The patriotic motive that guided the Liberator in founding the National Library is evident in his decree, which declares that “as ignorance is the strongest pillar of despotism, free governments should adopt an opposite course, allowing mankind to follow its natural impulse toward perfection.” The library was first opened to the public on the 17th of September, 1822, with a collection of about twelve thousand volumes. Many of these were of great value, as the long residence of Spanish state and church officials in the viceregal capital had resulted in the introduction of the best European literature, some of which, interdicted by the Holy Office, had been concealed for a long time, and came to light only with the triumph of the Independence. All the works printed by the press in Peru since its first establishment in 1580 were placed in the National Library, which was enriched with rare editions of the Bible; a curious volume on palmistry, dated 1449, presented by General San Martin; a breviary, printed in Venice in 1489; and an edition of Plato of still older publication, as well as complete sets of the writings of classic and modern philosophers and scientists. The nucleus was chiefly derived from the convents, which had been the great repositories of literature in colonial days, and many Latin books, in folio, were acquired, treating chiefly of religious subjects. The library was established in a building formerly occupied by the College of Caciques, famous under the viceroyalty as an institution that provided for the Christian education of noble descendants of the Inca emperors. When the Chilean army occupied Lima in 1881, this flourishing institution, which was among the most important in America, was destroyed, the valuable collection, then amounting to about fifty thousand volumes, being in part carried off to Chile and the remainder publicly sold at auction by weight.