Page:The Lusiad; Or, The Discovery of India.djvu/22

 that might put them to shame in any thing. . . . And the spies said to their brethren, ''Arise, that we may go up against them; for we have seen the land, and behold it is very good. . . .and they came unto Laish, unto a people that were quiet and secure, and they smote them with the edge of the sword, and burnt the city with fire; and there was no Deliverer, because it was far from Zidon, and they had no business with any man''——However the happy simplicity of this society may please the man of fine imagination, the true philosopher will view the men of Laish with other eyes. However virtuous he may suppose one generation, the children of the next were sure to sink into every vice of brutality. When his wants are easily supplied, the manners of the savage will be simple, and often humane, for the human heart is not vicious without objects of temptation. But these will soon occur; he that gathers the greatest quantity of fruit will be envied by the less industrious: The human passions will operate, and where there is no magistrate to put to shame in any thing, depredation will soon display all its horrors. And could such a tribe be secured from the consequences of their own unrestrained passions, could even this impossibility be surmounted, still are they a wretched prey to the first invaders, and because they have no business with any man, they will find no deliverer. While human nature is the same, the fate of Laish will always be the fate of the weak and defenceless; and thus the most amiable description of savage life, raises in our minds the strongest imagery of the misery and impossible continuance of such a state. But if the view of Laish then terminate in horror, with what contemplation shall we behold the wilds of Africa and America? Immense tracts peopled by a few tribes scattered at great distances, who esteem and treat each other as beasts of the chace. Attachment to their own tribe constitutes their highest idea of virtue; but this virtue includes the most brutal depravity, makes them consider the man of every other tribe as one with whom nature had placed them in a state of war, and had commanded to destroy. And