The order in which the vegetables, animals, and man were formed is the same in both records.

In Genesis (chap. ii., 7) we are told, “And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground.”  The Quiche legend says.  “The first man was made of clay; but he had no intelligence, and was consumed in the water.”

In Genesis the first man is represented as naked.  The Aztec legend says, “The sun was much nearer the earth then than now, and his grateful warmth rendered clothing unnecessary.”

Even the temptation of Eve reappears in the American legends.  Lord Kingsborough says:  “The Toltecs had paintings of a garden, with a single tree standing in the midst; round the root of the tree is entwined a serpent, whose head appearing above the foliage displays the face of a woman.  Torquemada admits the existence of this tradition among them, and agrees with the Indian historians, who affirm that this was the first woman in the world, who bore children, and from whom all mankind are descended.” ("Mexican Antiquities,” vol. viii., p. 19.) There is also a legend of Suchiquecal, who disobediently gathered roses from a tree, and thereby disgraced and injured herself and all her posterity. ("Mexican Antiquities,” vol. vi., p. 401.)

The legends of the Old World which underlie Genesis, and were used by Milton in the “Paradise Lost,” appear in the Mexican legends of a war of angels in heaven, and the fall of Zou-tem-que (Soutem, Satan—­Arabic, Shatana?) and the other rebellious spirits.

We have seen that the Central Americans possessed striking parallels to the account of the Deluge in Genesis.

There is also a clearly established legend which singularly resembles the Bible record of the Tower of Babel.

Father Duran, in his Ms.  “Historia Antiqua de la Nueva Espana,” A.D. 1585, quotes from the lips of a native of Cholula, over one hundred years old, a version of the legend as to the building of the great pyramid of Cholula.  It is as follows: 

“In the beginning, before the light of the sun had been created, this land (Cholula) was in obscurity and darkness, and void of any created thing; all was a plain, without hill or elevation, encircled in every part by water, without tree or created thing; and immediately after the light and the sun arose in the east there appeared gigantic men of deformed stature and possessed the land, and desiring to see the nativity of the sun, as well as his occident, proposed to go and seek them.  Dividing themselves into two parties, some journeyed to the west and others toward the east; these travelled; until the sea cut off their road, whereupon they determined to return to the place from which they started, and arriving at this place (Cholula), not finding the means of reaching the sun, enamored of his light and beauty, they determined to build a tower so high that its summit should reach the sky.  Having collected materials for the purpose, they found