INTRODUCTION. 



France^ where within the last century, the human 

 mind had been continually making the most surpris- 

 ing progress. The books which occasionally found 

 their way through the numerous watches posted at 

 every avenue to prevent their entrance, were regarded 

 as treasures. I have been informed, that there have 

 been instances of young Creoles transcribing the whole 

 of a prohibited book! From Spain they expected 

 nothing to enlighten them; and this may account for 

 the well known fact, that in the Spanish Cortes, the 

 American members exhibited an astonishing superiori- 

 ty in learning, as well as liberality over those from the 

 different provinces of Spain. But this intelligence 

 and spirit of inquiry in the higher classes of Amer- 

 icans, formed a singular contrast with the ignorance 

 and apathy prevailing in the great body of the popu- 

 lation. The first were compelled to keep their know- 

 ledge to themselves; they had neither the opportunity 

 nor the means of diffusing it, while the common peo- 

 ple from their utter insignificance in a political point 

 of view, had nothing to stimulate their curiosity; al- 

 though I have no doubt they were more intelligent, 

 and less slavish in their minds than the same class of 

 people in Spain. In America there were many learn- 

 ed jurists, theologians, and physicians, and well edu- 

 cated gentlemen, but the people taken in the aggre- 

 gate^ in point of information, were very far inferior to 

 the colonists in North America. 



The inquisition within the last thirty or forty years, 

 exercised its functions with augmented severity, to 

 prevent the introduction of prohibited books into the 

 American colonies. Every ship which sailed from 

 Spain, was obliged to give the strictest account of the 



