XX PREFACE TO THE 



that nature, having bestowed on the whole species a certain 

 small degree of intellect, to which they all individually attain, 

 placed an insurmountahle barrier against their further progress: 

 of course, that they are not (properly speaking) men, but 

 beings of a secondary and subordinate rank in the scale of 

 creation. 



Although our own learned Historian* is much too enligh- 

 tened to adopt in their fullest extent, these opinions; which 

 cannot, indeed, be read without indignation; yet it is impos- 

 sible to deny, that they have had some degree of influence in 

 the general estimate which he has framed of the American 

 character: for he ascribes to all the natives of the New World 

 many of those imperfections on which the system in question 

 is founded; and repeatedly asserts, that " the qualities belong- 

 ing to the people of all the different tribes may be painted 

 with the same features. "f With this bias on his pen, it is 

 not wonderful, that this author is sometimes chargeable with 

 repugnancy and contradiction. Thus we are told, that " the 

 Americans are, in an amazing degree, strangers to the first in- 

 stinct of nature (a passion for the sex,) and, in every part of 

 the New World, treat their women with coldness and indiffe- 

 rence. "J Yet we find soon afterwards, that, " in some coun- 

 tries of the New World, the women are valued and admired, 

 the animal passion of the sexes becomes ardent, and the disso- 

 lution of their manners is excessive. " It is elsewhere ob- 

 served, that " the Americans were not only averse to toil, 

 but incapable of it, and sunk under tasks which the people of 

 the other continent would have performed with ease; and it is 

 added, that ** this feebleness of constitution was universal, 

 and may be considered as characteristic of the specie s"\\ It 



* Dr. Robertson. 



f History of America,. Vol. I. p. 280 and 283. 



J P. 292. 



$ P. 296. 



11 P. 290. 



