The
man rules over the woman, the adult over the child, the father
over his children. That is to say, the most powerful and most
perfect rule over the weakest and most imperfect. This same
relationship exists among men, there being some who by nature
are masters and others who by nature are slaves. Those who surpass
the rest in prudence and intelligence, although not in physical
strength, are by nature the masters. On the other hand, those
who are dim-witted and mentally lazy, although they may be physically
strong enough to fulfill all the necessary tasks, are by nature
slaves. It is just and useful that it be this way. We even see
it sanctioned in divine law itself, for it is written in the
Book of Proverbs: "He who is stupid will serve the wise
man." And so it is with the barbarous and inhumane peoples
[the Indians] who have no civil life and peaceful customs. It
will always be just and in conformity with natural law that
such people submit to the rule of more cultured and humane princes'
and nations. Thanks to their virtues and the practical wisdom
of their laws, the latter can destroy barbarism and educate
these [inferior] people to a more humane and virtuous life.
And if the latter reject such rule, it can be imposed upon them
by force of arms. Such a war will be just according to natural
law. . . .
Now
compare these natural qualities of judgment, talent, magnanimity,
temperance, humanity, and religion [of the Spanish] with those
of these pitiful men [the Indians], in whom you will scarcely
find any vestiges of humanness. These people possess neither
science nor even an alphabet, nor do they preserve any monuments
of their history except for some obscure and vague reminiscences
depicted in certain paintings, nor do they have written laws,
but barbarous institutions and customs. In regard to their virtues,
how much restraint or gentleness are you to expect of men who
are devoted to all kinds of intemperate acts and abominable
lewdness, including the eating of human flesh? And you must
realize that prior to the arrival of the Christians, they did
not live in that peaceful kingdom of Saturn [the Golden Age]
that the poets imagine, but on the contrary they made war against
one another continually and fiercely, with such fury that victory
was of no meaning if they did not satiate their monstrous hunger
with the flesh of their enemies. ...These Indians are so cowardly
and timid that they could scarcely resist the mere presence
of our soldiers. Many times thousands upon thousands of them
scattered, fleeing like women before a very few Spaniards, who
amounted to fewer than a hundred. . . .
In
regard to those [the Aztecs] who inhabit New Spain and the province
of Mexico, I have already said that they consider themselves
the most civilized people [in the New World]. They boast of
their political and social institutions, because they have rationally
planned cities and nonhereditary kings who are elected by popular
suffrage, and they carry on commerce among themselves in the
manner of civilized people. But . . . I dissent from such an
opinion. On the contrary, in those same institutions there is
proof of the coarseness, barbarism, and innate servility of
these men. Natural necessity encourages the building of houses,
some rational manner of life, and some sort of commerce. Such
an argument merely proves that they are neither bears nor monkeys
and that they are not totally irrational.
But
on the other hand, they have established their commonwealth
in such a manner that no one individually owns anything, neither
a house nor a field that one may dispose of or leave to his
heirs in his will, because evervthing is controlled by their
lords, who are incorrectly called kings. They lived more at
the mercy of their king’s will than of their own. They
are the slaves of his will and caprice, and they are not the
masters of their fate. The fact that this condition is not the
result of coercion but is voluntary and spontaneous is a certain
sign of the servile and base spirit of these barbarians. They
had distributed their fields and farms in such a way that one
third belonged to the king, another third belonged to the religious
cult, and only a third part was reserved for the benefit of
everyone; but all of this they did in such a way that they themselves
cultivated the royal and religious lands. They lived as servants
of the king and at his mercy, paying extremely large tributes.
When a father died, all his inheritance, if the king did not
decide otherwise, passed in its entirety to the oldest son,
with the result that many of the younger sons would either die
of starvation or subject themselves to an even more rigorous
servitude. They would turn to the petty kings for help and would
ask them for a field on the condition that they not only pay
feudal tribute but also promise themselves as slave labor when
it was necessary .And if this kind of servitude and barbaric
commonwealth had not been suitable to their temperament and
nature, it would have been easy for them to take advantage of
the death of a king, since the monarchy was not hereditary ,
in order to establish a state that was freer and more favorable
to their interests. Their failure to do so confirms that they
were born for servitude and not for the civil and liberal life.
. . .
Until
now we have not mentioned their impious religion and their abominable
sacrifices, in which they worship the Devil as God, to whom
they thought of offering no better tribute than human hearts.
...Interpreting their religion in an ignorant and barbarous
manner, they sacrificed human victims by removing the hearts
from the chests. They placed these hearts on their abominable
altars. With this ritual they believed that they had appeased
their gods. They also ate the flesh of the sacrificed men. .
. .
War
against these barbarians can be justified not only on the basis
of their paganism but even more so because of their abominable
licentiousness, their prodigious sacrifice of human victims,
the extreme harm that they inflicted on innocent persons, their
horrible banquets of human flesh, and the impious cult of their
idols. Since the evangelical law of the New Testament is more
perfect and more gentle than the Mosaic law of the Old Testament
(for the latter was a law of fear and the former is a law of
grace, gentleness, and clemency), so also [since the birth of
Christ] wars are now waged with more mercy and clemency. Their
purpose is not so much to punish as to correct evils. What is
more appropriate and beneficial for these barbarians than to
become subject to the rule of those whose wisdom, virtue, and
religion have converted them from barbarians into civilized
men (insofar as they are capable of becoming so), from being
torpid and licentious to becoming upright and moral, from being
impious servants of the Devil to becoming believers in the true
God? They have already begun to receive the Christian religion,
thanks to the prudent diligence of the Emperor Charles, an excellent
and religious prince. They have already been provided with teachers
learned in both the sciences and letters and, what is more important,
with teachers of religion and good customs.
