Very faint traces
of any such belief except where derived from the missionaries are
visible in the New World. Nowhere was any well-defined doctrine that
moral turpitude was judged and punished in the next-world. No contrast
is discoverable between a place of torments and a realm of joy; at the
worst but a negative castigation awaited the liar, the coward, or the
niggard. The typical belief of the tribes of the United States was well
expressed in the reply of Esau Hajo, great medal chief and speaker for
the Creek nation in the National Council, to the question, Do the red
people believe in a future state of rewards and punishments? "We have an
opinion that those who have behaved well are taken under the care of
Esaugetuh Emissee, and assisted; and that those who have behaved ill
are left to shift for themselves; and that there is no other
punishment."[243-1]
Neither the delights of a heaven on the one hand, nor the terrors of a
hell on the other, were ever held out by priests or sages as an
incentive to well-doing, or a warning to the evil-disposed.
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