p. 99 | PREHISTORIC ART by Hastings

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Sep 21, 1876

PREHISTORIC ART.

By Hastings

It is surprising to see upon what slender and sandy foundations learned men will proceed to base the most astounding conclusions. Readers are familiar with the notable story of the investigations of those learned savants who studied, theorized, and philosophized concerning the relics of an animal of some long-extinct species, found among the most ancient subterranean strata, and how at last they resolved themselves into the skeleton of a dead donkey which was tumbled into the shaft of a mine to save the trouble of burying him; and in a similar spirit of wonderful research certain old relics and remains are referred to as affording indubitable proof of the existence of extinct races whose customs and manners pertained exclusively to far-off ages; when in fact it may be found that these very primitive forms and relics have their place to-day among the actual scenes of common life. Dr. Arthur Mitchell, a British antiquary, in a course of lectures in Edinburgh, describes a number of ancient customs which still exist in the remoter districts of Scotland.

Dr. Mitchell found at one time a stone-breaker sitting on the roadside eating his dinner out of what seemed to be a sepulchral urn. Closer inspection proved the vessel to be a specimen of hand-made pottery which was in general use in that region. It was made by a woman from clay without especial preparation, shaped by the hand and burned in an open peat-fire, and its porosity corrected by a bowlful of milk being poured over it while still hot. No pottery of “the stone age” or modern savage life, was ruder than this; yet the house in which the woman lived who manufactured this vessel, contained cotton from Manchester, cutlery from Sheffield, pottery from Staffordshire, tea from China and sugar from the West Indies. She was shrewd, intelligent, and well-informed; yet it is possible that some wiseacre, digging on the site of her hut when it had gone to ruin, would find nothing except the pottery of her own rude manufacture, and would conclude that she belonged to a race which lived ages and ages ago, before any modern discoveries had been made, and would offer her old earthen pot in proof of the theory. These and many other palpable and well-authenticated facts should cause men to hesitate a little before they undertake to overturn all faith and hope for this world and the one to come by the alleged discovery of some old bone, or some tomahawk in which they claim to read a history which would doubtless astonish the persons who were familiar with the actual origin of relics upon which their theories are based.—Hastings.