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352 corps of Foreign Auxiliaries joined, at a very early period, the Independent standard, and fought the battles of the Republic against the armies of Murillo. It was after more than one victory, in which this corps had taken a brilliant share, that the Congress of Truxillo, assembled under the auspices of Bolivar, framed the present Constitution. Gratitude to the army forbade, at such a moment, the insertion of an Article prohibiting the exercise of a religion, which a very important part of that army professed; and, at the same time, the certainty of its support, if required, encouraged the Columbian Legislators to avoid the insertion of a provision in the National Act, the disadvantages of which, at no distant period, it was easy to foresee.

In Mexico, none of these favourable circumstances occurred. The war of Independence, instead of enfranchising the people from the dominion of that blind system of superstition, which it had been the interest of the Spaniards, during three centuries, to keep up, had rather a contrary tendency. It was by appealing to the religious feelings of the people, and by inviting them to defend the rights of their Church against the pollution, with which they were menaced by a French invasion, that the leaders of the first Insurrection, in 1810, induced the lower classes to join the standard of revolt. The Virgin of Guadalupe, was declared the Patroness of all the Insurgents: her images were worn, and her name invoked by them, on entering into battle. Their