Remaining silent about the destruction of nature is an endorsement of that destruction.

  

      

 

 

Spain’s frontier institutions were made

in the West Indies and further developed

in the fertile Mesa Central around Mexico City,

where the Indians were civilized, sedentary, agricultural,

and, as compared with the nomads of the Plains,

as docile as sheep…

 

            The labors of the holy fathers were at best

wholly negligible for the Indians and often disastrous to the missionaries.

The wild Comanche and Apache were not amenable

to the gentle philosophy of Christ nor were they tamed

by the mysteries and elaborate ceremonies of the church.

The warwhoop was sweeter to them than evening vespers;

the crescent bow was a better symbol

of their desires than the holy cross;

and it was far more joyful, in their eyes

to chase the shaggy buffalo on pinto ponies

than to practice the art of dry-farming

under the direction of a black-robed priest.

          -------Walter Prescott Webb