on the manifesto with contempt, in reality gave it the greatest importance by decreeing on the 8th of April that the document should be burned in the public plaza by the common executioner, thus awakening in the people a desire to know its contents.[1] Another edict required that all copies should be gathered in; and the reading of the documents, except by special government sanction, was strictly forbidden.[2]
The sovereign junta continued the policy of giving publicity to its views by means of the printing-press.[3] The viceroy did what he could to counteract this influence by edicts and ecclesiastical injunctions. The circulation and reading of such productions were forbidden, and every copy called in. Priests at the confessional and from the pulpit were directed to enjoin upon the faithful obedience to these commands.[4]
During the siege of Cuautla a number of persons occupying good social standing hastened to join the revolution. Among them was a distinguished lawyer, Juan Nepornuceno Rosains, who had been deterred for a year past from such action by the bad character of some of the insurgent leaders.[5]
- ↑ He said that he could find no better means of showing the horror and abomination inspired by those proposals. Negrete, Mex. Sig. XIX., v. 90-2; Gaz. de Mex., 1812, iii. 373-4.
- ↑ Beristain, archdeacon of Mexico and influential with the viceroy, and Friar Diego Miguel Bringas y Eucinas, guardian of Santa Cruz de Querétaro, undertook to defend the despotic order, and to impugn Cos' plan. Bustamante believed it beneficent. Of Bringas' character he speaks in high terms of praise, giving him credit for honesty of purpose in his effort, though based on wrong impressions. Cuadro Hist., i. 401. Beristain gave his arguments in the journal El Filopatro. and in a pamphlet of 65 numbers, ending 15th October, 1812, dedicated to the tribunal of the inquisition. Bringas confutes the charges made against the royalists, and specifies the acts of atrocity by the insurgents which he saw or heard of. If he did not vindicate the royalists, he made it appear that the insurgents had excelled them in cruelty. Bringas, Impugn. del pap. sedic., 176 and 143 pp. issued from the press of María Fernandez de Jáurequi, in Mex., 1812.
- ↑ Owing to the acquisition of the type as already narrated at this time, the Ilustrador Americano and the Semanario Patriótico had freer course, and exercised no small influence. Rivera, Gob. Mex., ii. 39.
- ↑ The edicts were dated June 1st and 3d respectively. The ecclesiastical chapter said that the newspapers of the independents were 'una máquina infernal inventada por el padre de la discordia para desterrar del pais la paz.' Gaz. de Mex., 1812, iii. 599-601.
- ↑ Such men had justly won the name of 'devorantes' given them by Morelos. Máximo Machorro, Arroyo, and Antonio Bocardo were of the
