e weigh the happiness of
Europe in the scale of political philosophy, we are not to confine our
eye to the dreadful ravages of Attila the Hun, or of Alaric the Goth. If
the waters of a stagnated lake are disturbed by the spade when led into
new channels, we ought not to inveigh against the alteration because the
waters are fouled at the first; we are to wait to see the streamlets
refine and spread beauty and utility through a thousand vales which they
never visited before. Such were the conquests of Alexander, temporary
evils, but civilization and happiness followed in the bloody track. And,
though disgraced with every barbarity, happiness has also followed the
conquests of the Spaniards in the other hemisphere. Though the villainy
of the Jesuits defeated their schemes of civilization in many countries,
the labours of that society have been crowned with a success in Paraguay
and in Canada, which reflects upon their industry the greatest honour.
The customs and cruelties of many American tribes still disgrace human
nature, but in Paraguay and Canada the natives have been brought to
relish the blessings of society, and the arts of virtuous and civil
life. If Mexico is not so populous as it once was, neither is it so
barbarous;[26] the shrieks of the human victim do not now resound from
temple to temple, nor does the human heart, held up reeking to the sun,
imprecate the vengeance of Heaven on the guilty empire. And, however
impolitically despotic the Spanish governments may be, still do these
colonies enjoy the opportunities of improvement, which in every age
arise from the knowledge of commerce and of letters--opportunities which
were never enjoyed in South America under the reigns of Montezuma and
Atabalipa. But if from Spanish, we turn our eyes to British America,
what a glorious prospect! Here, formerly, on the wild lawn, perhaps
twice in the year, a few savage hunters kindled their evening fire,
kindled it more to protect them from evil spirits and beasts of prey,
than from the cold, and with their feet pointed to it, slept on the
ground. Here, now, population spreads her thousands, and society appears
in all its blessings of mutual help, and the mutual lights of
intellectual improvement. "What work of art, or power, or public
utility, has ever equalled the glory of having peopled a continent,
without guilt or bloodshed, with a multitude of free and happy
commonwealths; to have given them the best arts of life and gove