Part 6
Villers has drawn a brilliant sketch of the influence which the Reformation exercised over biblical criticism. "It may be said that criticism of the Scripture text was unknown previous to the time of Luther; and if by this is meant that captious, whimsical, and shuffling criticism which DeWette has so justly condemned--certainly so. But that which relates to languages, antiquities, the knowledge of times, places, authors--in a word, hermeneutics--was known and practised in our schools before the Reformation, as is proved by the works of Cajetan and Sadoletus, and a multitude of learned men whom Leo X had encouraged and rewarded. We have seen besides, in the history of the Reformation, what that vain science has produced. It was by means of his critical researches that, from the time of Luther, Karlstadt found such a meaning of '_Semen immolare Moloch_,' as made his disciples shrug their shoulders; that Muenzer preached community of goods and wives; that Melanchthon taught that the dogma of the Trinity deprives our mind of all liberty; that at a later period Ammon asserted that the resurrection of the dead could not be deduced from the New Testament; Veter, that the Pentateuch was not written by Moses; that the history of the Jews to the time of the Judges is only a popular tradition; Bretschneider, that the Psalms cannot be looked upon as inspired; Augusti, that the true doctrine of Jesus Christ has not been preserved intact in the New Testament; and Geisse, that not one of the four gospels was written by the evangelist whose name it bears.
"Since the days of Semler, Germany presents a singular spectacle: every ten years, or nearly so, its theological literature undergoes a complete revolution. What was admired during the one decennial period is rejected in the next, and the image which they adored is burned to make way for new divinities; the dogmas which were held in honor fall into discredit; the classical treatise of morality is banished among the old books out of date; criticism overturns criticism; and the commentary of yesterday ridicules that of the previous day."
FOOTNOTES:
[25] Frederick the Wise, Elector of Saxony, was Luther's friend and protector.
[26] Georg Spalatin, a friend and fellow-reformer of Luther's, was in the diplomatic service of Elector Frederick.
[27] Charles, the grandson of Maximilian I, Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, succeeded him 1519. At the time of his coronation Charles was but twenty years old. He was also King of Spain.--ED.
[28] It is obvious that he refers to Christ, who is spoken of in Scripture as the Holy One of God (St. Mark i. 24; Acts ii. 27), not, as ignorance and malice have suggested, to himself.
[29] Ulrich von Hutten was a friend and supporter of Luther.
[30] In 1521-1522 Frederick the Wise gave Luther asylum in the Wartburg, where for ten months the reformer remained in disguise as "Junker Georg." His room, with its furniture, is still preserved.
NEGRO SLAVERY IN AMERICA
ITS INTRODUCTION BY LAW
A.D. 1517
SIR ARTHUR HELPS
In 1442 the first negro slaves were imported into Europe. They were taken from Africa to Portugal in ships of Prince Henry, the "Navigator." From that time there was little traffic in negroes until after the discovery of America. Then there was great destruction of American Indians by war, disease, and killing work, and the importation of negroes into Spanish America was begun in order to fill the void in the labor market.
Influenced by the spirit of Bartolome de las Casas, a Spanish monk, celebrated as the defender of the Indians against his own countrymen who conquered them, the monarchs of Spain prohibited Indian slavery. "It is a very significant fact that the great 'Protector of the Indians,' Las Casas, should, however innocently, have been concerned with the first large grant of licenses to import negroes into the West India Islands."
We first hear of the introduction of negro slaves in those islands through the instructions given in 1501 to Nicolas de Ovando, who in the following year succeeded Columbus as governor. During the nine years of his governorship negro slavery in the Spanish possessions of the New World was greatly extended. A few years later, as shown by Helps, official license gave it a legal sanction. Helps' account begins with an abstract of Las Casas' memorials to the King of Spain looking to a remedy for the bad government of the West Indies.
The outline of Las Casas' scheme was as follows: The King was to give to every laborer willing to emigrate to Espanola his living during the journey from his place of abode to Seville, at the rate of half a real a day throughout the journey, for great and small, child and parent. At Seville the emigrants were to be lodged in the Casa de la Contratacion (the India House), and were to have from eleven to thirteen maravedis a day. From thence they were to have a free passage to Espanola, and to be provided with food for a year. And if the climate "should try them so much" that at the expiration of this year they should not be able to work for themselves, the King was to continue to maintain them; but this extra maintenance was to be put down to the account of the emigrants, as a loan which they were to repay. The King was to give them lands--his own lands--furnish them with ploughshares and spades, and provide medicines for them. Lastly, whatever rights and profits accrued from their holdings were to become hereditary. This was certainly a most liberal plan of emigration. And, in addition, there were other privileges held out as inducements to these laborers.
In connection with the above scheme, Las Casas, unfortunately for his reputation in after-ages, added another provision, namely, that each Spanish resident in the island should have license to import a dozen negro slaves.
The origin of this suggestion was, as he informs us, that the colonists had told him that, if license were given them to import a dozen negro slaves each, they, the colonists, would then set free the Indians. And so, recollecting that statement of the colonists, he added this provision. Las Casas, writing his history in his old age, thus frankly owns his error: "This advice, that license should be given to bring negro slaves to these lands, the _clerigo_ Casas first gave, not considering the injustice with which the Portuguese take them and make them slaves; which advice, after he had apprehended the nature of the thing, he would not have given for all he had in the world. For he always held that they had been made slaves unjustly and tyrannically; for the same reason holds good of them as of the Indians." The above confession is delicately and truthfully worded--"not considering"; he does not say, not being aware of; but though it was a matter known to him, his moral sense was not watchful, as it were, about it. We must be careful not to press the admissions of a generous mind too far, or to exaggerate the importance of the suggestion of Las Casas.
It would be quite erroneous to look upon this suggestion as being the introduction of negro slavery. From the earliest times of the discovery of America, negroes had been sent there. But what is of more significance, and what it is strange that Las Casas was not aware of, or did not mention, the Hieronymite Fathers[31] had also come to the conclusion that negroes must be introduced into the West Indies. Writing in January, 1518, when the fathers could not have known what was passing in Spain in relation to this subject, they recommended licenses to be given to the inhabitants of Espanola, or to other persons, to bring negroes there. From the tenor of their letter it appears that they had before recommended the same thing. Zuazo, the judge of residencia, and the legal colleague of Las Casas, wrote to the same effect. He, however, suggested that the negroes should be placed in settlements and married. Fray Bernardino de Manzanedo, the Hieronymite father, sent over to counteract Las Casas, gave the same advice as his brethren about the introduction of negroes. He added a proviso, which does not appear in their letter--perhaps it did exist in one of the earlier ones--that there should be as many women as men sent over, or more.
The suggestion of Las Casas was approved of by the Chancellor; and, indeed, it is probable there was hardly a man of that time who would have seen further than the excellent clerigo did. Las Casas was asked what number of negroes would suffice? He replied that he did not know; upon which a letter was sent to the officers of the India House at Seville to ascertain the fit number in their opinion. They said that four thousand at present would suffice, being one thousand for each of the islands, Espanola, Porto Rico, Cuba, and Jamaica. Somebody now suggested to the Governor, De Bresa, a Fleming of much influence and a member of the council, that he should ask for this license to be given to him. De Bresa accordingly asked the King for it, who granted his request; and the Fleming sold this license to certain Genoese merchants for twenty-five thousand ducats, having obtained from the King a pledge that for eight years he should give no other license of this kind.
The consequence of this monopoly enjoyed by the Genoese merchants was that negroes were sold at a great price, of which there are frequent complaints. Both Las Casas and Pasamonte--rarely found in accord--suggested to the King that it would be better to pay the twenty-five thousand ducats and resume the license, or to abridge its term. Figueroa, writing to the Emperor from Santo Domingo in July, 1500, says: "Negroes are very much in request; none have come for about a year. It would have been better to have given De Bresa the customs duties--_i.e._, the duties that had been usually paid on the importation of slaves--than to have placed a prohibition." I have scarcely a doubt that the immediate effect of the measure adopted in consequence of the clerigo's suggestion was greatly to check that importation of negro slaves which otherwise, had the license been general, would have been very abundant.
Before quitting this part of the subject, something must be said for Las Casas which he does not allege for himself. This suggestion of his about the negroes was not an isolated one. Had all his suggestions been carried out, and the Indians thereby been preserved, as I firmly believe they might have been, these negroes might have remained a very insignificant number in the general population. By the destruction of Indians a void in the laborious part of the community was being constantly created, which had to be filled up by the labor of negroes. The negroes could bear the labor in the mines much better than the Indians; and any man who perceived that a race, of whose Christian virtues and capabilities he thought highly, were fading away by reason of being subjected to labor which their natures were incompetent to endure, and which they were most unjustly condemned to, might prefer the misery of the smaller number of another race treated with equal injustice, but more capable of enduring it. I do not say that Las Casas considered all these things; but, at any rate, in estimating his conduct, we must recollect that we look at the matter centuries after it occurred, and see all the extent of the evil arising from circumstances which no man could then be expected to foresee, and which were inconsistent with the rest of the clerigo's plans for the preservation of the Indians.
I suspect that the wisest among us would very likely have erred with him; and I am not sure that, taking all his plans together, and taking for granted, as he did then, that his influence at court was to last, his suggestion about the negroes was an impolitic one.
One more piece of advice Las Casas gave at this time, which, if it had been adopted, would have been most serviceable. He proposed that forts for mercantile purposes, containing about thirty persons, should be erected at intervals along the coast of the _terra firma_, to traffic with merchandise of Spain for gold, silver, and precious stones; and in each of these ports ecclesiastics were to be placed, to undertake the superintendence of spiritual matters. In this scheme may be seen an anticipation of subsequent plans for commercial intercourse with Africa. And, indeed, one is constantly reminded by the proceedings in those times of what has occurred much later and under the auspices of other nations.
Of all these suggestions, some of them certainly excellent, the only questionable one was at once adopted. Such is the irony of life. If we may imagine superior beings looking on at the affairs of men, and bearing some unperceived part of the great contest in the world, this was a thing to have gladdened all the hosts of hell.
FOOTNOTES:
[31] Spanish monks, followers of St. Jerome (Hieronymus).
FIRST CIRCUMNAVIGATION OF THE GLOBE
MAGELLAN REACHES THE LADRONES AND PHILIPPINES
A.D. 1519
JOAN BAUTISTA ANTONIO PIGAFETTA[32]
Ferdinand Magellan, whose name in Portuguese was Fernao de Magalhaes, was born in Portugal about 1480. After serving with the Portuguese in the East Indies, 1505-1512, and in Morocco, 1514, where during an action he was lamed for life, he became disaffected toward his country, and in 1517 renounced his allegiance and turned to Spain in hope of better reward for his services. In conjunction with a fellow-countryman, Ruy Faleiro, a geographer and astronomer, he offered to find for Spain the Moluccas, in the Malay Archipelago, and to prove that they were within the Spanish and not the Portuguese lines of demarcation. The acceptance of this proposal by the Emperor, Charles V, who was also King of Spain, gave Magellan the opportunity, which he so well improved, to immortalize his name in the annals of maritime discovery.
While the specific object of the expedition failed on account of the leader's death, his performance made him worthy, as some historians think, to be considered "the most undaunted and in many respects the most extraordinary man that ever traversed an unknown sea."
A squadron of five ships with two hundred sixty-five men was fitted out by the Emperor, and the two friends were named as joint commanders, but Faleiro was afterward detached from the expedition, leaving full command to Magellan, who sailed from San Lucar, Spain, September 20, 1519, first touching at Madeira.
Magellan passed through the straits that bear his name and so penetrated to the Pacific, that ocean being first so called by him. He was the first European to reach it from the Atlantic. Magellan was killed by natives in the Philippines, April 27, 1521; but his ships continued their course. One by one they were lost from the expedition, except the Victoria, on which was Pigafetta, who wrote for Charles V an account of the voyage. The Victoria returned to Spain in September, 1522, completing the first circumnavigation of the earth. Bautista was pilot and afterward captain of the Trinidad, one of the lost vessels.
In 1898 the Philippines and Guam, one of the Ladrones, were acquired by the United States as a result of the Spanish-American War.
JOAN BAUTISTA
Magellan steered to the southwest to make the island of Teneriffe, and they reached the said island on the day of St. Michael, which was September 29th. Thence he made his course to fetch the Cape Verd Islands, and they passed between the islands and the cape without sighting either the one or the other. Having to make for Brazil, and as soon as they sighted the other coast of Brazil, he steered to the southeast along the coast of Cape Frio, which is in 23 deg. south latitude; and from this cape he steered to the west, a matter of thirty leagues, to make the Rio Janeiro, which is in the same latitude as Cape Frio, and they entered the said river on the day of St. Lucy, which was December 13th, in which place they took in wood, and they remained there until the first octave of Christmas, which was December 26th of the same year.
They sailed from this Rio de Janeiro on December 26th, and navigated along the coast to make Cape of St. Mary, which is only 35 deg.; as soon as they sighted it, they made their course west-northwest, thinking they would find a passage for their voyage, and they found that they had got into a great river of fresh water, to which they gave the name of River St. Christopher, and it is in 34 deg., and they remained in it till February 2, 1520.
He sailed from this river of St. Christopher on the 2d of the said month of February; they navigated along the said coast, and farther on to the south they discovered a point, which is in the same river more to the south, to which they gave the name of Point St. Anthony; it is in 36 deg.; hence they ran to the southwest a matter of twenty-five leagues, and made another cape, which they named Cape St. Apelonia, which is in 36 deg.; thence they navigated to the west-southwest to some shoals, which they named Shoals of the Currents, which are in 39 deg.; and thence they navigated out to the sea, and lost sight of land for a matter of two or three days, when they again made for the land, and they came to a bay, which they entered, and ran within it the whole day, thinking that there was an outlet for Molucca; and when night came they found that it was quite closed up, and in the same night they again stood out by the way which they had come in. This bay is in 34 deg.; they named it the island of St. Matthew. They navigated from this island of St. Matthew along the coast until they reached another bay, where they caught many sea-wolves and birds; to this they gave the name of Bay of Labors; it is in 37 deg.; here they came near losing the flag-ship in a storm. Thence they navigated along the said coast, and arrived on the last day of March of the year 1520 at the port of St. Julian, which is in 49 deg.. Here they wintered, and found the day a little more or less than seven hours.
In this port three of the ships rose up against the captain-major, their captains saying that they intended to take him to Castile in arrest, as he was taking them all to destruction. Here, through the exertions of the said captain-major, and the assistance and favor of the foreigners whom he carried with him, the captain-major went to the said three ships which were already mentioned, and there the captain of one of them was killed, who was the treasurer of the whole fleet, and named Luis de Mendoza; he was killed in his own ship by stabs with a dagger by the chief constable of the fleet, who was sent to do this by Ferdinand Magellan in a boat with certain men. The said three ships having thus been recovered, five days later Ferdinand Magellan ordered Gaspar de Quexixada to be decapitated and quartered; he was captain of one of the ships and was one of those who had mutinied.
In this port they refitted the ship. Here the captain-major made Alvaro de Mesquita, a Portuguese, a captain of one of the ships the captain of which had been killed. There sailed from this port on August 24th four ships, for the smallest of the ships had been already lost; he had sent it to reconnoitre, and the weather had been heavy and had cast it ashore, where all the crew had been recovered along with the merchandise, artillery, and fittings of the ship. They remained in this port, in which they wintered, five months and twenty-four days, and they were 70 deg. less ten minutes to the southward.
They sailed on August 24th of the said year from this port of St. Julian, and navigated a matter of twenty leagues along the coast, and so they entered a river which was called Santa Cruz, which is in 50 deg., where they took in goods and as much as they could obtain. The crew of the lost ship were already distributed among the other ships, for they had returned by land to where Ferdinand Magellan was, and they continued collecting goods which had remained there during August and up to September 18th, and there they took in water and much fish which they caught in this river; and in the other, where they wintered, there were people like savages, and the men are from nine to ten spans in height, very well made; they have not got houses, they only go about from one place to another with their flocks, and eat meat nearly raw. They are all of them archers, and kill many animals with arrows, and with the skins they make clothes, that is to say, they make the skins very supple, and fashion them after the shape of the body, as well as they can, then they cover themselves with them, and fasten them by a belt round the waist. When they do not wish to be clothed from the waist upward, they let that half fall which is above the waist, and the garment remains hanging down from the belt which they have girt around them.
They wear shoes which cover them four inches above the ankle, full of straw inside to keep their feet warm. They do not possess any iron, nor any other ingenuity of weapons, only they make the points of their arrows with flints, and so also the knives with which they cut, and the adze and awls with which they cut and stitch their shoes and clothes. They are very agile people and do no harm, and thus follow their flocks; wherever night finds them, there they sleep; they carry their wives along with them, with all the chattels they possess. The women are very small and carry heavy burdens on their backs. They wear shoes and clothes just like the men. Of these men they obtained three or four and brought them in the ships, and they all died except one, who went to Castile in a ship which went thither.
They sailed from this river of Santa Cruz on October 18th: they continued navigating along the coast until the 21st day of the same month, October, when they discovered a cape, to which they gave the name of Cape of the Virgins, because they sighted it on the day of the eleven thousand virgins; it is in 52 deg., a little more or less, and from this cape, a matter of two or three leagues' distance, we found ourselves at the mouth of a strait. We sailed along the said coast within that strait, which they had reached the mouth of: they entered in it a little and anchored. Ferdinand Magellan sent to discover what there was farther in, and they found three channels; that is to say, two more in a southerly direction, and one traversing the country in the direction of Molucca, but at that time this was not yet known, only the three mouths were seen.