This pamphlet was published in 1552, and aroused in the minds of some of the Spaniards an opposition only a little less marked than the favour with which it was received by the English. Bernardo de Vargas Machuca was one of those who rose to combat the views presented by Las Casas. His refutation appeared in _Apologías y discursos de las conquistas occidentales_. On the title-page of this pamphlet the author announces that it is written “in opposition to the treatise on the ruin of the Indies.”[11] The question concerning the servitude or the freedom of the Indians raised by Las Casas was discussed by a professor in the University of Córdoba, who wrote _Fasti novi orbis_ under the name of Cyriacus Morelli. His book was published in Venice in 1776. Dr. Juan Ginés de Sepúlveda, a distinguished Spanish theologian and jurist, opposed vigorously the ideas presented by Las Casas, and argued in support of the Spanish policy regarding the Indians. A similar attitude was assumed by Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo, whose education at the Spanish court, and whose later service under appointment by the king naturally disposed him to justify the conduct of the government. This subject continued to engage the attention of writers as long as the Spanish régime lasted. A work by Giovanni Nuix translated from the Italian by Pedro Varela y Ulloa, entitled in Spanish _Reflexiones imparciales sobre la humanidad de los españoles en las Indias, contra los pretendidos filósofos y políticos_, was published in Madrid in 1782. The writer characterized the views of Las Casas as false or exaggerated, and defended the thesis that the conquests made by the Spaniards in America were just, or at least as just as those made by other nations; and he attributed whatever covetousness or cruelty was displayed by the Spaniards to the great distance of the colonies from the supreme authority, under which local officers served in the colonies without adequate supervision. He distinguished clearly, moreover, between the benevolent designs of the crown and the unjust and cruel acts of governmental subordinates and irresponsible private persons. [Sidenote: Las Casas’ _Historia general_] [Sidenote: _Historia apologética_] [Sidenote: Conversion of Indians]