p. 87 (Zuñi) The breath is the symbol of life. It also is the means by which spiritual substance communicate and the seat of [impersonal] power or mana. Inhaling is an act of ritual blessing. One inhales from all sacred objects to derive benefit from their mana.
p. 91 (Zuñi) The sense of conflict as the basic principle of life does not dominate man's relation to the universe any more than it dominates man's relation to man. The Promethean theme - man's tragic and heroic struggle against the gods - has no place in Zuñi philosophic speculation. Nor have any of the other concepts of cosmic conflicts which have always absorbed the interest of Asiatic and European philosophers and mystics, the antithesis between good and evil, or between matter and spirit. There is no Satan in Zuñi ideology, and no Christ. The world, then, is as it is, and man's plan in it is what it is. Day follows night and the cycles of the years complete themselves. In the spring the corn is planted, and if all goes well the young stalks grow to maturity and fulfill themselves. They are cut down to serve man for food, but their seeds remain against another planting. So man, too, has his days, and his destined place in life. His road may be long or short, but in time it is fulfilled and he passes on to fill another rôle in the cosmic scheme. He, too, leaves his seed behind him. Man dies but mankind remains. This is the way of life; the whole literature of prayer shows no questioning of these fundamental premises. This is not resignation, the subordination of desire to a stronger force, but the sense of man's oneness with the universe. The conditions controlling human affairs are no more moral issues than those, like the blueness of the sky, to which we may well be indifferent. It is a remarkably realistic view of the universe. It is an attitude singularly free from terror, guilt, and mystery. The Zuñi feels great awe of the supernatural, and definitely fears certain beings in his pantheon - the recently dead, the Koyemci, certain "dangerous" katcinas, but this is quite different from the cosmic terror that crushes many primitive and civilized peoples.
p. 111 (Incas) In this way there were very few cultivable lands that remained desert in the time of the Incas, but all were peopled, as is well known to the first Christians who entered the country. Assuredly, it causes no small grief to reflect that these Incas, being gentiles and idolaters, should have established such good order in the government and maintenance of such vast provinces, while we, being Christians, have destroyed so many kingdoms. For wherever the Christians have passed, discovering and conquering, nothing appears but destruction.
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