Another group of writers formed a society known as “Buen Gusto.” These writers were accustomed to meet at the house of Doña Manuela Santamaría de Manrique, who was esteemed not only for her attainments in literature, but also for her knowledge of nature. The members of this group were chiefly poets, born in New Granada, and educated in either the college of Rosario or the college of San Bartolomé. They wrote, among other things, certain plays that were presented in the theatre of Bogotá. Two of these were the _Sacrificio de Idomeneo_ and _El Zagal de Bogotá_. Perhaps the most widely known of the poets of the Buen Gusto was Dr. José Fernández de Madrid, whose studies had given him the title of Doctor of Laws as well as that of Doctor of Medicine. Whether in prose or verse, the writings of the persons who were thus drawn together in these associations are rather indications of beginnings in literature than of a culmination of literary progress. They are not reminiscent of colonial dependence but premonitory of an emancipated population. [Sidenote: The poems of Aguirre] [Sidenote: _La rebelión y caída de Luzbel_] The poems of Juan Bautista Aguirre are found chiefly in a manuscript collection called _Versos castellanos, obras juveniles, misceláneas_. The author was born in Guayaquil, and as a youth was sent to Quito by his parents to prepare for his career as a man of letters. The university was then under the control of the Jesuits, and Aguirre accepted membership in the Society. It is, moreover, reported that he became a lecturer on philosophy in the university. An elegy on the death of Philip V and an account of the earthquake of 1746 suggest that he was writing before the middle of the century. In 1767 he was involved in the general expulsion of the Jesuits from South America. Later he lived in Rome. His lectures on philosophy, whether in Quito or Rome, apparently did not turn his mind from his inclination to write verses, and some part of his writings indicate that they were produced when religious thoughts and the image of the Bible were uppermost in his mind. In the _Concepción de Nuestra Señora_ he is lost in profound mysticism, and in _La rebelión y caída de Luzbel y sus secuaces_ he is seized by the subject which Milton evidently found the most inspiring in his great theme, the pride and ambition of Satan to rule the universe: Falsear haré con ira fulminante Del alto cielo en un vaivén ruidoso, La azul muralla y subiré triunfante A ser Señor del reino luminoso: Si son estorbo a mi ímpetu arrogante Aire, mar, tierra o firmamento hermoso, Haré que sientan mi furor violento El mar, la tierra, el aire, el firmamento.