140 PAZO'S STRICTURES ON SOUTH AMERICAN CLERGY. 



exist for the Indians when their conquerors were unable to read 

 them ? What I desire to prove by this is that religion was neither 

 taught the natives nor were they persuaded of its divine origin by 

 proof and argument ; the whole foundation of their faith was the 

 word of their missionaries, and the reason of their belief was the 

 bayonet of their conquerors. * * * * * The dependence of 

 the people was a sort of slavery, a necessary consequence of the 

 ignorance in which they were brought up, of the terror with which 

 the troops and authorities inspired them, of their despotism and 

 pride, and more than all, of an inquisition sustained both by the 

 military and by the religious superstitions of monks and clergymen 

 whose fanaticism was equal to their ignorance. ***** 

 The catechism of Padre Ripalda, which contains the maxims of a 

 blind obedience to the king and pope was the ground work of their 

 religion ; and their priests, parents and masters inculcated these 

 doctrines incessantly. " 1 



Don Vincente Pazos, in his celebrated Letters on the United 

 Provinces of South America, does not even stop at the clergy, in 

 charging a large share of the miseries of his countrymen upon the 

 ecclesiastical establishment, but confounds the creed with its un- 

 worthy ministers, and strikes even at the religion itself : 



" Among the evils suffered by the Indians which have been a 

 source of unhappiness to them, as well as to all South America, is 

 the Roman Catholic religion, which was introduced among them 

 by the Spaniards. This religion, in countries where it predomi- 

 nates or is connected with the government, is widely different from 

 the same religion as it appears in the United States of North Ame- 

 rica. Instead of being employed as all religions ought to be, in 

 directing the morals, purifying the hearts and restraining the vices 

 of the people, — it is so prostituted in Spanish countries, that it 

 has become nothing but a mass of superstitious ceremonies, and 

 the instrument of avarice and oppression. " 



The error of the patriotic writer is so evident that it does not 

 need exposure. The faith and the friar are different things. Yet 

 how deep must be the corruption of a class whose vices force an 

 intelligent man, born and educated in the bosom of the church, to 

 denounce his religion for the sake of its worthless teachers. 



We have dwelt upon this subject because the religion — and es- 

 pecially the protected state religion of a country — is always of 

 deep interest when we estimate the resources and character of a na- 

 tion. Priests of all creeds obtain a sacred character in the opinion 



1 Zavala, Rev. de Mejico, vol. 1, pp. 14, 25. 



