Nature needs not the help of man, to preserve the posthumous fame of her philosophers. Bearing therefore in our recollection, that the tombs of Cæsar and Alexander no longer exist, and that those which modern nations have raised to their heroes, must inevitably decay and perish, let us engrave on these solid rocks, sacred to the memory of our sages, and which time has respected: unius cetatls sunt, quae fortitur fiunt: quæ vera pro utilitate reipublicæ scribuntur æterna sunt. Lastly, instead of being terrified at their aspect, let us aspire to live amid the ruins of Peru.
Hitherto we have sketched the temple which Nature has erected to herself on two worlds, so far as it has been within our grasp and our view. The capitals of her proud columns rising into the region of the clouds, are not to be traced by our pencil. It may be said that glory has fixed on them her throne, securing it on crystal pedestals, which, refracting the light in every direction, represent in the ether the fountains and gardens of Elysium, seen through the prism. Commanding thence the whole of the universe, she serenely views beneath her feet the generation and shock of the tempests which affright living mortals, and discovers the inexhaustible sources whence spring the abundant rivers that empty themselves into the ocean[1], to enable the industrious European to supply, with the productions of every part of the globe, the country which invigorates
- ↑ It is certain that no part of the earth supplies a greater proportion of water to the sea than the cordiliera of the Andes. In his voyage, Condamine has very justly observed, "that the rivers which intersect the country of the Amazons are not rivers, but seas of fresh water," The celebrated Indus of Asia, the Nile of Africa, and the Danube of Europe, can scarcely be brought into a comparison with the Ucayali, Beni, and other rivers which unite in the formidable Maranon.
