Before the conquest of the Moors, as has already been observed in the body of this work, Spaniards were truly Catholics, and nothing more than Catholics. At that period, they had no other knowledge than that acquired from the study of Christian truth; excepting the military, there was no profession but that of the ecclesiastic; the arts, still rude, and almost denuded of invention and of ideality, were limited in their application to religious objects; and even architecture itself was not ostentatious of its grandeur and its beauties, nor were its plans and resources developed in great dimensions, except in the erection of those proud cathedrals, which, like those of Burgos, Seville, Palma, and Toledo, still excite the admiration of foreigners, and continue to be objects of study to the artist. {202} Animated by so vigorous a principle of action, the only one which was capable of exciting the enthusiasm of their energetic but simple minds, Spaniards became the admiration of the world for their prowess, for the elevation of their sentiments, for their conquests in the East, where the Arragonese humilitated even the throne of the Cæsars, and, above all, for the innumerable series of exploits and sublime feats of valour and patriotism with which they succeeded in expelling from Europe the Saracenic dominion, then about to extend itself from the shores of the Garonne to those of the Tiber. What a difference do we perceive between the Spaniard of those times and the abject and degraded vassal of the princes of the Austrian dynasty! Religious sentiment was not less energetic, it was not less profound, in the second epoch than in the first; but it was a sentiment perverted by superstition, envenomed by fanaticism, and which, far from associating itself, as before, with the propensity to illustrious deeds and grand enterprises, consecrated itself exclusively, moved by the former, to the most puerile rites and ridiculous exterior practices, and, influenced by the latter, to the most abominable excesses of persecution and intolerance. Thus it is, that from the time of Philip II. down to that of Charles II., the history of Spain presents nothing but an uninterrupted series of blunders in the government, of intrigues and disorders in the court, and of crosses and misfortunes in the national affairs. In a word, it sets before us a treasury without credit and without money, an army without discipline and without organization, tribunals sold to power:—and everywhere we perceive recklessness, ignorance, poverty, and immorality, which are the inseparable accompaniments of mal-administration.