Dedication
To
those brother Americans
whose tongues are Spanish and Portuguese
whose homes are between the Rio Grande
and Tierra del Fuego
but whose America
like mine
stretches from the Arctic to the Horn.
Often, meditating on the fervor with which Spain has ever defended and proclaimed the Doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, I have thought that in the depths of this dogma there must be a mystery akin with the mystery of our national soul: that perhaps this dogma is a symbol... of our being....
Angel Ganivet.