THE unchangeable word of our Savior Jesus Christ bears witness to us through the lips of saint Matthew that _This Gospel of the kingdom, shall be preached in the whole world, for a testimony to all nations, and then shall the consummation come_. History shows that the voice of the Apostles has resounded for several centuries past throughout all the old world, although to-day the Christian kingdoms form the smallest part of it. But as to the new world, discovered some hundred and twenty years ago, we have no proof that the word of God has ever [8] been proclaimed there prior to these later times; unless we are to believe the story of Jean de Lery,[5] who says that one day as he was telling the Brazilians about the great miracles of God in the creation of the world, and the mysteries of our redemption, an old man told him that he had heard his grandfather say that, many years before, a bearded man (Brazilians have no beards) had come among them and had related something similar; but that they would not listen to him, and since then had been killing and eating each other. As to the other countries beyond the sea, some of them have indeed a certain vague knowledge of the deluge, and of the immortality of the soul, together with the future reward of those who live aright; but they might have handed this obscure doctrine down, from generation to generation, since the universal deluge which happened in the time of Noah. It remains now to deplore the wretched condition of these people who occupy a country so large that the old world bears no comparison with it, if we include the land which lies beyond the straits of Magellan, called [9] _Terra del fugo_, extending as far toward China and Japan as toward New Guinea; and also the country beyond the great river of Canada,[6] which stretches out to the East and is washed by the great Western ocean. Dense ignorance prevails in all these countries, where there is no evidence that they have ever felt the breath of the Gospel, except in this last century when the Spaniard carried thither some light of the Christian religion, together with his cruelty and avarice.[7] But this was so little that it should not receive much consideration, since by the very confession of those who have written their histories, they have killed almost all the natives of the country, who, only seventy years ago, according to a certain historian,[8] numbered more than twenty millions. For more than twenty-five years, the English have retained a foothold in a country called, in honor of the deceased Queen of England, Virginia, which lies between Florida and the land of the Armouchiquois.[9] But that country carries on its affairs with so much secrecy, that very few persons know [10] anything definite about it. Soon after I published my History of New France,[10] there was an embarkation of eight hundred men to be sent there. It is not reported that they bathed their hands in the blood of those people, for