"Is it not obvious enough, that men cannot get together and count themselves, and say they are so many hundreds and so many thousands, and judge of their own qualifications, and call themselves the people, and set up a government? Why, another set of men, forty miles off on the same day, with the same propriety, with as good qualifications, and in as large numbers, may meet and set up another government; one may meet at Newport and another at Chepachet, and both may call themselves the people. What is this but anarchy? What liberty is there here but a tumultuary, tempestuous, violent, stormy liberty, a sort of South American liberty, without power except in its spasms, a liberty supported by arms to-day, crushed by arms to-morrow? Is that our liberty?"
And holding up these forcible words Colonel Sarmiento adds,—
"If the liberal party in South America which has been overthrown by more than one tyrant, beholds itself in this terrible mirror, will it not turn away its face from the unsightly image?"
Both in Chili and in Buenos Ayres, Colonel Sarmiento has been noted, even by his adversaries, for his inclination to limit the injurious extension attempted to be given to the rights of the people. On his first appearance in the Chilian press, when he had it in his power to choose between the political parties of the country, both of which solicited his support, he decided in favor of that which proposed, while applying liberal ideas to public action, to aim at the stability of the power which was to represent them. Twenty years have since elapsed, and no tyrant has appeared in
