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Is it possible that a plant of this kind could have been cultivated for
this immense period of time in both Asia and America? Where are the two
nations, agricultural and highly civilized, on those continents by whom
it was so cultivated? What has become of them? Where are the traces of
their civilization? All the civilizations of Europe, Asia, and Africa
radiated from the Mediterranean; the Hindoo-Aryans advanced from the
north-west; they were kindred to the Persians, who were next-door
neighbors to the Arabians (cousins of the Phoenicians), and who lived
along-side of the Egyptians, who had in turn derived their civilization
from the Phoenicians.
It would be a marvel of marvels if one nation, on one continent, had
cultivated the banana for such a vast period of time until it became
seedless; the nation retaining a peaceful, continuous, agricultural
civilization during all that time. But to suppose that two nations could
have cultivated the same plant, under the same circumstances, on two
different continents, for the same unparalleled lapse of time, is
supposing an impossibility.
We find just such a civilization as was necessary, according to Plato,
and under just such a climate, in Atlantis and nowhere else.
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