( ao ) 



I {hall, however, be as brief as poflible on this 

 head : firft, becaufe every thing relating to it is 

 not equally intereding \ in the fecond place, be- 

 caufe I would not willingly write you any thing, but 

 what is fupported on the credit of good witnedes ; 

 and it is no eafy matter to find people whofe fince- 

 rity is beyond all fufpicion, at lead of exaggerating 

 things \ pr who cannot be accufed of having too 

 fiightly believed what has been told them •, or lad- 

 ly, who have judgment fufficient to take things 

 in their true point of view ; which requires one to 

 have made a long flay in the country, and to have 

 converted much with the inhabitants. I mail 

 therefore give you nothing of my own on this ar- 

 ticle ; for which caufe, 1 ft all not obferve any exact 

 order, in what I mall fay ; but you will eafily col* 

 led: together, and make a juft whole of the paffages 

 I jhall give you in my letters, in proportion as I 

 ft all be informed of them. 



It mud be agreed, Madam, that the nearer we 

 view our Indians, the more good qualities we dif- 

 cover in them : mod of the principles which ferve 

 to regulate their conduct, the general maxims by 

 which they govern themfelves, and the efTential part 

 of their character, difcover nothing of the barba- 

 rian. Befidesthofe ideas, though wholly indiftinct, 

 which they dill preferve of a Supreme Being, thefe 

 yediges, now alrnoft nearly effaced, of a religious 

 worftip, which they feem formerly to have paid 

 £his fovereign ruler and the weak traces which we 

 remark in their mod indifferent actions of the anci- 

 ent belief, and of the primitive religion, might re- 

 store them more eafily than is imagined to the true 

 path, render their eonverfion to chridianity eafier 

 than is commonly found, and which is attended 

 with greater obftacles, even in the mod civilized 



nations. 



