consequences--Venality the special characteristic of Spanish polity
--Maxims of the foreign polity of Spain--The Spanish army and navy--
Insolvent state of the Government--The Duke of Lerma--His position
in the State--Origin of his power--System of bribery and
trafficking--Philip III. His character--Domestic life of the king
and queen.


A glance at the interior condition of Spain, now that there had been more
than nine years of a new reign, should no longer be deferred.
Spain was still superstitiously regarded as the leading power of the
world, although foiled in all its fantastic and gigantic schemes. It was
still supposed, according to current dogma, to share with the Ottoman
empire the dominion of the earth. A series of fortunate marriages having
united many of the richest and fairest portions of Europe under a single
sceptre, it was popularly believed in a period when men were not much
given as yet to examine very deeply the principles of human governments
or the causes of national greatness, that an aggregation of powers which
had resulted from preposterous laws of succession really constituted a
mighty empire, founded by genius and valour.

The Spanish people, endowed with an acute and exuberant genius, which had
exhibited itself in many paths of literature, science, and art; with a
singular aptitude for military adventure, organization, and achievement;
with a great variety, in short, of splendid and ennobling qualities; had
been, for a long succession of years, accursed with almost the very worst
political institutions known to history. The depth of their misery and
of their degradation was hardly yet known to themselves, and this was
perhaps the most hideous proof of the tyranny of which they had been the
victims. To the outward world, the hollow fabric, out of which the whole