But let me remind you that an intelligent Indian might with more eloquent tongue inveigh against the crimes of those who profess to be better than savages. He might truthfully speak of the perfidy of those who break the faith of treaties almost before the ink is dry in which the plausible yet one-sided contract is written. He might with indignant sneer point to the great army of vagrants claiming better blood, as filthy and vile, as dangerous and degraded as the worst savages were ever charged with being. But in saying all this he has not made out his case. No criminal can make even a plausible defence in any court by the plea that he is no worse than the worst men he can find in society; though, somehow, quite respectable sinners do seem to gain some comfort from this sort of scavenger’s logic. It is absurd to suppose that ignorant and brutal savages should be so much better than civilized men that there should not be found in every tribe, as there are with us in every community, a dangerous class, selfish enough to plunder and murder those who have never wronged them, and desperate enough to take any risk and to commit any crime. It were most surprising if it were not so. All the more, then, I insist upon their need of saving. With all the stronger emphasis I urge that this nation cannot afford, on its undefended borders, any more than it can afford in its strong centres of population and of well organized police, to be indifferent to the needless multiplying of such a class. Has our civilization much to boast of if it admits that there is no better way for forty millions of people to deal with four hundred thousand Indians than to exterminate them? If it were not true, as it is, that it costs more to kill them than to civilize, convert and by moral forces control them, what less than savages are we if we adopt the creed of the worst class of frontiersmen as the creed of the churches; that the best thing we can do with the savage is to kill him; and that there are no good Indians but dead ones? Let us be intelligent enough to know, and candid enough to confess, that in estimating their possibilities of social, industrial and moral development, we have taken too much account of the exceptional cases in which they have made trouble, and not enough of the many tribes that, for long years, have lived in peace, grown thrifty, maintained self-control, cared for the education of their children, and honored their profession of religion. What this and kindred associations have successfully achieved among the Indians alone, entitles them to the gratitude of the nation, and the liberal support of all who have faith in the Christ-like work of saving the lost.