MEXICAN OPINIONS CLASSES. 157 



to exhibit fairly the existing causes of trouble at those epochs. 1 

 There was an apology for incapability of political self-rule when a 

 bad government or a degrading despotism was suddenly removed. 

 But, since then, twenty-six years have elapsed; and, in more than 

 a quarter of a century, mankind is fairly entitled to demand from 

 Mexico a denial of the sarcasm of her oppressive oidor Bataller 

 " that the worst punishment to be inflicted upon the Mexicans is to 

 allow them to govern themselves ! " 



Dark as is this picture of neighboring republicans, we should 

 have been loth to paint it had not our careful studies of their 

 statistics and the commentaries of their own citizens justified the 

 sombre coloring. "For our own part we believe," — says Don 

 Francisco Lerdo, in his Considerations upon the Social and Politi- 

 cal Condition of the Mexican Republic in 1847, — "that all this 

 may be explained in a few words. In Mexico there neither is nor 

 can there be what is called national spirit, because there is no 

 nation." 2 



This, perhaps, is the key of Mexican decadence. The national 

 spirit is centrifugal, if any thing can strictly be called national 

 when citizen is armed against citizen, and when men in civil life - 

 * and politicians in public- life, are constantly seeking to aggran- 

 dize themselves either in wealth or power without a thought of 

 loyalty to the constitution which should perpetuate and consolidate 

 national unity of principle and action in spite of all their personal 

 ambitions or party dominations. 



If we recur to our statistics in the third chapter of this volume 

 we shall find that, out of seven millions six hundred and twenty- 

 six thousand eight hundred and thirty-one inhabitants of the repub- 

 lic, it is calculated that four millions three hundred thousand 

 are Indians, that more than two millions are either mixed bloods 

 or negroes, and only about one million white, while, of the 

 whole population, not many more than seven hundred and forty 

 thousand are to be regarded as either educated or at all in- 

 structed ! The most numerous class, the large majority of Mexi- 

 cans, — the Indians, — are not civilized. We make this assertion 

 without qualification. They are tamed and have been compara- 

 tively submissive ; they are not open idolators and have generally 

 conformed, according to their limited understanding and instruc- 

 tion, to the direction of the Catholic priesthood ; but neither this 

 taming nor this conformity, considered relatively to their general 

 demeanor, constitute civilization either under a monarchy or a re- 



1 See vol. 1, pages 



Lerdo, Consideraciones, &c., &c., p. 42. 



