Book excerpt: Excerpt from View of South America and Mexico, Vol. 1 of 2: Comprising Their History, the Political Condition, Geography, Agriculture, Commerce, &C. Of the Republics of Mexico, Guatemala, Columbia, Peru, the United Provinces of South America and Chile, With a Complete History of the Revolution, in Each of These In That the discovery and colonizing of a new world, several times 'as'large as the continent of Europe, would produce an important change in the commercial and political relations of the maritime powers of that continent, must have been fore seen at the time but that it should have had an important moral influence on the character of mankind, and have been the means of securing their rights, establishing their liberties, and exalting their destinies, no one could havelanticipated. On the contrary, it must have been supposed, that the estab lishment of distant colonies, dependant on the parent state, nursed by its care, protected by its arms, and entirely subject to, its power, would have tended to colonial oppression which by strengthening the power of the sovereign, would re-act upon the parent state, and thus tend to the oppression of both. Whatever may have been the case, with others, this was un doubtedly true of the Spanish Colonies, down to the period of the late revolution; Their degradation and Oppression aliena ted them from the parent country, and prepared their minds to embrace the first opportunity to throw off the yoke of a' dis tant and foreign power, which instead of conducting towards them, like an affectionate mother, treated them with the jealousy, selfishness, and cruelty of an unfe'eling step-dame. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.