The Italian Jesuit Matteo Ricci in the early 1600s told his European contemporaries about the vices and bad habits of the Chinese people. The Chinese, being ignorant of Christianity, were very superstitious and fatalistic, which led them to practice and accept numerous immoralities. Abuse by magistrates, drunkenness, adultery, and lust were quite widespread. The latter especially led the upper classes to practice polygamy, which was frowned upon by Ricci coming from a Christian society that was strictly monogamous. They took wives as young as 14 or 15, easily divorcing and changing them: some even had twenty or thirty wives. This desire to marry led several poor people, unable to support a wife, to become slaves to important men so they could at least marry their servants. This resulted in a high number of slaves, especially poor debtors and children sold due to poverty. However, Ricci was not entirely against slavery: in fact, he was pleased that some Chinese people had become Christians after being sold to the Spaniards. Prostitution was also common in China, both female (with 40,000 prostitutes in Beijing alone) and male. Ricci was particularly scandalized by the widespread pederasty among the Buddhist monks. Another group frowned upon by the Jesuit were the eunuchs (also found among the infidel Turks) originating from the custom of some poor families castrating their sons to sell them to the imperial court, where they had a bad influence on the emperor due to their personal ambition and immorality. Many poor families also practiced infanticide, especially of girls, due to the inability to support them and in the hope that their soul would reincarnate into a wealthier person: many Chinese believed in soul transmigration. Ricci did not seem disturbed by the practice of foot-binding of girls; in fact, he explained that this practice was due to a wise man who wanted to encourage women to "stay at home, as is most appropriate for women."