170 Hispanic America
put to work exploiting the mines. Thus, by virtue of fac-
tors of environment, the Anglo-Saxon colonists were com-
pelled to devote themselves to agriculture, hunting and fish-
ing. In Spanish America, the economic life rested upon the
aboriginal races, and on them reposed the aristocratic and
bureaucratic society. The difference between the northern
and the southern colonies is still greater in respect of the
geographical condition. Geographical unity and continuity,
which are so necessary to true civilization, were lacking in
Spanish America. The efforts of the English colonists cen-
tered upon the narrow strip that lay along the seaboard,
and only after the human elements that populated this
region took definite political and social shape, and attained
a certain degree of civilization of their own, did they cross
the mountains and advance slowly toward the Mississippi
Valley, later to cross the great divide and descend upon the
Pacific Coast. What a contrast between this process that
has been carried on in our days and that of the Spanish
colonization I Spain, with an incomparable effort, distrib-
uted her vital energies from California to Cape Horn. The
nuclei of population were separated by tremendous dis-
tances, and they were subjected to the varied influences of
climate and of contact and commingling with different races.
Economic life and efficiency in administration demand con-
centration and not dispersion; unity and not diversity.
Diversity and isolation were the sociological features of
Spanish America. Our only elements of unity were the
government and religion. Uniformity of government, as it
was imposed by Spain, was ill suited to the conditions, while,
on the other hand, unity of religion bequeathed us a strong
organization of the family and true artistic education
through the decorative character of Catholicism, as has
been said by the eminent historian, Professor Bernard