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SECTION III.

Of Cruelty proceeding from excessive anger or

EXC

revenge.

XCESSIVE anger and revenge are also very productive of cruelty. Some men make use of secret means privately to destroy those who have offended them: others take the more open and fashionable method of duelling, which, tho' not fo infamous as the former, cannot be justly reckoned much less cruel, especially as it is often occafioned by mere trifles, or very flight provocations; and many times happens between the most intimate friends, who tho' too thoughtless of the turpitude and cruelty of the action, before it is committed, yet when one falls, the furvivor frequently fees it in its true and most horrible form, and would then give, as the ufual expreffion is, the whole world, if in his power, that he had not committed fo fhocking and detestable a crime !—A crime without remedy, and for which no adequate recompence can poffibly be made.

THIS abominable cuftom of fighting duels feems, in fome measure, owing to that Gothic fashion of mens wearing fwords when they

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are not upon military duty. A gentleman cannot go to court, to church, to fee his miftress, nor a phyfician to vifit his patient, unlefs he is armed with an inftrument of flaughter. The ancient Greeks or Romans never wore fwords but in war; neither were any duels ever fought among them. If they challenged one another, it was to fight only against the enemies of their country. Cæfar, in his Commentaries", has given us a remarkable inftance of fuch a challenge. Two centurions, T. Pulfio and L. Varenus, having, with great animofity, long contested which was the braver man, or moft worthy of preferment, and being prefent at Cicero's camp when affaulted by the Gauls; the former, in the heat of the attack, called aloud to the lat ter in these words, Quid dubitas, Varene? aut quem locum probandæ virtutis tuæ exSpectas? Hic dies, hic dies de noftris controverfiis judicabit.

IMMEDIATELY after this fpirited incitement to a tryal of their valour, Pulfio went out of the camp alone, and rushed upon the thickest of the enemies ranks. Varenus followed his rival, who with his javelin flew the first of the Gauls that engaged him; but being attacked by a shower of darts, one of them pierced his fhield, and ftuck after fuch

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a manner

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a L. 5. §. 36.

a manner in his belt, as prevented him from drawing his fword. The enemy presently furrounded him, thus incumbered and unable to defend himself: at this inftant Varenus comes up to his affiftance, kills one, and drives the reft before him; but pursuing them too eagerly, ftept into a hole and fell down. Pulfio, who had now difincumbered himself from the dart, and drawn his fword, came very feasonably to the refcue of Varenus, with whom, after having killed many of the Gauls, he returned with fafety and glory to the camp. The Romans, we fee, did not in their private quarrels fheath their fwords in one another's breafts: contefts for valour, among them, were properly and nobly turned against the enemies of their country. Happy would it be, if in this we imitated them!

IT is reported of the famous viscount de Turenne, that when he was a young officer, and at the fiege of a fortified town, he had no lefs than twelve challenges fent him, all of which he pocketed. But being foon after commanded upon a defperate attack of fome part of the fortifications, he fent a billet to each of the challengers, acquainting them, that he had received their favours, which he deferred anfwering till a proper occafion offered, both for them, and himself, to exert their courage for the king's fervice; that be

ing

ing ordered to affault the enemies works the next day, he defired their company, when they would have an opportunity of fhewing their own bravery, and being witneffes of his. Certainly this was acting like a man of fenfe, of temper, and of true courage.

ANOTHER kind of cruelty alfo oftentimes arifes from these paffions of anger and revenge, which, tho' commonly practised with pleasure instead of remorfe, is little less barbarous than the former: I mean destroying mens characters, which many efteem equally with their lives: and, indeed, of what value is life without a good character? Men, of more wit than humanity, are very apt, in the wantonnefs of their hearts, to be guilty of this cruel injury: but that it is done with wit, is fo far from being a good excuse, that it is an aggravation of the crime; for, like a stab given by a sharp-pointed weapon, it pierces the deeper.

ALTHOUGH the Indians in North America have hardly any wealth or property to occafion covetoufnefs, nor notions of grandeur to excite ambition; yet, when first difcovered by the Europeans, they were, and still are, continually at war with, and exercifing the most horrid cruelties upon one another : father Hennepin, who refided many years among them, informs us of the principal. cause.

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caufe. "The favages of America," fays he, "have almost all of them a ftrong propen

fion to war, because they are very revenge"ful: when once they have taken a disgust "to any, who are not of their own nation,

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they must be revenged fooner or later, "tho' they wait an opportunity to the third "or fourth generation. They are restless “ day and night, 'till they have taken fatis"faction for an affront, by deftroying, if they can, most of that nation they are en"raged at."

FROM the fame author I fhall give a flight fketch of the shocking cruelties these people are prompted to commit by these paffions of anger and revenge.

"THERE are," fays this miffionary, "no favages in all the Northern America, but what are very cruel to their enemies. * ** "When they take a flave," (he means a prisoner) "they tie him, and make him run "after them; if he is unable to follow them, "they strike their hatchet into his head, and "there leave him, after they have torn off "fkin and hair together. They do not spare fucking infants. *** At their return from war, when they come near their villages, they are met by the men and women, who "make a lane for the flaves to pass through them. But 'tis a lamentable reception for

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