ing like such structures. There are sufficient remains of
Aztec temples left to show that they were plain in construction, of
pyramidal form, without towers, and that their altars were erected on
the summits in the open air, surrounded by broad platforms.

This pyramid was dedicated to the benevolent god Quetzalcoatl, "the
great, good, and fair god of the Aztecs." Yet, it seemed to have been
considered necessary to sacrifice human life to his godship in a most
sanguinary manner, as was the practice at the great temple of the
capital. We are told that twelve thousand lives were laid at the feet of
Quetzalcoatl in a single year! If this is true (which we very much
doubt), one would say that the advent of Cortez with all his cruelty was
a blessing that came none too soon. No matter how low the type of
Christianity which replaced the murderous devotion of these idolaters,
any change, it would seem, must have been for the better. The frightful
barbarity of the Aztecs is apparently shown by the records of Spanish
priests concerning the sacrificial stone, now preserved in the museum at
the national capital, upon which the victims were bound, their hearts
cut out and laid reverentially thereon, while their bodies were cast
down the declivity of the pyramid to the exultant multitude below, who
cooked and ate them at religious banquets. Even the hateful Inquisition
was an improvement upon this ghastly cannibalism covered up by a cloak
of religious rites.

It was Southey who expressed the opinion in poetic lines that heaven
made blind zeal and bloody avarice its ministers of vengeance against
the Aztec idolaters. Still, the Aztec remains and is the governing race
in Mexico, while the Spaniards as a distinct people have virtually
disappeared.

But we must take the record of these events with a degree of caution.
That fable and history have been indiscriminately mingled by the Spanish
authors is plain enough from the fact that ridiculous miracles are
constantly recorded by them as having actually occurred, which were the
pure invention of the priesthood, designed to influence and awe the
ignorant native race. This reduces us to the unfortunate condition of
being obliged to doubt what may have been historically true. The
Inquisition exercised a censorship over everything designed for
publication, and unless it subserved the interest of that fiendish
institution, it was made to do so, or it was suppressed. These facts
caused Presco