61 But while thus economical of life, both in their
own followers and in the enemy, they did not shrink from sterner
measures when provoked by the ferocious or obstinate character of the
resistance; and the Peruvian annals contain more than one of those
sanguinary pages which cannot be pondered at the present day without a
shudder. It should be added, that the beneficent policy, which I have
been delineating as characteristic of the Incas, did not belong to all; and
that there was more than one of the royal line who displayed a full
measure of the bold and unscrupulous spirit of the vulgar conqueror.
The first step of the government, after the reduction of a country, was to
introduce there the worship of the Sun. Temples were erected, and
placed under the care of a numerous priesthood, who expounded to the
conquered people the mysteries of their new faith, and dazzled them by
the display of its rich and stately ceremonial.62 Yet the religion of the
conquered was not treated with dishonor. The Sun was to be worshipped
above all; but the images of their gods were removed to Cuzco and
established in one of the temples, to hold their rank among the inferior
deities of the Peruvian Pantheon. Here they remained as hostages, in
some sort, for the conquered nation, which would be the less inclined to
forsake its allegiance, when by doing so it must leave its own gods in the
hands of its enemies.
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