740 



ANNUAL REGISTER, 1809. 



to resound in your ears the name 

 of your cortes, which to us have 

 ever been the bulwark of civil 

 liberty, and the throne of national 

 majesty, a name heretofore pro- 

 nounced with mystery by the learn- 

 ed, with distrust by politicians, and 

 with horror by tyrants, but which 

 henceforth signify in Spain the inde- 

 structible base of the monarchy, the 

 most secure supports of the rights 

 of Ferdinand VII. and of his family, 

 a right for the people, and the go- 

 vernment an obligation. 



That moral resistance, as general 

 as sublime, which has reduced our 

 enemies to confusion and despair in 

 the midst of their victories, must 

 not receive less reward. Those 

 battles which are lost, those armies 

 which are destroyed, not without 

 producing new battles, creating new 

 armies, and again displaying the 

 standard of loyalty on the ashes 

 and ruins which the enemies aban- 

 don ; those soldiers who, dispersed 

 in one action, return to offer them- 

 selves for another ; that populace 

 which despoiled of almost all they 

 possessed returned to their homes 

 to share the wretched remains of 

 their property with the defenders 

 of their country ; that concert of 

 lanientable and despairing groans 

 and patriotic songs; that struggle, 

 in fine, of ferocity and barbarity on 

 the one hand, and of resistance 

 and invincible constancy on the 

 other, present a whole as terrible as 

 magnificent, which Europe contem- 

 plates with astonishment, and which 

 history will one day record in let- 

 ters of gold for the admiration and 

 example of posterity. A people so 

 magnanimous and generous ought 

 only to be governed by laws which 

 are truly such, and which shall bear 

 the great character of public con- 



sent and common utility — a cha- 

 racter which they can only receive 

 by emanating from the august as- 

 sembly which has been announced 

 to you. The junta had proposed 

 that it should be held during the 

 whole of the ensuing year, or 

 sooner, if circumstances should per- 

 mit. But in the time which has 

 intervened since the revolution, a 

 variety of public events have agi- 

 tated the minds of the people, and 

 the difference of opinions relative 

 to the organization of the govern- 

 ment, and the re-establishment of 

 our fundamental laws, has recalled 

 the attention of the junta to these 

 important objects with which it has 

 latterly been profoundly occupied. 

 It has been recommended on the 

 one hand, that the present govern- 

 ment should be converted into a 

 regency of three or five persons : 

 and this opinion has been repre- 

 sented as supported by one of our 

 ancient laws, applicable to our pre- 

 sent situation. But the situation in 

 which the kingdom was, when the 

 Frencii threw off the mask of 

 friendship, to execute their treach- 

 erous usurpation, is singular in our 

 history, and cannot have been fore- 

 seen in our in^titutio^s. Neither 

 the infancy, nor the insanity, nor 

 even the captivity of the prince, in 

 the usual way in which these evils 

 occur, can be compared with our 

 present case, and the deplorable 

 situation to which it has reduced 

 us. A political position entirely 

 new requires political forms and 

 principles likewise entirely new. To 

 expel the French, to restore to his 

 liberty and his throne our adored 

 king, and to establish solid and 

 permanent bases of good govern- 

 ment, are the maxims which gave 

 the impulse to our revolution, are 



those 



