t of a
serpent.[111-2]

Probably this notion that it was annually rejuvenated led to its
adoption as a symbol of Time among the Aztecs; or, perchance, as they
reckoned by suns, and the figure of the sun, a circle, corresponds to
nothing animate but a serpent with its tail in its mouth, eating itself,
as it were, this may have been its origin. Either of them is more likely
than that the symbol arose from the recondite reflection that time is
"never ending, still beginning, still creating, still destroying," as
has been suggested.

Only, however, within the last few years has the significance of the
serpent symbol in its length and breadth been satisfactorily explained,
and its frequent recurrence accounted for. By a searching analysis of
Greek and German mythology, Dr. Schwarz, of Berlin, has shown that the
meaning which is paramount to all others in this emblem is _the
lightning_; a meaning drawn from the close analogy which the serpent in
its motion, its quick spring, and mortal bite, has to the zigzag course,
the rapid flash, and sudden stroke of the electric discharge. He even
goes so far as to imagine that by this resemblance the serpent first
acquired the veneration of men. But this is an extravagance not
supported by more thorough research. He has further shown with great
aptness of illustration how, by its dread effects, the lightning, the
heavenly serpent, became the god of terror and the opponent of such
heroes as Beowulf, St. George, Thor, Perseus, and others, mythical
representations of the fearful war of the elements in the thunder storm;
how from its connection with the advancing summer and fertilizing
showers it bore the opposite character of the deity of fruitfulness,
riches, and plenty; how, as occasionally kindling the woods where it
strikes, it was associated with the myths of the descent of fire from
heaven, and as in popular imagination where it falls it scatters the
thunderbolts in all directions, the flint-stones which flash when struck
were supposed to be these fragments, and gave rise to the stone worship
so frequent in the old world; and how, finally, the prevalent myth of a
king of serpents crowned with a glittering stone or wearing a horn is
but another type of the lightning.[113-1] Without accepting unreservedly
all these conclusions, I shall show how correct they are in the main
when applied to the myths of the New World, and thereby illustrate how
the red race is of one blood and one fait