Some Observations Upon the Civilization of the Western Barbarians, Particularly of the English / made during the residence of some years in those parts.

by John B. Swazey

For this shameful and cruel conduct, the English and other Western Barbarians find ample justification in their Superstition. For they believe that the peoples beyond the seas are Heathen, and under the ban of Jah. Their Sacred Writings so declare; and that "the Heathen are given to the Saints as a spoil, and their Lands as an Inheritance." Now, these Barbarians affirm that they are the Saints; that the people who do not worship their gods are Heathen; and that consequently they (these Barbarians) have a right to the possessions and lands of these distant and unoffending tribes! And not only this, that these tribes, under the wrath of Jah, and subjects of the Devil and hell, ought to be grateful for the inestimable boon of the Gospel (the Sacred Writings), by which they may learn the way to be saved; may, in fine, become Christians!

Thus it comes about that the intercourse of the Western Barbarians with peoples beyond the seas has been aggressive and piratical. From the earlier part of the dynasty Ming, when these Barbarous tribes first visited the great seas and distant regions in the far West and mighty East, the Pope (then worshipped by all the tribes) gave to two of them, very devoted to his worship and powerful in ships, the whole world of Heathen. This meant all the wide world but that small region in Europe wherein the Pope-worshippers lived. To the one tribe, called Portugals, he gave the whole immense East, and to the other, styled Spaniards, the vast regions in the West. Thus the two were possessed, by the gift of their god, of the whole Heathen world—India and our Flowery Kingdom being portions!

In their many ships, these two tribes, sailing East and West, landed upon the distant shores, and seized upon everything which they could. They thought it pleasing to Jah to put to death those who had offended him, and were already under his wrath and condemnation: the Heathen were justly extirpated, unless they believed and worshipped Jah!

Not very long after this gift to the two tribes, the English and Dutch, having quarrelled with the Romish Priests, refused to worship the Pope and denied his authority. The Dutch first, and then the English, growing more powerful in ships, made distant forays for plunder and trade; and, following the tracks of the Portugals and Spaniards, disregarded their pretended exclusive title to the Heathen. They determined to have a portion of this general transfer of the world to Christians; they were in their own judgment the better, the Reformed Christians, and far better entitled!

Since this enormous Blasphemy [Swa-tze] of the Pope, History, as known to the Barbarians, has been, to a large extent, an account of its consequences. Wars between the contending Christians for the distant possessions, and savage and cruel depopulation, plunder, and subjugation of the unoffending inhabitants. Whole races of men have melted away in the presence of these Christ-god worshippers; and the horrors of the dreadful Superstition, which in the regions of Europe had made man more like the Devil of his Idolatry than anything human, spread, with fire and sword, over the wide world! In the far West, beneath the setting sun, a beautiful and peaceful people, rich and numerous, suffered cruelties too shocking to tell; and in the civilised and populous East, the very name of Christian became a synonym of all that is detestable.

None the less, the English Barbarians, to this day, acting upon these Christ-god pretensions, will insist that this Trade and Plunder is the handmaid of Enlightenment, the chief agent in the preparing of the World for a knowledge of the true gods, and the ultimate salvation of the Heathen!

Trade is, therefore, a civilising agency and a powerful helper in the redemption of mankind from the awful Hell. A few poor Missionaries are sometimes added to the general cargo of means of conversion. The same ship which transports these Bonzes to convert the benighted pagans will, perhaps, have a few volumes of the Sacred Writings, some bad rum, worse muskets (more dangerous to him who shoots than to him to whom the shot is directed), gunpowder, flimsy articles too poor for home trade; to these, add the licentious and degraded sailors; and one sees how well the English Barbarians work to introduce their true worship and save the Heathen! But this is feeble: only a trade-ship. The great fire-ships, with big cannons, full of armed and fierce barbarians, which devastate the populous coasts, and burn and plunder the maritime parts—these are illustrious workers in the spread of the Christ-god Salvation and a lofty Civilization! Thus the very worship of the Barbarians has helped, by its cruel pretensions, to ingrain a wrong notion—one making them immoral and cruel. Taking the Jah of the old, huckstering Jews, as an object of idolatry, the whole people has, in trade, become Jewish, as in much else.

I have referred to petty cheating, and to that wholesale criminality of adulteration. But fraud is very common, and often on an enormous scale. Nor is there any remedy. In truth, it is so common, that, as all hope to have a turn at its advantage, none care to punish heavily him, who, by chance, has been too bold. The fraud must take the form of open robbery, or be of such grossness as to be hardly disguised, before the wrong-doer will be arrested. A man may enjoy unmolested, and even with respect, a great fortune acquired by notorious trickery.

So universal is this toleration of roguery, that the Plays and Pastimes are often enlivened by comical illustrations of the various arts, tricks, and deceptions practised. The charlatans, rogues, cheats, and the like, are shown in the Lawyer, the Doctor, the Bonze (low-caste), and other professions and occupations. Endless are the villanies of the Lawyer—the quack pretensions and impositions of the Medical man—the cant, hypocrisy and meanness of the Bonze.

Among the professions and trades, the teacher is a brutal ignoramus, who beats and starves the wretched children under his care; the nurse quietly drinks herself drunk and goes to sleep, leaving the sick man to gasp and die for the drink close at hand, but which he cannot reach; the milkman stops at the pump, and fills up his milk-cans with water; the teaman shows and sells you one sort, but delivers a very different; the grocer says his prayers, hurries to his goods, asks his servant if "the sugar be sanded," "the rum watered," "the tobacco wet down," "the teas mixed," "the small bottles filled," and the like; the tailor sells you more cloth than he knows will be required for your garments, and cabbages the excess; the cabman who knows you are a stranger demands quadruple fare; the innkeeper gives you the meanest room, and charges you the price for the best; and so on through every business of life.