Chapter 22

DEBATE WITH GINES DE SEPULVEDA

Rejected by his flock in Chiapa, abused and denounced by the Spanish colonists in America, the venerable Bishop’s arrival in his native country was preceded by accusations intended to prejudice the young Prince, Don Philip, who was regent during the Emperor’s absence, against him. Long years of championship of an unpopular cause rendered him impervious to these baseless attacks of his enemies. At a time of life when most men think to rest, Las Casas prepared himself with undiminished vigour to continue the struggle in the cause of freedom. Upon his arrival in Spain, he repaired at once to Valladolid where the court was usually in residence, only to find that Don Philip had gone to hold a Córtes in the kingdom of Aragon. With his habitual promptness, the Bishop followed him thither, and was received with great kindness by the Prince, who, after listening attentively to all that he had to recount, wrote to the Dominicans in Chiapa commending their conduct and offering to send more men of their Order to reinforce them, if they were required.

The Indians were ever uppermost in the mind of Las Casas and he likewise obtained that the Prince should write letters to the caciques in Chiapa and Tuzulutlan, who had become Christians, congratulating them on their conversion, praising their zeal, of which the Bishop had informed him, and urging them to follow the counsels of their Dominican friends. To celebrate his pacific victory in the “Land of War,” Las Casas also had the sinister name Tuzulutlan officially changed to that of Vera Paz or True Peace.

The formal resignation of Las Casas from the diocese of Chiapa was made known to the Spanish Ambassador in Rome, Don Diego Hurtado de Mendoza, in a letter from the Emperor dated September 11, 1550, with instructions to announce the same to the Pope and to present the name of Fray Tomas Casillas for the vacant bishopric.

Mention has been made of the _Confesionario_, or book of instructions written by the Bishop of Chiapa and distributed to the clergy of his diocese. In this little manual, Las Casas demonstrated that the armed invasion of America by the Spaniards and the conquest of the various countries were contrary to all right and justice: he argued that the Bull of donation given by Alexander VI. charged the Spanish sovereigns with the right, or rather the duty, of converting the inhabitants of the New World to Christianity; once their conversion was effected, they might be induced, if possible, by gentle and pacific means to place themselves under Spanish rule. Arguing from these premises, the Bishop directed his clergy to refuse absolution and the sacraments to all who refused to liberate their slaves or continued to oppress and rob the natives.

Reduced to a formula the doctrine of Las Casas may be summed up: Convert the Indians first and they will afterwards become Spanish subjects; as against the contention of his adversaries that they must first be conquered, after which their conversion would follow.

His enemies were not slow in seizing upon these definitions and in twisting them into a denial of the sovereign rights of the Crown. Formal denunciations of the teachings contained in the _Confesionario_ were laid before the India Council, (66) and that body having summoned Las Casas to explain his doctrines in writing, he submitted an exposition of the contents of his book, in the form of thirty propositions, the substance of which may be summarised as follows: (67)

1.1. The power and authority which the Pope holds from Jesus Christ, extends over all men, whether they be Christians or infidels, as far as everything touching their salvation is concerned. Their exercise should, however, be different over pagans than over those who have received or have refused to receive the true faith. 2.2. The primacy of the Pope imposes upon him the obligation to diffuse the Christian religion throughout the world and to see that the Gospel is preached to the heathen wherever they will receive it. 3.3. The Pope is bound to choose proper missioners for such propaganda. 4.4. It is evident that Christian rulers are his most suitable and efficient assistants in this work. 5.5. The Pope is free to invite or justified in obliging Christian rulers to lend their help, by the exercise of their power, by the expenditure of money, and by sending suitable men to conduct missions. 6.6. The Pope and the Christian sovereigns should act together for this end, in agreement with one another. 7.7. The Pope may distribute heathen lands among Christian rulers, designating where each is to labour for the conversion of the infidels. 8.8. Such distribution should be made, however, for the purpose of ensuring the instruction and the conversion of the pagan nations but not at all to increase the territories of the Christian sovereign or to augment his revenues, titles, and honours, at the expense of the natives. 9.9. It may follow that Christian princes may incidentally derive some profit from this conversion of such infidels, and all such may be permitted to them, but the primary object must be the propagation of the Faith, the extension of the Church, and the service of God. 10.10. Native kings and rulers hold their authority and jurisdiction by a just title and have a right to the obedience of their lawful subjects, nor should they be deposed or violently treated. 11.11. Injustice, cruelty, and every form of wickedness are produced by the violation of this law. 12.12. Neither idolatry nor any kind of sin justifies Christians in usurping the authority of native rulers or in seizing the lands and goods of their subjects. 13.13. As long as such infidels have not opposed the propagation of the Gospel and have not refused to receive the Faith preached to them, no Christian tribunal or judge has a right to punish them for the practice of idolatry or for the commission of any sins, no matter how heinous. 14.14. The New World was discovered during the pontificate of Alexander VI., hence that pontiff was obliged to designate some Christian prince under whose protection the propagation of the Faith should be carried on. 15.15. Since the Catholic sovereigns of Spain, Ferdinand and Isabella, had protected and aided Columbus in making his discovery, and had, moreover, expelled the Mahometans from their land, the Pope perceived the special claims they had to receive this privilege, and the great advantages to religion of confiding this mission to them. 16.16. The Pope, having authority to grant such a privilege, has power likewise to annul, revoke, or suspend it for just cause; or he may transfer it to some other ruler and forbid all others to interfere. 17.17. The jurisdiction over the Indies held by the sovereigns of Spain is lawful. 18.18. The native rulers in the Indies are therefore obliged to submit to the jurisdiction of the Spanish sovereigns. 19.19. Once the native rulers have voluntarily and freely accepted the Faith and been baptised Christians, they become bound by another title than before to acknowledge the Spanish sovereignty. 20.20. The law of God imposes on the Spanish sovereigns this duty of selecting proper persons and sending them to preach Christianity to the natives, and to neglect nothing that may ensure their conversion. 21.21. They share this obligation with the Pope and, before the conversion of the natives has been accomplished, they have the same power over them as has His Holiness. 22.22. The Catholic Faith may be best spread throughout the New World by imitating the example of our Lord in establishing His religion upon earth. The natives are submissive, docile people, who may be won by kindness, charity, and good examples of holy living. They should be encouraged and favoured, and treated as brothers. 23.23. The Romans, Mahometans, Moors, and Turks have propagated their doctrines by the sword, but such means are tyrannical, and it is blasphemy for Christians to imitate such cruelties; what has already been done in the Indies has caused the natives to believe the Christian God to be the most merciless and cruel of all deities. 24.24. It is only natural that the Indians should defend their countries from armed invasion, thus they resist the propagation of the Faith. 25.25. The Spanish sovereigns have from the outset repeatedly forbidden wars, conquests, and acts of cruelty. Those officials who have pretended to act by royal authority in such wars and acts have lied, and the warrants they have shown are forgeries. 26.26. It follows that all the wars, invasions, and conquests that have been made, have been tyrannical, contrary to justice and authority, and hence, in fact, null and void: this is proven by the record of the proceedings in Council against all such tyrants and usurpers who have been found guilty. 27.27. It is the duty of the Spanish sovereigns to maintain and re-establish all laws and usages amongst the Indians which are good, and that is to say the most of them; those which are bad should be abolished, and the preaching and application of the Gospel is the best means for effecting this. 28.28. The Devil himself could not have worked greater harm than have the Spaniards, by their tyranny and cruel greed; they have treated the Indians like beasts, worked them to death, and persecuted those who have wished to learn from the friars, even more than others. 29.29. The system of giving the Indians in encomienda and repartimiento is absolutely contrary to the royal commands issued by Queen Isabella to Columbus and his successors during her reign. The Queen ordered all Indians who had been brought to Spain as slaves, to be sent back and set free. What would she think could she but witness the present state of things? The present sovereign has been kept in ignorance of the true condition, and his long journeys and absences have prevented him from informing himself. 30.30. It follows, therefore, from these propositions that all the conquests, acquisitions of territory, invasions, and usurpations, whether by the Crown officials or by the colonists and individuals, are illegal, because all have been accomplished contrary to the orders of the Spanish sovereigns and in defiance of their authority. (68)

Without pausing to examine the origin or trace the development of the papal claim to dispose of the western hemisphere, which Las Casas admits in these Thirty Propositions, it should be borne in mind that Alexander VI. made no unusual exercise of his prerogative in so doing, nor was there anybody, whether philosopher, jurist, or statesman, who, at that time, contested his pretension; arguments which Las Casas presented as almost axiomatic are now obsolete, and of interest merely as illustrating the political doctrines of his times. He was, perhaps, the first to limit the exercise of the papal power by describing it as conditional, and in denying that the bull gave the sovereigns of Castile any property rights in the New World. According to his doctrines, the Pope was exercising his purely spiritual power. Charged by the Founder of Christianity with the obligation to cause the Gospel to be preached to every creature, he might delegate to the sovereign of his choice the right, or rather the duty of sending his subjects to convert the heathen within a prescribed portion of the Indies—but for no other purpose. Equally clear is the limitation he places to the action of the prince. The latter receives no authorisation from the Pope to invade, occupy, or govern territory in America. His mission is exclusively religious, and any advantage accruing to himself must be merely incidental. Since he may not rightfully use force to establish his rule over the Indians, the rights of sovereignty conferred by the Bull, only become effective in cases where the native rulers, after their conversion, voluntarily acknowledge them.

In these definitions, Las Casas had gone far, but his adversaries despite their subtlety were impotent either to force or inveigle him into a position, where even constructive heresy and disloyalty might be imputed to him. More adroit than they, he skilfully evaded their snares, without sacrificing one jot of his contention. The India Council was well satisfied with his defence of the _Confesionario_, but the resentment of his enemies was inflamed the more by his victory, and it was felt to be more than ever necessary to fix upon some one able to refute his arguments and discredit him in the estimation of statesmen and theologians.

One of the foremost of Spanish theologians and Jurists at that period was Gines de Sepulveda, whose distinction as a master of Latin style had caused Erasmus to describe him as the Spanish Livy. Born in Cordoba of noble parents in 1490, he had passed many years in Italy and had but recently returned to Spain, where he was named royal historiographer by Charles V. During his sojourn in Rome, Sepulveda had published a dialogue entitled _Democrates_, in which he sought to prove that war was consonant with the doctrines of Christianity: “De convenientia, disciplinæ militaris cum cristiana religione.”

Whether or no Sepulveda was deliberately chosen by the opponents of Las Casas to dispute the Bishop’s propositions in defence of the Indians, does not positively appear, (69) but just before the latter returned from America, he composed a second dialogue, _Democrates II. De justis belli causis apud Indios_, in which he upheld the right of the Spaniards to make war on the Indians. This dialogue was apparently written in Valladolid and called forth an episcopal reprimand from the Bishop of Segovia. The fraternal admonition of the Bishop, instead of disposing of the subject, provoked a reply from Sepulveda in the form of an _Apologia_ of an _Democrates II_.

The India Council having refused to permit the publication of this dialogue, Sepulveda petitioned the Emperor, who referred the matter to the Council of Castile. That body having given its assent, the Emperor signed a royal cedula at Aranda de Duero, authorising the printing of the book.

In the midst of the interest excited by this controversy, Las Casas arrived in Spain. He prevailed upon the Council of Castile to reconsider its decision, and to submit Sepulveda’s work to the universities of Salamanca and Alcala, for an opinion on the soundness of his doctrine. The reply of the universities was adverse, and the authorisation to publish was consequently annulled. (70)

Prohibited from publishing his book in Spain, Sepulveda sent it to Rome where the censorship of the press was freer and where, in fact, the condemned dialogue was printed, together with the author’s _Apologia_ addressed to the Bishop of Segovia. An edition of the work was prepared in Spanish for the benefit of those who did not read Latin, but the Emperor forbade the entrance of the one and the other into Spain.

Las Casas took but the time necessary to master the propositions of Sepulveda, before he seized the cudgels in defence of his Indians. From this moment the controversy took another complexion. Sepulveda had so far crossed weapons with learned theologians, men of study rather than of action, who carried on the dispute along purely scholastic lines and according to the recognised rules governing debates between scholars.

His new adversary, who was the best informed man in the world on the special subject under dispute, transferred the debate from academic to practical ground, of every foot of which he was master. Though inferior in learning to the polished humanist, who affected to regard him as a furious fanatic whose crude Latin shocked his scholarly sensibilities, Las Casas was his match in fervid eloquence, overmatched him in the ardour of his feelings, and ended by pulverising him under the weight of facts he hurled upon him.

The controversy assumed such proportions that the Emperor, in the fashion of the times, ordered the India Council to assemble in Valladolid in conjunction with certain theologians and scholars, to decide whether or no wars for conquest might be justly waged against the Indians. (71) Before this learned jury both Las Casas and Sepulveda were summoned to appear in 1550.

In the first session of the assembly, Sepulveda stated his propositions and expounded his defence of them, presenting, under four heads, his reasons why it was lawful to make war on the Indians:

1.1. Because of the gravity of their sins, particularly the practice of idolatry and other sins against nature. 2.2. Because of the rudeness of their heathen and barbarous natures, which oblige them to serve those of more elevated natures, such as the Spaniards possess. 3.3. For the spread of the faith; for their subjection renders its preaching easier and more persuasive. 4.4. On account of the harm they do to one another, killing men to sacrifice them and some, in order to eat them.

These reasons were defended by their author in an able discourse, in which all the resources of his vast learning and forensic ability were called into play.

Las Casas occupied five sessions in reading his _Historia Apologetica_, after which the assembly directed the Emperor’s confessor, Fray Domingo de Soto, to prepare a summary of the arguments of both parties, of which fourteen copies should be made for distribution to the members of the conference.

After the reading of Fray Domingo’s summary, which was drawn up with perfect impartiality and great clearness, Sepulveda presented twelve objections to the arguments of Las Casas, each of which he argued with great subtlety and erudition. The refutation of these twelve objections by Las Casas, closed this memorable controversy; in none of his writings is the character of the Protector of the Indians more fully revealed than in this final discourse before the conference at Valladolid. To give it in its entirety would occupy too much space in this place, but the following translation of the speech with which he introduced his twelve answers, is worthy of our closest attention.

After the introductory phrases required by the etiquette of such debates he continued: “So enormous are the errors and scandalous propositions, contrary to all evangelical truth and to all Christianity that the Doctor Sepulveda has accumulated, set forth, and coloured with misguided zeal in the royal service, that no honest Christian would be surprised should we wish to combat him, not only with lengthy argument, but likewise as a mortal enemy of Christendom, an abettor of cruel tyrants, extirpator of the human race, and disseminator of fatal blindness throughout this realm of Spain. But the least we could do, having regard to the obligations imposed by the law of God, is to answer each point here presented, and this will complete his confusion.”

From this vigorous opening, the Bishop went on to examine the nature of the Bull of donation and the intention of Alexander VI. in granting it. He demonstrated the irrefutable fact that the Catholic sovereigns and the Pope were in absolute agreement, and that the clearness of the language of the Bull left no room for two interpretations. The better to illustrate and drive home this argument, he cited articles from the last will of Queen Isabella, of which the following translation proves the truth of his contention:

“Forasmuch as when the islands and terra-firma discovered, or to be discovered, in the Ocean Sea, were granted to us by the Holy Apostolic See, our principal intention, when we asked the said concession from Pope Alexander VI. of happy memory, was to provide for attracting and winning to us the natives, and to convert them to our holy Catholic faith; and to send to the said islands and and terra-firma, prelates, religious, clerics, and other learned and God-fearing men, to instruct the inhabitants in the Catholic faith: and to use all necessary diligence in teaching them and in introducing good customs among them; all this according as may be more fully seen in the wording of the said concession. I therefore very affectionately beseech my lord the King, and I charge and command the said Princess, my daughter, and the said Prince, her husband, that they shall execute and accomplish this, making it their principal object, and using the greatest diligence therein. They shall not consent, or furnish occasion that the Indian natives and inhabitants of the said islands and and terra-firma, sustain any injury, either in their persons or their belongings, but they shall rather order that they be well and justly treated. And if they [the Indians] have received any injury, they shall correct it and shall take measures to prevent what is conceded to and enjoined upon us by the wording of the said concession, from being exceeded.”

Reviewing the conditions in the colonies, Las Casas described the richness of the soil and the vast resources of the Indies, declaring that what was wanted there, were industrious, honest, and frugal emigrants, who would develop the agricultural sources of wealth, instead of the horde of rapacious adventurers and dissolute soldiery then engaged in depopulating and ruining them. One by one he stripped Sepulveda’s propositions of their brilliant rhetoric, exposing the hollowness and sham beneath the specious reasoning, with which the latter sought to cloak his poverty of facts. Las Casas closed his case with the following brilliant and prophetic peroration:

“The injuries and loss which have befallen the Crown of Castile and Leon will be visited likewise on all Spain, because the tyranny wrought by their devastations, massacres, and slaughters is so monstrous, that the blind may see it, the deaf hear it, and the dumb recount it, while after our brief existence, the wise shall judge and condemn it. I invoke all the hierarchies and choirs of angels, all the saints of the Celestial Court, all the inhabitants of the globe and especially those who may live after me, to witness that I free my conscience of all that has been done; and that I have fully exposed all these woes to his Majesty; and that if he abandons the government of the Indies to the tyranny of the Spaniards, they will all be lost and depopulated—as we see Hispaniola, and other islands and three thousand leagues of the continent destitute of inhabitants. For these reasons, God will punish Spain and all her people with inevitable severity. So may it be!”(72)

Language worthy of a saint and a statesman, in which there breathed the spirit of prophecy, for the system of government, once initiated by the Spanish officials, was persisted in till the end, while one by one the great possessions of Spain in the New World were torn from the mother country. In no land where freedom of speech was a recognised right, could an orator have used plainer language, and it shows both the Spanish civil and ecclesiastical authorities of that age in a somewhat unfamiliar light that Las Casas not only escaped perilous censures but even won a moral victory over his talented opponent. What would have become of the champion of such unpopular doctrines, attacking as he did the material interests of thousands of the greatest men in the land, had there been daily newspapers in those times, it is not difficult to imagine. Examples of the defenders of forlorn causes are not wanting in our own day, and the fate of those who lead an unpopular crusade is the pillory of the press, which spares no less than did the fires of the mediaeval stake.

The discovery and conquest of the American dominions brought ruin to Spain as a nation; beyond the tribute of glory which those early achievements yielded to the Spanish name, the results were disastrous to her power. During centuries, much of the best blood of her prolific people was drained by the Americas, so that the population of the peninsula to-day is little more numerous than in the reign of Ferdinand and Isabella, whereas her territory and natural resources might maintain triple their number.