Page images
PDF
EPUB

Vinuesa, of Father Osuna, with his companions, of the Bishop of Vich, and of the prisoners in the castle of Corunna, thrown alive into the sea?

'Without the illegal impunity of the Persas, (members of the Cortes, we believe sixty in number, who presented to the king a petition against the Constitution;) without the premature pardon granted to the Factious; and without the constant acquittal which the enemies of the new system were sure to receive from the mouth of our judges; would this hideous blot have fallen on our holy cause? though it is probably the only one with which the party who sincerely supported the new system can be reproached.'*

But why should we go elsewhere for proofs that the principle of assassination was supported by some, at least, of the Spanish secret societies, when, notwithstanding a disclaimer at the beginning of the account which the author of Don Esteban' gives of them, he himself affords the clearest instances of that murderous spirit? Do we not find Vidal, one of the greatest heroes of the Spanish Freemasons, represented by the Don himself as engaging to murder Elio the captain-general of Valencia? Is not that determination extolled as an act of patriotic devotion? Had not several plans been formed to make away with that brave man,for such we must in justice call him, though we have not sufficient information to judge of his other moral qualities? Did not the Freemasons attend the execution of Vidal in disguise to murder the general, who was expected to be present? Let any man of common sense, and undepraved moral feeling, read in this Sandoval, the whole account of the horrible transaction to which we allude,† and judge what must have been the state of Spain, governed, as it was during the last year before the arrival of the Duke d'Angoulême, by secret societies, in which those principles prevailed. Even the ministers were appointed or ousted through their influence, and the monthly presidency of the Cortes was not independent of their control. No set of men,

however, were so fatally exposed to the insulting interference of the Comunero Castles as the Spanish judges. Our readers may perhaps remember that a kind of jury was established in Spain, exclusively for cases of libel. But how were the trials managed by the secret societies? The courts were crowded with the mob which they kept in their pay; and we have documents in our possession which prove, that no honest man could sit as one of the jury without danger.

But nothing shows so thoroughly the spirit of those societies as the character of the writers whom they employed. We regret that we must give some parts of the history of one of the most eminent

Español Const. No. XL. p. 451.

† Sandoval, vol. iii. p. 87. & seq. of

of those apostles of profligacy and atheism from memory, for want of a copy of the life of him published at Madrid. The facts, however, which we are about to mention are notorious. A native of the province of Biscay, whose real name we have not the means to give, resided as a friar of the order of St. Francis at Cadiz, about the year 1809. Having, as it not unfrequently happens among the Spanish priesthood, become an infidel, and being of too bold a temper to continue in that kind of passive dissimulation which is the common resource in such cases, he left Cadiz for Mexico, where he expected to enjoy more liberty. But he could not escape the eye of the Inquisition, and he was soon lodged in one of its prisons. Thence he contrived to escape, and in the dress of a layman, lived for several years in Portugal. The surname which he assumed, was Clararosa, a compound, as he unblushingly used to declare at Cadiz, of the names of his two favourite mistresses, Clara and Rosa. Supported by the Comuneros, this man ventured back to Cadiz, though there were still many individuals who could identify his person. Clararosa soon became the oracle of the lower classes, and his penny tracts of impiety and immorality, their Bible. The mischief which he did among the uneducated part of the town was terrible, and is, we fear, enduring. Husbands were heard openly retailing to their wives the doctrines which declared all restraint of the passions to be a human contrivance, an encroachment of religious tyranny; and quoting the authority of Clararosa for the truth of their statement. A prosecution of the wretch was undertaken by some spirited inhabitants of Cadiz ; but Clararosa was in favour with the Comuneros, and he laughed at his prosecutors.

Unfortunately for the apostle of immorality, there ensued by and by a schism among these Comuneros, in which he adhered to the most violent, though then the weakest party. Some of the more sensible among them had perceived, that the Constitutionalsystem could not subsist, if the secret war, which had been so long carried on between the Freemasons and Comuneros, was not discontinued. A declaration signed by about fifty Comuneros was published, in which these men declared their adherence to the original institution of Freemasons, and renounced the violent revolutionary principles of the Castles. Among the subscriptions to this document were found the names of not a few members of the last Cortes; and Clararosa, being too violent a Liberal to join some of his old patrons in this secession, was given up to the regular course of the law. Being sent to prison, he was there seized with a paroxysm of a disease which his irregularities had probably brought on him; and he died in a few days, not without the usual suspicions of poison-suspicions, however, which the cir

I 14

cumstances

cumstances of his death will prove, to any one not quite ignorant of the rudiments of pathology, to be perfectly groundless.

It is strange that the author of Don Esteban,' who is so fond of striking scenes, and goes so often out of his way in search of the picturesque, should not have favoured us with a description of Clararosa's funeral. We will supply his omission, in order that those who wonder why the people of Spain allowed the French army to cross the whole of the Peninsula without opposition, may explain the fact to themselves.-The man had been allowed to quit the prison when he became alarmingly ill; and consequently his body was, after his death, in the care of his friends the violent comuneros. These friends of freedom determined to set every feeling of the country at defiance, in order to honour their protegé according to the principles of the association. The body was dressed, not in the monkish frock, which is the established shroud in Spain, but in a coat and cocked-hat. In imitation of the funeral of the despondent lover Chrysostom, described by Cervantes, the body was carried to the burial-ground beyond the city gates, covered with copies of his own tracts, and with flowers. A band of blind men, who are the regular hawkers of newspapers in Spain, preceded the coffin; an immense mob composed of Clararosa's readers, the lowest of the populace, followed it. No clergy attended the procession, though their attendance is an established custom. Instead of the usual psalms, republican songs were vociferated by the crowd; and thus the unfortunate priest, who during his life had attacked the first principles of Christian faith and morality, was made, even after death, an instrument of open insult to every Christian feeling.-We take no pleasure in recording these deeds of shame. But it is necessary that the public should know what principles and maxims are prevalent among a party which seems to be even now far from quiescent. For anything we know, the lodge or castle, (we do not care to be very correct in such a nomenclature,) which in London prepared the mutiny of the Isla, may still exist in this capital-we think it extremely likely that it does. These glowing descriptions of Spanish freemasonry-these atrocious libels on the king and his party which have appeared in six volumes, within a short period, may be intended as party engines to prepare the public mind for some embryo plan to increase the miseries of Spain by a fresh convulsion:—we strongly suspect that such is the unhappy truth of the case.

We decidedly condemn the severe system which has been pursued in Spain against the partisans of the Cortes. But must not such works as Don Esteban and Sandoval increase the violence of the king's party against the liberales? Is it not possible

that

that one object of such publications may be to preclude an amnesty which would separate those who might return to their homes with equal advantage to themselves and their country, from those who have forfeited their liberty, and perhaps their lives, to the real justice of the laws?

It is a subject of annual declamation in parliament, that Spain is allowed to remain in the military possession of a French army. Let those who are disposed to blame the government for their supposed apathy upon this subject, examine the spirit of the books which we have been considering, and they will not be in want of official papers to obtain a satisfactory answer. From everything we know of the state of Spain it would be cruel to leave her entirely to herself for the present; nor is it from any excessive tenderness for the bigoted and royalist party that we fear the premature removal of a foreign force from her soil. Our fears and concern have the moderate constitutionalists, both in Spain and among us, for their object. We wish to see the exile and pri vations of the latter at an end, and feel sincere anxiety for the safety of the former. But there is no hope for either, unless the great mass of the Spanish population are prevented from giving way to their hatred of all who have, in any degree, supported the constitution. We do not make this assertion upon vague surmise. We have good reasons for asserting that the Duke d'Angoulême intended to have made the establishment of a Political Charter the condition of the restoration of Ferdinand. But such was the almost universal hatred which these anti-Christian and murderous Secret Societies had created against anything like a constitution, that he was soon compelled to perceive that even his military force would not have been sufficient to keep his kinsman on the throne under any charter. The fact, though not the cause, is acknowledged in the tract already quoted, from the Español Constitucional; and in that part of it which the author, a Spaniard of high respectability, has sanctioned with his name.*

There is a very numerous body of Spaniards who would most gladly sacrifice their lives to the improvement of their country, by means of a definite charter of popular liberties. But a sad experience has abundantly taught these that such an improvement cannot originate in the mass of the Spanish people. Any attempt at re-establishing the Spanish Constitution, by a violent overthrow of the present system, must fail, after shedding torrents of blood. No moderation can be expected, either from the constitutionalists or royalists, in their present state of violent exasperation. Both have already tasted and re-tasted blood, and every alternate

* Español Const. No. XLI. p. 45.

superiority

superiority over each other must increase that horrible and insatiable thirst. The Liberal soldiers who, in 1814, according to this same Sandoval, were determined to burn an officer alive, for being the bearer of Abisbal's proclamation in favour of the king, and the general and officers who waited to hear the des tined victim's protestations, before they interposed to save him, -these soldiers, the heroes of our Freemason-novelist, cannot be fit instruments for the restoration of liberty to their country. Nor are we more disposed to expect any improvement from the Soldiers of the Faith, and their leaders. Whatever is to benefit Spain must proceed from the royal authority of that country, under the advice and influence of more enlightened nations. But no moral power can exert itself in favour of a people as yet so fearfully divided; all that humanity can achieve, is to prevent the opposite parties from imbruing their hands in each other's blood. The occupation of Spain by a foreign army is melancholy, is galling to every one who loves that unfortunate country; but, if there be a class of Spaniards who derive any direct personal benefit from it, we must not look for them among the Serviles. The French army has been now four years affording protection to those moderate friends of Spanish liberty, who are still confounded in Spain by a blind and irritated populace with those who are the real cause of their irritation. It may be the interest of some Spaniards to prolong this state of things by means of such books as Don Esteban and Sandoval; but it is also the duty of every true friend of Spain to watch and expose the workings of a political spirit which is the true cause of her present miserable degradation.

*No sooner was the purport of the proclamation discovered by the assembled multitude, than cries of "To the fire with it-to the fire with it-and its infamous owner!"-At these words the speaker suddenly disappeared; his supporters, alarmed at the doom pronounced by the crowd, dropped their load, and endeavoured to escape the fury of their comrades by mixing with them. The orator, however, was not so fortunate; for, as he fell down, he was collared by some of those who were nearest to him, and kept fast, to undergo the summary sentence passed upon him. Meantime, several of the soldiers were seen climbing to the windows of the surrounding houses, and presently chairs and tables were hurled out of them to furnish fuel for the intended political auto-da-fe. In a few minutes the pile was prepared in the middle of the square; volumes of thick smoke rose on high, performing their vertical evolutions, followed by immense sparkles, and at length by a pyramidical column of flame, which waved its terrific radiance over the heads of the infuriated soldiery. During these fearful preparations, the destined victim was protesting to heaven and all its saints, that he was perfectly innocent of any evil intentions; that he had not read the proclamation previous to his reading it in public and, consequently, could not know its contents; and that, moreover, he was as ready as any of them to lose his blood in support of the Constitution. General Cienfuegos, who heard his protestations, and various officers of the staff who were then present, interposed in his behalf, and obtained his acquittal, to the no small disappointment of many soldiers, who had been feasting their imaginations with the prospect of seeing a Servile roasted.'-Sandoval, vol. i. p. 78.

ART.

« PreviousContinue »