Hell on Earth: Maranhão (Brazil) in the seventeenth century

Father Antonio Vieira vindicated
D.Antón
Portuguese rule in Brazil represented one of the most systematic and widespread genocides in the history of the colonization of America. Millions of people from native communities were enslaved, put to work in plantations and mines and forced to satisfy the wishes of the Portuguese settlers in every imaginable way. Many ndividuals,  previously free, healthy, became usable and disposable marchandises.

The paradise on Earth described by Morelli, Gabriel de Foigny, Fracois Salignac, Jean Jacques Rousseau and others became a living hell.
Jesuit Father Antonio Vieira witnessed the continuous abuses and indiscriminate ill treatment of native populations in Maranhão and eastern Amazon (Brazil) and recounts his imprssions in a vivid and illustrative manner.
Antonio Vieira arrived to Maranhão in 1652. His life was a constant struggle for the freedom of slaves and racial and religious tolerance.
In addition to the Portuguese language, he spoke Tupi, kimbundu (from African slaves) and various Amazonian languages. In Maranhão he found one of the most devastating exploitation of native slaves and lawlessness panoramas that could be found.
He did not hesitate to confront the planters and traders and remind them some principles of the Christian religion that, supposedly, they professed.
"What different price is paying the devil for human souls compared to what he was offered beforehand! There is no market in the world where you can get souls cheaper than here in your own land. In the Gospels, he offered all the kingdoms of the world by a soul; in Maranhão, the devil does not need to offer even a tenth of that fot all souls. It is not necessary to provide worlds or realms; it is not necessary to provide cities or towns or villages. All you have to do is offer a few Indians Tapuia and immediately he will be fervently worshiped. The cheapest opportunity! An Indian by a soul! That Indian will be your slave for a few days while he or she survives, but your soul will be enslaved for eternity. This is the contract that you make with the devil. Not only they accept but will pay money for it. Christians, nobles and people of Maranhão: do you know what God wants from you during Lent? 
He wants you to break the chains of injustice and release those who are captives and oppressed. These are the sins of Maranhão. This is what God commanded me to tell you. 
Christians, God ordered me to clarify these issues and I do. You are all in mortal sin; all of you live in a state of condemnation; and you all will go straight to hell. Indeed, there are many there now and you will meet with them if you don't change your life ...
Any man who deprives another of his freedom and,, being able to do so, doesn't do it is condemned. Therefore, all of  you or nearly all are condemned. You can tell me that even if this were true, you did not know that and you did it in good faith. I deny it! you will be condemmed! 
Some will be condemned for their knowledge, others condemmed for their doubt and still others for their ignorance. But all of you will be condemmed! "

Some years later, in 1661, Vieira was expelled from Brazil and Portugal, was arrested by the Inquisition and accused of committing "egalitarian" heresies.
Six years later, already released, he resumed his fight for the rights of slaves that would continue until his death on July 18, 1697.
From "Amerrique, the Orphans of Paradise" Danilo Antón, Piriguazú Editions.