Note 225 — NEW ENGLISH CANAAN OR NEW CANAAN.

Roger Williams, in the preface to his Key (p. 23), says: “Wise and judicious men, with whom I have discoursed, maintain their [the Indians] original to be northward from Tartaria.” The Asiatic origin of the North American Indians was a necessary part of the scriptural dogma of the origin and descent of man. It is safe, however, to assert that, first and last, every possible theory on this subject has been carefully elaborated. It is not necessary, in connection with the New Canaan, to enter into the discussion, as the views of those, from St. Gregory to Voltaire, who have taken part in it, have been laboriously collected by Drake in his Book of Indians (ch. ii.).