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Show 'g6o DISSER<f'. v. t..-y-;..J . H I S T 0 R Y•f 0 F M E X I· C 0. the contrary, all the hiftoiians 1o£. Mexico fay una~imoufly, that fuch a vice was held in abomination by thofe nations, and xpake mention of the fevere punilhments prefcribed .by , the laws againft it, as appears from the wotks of Gomara, .Herrer~, Torquemada, Betancourt, and others. Las Cafas, in .his memorial to Charles V ., prefented in r 54;2, attefts, that having made a diligent, enquiry in the Spania1 ifiands, Cuba, Jamaica, and Porto Rico, he foupd there was no memory of fuch a vice among thofe n:1tions. The fame thing he affirms of Peru, Y.ucatan, and all the countries of America in general; in fome one place or other, he fays, there may be fome addiCted to that crime; but he . adds, the whole new world, however, muft not be taxed with. that vice. Who then has authorifed M. de Paw to defame. in a point fo injuriou~, the :vvbole of the new world? Although the Americans were, as he believes, men without honour, and without !hame, the laws of humanity forbid him to calumniate .them. Such is the excefs into which his ridiculous eagernefs to depreciate America leads him, and fuch are the confequences of his unnatural logic, that he conftantly ~deduces .from particular premifes univerfal conclufions ! If poffibly the Panuchefe, or any other people of America, were infeCted with that vice, is it from thence to be affirmed that pederafty was much a vice irn all the new world ? The Americans might as well defame in the fame manner the whole old continent, be~aufe among (orne ancient people of Afi:a and among the Greeks and Romans it was a notorious vice. Befides, it is not known that there is any natio~l at prefent in America infected with that vice; whereas we are inforq1ed by fevernl authors, that fome people of Afia are ftill tainted with it; ai1d that even in Europe, rjf what Mr. Locke and M. de Paw fay is true, among Turks of a certain profeilion, another vice more execrable, of the fame kind, is common ; and that inftend of being feverely punilhed for it, they are held, by that nation, in the light of faints, and receive the highefi: marks of rcfpeCl: and veneration. Amopg(L the c;rimes charged to the Americans by M. de ·Paw fuicide is inclutled • . It is true that at the t,'mes of the conquefi: many hanged thernfelves, or threw themfelves dow.n precipices, or put an end to themfelves by, abftinence; put it is. npt the)eaft wonderful that men v.iho had becor.ne- d~fpe,rate from continual h:~;ra!fment and vexa-tions, H I S T 0 R Y 0 F M E X I c 0 • 'iions, who thought their gods had abandoned, and the elemeilts con~ \ fpired againft them, £hould do that which was frequent with the Ro-mans, the Franks, and ancient Spaniards, the modern Engli01 (x), French, and J apanefe, for a flight motive; for fome falfe idea of honour, or fame caprice of pailion ? Who could perfuade himfclf that a European would reproach the Americans with fuicide in an age in which it is become a daily event in England and France (y), where the juft ideas we have from nature and her religion, are banifi1ed from the mind, and arguments invented, and books publilhed, to vindicate it ? So great is the rage for defaming America and the Americans. A fimilar pailion feems to have affeCted that Spaniard who formed the general Index of the Decads of Herrera, inconfiderately imputing to all the Americans what Herrera fays in his work of fome individuals, with various exceptions. We copy here what we have read in that Index. " The Indians," he fays, "are very fiothful, very full of vices, " great drunkards, by nature lazy, weak, lyars, cheats, fickle, inconfi:ant, " have much levity, cowardly, nafty, mutinous, thievilh, ungrateful, u inexorable, more vindiCtive than any other nation, of fo low a nature, " &c. that it is doubtful if they are rational creatures; barbarous, bef.. " tial, and led like the brutes by their appetites." This is the language of M. de Paw, and other moft humane Europeans ; fo it appears they do not think themfelves obliged to believe the truth with regard to the people of the new world, nor obferve the laws of fraternal charity, publilhed by the fon of their own God in the old world. But it would be eafy for any American of moderate genius, and fome . erudition, who was defirous of retaliating upon thofe authors, to compofe a work with this title, Philofophical Enquiries concerning the Inhabitants of the Old Continent. In imitation of the method purfued by M. d~ Paw, he would collect whatever had been written of the barren countries of the old world, of inacceffible mountains, of marfhy plains, of impenetrable woods, of fandy deferu, and malignant climes; of difguftful and noxious reptiles and infeCl:s, of ferpents, of toads, <~·) We have been informed by a perfon who was at tl1c fame time in London, that a fui~ide Jeft in writing, that he killed himfelf to get free !If the trouble of dreffing and undreffing lum• felf every day. . .. (y} We know in one of thefe lafr years, there have been one hundred an,d fifty fu1c1des com• miued in the city of Paris alone. VoL. II. A a a of , DISSERT. v. -· ! , I |