The tranquility of Chile, the tyranny of Rosas in Argentina,
the Mexican empire, all were clearly seen in the future by his genius. Near
the close of his letter, he adds these inspired words:
"How beautiful it would be if the Isthmus of Panama should come to be
to us what the Isthmus of Corinth was to the Greeks! May God g
that some day we may have the happiness of installing there an august
congress of the representatives of the republics, kingdoms and empires,
to discuss and study the high interests of peace and war with the
nations of the other three parts of the world! This kind of cooperation
may be established in some happy period of our regeneration...."
He ends this capital document of his career as a political writer, by
pleading again for union as the only means of putting an end to Spanish
domination, in America.
Nothing better can be said than the following words of a biographer of
Bolivar:[1]
"Alone, poor, in a foreign land, when his friends had denied him and
had persecuted him, and his enemies had torn him to shreds in blind
rage, when everybody saw America carrying once again the yoke imposed
upon her, Bolivar saw her redeemed, and from the depth of his soul he
felt himself bound to this wonderful task of redemption. His spirit,
animated by an unknown breath, and which had lived a superior life, saw
Colombia free, Chile established, Argentina expanding, Mexico
Peru liberated, the Isthmus of Panama converted into the center of
communications and activities of human industry; it saw South America
divided into powerful nationalities, having passed from slavery to
struggle and to the conquest of her own dignity, and from the times of
the sword to those of political civilization and organization of power;
national units weighty in the statistics of the world by reason of
their products, by their commerce, by their culture, by their wars,
their alliances, their laws, their free governments; with names of
their own, with famous histories, with supreme virtues.
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