of the continent, in virtue of this donation; and as king and lord aforesaid, most of the islands to which his title hath been notified, have recognised his majesty, and now yield obedience and subjection to him as their lord, _voluntarily and without resistance_! and instantly, as soon as they received information (from the sword and musket!) they obeyed the religious men sent by the king to preach to them, and _to instruct them in our holy faith_!... You are _bound and obliged_ (true enough!) to act in the same manner.... If you do this, you act well, and perform that to which you are bound and obliged; his majesty, and I in his name, _will receive you with love and kindness_, and _will leave you and your children free and exempt from servitude, and in the enjoyment of all you possess, in the same manner as the inhabitants of the islands_! (ay, love and kindness, _such_ as they had shewn to the islanders. Satan’s genuine glozing—“lies like truth, and yet most truly lies.”) Besides this, his majesty _will bestow upon you many privileges, exemptions, and rewards_! (Ay, such as they had bestowed on the islanders—but here begins the simple truth.) But if you will not comply, or maliciously delay to obey my injunctions, then, _with the help of God_, I will enter your country by force; I will carry on war against you with the utmost violence; I will subject you to the yoke of the church and the king; I will take your wives and children, and will make slaves of them, and sell or dispose of them according to his majesty’s pleasure; I will seize your goods, and do all the mischief in my power to you as rebellious subjects, who will not acknowledge or submit to their lawful sovereign. And I protest that all the bloodshed and calamities which shall follow are to be imputed to you, and not to his majesty, or to me, or to the gentlemen who serve under me, etc.”—_Herrera._ Here then we have the romance stripped away from such ruffians as Cortez and Pizarro. We have here the very warrant under which they acted—a tissue of such most impudent fictions, and vindictive truths, as could only issue from that great office of delusion and oppression which corrupted all Europe with its abominable doctrine. The last sentence, however, betrays the inward feeling and consciousness of those who used it, that blood-guiltiness was not perfectly removed to their satisfaction, and is a miserable attempt at further self-delusion. These apostles of the sword, before whose proclamation our sarcasms against Mahomet and his sword-creed, fall to the ground, knew only too well that all their talk of love and kindness to the islanders was the grossest falsehood. The Pope’s bull could not blind them to that; and though the misery they inflicted is past, Europe still needs the warning of their deeds, to open its eyes to the nature of much of its own morality.