Spain's Selfish Ambition Essay

Selfish ambition is the brother of pain. Spain’s presence in the Americas was the epitome of this. From 1469 and onwards, Spain voyaged to America in search of gold and converts (Freire). Although one of these reasons sounds noble, both caused many people years of pain and death. As shown by Bartolome de Las Casas’s testimony, the occupation of the Americas by the Spanish and their reasons for being there led to more harm than good for the natives.
The reasons that Spain came to the Americas, in reality, were for their own benefit. In the first place, Spain set out to the Americas to spread Christianity. Spain felt a sense of superiority in their “higher mission” of sharing the Gospel, which unfortunately added to the feeling of “ethnic superiority”. …show more content…
Las Casas was born in 1474, and he and his father journeyed to America with Columbus on his second voyage. He became the first person in America to become a priest. Since Las Casas had served on many expeditions, he was given an encomienda, which was a grant of land from the king that included Indian servants. However, he gave this up in 1514 when he saw firsthand the misuse of the Indians and chose to fight for Indian slavery’s abolition. Las Casas was the first to condemn the natives’ severe mistreatment (“Las Casas”). When speaking of their abuse, Las Casas said that “the Spanish kick them and beat them with sticks to make them get up and resume their wearisome trudge. They do not allow them to stop and gasp for breath, and even knock their teeth out with the pommel of their swords” (De Las Casas). In addition to mistreatment, Spanish conquistadors unknowingly brought with them new diseases that utterly destroyed the natives, a fact that he lamented (Davenport). Suffering, disease, and death overshadowed the lives of the natives, who did not have a voice to protest it. Bartolome de Las Casas was heartbroken for them, and it moved him to