ties practised by the American savages on their
prisoners of war (and war is their chief employment) convey every idea
expressed by the word diabolical, and give a most shocking view of the
degradation of human nature. But what peculiarly completes the character
of the savage is his horrible superstition. In the most distant nations
the savage is, in this respect, the same. The terror of evil spirits
continually haunts him; his God is beheld as a relentless tyrant, and is
worshipped often with cruel rites, always with a heart full of horror
and fear. In all the numerous accounts of savage worship, one trace of
filial dependence is not to be found. The very reverse of that happy
idea is the hell of the ignorant mind. Nor is this barbarism confined
alone to those ignorant tribes whom we call savages. The vulgar of every
country possess it in certain degrees, proportionated to their
opportunities of conversation with the more enlightened. Sordid
disposition and base ferocity, together with the most unhappy
superstition, are everywhere the proportionate attendants of ignorance
and severe want. And ignorance and want are only removed by intercourse
and the offices of society. So self-evident are these positions, that it
requires an apology for insisting upon them; but the apology is at hand.
He who has read knows how many eminent writers,[25] and he who has
conversed knows how many respectable names, connect the idea of
innocence and happiness with the life of the savage and the unimproved
rustic. To fix the character of the savage is therefore necessary, ere
we examine the assertion, that "it had been happy for both the old and
the new worlds if the East and West Indies had never been discovered."
The bloodshed and the attendant miseries which the unparalleled rapine
and cruelties of the Spaniards spread over the new world, indeed
disgrace human nature. The great and flourishing empires of Mexico and
Peru, steeped in the blood of forty millions of their sons, present a
melancholy prospect, which must excite the indignation of every good
heart. Yet such desolation is not the certain consequence of discovery.
And, even should we allow that the depravity of human nature is so great
that the avarice of the merchant and rapacity of the soldier will
overwhelm with misery every new-discovered country, still, are there
other, more comprehensive views, to be taken, ere we decide against the
intercourse introduced by navigation. When w