INDIAN CREEDS 109 



The way to Heaven was beset with difficulties 

 which the Indians braced themselves to face. It 

 was represented as a narrow path between moving 

 rocks which each instant clashed together ; or a swift 

 river crossed by a shaking log, and guarded by a 

 ferocious dog which sought to drive the aspirant into 

 the abyss. Whilst these crude tenets appealed to 

 courage and perseverance, there was nothing con- 

 nected with them that stood for a higher ideal of 

 faith and conduct. The Indians* gods were no 

 better than themselves. They were represented as 

 animated by lust and cruelty ; and obedience was 

 stimulated by sentiments of hatred rather than trust. 

 The worst passions, not the nobler qualities, 

 characterized these divinities. In them vice was 

 deified, not virtue. This was the material out of 

 which the Jesuits sought to fashion a nobler 

 manhood on the shores of Lake Huron. The con- 

 ditions were as unpromising as those found by the 

 missionaries of a later period in Terra del Fuego, the 

 inhabitants of which Darwin pronounced incapable 

 of either civilizing or christianizing. And what was 

 the character of the men who undertook the mission 

 to the North American Indians } A brief glance at 

 their history answers the question. 



The founder of the Jesuit order was Ignatius 

 Loyola, a man of singularly composite character. He 

 embodied in his personality the mixed elements of 

 soldier, courtier, and zealot. These qualities were 



