Mexico – Page 4 – The Pull Of The Land

The Indian worker is poor, but he is free. His condition is preferable to that of the peasant in great parts of northern Europe …. — Alexander von Humboldt, circa 1800

… y el pobre en su choza, libertad pidió [And the poor man in his hovel, for freedom implored.]. — Venezuelan National Anthem, 1810

Well, which is it?

This blog has often referred to Humboldt (see Monster Aguirre and The Invention of Nature for but two allusions; the search bar will direct you to more). Humboldt was no royalist; he did not even pause for an irony alert to ponder that “modern”, progressive France denied him permits to travel for scientific inquiry, whereas obscurantist Spain did.

Nevertheless, he recognized that the poor in pre-revolutionary Spanish America were free and many were prosperous. He wrote that a Mexican peasant under the Spaniards earned five (5) times more than a peasant in India under the English. He further discovered that Nueva España (Mexico) provided twice more to Spain’s treasury than India, with 5-times the population, did to England’s. During his visit to Spanish America, Venezuelans consumed 189 pounds of meat per capita, compared to 163 pounds by Parisians. Mexicans consumed 363 pounds of bread per capita compared to 377 by Parisians. Miners earned 25 to 30 francs per week compared to 4 to 5 francs by Saxons.

Esquivel Obregón, a Mexican, wrote that a wage earner in his country could buy 38 hectoliters (a hectoliter is 100 liters) of corn and 2,300 kilograms of flour in 1800, but only 24 and 525, respectively, in 1908, after “independence.” These are not isolated figures, but they do signal the catastrophic decline of Spanish America’s standard of living and reflect the desolation caused by the “chimera of liberty”.

But no need to rely on a Humboldt or an Obregón. What did Simón Bolívar himself write in 1829, a year before he died?

“From one end to the other, the New World is an abyss of abomination; there is no good faith in [Spanish] America; treaties are mere paper; constitutions, books; elections, combat; liberty, anarchy; life, a torment. We’ve never been so disgraced as we are now. Before, we enjoyed good things; illusion is fed by chimera … we are tormented by bitter realities.”

So one must wrestle with the fact that “the poor man in his hovel” most certainly was not imploring for freedom. He was free and prosperous.

Much, much more was going on at the time, but the overarching canopy was the French Revolution and its atheistic concepts which sought to disparage all that went before, including one’s own history. A 19th century Colombian diplomat wrote perceptively,

“In the codices [Spain was notorious for documenting everything. These codices are treasure troves for those willing and able to research largely unread tomes waiting to be rediscovered] known by me, the history of the Conquest and of the vice-royalty was recorded…. Three centuries of a patriarchal empire whose glories were echoed in palaces, pulpits, taverns, Indian colloquiums, and in royal audiences…. Then the violent winds blew and our ship ran aground on the Oedipus reefs where the desire to assassinate the fathers, to destroy the moorings of common ethics and religion which bound diverse cultures and civilizations to one tongue, one culture, and one loyalty to common principles, exalted the passions and drove men to madness.”

That diplomat went on to say, “…the degree of destruction and depopulation experienced in these lands compares with my vehement desire that someone, one day will love the Truth enough to divulge what I have observed and written.”

Readers of this blog know that I love Venezuela, the land of my birth. It is a land of heartbreaking beauty and one that has absorbed many rivers of blood since the early 19th century and is even now suffering greatly. The way back to sanity, prosperity, liberty, and peace begins with the Truth.

Readers should also see significant parallels to current events in the United States. George Washington, in his Farewell Address, addressed similar matters as were addressed by that Colombian diplomat, including the need for a common religion and common culture to bind together diverse peoples. The current, unbridled rush to deny anything good in our founding, and especially to denigrate our common religion, is very similar to the temper which became prevalent in Spanish American elite circles in the early 1800’s.

In both, Truth is the first casualty and all else follows, beginning with ordered liberty.

To restore and preserve our ordered liberty, we must recover and speak the Truth. Pilate tarried not for an answer when he asked, “What is truth?”, but turned away from Truth Personified, Who stood before him.

Unlike Pilate who inquired and did not await for a reply, we must do differently.

And the Truth will set us free.

17th century Spanish American art from Peru

“Only those born in Spain were allowed to own shops or mines in the colonies.” The Invention of Nature: Alexander von Humboldt’s New World, page 47.

“…[Simón] Bolivar was the son of one of Caracas’s wealthiest creole families [which] owned several plantations, mines and elegant town homes.” The Invention of Nature: Alexander von Humboldt’s New World, page 117.

Yes, it’s the same book, published in 2016 (I am about halfway through). And the above tendentiousness — the colonists could own nothing on page 47 — and contradiction — the colonists were tycoons 70 pages later — are not isolated.

It is hailed as a masterpiece by the usual literati. It is considered at times interesting, at times insufferable, and at times infuriating by your humble blogger. You’re better off reading Humboldt’s writings directly.

We’ve much work yet ahead of us in clearing the misconceptions and prejudices which color our understanding of South America generally and Venezuela specifically, not to mention world history and science.

The fact remains that Spain’s conquest of much of the Americas, their export of European culture to these shores, their eradication of human sacrifices, their education and teaching of the Spanish language to the indigenous peoples, and much more, remains an unequalled, spectacular achievement in history. Humboldt, himself a creature of the Enlightenment, who like his fellows, borrowed profusely from Christianity without so much as a tip of the hat, would have achieved nothing had it not been for Spain who gave him a passport when Enlightenment France did not, and had it not been for the missions in the Americas who helped him and had even seen many of his discoveries centuries before he was conceived in his mother’s womb. He just took it all for granted, like a good modern.

Now, saying the above does not mean I am blind to Spanish failures (nor am I blind to English failures) or Jesuit perfidy. But it does mean that I refuse to take at face value the usual textbook approach to Spain and South America that we’ve been spoon fed for centuries now. The history of our neighbors to the south and across the pond is much more complex and vastly richer than: Spain bad–Spain rape–Spain kill–Las Casas saint.

I would challenge us to consider the possibility that we in the United States have much more in common with South America than we do with modern Europe. But to consider that challenge, we must first make an effort to clear the underbrush accumulated over hundreds of years. What did Spain do right? What did she do wrong? Was Spain responsible for the fearsome bloodletting in 19th century South America? Hint: she was not. Then who and what was?

In 1829, after “independence”, Simón Bolivar wrote to his fellow South Americans in A Look At Spanish America:

This, from a man who was largely responsible for the chaos he now bitterly laments. A man who proclaimed the glorious unity of the continent, saw it irredeemably fractured and destroyed. He died, embittered (“I have plowed the sea!”), a mere year later.

Historian Luis Level de Goda wrote in 1893, “The revolutions have produced in Venezuela nothing but the most vulgar leaders, tribal chieftains, the greatest disorders and lack of concern for one another, corruption, and a long, never-ending tyranny, the moral ruin of the country, and the degradation of a great number of Venezuelans.”

Half a century before Level de Goda, the writer, Cecilio Acosta made a like point, “The internal convulsions have produced sacrifices but not improvements; tears but not harvests.” Others have made similar, terrible, and depressing observations.

One of the purposes of this blog is to look at these and related matters as dispassionately as possible and hopefully to encourage us to reconsider what we’ve been taught for generations.

And maybe, with God’s help and with sincere goodwill, we might see a true and wonderful rapprochement between “The Colossus of the North” (how they referred to the USA for generations) and the land which was first called “America” (it was South America who first had that epithet, not the United States).

Long time Mexican president, Porfirio Díaz, spoke for many in Central and South American when he exclaimed in exasperation: “Poor Mexico! So far from God, so close to the United States [Pobre Méjico! Tan lejos de Dios y tan cerca de los Estados Unidos]!”

I’d say that, today, both the United States and South America are far from God as far as their legislators go. Let’s pray and work towards a rapprochement with the Triune God. Then the way to a bright future between these great neighbors will be not only more possible but excitingly successful and fruitful!

Porfirio Díaz, president of Mexico; photo taken early 20th century.

Don Porfirio Díaz and his wife, Doña Carmen, in exile in Paris circa 1912, shortly before his death.

Sketch from life in 1830 by José María Espinosa. Bolivar was 47 and died shortly thereafter.

Following are representative examples of Spanish architecture in colonial Americas

Tag: Mexico

Which is it?

So far from God and so close to the United States!