84< INTRODUCTION. 



give absolution to any one who should be guilty of 

 this offence. ^^There is no time worse employed/^ 

 says Depons, ^^than that which the priest spends in 

 making this publication; there is no act in the whole 

 ecclesiastic liturgy which makes less impression on 

 the Spaniard.'^ It was no less the interest of the 

 whole swarm of oflBcers, from the viceroy down to the 

 meanest centinel, whose object was to make the most 

 of their situations, to assist in the pious work of prac- 

 tising these frauds (if they deserve that name) upon 

 the king; and probably the king himself, was ulti- 

 mately more benefitted in the breach of his laws than 

 in their observance, if we take into view the increase 

 and advancement of his American possessions. But 

 kings are apt to be short sighted, and to look only to 

 their own immediate advantage, whatever may be 

 thought by those who are fond of them; and the rea- 

 son of this is given by Miribeau, in one short sen- 

 tence, ^-kings perish, but the people are immortal.^^ 



Bribery and corruption, became by this means in- 

 timately interwoven with every thing relating to colo- 

 nial transactions, and contributed much to mitigate the 

 rigor of the system, which if enforced, would have 

 completely checked the progress of the Spanish set- 

 tlements.* It is natural to expect, that when com- 



* But this mitigation was far from producing in all respects the 

 eflfects of regular commerce; it is observed by a Spanish writer, 

 Filangieri: "in this case the exclusive commerce must become in- 

 jurious to the merchants of the metropolis, as well as ruin- 

 ous to the colonies; for a clandestine commerce is only bene- 

 ficial to a few bold and avaricious contrabandists, who taking ad- 

 vantage of the existing laws, rob both the metropolis and the colo?^ 

 nies." 



