The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic — Volume 3

by William Hickling Prescott

Nothing is easier than to parade abstract theorems,—true in the abstract,—in political economy; nothing harder than to reduce them to practice. That an individual will understand his own interests better than the government can, or, what is the same thing, that trade, if let alone, will find its way into the channels on the whole most advantageous to the community, few will deny. But what is true of all together is not true of any one singly; and no one nation can safely act on these principles, if others do not. In point of fact, no nation has acted on them since the formation of the present political communities of Europe.

All that a new state, or a new government in an old one, can now propose to itself is, not to sacrifice its interests to a speculative abstraction, but to accommodate its institutions to the great political system, of which it is a member. On these principles, and on the higher obligation of providing the means of national independence in its most extended sense, much that was bad in the economical policy of Spain, at the period under review, may be vindicated.

It would be unfair to direct our view to the restrictive measures of Ferdinand and Isabella, without noticing also the liberal tenor of their legislation in regard to a great variety of objects. Such, for example, are the laws encouraging foreigners to settle in the country; [92] those for facilitating communication by internal improvements, roads, bridges, canals, on a scale of unprecedented magnitude; [93] for a similar attention to the wants of navigation, by constructing moles, quays, lighthouses along the coast, and deepening and extending the harbors, "to accommodate," as the acts set forth, "the great increase of trade;" for embellishing and adding in various ways to the accommodations of the cities; [94] for relieving the subject from onerous tolls and oppressive monopolies; [95] for establishing a uniform currency and standard of weights and measures throughout the kingdom, [96] objects of unwearied solicitude through this whole reign; for maintaining a police, which, from the most disorderly and dangerous, raised Spain, in the language of Martyr, to be the safest country in Christendom [97] for such equal justice, as secured to every man the fruits of his own industry, inducing him to embark his capital in useful enterprises; and, finally, for enforcing fidelity to contracts, [98] of which the sovereigns gave such a glorious example in their own administration, as effectually restored that public credit, which is the true basis of public prosperity.

While these important reforms were going on in the interior of the monarchy, it experienced a greater change in its external condition by the immense augmentation of its territory. The most important of its foreign acquisitions were those nearest home, Granada and Navarre; at least, they were the ones most capable, from their position, of being brought under control, and thoroughly and permanently identified with the Spanish monarchy. Granada, as we have seen, was placed under the sceptre of Castile, governed by the same laws, and represented in its cortes, being, in the strictest sense, part and parcel of the kingdom. Navarre was also united to the same crown. But its constitution, which bore considerable analogy to that of Aragon, remained substantially the same as before. The government, indeed, was administered by a viceroy; but Ferdinand made as few changes as possible, permitting it to retain its own legislature, its ancient courts of law, and its laws themselves. So the forms, if not the spirit of independence, continued to survive its union with the victorious state. [99]

The other possessions of Spain were scattered over the various quarters of Europe, Africa, and America. Naples was the conquest of Aragon; or, at least, made on behalf of that crown. The queen appears to have taken no part in the conduct of that war, whether distrusting its equity, or its expediency, in the belief that a distant possession in the heart of Europe would probably cost more to maintain than it was worth. In fact, Spain is the only nation, in modern times, which has been able to keep its hold on such possessions for any very considerable period; a circumstance implying more wisdom in her policy than is commonly conceded to her. The fate of the acquisitions alluded to forms no exception to the remark; and Naples, like Sicily, continued permanently ingrafted on the kingdom of Aragon.

A fundamental change in the institutions of Naples became requisite to accommodate them to its new relations. Its great offices of state and its legal tribunals were reorganized. Its jurisprudence, which, under the Angevin race, and even the first Aragonese, had been adapted to French usages, was now modelled on the Spanish. The various innovations were conducted by the Catholic king with his usual prudence; and the reform in the legislation is commended by a learned and impartial Italian civilian, as breathing a spirit of moderation and wisdom. [100] He conceded many privileges to the people, and to the capital especially, whose venerable university he resuscitated from the decayed state into which it had fallen, making liberal appropriations from the treasury for its endowment. The support of a mercenary army, and the burdens incident to the war, pressed heavily on the people during the first years of his reign. But the Neapolitans, who, as already noticed, had been transferred too often from one victor to another to be keenly sensible to the loss of political independence, were gradually reconciled to his administration, and testified their sense of its beneficent character by celebrating the anniversary of his death, for more than two centuries, with public solemnities, as a day of mourning throughout the kingdom. [101]

But far the most important of the distant acquisitions of Spain were those secured to her by the genius of Columbus and the enlightened patronage of Isabella. Imagination had ample range in the boundless perspective of these unknown regions; but the results actually realized from the discoveries, during the queen's life, were comparatively insignificant. In a mere financial view, they had been a considerable charge on the crown. This was, indeed, partly owing to the humanity of Isabella, who interfered, as we have seen, to prevent the compulsory exaction of Indian labor. This was subsequently, and immediately after her death indeed, carried to such an extent, that nearly half a million of ounces of gold were yearly drawn from the mines of Hispaniola alone. [102] The pearl fisheries, [103] and the culture of the sugar-cane, introduced from the Canaries, [104] yielded large returns under the same inhuman system.

Ferdinand, who enjoyed, by the queen's testament, half the amount of the Indian revenues, was now fully awakened to their importance. It would be unjust, however, to suppose his views limited to immediate pecuniary profits; for the measures he pursued were, in many respects, well contrived to promote the nobler ends of discovery and colonization. He invited the persons most eminent for nautical science and enterprise, as Pinzon, Solis, Vespucci, to his court, where they constituted a sort of board of navigation, constructing charts, and tracing out new routes for projected voyages. [105] The conduct of this department was intrusted to the last-mentioned navigator, who had the glory, the greatest which accident and caprice ever granted to man, of giving his name to the new hemisphere.

Fleets were now fitted out on a more extended scale, which might vie, indeed, with the splendid equipments of the Portuguese, whose brilliant successes in the east excited the envy of their Castilian rivals. The king occasionally took a share in the voyage, independently of the interest which of right belonged to the crown. [106.]

The government, however, realized less from these expensive enterprises than individuals, many of whom, enriched by their official stations, or by accidentally falling in with some hoard of treasure among the savages, returned home to excite the envy and cupidity of their countrymen. [107] But the spirit of adventure was too high among the Castilians to require such incentive, especially when excluded from its usual field in Africa and Europe. A striking proof of the facility, with which the romantic cavaliers of that day could be directed to this new career of danger on the ocean, was given at the time of the last-meditated expedition into Italy under the Great Captain. A squadron of fifteen vessels, bound for the New World, was then riding in the Guadalquivir. Its complement was limited to one thousand two hundred men; but, on Ferdinand's countermanding Gonsalvo's enterprise, more than three thousand volunteers, many of them of noble family, equipped with unusual magnificence for the Italian service, hastened to Seville, and pressed to be admitted into the Indian armada. [108] Seville itself was in a manner depopulated by the general fever of emigration, so that it actually seemed, says a contemporary, to be tenanted only by women. [109]