Page:The History of the American Indians.djvu/456

 444 General O&fervattons on

and credulous, with the wild notion of wandering after death in the ae- curled place of darknefs, without any poflibility of avoiding that dreadful fate, unlefs they revealed all their crimes to them, and paid them a fixed price. Becaufe pride and envy had fpoiled fome of the fpirits above, and made them accurfed beings j therefore, the mefienger of IJhtokoollo, as I told you,, flrongly checked the like difpofuion in its firft appearance among his fcholars. But the pride of the Romim chieftain, and defire of abfolute religious and civil power, became fo unbounded, as to claim an unlimited authority over all the great chieftains on earth ; and he boafted of being fo highly actuated by the unerring divine wifdom, as to know and do every thing perfectly. He, at the fame time, ordered all his fcholars to involve the people in thick clouds of darknefs, and imprefs them with a firm belief, that ignorance produces virtue. He invented a third ftate for the fake of his temporal intereft, fixing it half way between people's favourite place of living anew, and that of the horrible darknefs, which was to be a vomit ing or purging ftate of the dead, and called it purgatory, where the dead muft unavoidably call, and be detained, till furviving relations fa- tisfied them for their enlargement. He became fo highly intoxicated by pride and power, that he erected images of fuch dead people as moft re- fembled himfelf, with various other objects for the living to invoke, inftead of the great eternal To He Wab^ whom you fupplicate in your religious invocations : and he marked for his black fcholars, a great many very evil fpeeches, and fpoke them with a ftrong mouth and ill heart, and en forced them by fwords and fiery faggots, contrary to the old beloved fpeech which wa.s confirmed by the anointed mefTenger.

At length, the holy fpirit of fire influenced two great beloved men in particular, according to a former prediction, to fpeak to the people with a ftrong mouth, as witnefles of the divine truth. Their ears were honeft in hearing the old beloved fpeech, and it funk deep into their hearts. But a great many fuperftitious cuftoms ftill remained, for had they aimed at a perfect eftablifhment of the divine law in their religious worlhip, probably the high placed religious men through a covetous fpirit would have op- pofed the reformation with all their might -, as very few of them endea voured to teach the youpg people, by honeft examples, to live a virtuous life, or enabled them to get refrefliing (bowers from IJhtoboollo Aba to make plentiful harvefts and yet they claimed a great part of it, and even

of

�� �