A traveller observes, that the white settlers, who live in the woods,
soon become sallow, lanky, and dejected; the atmosphere of the trees
does not agree with Caucasian lungs; and it is, perhaps, in part, an
instinct of this, which causes the hatred of the new settlers towards
trees. The Indian breathed the atmosphere of the forests freely; he
loved their shade. As they are effaced from the land, he fleets too; a
part of the same manifestation, which cannot linger behind its proper
era.
The Chippewas have lately petitioned the state of Michigan, that they
may be admitted as citizens; but this would be vain, unless they could
be admitted, as brothers, to the heart of the white man. And while the
latter feels that conviction of superiority, which enabled our Wisconsin
friend to throw away the gun, and send the Indian to fetch it, he had
need to be very good, and very wise, not to abuse his position. But the
white man, as yet, is a half-tamed pirate, and avails himself, as much
as ever, of the maxim, "Might makes right." All that civilization does
for the generality, is to cover up this with a veil of subtle evasions
and chicane, and here and there to rouse the individual mind to appeal
to heaven against it.
I have no hope of liberalizing the missionary, of humanizing the sharks
of trade, of infusing the conscientious drop into the flinty bosom of
policy, of saving the Indian from immediate degradation, and speedy
death. The, whole sermon may be preached from the text, "Needs be that
offences must come, yet we them by whom they come.
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