As a machine Spain in the sixteenth century was a marvel of power; as an aggregation of thinking men, it was even then contemptible. Ferdinand, Charles V and Philip II were able and illustrious rulers, and they appeared at a time when their several characters could tell on the immediate fortunes of Spain. They were warriors, and the nation was entirely warlike. During this period the Spaniard overran the earth, not that he might till the soil, but that he might rob the man who did. With one hand he was raking in the gold and silver of Mexico and Peru; with the other confiscating the profits of the trade and manufactures of the Low Countries--and all in the name of the Great God and Saints! How was Spain overthrown? The answer is a short one. Spain, under Philip II staked her all upon a religious war against the awakening age. She met the Reformation within her own borders and extinguished it; but thought had broken loose from its chains and was abroad in the earth. England had turned Protestant, and Elizabeth was on the throne; Denmark, Norway and Sweden, indeed all countries except Spain and Italy had heard the echoes from Luther's trumpet blast. Italy furnished the religion, and Spain the powder, in this unequal fight between the Old and the New. Spain was not merely the representative of the old, she WAS the old, and she armed her whole strength in its behalf. Here was a religion separated from all moral principle and devoid of all softening sentiment--its most appropriate formula being, death to all heretics. Death--not to tyrants, not to oppressors, not to robbers and men-stealers--but death to _heretics_. It was this that equipped her Armada. The people were too loyal and too pious to THINK, and so were hurled in a solid mass against the armed thought of the coming age, and a mighty nation crumbled as in a day. With the destruction of her Armada her warlike ascendancy passed and she had nothing to put in its place. She had not tillers of the soil, mechanics or skilled merchants. Business was taking the place of war all over the world, but Spain knew only religion and war, hence worsted in her only field, she was doomed. From the days of Philip II her decline was rapid. Her territory slipped from her as rapidly as it had been acquired. Her great domains on our soil are now the seat of thriving communities of English-speaking people. The whole continent of South America has thrown off her yoke, though still retaining her language, and our troops now embarked from Port Tampa are destined to wrest from her the two only remaining colonies subject to her sway in the Western World,--Cuba and Porto Rico. With all her losses hitherto, Spain has not learned wisdom. Antagonistic to truth and liberty, she seems to sit in the shadow of death, hugging the delusions that have betrayed her, while all other people of earth are pressing onward toward light and liberty.