This act was ratified by the General Congress, which, catching the same spirit, within two months after the banishment of the Archbishop declared all religious orders at an end throughout the Republic. This decisive measure met with the almost unanimous sanction of the people, and was at once carried into effect in the several States. The Congress also decreed not only complete Religious Liberty, but that the appointment to church dignities pertained to the nation, and should be made by the President of the Republic; prohibited the promulgation of all papal bulls, unless they had received the previous sanction of the Federal Government, as also the sale or use of papal dispensations, of whatever character. The State of Honduras shortly afterwards passed a law, which, I believe, was also adopted by all the other States, legalizing the marriage of the priests, and legitimatizing their children, so as to permit of their succeeding to their fathers’ property.[22] ----- Footnote 22: In their zeal to educate the people, and to weaken their religious prejudices, theatres were established, in which the arts and objects of priestcraft were exposed to ridicule, contempt, and reprobation. A play called “La Inquisicion por dentro,” or “A Peep into the Inquisition,” had a great run, and brought that institution into effectual and lasting odium. “In Guatemala,” says Mr. Crowe, “Papal bulls of indulgence, which used to be as much valued as paper currency in other countries, are now used by the shopkeepers as waste paper for wrapping their goods. In San Salvador, the Bishop, a few years since, offered first twenty and afterwards forty days of plenary indulgence, to be deducted from the period of purgatorial sufferings after death, to all who should aid in removing an unsightly mound of earth which disgraced one of the squares of the city, and injured the effect of the Cathedral; but the mound remained, although the Bishop again doubled the promised remission.” ----- Subsequently to the dissolution of the confederacy, and under the direction of the Serviles, the convents of Guatemala were re-established, but the other States have persisted in the prohibitory action of 1829, or rather no attempt has been made to revive the monasteries suppressed under it. There were formerly, as I have already said, three convents in Leon; that of San Juan de Dios has been converted into a hospital; that of La Merced is only used by the government in case of need as a cuartel, or barracks. The largest, the Franciscan, although in a state of hopeless decay, is still watched over faithfully by the Padre Cartine. He has thus far preserved its precincts sacred from profane intrusion, and lingers silently amongst its dilapidated corridors, and weed-infested courts, like the antiquary amongst the tombs, the last of the powerful fraternity of San Francisco in Leon.