7 \ F 1231 .5 .C64 Copy 1 nB HEART OF MEXICO POLITICS! RELIGIONM WaR! PAIN AND HER METHODS OVERTHROWN. A LECTURE W)^F. CLOUD, First Sergeant Co. K, Second Ohio, Mexican War. Colonel Second, Tenth and Fifteenth Kansas, 1867-65. Copyright 1898, by W. f. Cluc:^. 1096: LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. Chap, Copyright No.. Shelf.. „\::5 UNITED STATES. OF AMERICA. /^' -A' THE HEART OF MEXICO; A Lecture by COL. W. F. CLOUD, of Kansas City, Mo. Of all countries on the globe Mexico, in many respects, nuist rank as the most wonderful. She is wonderful as to climate, soil, prodiictions, topography and geographicalloca- tion; but such themes will receive no mention at this time. Nor will her peoples be the subject of remark, notwithstand- ing the interest which attaches to their origin, their migra- tions, or the time when they first occupied their very peculiar country- where the Spanish conquerors found them. They were there, mi.'.io"': of them; the}- had an origin- al civilization; they had political organizatit ' -osperit}' and plenty. The>- were rich prey for the human-formed demons who despoiled them. While they had n^^mbers and courage, and fought with desperate tenacity, the\ unfortun- ately lacked arms and military skill whereby to destro}- their spoilers. Whoever would "do" INIexico must climb. The country is very moinitainous. Much of the land consists of elevated plateaus. The Cit}' of Mexico lies in a valley which is seven thousand five hundred feet above the level of the sea. Go to one of the coming six-hundred-ston,- houses in this, the future great city (Kansas City); enter the elevator and go to the top; take a flying-ship, one of those birds of passage of coming generations, and sail oiT at that eleva- tion eighteen hiuidred miles, a little to the west of south, and you will be able to step oiT at the Hotel Iturbide in the City of the Aztecs. . There, 3'ou are in that wonderful vallej' of volcanoes; by the graves of unknown nations; on the lava-covered soil where nature once poured forth her awe-inspiring flames, and, later, the brave Aztecan smig of greatness and of glors'. ^f- 2 Thk Heart of Mexico. In that historic vallc}' 3^011 are at the center of a popu- lation of 12,000,000. One-half of them are full-blooded Indians, about 4,000,000 mixed whites and Indians, i ,500,000 native whites, probably 200,000 Americans from the United States and 100,000 Europeans. 100,000 other foreigiiers, in- cluding Chinese, and some 100,000 mulattoes and negroes. Spanish is the recognized language, but a majority- of the nation use the various Indian dialects of their ancestors. Nearl}^ two millions speak the Aztecan tongue. This numer- ical preponderance of Indian and Mestizo asserts itself every- where. Go a few blocks eastward from the hotel where you landed and you are in the "Zocalo," the Grand Plaza. Way to the front .stands the "volcan" Popocatepetl, 10,000 feet above you. To the left of that mountain rises Ixtaccihuatl, nearly as high, each with its crown of abiding snow and ice. Mountains circumvallate the scene. No street in the city in any direction which does not open to a mountain view in di- rect line. I^akes, as gems, bestud the verdant plain. Cha- pultepec rises in grandeur at the citj' limits. There, are the trees of mammoth proportions, under whose shade Monte- zuma rested in regal relaxation. There, are the pools where in royal state he took his baths. On two sides of the Plaza are mercantile palaces. On your immediate front is the famous Halls of the Montezumas, now the National Palace. On your left is the Grand Cathe- dral, three hundred and eighty-seven feet long and one hundred and seventy-seven feet wide. Two millions of dollars are represented in the structure and its adornments. Two hundred years passed while it was being erected. It stands on the gTOund once occupied b)- the great Aztecan Temple and where unnumbered thousands were sacrified to the war-god Huitzilopochtli, among whom were scores of Spaniards from the army of Cortez, who thus met a well-deserved fate. Go up the towers, more than two hundred feet high, and von are in the very space where those victims shrieked The Heart oe Mexico. 3 out their souls in the, painful ordeal and agony of immola- tion, wherein the priests — through an incision in the side — tore out the hearts of the living, dying offerings. Enter the Cathedral. You are filled with awe at its magnitude and magnificence. Ninety quadruple columns of colos.sal and symetrical proportions support the arched ceilings nearly two hundred feet in height. It seems larger and larger, and higher and higher as you peer into its shad- owy distances and try to penetrate the dreamy, glimmering .spaces above. Music peals forth from some far off gallery. It falls upon your ear wath the pathos of the agonies of all the past. In it you can hear the shrieks in their death- throes of the victims of the war-god in the years of Aztecan dominion. You think of the Spaniards, of their Tlascalan, their Otomiean, their Cempoalan and their Texcocan allies; of old and young, of prisoners of war and of voluntary vic- tims who sought b}' personal sufferings and death to attain a happy eternity. Still the music rolls and peals out. Still in it you can hear, as "with your ears," the discord of torn and bleeding and of "broken hearts;" the wails of woe — the cries of despair from lost, lost souls. But, while themes like these are deepl}' interesting, this occasion will be improved in presenting some of the thrilling and sanguinary' struggles through which the people passed in their attainment of liberty, and by which the Republic of Mexico was e.stablished. Out from one of the .states of Mexico, Oaxaca, came two grand men. To them and their achievements this hour .shall be dedicated. Ninety-two years ago Benito Pablo Juarez w^as born. Twenty- four years later Porfirio Diaz first saw the light. These two men have greatly contributed to make the Nine- teenth Century itself illustrious. Under their patriotism, genius and labors, the government of Mexico was changed from a Theocracy to a Deimocracy, the only instance of such a change in the historv of the world. 4 ' The Heart of Mexico. Juarez was the poineer reformer. He stands to Mexi- cans as Moses stood to the Israelites in Egypt, their leader and law-giver. As Cromwell stood to the Puritans of Eng- land, a national and political reformer who hurled into the air a thousand useless dogmas. As Washington stands to Americans, the first in the hearts of his countrymen, the benefactor of his people for all time. As I^incoln stands among humanitarians, a grand exemplar of emancipation. Juarez came from the lowest rank of Mexican society. His childhood was spent in poverty, ignorance and squalor. He had no exemplar or instructor in the high order of work which fell to him. He had to learn by intuition, by experi- ence. He thus learned and became the leader of his people, undaunted, self- poised, thoroughly prepared, confident. He was not a man of speeches, but of intense resolve and of intelligent persistent action. He rode on the cap- wave of a turbulent tide but made a safe landing. He was unher- alded, unknown except by his works — but by his works is destined to become well known and immortal. Three centuries before his day the Mexicans had en- dured and suffered the brutal and ferocious acts committed during the conquest by Cortez, which can be summed up in three words, "blood and ashes." For three centuries they endured and suffered from the iniquitous and abomin- able system of oppression and t5^rann3^ established by those who followed the conquerors, a system of robbery and slavery. Immense territories had been depopulated, and millions of natives sacrificed by the cupidity and brutality of task-mas- ters to secure revenue for the sensual and unfeeling monarch of Spain and his courtiers; for so long as revenue flowed freely into the royal treasury what did they care? The adventurer, the official, the soldier and the priest had preyed upon the Indians. They had despoiled them of liberty and property. In greed and lust they had invaded and destroyed the family relation. Children had been sold The Heart of Mexico. 5 into slaver>- and men consigned to hopeless and lonely sen-i- tude in mine and field as laborers or as beasts of burden. Saddened, oppressed and weighed down by conquest, mutilated by the sword of the conqueror and ground to the very dust and ashes of poverty b}' his relentless imposts and all-devouring a\-arice, poor and despised; degenerated from the rank which ihcy held in the days of Montezuma, ban- i.shed into Uie most l)arren districts where their efforts gained for them only a precarious existence, swarming the .streets of the cities, ba.sking in the sun during the daj' and pa.ssing the night in the open air, they afforded, during the centuries of Spanish rule, a sad and striking example of that general degradation which the government of Spain brought upon the natives of all the Spanish- American colonies. Spain never gave the world a good example and never followed one. Her government, though a theocrac}^, was one of the most base and despicable dynasties that ever existed. Eminently a religious nation, her religion was but bigotry and it influenced men to deeds of direst cruelty. In the language of Senator Thurston, "Spain has set up more cro.sses, in more lands, beneath more skies, and under them has butchered more people than all the nations of the earth combined." After three centuries of the misrule and the ruin of Spain, Mexican patriots, through the ordeal of suffering, blood and death, attained political independence. Their freedom from Spanish theocracj- came later. Here let me say that Spain's administrations in Cuba have shown no evidence of improvement or reform. She has been controlled by the same religion and bigotry, has main- tained the .same tyrannical policies and been represented by the .same treacherous, inhuman, cruel and blood-thirsty minions as in Mexico. Cubans have been struggling for libert}', religious as well as political. They would throw off the barbarism and cur.se of Spanish tyranny and theocracy. They have suc- ceeded. Surely divine providence and America's mission of political evangelism will prove to be flat failures if Spain henceforth holds the "Pearl of the Antilles." 6 The Heart of Mexico. Generations of Mexicans followed generations, each retaining knowledge of the woes of their ancestors. Upris- ings had been suppressed. Organizations prohibited and bondage more and more hopeless fastened upon them. But by secret and continuous narrations, each knew of their ancient liberty and happiness, their wealth, their political and domestic peace, their manhood. Hatred toward their conquerors and oppressors had never died out in the natives. It descended as a sacred heritage, a heritage in which hope of deliverance, though not extinct, had well-nigh turned to despair. Juarez inherited all this animosity to Spaniard, to Spain, to soldier, to Priest. He deprecated the ill-advised efforts to force the methods of Spain and her religion upon the Mexicans by the use of arms. He knew that the religion of his ancestors was one of pure morals, honesty, temperance and education, in all of which it was superior to that of his day, when, by reason of the covetousness, duplicity and licentiousness of their teachers — dishonesty, falsehood and vileness prevailed among the masses. He knew that his ancestors were men of skill as artizans, engineers, mechanics and agriculturalists. He knew that^ they were record-keepers, that they preserved their civil, political and religious laws, tenets, histories and general literature by a method and style peculiar to themselves — by pictorial illus- trations — being words, sentences and idioms in pictures, and that their knowledge of astronomy had attained such per- fection that, at the date of the conquest, they had a more accurate calendar than had the astronomers of Europe. He knew that the priest — and the soldier at the instigation of the priest — had gathered together all the literature of his highly educated and civilized people into mountains of bound volumes and manuscripts and then had burned all to ashes in the name of the Christ of their religion. He knew that never did fanaticism achieve a more signal triumph than in this annihilation of so many instructive monuments to human ingenuity and learning. He knew that a few years after the conquest the priest by persuasion, by force and by fraud, had induced millions of the natives to profess TiiK Heart oe Mexico. 7 the reli.s:ion of Christ; but he also knew that their faith remained essentially the same and that for want of educa- tion they knew but little of religion except its external forms, while in morals they had deteriorated. He knew that the torments inflicted in the inquisition were far more barbarous than those perpetrated by Azetecan priests upon prisoners of war in the religious ceremonies in the Mexican temples, ''tcocallis,'' houses of God. He knew that the vic- tims who perished in the inquisition were branded with infam>- in this world and consigned to perdition in the next, while the Aztec priest devoted his offerings to the gods — thereby ennobling them. He knew that such a death was at times voluntarily embraced as a sure passport to a happy eternity. As an educated Mexican, Juarez knew that the govern- ment of his ancestors was an elective monarch}^, and that the administrations of that monarchy tended to the happi- ness and prosperity of the people. He regarded the destruc- tion of the Aztecan government and the degradation and en.slavement of its citizens as one of the greatest outrages written on the pages of the world's hi.story — unjustified and uniustifia]:ile upon any hypothesis. Columbus having discovered the new world and brought it under the dominion of the Spanish monarch laid a tax upon the natives. This tax was to be paid quarterly and was excessively exorbitant. Many failing to pay were sent as slaves to Spain. Others offered time-service or labor as a substitute for gold, cotton and other products of the country. This was the beginning of that sj^stem of rcpa?-- timicntos, tnider which the natives were made the ser\^ants and slaves of the Spaniards. This system was adopted by Cortez and his as.sociates in Mexico and it was carried to the utmost limit. There never was a thought that the Indian had title to his land, his liberty or the products of his labor. All, all belonged to the conquerors. From the date of the conquest the clergy charged them- selves with two lines of work. One was to see to the 8 The Heart of Mexico. spiritual welfare of the Indians and to that they devoted some of their time and had some success. The other was to secure as much as possible of the wealth of the country into the hands of the priests and the coffers of the church, and in the last named duty they had gratifying results. Not- withstanding losses consequent on war, in the beginning of the great struggle for liberty inaugurated by Juarez, the holdings of the church and ecclesiastics were $500,000,000 in real estate and $150,000,000 in cash and other personal propert5^ The coffers of the church were full of mouldering money while the state treasury was empty. During the eighteenth and the first part of the nine- teenth centuries the incomes of the church arising from land holdings and clerical services amounted to thirteen million dollars annually, and the arch-bishop managed to keep the wolf of want from the door of his domestic domicile — wherein no wife could overtax his income by personal or so- cial indulgence in dress, adornments, equipage or entertain- ments — by having apportioned as his share one-third of the gross amount, thus giving him the royal income of eleven thousand dollars for each and every day of his life as the representative of the meek and lowly Christ "who had not where to lay his head." But let two honest Spaniards — Don Jorge Juan and Don Antonio Ulloa — describe how the "L^aws of the Indies" were executed; and the happiness they had secured for the Indians two centuries after the Spaniards began to fulfill their divine mission in the New World. These two gentle- men, while coming to America on a scientific mission in 1735, were privately commissioned to report generally about the condition of the country and the people, and in 1748 they submitted their "Noticias Secretas" (Private Report). We quote from the English translation published by Crocker and BreWvSter of Boston in 1851. The report in part explains the many devices by which the priests relieved the Indians of what little sustenance they had succeeded in concealing and saving from the lynx- eyed and greedy corregidor, and states the yearly contribu- The Hkart of Mexico. 9 tions, in kind, received by a curate "whose parish was not one of the most lucrative," namely, more than 200 sheep, 6,000 hens, 4,000 guinea pigs and 50,000 eggs. These were besides the payments in mone3\ The churches were con- verted into factories, where the Indians, "after mass had been said, were shut in, just as at the mills, and their occu- pation could not be disguised because the noise of the frames or weaving rods could be distinctlj^ heard from the outside. The Indians, of course, received no compensation for their labor. If an Indian died leaving some property, the 'curate became the universal heir,' collecting together live stock and utensils, and stripping the wife and children of every- thing they had. The method of doing it consisted in mak- ing for the deceased a sumptuous funeral however repug- nant it might be to the views of the interested parties. ' ' The wretched condition of the Indians, says the report, is to be attributed to the vices of , the priests, the extortions of the officials and bad treatment from Spaniards generally. * * It also happens that the 3'oung, not being able to labor, are, by the corregidor — or tax collector — made subject to tribute illegally; and fathers and elder brothers are bound, if the}^ would not see a son or brother punished with the whip, to unite their eflforts to help him earn the tribute mone5^ '^' * "The Indian women specially are obliged to task themselves the whole year round in order to meet, b}- unremitting toil, the unjust demands of the corregidor." -■' * * "Nor is the corredigor content with obliging those to pa}' who are exempt by law, it is often carried to such extent as to en- force the paj-ment of a two- fold contribution." "All these calamities are brought upon the Indians b)^ their parish priests who, while they should be their spiritual fathers and their protectors against the unrighteous extor- tions of the corregidors, do themselves go hand in hand with the latter to wrest from the poor Indian the fruit of his incessant toil, even at the cost of the blood and sweat of a people whose condition is so deplorable that, while they have abundant means to enrich and aggrandise others, are desti- tute of a .scanty allowance of bread for their own meagre sustenance. lo The Hkart op Mexico. Mexico, under Spain, was a government of the Viceroy, an autocracy, a theocracy. There were but two classes of citizens, the army and the clergy. The constant sound of the drum and the bell, from early morn to midnight, with ever exhibited show and parade in uniform and canonical robes testified to the dominance of military and spiritual power. The divine right of kings and officials was a religious tenet, a profound conviction. No one questioned it. This de- scended to the nation and ruled the people, whatever the form of government. It had been thoroughly ingrained into the brain of almost every man that the government had absolute right over him, that in some miraculous manner he belonged to the state and the church, the man with a sword and the man with a cross in hand; that the government owned the people. True, Spain had ceased to rule, but the superstitious incubus remained. Though a republic, Mexico was strictly a theocracy; a government in which one particular church held jurisdiction over the souls and bodies of the people. The throne had disappeared, but the power behind the throne remained. Filled with knowledge of all the past, and deeply im- pressed with truths of the present, Juarez stood as one in- spired, as one selected by providence to do a grand work for Mexico. God in his wisdom seems to have ordained that his appointed and annointed leaders should come forth from the people whose wrongs they are to redress and whose rights they are to secure and protect. Not as a soldier did the savior of Mexico come upon the field, but as a civillian, a man of education, a lawyer and advocate, as a statesman and patriot, as chief magistrate of the nation. Though not a military man, his physical cour- age equalled that of any son of mars. By his life, his prin- ciples and his political and executive actions he warred against the most skillful, conscienceless and experienced political and ecclesiastical power with which a Mexican could ever contend. His moral courage was therefore almost infinitely beyond the physical. Benito Pablo Juarez was a pure-blooded Indian of the The Hkart of Mexico. ii Zapoteca tribe. He was born in an adobe house with a dirt floor, in the state of Oaxaca, on the 21st day of March, 1806. He became an orphan in infancy-, his father having died just before and his mother soon after his birth. At the age of twelve he could only speak his native tongue and could neither read nor write. Being a penniless orphan, he toiled at boyish occupations among which was herding cat- tle. His industry and intelligence attracted the attention and enlisted the sympath}- of a merchant who placed him in a .seminary. He pa.s.sed the course of stud}- in that school with honor, when a religious zealot, noting his good quali- ties, proposed to provide for his education for the priest- hood. While the yotith appreciated the generous offer his honesty and patriotism forbade its acceptance. The times were very favorable for education in the politics of the coun- try as ever since he began his studies there had been a continual series of pronunciamientoes, outrages and revolu- tions and party zeal had risen to the grade of excessive heat. The country was in a state of general political and military excitement, and war was almost continuous. Juarez, early in his knowledge of these excitements and contests, had adopted liberal principles and had become the enemj^ of the ambitious and covetous priests. Under the influence of his very po.sitive political principles he declined to study for the priesthood and decided to become an advocate or attorney at law. Availing himself of all means at his command he received the degree of bachelor of laws in 1832 and at the same time was elected deputy to the legislature of Oaxaca, his native state. Two years later he graduated and took rank as aba^^ado or attorney at law. Thus rapid was the elevation of this humble-born Indian boy, who, at the age of twelve years, nearly naked, worked in his native mountians and whose hopes at that time of acquiring education, position and fame were on a par with the cattle which he herded. Twent3'-four 3'ears after this date he occupied the presidential chair and could use with energy and eloquence the language of which he knew not a single syllable at the age of twelve years. During her first tliirty-sevtn years of independence 12 The Heart of Mexico. Mexico had eight or nine distinct forms of government, fifty changes in the office of chief executive and more than three-hundred revolutions. These changes came from the army and the church or were the patriotic uprisings of the people to resist or overthrow usurping and oppressive admin- istrations which had no better right or title to power than the will and ambition of the clergy or the military. The mass of the people were educated to the convic- tion that they were the property of the state and the church. To resist the right of the state was treason and the penalty was death. To question the right of the church was heresy and the penalty was excommunication, ostracism, death and eternal perdition. Thus mental slaver3^ and entire subjection to the will and judgment of spiritual teachers was the secret of their self-abnegation. They not only consented to belong to somebody, but they yielded to the idea that they had no right to think or to express their thoughts. The inquisition had been abolished, but no liberty or enlargement had fol- lowed. The sword and the cross, still united, still held sway. The people did not realize or say that the army were robbers and that the priests were hypocrites and spoilsman, as well the}' might. It was thus that Jviarez looked upon them and knew them. But while he knew that superstition-inspir- ing dogmas, attitudes, gowns, forms of worship, show and parade do not constitute the genius of religion, are not the ends and objects of revelation, are not the culmination of the grace of God, he yet made no war upon tenet or ceremony. He was not a religious, but a political reformer. He would separate church and state. He would displace the priest from political control, would stop his spoils, make him subject to the civil law and tax his property. He would make the military subject to the civil power. While thus disposed toward those factors in the weal and woe of the commonwealth, he 3^earned for the elevation of the people. He knew that the education of the poorer classes was almost entirely neglected and that it was the custom to regard the Indian as a beins: that did not belong Til]': Hi<:akt of Mkxico. 13 to llie Inunan race. He knew that of the fotr: millions form- ing this class not four in a thousand cotild read and scarcely one in a thousand could sign his name. He was saddened to know that their moral debasement was in keeping with their abject ignorance, and more sad- dened to know that they had sunk mtich lower in morals than when Cortez .set foot on the soil of Mexico. He knew that this ignorance, attended with a degrading stiperstition. wei'e the chief .shackels which bound them. Therefore he would introduce a system of primary edttca- tion as the most sure means of their elevation and liberty. He would recognize and teach the eqtial political rights of each indi\-idual, though so to do had long been denounced by the clergy as a danniable heresy. He wotdd unify all cla.s.ses for their mutual improvement. He wotdd encourage innnigration and therewith the introdtiction of independent tlunight and free disctission. Can anyone imagine a harder task than fell to Juarez as he thtis tmdertook to revolutionize, to reverse, to educate, to rebuild? He was confronted with the army in full co- operation with the church. He had to contend with the inctibtis of settled methods of belief and action. He was face to face with a stiperstition which was pitiable. The people did not know what political, wdiat religious liberty was. They had been tattght that it was treason, heresy, sacrilege, to think a new aspiring thottght or to do an inde- pendent act. It has been .said that Cromwell's .soldiers learned poli- tics upon their knees and received inspiration and courage direct from God in answer to prayer. Not so with the fol- lowers of Juarez. They imbibed principles of libert}^ were relieved from superstitious fears, were enthused with cour- age and hope and were led to independent thought and act under the teachings of their daring leader and by their ex- perience on the field of battle. The impulses of hatred and revenge wdiich laid deep down in their minds were developed into fierce and sanguinary actions as opportunity offered, for 14 The Heart of Mexico. the lessons of oppression and extortion had been well learned in the centuries of hard, bitter, sorrowful experi- ence. So they were ruthlessly applied when the people's turn came and their spoilers became victims. As a leader Juarez captured the confidence, the love, the fealty of the multitudes. He offered freedom from the exactions and oppressions of the tax collector, the clergy and the rich proprietors of the lands. He assured political reform on principles, of liberty, equality and justice. Under his majestic, magnetic presence and guidance units of weak- ness were solidified into a mass of indivisible, unconquerable strength, and his final victory was a monument of glory, testifying to native Mexican patriotism, persistence and statesmanship. It was an era of intense excitement. The great ques- tion of a basic principle of government was in final issue in Mexico. Should it be centralism or federalism, theocracy or democracy? That was the question. The one man who for a third of a century had been the sanguinary representative of centralism was but recently driven from executive power. Seek to know the most not- able man in Mexican history whose life and character stands out as the opposite to that of Juarez and you will find Santa Anna, a man who took a leading part in national affairs for more than half a century. He was among the patriots who secured independence from Spain in 182 1. In 1823 he led a successful revolution against the Emperor Iturbide. In 1828 he resisted the seating of Pedraza who had been elected president and secured the installing of Guerrero. In the same year he revolted against Guerrero and aided in seat- ing Bustamente. In 1829 he revolted against Bustamente and in 1832 overthrew him and secured the inauguration of Pedraza. In 1833 he was elected president and aspired to dictatorial authority. In 1836 he invaded Texas, was de- feated and captured and while a prisoner was deposed from the presidency. In 1838 he fought the French army at Vera Cruz and regained popularity. In 1841 he headed a revolution against and overthrew Bustamente for the second time. In 1843 he was appointed provisional president and The HjvVrt of Mexico. 15 in 1S44 he proclaimed himself dictator. In i- class in the United States in 1865. While it may truly be said that Juarez is the Lincoln of Mexico, it may quite as truly be said that Lincoln is the Juarez of the United States. Lincoln in 1858-60 was talk- ing against the system of American SlaA'en,- and its exten- sion. He had no plan if even a hope of its utter extinction. He proposid no such plan nor expressed such hope. Thoise years saw Juarez emancipating his people of Mexico from the serfdom in which they were held b}- priests, tax col- lectors and domineering soldiers. He was accomplishing the cherished wish, plan, hope and ambition of his life. Each of these grand men proclaimed emancipation at the age of fifty-three. Juarez stood as an emancipator from the beginning of La lucha por la Libertad, (the struggle for liberty.) That was the issue made for him and made bj- him and so known and considered bj- friend and foe, and on that issue the war was fought to a finish. Xor were principles of reform new to his faith and prac- tice. In the first years of the republic he was a leader in the ■ ' progressist party. ' ' That party worked for libert}- of speech and of the press, the repeal or abolition of the ecclesiastical and military- statutes whereby the church and the army controlled the state : the suppression of convents and monasteries as institutions which corrupted the public morals, and the making of marriage to be a civil contract. As a member of the cabinet of Alvarez and the advisor of Comonfort he led in each and ever\- reform established. The stand thus taken by Juarez to dispossess the church of property, revenue, influence and power was not the re- sult of any change in his religion. He was bom and reared, lived and died in the pale of the church. He never apos- tatized nor was he formally excommunicated. He had no assistance in the wa^* of counsel from a prote.stant, nor were his acts the result of any conspiracy against the church. 22 The Heart of Mexico. He knew that the vicious greed for wealth and power, in- herent in all corporations, was fully developed in the Roman Catholic church and clergy; that in Europe they had made and destroyed kingdoms and empires by the exercise of their well-known world-wide claim to temporal power; that they had acted on that claim in the political affairs of Mexico and that they were making the fight againt him on that claim. He knew the vast wealth which had accrued to the church in Mexico and he knew that all the property in its hands would be used to crush him and to overthrow the constitution. He knew that the equitable title to all the lands and the usufruct of the same was still in the people who for centuries had been wronged and robbed. There- fore he issued his decree. Had lyincoln issued his emancipation proclamation coincident with his first call for military aid and as a basic principle of action the cause of the Union must have failed and the Confederacy have been established. Juarez daringly led popular sentiment. lyincoln care- fully moved with the popular tide. In the American revolution there were many Washing- tons. . In this struggle for liberty in Mexico all depended upon Juarez; he was the chief standard-bearer. Had Wash- ington fallen others could have been found to take his place; he was one of many. Had Juarez fallen the cause of liberty must have failed; he was many in one. The assassination of Lrincoln during any year of the war of the rebellion would have developed other patriots and other statesmen who would have carried his work to final success, as was done when he did fall. Juarez was the embodiment of his cause; all depended on his life. Amid all the lurid passions of the times his figure stood like the sturdy oak resisting the concentrated fury of theocracy. His fall would have ended democracy in Mexico. He was the right man in the right place at the right time. It can hardly be denied that had England, France and Spain not only acknowledged the confederacy but had sent armies to fisrht its battles the Union must have been dis- The Heart of Mexico. 23 ruptecl, Juarez contended successfully against the military and moral power of those nations. While a due regard to the truths of hi.story acknowl- edges the moral influence of the International policy of the United States and its exhibition of military force on the Rio Grande as a counterpoise to Europe, it still must be admit- ted that the diplomatic genius displayed by Juarez was a paramount power in presenting the intricate issues involved so properly and persistently that the rights of sympathizing and reinforcing friends and the palpable wrongs of the offending nations stood, respectively, approved and disap- proved in the high court of public opinion. The first era of I^a lucha por la I^ibertad passed. The result was victory' for Juarez and the constitution. On the first day of January, 1861, he entered the capital as chief magistrate. He was elected president under the forms of the constitution and proceeded to reorganize the country on the lines of his proclamation and for more than a year- he held his w^a)^ with dignity and success. As far as Mexicans were concerned his triumph was final. But his victory was not as 3'et complete. He was de- stined to meet the most terrific storm that ever assailed the republic. All political powers but the United States, then engaged in her own most desperate struggle for existence, hated the Republic of Mexico and despised President Juarez and his political principles. Europe in unison con- spired against him. England, France and Spain made an armed invasion. The Empire of Austria, the Kingdom of Belgium and the Pope of Rome co-operated and gave S3'm- pathy. Troops from abroad and at home drove him a thousand miles from his capital and occupied the countr5\ The officers and the functions of the Republic were sup- planted by a Monarchy with the Archduke Miximilian on the throne. But the statesmanship, the diplomac}', the patriot- ism, the patience and the good sense of Juarez, in .spite of foreign hate, armed intervention and domestic enemies triumphed over all. 24 - The Heart of Mexico. Ah, the sad and. inglorious fate of Maximilian. An Austrian Archduke, educated and traveled, selected by the wily and intriguing- Napoleon III, to occupy the throne as Emperor of Mexico, he took his place as such; becoming thereby but a puppet in the hands of that strategetic med- dler in the affairs of Europe and America. The protege of the Pope, Blessed by him and instructed in the basic pHncipIes of the HoivY See. ''Great are the rights of nations and they inust be heeded, but greater and more sanded are the rights of the church.'' Delegated to establish an empire in antagonism to a republic, and later by special legate charged to secure ' ' The excl^tsion from the Mexican empire of every form of religion but the Roman Cathoeic. The independent sovereignity of each bishop m his own dioeese. Tlie absohite control of schools and education and THE immunity of the church from any interfer- ence of the civil authorities" the newly fledged poten- tate, overburdened with inconsistent and impossible instruc- tions and injunctions sailed for and entered his empire. Weak and irresolute, temporizing when possible and compromising when compelled to act, dreaming of a kind of democratic imperialism, bored with the practical details of government, formulating neither fundamental nor statutory laws, assuming power as an absolute sovereign, neglecting a financial system, depending upon the French general for a policy and on the French army for support, affable to all political factions but failing to secure the support of any, leading a gay life with his suite at the capital, enjoying his imperial income as a spendthrift who after suffering much from want suddenly enters upon a fortune — wishing the world to share his exuberance — he passed the time from June, 1864, to the same month in 1867, when under sen- tence of death as the decree of a military court he stood up in the presence of an immense multitude on the Cerro de las Campanas (hill of the bells) at Queretaro to meet his fate. True, a most terrible fate, but inflicted substantially in accord with his own "October decree" wherein, when deeming his government established, he said ' ' that armed resistance to his authority would not be considered war but The Heart of Mexico. 25 as acts of bandits, that all such offenders should be tried by courts-martial, that the guilty should be summarily exe- cuted and that to prisoners in arms no quarter would be granted." On trial of the emperor the prosecution successfully demanded the application of the spirit of his own decree, by which distinguished Mexicans had died, and his doom was sealed. Nor were pleas for clemency, made by governments and individuals, of avail. The grim singleness of purpose which had made Juarez great and admirable in all his past official history, and which had caused him to hold the wel- fare of the state as supreme, to the disregard of personal interests, maintained control now when mercy to the indi- vidual meant injustice to the commonwealth. Should jNIaximilian live his cause would also sur\nve and give occasion for foreign and domestic uprisings for his re-enthronement; a dangerous precedent would be estab- lished and encouragement given for other foreign inter- meddling in the affairs of Mexico — dictating her policies and pursuing the debt created by the inter^-ention and the empire. So declared Juarez and the ill-starred Maximilian stood to meet his fate. Addressing the soldiers and the sur- rounding throng he said: " Mexicanos, I die for a just cause, the independence of Mexico. God grant that my blood may bring happiness to nw new country. Viva Mexico. ' ' The voile}' was fired only to bring him wounded to the ground, writhing and groaning in agony. An officer b}' a shot froni a pistol gave him the golpe de gi^ada — the blow of mercy and ended his mortal existence; the spirit of Maximilian entered the shadows. Prompted by pride he left as his last words to his mother, the one living person nearest his heart, "Behold as a soldier I have performed my duty." Friends in the spirit of kindness had given him the false information that his beloved Carlote, his wife, was dead and he cheerfully faced death, enthused with the hope of a happy reunion 26 The Heart of Mexico. with her immediately beyond the sad and painful ordeal of execution. His last hours might well have been saddened by the perfidy of Napoleon III., who in violation of treaty stipulations had withdrawn his troops and the heartless in- difference of Pope Pius IX., each of whom resented Carlote in her appeals for aid, though made upon her knees and with dramatic tears and soul-thrilling entreaties. After more than a thousand battles and skirmishes and the sacrifice of more than forty thousand lives the usurping emperor and the invading armies disappeared from the field and Juarez again triumphantly entered the capital as chief magistrate of the fully established Republic. The shadow which all thrones and potentates had thrown over Mexico from the beginning was a pall of op- pression, superstition and bonds. lyiberty, relief came from"- truth and right and not by the will or consent of Popes, Emperors, Kings or Generals. Right in this case was might. One man and God was a majority, a paramount power against thrones and dominions. In this grand contention Juarez did not do what others thought ought to be done but what he thought should be done. All that he wanted done was finally accomplished. What chief in history paralells him ? For five years no congress held sessions to give him legislative aid; no courts issued decrees nor gave verdicts; his cabinet was limited to a few personal friends and advisors who shared his retire- ment and adversities ; the republic had apparently ceased to exist. But way beyond the accident and incident of his dis- placement from executive power, beyond policy, intrigue, compromise and war he saw and patiently waited for the end. Strong of faith and assured of the dissolution of the so-called empire, of the triumph of his principles, of the constitution and of the Republic he listened with stoical indifference to the alarms which discouraged and dispersed many of his followers. The /Heart of Mexico. 27 Returned, on the death of Maximilian, to the capital and the undisputed tenure of the Presidency, Juarez was, in time twice reelected to that high office. Nothing di.scloses real character like the use of power. Most men can stand adversity but if you wish to know what a man reall}^ is give him power. This is the supreme test. It is the glor>' of that great man that having almost ab.solute power he never abused it. His administrations were marked b}^ patriotism, personal probity and self-ab- negation. His chief ambition was to reconstruct the politi- cal affairs of the country and to that work he devoted him- self. With the final constitutional amendments in process which were to place the principles of his decree of emanci- pation in the fundamental law he retired to rest on the 1 8th of July, 1872. In the night he had an attack at the heart and in spite of the .sympathy of friends and of the physician's .skill, one hour before midnight this grand man exhaled his last breath. His life — his character — fully rounded out in ex- cellent development had«reached the meridian — the zenith. It went out like the paleing of the morning .star in the pure light of the rising sun, or the refulgent glory of a perfect day. In the language of Sr. Mariscal, minister of relations in the cabinet of President Diaz on the twenty-fifth anni- versary of the death of Juarez, "Like another Moses he had lead his people out of the house of bondage and across the .sandy desert they were fated to traverse. He released them from the serfdom in which they were held b}- priests and a pernicious class of .soldiers. He freed them from tho.se tyrants, from those infatuated Pharaos. He saved them from appalling oppression but after all his weary migrations he was not granted to reach the promised land. He was barely able to see it from afar on his triumphal return to the capital; just as the dying leader and law-giver of the He- brews caught a glimp.se of Palestine from the heights of Mount Xebo." The patriotism of Juarez was unquestioned and dis- 28 The Heart of Mexico. interested. It embraced all the interests of the state. In the interest of the commonwealth he fought one of the world's greatest battles. The results of the victory which crowned that conflict will enure to the benefit of Mexico for air time. Such revolutions never go backward. In Mexico as in Europe liberty from priestly control will prove to be perpetual. To select from the many illustrious names which abound on the pages of Mexican history that man whose life and whose character best exhibits the possibilities offered to youth of brain, honesty and industry, even in peculiar Mexico, who in early life was taught firmness and stability by the motionless, snow-capped mountains; quiet- ness and placidity by the lakes within the valleys; patriotism by the sorrows of his despoiled kindred, and ambition by the bright stars shining over his head; the one whose life was a benediction; the one whose name is tenderly enshrined in every heart and lovingly voiced by every tongue; for such a one go to the adobe hut, the home of the lowly Indian, and select the child of poverty and orphanage, the youth of ad- vertity and toil, the student of diligence and promise, the man of virtue and integrity, the champion of law and liberty, the emancipator of his nation from the curse of ecclesiasticism in politics — Benito Pablo Juarez. In the Panteon de San Ferna^ido, in the City of Mexico, I stood by a noble marble mausoleum, the resting place of the lyiNCOLN of Mexico. Upon a dais rests a sarcophagus containing his mortal remains. On the top is his recumbent statue of marble — cold in death; over which a seraphim with over-shadowing wings stoops, and with sad and sorrowful countenance testifies a nation's grief at the mortality of her noblest citizen, the grandest man in whose veins ever coursed pure aboriginal blood. Well may the people mourn his departure. Well may they cherish his memory. Well may his tomb be a mecca where with daily visit and daily decoration citizens of Mexico testify their love and receive new inspirations of The Heart of Mexico. 29 patriotism. Well may the fallen champion of liberty there rest and abide the verdict of history which will surely make perpetual record of his worth and work — his hard, his suc- cessful work of reform. He had carried on his soul a load of care — a mountain of woe, as he witnessed and felt the sorrows of his people, as he contended with priest and soldier, with church and insurgent army. He had ex- perienced the exuberance of joy attendant upon the over- throw of insurgent armies, his return in triumph to the capi- tal and the reorganization of the Republic on principles of liberty, justice and equality. But again had the load of woe been placed upon his soul when Napoleon HI. and his European fellow-conspirators against liberty and democracy landed their armies in Mexico, occupied the capital and sent him as a fugitive away from his rightful executive jurisdiction. For five years he wandered — a president un- seated. But his abiding faith in his mission sustained him. With dignity he worked and waited. Never in all the ages was there more dauntless courage, more stubborn will or clearer political perceptions. Nothing in all American his- tory or biography compares with it. He was a man with a single purpose using his unsurpassed opportunities. Mexico alone could have produced such a man or offered such grand opportunities. No statesman ever dictated more success- fully affairs of State. Nor Cromwell, nor Washington, nor Lincoln paralelled him in hazardous, perilous issues nor sur- passed him in glorious beneficent achievements. Shall we call it divine retribution ? Shall it be re- garded as testimony to the truth of the maxim ' ' The mills of God grind slowly, yet they grind exceeding small?" The church was defeated, the foreign armies departed in- gloriously, the Austrian was executed, Juarez returned to and retained the presidency to the day of his death; theo- cracy gave place to democracy and the Republic of Mexico is established. The imperious Spaniard was finally out- classed and over-mastered, and his methods overthrown b}^ the Indian of his abhorrence and detestation. Mexico is regenerated and has assurance of a bright and glorious 30 The Heart of Mexico. future freed from the Spain-cursed past. So mote it be. So will it be in Cuba. Let it not be said that this man and his works are un- dul}^ extolled. He revolutionized a nation and changed its basic principle of government. He gave his people liberty, equality and education. He defeated armies and political powers, domestic and foreign, including Pope Pius IX., who vainly launched anathemas, issued canon laws and sent a nuncio as his representative to give orders, point out lines of action and fix on objective points. For a quarter of a century the Vatican maintained opposition to the re- forms established and only in 1897 did it surrender to de- feat and fall into line. It seemed to be the will of God that the very idea of slavery should be obliterated in American history and that Lincoln should be his agent to effect that gracious and righteous achievement. So it seemed to be the will of God that the priest should cease as a dominant power in the political life and history of Mexico and that Juarez and Diaz were designated as his agents to consummate that beneficent end; witness this from the "Associated Press:" ' ' President Diaz Triumphs. The Papal legate orders Catholics to obey the Reform Laws in Mexico. "Monterey, Mexico, January i6th, 1897. — Ever since the enactment of laws in Mexico regulating the Catholic church the ecclesiastical officials have opposed enforcement. Six months ago Archbishop Averfidi was sent to Mexico to investigate and now he has issued instructions that the laws must be strictly obeyed and that the church must support the Diaz administration." "The old order changeth yielding place to new. And God fulfills himself in many ways." Possibly, however, it is but the adoption of the policy of an eminent Hibernian business man and whilom ppliti- cian, in a prosperous western city, (now deceased) when in speaking of active and uncontrollable oppositions he would say, "If you can't beat 'em, jine em." The Heart of Mexico. 31 With the fall of Maximilian and his empire the church party also fell, and though Juarez did not live to see the regeneration of the country in all its fulness it came in due time. Processes had been commenced in his life which were completed by Lerdo, his immediate successor, and the reforms foreshadowed in his decree of emancipation were enacted into the constitution in 1873. B_\- those amendments there is an absolute separation of church and state, congress is prohibited to make laws establishing or forbidding any religion. Matrimony is made to be a civil contract. The church can neither ac- quire or own real estate. A simple promise to speak the truth or perform ofhcial duties is substituted for a formal religious oath. All religious societies are prohibited, and all who had made obligations of ser^dce to such orders were absolved from fulfillment. The church had allied itself with royalty, with Iturbide, with centralism, with Santa Anna, with Zuloaga, with Miramon and finally with the French invaders and the em- pire of Maximilian in its determined and sanguinary efforts to maintain control of the government and the wealth of the country. Each and ever}^ one of them had failed and in the re-action the church and clergy have lost rights and privileges in Mexico which they have in other countries. The suppression of religious orders is not in the line of persecution, but is the exercise of wise political precautions, for from within their secret councils came intrigues, con- spiracies and revolutions. Juarez rescued the Mexican nation from the incubus of Spanish theocracy and behold what a quarter of a century has produced. "In the space of five lustres Mexico has been transformed. At death Juarez left behind him an im- poverished country- , whose broad expanse was continuously wasted by the torch of war; a countrj' whose boast of wealth seemed like a cruel iron}', without money at home, and credit, \\2.y even hope of credit abroad; whose foreign trade was insignificant; whose agriculture and manufactures were 32 The Heart of Mexico. in the rudimentary stage; where even the mining industry was restricted and which had just enough railway mileage to enable its inhabitants to say they knew what a railroad was." (Mariscal.) Today Mexico is a grand country, with a grander future assured. With a disadvantageous financial system, based on silver alone, her wisely conducted revenues are sufl&cient to keep her bonds at par, and above it, in Europe. Her railway system amounts to twelve thousand kilometers — say seven thousand four hundred miles. These with canals and a complete telegraph system, facilitate business and research. Development of material resources offers field for safe and profitable investment. The revolutionist and bandit have passed, giving security to commercial en- terprise and travel. Asylums, sanitariums and hospitals take the place of imposing and costly church structures, show and parade. Free schools, with compulsory attend- ance, wherein no priest can direct or teach, are preparing her on-coming citizens for an intelligent exercise of the elective franchise. In 1866 only about 16,000 Mestizos and half that num- ber of Indians attended public schools, in 1876 the numbers were respectively 129,000 and 74,000, and in 1891 235,000 and 170,005, while the per cent, of increase continues annually. The decrease of crime has been almost in direct ratio to the progress in education. Grave offences are few in number and becoming fewer every day. Mexico stands today, not the peer, but the superior of the United States in the matter of the enforcement of crim- inal statutes. She has no jury system and thus avoids that very abominable possibility for corrupt control of the methods and ends of justice. Neither, wealth, family or political influence, nor official positions can thwart justice by the interminable delays, changes of venue, new trials, continuances, stays of execution, and questionable decisions that obtain in some of the United States; establishing the conviction that the laws and the processes of justice — in The Hkart of Mexico. 33 their easy perversion — give protection to criminals, speciall}'- when money is at the command of the offender. In this administration of prompt justice and in the matter of protest against clerical meddling in civil, political and educational affairs that much unknown and misinter- preted nation stands as an example to all the world beside. Whoever may trutlifully be the Washington of Mexico, whether Hidalgo or Iturbide, it must be conceded that Juarez well represents Lincoln, while for our most capable and successful soldier and able statesman, Ulysses S. Grant, none can compete as the paralell but Porfirio Diaz, the present chief magistrate of Mexico. Like Grant, he fought his country's battles upon field after field with unswerving loyalty to constitution and president, refusing a very seduc- tive offer from Bazaine of place, which promi.sed promotion to imperial rank and power, as Maximilian's star was becom- ing obscured and Napoleon III. wi.shed to substitute a Mex- ican for the Austrian on the throne. Like Grant, Diaz, b}^ choice of his fellow-citizens was exalted to the presidenc}-. For more than twent}' 3'ears he has shaped the laws and policies of the republic and guided it to an established domestic and foreign credit. Grant administered affairs of state on principles and by processes established in the j^ears of American history and experience. He filled the office of president with credit but left no special evidence of his administrations in the form of new and valuable principles or statutes. Diaz and his administrations will be perpetually im- pressed upon Mexican history b}- reason of new laws, new methods and new and valuable principles originated, de- veloped and established b\- him. Much that Juarez left un- finished Diaz has completed in the letter and spirit of re- form. Where Juarez laid down the work Diaz took it up, uniting in a common brotherhood all classes of the nation and initiating the grand intellectual evolution which recent 3'ears have witnessed and which demonstrates the su- periorit}- of a Republic to a theocracy as a basic principle of government. Public improvements have been judiciously 34 Thk Hkak'p oi'^ Mkxtci). prosecutcil. Business successfully encouraged. K(liic;Uit>ii suslaiueil anil forwarded. I^aws revised, codified and en- acted in the interest of justice and ei[uit>'. Courts of in- ferior and superior jurisdiction created. The police ren- dered efficient ii» country as well as municipality and the arni>' so commanded as to secure peace and freedom from revolution. A wise surveillance is exercised over the entire country, aided b>' tlaily telegrams which enables the presi- dent to keep his hand on the public pulse at all times. The bandit, the revolutionist and the ecclesiastical fanatic are controlled in the interest of peace, prosperity, stability, re- ligious libert>' and political education. It may truthfulh' be asserted that no national presiding officer in the wiuld, whatever the title may be, has better adaptation to his work, nor has been more successful as the benefactor of his people than Porfirio Diaz, president of the Republic of Mexico. Moreover Diaz is the ally of the United States in main- taining the principles of the Monroe Doctrine; going further, it is said, and insisted that Kuropean holdings in the Western Continent shall eventually cease. His friendship for this country is fully manifested at this time by his sup- pressing sympathy ami aid, fron\ v*-^panianls in INIexico, for vSpain. After Diaz what ? This momentous question confronts the statesmen and patriots of Mexico. The standing enemy of RiCFORM is the church, the clergy. No other party has or has had principles or plans in opposition. To meet and coiuiteract this ever-existing menace to liboity of con- ,science, eilnc.it ion -uul progress it has pleased i>atriots cvf Mexico to organize "'Socie;tiiss ofthic Rijforim" through- out the entire country, who.se object and intention is to keep ecclesiasticism out ol" political and state affairs including education. Those luwing aiuhout\ .md control lia\-e apptiintod three luuulred and sixt\' five decoration days for each year. Daily a .society or its representatives with appropriate cere- monies makes visit and floral be.stowment to the tombs of Till', lli;.\K'i' <)!■ Mi';xiC(). .•^.S the Reformers. This is to poi)iilari/,e and perpcliuile llie era and principles of " L,A Rrforma " and is also inlended to prevent any tendency to ecclesiastical reaction. It pleased the PontifT of Rome, in 1840, to send an alj- lej^ate to Mexico. His coming having been heralded there was a wonderful demonstration of welcome. All Mexico ro.se up to do him Jionor. In 1H96 the same venerable po- tentate, in the person of I^eo XIII., .sent Archbi.shop Aver- fidi in the same office and duty as ablegate. Notwithstand- ing the heralding of his coming only one priest and one representative of the press met liiiii at tlie station to do him honor and give him early welcome. That he might pu1)licly make known his niissi(Mi a ])a- villion of .six thousand seating capacity was secured. Tliere, before a full house the ablegate discoursed upon the anti- quity of the Hoi.Y Skk its divine authorily as RULER OP THE WORLD, the inten.se love of the Holy Father Leo XIII. to- ward his people of all nations and specially towards Mexi- cans. He in official capacity earnestly entreated them to resume their fealty as of yore. A distinguished Mexican orator on behalf of the officials of the Republic and the people replied, substantially, that they desired no clo.ser rela- tion to the Vatican than that su.stained at the time. He bade the Archbi.shop to look upon the Mexico of to-day under the auspices of the Republic and then compare it with the Mexico of Theocratic rule. He alleged that no classes had suffered lo.ss by the change but priests and tax- gatherers, while the whole people otherwise had been bene- ficiaries of the reform. He then and there informed the distinguished agent of the Pope that if priests were in demand by the holy father for work elsewhere Mexico could and cheerfully would spare an army of them for such foreign .service. These evidences of individual resolve, of policies, of .sentiment and good sense answer the query, " After Diaz what ? ' ' Mexican history never can repeat itself. It arose like a flood and swept away custom, tradition, superstition and eccle.sia.stical politician like a tidal wave. But the turbulent 36 The Heart of Mexico. tide of events has left a smooth, calm sea upon which the ship of state sails on majestically bearing a precious freight of liberty, development and prosperity — and no priest can stand at the helm. If the Mexican people have not attained to all possible heights of education, and to all degrees of development they yet, under their democratic form of government, have the right and privilege to advance, unburdened bj^ priestly re- strictions and relieved of the inexorable rapacity of the tax collector — coparcener with ecclesiasticism — which had so long a rule under the theocracy. The people are surely, even if slowly, moving toward higher planes of individual and national attainment by the paths of education, self- assertion and intelligent patriotism. They advance and do not retrograde. With a retrospect of the closing centurj^ it seems in- disputable that among progressive nations Mexico has made the greatest advances in reform and development; while among the great number of eminent men who have im- pressed themselves upon the records as humanitarians, re- formers, educators and statesmen, Benito Pablo Juarez and Porfirio Diaz rank all, who by initiating and effecting reforms have made glorious and illustrious this Nineteenth Century of Christ. THE end. LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 015 834 921 8 MAILMAN & COMPANY, PRINTERS, 723 WALNUT STREET, KANSAS CITY, MO.