potent than all combined—fear of incurring the displeasure of that tribunal which punished unbelief with fire, torture, and confiscation." If Mr. Wilson, as his language implies, stands in fear of "fire, torture, and confiscation," and if this is his most potent reason for distrusting the correctness of Spanish statements, we can readily understand why he should have chosen to remain on his native soil and write the history of the Conquest of Mexico from "the American stand-point." Lastly, Mr. Wilson makes no allusions to matter contained in the manuscripts which had not been reproduced in the pages of Prescott. He is careful, indeed, to tell us very little of the contents of these works; but he talks about them with the most gratifying candor, and in his choicest phraseology. He informs us, that "Sarmiento's History of the Peruvian Incas altogether surpasses that of Dr. Johnson's Rasselas and the Happy Valley." The history of Dr. Johnson's "Rasselas" is related, we believe, by Boswell. The great moralist composed his beautiful and philosophical, but somewhat gloomy romance, in the evenings of a single week, in order to obtain the means of defraying the expenses of his mother's funeral. The story is a touching one; but Mr. Wilson's comparison is so inapt, that we cannot help suspecting him of having had in his mind, not the history of Johnson's "Rasselas," but Johnson's history of Rasselas. We think it rather hard, that, having, in general, such a limited amount of meaning to express, Mr. Wilson should have followed the maxim of Talleyrand, and employed language chiefly as a means of concealing his thoughts.
Mr. Wilson nowhere asserts, in so many words, that he has had access to manuscript authorities. His mode of speaking of them, however, implies as much, and he evidently intends that this inference should be drawn by his readers. In a printed note, addressed to his publishers, disclaiming any intention of "assailing the memory of the dead,"—a disclaimer which was not needed to suggest the reason why his book, loaded with typographical blunders, was hurried through the press,[A]—he "insists on the lawyer's privilege of sifting the evidence—a labor which Mr. Prescott was incapable of performing, from a physical infirmity"; and he undertakes to prove that Mr. Prescott's "books and manuscripts were not reliable authorities." Now even "the lawyer's privilege" does not extend to sifting evidence which he has never heard; and if Mr. Prescott was "incapable, from a physical infirmity," of properly scrutinizing his authorities, it was the more necessary that Mr. Wilson, with his own wonderful eyes, should undertake the task. There is one manuscript which he might be supposed to have had a strong desire to examine. His book professes to be a vindication of "Las Casas' denunciations of the popular historians" of the Conquest. The work of Las Casas, supposed to contain these denunciations, is his History of the Indies. Mr. Wilson acknowledges that he has never seen this work; it has, he says, "been wholly suppressed"; and he is terribly severe on the censorship and the Inquisition for having been guilty of this suppression. But the only suppression in the case is, that the book has never been printed. The original manuscript may be consulted at Madrid. A copy of the most important parts of it is in Mr. Prescott's collection. Mr. Wilson might have seen that copy, had he expressed the wish. He did not, however, give himself this trouble; and we think he was right. The truth is, that, of all the Spanish historians of the Conquest of Mexico, Las Casas is the one who has indulged most largely in hyperbole. Writing, with little personal knowledge, in support of a theory which required him to magnify the ruin accomplished by the Conquistadores, he has exaggerated the population of the Mexican empire, the number and size of its towns, and the evidences of its civilization. It was on this very account that Navarrete, who examined the work with a view to its publication, came to the decision not to print it. We have little doubt as to the propriety of that decision; and Mr. Wilson, we think, also did well in sticking to Cass and "suppressing" Las Casas.[B]
[Footnote A: Author, compositor, and proof-reader were evidently engaged in a "stampede,"—the (Printer's) Devil having strict orders to make seizure of the hindmost. Part of a Spanish poem, borrowed, without acknowledgment, from Prescott, seems to have gone to "pie" on the imposing-stone, and been suffered to remain in that state.]