“Brothers, some of our friends have been engaged in instructing you for more than twenty years. You have been taught to build more comfortable houses—you have enclosed and cultivated fields—you have much increased your stock of cattle, and other useful animals. Some of your men have been instructed in useful trades. Many of your women have learned to spin, and some of your children have been taught to read and write.
“Brothers, we love you, and therefore we feel bound to speak plainly to you. We hope our words may sink deep into your minds. It is the voice of your old and true friends, who have never deceived you. You must endeavour to improve in the habits of civilized life, until you arrive at the state of some of the best of the white people, or you will gradually go back until you lose what you have gained—your friends with mournful hearts will give you up—your lands will go from you—and the very name of the Seneca nation, like many that have gone before you, will only be known in history.
“Brothers, a man in the habit of taking strong drink to excess sets a bad example to his neighbours, and his family, and brings his poor wife and innocent children to poverty and distress. This conduct is offensive to the Great Spirit; and unless he changes, he becomes one of the most wretched of men. We wish you, therefore, to endeavour to reclaim such of your people as have fallen into this evil practice, and to warn those who may be in danger of contracting the habit.
“Brothers, we desire to stimulate you to increased industry. The industrious man is always the most comfortable. Labour is good for health; it makes the mind cheerful; and by steadily attending to business, we have the satisfaction to see every thing improving around us. What appeared hard, by perseverance becomes easy.
“Brothers, the greatest kindness a man can do to his children, is to begin early, to learn them to be industrious, and to engage them in business suitable to their years. The boys ought to help their fathers in the fields—the mothers and daughters to be engaged in spinning—in making clothes, in cooking victuals, and in all the business that is suitable to their sex—their houses, their beds, their clothes, and every thing about them, should be kept clean and in good order.
“Brothers, it is consistent with the will of the Great Spirit, that men and women should be connected in marriage. It is an engagement of great importance, and we should not enter into it, until we are of sufficient age to think and judge for ourselves; and when marriage is contracted, the parties are bound to help and love each other—to care for, and instruct their children—and while families live in love and harmony together, it is very comfortable and very good;—but when division gets in, and differing, it is the work of the evil spirit—and if man and wife separate and marry others, it produces confusion, and must be displeasing in the Divine sight, and no people can prosper and grow strong who are in such practices.
“Brothers, it is the duty of parents to have their children educated. The Great Spirit has given us minds capable of improvement, and by education children become more capable of learning the various trades, which will add to their comfort and happiness; and we believe it is right that the girls should be taught as well as the boys.
“Brothers, we have been desirous that the lands belonging to you might remain firm in your hands, that your children and children’s children might possess them. For this end, we advised you to divide to every family a farm, so that they might say, “this is mine,” and improve it for their own benefit. And although changes are at first subject to some difficulties, yet we believe those difficulties may be overcome.
“Brothers, on this subject you wished to have the mind of your father, the President of the United States, to strengthen you in the conclusion you had come to in general council, to divide the Alleghany reservation. You requested your friends in Philadelphia to go to the President, and obtain his opinion. One of us, who are now present, with some others, took a journey to Washington, for the purpose of complying with your request, and we found the President fully impressed with the necessity of such a measure, and he gave us a paper, in strong words, sealed with the great seal of the United States, and directed to the Alleghany chiefs, advising and urging that you might carry the business into effect, which paper was sent to you.
“Brothers, we hope you will keep your minds strong on this subject, for we shall hardly know how to go again to the President, and make requests on your behalf, if, when they are granted, they are not proceeded in.