[44] San Martín, Belgrano, the two greatest military leaders of Argentina during the period of the struggle for independence.
[45] cuerpo de doctrina, system of dogmas.
[46] sui generis, Latin for a su modo. V. note 18, 10.
[47] de que no se daba otra cuenta... superior, lit., of which he gave himself no other account save as of a superior fact, i.e., of which he knew nothing save that it was a divine fact.
[48] le venía impuesto, was imposed upon him. Venir is here used as an auxiliary for the passive voice instead of ser.
[49] doctrina. Notice the use of a general term for a concrete term. What is meant here by doctrina is not teaching but teachers.
[50] Motto. The steppes, like the ocean, fill the soul with the feeling of the infinite. Taken from Humboldt’s Voyages aux régions équinoxiales du nouveau continent.
[51] no puede... negarse, it cannot be denied. Cf. 2, 9.
[52] lucha imponente. The indefinite article is regularly omitted in Spanish with nouns in apposition.
[53] están combatiendo. The first edition of Sarmiento’s Facundo, the work from which this extract is taken, appeared in 1845; hence the use of the present.