Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 3 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
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The Most Critical Moment Is That When Nations, After Long
Oppression, Find Themselves Suddenly At Liberty To Promote Their Own
Prosperity.
The Spanish Americans, it is unceasingly repeated, are not
sufficiently advanced in intellectual cultivation to be fitted for
free institutions.
I remember that at a period not very remote, the
same reasoning was applied to other nations who were said to have made
too great an advance in civilization. Experience, no doubt, proves
that nations, like individuals, find that intellect and learning do
not always lead to happiness; but without denying the necessity of a
certain mass of knowledge and popular instruction for the stability of
republics or constitutional monarchies, we believe that stability
depends much less on the degree of intellectual improvement than on
the strength of the national character; on that balance of energy and
tranquillity of ardour and patience which maintains and perpetuates
new institutions; on the local circumstances in which a nation is
placed; and on the political relations of a country with neighbouring
states.
CHAPTER 3.28.
PASSAGE FROM THE COAST OF VENEZUELA TO THE HAVANNAH.
GENERAL VIEW OF THE POPULATION OF THE WEST INDIA ISLANDS, COMPARED
WITH THE POPULATION OF THE NEW CONTINENT, WITH RESPECT TO DIVERSITY OF
RACES, PERSONAL LIBERTY, LANGUAGE, AND WORSHIP.
We sailed from Nueva Barcelona on the 24th of November at nine o'clock
in the evening; and we doubled the small rocky island of Borachita.
The night was marked by coolness which characterizes the nights of the
tropics, and the agreeable effect of which can only be conceived by
comparing the nocturnal temperature, from 23 to 24 degrees centigrade,
with the mean temperature of the day, which in those latitudes is
generally, even on the coast, from 28 to 29 degrees. Next day, soon
after the observation of noon, we reached the meridian of the island
of Tortugas. It is destitute of vegetation; and like the little
islands of Coche and Cabagua is remarkable for its small elevation
above the level of the sea.
In the forenoon of the 26th we began to lose sight of the island of
Marguerita and I endeavoured to verify the height of the rocky group
of Macanao. It appeared under an angle of 0 degrees 16 minutes 35
seconds; which in a distance estimated at sixty miles would give the
mica-slate group of Macanao the elevation of about 660 toises, a
result which, in a zone where the terrestrial refractions are so
unchanging, leads me to think that the island was less distant than we
supposed. The dome of the Silla of Caracas, lying 62 degrees to the
south-west, long fixed our attention. At those times when the coast is
not loaded with vapours the Silla must be visible at sea, without
reckoning the effects of refraction, at thirty-three leagues distance.
During the 26th, and the three following days, the sea was covered
with a bluish film which, when examined by a compound microscope,
appeared formed of an innumerable quantity of filaments.
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