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 these
innocent people terminate in horror, with what contemplation shall we
behold the wilds of Africa and America? The tribes of America, it is
true, have degrees of policy greatly superior to anything understood by
the men of Laish. Great masters of martial oratory, their popular
assemblies are schools open to all their youth. In these they not only
learn the history of their nation, and what they have to fear from the
strength and designs of their enemies, but they also imbibe the most
ardent spirit of war. The arts of stratagem are their study, and the
most athletic exercises of the field their employment and delight; and,
what is their greatest praise, they have magistrates "to put them to
shame." They inflict no corporeal punishment on their countrymen, it is
true; but a reprimand from an elder, delivered in the assembly, is
esteemed by them a deeper degradation and severer punishment than any of
those too often most impolitically adopted by civilized nations. Yet,
though possessed of this advantage--an advantage impossible to exist in
a large commercial empire--and though masters of great martial policy,
their condition, upon the whole, is big with the most striking
demonstration of the misery and unnatural state of such very imperfect
civilization. "Multiply and replenish the earth" is an injunction of the
best political philosophy ever given to man. Nature has appointed man to
cultivate the earth, to increase in number by the food which its culture
gives, and by this increase of brethren to remove some, and to mitigate
all, the natural miseries of human life. But in direct opposition to
this is the political state of the wild aborigines of America. Their
lands, luxuriant in climate, are often desolate wastes, where thousands
of miles hardly support a few hundreds of savage hunters. Attachment to
their own tribe constitutes their highest idea of virtue; but this
virtue includes the most brutal depravity, makes them esteem the man of
every other tribe as an enemy, as one with whom nature had placed them
in a state of war, and had commanded to destroy.[24] And to this
principle their customs and ideas of honour serve as rituals and
ministers. The cruel