Aboriginal Race of America, 125 



jects an abject obedience which knew no limit. They endeavored 

 to eradicate the feeling of individuality ; or in other words to unite 

 the minds of the plebeian multitude in a common will which was 

 that of their master. Thus when Pizarro made his first attack on 

 the defenceless Peruvians in the presence of their Inca, the latter 

 was borne in a throne on the shoulders of four men ; and we are told 

 by Herrera that while the Spaniards spared the Sovereign, they 

 aimed their deadly blows at his bearers : these, however, never 

 shrunk from their sacred trust ; but when one of their number fell, 

 another immediately took his place ; and the historian declares that 

 if the whole day had been spent in killing them, others would still 

 have come forward to the passive support of their master. In fact 

 what has been called the paternal government of the Incas was 

 strictly such ; for their subjects were children, who neither thought 

 nor acted except at the dictation of another. Thus it was that a 

 people whose moral impulses are known to have differed in little or 

 nothing from those of the barbarous tribes, were reduced, partly by 

 persuasion, partly by force, to a state of effeminate vassalage not 

 unlike that of the modern Hindoos. Like the latter, too, they made 

 good soldiers in their native wars, not from any principle of valour, 

 but from the sentiment of passive obedience to their superiors ; and 

 hence when they saw their monarch bound and imprisoned by the 

 Spaniards, their conventional courage at once forsook them ; and we 

 behold the singular spectacle of an entire nation prostrated at a blow, 

 like a strong man whose energies yield to a seemingly trivial but 

 rankling wound. 



After the Inca power was destroyed, however, the dormant spirit 

 of the people was again aroused in all the moral vehemence of their 

 race, and the gentle and unoffending Peruvian was transformed into 

 the wily and merciless savage. Every one is familiar with the 

 sequel. Resistance was too late to be availing, and the fetters to 

 which they had confidingly submitted were soon riveted for ever. 



As we have already observed, the Incas depressed the moral 

 energies of their subjects in order to secure their own power. This 

 they effected by inculcating the arts of peace, prohibiting human 

 sacrifices, and in a great measure avoiding capital punishments ; and 

 blood was seldom spilt excepting on the subjugation of warlike and 



