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The Spanish Fichte - Menéndez y Pelayo PDF
The Spanish Fichte - Menéndez y Pelayo PDF
Foard
Forty years have now elapsed since the grim-faced soldiers of the
Second Spanish Republic retreated before the Nationalist armies
and crossed the Pyrenees into bitter exile. The demise of the
Republic was no momentary setback for those who aspired to a
democratic Spain. It heralded a generation of the subordination of
the Spanish people to the dictatorship of Francisco Franco, who is
conceded even by one of his harshest critics to have been ’unques-
tionably the most powerful single ruler in Spanish history’ .’I
In spite of the singular place occupied by the Franco regime in
the history of modern Spain and the labours of historians to define
it, the nature of ’Franquismo’ remains elusive. Journalists, for ex-
ample, continue to employ the label ’fascist’ in their references to
the dictatorship, although Stanley Payne’s Falange long ago
demonstrated how carefully General Franco had decimated that
element in his ’Movimiento’.
If not fascism, then, what else could have sustained the Caudillo
so long in his domination of a proud nation, except the naked in-
struments of force? A hint of at least a partial answer to that in-
quiry is provided in a scene from the civil war described by the
Spanish historian, Enrique Sanchez Reyes. During the early mon-
ths of the military uprising against the Republic, he reports, Na-
tionalist propaganda officers were charged with rallying civilians to
General Franco’s cause by explaining the ideology which moved the
revolt. For want of any other clear statements of purpose, these of-
ficials read excerpts from a history book, Historia de los
Heterodoxos Espanoles, to inspire the confused and terrified
citizens of remote Spanish pueblos. From memory, the Nationalist
him to pursue his studies abroad. He had also gained the attention
and friendship of the Marques de Pidal, leader of an ultramontane
political faction later called the Catholic Union. Pidal promoted
Menendez y Pelayo’s scholarly publications and wielded his in-
fluence with the Prime Minister, CAnovas del Castillo, to advance
his young protégé to the forefront of the nation’s academic com-
munity. In 1877 it was the Marques and Prime Minister Canovas
who persuaded a majority of a turbulent session of the Cortes to
reduce the age restriction to twenty-one for those seeking one of the
nation’s highest academic posts the professorship of Spanish
-
When ’98 came and with it the bitterness of defeat at the hands of a people who
had no traditions [the United States], many of us disdained the value of
Menendez y Pelayo’s studies. What good [we asked] are our coats of arms? Of
what value hoary wisdom if a traditionless people can in combat use our wooden
7
ships for targetpractice?7
Eventually, the author of these lines came to regret them and to
join his countrymen in honouring the memory of Don Marcelino.
Spain’s tributes to Menendez y Pelayo began long before his death
in 1912. The Spanish Academy inducted him into their prestigious
membership in 1881 when Don Marcelino was only twenty-four
years old. Two years later he was similarly honoured by the
Academy of History and before the turn of the century had been
elected to the Academy of Moral and Political Sciences, and the
Academy of Fine Arts as well. The government struck a gold medal
in 1909 to honour his achievements and the Spanish Academy went
so far as to put him forward as a candidate for a Nobel Prize in
literature. The French Republic seconded Spain’s tributes by awar-
ding Don Marcelino the Legion of Honour; England elected him to
honorary membership of the Royal Society of Literature; and in
1905 he was accorded membership of the Hispanic Society of
What little there is of genuine theoretical substance in the current Spamsh regime
-
In the literature of
a nation whose experience has so often been
others’s, consistent or not with the dominant ideas of the day. One crude pan-
theist [Servetius] did perish in flames, but his torment occurred in Geneva, not
Spain; commanded by John Calvin, not the Tribunal of Faith.
This terrifying name of Inquisition, a bogey-man for infants and a menace for
dolts, is for many the solution for all our problems, a ’deus ex machina’ which
arrives unexpectedly in dangerous situations. Why is there no industry in Spain?
Because of the Inquisition. Why are there bad habits? Because of the Inquisition.
Why are we Spaniards lazy? Because of the Inquisition. Why are there bulls in
Spain? Because of the Inquisition. Why do we take siestas? Because of the In-
quisition.l6
To prove his contention that Spanish science had been only
relatively ’decadent’ in the three previous centuries, Don Marcelino
trotted out the of hundreds of Spanish and Portuguese
names
... the twisted spirit of the age and half of Europe united in defence of the
Reformation. In the end, we were defeated because we were alone. But we had
performed well and that is enough since great enterprises in history are not judg-
ed merely by their success... We shed our blood for religion, for culture, for our
nation. We did not, nor should we now, apologize for that fact. 25
True and original ideas ask no one’s permission to be born and care little whether
they gain this or that legal right. Christianity did not need freedom of the press
or the right to free assembly in order to conquer the world.28
Today we are witnessing the slow suicide of a nation which, deceived a thousand
times by garrulous sophists, impoverished, wasted and desolate, employs in its
self-destruction the meagre energies it has retained. [Spain] chases after the vain
deceptions of a false and artificial culture instead of cultivating its own spirit,
which alone may ennoble and redeem a race and a people. [It is] permitting a ter-
rifying liquidation of its past, always ridiculing the memory of its ancestors, flee-
ing from any contact with their thoughts, denying whatever elements of their
history once made them great, throwing its artistic heritage to the four winds and
stupidly watching the destruction of the only Spain the world knows, the only
Spain whose recollection is worthy enough to lessen our agony.33
The issue of continuity in Don Marcelino’s thought proved to be
highly debatable and has been the subject of a considerable
literature in Spain. Pedro Sainz Rodriguez, previously cited as the
Franco regime’s first Minister of Education, recently made an in-
teresting comment on this dispute. Speaking of his decision to rush
Menendez y Pelayo has been the object of [political] capture and I am responsi-
ble for it... When I was Minister... I began to fear that this national movement,
which had produced nothing less than civil war, would (when it began to acquire
an intellectual structure) start imitating foreign models instead of seeking its na-
tional roots, finding them in a nationalist philosophy that was neither isolationist
nor anti-European. For this reason I ordered the printing of the national edition
NOTES
Douglas W. Foard
is Professor of History and Chairman of
the Social Science Division at Ferrum Col-
lege, Ferrum, Virginia. He is currently
writing a book on Spain’s ’White
Legend’ .