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 [pg 279] 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 [pg 281] 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 [pg 282] 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 [pg 284] 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 [pg 285] 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 [pg 286] 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.”