Santiago F. Puglia, alias James or Jacques Philip Puglia, or James Quicksilver, born in Genoa in 1760, was a revolutionary before his time. Fated to be dismissed, overshadowed, and ultimately forgotten, Puglia is brought back from the mists of obscurity in Merle E. Simmons's exemplary study. This volume treats extensively with both Puglia's work and his life, offering analysis of his major revolutionary treatise, El desengaño del hombre, as well as his other publications and manuscripts, biographical information, and commentary on his reception by the Spanish authorities. This recovery of a relatively minor but brilliant revolutionary enriches the scene in which Bolívar, Bello, and Heredia would take the stage.