finding itself attacked on all seas would beg for peace." When the Mexican corsairs have captured a few American ships and the Americans have thrown a few bombs into Vera Cruz, matters will be arranged, predicted Le Constitutionnel of Paris.[1]
Evidently, then, Mexico was not likely to suffer disastrously, and certain benefits of great value could be anticipated. The act of crossing swords with us would fulfil a patriotic duty and vindicate the national honor. Glory and the satisfaction of injuring a perfidious and grasping enemy would more than compensate for the cost. A conflict would prevent this greedy neighbor, as the London Times argued, from imagining that Mexico dared not resist spoliation. The American settlers, whom every effort had been made for many years to keep out of the country, would be driven away, and the danger of American ideas averted. Even if the frontier could not be forced back to the Sabine, a long period of hostilities would render it impossible to practice near the border our arts of political seduction, and merely a short contest would tend to re-Mexicanize thoroughly the northern departments. Indeed the whole country would be re-Mexicanized, for the first effect of the war would be to cure disunion and baptize the nation anew in the fires of patriotism. The necessity of meeting a foreign foe would vitalize the courage of the army, which had grown somewhat lax in battling with fellow-citizens, restore discipline, and perfect the officers in their difficult but noble profession. A blockade, many believed with Almonte and Santa Anna, preventing the exportation of silver and the squandering of good money on foreign luxuries, would be "the best possible thing" for the country. Stimulated by exemption from ruinous foreign competition, the industries would at length flourish, and the boundless natural resources of the country become fountains of wealth.[2]
War is no doubt a great evil, argued the editors of La Voz del Pueblo, "but we recall what Polybius said, to wit: 'If many empires have been destroyed by war, by war also have many risen from nothing.'" Prussia owes her greatness to the Seven Years War, pointed out El Siglo XIX. The conquest of the Moors cost Spain a struggle of centuries, but what Spaniard would undo it? asked others. "Nations determine
