ence. If they could have had their will any time during the
last thirty-five years, the priests would have been reduced to a
condition of apostolic simplicity, and the Church's vast property been
put to uses such as the Apostles would have approved. Guadalupe Victoria
would probably have been as little averse to the confiscation of
ecclesiastical property as was Thomas Cromwell himself. The fear that a
firm and stable federal government would interfere with the privileges
of the Church, and would not cease such interference until the change
had been made perfect, which implied the Church's political destruction,
is one of the chief reasons why no such government has ever had an
existence in Mexico. The Church has favored every party and faction that
has been opposed to order and liberty. Royalism, centralism, despotism,
and even foreign conquest has it preferred to any state of things in
which there should be found that due union of liberty and law without
which no country can expect to have constitutional freedom. Had it ever
been possible to establish a strong central government in Mexico, it is
very probable the Church would have been one of its firmest pillars. The
character and organization of that institution, its desire to maintain
possession of its property, and its aversion to liberty of every kind,
would all have united to make such a government worthy of the Church's
support, provided it had supported the Church in its turn. The
ecclesiastical influence is everywhere observable in the history of
Mexico, from the beginning of the struggle for independence. The clergy
were supporters of independence, not because they wished for liberty to
the country, but that they might monopolize the vast power of their
order. They hated the Spaniards as bitterly as they were hated by any
other portion of the inhabitants of Mexico. But they never meant that
republicanism should obtain the ascendency in the country. A powerful
monarchy, an empire, was what they aimed at; and the government which
Iturbide established was one that would have received their aid, could
it have brought any power to the political firm the clergy desired to
see in existence. It may be assumed that the clergy would have preferred
a Spanish prince as emperor, for they were too sagacious not to know
that the best part of royalty is that which is under ground. Kings must
be born to their trade to succeed in it; and a brand-new emperor, like
Iturbide, unles