ny Indians to unite and to fortify
themselves among certain cliffs: against them the Spaniards have
again perpetrated such cruelty, killing numberless people, that they
have almost finished depopulating and destroying all that large
country.
18. These wretched, blind men whom God has permitted to yield to
reprobate appetite, do not perceive the Indians' cause, or rather
the many causes sanctioned by every justice, and by the laws of
nature, of God and of man, to cut them to pieces, whenever they have
the strength and weapons, and to drive them from their countries:
nor do they perceive the iniquity and great injustice of their own
pretensions, which are condemned by all laws, not to mention the
many outrages, tyrannies and grave and inexpiable sins they have
committed against the Indians, by repeatedly making war on them:
seeing nothing of this, they think and say and write, that the
victories they obtain over the innocent Indians by destroying them,
are all conceded to them by their God, because their iniquitous wars
are just. Almost as though they rejoiced, and glorified, and
rendered thanks to God for their tyranny: like those tyrant bandits
did of whom the prophet Zacharias says in chapter eleven Pasce
pecora occisionis, quae qui occidebant non dolebant, sed dicebant:
Benedictus Deus, quia divites facti sumus.

The Kingdom of Yucatan

In the year 1526, by lying and deceiving and by making offers to the
King, as all the other tyrants have done till now to obtain offices
and positions, so as to rob, another unhappy man(95) was elected
governor of the kingdom of Yucatan.
2. This kingdom possessed a dense population, because the country is
very healthy and abounding much more than Mexico in provisions and
fruit: and honey was particularly abundant, more so than in any
other part of the Indies thus far discovered.
2. The said kingdom has a circumference of about three hundred leagues.
Its people were famous among all those of the Indies for prudence
and cleanliness, and for having fewer vices and sins than any other;
and they were very willing and worthy of being brought to the
knowledge of God. A great town might have been built there by the
Spaniards where they might have lived as in a