Page:Native Religions of Mexico and Peru.djvu/265

248 it is the Sun that reigns supreme, though not without leaving a very exalted place to other phenomena, such as wind, rain, vegetation and so on, personified as so many special deities. But in all this there is no indication of an antecedent and primitive monotheism. It is quite true that each one of these deities receives in his turn epithets which seem to attribute omnipotence to him and to make him the sole creator. But this is the case in all polytheistic systems, whether in Greece, Persia, and India, or in Mexico and Peru. It only proves that when man worships, he never limits the homage he renders to the object of his adoration; but if he is a polytheist, he has no scruple in attributing the same omnipotence to each of his gods in turn. It is much the same with the worthy curés in our rural districts, whose sermons systematically exalt the saint of the day, whoever he may be, to the chief place in Paradise! And here in Mexico and in Peru, as in Greece and in India, we observe the ever growing tendency towards anthropomorphism, transforming into men, of enormous strength, stature and power, those natural phenomena which at the earlier stage were rather