The Lusiad; Or, The Discovery of India, an Epic Poem
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. Sordid
disposition and base ferocity, together with the most unhappy
superstition, are everywhere 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,[25] and he who has
conversed knows how many respectable names, connect the idea of
innocence and happiness with the life of the savage and the unimproved
rustic. To fix the character of the savage is therefore necessary, ere
we examine the assertion, that "it had been happy for both the old and
the new worlds if the East and West Indies had never been discovered."
The bloodshed and the attendant miseries which the unparalleled rapine
and cruelties of the Spaniards spread over the new world, indeed
disgrace human nature. The great and flourishing empires of Mexico and
Peru, steeped in the blood of forty millions of their sons, present a
melancholy prospect, which must excite the indignation of every good
heart. Yet such desolation is not the certain consequence of discovery.
And, even should we allow that the depravity of human nature is so great
that the avarice of the merchant and rapacity of the soldier will
overwhelm with misery every new-discovered country, still, are there
other, more comprehensive views, to be taken, ere we decide against the
intercourse introduced by navigation. When we weigh the happiness of
Europe in the scale of political philosophy, we are not to confine our
eye to the dreadful ravages of Attila the Hun, or of Alaric the Goth. If
the waters of a stagnated lake are disturbed by the spade when led into
new channels, we ought not to inveigh against the alteration because the
waters are fouled at the first; we are to wait to see the streamlets
refine and spread beauty and utility through a thousand vales which they
never visited before. Such were the conquests of Alexander, temporary
evils, but civilization and happiness followed in the bloody track. And,
though disgraced with every barbarity, happiness has also followed the
conquests of the Spaniards in the other hemisphere. Though the villainy
of the Jesuits defeated their schemes of civilization in many countries,
the labours of that society have been crowned with a success in Paraguay
and in Canada, which reflects upon their industry the greatest honour.
The customs and cruelties of many American tribes still disgrace human
nature, but in Paraguay and Canada the natives have been brought to
relish the blessings of society, and the arts of virtuous and civil
life. If Mexico is not so populous as it once was, neither is it so
barbarous;[26] the shrieks of the human victim do not now resound from
temple to temple, nor does the human heart, held up reeking to the sun,
imprecate the vengeance of Heaven on the guilty empire. And, however
impolitically despotic the Spanish governments may be, still do these
colonies enjoy the opportunities of improvement, which in every age
arise from the knowledge of commerce and of letters--opportunities which
were never enjoyed in South America under the reigns of Montezuma and
Atabalipa. But if from Spanish, we turn our eyes to British America,
what a glorious prospect! Here, formerly, on the wild lawn, perhaps
twice in the year, a few savage hunters kindled their evening fire,
kindled it more to protect them from evil spirits and beasts of prey,
than from the cold, and with their feet pointed to it, slept on the
ground. Here, now, population spreads her thousands, and society appears
in all its blessings of mutual help, and the mutual lights of
intellectual improvement. "What work of art, or power, or public
utility, has ever equalled the glory of having peopled a continent,
without guilt or bloodshed, with a multitude of free and happy
commonwealths; to have given them the best arts of life and government!"
To have given a savage continent an image of the British Constitution
is, indeed, the greatest glory of the British crown, "a greater than any
other nation ever acquired;" and from the consequences of the genius of
Henry, Duke of Viseo, did the British American empire arise, an empire
which, unless retarded by the illiberal and inhuman spirit of religious
fanaticism, will in a few centuries, perhaps, be the glory of the world.
Stubborn indeed must be the theorist who will deny the improvement,
virtue, and happiness which, in the result, the voyage of Columbus has
spread over the western world. The happiness which Europe and Asia have
received from the intercourse with each other, cannot hitherto, it must
be owned, be compared either with the possession of it, or the source of
its increase established in America. Yet, let the man of the most
melancholy views estimate all the wars and depredations which are
charged upon the Portuguese and other European nations, still will the
eastern world appear considerably advantaged by the voyage of Gama. If
seas of blood have been shed by the Portuguese, nothing new was
introduced into India. War and depredation were no unheard-of strangers
on the banks of the Ganges, nor could the nature of the civil
establishments of the eastern nations secure a lasting peace. The
ambition of their native princes was only diverted into new channels,
into channels which, in the natural course of human affairs, will
certainly lead to permanent governments, established on improved laws
and just dominion. Yet, even ere such governments are formed, is Asia no
loser by the arrival of Europeans. The horrid massacres and unbounded
rapine which, according to their own annals, followed the victories of
their Asian conquerors were never equalled by the worst of their
European vanquishers. Nor is the establishment of improved governments
in the East the dream of theory. The superiority of the civil and
military arts of the British, notwithstanding the hateful character of
some individuals, is at this day beheld in India with all the
astonishment of admiration; and admiration is always followed, though
often with retarded steps, by the strong desire of similar improvement.
Long after the fall of the Roman empire the Roman laws were adopted by
nations which ancient Rome esteemed as barbarous. And thus, in the
course of ages, the British laws, according to every test of
probability, will have a most important effect, will fulfil the prophecy
of Camoëns, and transfer to the British the high compliment he pays to
his countrymen--
"Beneath their sway majestic, wise, and mild,
Proud of her victor's laws thrice happier India smiled."
In former ages, and within these few years, the fertile empire of India
has exhibited every scene of human misery, under the undistinguishing
ravages of their Mohammedan and native princes; ravages only equalled
in European history by those committed under Atilla, surnamed "the
scourge of God," and "the destroyer of nations." The ideas of patriotism
and of honour were seldom known in the cabinets of the eastern princes
till the arrival of the Europeans. Every species of assassination was
the policy of their courts, and every act of unrestrained rapine and
massacre followed the path of victory. But some of the Portuguese
governors, and many of the English officers, have taught them that
humanity to the conquered is the best, the truest policy. The brutal
ferocity of their own conquerors is now the object of their greatest
dread; and the superiority of the British in war has convinced their
princes,[27] that an alliance with the British is the surest guarantee
of their national peace and prosperity. While the English East India
Company are possessed of their present greatness, it is in their power
to diffuse over the East every blessing which flows from the wisest and
most humane policy. Long ere the Europeans arrived, a failure of the
crop of rice, the principal food of India, had spread the devastations
of famine over the populous plains of Bengal. And never, from the seven
years' famine of ancient Egypt to the present day, was there a natural
scarcity in any country which did not enrich the proprietors of the
granaries. The Mohammedan princes, and Moorish traders have often added
all the horrors of an artificial, to a natural, famine. But, however
some Portuguese or other governors may stand accused, much was left for
the humanity of the more exalted policy of an Albuquerque, or a Castro.
And under such European governors as these, the distresses of the East
have often been alleviated by a generosity of conduct, and a train of
resources formerly unknown in Asia. Absurd and impracticable were that
scheme which would introduce the British laws into India without the
deepest regard to the manners and circumstances peculiar to the people.
But that spirit of liberty upon which they are founded, and that
security of property which is their leading principle, must in time have
a wide and stupendous effect. The abject spirit of Asiatic submission
will be taught to see, and to claim, those rights of nature, of which
the dispirited and passive Hindus could, till lately, hardly form an
idea. From this, as naturally as the noon succeeds the dawn, must the
other blessings of civilization arise. For, though the four great castes
of India are almost inaccessible to the introduction of other manners,
and of other literature than their own, happily there is in human nature
a propensity to change. Nor may the political philosopher be deemed an
enthusiast who would boldly prophesy, that unless the British be driven
from India the general superiority which they bear will, ere many
generations shall have passed, induce the most intelligent of India to
break the shackles of their absurd superstitions,[28] and lead them to
partake of those advantages which arise from the free scope and due
cultivation of the rational powers. In almost every instance the Indian
institutions are contrary to the feelings and wishes of nature. And
ignorance and bigotry, their two chief pillars, can never secure
unalterable duration. We have certain proof that the horrid custom of
burning the wives along with the body of the deceased husband has
continued for upwards of fifteen hundred years; we are also certain that
within these twenty years it has begun to fall into disuse. Together
with the alteration of this most striking feature of Indian manners,
other assimilations to European sentiments have already taken place. Nor
can the obstinacy even of the conceited Chinese always resist the desire
of imitating the Europeans, a people who in arts and arms are so greatly
superior to themselves. The use of the twenty-four letters, by which we
can express every language, appeared at first as miraculous to the
Chinese. Prejudice cannot always deprive that people, who are not
deficient in selfish cunning, of the ease and expedition of an alphabet;
and it is easy to foresee that, in the course of a few centuries, some
alphabet will certainly take the place of the 60,000 arbitrary marks
which now render the cultivation of the Chinese literature not only a
labour of the utmost difficulty, but even the attainment impossible
beyond a very limited degree. And from the introduction of an alphabet,
what improvements may not be expected from the laborious industry of the
Chinese! Though most obstinately attached to their old customs, yet
there is a tide in the manners of nations which is sudden and rapid, and