“An imperfect knowledge of logic and natural philosophy was all I acquired at the university before I began the study of divinity; and like most of my countrymen, I should have completed my studies without so much as suspecting the existence of elegant literature, had it not been for my acquaintance with an excellent young man, much my senior at the university, who, by his own unassisted industry, had made some progress in the study and imitation of the classics.[16] To him I owed my first acquaintance with Spanish poetry, and my earliest attempts at composition in my own language. My good fortune led me, but a short time after, to a member of the _Colegio Mayor_ of this town--another self-improved man, whose extraordinary talents having enabled him, at the age of nineteen, to cast a gleam of good taste over the system of his own university of Osuna, made him subsequently, at Seville, the centre of a small club of students.[17] Through the influence of his genius, and the gratuitous assistance he gave them in their studies, some of his private pupils rose so far above the mass of their academical fellows, as to shew by the fair, though scanty, produce of their minds, the rich promise which the state of their country yearly blasts. [16] Don Manuel Maria del Marmol. [17] Don Manuel Maria de Arjona. “In all the Spanish universities with which I am acquainted, I have observed a similar struggle between enterprising genius and constituted ignorance. Valencia, Granada, the college of San Fulgencio at Murcia; Salamanca, above all, and Seville, the least among them; have exhibited symptoms of rebellion, arising from the undaunted ardour of some young members, who having opened for themselves a path to knowledge, would, at some time or other, make a desperate effort to allure the rising generation to follow their steps. The boldest champions in this hopeless contest, have generally started among the professors of moral philosophy. Government had confined them to the puny Elements of Jacquier and Heinnecius; but a mind once set on “the proper study of mankind,” must be weak indeed not to extend its views beyond the limits prescribed by the ignorance of a despot or his ministers. With alarm and consternation to the _white-tasselled_ heads,[18] and thrilling hopes to their secret enemies, connected series of Theses have of late appeared among us, which, in spite of the studied caution of their language, betrayed both their origin and tendency. Genuine offspring of the French school, the very turn of their phrases gave strong indications of a style formed in defiance of the Holy Inquisition. But these fits of restless impatience have only secured the yoke they were intended to loosen. I have visited Salamanca after the great defeat of the philosophical party, the strongest that ever was formed in Spain. A man of first-rate literary character among us,[19] whom merit and court favour had raised to one of the chief seats in the judicature