[vi] Preface.
VERY appropriately (dear Reader) one of the earlier Prophets, depicting to us allegorically, under the visible and historical downfall of Judah, the horrible ravages, exterminations, and ruin wrought by Satan, where his fury can have full sway, has said emphatically: Before him the land is a Garden of pleasure, and behind him a desolate wilderness. For truly, whoever will cast his eyes over all the vast circumference of the earth, and will consider the nations thereof which are illuminated by the Sun of Justice, our Savior Jesus Christ; bedewed with his blood and precious Sacrament; nourished by his grace and word; animated and gladdened by his [vii] spirit; enlightened and governed by his divine Offices, honored by his utterances and actual presence; whoever, I say, will contemplate this, will have great reason to cry out, Beyond the infernal destroyer, and, Where he does not extend, the earth is a Garden of delight, where all blessings, even temporal and worldly happiness, follow the people, the real tree of life, our Redeemer, Jesus Christ, being planted in their midst. On the contrary, if we turn aside our gaze, and look behind this cursed tyrant, Lucifer, and upon the places where he has exercised his intolerable cruelties, we shall find only destruction and solitude, cries and lamentations, only desolation and the shadow of death. Now we need not go out from our own hemisphere to see and recognize [viii] this truth; Greece and Palestine confront us, formerly as beautiful as Eden, to-day a mournful desert; but if you wish that we should look upon our own country, that, having a striking proof thereof, we may render praise to the liberal giver of our blessings; I pray you let us follow this corporal Sun, which gives us light, and accompany it to its setting, to learn to whom, in a direct line from us, it goes forth to give good day across our Ocean, leaving us here to the stillness of the night. It is new France, this new land, first discovered in the last century, by our countrymen, a twin land with ours, subject to the same influences, lying in the same latitude, and having the same climate; a vast country, and so to speak, infinite; [ix] a country which we greet, facing our Sun at eventide: a land moreover, of which you may well say, if you consider Satan opposite and coming up from the West to smite us; A Garden of delight lies before him, behind him a solitary wilderness. For verily all this region, though capable of the same prosperity as ours, nevertheless through Satan's malevolence, which reigns there, is only a horrible wilderness, scarcely less miserable on account of the scarcity of bodily comforts than for that which renders man absolutely miserable, the complete lack of the ornaments and riches of the soul; and neither the sun, nor malice of the soil, neither the air nor the water, neither men nor their caprices, are to be blamed for this. We are all created by and dependent upon the same principles: [x] We breathe under the same sky; the same constellations influence us; and I do not believe that the land, which produces trees as tall and beautiful as ours, will not produce as fine harvests, if it be cultivated. Whence, then, comes such great diversity? Whence such an unequal division of happiness and of misfortune? of garden and of wilderness? of Heaven and of Hell? Why do you ask me? Ask him, who from Heaven counsels his people, to consider the so opposite division between Esau and Jacob, twin brothers, the former cast out to dwell with dragons and wild beasts; the latter in the lap and bosom of the earth with the Angels.
Ceste consideration de vray est puissante, & deuroit occuper d'admiration tous nos sentimens, [xi] nous retenãt en vne pieuse crainte, & affectiõnée volonté de communiquer charitablement ce comble de biẽ du Christianisme; qui nous vient si gratuitement au rencontre: Car autrement certes il est facile à nostre benin Pere de croiser ses bras comme fit Iacob, & mettre sa dextre sur le puysné, & sa gauche sur le plus grand. O mon Dieu! où est icy l'ambition des Grands? où la contention des forts? où la monstre des riches? où l'effort des vertueux? y a-il champ de Marathon, ou lices Olympiques plus propres aux courageux? où est-ce que la gloire d'vn Chrestien le peut esleuer plus heureusement, que où elle apporteroit la felicité corporelle tout ensemble, & la spirituelle à ses consorts; & ou comme grand outil de Dieu, il feroit d'vn desert vn Paradis? où [xii] il dompteroit les Monstres infernaux, & introduiroit la police, & la milice du ciel en terre? où les generations, & generations à milliers, & iusques aux derniers siecles beniroyent son nom & memoire sans cesse, & le ciel mesme (qui se peupleroit de ses biẽfaits) se resiouyroit des graces, & benedictions, versées dessus luy?
This consideration is certainly powerful, and ought to inspire all our sentiments with admiration, [xi] keeping us in pious fear, and in loving desire to benevolently impart this highest of all the blessings of Christianity, which comes to us so gratuitously and of its own accord. For otherwise it is certainly easy for our kind Father to cross his hands as did Jacob, and put his right upon the younger, and his left upon the elder. Oh, my God! where is here the ambition of the Great? where, the contention of the strong? where, the display of the rich? where, the endeavor of the virtuous? is there a field of Marathon, or are there Olympian games, more fitting to the brave? Where can the glory of a Christian more successfully ennoble him, than there where it brings both bodily and spiritual happiness to his brethren; and where, as one of God's great instruments, he would make a Garden out of the wilderness; where [xii] he would subjugate satanic Monsters, and would introduce the order and discipline of heaven upon earth; where generations upon generations, by thousands and to the remotest ages, would forever bless his name and memory, and heaven itself (which would be peopled by his good deeds) would rejoice at the thanksgivings and blessings bestowed upon him.
[36] Or c'est (amy Lecteur) l'ardent desir, & zele de voir ceste nouuelle France, que ie dy, cõquise à nostre Seigneur: qui m'a fait prendre la plume en main pour vous depeindre briefuement, & en toute verité ce que i'ay recogneu de ses cõtrées. Il y a quatre ans, que i'y fus enuoyé pas mes Superieurs: &, Dieu punissant mes pechez, i'en ay esté despuis enleué par les Anglois, ainsi que ie raconteray cy-apres.
Now (dear Reader) it is this my eagerness and ardent desire to see this new France converted to our Lord, which has made me take my pen in hand to describe to you briefly, and in all truth, what I have found out about these lands. It is four years since I was sent there by my Superiors; and, as God's punishment for my sins, I was taken away from there by the English, as I shall relate hereafter.
Relation de la Novvelle France, et le Voyage des Peres Iesvites en icelle.