672 SPAIN AND HER FACTIONS. 



influence they may be imagined to controul. Their politics, if the term 

 can be so misused, are attached to the present state of things, which 

 gives them a master to flatter, a court to revel in, a nation to feed on, 

 and the privilege of wearing a hat in the royal presence. 



Such are the anarchial and worthless materials of the body politic of 

 Spain, which render her an anomaly among nations, a political enigma 

 to be solved only by a close and attentive observer of her nationalism ; 

 by one well disposed to follow up the infinite details of her manifold 

 contradictions ; by one willing, on entering upon his task, to throw 

 overboard all his preconceived and European ideas of political effects 

 and causes, and to adopt an entirely distinct mode of judging facts and 

 events, a mode current only in Spain, and untranslateable beyond the 

 Pyrenees, and through the medium of which alone every thing that is 

 Spanish, from polemics to bull-fighting, must be considered. 



From these causes, whatever may be the fate of Spain, it can as yet 

 only be a matter of speculative uncertainty. It is fortunate for this 

 poor, proud, and patient people, that the influence of the clergy, though 

 still great, is considerably on the wane. When the struggle shall arrive, 

 this will be beneficially felt. The religious part of apostolicism exists 

 with the people its political portion with their leaders; the first is per- 

 ceptibly dying away, and as it cannot be replaced, the other, of which 

 it is the spirit and vitality, must with it gradually decline into innocuous 

 exhaustion : we may thus hope eventually for better times. 



But whatever may be the solution of the problem, the immediate 

 prospect certainly looks gloomy in the extreme. The misfortunes of the 

 nation, and the mismanagement of its government, have sapped and 

 ruined the natural and commercial resources of this unhappy country ; 

 these a few years of peaceful industry might re-establish ; but ages, we 

 fear, will scarcely suffice to bring the mind of the nation to the healthy 

 state requisite for their cultivating them with advantage, and for the un- 

 derstanding their true interests, unless a total overthrow of the present 

 system of monopoly in commerce, bigotry in religion, and absolutism in 

 politics, do shortly occur, to pave the way for the Spanish people to 

 resume their rank among European nations. Ere this can take place, 

 or even the preceding struggle, there will be much aggravating oppres- 

 sion on one side, and an accumulation of wrongs on the other, which, 

 when the time arrives, will present a frightful picture of hatred and re- 

 taliation. 



Notwithstanding the favourable aspect assumed by the late change in 

 affairs, Ferdinand, should he recover, will not regard the liberals more 

 favourably than he has ever done. He will look on both parties with 

 equal suspicion, The change was occasioned from merely personal 

 feeling, in which principle had no share ; it is therefore impossible to 

 say what effect an abject concession on the other part might effect. 

 This good, however, is manifest, that a number of liberal men will be 

 restored to their country, which cannot fail to infuse an additional spirit 

 of liberality into public opinion. It will so far accelerate the prpgress 

 of freedom, that when the struggle does arrive it will be of shorter con- 

 tinuance. The change in Spain will ultimately be violent. The aposto- 

 licals must oppose it, and perhaps at first with success ; but the liberals 

 will ultimately most fearfully avenge their long sufferings. Tempus 



mon&trabit. 



, 



