And to this principle their customs and ideas of honour serve as rituals and ministers. The ancient cruelties practised by the American savages on their prisoners of war (and war was 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 the same. The terror of evil spirits continually haunts him, and 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. Selfishness, cruel and often cowardly ferocity, together with the most unhappy superstition, are every where 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[1], and he who has conversed knows how many respectable
- ↑ The author of that voluminous work, Histoire Philosophique & Politique des Etablissemens & du Commerce des Européens dans les deux Indes, is one of the many who assert that the savage is happier than the civil life. His reasons are thus abridged: The savage has no care or fear for the future, his hunting and fishing give him a certain subsistence. He sleeps sound, and knows not the diseases of cities. He cannot want what he does not desire, nor desire that which he does not know, and vexation or grief do not enter his soul. He is not under the control of a superior in his actions; in a word, says our author, the savage only suffers the evils of nature. If the civilized, he adds, enjoy the elegancies of life, have better food, and are more comfortably defended against the change of seasons, it is use which makes these things necessary, and they are purchased by the painful labours of the multitude who are the basis of society. To what outrages is not the man of civil life exposed? if he has property it is in danger; and government or authority is, according to our author, the greatest of all evils. If there is a famine in the north of America, the savage, led by the wind and the sun, can go to a better clime; but in the horrors of famine, war, or pestilence, the ports and barriers of polished states place the subjects in a prison, where they must perish—In resteroit encore—There still remains an infinite difference between the lot of the civilized and the savage; a difference, toute entiere, all entirely to the disadvantage of society, that injustice which reigns in the inequality of fortunes and conditions. "In fine, says he, as the wish for independence is
