Page:History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic Vol. II.djvu/522

496 496 SPANISH COLONIAL FOLIC! . PART to such gigantic dimensions as to embrace every ^ — quarter of the empire, that their gross impolicy became manifest. The queens It wouM not bc giviug 3. fair view of the great zeal for con- o o O uativel"'^ objects proposed by the Spanish sovereigns in their schemes of discovery, to omit one which was para- mount to all the rest, with the queen at least, — the propagation of Christianity among the heathen. The conversion and civilization of this simple peo- ple form, as has been already said, the burden of most of her official communications from the earliest period.'^ She neglected no means for the further- ance of this good work, through the agency of mis- sionaries exclusively devoted to it, who were to establish their residence among the natives, and win them to the true faith by their instructions, and the edifying example of their own lives. It was with the design of ameliorating the condition of the 1501. natives, that she sanctioned the introduction into the colonies of negro slaves born in Spain. This she did on the representation, that the physical constitution of the African was much better fitted than that of the Indian, to endure severe toil under a tropical climate. To this false principle of economizing human suffering, we are indebted for that foul stain on the New World, which has grown deeper and darker with the lapse of years. '^ 15 Navarre te, Coleccion de Via- CEuvres, ed. de Llorente, torn. i. ges, torn, ii., Doc. Dipl., no. 45, et pp. 21, 307, 395, et alibi, loc. al. — Las Casas, amidst his ^G Herrera, Indias Occidentales, unsparitifT condemnatioa of the lib. 4, cap. 12. — A good account guilty, dors ample justice to the of the inlvoduction of negro slav- pure and generous, though alas ! ery into the New World, comprc- imavailingefTorts of the queen. See hending the material facts, and