Page:History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic Vol. III.djvu/493

465 I REVIEW OF THEIR ADMINISTRATION. 465 if Others do not. In point of fact, no nation has chapter 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 in- stitutions to the great political system, of which it is a member. On these principles, and on the higher obligation of providing the means of nation- al 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 re- intemai im- provements. strictive measures of Ferdinand and Isabella, with- out 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 ;^^ those for facilitating com- munication by internal improvements, roads, bridges, canals, on a scale of unprecedented magnitude ; ^^ for a similar attention to the wants of navigation, by constructing moles, quays, lighthouses along the coast, and deepening and extending the harbours, " to accommodate," as the acts set forth, " the great increase of trade " ; for embellishing and add- ing in various ways to the accommodations of the cities ;^^ for relieving the subject from onerous tolls 92 Ordenangas Reales, lib. 6, tit. 9* " Ennoblescense los cibdades 4, ley 6. e villas en tener casas grandes 6 93 Archivo de Simancas ; in bien fechas en que fagan sus ayun- which most of these ordinances ap- tamientos ^ concejos," &c. (Or- pear to be registered. Mem. de la denan^as Reales, lib. 7, tit. 1, ley Acad, de Hist., tom. vi. Ilust. 11. 1.) Sefior Clemencin has specified VOL. III. 59