But their crimes,
which justly provoked the anger of heaven, could not justify the
cruelty of their European enemies, in whom avarice seemed to have
extinguished the sentiments both of humanity and religion. The
missionary priests endeavored in vain to put a stop to the outrages
of their countrymen; and the Dominicans carried repeated complaints
against them to the kings of Spain. At their remonstrances,
Ferdinand, king of Castile, declared the Indians free, and forbade
the Spaniards to employ them in carrying burdens, or to use a stick
or whip in chastising them. The emperor, Charles V., was prevailed
upon to send into America severe orders and regulations in their
favor, but to very little effect. The officers, who assumed the
haughty titles of conquerors of Mexico and Peru, would not be
controlled. Bartholomew de las Casas, a Dominican, and bishop of
Chiapa, in New Spain, made four fruitless voyages into Castile to
plead the cause of the poor Indians; he obtained ample rescripts
from the king, and was constituted by him protector-general of the
Indians in America. But these expedients proved too weak against men
that were armed. He therefore resigned his bishopric into the hands
of the pope, in 1551, and returned into the convent of his order at
Valhutolid; where he wrote his books, On the Destruction of the
Indians by the Spaniards, and On the Tyranny of the Spaniards in the
Indies, both dedicated to king Philip II. The archbishop of Seville,
and the universities of Salamanca and Alcala, forbade the impression
of the answers which some wrote to defend the Spanish governors, on
principles repugnant to the law of nature and of nations. These
books of las Casas, being translated into French, were scattered
among the people in the Low Countries, who had taken up arms against
the Spaniards, and animated them exceedingly in their revolt. But
the crimes of some ought not to be imputed to a nation: and the same
country which gave birth to some monsters was most fruitful in
saints, and produced the most zealous apostles and defenders of the
Indians. The great principle which las Casas defended in the
emperor's council, and in his writings, was, that the conquered
Indians could not, without injustice, be made slaves to the
Spaniards, which the king's council and the divines agreed to with