is necessary for a people at all times to find expression for its
aesthetic life. Architecture, like literature, reflects the sentiments
and tendencies of a nation's mind. As truly as Don Quixote, Don Juan, or
the Cid express them, so do the stories told by Toledo, Leon, or Burgos.
They reproduce the passions, the dreams, the imagination, and the
absurdities of the age which created them.

Toledo's first architect, who superintended the work for more than half
a century, was named Perez (d. 1285). He was followed by Rodrigo,
Alfonso, Alvar Gomez, Annequin de Egas, Martin Sanchez, Juan Guas, and
Enrique de Egas. Hand in hand with the architects, worked the high
priests.

The Archbishop of Toledo is the Primate of Spain. Mighty prelates have
sat on that throne, and the chapter was once one of the most celebrated
in the world. The Primate of Toledo has the Pope as well as the King of
Spain for honorary canons, and his church takes precedence of all others
in the land. The offices attached to his person are numerous. As late as
the time of Napoleon's conquest of the city, fourteen dignitaries,
twenty-seven canons, and fifty prebends, besides a host of chaplains and
subaltern priests, followed in the train of the Metropolitan. At the
close of the fifteenth century, his revenues exceeded 80,000 ducats
(about $720,000), while the gross amount of those of the subordinate
beneficiaries of his church rose to 180,000. This amount, or 12,000,000
reals, had not decreased at the beginning of the nineteenth century. In
the middle ages he was followed by more horse and foot than either the
Grand Master of Santiago or the Constable of Castile. When he threw his
influence into the balance, the pretender to the throne was often
victorious. He held jurisdiction over fifteen large and populous towns
besides numbers of inferior places.

Many who occupied the episcopal throne of Toledo ruled Spain, not only
by virtue of the prestige their high office gave them, but through
extraordinary genius and remarkable attainments. They were great alike
in war and in peace. Many of them combined broadness of view and real
learning with purity of morals. They founded universities and libraries,
framed useful laws, stimulated noble impulses, corrected abuses, and
promoted reforms. Popes called them to Rome to ask their advice in
affairs of the Church. Bright in the history of Spain shine the names of
such prelates as Rodriguez, Tenorio, Fonseca, Ximenez