Page:Mexico (1829) Volumes 1 and 2.djvu/278

240 denunciation, if directed against a layman, might have been attended with the most serious consequences. The Court of Madrid saw its error when too late, and the elevation of Don Antonio Perez (a Creole,) to the Bishopric of La Puebla, in 1815, proves how willingly it would have retraced its steps. But it was no longer time for concilia- tion : notwithstanding their privileges, as servants of the altar, a number of priests had sealed, with their blood, their new political creed : many others were noted as wavering ; some as notoriously disaffected ; the passions of all were ex- cited, and it was soon evident that a good understanding be- tween the Crown and the Parochial Clergy was impossible.

The old system was therefore pursued, and, up to 1820, all benefices were conferred upon Gachupines ; a circumstance that not a little facilitated the changes which the following year was destined to produce.

It is a singular fact, that, after taking so prominent a part in the struggle which preceded the Revolution, the Mexican Clergy should be almost the only class of Creoles that has derived, as yet, no advantage from the event. In the Army, the Congress, the Government-offices, and the Law, Natives were substituted at once for the Spaniards, whom the Vice- regal Government had employed ; but the different tenure by which Ecclesiastical preferments are held, prevented this change from extending to the Church. Nor was this the only difficulty to be surmounted : the separation from Spain had broken the link, by which Mexico was connected with the See of Rome ; and the establishment of a direct intercourse, at a moment, when the possession of an independent existence by New Spain was not admitted by any European Power, and was loudly denied by the Mother country, was found to be by no means an easy task.

To trench too suddenly upon the privileges of the Holy See, and to attempt to exercise, at once, the right of Patronage formerly vested in the King, without the possibility of obtain-