tanding the agreements to that effect
actually existing at the time. Disputes without end arose between
Portugal and Spain concerning the colonies adjoining to the Rio de la
Plata, and it was especially stipulated that no other power,
particularly England, should be allowed to form settlements there on
account of the facilities such settlements might afford for smuggling
the precious metals out of the country. These had now become the first
object in Brazil. St. Paul's had been erected into a city, and the
district of the mines had been formed into a captaincy: the inhabitants
of the coast flocked to the interior, where new towns were daily
springing up; all were desirous of a share in that lottery where the
prizes were so enormous, that the great preponderance of blanks was
overlooked. Great inconvenience must have been felt by the early
adventurers to the mines: for so many hands were employed in searching
for gold, that few remained to cultivate the soil, and provide the
necessaries of life. Yet that insatiable thirst of gold is a stimulus
which has led to useful and to honourable things: it is not the love of
the metal, but the possession of it gives power, and that is the real
object of most men's ambition: it is certainly that of the ambition of
all nations, and this object is held legitimate: we account those base
or wicked who seek the means; we admire those who attain the end. The
philosophic historian and the poet are alike ready to condemn the man
who first dug the ore from the mine: the panegyric in prose and in verse
is lavished on the hero and the patron. But gold furnished the means for
the hero's conquests and the patron's liberality, and gold, or the worth
of gold, is the object of both; whether in the form of continued power,
or of that fame which patronage can bring. Sad indeed has been the waste
of human life in searching for gold: but have all the mines together
consumed more men than the single revolutionary war? And have not the
religious contests among Christians, and their persecutions and
mutilations and burnings cost many more? I would not justify the gold
finders; their actions were horrible, their oppressions atrocious; but
let them have justice: the stimulus was great; urged on by it, they
performed great things, they braved cold, and hunger, and fatigue, and
persecution, and death; they persevered, they opened the way to unknown
lands, they laid the foundations for future civilisation in cou