POL£CY OF SAN MARTIN. 279 



ciety antecedently. That a taste for liberty will 

 eventually spring up with the judicious establish- 

 ment of free institutions, and with the power to 

 enjoy civil rights, is unquestionable : the mistake 

 lies in supposing, that this will take place imme- 

 diately. With this taste will come the ability to 

 take further advantage of the opportunities for as- 

 serting these valuable privileges, and of securing 

 them by corresponding institutions. In process of 

 time, mutual confidence, and mutual forbearance, 

 which it was the narrow policy of the former go- 

 vernment to discourage, will of course be deve-^ 

 loped ; and society will then act in concert and 

 consistently, instead of being as heretofore like a 

 rope of sand, without strength or cohesion. 



In a pamphlet just published (June 1824) by 

 Iturbide, Ex-Emperor of Mexico, there occur 

 many just reflections on this subject. The fol- 

 lowing observations are much to the present pur- 

 pose : " To think that we could emerge all at 

 once from a state of debasement, such as that of 

 slavery, and from a state of ignorance, such as had 

 been inflicted upon us for three hundred years, 

 during which we had neither books nor instruc- 



