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116 of this famous university, which has for two centuries provided a great part of South America with theologians and doctors. "The course of theology lasted for five years and a half. Theology had come to share in the corruption of philosophy. The Aristotelian philosophy applied to theology had resulted in a mixture of the profane with the spiritual. Mere human reasonings, deceptive subtleties and sophisms, frivolous and misplaced inquiries—such were the conditions under whichthe ruling taste of these schools had been formed." If you would look a little deeper into the spirit of liberty likely to be the result of such teaching, listen a little longer to Dean Funes: "This university was originated and established wholly by Jesuits, who founded it in their college of the city of Cordova, called Maximo." Very distinguished advocates have proceeded from this institution, but no man of letters who has not also been educated at Buenos Ayres with modern books.

This learned city has never yet had a public theatre, nor become acquainted with the opera. It is still without journals, and typography is a branch of industry which has failed to take root in it. The spirit of Cordova up to 1829 was monastic and scholastic; the conversation of its society always turned on processions, the saints' days, university examinations, taking the vail, and reception of the doctor's "tassels."

How far these circumstances tended to influence the temper of a population occupied with such ideas for two centuries, cannot be determined; but some influence they must have had, as is plain at a glance. The inhabitant of Cordova does not look beyond his own