COLONIZATION AND CHRISTIANITY.
COLONIZATION AND CHRISTIANITY:
A
POPULAR HISTORY
OF THE
TREATMENT OF THE NATIVES
BY THE EUROPEANS
IN ALL THEIR COLONIES.
BY
WILLIAM HOWITT.
Have we not all one father?—hath not one God created us?
Why do we deal treacherously every man against his brother?
_Malachi_ ii. 10.
LONDON:
LONGMAN, ORME, BROWN, GREEN, & LONGMANS.
1838.
LONDON:
PRINTED BY MANNING AND SMITHSON,
IVY-LANE, PATERNOSTER-ROW.
The object of this volume is to lay open to the public the most
extensive and extraordinary system of crime which the world ever
witnessed. It is a system which has been in full operation for more
than three hundred years, and continues yet in unabating activity
of evil. The apathy which has hitherto existed in England upon this
subject has proceeded in a great measure from want of knowledge.
National injustice towards particular tribes, or particular
individuals, has excited the most lively feeling, and the most
energetic exertions for its redress,—but the whole wide field of
unchristian operations in which this country, more than any other, is
engaged, has never yet been laid in a clear and comprehensive view
before the public mind. It is no part of the present volume to suggest
particular plans of remedy. The first business is to make known the
nature and the extent of the evil,—that once perceived, in this great
country there will not want either heads to plan or hands to accomplish
all that is due to the rights of others, or the honour and interest of
England.
_West End Cottage, Esher,
June 8th, 1838._
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I. PAGE
Introduction 1
II.
The Discovery of the New World 11
III.
The Papal Gift of all the Heathen World to the Portuguese
and Spaniards 19
IV.
The Spaniards in Hispaniola 28
V.
The Spaniards in Hispaniola and Cuba 43
VI.
The Spaniards in Jamaica and other West Indian Islands 56
VII.
The Spaniards in Mexico 62
VIII.
The Spaniards in Peru 92
IX.
The Spaniards in Peru—(_continued_) 104
X.
The Spaniards in Paraguay 119
CHAPTER XI.
The Portuguese in Brazil 145
XII.
The Portuguese in Brazil—(_continued_) 158
XIII.
The Portuguese in India 173
XIV.
The Dutch in India 185
XV.
The English in India.—System of Territorial Acquisition 202
XVI.
The English in India—(_continued_).—Treatment of the
Natives 252
XVII.
The English in India.—Treatment of the Natives—
(_continued_) 272
XVIII.
The English in India—(_continued_) 285
XIX.
The English in India—(_concluded_) 298
XX.
The French in their Colonies 312
XXI.
The English in America 330
XXII.
The English in America—Settlement of Pennsylvania 356
XXIII.
The English in America till the Revolt of the Colonies 367
XXIV.
Treatment of the Indians by the United States 386
XXV.
Treatment of the Indians by the United States—
(_continued_) 402
XXVI.
The English in South Africa 417
XXVII.
The English in South Africa—(_continued_) 443
XXVIII.
The English in New Holland and the Islands of the Pacific 469
XXIX.
Conclusion 499
COLONIZATION AND CHRISTIANITY.
CHAPTER I.
These are they, O Lord!
Who in thy plain and simple gospel see
All mysteries, but who find no peace enjoined,
No brotherhood, no wrath denounced on them
Who shed their brethren’s blood! Blind at noon-day
As owls; lynx-eyed in darkness.—_Southey._
Christianity has now been in the world upwards of ONE THOUSAND EIGHT
HUNDRED YEARS. For more than a thousand years the European nations
have arrogated to themselves the title of CHRISTIAN! some of their
monarchs, those of MOST SACRED and MOST CHRISTIAN KINGS! We have long
laid to our souls the flattering unction that we are a civilized and a
Christian people. We talk of all other nations in all other quarters of
the world, as savages, barbarians, uncivilized. We talk of the ravages
of the Huns, the irruptions of the Goths; of the terrible desolations
of Timour, or Zenghis Khan. We talk of Alaric and Attila, the sweeping
carnage of Mahomet, or the cool cruelties of more modern Tippoos and
Alies. We shudder at the war-cries of naked Indians, and the ghastly
feasts of Cannibals; and bless our souls that we are redeemed from all
these things, and made models of beneficence, and lights of God in the
earth!
It is high time that we looked a little more rigidly into our
pretences. It is high time that we examined, on the evidence of facts,
whether we are quite so refined, quite so civilized, quite so Christian
as we have assumed to be. It is high time that we look boldly into the
real state of the question, and learn actually, whether the mighty
distance between our goodness and the moral depravity of other people
really exists. WHETHER, IN FACT, WE ARE CHRISTIAN AT ALL!
Have bloodshed and cruelty then ceased in Europe? After a thousand
years of acquaintance with the most merciful and the most heavenly of
religions, do the national characters of the Europeans reflect the
beauty and holiness of that religion? Are we distinguished by our
peace, as the followers of the Prince of Peace? Are we renowned for
our eagerness to seek and save, as the followers of the universal
Saviour? Are our annals redolent of the delightful love and fellowship
which one would naturally think must, after a thousand years,
distinguish those who pride themselves on being the peculiar and
adopted children of Him who said, “By this shall all men know that
ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another?” These are very
natural, but nevertheless, very awkward questions. If ever there was a
quarter of the globe distinguished by its quarrels, its jealousies, its
everlasting wars and bloodshed, it is Europe. Since these _soi-disant_
Christian nations have risen into any degree of strength, what single
evidence of Christianity have they, as nations, exhibited? Eternal
warfare!—is that Christianity? Yet that is the history of _Christian_
Europe. The most subtle or absurd pretences to seize upon each other’s
possessions,—the contempt of all faith in treaties,—the basest
policy,—the most scandalous profligacy of public morals,—the most
abominable international laws!—are they Christianity? And yet they are
the history of Europe. Nations of men selling themselves to do murder,
that ruthless kings might ravish each other’s crowns—nations of men,
standing with jealous eyes on the perpetual watch against each other,
with arms in their hands, oaths in their mouths, and curses in their
hearts;—are those Christian? Yet there is not a man acquainted with
the history of Europe that will even attempt to deny that _that_ is
the history of Europe. For what are all our international boundaries;
our lines of demarcation; our frontier fortresses and sentinels; our
martello towers, and guard-ships; our walled and gated cities; our
bastions and batteries; and our jealous passports? These are all
barefaced and glaring testimonies that our pretence of Christianity
is a mere assumption; that after upwards of a thousand years of the
boasted possession of Christianity, Europe has not yet learned to
govern itself by its plainest precepts; and that her children have
no claim to, or reliance in that spirit of “love which casteth out
all fear.” It is very well to vaunt the title of Christian one to
another—every nation knows in its own soul, it is a hollow pretence.
While it boasts of the Christian name, it dare not for a moment throw
itself upon a Christian faith in its neighbour. No! centuries of the
most unremitted hatred,—blood poured over every plain of Europe, and
sprinkled on its very mountain tops, cry out too dreadfully, that it
is a dismal cheat. Wars, the most savage and unprovoked; oppressions,
the most desperate; tyrannies, the most ruthless; massacres, the most
horrible; death-fires, and tortures the most exquisite, perpetuated
one on another for the faith, and in the very name of God; dungeons
and inquisitions; the blood of the Vaudois, and the flaming homes of
the Covenanters are all in their memories, and give the lie to their
professions. No! Poland rent in sunder; the iron heel of Austria on the
prostrate neck of Italy; and invasions and aggressions without end,
make Christian nations laugh with a hollow mockery in their hearts, in
the very midst of their solemn professions of the Christian virtue and
faith.
But I may be told that this character applies rather to past Europe
than to the present. What! are all these things at an end? For what
then are all these standing armies? What all these marching armies?
What these men-of-war on the ocean? What these atrocities going on from
year to year in Spain? Has any age or nation seen such battles waged
as we have witnessed in our time? How many WATERLOOS can the annals
of the earth reckon? What Timour, or Zenghis Khan, can be compared to
the Napoleon of modern Europe? the greatest scourge of nations that
ever arose on this planet; the most tremendous meteor that ever burnt
along its surface! Have the multitude of those who deem themselves
the philosophical and refined, as well as the Christian of Europe,
ceased to admire this modern Moloch, and to forget in _his_ individual
and retributory sufferings at St. Helena, the countless agonies and
the measureless ruin that he inflicted on innocent and even distant
nations? While we retain a blind admiration of martial genius, wilfully
shutting our senses and our minds to the crimes and the pangs that
constitute its shadow, it is laughable to say that we have progressed
beyond our fathers in Christian knowledge. At this moment all Europe
stands armed to the teeth. The peace of every individual nation is
preserved, not by the moral probity and the mutual faith which are the
natural growth of Christian knowledge, but by the jealous watch of
armed bands, and the coarse and undisguised force of brute strength. To
this moment not the slightest advance is made towards a regular system
of settling national disputes by the head instead of the hand. To this
moment the stupid practice of settling individual disputes between
those who pride themselves on their superior education and knowledge,
by putting bullets instead of sound reasons into each other’s heads,
is as common as ever. If we really are a civilized people, why do
we not abandon barbarian practices? If we really are philosophical,
why do we not shew it? It is a poor compliment to our learning, our
moral and political philosophy, and above all, to our religion, that
at this time of day if a dispute arise between us as nations or as
men, we fall to blows, instead of to rational inquiry and adjustment.
Is Christianity then so abstruse? No! “He that runneth may read, and
the way-faring man, though a fool, cannot err therein.” Then why, in
the name of common sense, have we not learned it, seeing that it so
closely concerns our peace, our security, and our happiness? Surely
a thousand years is time enough to teach that which is so plain, and
of such immense importance! We call ourselves civilized, yet we are
daily perpetrating the grossest outrages; we boast of our knowledge,
yet we do not know how to live one with another half so peaceably as
wolves; we term ourselves Christians, yet the plainest injunction of
Christ, “to love our neighbour as ourselves,” we have yet, one thousand
eight hundred and thirty-eight years after his death, to adopt! But
most monstrous of all has been the moral blindness or the savage
recklessness of ourselves as Englishmen.
Secure from actual warfare, we have loved
To swell the war-whoop, passionate for war!
Alas! for ages ignorant of all
Its ghastlier workings (famine or blue plague,
Battle, or siege, or flight through wintry snows,)
We, this whole people, have been clamorous
For war and bloodshed; animating sports,
The which we pay for as a thing to talk of,
Spectators and not combatants! Abroad
Stuffed out with big preamble, holy names,
And adjurations of the God in heaven,
We send our mandates for the certain death
Of thousands and ten thousands! Boys and girls,
And women, _that would groan to see a child_
_Pull off an insect’s leg_, all read of war,
The best amusement for our morning’s meal!
The poor wretch who has learnt his only prayers
From curses, who knows scarce words enough
To ask a blessing from his heavenly Father,
Becomes a fluent phraseman, absolute,
Technical in victories, and deceit,
_And all our dainty terms for fratricide_;
Terms which we trundle smoothly o’er our tongues
Like mere abstractions, empty sounds, to which
We join no feeling, and attach no form!
As if the soldier died without a wound;
As if the fibres of this god-like frame
Were gored without a pang; as if the wretch
Who fell in battle, doing bloody deeds,
Passed off to heaven, translated and not killed;
As though he had no wife to pine for him,
No God to judge him! Therefore evil days
Are coming on us, O my countrymen!
And what, if all-avenging Providence,
Strong and retributive, should make us know
The meaning of our words, force us to feel
The desolation and the agony of our fierce doings?
_Coleridge._
This is the aspect of the Christian world in its most polished and
enlightened quarter:—there surely is some need of serious inquiry;
there must surely be some monstrous practical delusion here, that wants
honestly encountering, and boldly dispersing.
But if such is the internal condition of Christian Europe, what
is the phasis that it presents to the rest of the world? With the
exception of our own tribes, now numerously scattered over almost
every region of the earth, all are in our estimation barbarians. We
pride ourselves on our superior knowledge, our superior refinement,
our higher virtues, our nobler character. We talk of the heathen, the
savage, and the cruel, and the wily tribes, that fill the rest of the
earth; but how is it that these tribes know _us_? Chiefly by the very
features that we attribute exclusively to them. They know us chiefly
by our crimes and our cruelty. It is we who are, and must appear to
them the savages. What, indeed, are civilization and Christianity?
The refinement and ennoblement of our nature! The habitual feeling
and the habitual practice of an enlightened justice, of delicacy and
decorum, of generosity and affection to our fellow men. There is not
one of these qualities that we have not violated for ever, and on
almost all occasions, towards every single tribe with which we have
come in contact. We have professed, indeed, to teach Christianity to
them; but we had it not to teach, and we have carried them instead, all
the curses and the horrors of a demon race. If the reign of Satan, in
fact, were come,—if he were let loose with all his legions, to plague
the earth for a thousand years, what would be the characteristics
of his prevalence? Terrors and crimes; one wide pestilence of vice
and obscenity; one fearful torrent of cruelty and wrath, deceit and
oppression, vengeance and malignity; the passions of the strong would
be inflamed—the weak would cry and implore in vain!
And is not that the very reign of spurious Christianity which has
lasted now for these thousand years, and that during the last three
hundred, has spread with discovery round the whole earth, and made
the name of Christian synonymous with fiend? It is shocking that
the divine and beneficent religion of Christ should thus have been
libelled by base pretenders, and made to stink in the nostrils of
all people to whom it ought, and would, have come as the opening of
heaven; but it is a fact no less awful than true, that the European
nations, while professing Christianity, have made it odious to the
heathen. They have branded it by their actions as something breathed
up, full of curses and cruelties, from the infernal regions. On them
lies the guilt, the stupendous guilt of having checked the gospel in
its career, and brought it to a full stop in its triumphant progress
through the nations. They have done this, _and then wondered at their
deed_! They have visited every coast in the shape of rapacious and
unprincipled monsters, and then cursed the inhabitants as besotted
with superstition, because they did not look on them as angels!
People have wondered at the slow progress, and in many countries, the
almost hopeless labours of the missionaries;—why should they wonder?
The missionaries had Christianity to teach—and their countrymen
had been there before them, and called themselves Christians! That
was enough: what recommendations could a religion have, to men who
had seen its professors for generations in the sole characters of
thieves, murderers, and oppressors? The missionaries told them that
in Christianity lay their salvation;—they shook their heads, they
had already found it their destruction! They told them they were come
to comfort and enlighten them;—they had already been comforted by
the seizure of their lands, the violation of their ancient rights,
the kidnapping of their persons; and they had been enlightened by the
midnight flames of their own dwellings! Is there any mystery in the
difficulties of the missionaries? Is there any in the apathy of simple
nations towards Christianity?
The barbarities and desperate outrages of the so-called Christian
race, throughout every region of the world, and upon every people
that they have been able to subdue, are not to be paralleled by those
of any other race, however fierce, however untaught, and however
reckless of mercy and of shame, in any age of the earth. Is it fit
that this horrible blending of the names of Christianity and outrage
should continue? Yet it does continue, and must continue, till the
genuine spirit of Christianity in this kingdom shall arouse itself,
and determine that these villanies shall cease, or they who perpetrate
them shall be stripped of the honoured name of—Christian! If foul
deeds are to be done, let them be done in their own foul name; and
let robbery of lands, seizure of cattle, violence committed on the
liberties or the lives of men, be branded as the deeds of devils
and not of Christians. The spirit of Christianity, in the shape of
missions, and in the teaching and beneficent acts of the missionaries,
is now sensibly, in many countries, undoing the evil which wolves in
the sheep’s clothing of the Christian name had before done. And of
late another glorious symptom of the growth of this divine spirit has
shown itself, in the strong feeling exhibited in this country towards
the natives of our colonies. To fan that genuine flame of love, is the
object of this work. To comprehend the full extent of atrocities done
in the Christian name, we must look the whole wide evil sternly in the
face. We must not suffer ourselves to aim merely at the redress of this
or that grievance; but, gathering all the scattered rays of aboriginal
oppression into one burning focus, and thus enabling ourselves to feel
its entire force, we shall be less than Englishmen and Christians if we
do not stamp the whole system of colonial usage towards the natives,
with that general and indignant odium which must demolish it at once
and for ever.