The History of nineteenth-century Mexico presents a strange succession of violent changes, political and social upheavals, bitter struggles among rival factions whose aims and ideals were often ill-defined and illusory. The infant republic found that the gaining of its independence was only the beginning of its troubles. The bane of personalism was never to abandon the Mexican political stage, and the ambitions of individuals, to a large extent, were to guide the destinies of the entire nation. José María Roa Bárcena, whose life embraced the last three quarters of the century, was one of the most prominent figures of those troubled times. A man of action, integrity of character, and no small intellectual gifts, he entered resolutely into the struggle between liberals and conservatives, leaving the stamp of his personality on the history of the period.