Eldorado And The Quest For Fortune And Glory In South America PDF Download

Excerpt from The Quest of El Dorado: The Most Romantic Episode in the History of South American Conquest "There are epochs in which the reason is bewildered by the contemplation of new and unusual objects. And even the most clear-sighted man, when exposed to a continuous series of violent impressions, ceases to analyze them and descends to the level of common intelligences which exaggerate and marvel at everything. To comply with the precepts of the sage nil admirari, one must be in the full exercise of his faculties and have acquired a certain dominion over his senses which are always prone to bewitch and deceive him. How far were the Conquistadores of America from this state of intellectual calm? For them everything was matter for surprise. The spectacle of a new world, new peoples, new customs, and, more than all else, those inexhaustible fountains of riches which gushed forth everywhere with greater rapidity than their desire to possess them, maintained them in a sweet, and perpetual ecstasy. Without taking opium, like the Mussulmans, they experienced the same sensations from which they could not free themselves without great effort." Pedro De Angelis, in "Coleccion de Obras y Documentos Relativos a la Historia Antigua y Moderna de las Provincias del Rio de la Plata." About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.