CASAS, Bartholomeo de Las, bishop of Chiapa, in Mexico was descended of a noble Spanish family, and born at Seville in 1474. At the age of nineteen he went to St Domingo with his father, Antonio de Las Casas, who had accompanied Christopher Columbus in his first voyage to the New World. On his return to Spain he became an ecclesiastic, and afterwards entered the order of Dominicans with the view of being employed as a missionary for the conversion of the Indians. In 1533 we find him residing in the monastery of St Dominic, in the island of St Domingo, where lie passed his time in preaching the gospel to the Indians and negroes, and in inculcating humanity on their oppressors. The most faithful historian of this epoch, Oviedo Valdes, a Spanish officer, who had passed the greater part of his life in the New World, informs us that ever since the year 1519 the Indians had been in a state of insurrection, in consequence of an outrage which had been offered by a Spanish officer to the wife of the cacique, Don Henry, who had embraced Christianity. Having in vain demanded justice, this cacique retired with his people to the mountains of Beoruko, whence, during nearly fourteen years, he made war upon the Spaniards. Peace was, however, re-established in 1533, principally through the influence of Las Casas. Oviedo, conquistador though he was, and as such almost the natural enemy of a man like [7:6:210]Las Casas, concludes the twelfth chapter of his work with a tribute to the virtues and zeal of the missionary, who scrupled not to betake himself to the forests and the mountains in order to reconcile the offended cacique and the Indians with the Spaniards, and who mainly contributed to bring about the peace which, unhappily, proved of but short duration, and was followed by the extermination of nearly the whole of the natives.

Before entering the order of St Dominic, Las Casas had presented to Charles V. several memoirs in favour of the Indians. But the efforts which he made to alleviate their sufferings proving fruitless, he proposed to found a colony, on principles very different from those which were then followed by his countrymen; and with this view he prevailed on the emperor to send him to Cumana in the capacity of governor. On his arrival at Porto Ricco in 1519, with three hundred Castilian emigrants, he immediately set out for Cumana, in order to establish his colonists in that territory; and being aware that his countrymen were regarded with horror by the natives, he found it necessary to distinguish his settlers by a particular dress, ornamented with a white cross, in order that they might not be confounded with the other Spaniards. To conquer the affection of the natives, by acting in conformity to the benevolent spirit of the gospel, and by respecting their liberty and their property, was the plan adopted by Las Casas and the men who accompanied him. Unfortunately, some time before his arrival, Spanish pirates, who took the name of Conquistadores, having made several descents on the coasts of Trinidad, Venezuela, and Cumana, and seized and carried away Indians while in the act of trading with and even entertaining them, the natives, exasperated at this inhuman perfidy, revenged themselves by putting to death every Spaniard who fell into their hands. When Las Casas arrived at Cumana with his people, Gonzalo Ocampo, who had been dispatched thither by the governor of St Domingo in quality of commandant, refused to recognise his authority; upon which Las Casas, having lodged his settlers in a fort surrounded with pallisades, repaired to St Domingo, in order to make known to the governor-general of the Indies the rebellion of Ocampo. Meanwhile the latter, by his exactions and his cruelties, goaded the Indians into insurrection; and as they could not believe that there were individuals of respectability and humanity among the Spaniards, they fell indiscriminately on the colonists of Las Casas and the satelites of Ocampo, and massacred all who were unable to effect their escape to the small island of Cubagua.

But Las Casas was not discouraged nor disheartened. In fact, we find him continually going from America to Spain, and returning from Spain to America, in order to plead the cause of the oppressed Indians. So much zeal and virtue, however, exasperated against him the oppressors of this unhappy race; and another ecclesiastic, Sepulveda, canon of Salamanca, and historiographer to Charles V., composed a work, entitled “Democrates Secundus, seu de justis belli causis: an liceat bello Indos prosequi, auferendo ab eis dominia possessionesque et bona temporalia, et occidendo eos si resistentiam opposuerint, ut sic spoliati et subjecti, facilius per praedicatores suadeatur iis fides.” Charles V. prohibited the publication of this memoir; but it was nevertheless printed at Rome, and circulated throughout Spain by the monks, in contempt of the sovereign authority. Las Casas, now bishop of Chiapa, answered this abominable libel, in a work which bears the impress of his character, and is entitled “Brevissima Relacion de la Destruccion de las Indias.” But Sepulveda did not consider himself as confuted. He demanded a public conference with Las Casas, and continued to maintain, in his discourses and his writings, that, according to political law, Charles V. might compel the Indians to recognise him as their sovereign; and that, according to the laws of the church, it was a duty to exterminate every one who refused to embrace the Christian religion. Charles V. appointed his confessor, DominicoSoto, to examine and report on the merits of this dispute; but being overwhelmed with more urgent affairs, the emperor never found time to pronounce any decision. Meanwhile the Indians were hunted down and exterminated, or crowded into the mines; and it is even alleged that fifteen millions of them perished in less than ten years.

The devotion of Las Casas to the cause of the poor oppressed Indians gave rise, according to Herrera, to a very remarkable accusation; namely, that it was he who recommended to the Spaniards the trade in negroes, in order to substitute the blacks for the Indians in the labours of the colonies. But Μ. Gregoire, in a memoir entitled Apologie de E. de Las Casas, inserted in the fourth volume of the Mémoires de la Classe des Seiences Morales et Politiques de l’ Institut, has refuted this calumnious imputation. On referring to the Spanish and Portuguese writers of that period, as well as to the works of English authors who have written on commerce, it will in fact be found, first, that all the historians, as Raynal, Pauw, and even Robertson, who have accused the bishop of Chiapa of this barbarous inconsistency, have followed either Herrera, an elegant but partial historian, or Charlevoix, who, when he speaks of the Spanish colonies, merely translates Herrera; and, secondly, that the Spaniards were in the habit of purchasing negro slaves from the Portuguese long before the discovery of the New World, and that, from the commencement of their establishment in St Domingo, negroes were regularly imported into that island. Nor is this the only evidence which maybe adduced’to disprove the calumny in question. There are still extant three manuscript volumes in folio, from the pen of Las Casas, containing his memoirs, official and familiar letters, and political and theological works; which, so far from countenancing the charge brought against his memory, not only breathe the most ardent spirit of philanthropy, but, in many passages, show that the admirable author deeply compassionated the wrongs and sufferings of the injured Africans.

Las Casas was distinguished both as a theologian and an historian. He has been accused of exaggeration in the recital which he has given of the crimes and murders committed by the Spaniards in the New World. But he is borne out by Clavigero, who reluctantly admits the iniquities and cruelties of Cortes, Alvaredo, and the other Spanish chiefs, and represents Mexico Elascala, and the other neighbouring states, as exceedingly populous at the time of the conquest; a point, we may add, on which Cortes himself is perfectly at one with the good bishop. After having passed half a century in the New World, and twelve times crossed the ocean to plead in Spain the cause of the Indians, Las Casas renounced his bishopric, and returned, in 1554, to his native country, where, having immortalized himself by his beneficence, and the practice of all the virtues, he died at Madrid in 1566. The works of Las Casas are, 1. Brevissima Relacion de la Destruccion de las Indias, already mentioned; 2. Principia quoedam ex quibus procedendum est in disputatione, ad manifestandam et defendendam justitiam Indorum; 3. Utrum reges et principes, jure aliquo vel titulo et salva conscientia cives ac subditos a regia corona alienare et alterius dominii particularis ditioni subjicere possint? Frankfort, 1571; 4. Various tracts and pieces on theology and morals. The original edition of Las Obras de D. Earth, de Las Casas, Seville, 1552, printed in Gothic characters, is now very scarce, and for this reason eagerly sought after by collectors.