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qnity. It is three thoufand years at mod fince 

 Europe was full of people as favage and as little ci- 

 vilized, as the greater!: part of the Americans ; and 

 of thefe there are ftill fome remains. Does not Afia, 

 the firft feat of religion, policy, arts, and fciences, 

 and the centre of the pureft and moft ancient tradi- 

 tions, ftill behold her moft fiourifhing empires en- 

 vironed by the grofTeft barbarity ? Egypt which has 

 boafted of having been the fource of the fined im- 

 provements, and which has relapfed into the pro- 

 founded ignorance ; the empire of the Abyftinians fo 

 ancient, and heretofore fo fiourifhing ; Lybia, which 

 has produced fo many great men ; Mauritania which 

 has fent forth fo many men learned in all fciences : 

 have not thefe always had in their neighbourhood 

 people who feemed to pofiefs nothing human but 

 the figure ? Why then mould we be furprized than 

 the Americans, fo long unknown to the reft of the 

 world, mould have become barbarians and favages, 

 and that their moft fiourifhing empires fhould be 

 found deftitute of fo many articles which we reckon 

 indifpenfably neceffary in our hemifphere. 



Let us enquire what has rendered the moun- 

 taineers of the Pyrenees fo fierce as many of them 

 are at this day what is the original of the Lap- 

 landers and Samoeides, the Cafres, and Hottentots % 

 why under the fame parallels of latitude there are 

 blacks in Africa, and not elfe where ; and we mall 

 then find an anfwer to the fame queftions, refpe&ing 

 the Efkimaux and Algonquins, the Hurons and 

 Sioux, the Guayranis and Jratagonians. If it be 

 afked, why the Americans have no beards, nor hair 

 on their bodies, and why the greateft part of them 

 are of a reddifh colour, I fhall afk in my turn, 

 why the Africans are moftly black ? This queftion 



is 



