,youth and ,egolatry ,by ,p,o ,,baroja ,translated from the ,spanish ,by ,jacob ,s4 ,fassett1 ,jr4 and ,frances ,l4 ,phillips ,,table ,,of ,,contents ,,introduction ,,by ,h4 ,l4 ,,mencken ,,prologue ,,on ,,intellectual ,,love ,,egotism ,i4 ,,fundamental ,,ideas ,the bad man of ,itzea ,humble and a wanderer ,dogmatophagy ,ignoramus1 ,ignorabimus ,nevertheless1 we call ourselves materialists ,in defense of religion ,arch-,european ,dionysus or ,apollonian ,epicuri de grege porcum ,evil and ,rousseau's ,chinaman ,the root of disinterested evil ,music as a sedative ,concerning ,wagner ,universal musicians ,the folk song ,on the optimism of eunuchs ,,ii4 ,,myself1 ,,the ,,writer ,to my readers thirty years hence ,youthful writings ,the beginning and end of the journey ,mellowness and the critical sense ,sensibility ,on devouring one's own ,god ,anarchism ,new paths ,longing for change ,baroja1 you will never amount to anything 7,a ,refrain7 ,the patriotism of desire ,my home lands ,cruelty and stupidity ,the anterior image ,the tragi-comedy of sex ,the veils of the sexual life ,a little talk ,the sovereign crowd ,the remedy ,,iii4 ,,the ,,extraradius ,rhetoric and anti-rhetoric ,the rhythm of style ,rhetoric of the minor key ,the value of my ideas ,genius and admiration ,my literary and artistic inclinations ,my library ,on being a gentleman ,giving offence ,thirst for glory ,elective antipathies ,to a member of several academies ,,iv4 ,,admirations ,,and ,,incompatibilities ,cervantes1 ,shakespeare1 ,molire ,the encyclopedists ,the romanticists ,the naturalists ,the ,spanish realists ,the ,russians ,the critics ,v4 ,,the ,,philosophers ,,vi4 ,,the ,,historians ,the ,roman historians ,modern and contemporary historians ,,vii4 ,,my ,,family ,family mythology ,our ,history ,,viii4 ,,memories ,,of ,,childhood ,san ,sebastian ,my parents ,monsignor ,two lunatics ,the hawk ,in ,madrid ,in ,pamplona ,don ,tirso ,larequi ,a visionary rowdy ,sarasate ,robinson ,crusoe and the ,mysterious ,island ,,ix4 ,,as ,a ,,student ,professors ,anti-militarism ,to ,valencia ,x4 ,,as ,a ,,village ,,doctor ,dolores1 ,la ,sacristana ,,xi4 ,,as ,a ,,baker ,my father's disillusionment ,industry and democracy ,the vexations of a small tradesman ,,xii4 ,,as ,a ,,writer ,bohemia ,our own generation ,azorn ,paul ,schmitz ,ortega y ,gasset ,a pseudo-patron ,,xiii4 ,,parisian ,,days ,estvanez ,my versatility according to ,bonafoux ,,xiv4 ,,literary ,,enmities ,the enmity of ,dicenta ,the posthumous enmity of ,sawa ,semi-hatred on the part of ,silverio ,lanza ,,xv4 ,,the ,,press ,our newspapers and periodicals ,our journalists ,americans ,,xvi4 ,,politics ,votes and applause ,politicians ,revolutionists ,lerroux ,an offer ,socialists ,love of the workingman ,the conventionalist ,barriovero ,anarchists ,the morality of the alternating party system ,on obeying the law ,the sternness of the law ,,xvii4 ,,military ,,glory ,the old-time soldier ,down goes prestige ,science and the picturesque ,what we need today ,our armies ,a word from ,kuroki1 the ,japanese ,,epilogue ,palinode and fresh outburst of ire ,,appendices ,spanish politicians ,on ,baroja's anarchists ,note ,,introduction ,po ,baroja is a product of the intellectual reign of terror that went on in ,spain after the catastrophe of #ahih4 ,that catastrophe1 of course1 was anything but unforeseen4 ,the national literature1 for a good many years before the event1 had been made dismal by the croaking of ,iokanaans1 and there was a definite dfaitiste party among the intelligentsia4 ,but among the people in general1 if there was not optimism1 there was at least a sort of resigned indifference1 and so things went ahead in the old stupid ,spanish way and the structure of society1 despite a few gestures of liberalism1 remained as it had been for generations4 ,in ,spain1 of course1 there is always a ,kulturkampf1 as there is in ,italy1 but during these years it was quiescent4 ,the ,church1 in the shadow of the restored monarchy1 gradually resumed its old privileges and its old pretensions4 ,so on the political side4 ,in ,catalonia1 where ,spain keeps the strangest melting-pot in ,europe and the old ,iberian stock is almost extinct1 there was a menacing seething1 but elsewhere there was not much to chill the conservative spine4 ,in the middle nineties1 when the ,socialist vote in ,germany was already approaching the two million mark1 and ,belgium was rocked by great ,socialist demonstrations1 and the ,socialist deputies in the ,french ,chamber numbered fifty1 and even ,england was beginning to toy gingerly with new schemes of social reform1 by ,bismarck out of ,lassalle1 the total strength of the ,socialists of ,spain was still not much above five thousand votes4 ,in brief1 the country seemed to be removed from the main currents of ,european thought4 ,there was unrest1 to be sure1 but it was unrest that was largely inarticulate and that needed a new race of leaders to give it form and direction4 ,then came the colossal shock of the ,american war and a sudden transvaluation of all the old values4 ,anti-clericalism got on its legs and ,socialism got on its legs1 and out of the two grew that great movement for the liberation of the common people1 that determined and bitter struggle for a fair share in the fruits of human progress1 which came to its melodramatic climax in the execution of ,francisco ,ferrer4 ,spain now began to go ahead very rapidly1 if not in actual achievement1 then at least in the examination and exchange of ideas1 good and bad4 ,parties formed1 split1 blew up1 revived and combined1 each with its sure cure for all the sorrows of the land4 ,resignationism gave way to a harsh and searching questioning1 and questioning to denunciation and demand for reform4 ,the monarchy swayed this way and that1 seeking to avoid both the peril of too much yielding and the worse peril of not yielding enough4 ,the ,church1 on the defensive once more1 prepared quickly for stormy weather and sent hurried calls to ,rome for help4 ,nor was all this uproar on the political and practical side4 ,spanish letters1 for years sunk into formalism1 revived with the national spirit1 and the new books in prose and verse began to deal vigorously with the here and now4 ,novelists1 poets and essayists appeared who had never been heard of before--young men full of exciting ideas borrowed from foreign lands and even more exciting ideas of their own fashioning4 ,the national literature1 but lately so academic and remote from existence1 was now furiously lively1 challenging and provocative4 ,the people found in it1 not the old placid escape from life1 but a new stimulation to arduous and ardent living4 ,and out of the ruck of authors1 eager1 exigent1 and the tremendous clash of nations1 new and old1 there finally emerged a prose based not upon rhetorical reminiscences1 but responsive minutely to the necessities of the national life4 ,the oratorical platitudes of ,castelar and ,cnovas del ,castillo gave way to the discreet analyses of ,azorn 7,jos ,martnez ,ruiz7 and ,jos ,ortega y ,gasset1 to the sober sentences of the ,rector of the ,university of ,salamanca1 ,miguel de ,unamuno1 writing with a restraint which is anything but traditionally ,castilian1 and to the journalistic impressionism of ,ramiro de ,maeztu1 supple and cosmopolitan from long residence abroad4 ,the poets now jettisoned the rotundities of the romantic and emotional schools of ,zorrilla and ,salvador ,rueda1 and substituted instead the precise1 pictorial line of ,rubn ,daro1 ,juan ,ramn ,jimnez1 and the brothers ,machado1 while the socialistic and republican propaganda which had invaded the theatre with ,prez ,galds1 ,joaqun ,dicenta1 and ,angel ,guimer1 bore fruit in the psychological drama of ,benavente1 the social comedies of ,linares ,rivas1 and the atmospheric canvases which the ,quinteros have painted of ,andalusia4 ,in the novel1 the transformation is noticeable at once in the rapid development of the pornographic tale1 whose riches might bring a blush to the cheek of ,boccaccio1 and provide ,poggio and ,aretino with a complete review2 but these are stories for the barrack1 venturing only now and then upon the confines of respectability in the erotic romances of ,zamacois and the late enormously popular ,felipe ,trigo4 ,few ,spaniards who write today but have written novels4 ,yet the gesture of the grand style of ,valera is palsied1 except1 perhaps1 for the conservative ,quixote1 ,ricardo ,len1 a functionary in the ,bank of ,spain1 while the idyllic method lingers fitfully in such gentle writers as ,jos ,mara ,salaverra1 after surviving the attacks of the northern realists under the lead of ,pereda1 in his novels of country life1 and of the less vigorous ,antonio de ,trueba1 and of ,madrid vulgarians1 headed by ,mesonero ,romanos and ,coloma4 ,the decadent novel1 foreshadowed a few years since by ,alejandro ,sawa1 has attained full maturity in ,hoyos y ,vinent1 while the distinctive growth of the century is the novel of ideas1 exact1 penetrating1 persistently suggestive in the larger sense1 which does not hesitate to make demands upon the reader1 and this is exemplified most distinctively1 both temperamentally and intellectually1 by ,po ,baroja4 ,it would be difficult to find two men who1 dealing with the same ideas1 bring to them more antagonistic attitudes of mind than ,baroja and ,blasco ,ibez4 ,for all his appearance of modernism1 ,blasco really belongs to the generation before #ahih4 ,he is of the stock of ,victor ,hugo--a popular rhapsodist and intellectual swashbuckler1 half artist and half mob orator--a man of florid and shallow certainties1 violent enthusiasms1 quack remedies1 vast magnetism and address1 and even vaster impudence--a fellow with plain touches of the charlatan4 ,his first solid success at home was made with ,la ,barraca in #ahii--;and it was a success a good deal more political than artistic2 he was hailed for his frenzy far more than for his craft4 ,even outside of ,spain his subsequent celebrity has tended to ground itself upon agreement with his politics1 and not upon anything properly describable as a critical appreciation of his talents4 ,had ,the ,four ,horsemen of the ,apocalypse been directed against ,france instead of in favour of ,france1 it goes without saying that it would have come to the ,united ,states without the imprimatur of the ,american ,embassy at ,madrid1 and that there would have appeared no sudden rage for the author among the generality of novel-readers4 ,his intrinsic merits1 in sober retrospect1 seem very feeble4 ,for all his concern with current questions1 his accurate news instinct1 he is fundamentally a romantic of the last century1 with more than one plain touch of the downright operatic4 ,baroja is a man of a very different sort4 ,a novelist undoubtedly as skilful as ,blasco and a good deal more profound1 he lacks the quality of enthusiasm and thus makes a more restricted appeal4 ,in place of gaudy certainties he offers disconcerting questionings2 in place of a neat and well-rounded body of doctrine he puts forward a sort of generalized contra-doctrine4 ,blasco is almost the typical ,socialist--iconoclastic1 oratorical1 sentimental1 theatrical--a fervent advocate of all sorts of lofty causes1 eagerly responsive to the shibboleths of the hour4 ,baroja is the analyst1 the critic1 almost the cynic4 ,if he leans toward any definite doctrine at all1 it is toward the doctrine that the essential ills of man are incurable1 that all the remedies proposed are as bad as the disease1 that it is almost a waste of time to bother about humanity in general4 ,this agnostic attitude1 of course1 is very far from merely academic1 monastic4 ,baroja1 though his career has not been as dramatic as ,blasco's1 has at all events taken a hand in the life of his time and country and served his day in the trenches of the new enlightenment4 ,he is anything but a theorist4 ,but there is surely no little significance in his final retreat to his ,basque hillside1 there to seek peace above the turmoil4 ,he is1 one fancies1 a bit disgusted and a bit despairing4 ,but if it is despair1 it is surely not the despair of one who has shirked the trial4 ,the present book1 ,juventud1 ,egolatra1 was written at the height of the late war1 and there is a preface to the original edition1 omitted here1 in which ,baroja defends his concern with aesthetic and philosophical matters at such a time4 ,the apologia was quite gratuitous4 ,a book on the war1 though by the first novelist of present-day ,spain1 would probably have been as useless as all the other books on the war4 ,that stupendous event will be far more soundly discussed by men who have not felt its harsh appeal to the emotions4 ,baroja1 evading this grand enemy of all ideas1 sat himself down to inspect and co-ordinate the ideas that had gradually come to growth in his mind before the bands began to bray4 ,the result is a book that is interesting1 not only as the frank talking aloud of one very unusual man1 but also as a representation of what is going on in the heads of a great many other ,spaniards4 ,blasco1 it seems to me1 is often less ,spanish than ,french2 ,valencia1 after all1 is next door to ,catalonia1 and ,catalonia is anything but ,castilian4 ,but ,baroja1 though he is also un-,castilian and even a bit anti-,castilian1 is still a thorough ,spaniard4 ,he is more interested in a literary feud in ,madrid than in a holocaust beyond the ,pyrenees4 ,he gets into his discussion of every problem a definitely ,spanish flavour4 ,he is unmistakably a ,spaniard even when he is trying most rigorously to be unbiased and international4 ,he thinks out everything in ,spanish terms4 ,in him1 from first to last1 one observes all the peculiar qualities of the ,iberian mind--its disillusion1 its patient weariness1 its pervasive melancholy4 ,spain1 ,i take it1 is the most misunderstood of countries4 ,the world cannot get over seeing it through the pink mist of ,carmen1 an astounding ,gallic caricature1 half flattery and half libel4 ,the actual ,spaniard is surely no such grand-opera ,frenchman as the immortal toreador4 ,i prescribe the treatment that cured me1 for one1 of mistaking him for an ,iberian4 ,that is1 ,i prescribe a visit to ,spain in carnival time4 ,baroja1 then1 stands for the modern ,spanish mind at its most enlightened4 ,he is the ,spaniard of education and worldly wisdom1 detached from the mediaeval imbecilities of the old rgime and yet aloof from the worse follies of the demagogues who now rage in the country4 ,vastly less picturesque than ,blasco ,ibez1 he is nearer the normal ,spaniard--the ,spaniard who1 in the long run1 must erect a new structure of society upon the half archaic and half ,utopian chaos now reigning in the peninsula4 ,thus his book1 though it is addressed to ,spaniards1 should have a certain value for ,english-speaking readers4 ,and so it is presented4 ,h4 ,l4 ,,mencken4 ,,prologue ,,on ,,intellectual ,,love ,only what is of the mind has value to the mind4 ,let us dedicate ourselves without compunction to reflecting a little upon the eternal themes of life and art4 ,it is surely proper that an author should write of them4 ,i cultivate a love which is intellectual1 and of a former epoch1 besides a deafness to the present4 ,i pour out my spirit continually into the eternal moulds without expecting that anything will result from it4 ,but now1 instead of a novel1 a few stray comments upon my life have come from my pen4 ,like most of my books1 this has appeared in my hands without being planned1 and not at my bidding4 ,i was asked to write an autobiographical sketch of ten or fifteen pages4 ,ten or fifteen pages seemed a great many to fill with the personal details of a life which is as insignificant as my own1 and far too few for any adequate comment upon them4 ,i did not know how to begin4 ,to pick up the thread1 ,i began drawing lines and arabesques4 ,then the pages grew in number and1 like ,faust's dog1 my pile soon waxed big1 and brought forth this work4 ,at times1 perhaps1 the warmth of the author's feeling may appear ill-advised to the reader2 it may be that he will find his opinions ridiculous and beside the mark on every page4 ,i have merely sought to sun my vanity and egotism1 to bring them forth into the air1 so that my aesthetic susceptibilities might not be completely smothered4 ,this book has been a work of mental hygiene4 ,,egotism ,egotism resembles cold drinks in summer2 the more you take1 the thirstier you get4 ,it also distorts the vision1 producing an hydropic effect1 as has been noted by ,caldern in his ,life is a ,dream4 ,an author always has before him a keyboard made up of a series of ,i's4 ,the lyric and satiric writers play in the purely human octave2 the critic plays in the bookman's octave2 the historian in the octave of the investigator4 ,when an author writes of himself1 perforce he plays upon his own ,i1 which is not exactly that contained in the octave of the sentimentalist nor yet in that of the curious investigator4 ,undoubtedly at times it must be a most immodest ,i1 an ,i which discloses a name and a surname1 an ,i which is positive and self-assertive1 with the imperiousness of a ,captain ,general's edict or a ,civil ,governor's decree4 ,i have always felt some delicacy in talking about myself1 so that the impulsion to write these pages of necessity came from without4 ,as ,i am not generally interested when anybody communicates his likes and dislikes to me1 ,i am of opinion that the other person most probably shares the same feelings when ,i communicate mine to him4 ,however1 a time has now arrived when it is of no consequence to me what the other person thinks4 ,in this matter of giving annoyance1 a formula should be drawn up and accepted1 after the manner of ,robespierre3 the liberty of annoying another begins where his liberty of annoying you leaves off4 ,i understand very well that there may be persons who believe that their lives are wholly exemplary1 and who thus burn with ardour to talk about them4 ,but ,i have not led an exemplary life to any such extent4 ,i have not led a life that might be called pedagogic1 because it is fitted to serve as a model1 nor a life that might be called anti-pedagogic1 because it would serve as a warning4 ,neither do ,i bring a fistful of truths in my hand1 to scatter broadcast4 ,what1 then1 have ,i to say8 ,and why do ,i write about myself8 ,assuredly1 to no useful purpose4 ,the owner of a house is sometimes asked3 ,is there anything much locked up in that room8 ,no1 nothing but old rubbish1 he replies promptly4 ,but one day the owner opens the room1 and then he finds a great store of things which he had not remembered1 all of them covered with dust2 so he hauls them out and generally they prove to be of no service at all4 ,this is precisely what ,i have done4 ,these pages1 indeed1 are a spontaneous exudation4 ,but are they sincere8 ,absolutely sincere8 ,it is not very probable4 ,the moment we sit for a photographer1 instinctively we dissemble and compose our features4 ,when we talk about ourselves1 we also dissemble4 ,in as short a book as this the author is able to play with his mask and to fix his expression4 ,throughout the work of an entire lifetime1 however1 which is of real value only when it is one long autobiography1 deceit is impossible1 because when the writer is least conscious of it1 he reveals himself4 ,i ,,fundamental ,,ideas ,the ,bad ,man of ,itzea ,when ,i first came to live in this house at ,vera del ,bidasoa1 ,i found that the children of the district had taken possession of the entryway and the garden1 where they misbehaved generally4 ,it was necessary to drive them away little by little1 until they flew off like a flock of sparrows4 ,my family and ,i must have seemed somewhat peculiar to these children1 for one day1 when one little fellow caught sight of me1 he took refuge in the portal of his house and cried out3 ,here comes the bad man of ,itzea6 ,and the bad man of ,itzea was ,i4 ,perhaps this child had heard from his sister1 and his sister had heard from her mother1 and her mother had heard from the sexton's wife1 and the sexton's wife from the parish priest1 that men who have little religion are very bad2 perhaps this opinion did not derive from the priest1 but from the president of the ,daughters of ,mary1 or from the secretary of the ,enthronization of the ,sacred ,heart of ,jesus2 perhaps some of them had read a little book by ,father ,ladrn de ,guevara entitled1 ,novelists1 ,good and ,bad1 which was distributed in the village the day that ,i arrived1 and which states that ,i am irreligious1 a clerophobe1 and quite shameless4 ,whether from one source or another1 the important consideration to me was that there was a bad man in ,itzea1 and that that bad man was ,i4 ,to study and make clear the instincts1 pride1 and vanities of the bad man of ,itzea is the purpose of this book4 ,,humble ,,and ,a ,,wanderer ,some years ago1 ,i cannot say just how many1 probably twelve or fourteen1 during the days when ,i led1 or thought ,i led1 a nomadic life1 happening to be in ,san ,sebastian1 ,i went to visit the ,museum with the painter ,regoyos4 ,after seeing everything1 ,soraluce1 the director1 indicated that ,i was expected to inscribe my name in the visitor's register1 and after ,i had done so1 he said3 ,place your titles beneath4 ,titles6 ,i exclaimed4 ,i have none4 ,then put down what you are4 ,as you see1 the others have done the same4 ,i looked at the book4 ,true enough2 there was one signature1 ,so-and-,so1 and beneath1 ,chief of ,administration of the ,third ,class and ,knight of ,charles ,,iii2 another1 ,somebody ,else1 and beneath was written ,commander of the ,battalion of ,isabella the ,catholic1 with the ,cross of ,maria ,cristina4 ,then1 perhaps slightly irritated at having neither titles nor honours 7burning with an anarchistic and ,christian rancour1 as ,nietzsche would have it71 ,i jotted down a few casual words beneath my signature3 ,po ,baroja1 a humble man and a wanderer4 ,regoyos read them and burst out laughing4 ,what an idea6 exclaimed the director of the ,museum1 as he closed the volume4 ,and there ,i remained a humble man and a wanderer1 overshadowed by ,chiefs of ,administration of all ,classes1 ,commanders of all ,branches of the ,service1 ,knights of all kinds of ,crosses1 rich men returned from ,america1 bankers1 etc41 etc4 ,am ,i a humble man and a wanderer8 ,not a bit of it6 ,there is more literary phantasy in the phrase than there is truth4 ,of humility ,i do not now1 nor have ,i ever possessed more than a few rather ,buddhistic fragments2 nor am ,i a wanderer either1 for making a few insignificant journeys does not authorize one to call oneself a wanderer4 ,just as ,i put myself down at that time as a humble man and a wanderer1 so ,i might call myself today a proud and sedentary person4 ,perhaps both characterizations contain some degree of truth2 and perhaps there is nothing in either4 ,when a man scrutinizes himself very closely1 he arrives at a point where he does not know what is face and what is mask4 ,,dogmatophagy ,if ,i am questioned concerning my ideas on religion1 ,i reply that ,i am an agnostic--,i always like to be a little pedantic with philistines--now ,i shall add that1 more than this1 ,i am a dogmatophagist4 ,my first impulse in the presence of a dogma1 whether it be political1 moral1 or religious1 is to cast about for the best way to masticate1 digest1 and dispose of it4 ,the peril in an inordinate appetite for dogma lies in the probability of making too severe a drain upon the gastric juices1 and so becoming dyspeptic for the rest of one's life4 ,in this respect1 my inclination exceeds my prudence4 ,i have an incurable dogmatophagy4 ,ignoramus1 ,ignorabimus ,such are the words of the psychologist1 ,du,bois-,reymond1 in one of his well-known lectures4 ,the agnostic attitude is the most seemly that it is possible to take4 ,nowadays1 not only have all religious ideas been upset1 but so too has everything which until now appeared most solid1 most indivisible4 ,who has faith any longer in the atom8 ,who believes in the soul as a monad8 ,who believes in the objective validity of the senses8 ,the atom1 unity of the spirit and of consciousness1 the validity of perception1 all these are under suspicion today4 ,ignoramus1 ignorabimus4 ,,nevertheless1 ,,we ,,call ,,ourselves ,,materialists ,nevertheless1 we call ourselves materialists4 ,yes2 not because we believe that matter exists as we see it1 but because in this way we may contradict the vain imaginings and all those sacred mysteries which begin so modestly1 and always end by extracting the money from our pockets4 ,materialism1 as ,lange has said1 has proved itself the most fecund doctrine of science4 ,wilhelm ,ostwald1 in his ,victory of ,scientific ,materialism1 has defended the same thesis with respect to modern physics and chemistry4 ,at the present time we are regaled with the sight of learned friars laying aside for a moment their ancient tomes1 and turning to dip into some manual of popular science1 after which they go about and astonish simpletons by giving lectures4 ,the war horse of these gentlemen is the conception entertained by physicists at the present-day concerning matter1 according to which it has substance in the precise degree that it is a manifestation of energy4 ,if matter is scarcely real1 then what is the validity of materialism8 shout the friars enthusiastically4 ,the argument smacks of the seminary and is absolutely worthless4 ,materialism is more than a philosophical system3 it is a scientific method1 which will have nothing to do either with fantasies or with caprices4 ,the jubilation of these friars at the thought that matter may not exist1 in truth and in fact is in direct opposition to their own theories4 ,because if matter does not exist1 then what could ,god have created8 ,,in ,,defense ,,of ,,religion ,the great defender of religion is the lie4 ,lies are the most vital possession of man4 ,religion lives upon lies1 and society maintains itself upon them1 with its train of priests and soldiers--the one1 moreover1 as useless as the other4 ,this great ,maia of falsehood sustains all the sky borders in the theatre of life1 and1 when some fall1 it lifts up others4 ,if there were a solvent for lies1 what surprises would be in store for us6 ,nearly everybody who now appears to us to be upright1 inflexible1 and to hold his chest high1 would be disclosed as a flaccid1 weak person1 presenting in reality a sorry spectacle4 ,lies are much more stimulating than truth2 they are also almost always more tonic and more healthy4 ,i have come to this conclusion rather late in life4 ,for utilitarian and practical ends1 it is clearly our duty to cultivate falsehood1 arbitrariness1 and partial truths4 ,nevertheless1 we do not do so4 ,can it be that1 unconsciously1 we have something of the heroic in us8 ,,arch-,,european ,i am a ,basque1 if not on all four sides1 at least on three and a half4 ,the remaining half1 which is not ,basque1 is ,lombard4 ,four of my eight family names are ,guipzcoan1 two of them are ,navarrese1 one ,alavese1 and the other ,italian4 ,i take it that family names are indicative of the countries where one's ancestors lived1 and ,i take it also that there is great potency behind them1 that the influence of each works upon the individual with a duly proportioned intensity4 ,assuming this to be the case1 the resultant of the ancestral influences operative upon me would indicate that my geographical parallel lies somewhere between the ,alps and the ,pyrenees4 ,sometimes ,i am inclined to think that the ,alps and the ,pyrenees are all that is ,european in ,europe4 ,beyond them ,i seem to see ,asia2 below them1 ,africa4 ,in the riparian ,navarrese1 as in the ,catalans and the ,genovese1 one already notes the ,african2 in the ,gaul of central ,france1 as well as in the ,austrian1 there is a suggestion of the ,chinese4 ,clutching the ,pyrenees and grafted upon the ,alps1 ,i am conscious of being an ,arch-,european4 ,,dionysian ,,or ,,apollonian8 ,formerly1 when ,i believed that ,i was both humble and a wanderer1 ,i was convinced that ,i was a ,dionysian4 ,i was impelled toward turbulence1 the dynamic1 the theatric4 ,naturally1 ,i was an anarchist4 ,am ,i today8 ,i believe ,i still am4 ,in those days ,i used to enthuse about the future1 and ,i hated the past4 ,little by little1 this turbulence has calmed down--perhaps it was never very great4 ,little by little ,i have come to realize that if following ,dionysus induces the will to bound and leap1 devotion to ,apollo has a tendency to throw the mind back until it rests upon the harmony of eternal form4 ,there is great attraction in both gods4 ,,epicuri ,,de ,,grege ,,porcum ,i am also a swine of the herd of ,epicurus2 ,i1 too1 wax eloquent over this ancient philosopher1 who conversed with his pupils in his garden4 ,the very epithet of ,horace1 upon detaching himself from the ,epicureans1 ,epicuri de grege porcum1 is full of charm4 ,all noble minds have hymned ,epicurus4 ,hail ,epicurus1 thou honour of ,greece6 ,lucretius exclaims in the third book of his poem4 ,i have sought to avenge ,epicurus1 that truly holy philosopher1 that divine genius1 ,lucian tells us in his ,alexander1 or the ,false ,prophet4 ,lange1 in his ,history of ,materialism1 sets down ,epicurus as a disciple and imitator of ,democritus4 ,i am not a man of sufficient classical culture to be able to form an authoritative opinion of the merits of ,epicurus as a philosopher4 ,all my knowledge of him1 as well as of the other ancient philosophers1 is derived from the book of ,diogenes ,laertius4 ,concerning ,epicurus1 ,i have read ,bayle's magnificent article in his ,historical and ,critical ,dictionary1 and ,gassendi's work1 ,de ,vita et ,moribus ,epicuri4 ,with this equipment1 ,i have become one of the disciples of the master4 ,scholars may say that ,i have no right to enrol myself as one of the disciples of ,epicurus1 but when ,i think of myself1 spontaneously there comes to my mind the grotesque epithet which ,horace applied to the ,epicureans in his ,epistles1 a characterization which for my part ,i accept and regard as an honour3 ,swine of the herd of ,epicurus1 ,epicuri de grege porcum4 ,,evil ,,and ,,rousseau',s ,,chinaman ,i do not believe in utter human depravity1 nor have ,i any faith in great virtue1 nor in the notion that the affairs of life may be removed beyond good and evil4 ,we shall outgrow1 we have already outgrown1 the conception of sin1 but we shall never pass beyond the idea of good and evil2 that would be equivalent to skipping the cardinal points in geography4 ,nietzsche1 an eminent poet and an extraordinary psychologist1 convinced himself that we should be able to leap over good and evil with the help of a springboard of his manufacture4 ,not with this springboard1 nor with any other1 shall we escape from the polar ,north and ,south of the moral life4 ,nietzsche1 a product of the fiercest pessimism1 was at heart a good man1 being in this respect the direct opposite of ,rousseau1 who1 despite the fact that he is forever talking about virtue1 about sensibility1 the heart1 and the sublimity of the soul1 was in reality a low1 sordid creature4 ,the philanthropist of ,geneva shows the cloven hoof now and then4 ,he asks3 ,if all that it were necessary for us to do in order to inherit the riches of a man whom we had never seen1 of whom we had never even heard1 and who lived in the furthermost confines of ,china1 were to press a button and cause his death1 what man living would not press that button8 ,rousseau is convinced that we should all press the button1 and he is mistaken1 because the majority of men who are civilized would do nothing of the kind4 ,this1 to my mind1 is not to say that men are good2 it is merely to say that ,rousseau1 in his enthusiasm for humanity1 as well as in his aversion to it1 is wide of the mark4 ,the evil in man is not evil of this active sort1 so theatrical1 so self-interested2 it is a passive1 torpid evil which lies latent in the depths of the human animal1 it is an evil which can scarcely be called evil4 ,,the ,,root ,,of ,,disinterested ,,evil ,tell a man that an intimate friend has met with a great misfortune4 ,his first impulse is one of satisfaction4 ,he himself is not aware of it clearly1 he does not realize it2 nevertheless1 essentially his emotion is one of satisfaction4 ,this man may afterward place his fortune1 if he has one1 at the disposition of his friend1 yes1 even his life2 yet this will not prevent his first conscious reaction upon learning of the misfortune of his friend1 from being one which1 although confused1 is nevertheless not far removed from pleasure4 ,this feeling of disinterested malice may be observed in the relations between parents and children as well as in those between husbands and wives4 ,at times it is not only disinterested1 but counter-interested4 ,the lack of a name for this background of disinterested malice1 which does exist1 is due to the fact that psychology is not based so much upon phenomena as it is upon language4 ,according to our current standards1 latent evil of this nature is neither of interest nor significance4 ,naturally1 the judge takes account of nothing but deeds2 to religion1 which probes more deeply1 the intent is of importance2 to the psychologist1 however1 who attempts to penetrate still further1 the elemental germinative processes of volition are of indispensable significance4 ,whence this foundation of disinterested malice in man8 ,probably it is an ancestral legacy4 ,man is a wolf toward man1 as ,plautus observes1 and the idea has been repeated by ,hobbes4 ,in literature1 it is almost idle to look for a presentation of this disinterested1 this passive evil1 because nothing but the conscious is literary4 ,shakespeare1 in his ,othello1 a drama which has always appeared false and absurd to me1 emphasizes the disinterested malice of ,iago1 imparting to him a character and mode of action which are beyond those of normal men2 but then1 in order to accredit him to the spectators1 he adds also a motive1 and represents him as being in love with ,desdemona4 ,victor ,hugo1 in ,l',homme qui ,rit1 undertook to create a type after the manner of ,iago1 and invented ,barkilphedro1 who embodies disinterested yet active malice1 which is the malice of the villain of melodrama4 ,but that other disinterested malice1 which lurks in the sodden sediment of character1 that malice which is disinterested and inactive1 and not only incapable of drawing a dagger but even of writing an anonymous note1 this no writer but ,dostoievski has had the penetration to reveal4 ,he has shown us at the same time mere inert goodness1 lying passive in the soul1 without ever serving as a basis for anything4 ,,music ,,as ,a ,,sedative ,music1 the most social of the arts1 and that undoubtedly which possesses the greatest future1 presents enormous attractions to the bourgeoisie4 ,in the first place1 it obviates the necessity of conversation2 it is not necessary to know whether your neighbor is a sceptic or a believer1 a materialist or a spiritualist2 no possible argument can arise concerning the meaning and metaphysics of life4 ,instead of war1 there is peace4 ,the music lover may argue1 but his conceptions are entirely circumscribed by the music1 and have no relation whatever either to philosophy or to politics as such4 ,the wars are small wars1 and spill no blood4 ,a ,wagnerite may be a freethinker or a ,catholic1 an anarchist or a conservative4 ,even painting1 which is an art of miserable general ideas1 is not so far removed from intelligence as is music4 ,this explains why the ,greeks were able to attain such heights in philosophy1 and yet fell to such depths in music4 ,music has an additional merit4 ,it lulls to sleep the residuum of disinterested malice in the soul4 ,as a majority of the lovers of painting and sculpture are second-hand dealers and ,jews in disguise1 music lovers1 for the most part1 are a debased people1 envious1 embittered and supine4 ,,concerning ,,wagner ,i am one of those who do not understand music1 yet ,i am not completely insensible to it4 ,this does not prevent me1 however1 from entertaining a strong aversion to all music lovers1 and especially to ,wagnerites4 ,when ,nietzsche1 who apparently possessed a musical temperament1 set ,bizet up against ,wagner1 he confessed1 of course1 premeditated vindictiveness4 ,it is necessary to mediterraneanize music1 declares the ,german psychologist4 ,but how absurd6 ,music must confine itself to the geographical parallel where it was born2 it is ,mediterranean1 ,baltic1 ,alpine1 ,siberian4 ,nor is the contention valid that an air should always have a strongly marked rhythm1 because1 if this were the case1 we should have nothing but dance music4 ,certainly1 music was associated with the dance in the beginning1 but a sufficient number of years have now elapsed to enable each of these arts to develop independently4 ,as regards ,nietzsche's hostility to the theatocracy of ,wagner1 ,i share it fully4 ,this business of substituting the theatre for the church1 and teaching philosophy singing1 seems ridiculous to me4 ,i am also out of patience with the wooden dragons1 swans1 stage fire1 thunder and lightning4 ,although it may sound paradoxical1 the fact is that all this scenery is in the way4 ,i have seen ,king ,lear in ,paris1 at the ,theatre ,antoine1 where it was presented with very nearly perfect scenery4 ,when the ,king and the fool roamed about the heath in the third act1 amid thunder and lightning1 everybody was gazing at the clouds in the flies and watching for the lightning1 or listening to the whistling of the wind2 no one paid any attention to what was said by the characters4 ,,universal ,,musicians ,german music is undoubtedly the most universal music1 especially that of ,mozart and ,beethoven4 ,it seems as if there were fewer particles of their native soil imbedded in the works of these two masters than is common among their countrymen4 ,they bring out in sharp relief the cultural internationalism of ,germany4 ,mozart is an epitome of the grace of the eighteenth century2 he is at once delicate1 joyous1 serene1 gallant1 mischievous4 ,he is a courtier of whatever country one will4 ,sometimes1 when listening to his music1 ,i ask myself3 ,why is it that this1 which must be of ,german origin1 seems to be part of all of us1 to have been designed for us all8 ,beethoven1 too1 like ,mozart1 is a man without a country4 ,as the one manipulates his joyous1 soft1 serene rhythms1 the other throbs and trembles with obscure meanings and pathetic1 heartrending laments1 the source of which lies hidden as at the bottom of some mine4 ,he is a ,segismund who complains against the gods and against his fate in a tongue which knows no national accent4 ,a day will come when the negroes of ,timbuktu will listen to ,mozart's and ,beethoven's music and feel that it belongs to them1 as truly as it ever did to the citizens of ,munich or of ,vienna4 ,,the ,,folk ,,song ,the folk song lies at the opposite pole from universal music4 ,it is music which smacks most of the soil whereon it has been produced4 ,by its very nature it is intelligible at all times to all persons in the locality1 if only because music is not an intellectual art2 it deals in rhythms1 it does not deal in ideas4 ,but beyond the fact of its intelligibility1 music possesses different attractions for different people4 ,the folk song preserves to us the very savour of the country in which we were born2 it recalls the air1 the climate that we breathed and knew4 ,when we hear it1 it is as if all our ancestors should suddenly present themselves4 ,i realize that my tastes may be barbaric1 but if there could only be one kind of music1 and ,i were obliged to choose between the universal and the local1 my preference would be wholly for the latter1 which is the popular music4 ,,on ,,the ,,optimism ,,of ,,eunuchs ,in a text book designed for the edification of research workers--a specimen of peculiarly disagreeable tartuffery--the histologist1 ,ramn y ,cajal1 who1 as a thinker1 has always been an absolute mediocrity1 explains what the young scholar should be1 in the same way that the ,constitution of #ahab made it clear what the ideal ,spanish citizen should be4 ,so we know now the proper character of the young scholar4 ,he must be calm1 optimistic1 serene 444 and all this with ten or twelve coppers in his pocket6 ,some friends inform me that in the ,institute for ,public ,education at ,madrid1 where an attempt is made to give due artistic orientation to the pupils1 they have contrived an informal classification of the arts in the order of their importance2 first comes painting2 then1 music2 and1 last1 literature4 ,considering carefully what may be the reasons for such a sequence1 it would appear that the purpose must be to deprive the student of any occasion for becoming pessimistic4 ,certainly nobody will ever have his convictions upset by looking at ancient cloths daubed over with linseed oil1 nor by the bum-ta-ra of music4 ,but1 to my mind1 in a country like ,spain1 it is better that our young men should be dissatisfied than that they should go to the laboratory every day in immaculate blouses1 chatter like proper young gentlemen about ,el ,greco1 ,cezanne and the ,ninth ,symphony1 and never have the brains to protest about anything4 ,back of all this correctness may be divined the optimism of eunuchs4 ,,ii ,,myself1 ,,the ,,writer ,,to ,,my ,,readers ,,thirty ,,years ,,hence ,among my books there are two distinct classes3 ,some ,i have written with more effort than pleasure1 and others ,i have written with more pleasure than effort4 ,my readers apparently are not aware of this distinction1 although it seems evident to me4 ,can it be that true feeling is of no value in a piece of literature1 as some of the decadents have thought8 ,can it be that enthusiasm1 weariness1 loathing1 distress and ennui never transpire through the pages of a book8 ,indubitably none of them transpire unless the reader enters into the spirit of the work4 ,and1 in general1 the reader does not enter into the spirit of my books4 ,i cherish a hope which1 perhaps1 may be chimerical and ridiculous1 that the ,spanish reader thirty or forty years hence1 who takes up my books1 whose sensibilities1 it may be1 have been a little less hardened into formalism than those of the reader of today1 will both appreciate and dislike me more intelligently4 ,,youthful ,,writings ,as ,i turn over the pages of my books1 now already growing old1 ,i receive the impression that1 like a somnambulist1 ,i have frequently been walking close to the cornice of a roof1 entirely unconsciously1 but in imminent danger of falling off2 again1 it seems to me that ,i have been travelling paths beset with thorns1 which have played havoc with my skin4 ,i have maintained myself rather clumsily for the most part1 yet at times not without a certain degree of skill4 ,all my books are youthful books2 they express turbulence2 perhaps their youth is a youth which is lacking in force and vigour1 but nevertheless1 they are youthful books4 ,among thorns and brambles there lies concealed a tiny ,fountain of ,youth in my soul4 ,you may say that its waters are bitter and saline1 instead of being crystalline and clear4 ,and it is true4 ,yet the fountain flows on1 and bubbles1 and gurgles and splashes into foam4 ,that is enough for me4 ,i do not wish to dam it up1 but to let the water run and remove itself4 ,i have always felt kindly toward anything that removes itself4 ,,the ,,beginning ,,and ,,end ,,of ,,the ,,journey ,i formerly considered myself a young man of protoplasmic capabilities1 and ,i entertained very little enthusiasm for form until after ,i had talked with some ,russians4 ,since then ,i have realized that ,i was more clean cut1 more ,latin1 and a great deal older than ,i had supposed4 ,i see that you belong to the ancient rgime1 a ,frenchwoman remarked to me in ,rome4 ,i8 ,impossible6 ,yes1 she insisted4 ,you are a conversationalist4 ,you are not an elegant1 sprucely dressed abb2 you are an abb who is cynical and ill-natured1 who likes to fancy himself a savage amid the comfortable surroundings of the drawing-room4 ,the ,frenchwoman's observation set me to thinking4 ,can it be that ,i am hovering in the vicinity of ,apollo's ,temple without realizing it8 ,possibly my literary life has been merely a journey from the ,valley of ,dionysus to the ,temple of ,apollo4 ,now somebody will tell me that art begins only on the bottom step of the ,temple of ,apollo4 ,and it is true4 ,but there is where ,i stop--on the bottom step4 ,,mellowness ,,and ,,the ,,critical ,,sense ,whenever my artistic conscience reproaches me1 ,i always think3 ,if ,i were to undertake to write these books today1 now that ,i am aware of their defects1 ,i should never write them4 ,nevertheless1 ,i continue to write others with the same old faults4 ,shall ,i ever attain that mellowness of soul in which all the vividness of impression remains1 yet in which it has become possible to perfect the expression8 ,i fear not4 ,most likely1 when ,i reach the stage of refining the expression1 ,i shall have nothing to say1 and so remain silent4 ,,sensibility ,in my books1 as in most that are modern1 there is an indefinable resentment against life and against society4 ,resentment against life is of far more ancient standing than resentment against society4 ,the former has always been a commonplace among philosophers4 ,life is absurd1 life is difficult of direction1 life is a disease1 the better part of the philosophers have told us4 ,when man turned his animosity against society1 it became the fashion to exalt life4 ,life is good2 man1 naturally1 is magnanimous1 it was said4 ,society has made him bad4 ,i am convinced that life is neither good nor bad2 it is like ,nature1 necessary4 ,and society is neither good nor bad4 ,it is bad for the man who is endowed with a sensibility which is excessive for his age2 it is good for a man who finds himself in harmony with his surroundings4 ,a negro will walk naked through a forest in which every drop of water is impregnated with millions of paludal germs1 which teems with insects1 the bites of which produce malignant abcesses1 and where the temperature reaches fifty degrees ,centigrade in the shade4 ,a ,european1 accustomed to the sheltered life of the city1 when brought face to face with such a tropical climate1 without means of protection1 would die4 ,man needs to be endowed with a sensibility which is proper to his epoch and his environment2 if he has less1 his life will be merely that of a child2 if he has just the right measure1 it will be the life of an adult2 if he has more1 he will be an invalid4 ,,on ,,devouring ,,one',s ,,own ,,god ,it is said that the philosopher ,averroes was wont to remark3 ,what a sect these ,christians are1 who devour their own ,god6 ,it would seem that this divine alimentation ought to make men themselves divine4 ,but it does not2 our theophagists are human--they are only too human1 as ,nietzsche would have it4 ,there can be no doubt but that the ,southern ,european races are the most vivacious1 the most energetic1 as well as the toughest in the world4 ,they have produced all the great conquerors4 ,christianity1 when it found it necessary to overcome them1 innoculated them with its ,semitic virus1 but this virus has not only failed to make them weaker1 but1 on the contrary1 it has made them stronger4 ,they appropriated what suited them in the ,asiatic mentality1 and proceeded to make a weapon of their religion4 ,these cruel ,levantine races1 thanks only to ,teutonic penetration1 are at last submitting to a softening process1 and they will become completely softened upon the establishment in ,europe of the domination of the ,slav4 ,meanwhile they maintain their sway in their own countries4 ,they are quite inoffensive1 we are told4 ,nonsense6 ,they would burn ,giordano ,bruno as willingly now as they did in the old days4 ,there is a great deal of fire remaining in the hearts of our theophagists4 ,,anarchism ,in an article appearing in ,hermes1 a magazine published in ,bilbao1 ,salaverra assumes that ,i have been cured of my anarchism1 and that ,i persist in a negative and anarchistic attitude in order to retain my literary clientele2 which is not the fact4 ,in the first place1 ,i can scarcely be said to have a clientele2 in the second place1 a small following of conservatives is much more lucrative than a large one of anarchists4 ,it is true that ,i am withdrawing myself from the festivals of ,pan and the cult of ,dionysus1 but ,i am not substituting for them1 either outwardly or inwardly1 the worship of ,yahveh or of ,moloch4 ,i have no liking for ,semitic traditions--none and none whatever6 ,i am not able1 like ,salaverra1 to admire the rich simply because they are rich1 nor people in high stations because they happen to occupy them4 ,salaverra assumes that ,i have a secret admiration for grand society1 generals1 magistrates1 wealthy gentlemen from ,america1 and ,argentines who shout out3 ,how perfectly splendid6 ,i have the same affection for these things that ,i have for the cows which clutter up the road in front of my house4 ,i would not be ,fouquier-,tinville to the former nor butcher to the latter2 but my affection then has reached its limit4 ,even when ,i find something worthy of admiration1 my inclination is toward the small4 ,i prefer the ,boboli ,gardens to those of ,versailles1 and ,venetian or ,florentine history to that of ,india4 ,great states1 great captains1 great kings1 great gods1 leave me cold4 ,they are all for peoples who dwell on vast plains which are crossed by mighty rivers1 for the ,egyptians1 for the ,chinese1 for the ,hindus1 for the ,germans1 for the ,french4 ,we ,europeans who are of the region of the ,pyrenees and the ,alps1 love small states1 small rivers1 and small gods1 whom we may address familiarly4 ,salaverra is also mistaken when he says that ,i am afraid of change4 ,i am not afraid4 ,my nature is to change4 ,i am predisposed to develop1 to move from here to there1 to reverse my literary and political views if my feelings or my ideas alter4 ,i avoid no reading except that which is dull2 ,i shall never retreat from any performance except a vapid one1 nor am ,i a partisan either of austerity or of consistency4 ,moreover1 ,i am not a little dissatisfied with myself1 and ,i would give a great deal to have the pleasure of turning completely about1 if only to prove to myself that ,i am capable of a shift of attitude which is sincere4 ,,new ,,paths ,some months since three friends met together in an old-fashioned bookshop on the venerable ,calle del ,olivo--a writer1 a printer1 and myself4 ,fifteen years ago all three of us were anarchists1 remarked the printer4 ,what are we today8 ,i inquired4 ,we are conservatives1 replied the man who wrote4 ,what are you8 ,i believe that ,i have the same ideas ,i had then4 ,you have not developed if that is so1 retorted the writer with a show of scorn4 ,i should like to develop1 but into what8 ,how8 ,where am ,i to find the way8 ,when sitting beside the chimney1 warming your feet by the fire as you watch the flames1 it is easy to imagine that there may be novel walks to explore in the neighbourhood2 but when you come to look at the map you find that there is nothing new in the whole countryside4 ,we are told that ambition means growth4 ,it does not with me4 ,ortega y ,gasset believes that ,i am a man who is constitutionally unbribable4 ,i should not go so far as to say that1 but ,i do say that ,i do not believe that ,i could be bribed in cold blood by the offer of material things4 ,if ,mephistopheles wishes to purchase my soul1 he cannot do it with a decoration or with a title2 but if he were to offer me sympathy1 and be a little effusive while he is about it1 adding then a touch of sentiment1 ,i am convinced that he could get away with it quite easily4 ,,longing ,,for ,,change ,just as the aim of politicians is to appear constant and consistent1 artists and literary men aspire to change4 ,would that the desire of one were as easy of attainment as that of the other6 ,to change6 ,to develop6 ,to acquire a second personality which shall be different from the first6 ,this is given only to men of genius and to saints4 ,thus ,caesar1 ,luther1 and ,saint ,ignatius each lived two distinct lives2 or1 rather1 perhaps1 it was one life1 with sides that were obverse and reverse4 ,the same thing occurs sometimes also among painters4 ,the evolution of ,el ,greco in painting upsets the whole theory of art4 ,there is no instance of a like transformation either in ancient or modern literature4 ,some such change has been imputed to ,goethe1 but ,i see nothing more in this author than a short preliminary period of exalted feeling1 followed by a lifetime dominated by study and the intellect4 ,among other writers there is not even the suggestion of change4 ,shakespeare is alike in all his works2 ,caldern and ,cervantes are always the same1 and this is equally true of our modern authors4 ,the first pages of ,dickens1 of ,tolstoi or of ,zola could be inserted among the last1 and nobody would be the wiser4 ,even the erudite rhetorical poets1 the ,victor ,hugos1 the ,gautiers1 and our ,spanish ,zorrillas1 never get outside of their own rhetoric4 ,,baroja1 ,,you ,,will ,,never ,,amount ,,to ,,anything 7,a ,refrain7 ,baroja does not amount to anything1 and ,i presume that he will never amount to anything1 ,ortega y ,gasset observes in the first issue of the ,spectator4 ,i have a suspicion myself that ,i shall never amount to anything4 ,everybody who knows me has always thought the same4 ,when ,i first went to school in ,san ,sebastian1 at the age of four--and it has rained a great deal since that day--the teacher1 ,don ,len ,snchez y ,calleja1 who made a practice of thrashing us with a very stiff pointer 7oh1 these hallowed traditions of our ancestors671 looked me over and said3 ,this boy will prove to be as sulky as his brother4 ,he will never amount to anything4 ,i studied for a time in the ,institute of ,pamplona with ,don ,gregorio ,pano1 who taught us mathematics2 and this old gentleman1 who looked like the ,commander in ,don ,juan ,tenorio1 with his frozen face and his white beard1 remarked to me in his sepulchral voice3 ,you are not going to be an engineer like your father4 ,you will never amount to anything4 ,when ,i took therapeutics under ,don ,benito ,hernando in ,san ,carlos1 ,don ,benito planted himself in front of me and said3 ,that smile of yours1 that little smile 444 it is impertinent4 ,don't you come to me with any of your satirical smiles4 ,you will never amount to anything1 unless it is negative and useless4 ,i shrugged my shoulders4 ,women who have known me always tell me3 ,you will never amount to anything4 ,and a friend who was leaving for ,america volunteered3 ,when ,i return in twenty or thirty years1 ,i shall find all my acquaintances situated differently3 one will have become rich1 another will have ruined himself1 this fellow will have entered the cabinet1 that one will have been swallowed up in a small town2 but you will be exactly what you are today1 you will live the same life1 and you will have just two pesetas in your pocket4 ,that is as far as you will get4 ,the idea that ,i shall never amount to anything is now deeply rooted in my soul4 ,it is evident that ,i shall never become a deputy1 nor an academician1 nor a ,knight of ,isabella the ,catholic1 nor a captain of industry1 nor alderman1 nor ,member of the ,council1 nor a common cheat1 nor shall ,i ever possess a good black suit4 ,and yet when a man has passed forty1 when his belly begins to take on adipose tissue and he puffs out with ambition1 he ought to be something1 to sport a title1 to wear a ribbon1 to array himself in a black frock coat and a white waistcoat2 but these ambitions are denied to me4 ,the professors of my childhood and my youth rise up before my eyes like the ghost of ,banquo1 and proclaim3 ,baroja1 you will never amount to anything4 ,when ,i go down to the seashore1 the waves lap my feet and murmur3 ,baroja1 you will never amount to anything4 ,the wise owl that perches at night on our roof at ,itzea calls to me3 ,baroja1 you will never amount to anything1 and even the crows1 winging their way across the sky1 incessantly shout at me from above3 ,baroja1 you will never amount to anything4 ,and ,i am convinced that ,i never shall amount to anything4 ,,the ,,patriotism ,,of ,,desire ,i may not appear to be a very great patriot1 but1 nevertheless1 ,i am4 ,yet ,i am unable to make my ,spanish or ,basque blood an exclusive criterion for judging the world4 ,if ,i believe that a better orientation may be acquired by assuming an international point of view1 ,i do not hold it improper to cease to feel1 momentarily1 as a ,spaniard or a ,basque4 ,in spite of this1 a longing for the accomplishment of what shall be for the greatest good of my country1 normally obsesses my mind1 but ,i am wanting in the patriotism of lying4 ,i should like to have ,spain the best place in the world1 and the ,basque country the best part of ,spain4 ,the feeling is such a natural and common one that it seems scarcely worth while to explain it4 ,the climate of ,touraine or of ,tuscany1 the ,swiss lakes1 the ,rhine and its castles1 whatever is best in ,europe1 ,i would root up1 if ,i had my say1 and set down here between the ,pyrenees and the ,straits of ,gibraltar4 ,at the same time1 ,i should denationalize ,shakespeare1 ,dickens1 ,tolstoi and ,dostoievski1 making them ,spaniards4 ,i should see that the best laws and the best customs were those of our country4 ,but wholly apart from this patriotism of desire1 lies the reality4 ,what is to be gained by denying it8 ,to my mind nothing is to be gained4 ,there are many to whom the only genuine patriotism is the patriotism of lying1 which in fact is more of a matter of rhetoric than it is of feeling4 ,our falsifying patriots are always engaged in furious combat with other equally falsifying internationalists4 ,nothing but what we have is of any account1 cries one party4 ,no1 it is what the other fellow has1 cries the other4 ,patriotism is telling the truth as to one's country1 in a sympathetic spirit which is guided and informed by a love of that which is best4 ,now some one will say3 ,your patriotism1 then1 is nothing but an extension of your ego2 it is purely utilitarian4 ,absolutely so4 ,but how can there be any other kind of patriotism8 ,,my ,,home ,,lands ,i have two little countries1 which are my homes--the ,basque provinces1 and ,castile2 and by ,castile ,i mean ,old ,castile4 ,i have1 further1 two points of view from which ,i look out upon the world3 one is my home on the ,atlantic2 the other is very like a home to me1 on the ,mediterranean4 ,all my literary inspirations spring either from the ,basque provinces or from ,castile4 ,i could never write a ,gallegan or a ,catalan novel4 ,i could wish that my readers were all ,basques and ,castilians4 ,other ,spaniards interest me less4 ,spaniards who live in ,america1 or ,americans1 do not interest me at all4 ,,cruelty ,,and ,,stupidity ,it appears from an article written by ,azorn in connection with a book of mine1 that1 to my way of thinking1 there are two enormities which are incredible and intolerable4 ,they are cruelty and stupidity4 ,civilized man has no choice but to despise these manifestations of primitive1 brute existence4 ,we may be able to tolerate stupidity and lack of comprehension when they are simple and wholly natural1 but what of an utter obtuseness of understanding which dresses itself up and becomes rhetorical8 ,can anything be more disagreeable8 ,when a fly devours the pollen greedily from the pyrethrum1 which1 as we know1 will prove fatal to him1 it becomes clear at once that flies have no more innate sagacity than men4 ,when we listen to a conservative orator defending the past with salvos of rhetorical fireworks1 we are overwhelmed by a realization of the complete odiousness of ornamental stupidity4 ,with cruelty it is much the same4 ,the habits of the sphex surprise while bull fights disgust us4 ,the more cruelty and stupidity are dressed up1 the more hateful they become4 ,,the ,,anterior ,,image ,i wrote an article once called1 ,the ,spaniard ,fails to ,understand4 ,while ,i do not say it was good1 the idea had some truth in it4 ,it is a fact that failure to understand is not exclusively a ,spanish trait1 but the failing is a human one which is more accentuated among peoples of backward culture1 whose vitality is great4 ,like a child the ,spaniard carries an anterior image in his mind1 to which he submits his perceptions4 ,a child is able to recognize a man or a horse more easily in a toy than in a painting by ,raphael or by ,leonardo da ,vinci1 because the form of the toy adapts itself more readily to the anterior image which he has in his consciousness4 ,it is the same with the ,spaniard4 ,here is one of the causes of his want of comprehension4 ,one rejects what does not fit in with one's preconceived scheme of things4 ,i once rode to ,valencia with two priests who were by no means unknown4 ,one of them had been in the convent of ,loyola at ,azpeitia for four years4 ,we talked about our respective homes2 they eulogized the ,valencian plain while ,i replied that ,i preferred the mountains4 ,as we passed some bare1 treeless hills such as abound near ,chinchilla1 one of them--the one1 in fact1 who had been at ,loyola--remarked to me3 ,this must remind you of your own country4 ,i was dumbfounded4 ,how could he identify those arid1 parched1 glinting rocks with the ,basque landscape1 with the humid1 green1 shaded countryside of ,azpeitia8 ,it was easy to see that the anterior image of a landscape existing in the mind of that priest1 provided only the general idea of a mountain1 and that he was unable to distinguish1 as ,i was1 between a green mountain overgrown with turf and trees1 and an arid hillside of dry rocks4 ,an hypothesis explaining the formation of visual ideas has been formulated by ,wundt1 which he calls the hypothesis of projection4 ,it attributes to the retina an innate power of referring its impressions outward along straight lines1 in directions which are determined4 ,according to ,mller1 who has adopted this hypothesis1 what we perceive is our own retina under the category of space1 and the size of the retinal image is the original unit of measurement applied by us to exterior objects4 ,the ,spaniard like a child1 will have to amplify his retinal image1 if he is ever to amount to anything4 ,he will have to amplify it1 and1 no doubt1 complicate it also4 ,,the ,,tragi-,,comedy ,,of ,,sex ,it is very difficult to approach the sex question and to treat it at once in a clear and dignified manner4 ,and yet1 who can deny that it furnishes the key to the solution of many of the enigmas and obscurities of psychology8 ,who can question that sex is one of the bases of temperament8 ,nevertheless1 the subject may be discussed permissibly in scientific and very general terms1 as by ,professor ,freud4 ,what is unpardonable is any attempt to bring it down to the sphere of the practical and concrete4 ,i am convinced that the repercussion of the sexual life is felt through all the phenomena of consciousness4 ,according to ,freud1 an unsatisfied desire produces a series of obscure movements in consciousness which eat at the soul as electricity is generated in a storage battery1 and this accumulation of psychic energy must needs produce a disturbance in the nervous system4 ,such nervous disturbances1 which are of sexual origin1 produced by the strangulation of desires1 shape our mentality4 ,what is the proper conduct for a man during the critical years between the ages of fourteen and twenty-three8 ,he should be chaste1 the priests will say1 shutting their eyes with an hypocritical air4 ,he can marry afterwards and become a father4 ,a man who can be chaste without discomfort between fourteen and twenty-three1 is endowed with a most unusual temperament4 ,and it is one which is not very common at present4 ,as a matter of fact1 young men are not chaste1 and cannot be4 ,society1 as it is well aware of this1 opens a little loophole to sexuality1 which is free from social embarrassment--the loophole of prostitution4 ,as the bee-hive has its workers1 society has its prostitutes4 ,after a few years of sexual life without the walls1 passed in the surrounding moats of prostitution1 the normal man is prepared for marriage1 with its submission to social forms and to standards which are clearly absurd4 ,there is no possibility of escaping this dilemma which has been decreed by society4 ,the alternative is perversion or surrender4 ,to a man of means1 who has money to spend1 surrender is not very difficult2 he has but to follow the formula4 ,prostitution among the upper classes does not offend the eye1 and it reveals none of the sores which deface prostitution as it is practised among the poor4 ,marriage1 too1 does not sit heavily upon the rich4 ,with the poor1 however1 shame and surrender walk hand in hand4 ,to practise the baser forms of prostitution is to elbow all that is most vile in society1 and to sink to its level oneself4 ,then1 to marry afterwards without adequate means1 is a continual act of self-abasement4 ,it is to be unable to maintain one's convictions1 it is to be compelled to fawn upon one's superiors1 and this is more true in ,spain than it is elsewhere1 as everything here must be obtained through personal influence4 ,suppose one does not submit8 ,if you do not submit you are lost4 ,you are condemned irretrievably to perversions1 to debility1 to hysteria4 ,you will find yourself slinking about the other sex like a famished wolf1 you will live obsessed by lewd ideas1 your mind will solace itself with swindles and cheats wherewith to provide a solution of the riddle of existence1 you will become the mangy sheep that the shepherd sets apart from the flock4 ,ever since early youth1 ,i have been clearly conscious of this dilemma1 and ,i have determined and said3 ,no2 ,i choose the abnormal--give me hysteria1 but submission1 never6 ,so derangement and distortion have come to my mind4 ,if ,i could have followed my inclinations freely during those fruitful years between fifteen and twenty-five1 ,i should have been a serene person1 a little sensual1 perhaps1 and perhaps a little cynical1 but ,i should certainly not have become violent4 ,the morality of our social system has disturbed and upset me4 ,for this reason ,i hate it cordially1 and ,i vent upon it in full measure1 as best ,i may1 all the spleen ,i have to give4 ,i like at times to disguise this poison under a covering of art4 ,,the ,,veils ,,of ,,the ,,sexual ,,life ,i am unable to feel any spontaneous enthusiasm for fecundity such as that which ,zola sings4 ,moreover1 ,i regard the whole pose as a superstition4 ,i may be a member of an exhausted race1--that is quite possible1--but between the devotion to our species which is professed by these would-be re-peoplers of countries1 and the purely selfish preoccupation of the ,malthusians1 my sympathies are all with the latter4 ,i see nothing beyond the individual in this sex question--beyond the individual who finds himself inhibited by sexual morality4 ,this question must be faced some day and cleared up1 it must be seen divested of all mystery1 of all veils1 of all deceit4 ,as the hygiene of nutrition has been studied openly1 in broad daylight1 so it must be with sex hygiene4 ,as a matter of fact1 the notion of sin1 then1 that of honour1 and1 finally1 dread of syphilis and other sexual diseases1 rest like a cloud on the sexual life1 and they are jumbled together with all manner of fantastic and literary fictions4 ,obviously1 rigid sexual morality is for the most part nothing more than the practice of economy in disguise4 ,let us face this whole problem frankly4 ,a man has no right to let his life slip by to gratify fools' follies4 ,we must have regard to what is1 with ,stendhal4 ,it will be argued of course that these veils1 these subterfuges of the sexual life1 are necessary4 ,no doubt they are to society1 but they are not to the individual4 ,there are those who believe that the interests of the individual and of society are one1 but we1 who are defenders of the individual as against the ,state1 do not think so4 ,a ,,little ,,talk ,myself3 ,i often think ,i should have been happier if ,i had been impotent4 ,my ,hearers3 ,how can you say such a terrible thing8 ,myself3 ,why not8 ,to a man like me1 sex is nothing but a source of misery1 shame and cheap hypocrisy1 as it is to most of us who are obliged to get on without sufficient means under this civilization of ours4 ,now you know why ,i think that ,i should have been better off if ,i had been impotent4 ,,upon ,,the ,,supposed ,,morality ,,of ,,marriage ,single life is said to be selfish and detestable4 ,certainly it is immoral4 ,but what of marriage8 ,is it as moral as it is painted8 ,i am one who doubts it4 ,marriage1 like all other social institutions of consequence1 is surrounded by a whole series of common assumptions that cry out to be cleared up4 ,there is a pompous and solemn side to marriage1 and there is a private museum side4 ,marriage poses as an harmonious general concord in which religion1 society1 and nature join4 ,but is it anything of the kind8 ,it would appear to be doubtful4 ,if the sole purpose of marriage is to rear children1 a man ought to live with a woman only until she becomes pregnant1 and1 after that moment1 he ought not to touch her4 ,but here begins the second part4 ,the woman bears a baby2 the baby is nourished by the mother's milk4 ,the man has no right to co-habit with his wife during this period either1 because it will be at the risk of depriving the child of its natural source of nutriment4 ,in consequence1 a man must either co-habit with his wife once in two years1 or else there will be some default in the marriage4 ,what is he to do8 ,what is the moral course8 ,remember that three factors have combined to impose the marriage4 ,one1 the most far-reaching today1 is economic2 another1 which is also extremely important1 is social1 and the third1 now rapidly losing its hold1 but still not without influence1 is religious4 ,the three forces together attempt to mould nature to their will4 ,economic pressure and the high cost of living make against the having of children4 ,they encourage default4 ,how are we to have all these children8 the married couple asks4 ,how can we feed and educate them8 ,social pressure also tends in the same direction4 ,religious morality1 however1 still persists in its idea of sin1 although the potency of this sanction is daily becoming less1 even to the clerical eye4 ,if nature had a vote1 it would surely be cast in favour of polygamy4 ,man is forever sexual1 and in equal degree1 until the verge of decrepitude4 ,woman passes through the stages of fecundation1 pregnancy1 and lactation4 ,there can be no doubt but that the most convenient1 the most logical and the most moral system of sexual intercourse1 naturally1 is polygamy4 ,but the economic subdues the natural4 ,who proposes to have five wives when he cannot feed one8 ,society has made man an exclusively social product1 and set him apart from nature4 ,what can the husband and wife do1 especially when they are poor8 ,must they overload themselves with children1 and then deliver them up to poverty and neglect because ,god has given them1 or shall they limit their number8 ,if my opinion is asked1 ,i advise a limit--although it may be artificial and immoral4 ,marriage presents us with this simple choice3 we may either elect the slow1 filthy death of the indigent workingman1 of the carabineer who lives in a shack which teems with children1 or else the clean life of the ,french1 who limit their offspring4 ,the middle class everywhere today is accepting the latter alternative4 ,marriage is stripping off its morality in the bushes1 and it is well that it should do so4 ,,the ,,sovereign ,,crowd ,a strong man may either dominate and subdue the sovereign crowd when he confronts it1 as he would a wild beast1 or he may breathe his thoughts and ideas into it1 which is only another form of domination4 ,as ,i am not strong enough to do either1 ,i shun the sovereign masses1 so as not to become too keenly conscious of their collective bestiality and ill temper4 ,,the ,,remedy ,every man fancies that he has something of the doctor in him1 and considers himself competent to advise some sort of a cure1 so ,i come now with a remedy for the evils of life4 ,my remedy is constant action4 ,it is a cure as old as the world1 and it may be as useful as any other1 and doubtless it is as futile as all the rest4 ,as a matter of fact1 it is no remedy at all4 ,the springs of action lie all within ourselves1 and they derive from the vigour and health which we have inherited from our fathers4 ,the man who possesses them may draw on them whenever he will1 but the man who is without them can never acquire them1 no matter how widely he may seek4 ,,iii ,,the ,,extraradius ,the extraradius of a writer may be said to be made up of his literary opinions and inclinations4 ,i wish to expose the literary cell from the nucleus out and to unfold it1 instead of proceeding in from the covering4 ,the term may seem pedantic and histological1 but it has the attraction to my mind of a reminiscence of student days4 ,,rhetoric ,,and ,,anti-,,rhetoric ,if ,i were to formulate my opinions upon style1 ,i should say3 ,imitations of other men's styles are bad1 but a man's own style is good4 ,there is a store of common literary finery1 almost all of which is in constant use and has become familiar4 ,when a writer lays hands on any of this finery spontaneously1 he makes it his own1 and the familiar flower blossoms as it does in ,nature4 ,when an author's inspiration does not proceed from within out1 but rather from without in1 then he becomes at once a bad rhetorician4 ,i am one of those writers who employ the least possible amount of this common store of rhetoric4 ,there are various reasons for my being anti-rhetorical4 ,in the first place ,i do not believe that the pages of a bad writer can be improved by following general rules2 if they do gain in one respect1 they lose inevitably in another4 ,so much for one reason2 but ,i have others4 ,languages display a tendency to follow established forms4 ,thus ,spanish tends toward ,castilian4 ,but why should ,i1 a ,basque1 who never hears ,castilian spoken in my daily life in the accents of ,avila or of ,toledo1 endeavour to imitate it8 ,why should ,i cease to be a ,basque in order to appear ,castilian1 when ,i am not8 ,not that ,i cherish sectional pride1 far from it2 but every man should be what he is1 and if he can be content with what he is1 let him be held fortunate4 ,for this reason1 among others1 ,i reject ,castilian turns and idioms when they suggest themselves to my mind4 ,thus if it occurs to me to write something that is distinctively ,castilian1 ,i cast about for a phrase by means of which ,i may express myself in what to me is a more natural way1 without suggestion of our traditional literature4 ,on the other hand1 if the pure rhetoricians1 of the national school1 who are castizo--the ,mariano de ,cavias1 the ,ricardo ,lens--should happen to write something simply1 logically and with modern directness1 they would cast about immediately for a roundabout way of saying it1 which might appear elaborate and out of date4 ,,the ,,rhythm ,,of ,,style ,there are persons who imagine that ,i am ignorant of the three or four elementary rules of good writing1 which everybody knows1 while others believe that ,i am unacquainted with syntax4 ,seor ,bonilla y ,san ,martn has conducted a search through my books for deficiencies1 and has discovered that in one place ,i write a sentence in such and such fashion1 and that in another ,i write something else in another1 while in a third ,i compound a certain word falsely4 ,with respect to the general subject of structural usage which he raises1 it would be easy to cite ample precedent among our classic authors2 with respect to the word misticidad occurring in one of my books1 ,i have put it into the mouth of a foreigner4 ,the faults brought to light by ,seor ,bonilla are not very serious4 ,but what of it8 ,suppose they were8 ,an intelligent friend once said to me3 ,i don't know what is lacking in your style2 ,i find it acrid4 ,i feel that this criticism is the most apt that has yet been made4 ,my difficulty in writing ,castilian does not arise from any deficiency in grammar nor any want of syntax4 ,i fail in measure1 in rhythm of style1 and this shocks those who open my books for the first time4 ,they note that there is something about them that does not sound right1 which is due to the fact that there is a manner of respiration in them1 a system of pauses1 which is not traditionally ,castilian4 ,i should insist upon the point at greater length1 were it not that the subject of style is cluttered up with such a mass of preconceptions1 that it would be necessary to redefine our terminology1 and then1 after all1 perhaps we should not understand one another4 ,men have an idea that they are thinking when they operate the mechanism of language which they have at command4 ,when somebody makes the joints of language creak1 they say3 ,he does not know how to manage it4 ,certainly he does know how to manage it4 ,anybody can manage a platitude4 ,the truth is simply this3 the individual writer endeavours to make of language a cloak to fit his form1 while1 contrarywise1 the purists attempt to mould their bodies till they fit the cloak4 ,,rhetoric ,,of ,,the ,,minor ,,key ,persons to whom my style is not entirely distasteful1 sometimes ask3 ,why use the short sentence when it deprives the period of eloquence and rotundity8 ,because ,i do not desire eloquence or rotundity1 ,i reply4 ,furthermore1 ,i avoid them4 ,the vast majority of ,spanish purists are convinced that the only possible rhetoric is the rhetoric of the major key4 ,this1 for example1 is the rhetoric of ,castelar and ,costa1 the rhetoric which ,ricardo ,len and ,salvador ,rueda manipulate today1 as it has been inherited from the ,romans4 ,its purpose is to impart solemnity to everything1 to that which already has it by right of nature1 and to that which has it not4 ,this rhetoric of the major key marches with stately1 academic tread4 ,at great1 historic moments1 no doubt it is very well1 but in the long run1 in incessant parade1 it is one of the most deadly soporifics in literature2 it destroys variety1 it is fatal to subtlety1 to nice transitions1 to detail1 and it throws the uniformity of the copybook over everything4 ,on the other hand1 the rhetoric of the minor key1 which seems poor at first blush1 soon reveals itself to be more attractive4 ,it moves with a livelier1 more life-like rhythm2 it is less bombastic4 ,this rhetoric implies continence and basic economy of effort2 it is like an agile man1 lightly clothed and free of motion4 ,to the extent of my ability ,i always avoid the rhetoric of the major key1 which is assumed as the only proper style1 the very moment that one sits down to write ,castilian4 ,i should like1 of course1 to rise to the heights of solemnity now and then1 but very seldom4 ,then what you seek1 ,i am told1 is a familiar style like that of ,mesonero ,romanos1 ,trueba and ,pereda8 ,no1 ,i am not attracted by that either4 ,the familiar1 rude1 vulgar manner reminds me of a worthy bourgeois family at the dinner table4 ,there sits the husband in his shirt sleeves1 while the wife's hair is at loose ends and she is dirty besides1 and all the children are in rags4 ,i take it that one may be simple and sincere without either affectation or vulgarity4 ,it is well to be a little neutral1 perhaps1 a little grey for the most part1 so that upon occasion the more delicate hues may stand out clearly1 while a rhythm may be employed to advantage which is in harmony with actual life1 which is light and varied1 and innocent of striving after solemnity4 ,a modern poet1 in my opinion1 has illustrated this rhetoric of the minor key to perfection4 ,he is ,paul ,verlaine4 ,a style like ,verlaine's1 which is non-sequent1 macerated1 free1 is indispensable to any mastery of the rhetoric of the minor key4 ,this1 to me1 has always been my literary ideal4 ,,the ,,value ,,of ,,my ,,ideas ,from time to time1 my friend ,azorn attempts to analyse my ideas4 ,i do not pretend to be in the secret of the scales1 as such an assumption upon my part would be ridiculous4 ,as the pilot takes advantage of a favourable wind1 and if it does not blow1 of one that is unfavourable1 ,i do the same4 ,the meteorologist is able to tell with mathematical accuracy in his laboratory1 after a glance at his instruments1 not only the direction of the prevailing wind1 but the atmospheric pressure and the degree of humidity as well4 ,i am able only1 however1 to say with the pilot3 ,i sail this way1 and then make head as best ,i may4 ,,genius ,,and ,,admiration ,i have no faith in the contention of the ,lombrosians that genius is akin to insanity1 neither do ,i think that genius is an infinite capacity for taking pains4 ,lombroso1 for that matter1 is as old-fashioned today as a hoop skirt4 ,genius partakes of the miraculous4 ,if some one should tell me that a stick had been transformed into a snake by a miracle1 naturally ,i should not believe it2 but if ,i should be asked whether there was not something miraculous in the very existence of a stick or of a snake1 ,i should be constrained to acknowledge the miracle4 ,when ,i read the lives of the philosophers in ,diogenes ,laertius1 ,i arrive at the conclusion that ,epicurus1 ,zeno1 ,diogenes1 ,protagoras and the others were nothing more than men who had common sense4 ,clearly1 as a corollary1 ,i am obliged to conclude that the people we meet nowadays upon the street1 whether they wear gowns1 uniforms or blouses1 are mere animals masquerading in human shape4 ,contradicting the assumption that the great men of antiquity were only ordinary normal beings1 we must concede the fact that most extraordinary conditions must have existed and1 indeed1 have been pre-exquisite1 before a ,greece could have arisen in antiquity1 or an ,athens in ,greece1 or a man such as ,plato in ,athens4 ,by very nature1 the sources of admiration are as mysterious to my mind as the roots of genius4 ,do we admire what we understand1 or what we do not understand8 ,admiration is of two kinds1 of which the more common proceeds from wonder at something which we do not understand4 ,there is1 however1 an admiration which goes with understanding4 ,edgar ,poe composed several stories1 of which ,the ,goldbug is one1 in which an impenetrable enigma is first presented1 to be solved afterwards as by a talisman2 but1 then1 a lesson in cryptography ensues1 wherein the talisman is explained away1 and the miraculous gives place to the reasoning faculties of a mind of unusual power4 ,he has done something very similar in his poem1 ,the ,raven1 where the poem is followed by an analysis of its gestation1 which is called ,the ,philosophy of ,composition4 ,would it be more remarkable to write ,the ,raven by inspiration1 or to write it through conscious skill8 ,to find the hidden treasure through the talisman of ,the ,goldbug1 or through the possession of analytical faculties such as those of the protagonist of ,poe's tale8 ,much consideration will lead to the conclusion that one process is as marvellous as the other4 ,it may be said that there is nothing miraculous in nature1 and it may be said that it is all miraculous4 ,,my ,,literary ,,and ,,artistic ,,inclinations ,generally speaking1 ,i neither understand old books very well1 nor do ,i care for them--,i have been able to read only ,shakespeare1 and perhaps one or two others1 with the interest with which ,i approach modern writers4 ,it has sometimes seemed to me that the unreadableness of the older authors might be made the foundation of a philosophic system4 ,yet ,i have met with some surprises4 ,one was that ,i enjoyed the ,odyssey4 ,am ,i a hypocrite8 ,i asked myself4 ,i do not find old painters to be as incompatible as old authors4 ,on the contrary1 my experience has been that they are the reverse4 ,i greatly prefer a canvas by ,botticelli1 ,mantegna1 ,el ,greco or ,velzquez to a modern picture4 ,the only famous painter of the past for whom ,i have entertained an antipathy1 is ,raphael2 yet1 when ,i was in ,rome and saw the frescos in the ,vatican1 ,i was obliged again to ask myself if my attitude was a pose1 because they struck me frankly as admirable4 ,i do not pretend to taste1 but ,i am sincere2 nor do ,i endeavour to be consistent4 ,consistency does not interest me4 ,the only consistency possible is a consistency which comes from without1 which proceeds from fear of public opinion1 and anything of this sort appears to me to be contemptible4 ,not to change because of what others may think1 is one of the most abject forms of slavery4 ,let us change all we can4 ,my ideal is continual change--change of life1 change of home1 of food1 and even of skin4 ,,my ,,library ,among the things that ,i missed most as a student1 was a small library4 ,if ,i had had one1 ,i believe ,i should have dipped more deeply into books and into life as well2 but it was not given me4 ,during the period which is most fruitful for the maturing of the mind1 that is1 during the years from twelve to twenty1 ,i lived by turns in six or seven cities1 and as it was impossible to travel about with books1 ,i never retained any4 ,a lack of books was the occasion of my failure to form the habit of re-reading1 of tasting again and again and of relishing what ,i read1 and also of making notes in the margin4 ,nearly all authors who own a small library1 in which the books are properly arranged1 and nicely annotated1 become famous4 ,i am not sentimentalizing about stolid1 brazen note-taking1 such as that with which the gentlemen of the ,ateneo debase their books1 because that merely indicates barbarous lack of culture and an obtuseness which is ,kabyline4 ,having had no library in my youth1 ,i have never possessed the old favourites that everybody carries in his pocket into the country1 and reads over and over until he knows them by heart4 ,i have looked in and out of books as travellers do in and out of inns1 not stopping long in any of them4 ,i am very sorry but it is too late now for the loss to be repaired4 ,,on ,,being ,a ,,gentleman ,viewed from without1 ,i seem to impress some as a crass1 crabbed person1 who has very little ability1 while others regard me as an unhealthy1 decadent writer4 ,then ,azorn has said of me that ,i am a literary aristocrat1 a fine and comprehensive mind4 ,i should accept ,azorn's opinion very gladly1 but personality needs to be hammered severely in literature before it leaves its slag4 ,like metal which is removed from the furnace after casting and placed under the hammer1 ,i would offer my works to be put to the test1 to be beaten by all hammers4 ,if anything were left1 ,i should treasure it then lovingly2 if nothing were left1 we should still pick up some fragments of life4 ,i always listen to the opinions of the non-literary concerning my books with the greatest interest4 ,my cousin1 ,justo ,goi1 used to express his opinion without circumlocution4 ,he always carried off my books as they appeared1 and then1 a long time after1 would give his opinion4 ,of ,the ,way of ,perfection he said3 ,good1 yes1 very good2 but it is so tiresome4 ,i realized that there was some truth in his view4 ,when he read the three novels to which ,i had given the general title1 ,the ,struggle for ,life1 he stopped me on the ,calle de ,alcal one day and said3 ,you have not convinced me4 ,how so8 ,your hero is a man of the people1 but he is falsified4 ,he is just like you are2 you can never be anything but a gentleman4 ,this gentility with which my cousin reproached me1 and without doubt he was correct1 is common to nearly all ,spanish writers4 ,there are no ,spaniards at present1 and there never have been any at any other time1 who write out of the ,spanish soul1 out of the hearts of the people4 ,even ,dicenta did not4 ,his ,juan ,jos is not a workingman1 but a young gentleman4 ,he has nothing of the workingman about him beyond the label1 the clothes1 and such externals4 ,galds1 for example1 can make the common people talk2 ,azorn can portray the villages of ,castile1 set on their arid heights1 against backgrounds of blue skies2 ,blasco ,ibez can paint the life of the ,valencians in vivid colours with a prodigality that carries with it the taint of the cheap1 but none of them has penetrated into the popular soul4 ,that would require a great poet1 and we have none4 ,,giving ,,offence ,i have the name of being aggressive1 but1 as a matter of fact1 ,i have scarcely ever attacked any one personally4 ,many hold a radical opinion to be an insult4 ,in an article in ,la ,lectura1 ,ortega y ,gasset illustrates my propensity to become offensive by recalling that as we left the ,ateneo together one afternoon1 we encountered a blind man on the ,calle del ,prado1 singing a jota1 whereupon ,i remarked3 ,an unspeakable song6 ,admitted4 ,it is a fact1 but ,i fail to see any cause of offence4 ,it is only another way of saying more forcefully3 ,i do not like it1 it does not please me1 or what you will4 ,i have often been surprised to find1 after expressing an opinion1 that ,i have been insulted bitterly in reply4 ,at the outset of my literary career1 ,azorn and ,i shared the ill will of everybody4 ,when ,maeztu1 ,azorn1 ,carlos del ,rio and myself edited a modest magazine1 by the name of ,juventud1 ,azorn and ,i were the ones principally to be insulted4 ,the experience was repeated later when we were both associated with ,el ,globo4 ,azorn1 perhaps1 was attacked and insulted more frequently1 so that ,i was often in a position to act as his champion4 ,some years ago ,i published an article in the ,nuevo ,mundo1 in which ,i considered ,vzquez ,mella and his refutation of the ,kantian philosophy1 dwelling especially upon his seventeenth mathematical proof of the existence of ,god4 ,the thing was a burlesque1 but a conservative paper took issue with me1 called me an atheist1 a plagiarist1 a drunkard and an ass4 ,as for being an atheist1 ,i did not take that as an insult1 but as an honour4 ,upon another occasion1 ,i published an article about ,spanish women1 with particular reference to ,basque women1 in which ,i maintained that they sacrificed natural kindliness and sympathy on the altars of honour and religion1 whereupon the ,daughters of ,mary of ,san ,sebastian made answer1 charging that ,i was a degenerate son of their city1 who had robbed them of their honour1 which was absolutely contrary to the fact4 ,in passing1 they suggested to the editor of the ,nuevo ,mundo that he should not permit me to write again for the magazine4 ,i wrote an article once dealing with ,maceo and ,cuba1 whereupon a journalist from those parts jumped up and called me a fat ,basque ox4 ,the ,catalans have also obliged me with some choice insults1 which ,i have found engaging4 ,when ,i lectured in ,barcelona in the ,casa del ,pueblo1 ,la ,veu de ,catalunya undertook to report the affair1 picturing me as talking platitudes before an audience of professional bomb throwers and dynamiters1 and experts with the ,browning gun4 ,naturally1 ,i was enchanted4 ,recently1 when writing for the review ,espaa1 ,i had a similar experience1 which reminded me of my connection with the smaller periodicals of fifteen years ago4 ,some gentlemen1 mostly natives of the provinces1 approached the editor1 ,ortega y ,gasset1 with the information that ,i was not a fit person to contribute to a serious magazine1 as what ,i wrote was not so1 while my name would ruin the sale of the weekly4 ,these pious souls and good ,christians imagined that ,i might need that work in order to earn my living1 so in the odour of sanctity they did whatever lay in their power to deprive me of my means of support4 ,oh1 noble souls6 ,oh1 ye of great heart6 ,i salute you from a safe distance1 and wish you the most uncomfortable beds in the most intolerable wards set apart for scurvy patients1 in any hospital of your choosing1 throughout the world4 ,,thirst ,,for ,,glory ,fame1 success1 popularity1 the illusion of being known1 admired and esteemed1 appeal in different ways to authors4 ,to ,salvador ,rueda1 glory is a triumphant entrance into ,tegucigalpa1 where he is taken to the ,spanish ,casino1 and crowned with a crown of real laurel4 ,to ,unamuno1 glory is the assurance that people will be interested in him at least a thousand years after he is dead4 ,and to others the only glory worth talking about is that courted by the ,french writer1 ,rabbe1 who busied himself in ,spain with la gloire argent comptant4 ,some yearn for a large stage with pennons and salvos and banners1 while others are content with a smaller scene4 ,ortega y ,gasset says that to me glory reduces itself to the proportions of an agreeable dinner1 with good talk across the table4 ,and he is right4 ,to mingle with pleasant1 intelligent1 cordial persons is one of the more alluring sorts of fame4 ,there is something seductive and ingratiating about table talk when it is spirited4 ,a luxurious dining room1 seating eight or ten guests1 of whom three or four are pretty women1 one of whom should be a foreigner2 as many men1 none of them aristocrats--generally speaking1 aristocrats are disagreeable--nor shall we admit artists1 for they are in the same class as the aristocrats2 one's neighbour1 perhaps1 is a banker1 or a ,jew of aquiline feature1 and then the talk touches on life and on politics1 relieved with a little gallantry toward the ladies1 from time to time allowing to each his brief opportunity to shine--all this1 beyond doubt1 is most agreeable4 ,i like1 too1 to spend an afternoon conversing with a number of ladies in a comfortable drawing room1 which is well heated4 ,i visualize the various rewards which are meted out by fame as being housed invariably under a good roof4 ,what is not intimate1 does not appeal to me4 ,i have often seen ,guimer in a caf on the ,rambla in ,barcelona1 drinking coffee at a table1 alone and forlorn1 in the midst of a crowd of shop clerks and commercial travellers4 ,is that ,guimer8 ,i asked a ,catalan journalist4 ,yes4 ,and then he told me that they had tendered him a tremendous testimonial some months previously1 which had been attended by ,i don't know how many hundreds of societies1 all marching with their banners4 ,i have no very clear idea of just what ,guimer has done1 as it is many years since ,i have gone to the theatre1 but ,i know that he is considered in ,catalonia to be one of the glories of the country4 ,i should not care for an apotheosis1 and then find myself left forlorn and alone to take my coffee afterwards with a horde of clerks4 ,i may never write anything that will take the world by storm--most probably not2 but if ,i do1 and it occurs to my fellow townsmen to organize one of these celebrations with flags1 banners and choral societies1 they need not count upon my attendance4 ,they will not be able to discover me even with the aid of ,sherlock ,holmes4 ,when ,i am old1 ,i hope to take coffee with pleasant friends1 whether it be in a palace or a porter's lodge4 ,i neither expect nor desire flags1 committees1 nor waving banners4 ,laurel does not seduce me1 and you cannot do it with bunting4 ,,elective ,,antipathies ,as ,i have expressed my opinions of other authors sharply1 making them public with the proper disgust1 others have done the same with me1 which is but logical and natural1 especially in the case of a writer such as myself1 who holds that sympathy and antipathy are of the very essence of art4 ,my opponents and myself differ chiefly in the fact that ,i am more cynical than they1 and so ,i disclose my personal animus quite ingenuously1 which my enemies fail to do4 ,i hold that there are two kinds of morality2 morality of work and morality of play4 ,the morality of work is an immoral morality1 which teaches us to take advantage of circumstances and to lie4 ,the morality of play1 for the reason that it deals with mere futilities1 is finer and more chivalrous4 ,i believe that in literature and in all liberal arts1 the morality should be the morality of play1 while my opponents for the most part hold that the morality of literature should be the morality of work4 ,i have never1 consciously at least1 been influenced in my literary opinions by practical considerations4 ,my ideas may have been capricious1 and they are1--they may even be bad1--but they have no ulterior practical motive4 ,my failure to be practical1 together1 perhaps1 with an undue obtuseness of perception1 brings me face to face with critics of two sorts3 one1 esthetic2 the other1 social4 ,my esthetic critics say to me3 ,you have not perfected your style1 you have not developed the technique of your novels4 ,you can scarcely be said to be literate4 ,i shrug my shoulders and reply3 ,are you sure8 ,my social critics reproach me for my negative and destructive views4 ,i do not know how to create anything1 ,i am incapable of enthusiasm1 ,i cannot describe life1 and so on4 ,this feeling seems logical enough1 if it is sincere1 if it is honest1 and ,i accept it as such1 and it does not offend me4 ,but1 as some of my esthetic critics tell me3 ,you are not an artist1 you do not know how to write1 without feeling any deep conviction on the subject1 but rather fearing that perhaps ,i may be an artist after all and that at last somebody may come to think so1 so among my critics who pose as defenders of society1 there are those who are influenced by motives which are purely utilitarian4 ,i am reminded of servants shouting at a man picking flowers over the garden wall1 or an apple from the orchard as he passes1 who raise their voices as high as possible so as to make their officiousness known4 ,they shout so that their masters will hear4 ,how dare that rascal pick flowers from the garden8 ,how dare he defy us and our masters8 ,shall a beggar1 who is not respectable1 tell us that our laws are not laws1 that our honours are not honours1 and that we are a gang of accomplished idiots8 ,yes1 that is just what ,i tell them1 and ,i shall continue to do so as long as it is the truth4 ,shout1 you lusty louts in gaudy liveries1 bark you little lap-dogs1 guard the gates1 you government inspectors and carabineers6 ,i shall look into your garden1 which is also my garden1 ,i shall make off with anything from it that ,i am able1 and ,i shall say what ,i please4 ,,to ,a ,,member ,,of ,,several ,,academies ,a certain ,basque writer1 one ,seor de ,loyarte1 who is a member of several academies1 and ,royal ,commissioner of ,education1 assails me violently upon social grounds in a book which he has published1 although the attack is veiled as purely literary4 ,seor de ,loyarte is soporific as a general rule1 but in his polite sortie against me1 he is more amusing than is usual4 ,his malice is so keen that it very nearly causes him to appear intelligent4 ,in literature1 ,seor de ,loyarte--and why should ,seor de ,loyarte not be associated with literature--presents the figure of a fat1 pale1 flabby boy in a priests' school1 skulking under the skirts of a ,jesuit ,father4 ,seor de ,loyarte1 like those little1 chubby-winged cherubs on sacristy ceilings1 shakes his arrowlet at me and lets fling a billet doux4 ,seor de ,loyarte says ,i smack of the cadaver1 that ,i am a plagiarist1 an atheist1 anti-religious1 anti-patriotic1 and more to boot4 ,i shall not reply for it may be true4 ,yet it is also true that ,seor de ,loyarte's noble words will please his noble patrons1 from whom1 perhaps1 he may receive applause even more substantial than the pat on the shoulder of a ,jesuit ,father1 or the smile of every good ,conservative1 who is a defender of the social order4 ,his book is an achievement which should induct ,seor de ,loyarte into membership in several more academies4 ,seor de ,loyarte is already a ,corresponding ,member of the ,spanish ,academy1 or of the ,academy of ,history1 ,i am not quite sure which2 but they are all the same4 ,speaking of history1 ,i should be interested to know who did first introduce the sponge4 ,seor de ,loyarte is destined to be a member1 a member of academies all his life4 ,,iv ,,admirations ,,and ,,incompatibilities ,diogenes ,laertius tells us that when ,zeno consulted the oracle as to what he should do in order to attain happiness in life1 the deity replied that he should assimilate himself with the dead4 ,having understood1 he applied himself exclusively to the study of books4 ,thus speaks ,laertius1 in the translation of ,don ,jos ,ortz y ,sanz4 ,i confess that ,i should not have understood the oracle4 ,however1 without consulting any oracle1 ,i have devoted myself for some time to reading books1 whether ancient and modern1 both out of curiosity and in order to learn something of life4 ,,cervantes1 ,,shakespeare1 ,,moli,,re ,for a long time1 ,i thought that ,shakespeare was a writer who was unique and different from all others4 ,it seemed to me that the difference between him and other writers was one of quality rather than of quantity4 ,i felt that1 as a man1 ,shakespeare was of a different kind of humanity2 but ,i do not think so now4 ,shakespeare is no more the quintessence of the world's literature than ,plato and ,kant are the quintessence of universal philosophy4 ,i once admired the philosophy and characters of the author of ,hamlet2 when ,i read him today1 what most impresses me is his rhetoric1 and1 above all1 his high spirit4 ,cervantes is not very sympathetic to me4 ,he is tainted with the perfidy of the man who has made a pact with the enemy 7with the ,church1 the aristocracy1 with those in power71 and then conceals the fact4 ,philosophically1 in spite of his enthusiasm for the ,renaissance1 he appears vulgar and pedestrian to me1 although he towers above all his contemporaries on account of the success of a single invention1 that of ,don ,quixote and ,sancho1 which is to literature what the discovery of ,newton was to ,physics4 ,as for ,molire1 he is a poor fellow1 who never attains the exuberance of ,shakespeare1 nor the invention that immortalizes ,cervantes4 ,but his taste is better than ,shakespeare's and he is more social1 more modern than ,cervantes4 ,the half-century or more that separates the work of ,cervantes from that of ,molire1 is not sufficient to explain this modernity4 ,between the ,spain of ,quixote and the ,france of ,le ,bourgeois ,gentilhomme1 lies something deeper than time4 ,descartes and ,gassendi had lived in ,france1 while1 on the other hand1 the seed of ,saint ,ignatius ,loyola lay germinating in the ,spain of ,cervantes4 ,,the ,,encyclopedists ,a ,french journalist who visited my house during the summer1 remarked3 ,the ideas were great in the ,french ,revolution2 it was not the men4 ,i replied3 ,i believe that the men of the ,french ,revolution were great1 but not the ideas4 ,of all the philosophical literature of the pre-revolutionary period1 what remains today8 ,what books exert influence8 ,in ,france1 excerpts from ,montesquieu1 ,diderot and ,rousseau are still read in the schools1 but outside of ,france1 they are read nowhere4 ,only an extraordinary person would go away for the summer with ,montesquieu's ,esprit des ,lois1 or ,jean ,jacques ,rousseau's ,emile in his grip4 ,montesquieu is demonstration of the fact that a book cannot live entirely by virtue of correctness of style4 ,of all the writers who enjoyed such fame in the eighteenth century1 the only one who will bear reading today is ,voltaire--the ,voltaire of the ,dictionnaire ,philosophique and of the novels4 ,diderot1 whom the ,french consider a great man1 is of no interest whatsoever to the modern mind1 at least to the mind which is not ,french4 ,he is almost as dull as ,rousseau4 ,la ,religieuse is an utterly false little book4 ,some years ago ,i loaned a copy to a young lady who had just come from a convent4 ,i have never seen anything like this1 she said to me4 ,it is a fantasy with no relation to the truth4 ,that was my idea4 ,jacques1 le fataliste is tiresome2 ,le ,neveu de ,rameau gives at first the impression that it is going to amount to something1 to something powerful such as the ,satiricon of ,petronius1 or ,el ,buscn of ,quevedo2 but at the end1 it is nothing4 ,the only writer of the pre-revolutionary period who can be read today with any pleasure--and this1 perhaps1 is because he does not attempt anything--is ,chamfort4 ,his characters and anecdotes are sufficiently highly flavoured to defy the action of time4 ,,the ,,romanticists ,goethe ,if a militia of genius should be formed on ,parnassus1 ,goethe would be the drum-major4 ,he is so great1 so majestic1 so serene1 so full of talent1 so abounding in virtue1 and yet1 so antipathetic6 ,chateaubriand ,a skin of ,lacrymae ,christi that has turned sour4 ,at times the good ,viscount drops molasses into the skin to take away the taste of vinegar2 at other times1 he drops in more vinegar to take away the sweet taste of the molasses4 ,he is both moth-eaten and sublime4 ,victor ,hugo ,victor ,hugo1 the most talented of rhetoricians6 ,victor ,hugo1 the most exquisite of vulgarians6 ,victor ,hugo--mere common sense dressed up as art4 ,stendhal ,the inventor of a psychological automaton moved by clock work4 ,balzac ,a nightmare1 a dream produced by indigestion1 a chill1 rare acuteness1 equal obtuseness1 a delirium of splendours1 cheap hardware1 of pretence and bad taste4 ,because of his ugliness1 because of his genius1 because of his immorality1 the ,danton of printers' ink4 ,poe ,a mysterious sphinx who makes one tremble with lynx-like eyes1 the goldsmith of magical wonders4 ,dickens ,at once a mystic and a sad clown4 ,the ,saint ,vincent de ,paul of the loosened string1 the ,saint ,francis of ,assisi of the ,london ,streets4 ,everything is gesticulation1 and the gesticulations are ambiguous4 ,when we think he is going to weep1 he laughs2 when we think he is going to laugh1 he cries4 ,a remarkable genius who does everything he can to make himself appear puny1 yet who is1 beyond doubt1 very great4 ,larra ,footnote3 ,a ,spanish poet and satirist 7#ahji-cg71 famous under the pseudonym of ,figaro4 ,he committed suicide4 ,the poet ,zorrilla first came into prominence through some verses read at his tomb4 ,a small1 trained tiger shut up in a tiny cage4 ,he has all the tricks of a cat2 he mews like one1 he lets you stroke his back1 and there are times when his fiercer instincts show in his eyes4 ,then you realize that he is thinking3 ,how ,i should love to eat you up6 ,,the ,,naturalists ,flaubert ,flaubert is a heavy-footed animal4 ,it is plain that he is a ,norman4 ,all his work has great specific gravity4 ,he disgusts me4 ,one of ,flaubert's master strokes was the conception of the character of ,homais1 the apothecary1 in ,madame ,bovary4 ,i cannot see1 however1 that ,homais is any more stupid than ,flaubert himself1 and he may even be less so4 ,the ,giants ,the good ,zola1 vigorous1 dull and perspiring1 dubbed his contemporaries1 the ,french naturalistic novelists1 ,giants4 ,what an imagination was possessed by ,zola6 ,these ,giants were none other than the ,goncourts1 whose insignificance approached at times imbecility1 and in addition1 ,alphonse ,daudet1 with the air of a cheap comedian and an armful of mediocre books--a truly ,french diet1 feeble1 but well seasoned4 ,these poor ,giants1 of whom ,zola would talk1 have become so weak and shrunken with time1 that nobody is able any longer to make them out1 even as dwarfs4 ,,the ,,spanish ,,realists ,the ,spanish realists of the same period are the height of the disagreeable4 ,the most repugnant of them all is ,pereda4 ,when ,i read him1 ,i feel as if ,i were riding on a balky1 vicious mule1 which proceeds at an uncomfortable little trot1 and then1 all of a sudden1 cuts stilted capers like a circus horse4 ,,the ,,russians ,dostoievski ,one hundred years hence ,dostoievsky's appearance in literature will be hailed as one of the most extraordinary events of the nineteenth century4 ,among the spiritual fauna of ,europe1 his place will be that of the ,diplodocus4 ,tolstoi ,a number of years ago ,i was in the habit of visiting the ,ateneo1 and ,i used to argue there with the habitus1 who in general have succeeded in damming up the channels through which other men receive ideas4 ,to my mind1 ,tolstoi is a ,greek1 ,i observed4 ,he is serene1 clear1 his characters are god-like2 all they think of are their love affairs1 their passions4 ,they are never called upon to face the acute problem of subsistence1 which is fundamental with us4 ,utter nonsense6 ,there is nothing ,greek about ,tolstoi1 declared everybody4 ,some years later at a celebration in honour of ,tolstoi1 ,anatole ,france chanced to remark3 ,tolstoi is a ,greek4 ,when this fell from ,anatole ,france1 the obstruction in the channels through which these gentlemen of the ,ateneo received their ideas ceased for the moment to exist1 and they began to believe that1 after all1 ,tolstoi might very well have something of the ,greek in him4 ,,the ,,critics ,sainte ,beuve ,sainte ,beuve writes as if he had always said the last word1 as if he were precisely at the needle of the scales4 ,yet ,i feel that this writer is not as infallible as he thinks4 ,his interest lies in his anecdote1 in his malevolent insinuation1 in his bawdry4 ,beyond these1 he has the same ,mediterranean features as the rest of us4 ,taine ,hippolyte ,taine is also one of those persons who think they understand everything4 ,and there are times when he understands nothing4 ,his ,history of ,english ,literature1 which makes an effort to be broad and generous1 is one of the pettiest1 most niggardly histories ever written anywhere4 ,his articles on ,shakespeare1 ,walter ,scott and ,dickens have been fabricated by a ,french professor1 which is to say that they are among the most wooden productions of the universities of ,europe4 ,ruskin ,he impresses me as the ,prince of ,upstarts1 grandiloquent and at the same time unctuous1 a ,general in a ,salvation ,army of ,art1 or a monk who is a devotee of an esthetic ,doctrine which has been drawn up by a ,congress of ,tourists4 ,croce ,the esthetic theory of ,benedetto ,croce has proved another delusion to me4 ,rather than an esthetic theory1 it is a study of esthetic theories4 ,as in most ,latin productions1 the fundamental question is not discussed therein1 but the method of approaching that question4 ,clarin ,footnote3 ,pseudonym of ,leopoldo ,alas1 a ,spanish critic and novelist of the transition1 born in ,asturias1 whose influence was widely felt in ,spanish letters4 ,he died in #aije4 ,i have a poor opinion of ,clarin1 although some of my friends regard him with admiration4 ,as a man1 he must have been envious2 as a novelist1 he is dull and unhappy2 as a critic1 ,i am not certain that he was ever in the right4 ,v ,,the ,,philosophers ,a thirst for some knowledge of philosophy resulted in consulting ,dr4 ,letamendi's book on pathology during my student days4 ,i also purchased the works of ,kant1 ,fichte1 and ,schopenhauer in the cheap editions which were published by ,zozaya4 ,the first of these that ,i read was ,fichte's ,science of ,knowledge1 of which ,i understood nothing4 ,it stirred in me a veritable indignation against both author and translator4 ,was philosophy nothing but mystification1 as it is assumed to be by artists and shop clerks8 ,reading ,parerga and ,paralipomena reconciled me to philosophy4 ,after that ,i bought in ,french ,the ,critique of ,pure ,reason1 ,the ,world as ,will and ,idea1 and a number of other books4 ,how was it that ,i1 who am gifted with but little tenacity of purpose1 mustered up perseverance enough to read difficult books for which ,i was without preparation8 ,i do not know1 but the fact is that ,i read them4 ,years after this initiation into philosophy1 ,i began reading the works of ,nietzsche1 which impressed me greatly4 ,since then ,i have picked at this and that in order to renew my philosophic store1 but without success4 ,some books and authors will not agree with me1 and ,i have not dared to venture others4 ,i have had a volume of ,hegel's ,logic on my table for a long time4 ,i have looked at it1 ,i have smelled of it1 but courage fails me4 ,yet ,i am attracted to metaphysics more than to any other phase of philosophy4 ,political philosophy1 sociology and the common sense schools please me least4 ,hobbes1 ,locke1 ,bentham1 ,comte and ,spencer ,i have never liked at all4 ,even their ,utopias1 which ought to be amusing1 bore me profoundly1 and this has been true from ,plato's ,republic to ,kropotkin's ,conquest of ,bread and ,wells's ,a ,modern ,utopia4 ,nor could ,i ever become interested in the pseudo-philosophy of anarchism4 ,one of the books which have disappointed me the most is ,max ,stirner's ,ego and ,his ,own4 ,psychology is a science which ,i should like to know4 ,i have therefore skimmed through the standard works of ,wundt and ,ziehen4 ,after reading them1 ,i came to the conclusion that the psychology which ,i am seeking1 day by day and every day1 is not to be found in these treatises4 ,it is contained rather in the writings of ,nietzsche and the novels of ,dostoievski4 ,in the course of time1 ,i may succeed1 perhaps1 in entering the more abstract domains of the science4 ,,vi ,,the ,,historians ,miss ,blimber1 the school teacher in ,dickens's ,dombey and ,son1 could have died happily had she known ,cicero4 ,even if such a thing were possible ,i should have no great desire to know ,cicero1 but ,i should be glad to listen to a lecture by ,zeno in the portico of the ,poecil at ,athens1 or to ,epicurus's meditations in his garden4 ,my ignorance of history has prevented me from becoming deeply interested in ,greece1 although now this begins to embarrass me1 as a curiosity about and sympathy for classical art stirs within me4 ,if ,i were a young man and had the leisure1 ,i might even begin the study of ,greek4 ,as it is1 ,i feel that there are two ,greeces3 one of statues and temples1 which is academic and somewhat cold2 the other of philosophers and tragedians1 who convey to my mind more of an impression of life and humanity4 ,apart from the ,greek1 which ,i know but fragmentarily1 ,i have no great admiration for ancient literatures4 ,the ,old ,testament never aroused any devotion in me4 ,except for ,ecclesiastes and one or two of the shorter books1 it impresses me as repulsively cruel and antipathetic4 ,among the ,greeks1 ,i have enjoyed ,homer's ,odyssey and the comedies of ,aristophanes4 ,i have read also ,herodotus1 ,plutarch and ,diogenes ,laertius4 ,i am not an admirer of academic1 well written books1 so ,i prefer ,diogenes ,laertius to ,plutarch4 ,plutarch impresses me as having composed and arranged his narratives2 not so ,diogenes ,laertius4 ,plutarch forces the morality of his personages to the fore2 ,diogenes gives details of both the good and the bad in his4 ,plutarch is solid and systematic2 ,diogenes is lighter and lacks system4 ,i prefer ,diogenes ,laertius to ,plutarch1 and if ,i were especially interested in any of the illustrious ancients of whom they write1 ,i should vastly prefer the letters of the men themselves1 if any existed1 or otherwise the gossip of their tentmakers or washerwomen1 to any lives written of them by either ,diogenes ,laertius or ,plutarch4 ,,the ,,roman ,,historians ,when ,i turned to the composition of historical novels1 ,i desired to ascertain if the historical method had been reduced to a system4 ,i read ,lucian's ,instructions for ,writing ,history1 an essay with the same title1 or with a very similar one1 by the ,abb ,mably1 some essays by ,simmel1 besides a book by a ,german professor1 ,ernst ,bernheim1 ,lehrbuch der historischen ,methode4 ,i next read and re-read the ,roman historians ,julius ,caesar1 ,tacitus1 ,sallust and ,suetonius4 ,sallust ,all these ,roman historians no doubt were worthy gentlemen1 but they create an atmosphere of suspicion4 ,when reading them1 you suspect that they are not always telling the whole truth4 ,i read ,sallust and feel that he is lying2 he has composed his narrative like a novel4 ,in the ,mmorial de ,sainte ,hlne1 it is recorded that on ,march #bf1 #ahaf1 ,napoleon read the conspiracy of ,catiline in the ,roman ,history4 ,the ,emperor observed that he was unable to understand what ,catiline was driving at4 ,no matter how much of a bandit he may have been1 he must have had some object1 some social purpose in view4 ,the observation of this political genius is one which must occur to all who read ,sallust's book4 ,how could ,catiline have secured the support of the most brilliant men of ,rome1 among them of ,julius ,caesar1 if his only plan and object had been to loot and burn ,rome8 ,it is not logical4 ,evidently ,sallust lies1 as governmental writers in ,spain lie today when they speak of ,lerroux or ,ferrer1 or as the republican supporters of ,thiers lied in #ahga1 characterizing the ,paris ,commune4 ,tacitus ,tacitus is another great ,roman historian who is theatrical1 melodramatic1 solemn1 full of grand gestures4 ,he also creates an atmosphere of suspicion1 of falsehood4 ,tacitus has something of the inquisitor in him1 of the fanatic in the cause of virtue4 ,he is a man of austere moral attitude1 which is a pose that a thoroughgoing scamp finds it easy to assume4 ,a temperament such as that of ,tacitus is fatal to theatrical peoples like the ,italians1 ,spaniards1 and ,french of the ,south4 ,from it springs that type of ,sicilian1 ,calabrian1 and ,andalusian politician who is a great lawyer and an eloquent orator1 who declaims publicly in the forum1 and then reaches an understanding privately with bandits and thugs4 ,suetonius ,suetonius1 although deficient both in the pomp and sententiousness of ,tacitus1 makes no attempt to compose his story1 nor to impart moral instruction1 but tells us what he knows1 simply4 ,his ,lives of the ,twelve ,caesars is the greatest collection of horrors in history4 ,you leave it with the imagination perturbed1 scrutinizing yourself to discover whether you may not be yourself a hog or a wild beast4 ,suetonius gives us an account of men rather than a history of the politics of emperors1 and surely this method is more interesting and veracious4 ,i place more faith in the anecdotes which grow up about an historical figure than ,i do in his laws4 ,polybius is a mixture of scepticism and common sense4 ,he is what ,bayle1 ,montesquieu and ,voltaire will come to be centuries hence4 ,as far as ,caesar's ,commentaries are concerned1 in spite of the fact that they have been manipulated very skilfully1 they are one of the most satisfying and instructive books that can be read4 ,,modern ,,and ,,contemporary ,,historians ,i have very little knowledge of the historians of the ,renaissance or of those prior to the ,french ,revolution4 ,apart from the chroniclers of individual exploits1 such as ,lpez de ,ayala1 ,brantme1 and the others1 they are wholly colourless1 and either pseudo-,roman or pseudo-,greek4 ,even ,machiavelli has a personal1 ,italian side1 which is mocking and incisive--and this is all that is worth while in him--and he has a pretentious pseudo-,roman side1 which is unspeakably tiresome4 ,generally considered1 the more carefully composed and smoothly varnished the history1 the duller it will be found2 while the more personal revelations it contains1 the more engaging4 ,most readers today1 for example1 prefer ,bernal ,daz del ,castillo's ,true ,history of the ,conquest of ,new ,spain to ,solis's ,history of the ,conquest of ,mexico4 ,one is the book of a soldier1 who had a share in the deeds described1 and who reveals himself for what he is1 with all his prejudices1 vanities and arrogance2 the other is a scholar's attempt to imitate a classic history and to maintain a monotonous music throughout his paragraphs4 ,practically all the historians who have followed the ,french ,revolution have individual character1 and some have too much of it1 as has ,carlyle4 ,they distort their subject until it becomes a pure matter of fantasy1 or mere literature1 or sinks even to the level of a family discussion4 ,macaulay's moral pedantry1 ,thiers's cold and repulsive cretinism1 the melodramatic1 gesticulatory effusiveness of ,michelet are all typical styles4 ,historical bazaars la ,cesare ,cant may be put on one side1 as belonging to an inferior genre4 ,they remind me of those great nineteenth century world's fairs1 vast1 miscellaneous and exhausting4 ,as for the ,german historians1 they are not translated1 so ,i do not know them4 ,i have read only a few essays of ,simmel1 which ,i think extremely keen1 and ,stewart ,chamberlain's book upon the foundations of the nineteenth century1 which1 if the word ,france were to be substituted for the word ,germany1 might easily have been the production of an advanced nationalist of the ,action ,franaise4 ,,vii ,,my ,,family ,,family ,,mythology ,the celebrated ,vicomte de ,chateaubriand1 after flaunting an ancestry of princes and kings in his ,memoires d'outre-tombe1 then turns about and tells us that he attaches no importance to such matters4 ,i shall do the same4 ,i intend to furbish up our family history and mythology1 and then ,i shall assert that ,i attach no importance to them4 ,and1 what is more1 ,i shall be telling the truth4 ,my researches into the life of ,aviraneta ,footnote3 ,a kinsman of ,baroja and protagonist of his series of historical novels under the general title of ,memoirs of a ,man of ,action4 have drawn me of late to the genealogical field1 and ,i have looked into my family1 which is equivalent to compounding with tradition and even with reaction4 ,i have unearthed three family myths3 the ,goi myth1 the ,zornoza myth1 and the ,alzate myth4 ,the ,goi myth1 vouched for by an aunt of mine who died in ,san ,sebastian at an age of ninety or more1 established1 according to her1 that she was a descendant of ,don ,teodosio de ,goi1 a ,navarrese caballero who lived in the time of ,witiza1 and who1 after killing his father and mother at the instigation of the devil1 betook himself to ,mount ,aralar wearing an iron ring about his neck1 and dragging a chain behind him1 thus pilloried to do penance4 ,one day1 a terrible dragon appeared before him during a storm4 ,don ,teodosio lifted up his soul unto ,god1 and thereupon the ,archangel ,saint ,michael revealed himself to him1 in his dire extremity1 and broke his chains1 in commemoration of which event ,don ,teodosio caused to be erected the chapel of ,san ,miguel in ,excelsis on ,mount ,aralar4 ,there were those who endeavoured to convince my aunt that in the time of this supposititious ,don ,teodosio1 which was the early part of the eighth century1 surnames had not come into use in the ,basque country1 and even1 indeed1 that there were at that time no ,christians there--in short they maintained that ,don ,teodosio was a solar myth2 but they were not able to convince my aunt4 ,she had seen the chapel of ,san ,miguel on ,aralar1 and the cave in which the dragon lived1 and a document wherein ,charles ,v4 granted to ,juan de ,goi the privilege of renaming his house the ,palace of ,san ,miguel1 as well as of adding a dragon to his coat of arms1 besides a cross in a red field1 and a broken chain4 ,the ,zornoza myth was handed down through my paternal grandmother of that name4 ,i remember having heard this lady say when ,i was a child1 that her family might be traced in a direct line to the chancellor ,pero ,lpez de ,ayala1 and1 ,i know not through what lateral branches1 also to ,st4 ,francis ,xavier4 ,my grandmother vouched for the fact that her father had sold the documents and parchments in which these details were set forth1 to a titled personage from ,madrid4 ,the ,zornozas boast an escutcheon which is embellished with a band1 a number of wolves1 and a legend whose import ,i do not recall4 ,indeed1 wolves occur in all the escutcheons of the ,baroja1 ,alzate and ,zornoza families1 in so far as ,i have been able to discover1 and ,i take them to be more or less authentic4 ,we have wolves passant1 wolves rampant1 and wolves mordant4 ,the ,goi escutcheon also displays hearts4 ,if ,i become rich1 which ,i do not anticipate1 ,i shall have wolves and hearts blazoned on the doors of my dazzling automobile1 which will not prevent me from enjoying myself hugely inside of it4 ,turning to the ,alzate myth1 it too runs back to antiquity and the primitive struggles of rival families of ,navarre and ,labourt4 ,the ,alzates have been lords of ,vera ever since the fourteenth century4 ,the legend of the ,alzates of ,vera de ,navarra relates that one ,don ,rodrigo1 master of the village in the fifteenth century1 fell in love with a daughter of the house of ,urtubi1 in ,france1 near ,urrua1 and married her4 ,don ,rodrigo went to live in ,urtubi and became so thoroughly gallicized that he never cared to return to ,spain1 so the people of ,vera banded together1 dispossessed him of his honours and dignity1 and sequestrated his lands4 ,in the early part of the nineteenth century1 my great-grandfather1 ,sebastin ,ignacio de ,alzate1 was among those who assembled at ,zubieta in #ahac to take part in the rebuilding of ,san ,sebastian1 and this great-grandfather was uncle to ,don ,eugenio de ,aviraneta1 a good relative of mine1 protagonist of my latest books4 ,st4 ,francis ,xavier1 ,don ,teodosio de ,goi1 ,pero ,lpez de ,ayala1 ,aviraneta--a saint1 a revered worthy1 an historian1 a conspirator--these are our family gods4 ,now let me take my stand with ,chateaubriand as attaching no importance to such things4 ,,our ,,history ,baroja is a hamlet in the province of ,alava in the district of ,peacerrada4 ,according to ,fernndez ,guerra1 it is an ,iberian name derived from ,asiatic ,iberia4 ,i believe that ,i have read in ,campin that the word ,baroja is compounded from the ,celtic bar1 meaning mountain1 and the ,basque otza1 ocha meaning cold4 ,in short1 a cold mountain4 ,the district of ,peacerrada1 which includes ,baroja1 is an austere land1 covered with intricate mountain ranges which are clad with trees and scrub live oaks4 ,hawks abound4 ,in his treatise on falconry1 ,ziga mentions the ,bahari falcon1 propagated principally among the mountains of ,peacerrada4 ,my ancestors originally called themselves ,martnez de ,baroja4 ,one ,martn had a son who was known as ,martnez4 ,this ,martnez 7son of ,martn7 doubtless left the village1 and as there were others of the name ,martnez 7sons of ,martn71 they dubbed him the ,martnez of ,baroja1 or ,martnez de ,baroja4 ,the ,martnez de ,barojas lived in that country for many years2 they were hidalgos1 ,christians of old stock4 ,and there is still a family of the name in ,peacerrada4 ,one ,martnez de ,baroja1 by name ,juan1 who lived in the village of ,samiano1 upon becoming outraged because of an attempt to force him to pay tribute to the ,count of ,salinas--in those days a very natural source of offence--took an appeal in the year #afaf from a ruling of the ,prosecuting ,attorney of ,his ,majesty and the ,alcaldes and ,regidors of the ,earldom of ,trevio1 and he was sustained by the ,chamber of ,hidalgos at ,valladolid1 which decided in his favour in a decree dated the eighth day of the month of ,august1 #afai4 ,this same hidalgo1 ,juan ,martnez de ,baroja1 moved the enforcement of this decree1 as is affirmed by a writ of execution which is inscribed on forty-five leaves of parchment1 to which is attached a leaden seal pendant from a cord of silk1 at the end of which may be found the stipulations of the judgment entered against the ,municipality and ,corporation of the ,town and ,earldom of ,trevio and the ,village of ,samiano4 ,the ,martnez de ,barojas1 despite the fact that they sprang from the land of the falcon and the hawk1 in temper must have been dark1 heavy1 rough4 ,they were members of the ,brotherhood of ,san ,martn de ,peacerrada1 which apparently was of great account in those regions1 besides being regidors and alcaldes of the ,santa ,hermandad1 a rural police and judicial organization which extended throughout the country4 ,in the eighteenth century1 one of the family1 my great-grandfather ,rafael1 doubtless possessing more initiative1 or having more of the hawk in him than the others1 grew tired of ploughing up the earth1 and left the village1 turning pharmacist1 setting up in #ahjc at ,oyarzun1 in ,guipzcoa4 ,this ,rafael shortened his name and signed himself ,rafael de ,baroja4 ,don ,rafael must have been a man of modern sympathies1 for he bought a printing press and began to issue pamphlets and even occasional books4 ,evidently ,don ,rafael was also a man of radical ideas4 ,he published a newspaper at ,san ,sebastian in #ahbb and #ahbc1 which he called ,el ,liberal ,guipzcoano4 ,i have seen only one copy of this1 and that was in the ,national ,library4 ,that this newspaper was extremely liberal1 may be judged by the articles that were reprinted from it in ,el ,espectador1 the ,masonic journal published at ,madrid during the period4 ,don ,rafael had connections both with constitutionalists and members of the ,gallic party4 ,there must have been antecedents of a liberal character in our family1 as ,don ,rafael's uncle1 ,don ,juan ,jos de ,baroja1 at first a priest at ,pipaon and later at ,vitoria1 had been enrolled in the ,basque ,sociedad ,econmica4 ,don ,rafael had two sons1 ,ignacio ,ramn and ,po4 ,they settled in ,san ,sebastian as printers4 ,po was my grandfather4 ,my second family name1 ,nessi1 as ,i have said before1 comes out of ,lombardy and the city of ,como4 ,the ,nessis of ,como fled from ,austrian rule1 and came to ,spain1 probably peddling mousetraps and santi boniti barati4 ,one of the ,nessis1 who survived until a short time ago1 always said that the family had been very comfortably off in ,lombardy1 where one of his relatives1 ,guiseppe ,nessi1 a doctor1 had been professor in the ,university of ,pavia during the eighteenth century1 besides being major in the ,austrian ,army4 ,as mementos of the ,italian branch of the family1 ,i still preserve a few views of ,lake ,como in my house1 a crude image of the ,christ of the ,annunziatta1 stamped on cloth1 and a volume of a treatise on surgery by ,nessi1 which bears the imprimatur of the ,inquisition at ,venice4 ,,viii ,,memories ,,of ,,childhood ,,san ,,sebastian ,i was born in ,san ,sebastian on the #bhth of ,december1 #ahgb4 ,so ,i am not only a ,guipzcoan but a native of ,san ,sebastian4 ,the former ,i regard as an honour1 but the latter means very little to me4 ,i should prefer to have been born in a mountain hamlet or in a small coast town1 rather than in a city of summer visitors and hotel keepers4 ,garat1 who was a most conventional person who lived in ,bayonne1 always used to maintain that he came from ,ustariz4 ,i might say that ,i am from ,vera del ,bidasoa1 but ,i should not deceive myself4 ,there are several reasons why ,i dislike ,san ,sebastian3 ,in the first place1 the city is not beautiful1 when it might well be so4 ,it is made up of straight streets which are all alike1 together with two or three monuments that are horrible4 ,the general construction is miserable and shoddy4 ,although excellent stone abounds in the neighbourhood1 no one has had the sense to erect anything either noble or dignified4 ,cheap houses confront the eye on all sides1 whether simple or pretentious4 ,whenever the citizens of ,san ,sebastian raise their hands--and in this they are abetted by the ,madrileos--they do something ugly4 ,they have defaced ,monte ,igueldo already1 and now they are defacing the ,castillo4 ,tomorrow1 they will manage somehow to spoil the sea1 the sky1 and the air4 ,as for the spirit of the city1 it is lamentable4 ,there is no interest in science1 art1 literature1 history1 politics1 or anything else4 ,all that the inhabitants think about are the ,king1 the ,queen ,regent1 yachts1 bull fights1 and the latest fashions in trousers4 ,san ,sebastian is a conglomeration of parvenus and upstarts from ,pamplona1 ,saragossa1 ,valladolid1 ,chile and ,chuquisaca1 who are anxious to show themselves off4 ,some do this by walking alongside of the ,king1 or by taking coffee with a famous bull-fighter1 or by bowing to some aristocrat4 ,the young men of ,san ,sebastian are among the most worthless in ,spain4 ,i have always looked upon them as infra human4 ,as for the ladies1 many of them might be taken for princesses in summer1 but their winter tertulias are on a level with a porter's lodge where they play julepe4 ,it is a card game1 but the word means dose1 and ,madame ,recamier would have fainted at the mention of it4 ,when ,i observe these parvenus' attempts to shine1 ,i think to myself3 ,the ostentation of the freshman year at college4 ,how unfortunate that some of us have moved on to the doctorate6 ,no one reads in ,san ,sebastian4 ,they run over the society news1 and then drop the paper for fear their brains will begin to smoke4 ,this city1 imagining itself to be so cultivated1 although it really is a new town1 is under the domination of a few ,jesuit fathers1 who1 like most of the present days sons of ,loyola1 are coarse1 heavy and wholly lacking in real ability4 ,the ,jesuit manages the women1 which is not a very difficult thing to do1 as he holds the leading strings of the sexual life in his hands4 ,in addition he influences the men4 ,he assists the young who are of good social standing1 who belong to distinguished families1 and brings about desirable matches4 ,the poor can do anything they like4 ,they are at liberty to eat1 to get drunk1 to do whatever they will except to read4 ,these unhappy1 timid1 torpid clerks and hangers-on imagine they are free men whenever they get drunk4 ,they do not see that they are like the ,redskins1 whom the ,yankees poisoned with alcohol so as to hold them in check4 ,i inspected a club installed in a house in the older part of the city some years ago4 ,a sign on one door read ,library4 ,when it was opened1 ,i was shown1 laughing1 a room filled with bottles4 ,if a ,jesuit could see this1 he would be in ecstasy1 ,i exclaimed4 ,yes1 replacing books with wines and liquors6 ,what a business for the sons of ,saint ,ignatius6 ,in spite of all its display1 all its tinsel1 all its ,jesuitism1 all its bad taste1 ,san ,sebastian will become an important1 dignified city within a very few years4 ,when that time comes1 the author who has been born there1 will not prefer to hail from some hamlet buried in the mountains1 rather than from the capital of ,guipzcoa4 ,but ,i myself prefer it4 ,i have no city1 and ,i hold myself to be strictly extra-urban4 ,,my ,,parents ,my father1 ,serafn ,baroja y ,zornoza1 was a mining engineer1 who wrote books both in ,castilian and ,basque1 and he1 too1 came from ,san ,sebastian4 ,my mother's name is ,carmen ,nessi y ,goi4 ,she was born in ,madrid4 ,i should be a very good man4 ,my father was a good man1 although he was capricious and arbitrary1 and my mother is a good woman1 firmer and more positive in her manifestations of virtue4 ,yet1 ,i am not without reputation for ferocity1 which1 perhaps1 is deserved4 ,i do not know why ,i believed for a long while that ,i had been born in the ,calle del ,puyuelo in ,san ,sebastian1 where we once lived4 ,the street is well within the old town1 and truly ugly and forlorn4 ,the mere idea of it was and is distasteful to me4 ,when ,i complained to my mother about my birthplace and its want of attractiveness1 she replied that ,i was born in a beautiful house near the esplanade of ,la ,zurriola1 fronting on the ,calle de ,oquendo1 which belonged to my grandmother and looked out upon the sea1 although the house does so no longer1 as a theatre has been erected directly in front4 ,i am glad that ,i was born near the sea1 because it suggests freedom and change4 ,my paternal grandmother1 ,doa ,concepcin ,zornoza1 was a woman of positive ideas and somewhat eccentric4 ,she was already old when ,i knew her4 ,she had mortgaged several houses which she owned in the city in order to build the house which was occupied by us in ,la ,zurriola4 ,her plan was to furnish it and rent it to ,king ,amadeo4 ,before ,amadeo arrived at ,san ,sebastian1 however1 the ,carlist war broke out1 and the monarch of the house of ,savoy was compelled to abdicate1 and my grandmother to abandon her plans4 ,my earliest recollection is the ,carlist attempt to bombard ,san ,sebastian4 ,it is a memory which has now grown very dim1 and what ,i saw has been confused with what ,i have heard4 ,i have a confused recollection of the bringing in of soldiers on stretchers1 and of having peeped over the wall of a little cemetery near the city1 in which corpses were laid out1 still unburied4 ,as ,i have said1 my father was a mining engineer1 but during the war he was engaged in teaching natural history at the ,institute4 ,i have no idea how this came about4 ,he was also one of the ,liberal volunteers4 ,i have a vague idea that one night ,i was taken from my bed1 wrapped up in a mantle1 and carried to a chalet on the ,concha1 belonging to one ,errazu1 who was a relative of my mother's4 ,we lived there for a time in the cellar of the chalet4 ,three shells1 which were known in those days as cucumbers1 dropped on the house1 and wrecked the roof1 making a great hole in the wall which separated our garden from the next4 ,,monsignor1 ,,the ,,cat ,monsignor was a handsome yellow cat belonging to us while we were living in the cellar of ,seor ,errazu's chalet4 ,from what ,i have since learned1 his name was a tribute to the extraordinary reputation enjoyed at that period by ,monsignor ,simeoni4 ,monsignor--,i am referring to the yellow cat--was intelligent4 ,a bell surmounted the ,castillo de la ,mota at ,san ,sebastian1 by whose side was stationed a look-out4 ,when the look-out spied the flash of ,carlist guns1 he rang the bell1 and then the townspeople retired into the doorways and cellars4 ,monsignor was aware of the relation of the bell to the cannonading1 so when the bell rang1 he promptly withdrew into the house1 even going so far sometimes as to creep under the beds4 ,my father had friends who were not above going down into our cellar on such occasions so as better to observe the manoeuvres of the cat4 ,,two ,,lunatics ,after the war1 ,i used to stroll as a boy with my mother and brothers to the ,castillo de la ,mota on ,sundays4 ,it was truly a beautiful walk1 which will soon be ruined utterly by the citizens of ,san ,sebastian4 ,we looked out to sea from the ,castillo and then we talked with the guard4 ,we often met a lunatic there1 who was in the care of a servant4 ,as soon as he caught sight of us children1 the lunatic was happy at once1 but if a woman came near him1 he ran away and flattened himself against the walls1 kicking and crying out3 ,blind dog6 ,blind dog6 ,i remember also having seen a young woman1 who was insane1 in a great house which we used to visit in those days at ,loyola4 ,she gesticulated and gazed continually into a deep well1 where a half moon of black water was visible far below4 ,these lunatics1 one at the ,castillo and the other in that great house1 haunted my imagination as a child4 ,,the ,,hawk ,my latest recollection of ,san ,sebastian is of a hawk1 which we brought home to our house from the ,castillo4 ,some soldiers gave us the hawk when it was still very young1 and it grew up and became accustomed to living indoors4 ,we fed it snails1 which it gulped down as if they were bonbons4 ,when it was full-grown1 it escaped to the courtyard and attacked our chickens1 to say nothing of all the cats of the neighbourhood4 ,it hid under the beds during thundershowers4 ,when we moved away from ,san ,sebastian1 we were obliged to leave the hawk behind4 ,we carried him up to the ,castillo one day1 turned him loose1 and off he flew4 ,,in ,,madrid ,we moved from ,san ,sebastian to ,madrid4 ,my father had received an appointment to the ,geographic and ,political ,institute4 ,we lived on the ,calle ,real1 just beyond the ,glorieta de ,bilbao1 in a street which is now a prolongation of the ,calle de ,fuencarral4 ,opposite our house1 there was a piece of high ground1 which has not yet been removed1 which went by the name of ,la ,era del ,mico1 or ,the ,monkey ,field4 ,swings and merry-go-rounds were scattered all over it1 so that the diversions of ,la ,era del ,mico1 together with the two-wheeled calashes and chaises which were still in use in those days1 and the funerals passing continually through the street1 were the amusements which were provided ready-made for us1 as we looked down from our balcony4 ,two sensational executions took place while we lived here--those of the regicide ,otero and of ,oliva--one following closely on the heels of the other4 ,we heard the ,salve1 or prayer1 which is sung by the prisoners for the criminal awaiting death1 hawked about us then on the streets4 ,,in ,,pamplona ,from ,madrid we went to ,pamplona4 ,pamplona was still a curious city maintaining customs which would have been appropriate to a state of war4 ,the draw-bridges were raised at night1 only one1 or perhaps two1 gates being left open1 ,i am not certain which4 ,pamplona proved an amusing place for a small boy4 ,there were the walls with their glacis1 their sentry boxes1 their cannon2 there were the gates1 the river1 the cathedral and the surrounding quarters--all of them very attractive to us4 ,we studied at the ,institute and committed all sorts of pranks like the other students4 ,we played practical jokes in the houses of the canons1 and threw stones at the bishop's palace1 many of the windows of which were already paneless and forlorn4 ,we also made wild excursions to the roof of our house and to those of other houses in the neighbourhood1 prying about the garrets and peering down over the cornices into the courtyards4 ,once we seized a stuffed eagle1 cherished by a neighbour1 hauled it to the attic1 pulled it through the skylight to the roof1 and flung it down into the street1 creating a genuine panic among the innocent passers-by1 when they saw the huge bird drop at their feet4 ,one of my most vivid memories of ,pamplona is seeing a criminal on his way to execution passing our house1 attired in a round cap and yellow robe4 ,it was one of the sights which has impressed me most4 ,later in the afternoon1 driven by curiosity1 knowing that the man who had been garroted must be still on the scaffold1 ,i ventured alone to see him1 and remained there examining him closely for a long time4 ,when ,i returned home that night1 ,i was unable to sleep because of the impression he had made4 ,,don ,,tirso ,,larequi ,many other vivid memories of ,pamplona remain with me1 never to be forgotten4 ,i remember a lad of our own age who died1 leaping from the wall1 and then there were our adventures along the river4 ,another terrible memory was associated with the cathedral4 ,i had begun my first year of ,latin1 and was exactly nine at the time4 ,we had come out of the ,institute1 and were watching a funeral4 ,afterwards1 three or four of the boys1 among whom were my brother ,ricardo and myself1 entered the cathedral4 ,the echo of the responses was ringing in my ears and ,i hummed them1 as ,i wandered about the aisles4 ,suddenly1 a black shadow shot from behind one of the confessionals1 pounced upon me and seized me around the neck with both hands1 almost choking me4 ,i was paralyzed with fear4 ,it proved to be a fat1 greasy canon1 by name ,don ,tirso ,larequi4 ,what is your name8 he shouted1 shaking me vigorously4 ,i could not answer because of my fright4 ,what is his name8 the priest demanded of the other boys4 ,his name is ,antonio ,garca1 replied my brother ,ricardo1 coolly4 ,where does he live8 ,in the ,calle de ,curia1 ,number #ad4 ,there was no such place1 of course4 ,i shall see your father at once1 shouted the priest1 and he rushed out of the cathedral like a bull4 ,my brother and ,i then made our escape through the cloister4 ,this red-faced priest1 fat and ferocious1 rushing out of the dark to choke a nine-year-old boy1 has always been to me a symbol of the ,catholic religion4 ,this experience of my boyhood partly explains my anti-clericalism4 ,i recall ,don ,tirso with an undying hate1 and were he still alive--,i have no idea whether he is or not--,i should not hesitate to climb up to the roof of his house some dark night1 and shout down his chimney in a cavernous voice3 ,don ,tirso6 ,you are a damned villain6 ,a ,,visionary ,,rowdy ,i was something of a rowdy as a boy and rather quarrelsome4 ,the first day ,i went to school in ,pamplona1 ,i came out disputing with another boy of my own age1 and we fought in the street until we were separated by a cobbler and the blows of a leather strap1 to which he added kicks4 ,later1 ,i foolishly quarrelled and fought whenever the other boys set me on4 ,in our stone-throwing escapades on the outskirts of the town1 ,i was always the aggressor1 and quite indefatigable4 ,when ,i began to study medicine1 ,i found that my aggressiveness had departed completely4 ,one day after quarrelling with another student in the cloisters of ,san ,carlos1 ,i challenged him to fight4 ,when we got out on the street1 it struck me as foolish to goad him to hit me in the eye or else to land on my nose with his fist1 and ,i slipped off and went home4 ,i lost my morale as a bully then and there4 ,although ,i was a fighter from infancy1 ,i was also something of a dreamer1 and the two strains scarcely make a harmonious blend4 ,before ,i was grown1 ,i saw ,gisbert's ,death of the ,comuneros reproduced as a chromo4 ,for a long1 long while1 ,i always seemed to see that picture hanging in all its variety of colour on the wall before me at night4 ,for months and months after my vigil with the body of the man who had been garroted outside of ,pamplona1 ,i never entered a dark room but that his image rose up before me in all its gruesome details4 ,i also passed through a period of disagreeable dreams4 ,some time would elapse after ,i awoke before ,i was able to tell where ,i was1 and ,i was frightened by it4 ,,sarasate ,it was my opinion then1 and still is1 that a fiesta at ,pamplona is among the most vapid things in the world4 ,there was a mixture of incomprehension and culture in ,pamplona1 that was truly ridiculous4 ,the people would devote several days to going to bull fights1 and then turn about1 when evening came1 and welcome ,sarasate with ,greek fire4 ,a rude and fanatical populace forgot its orgy of blood to acclaim a violinist4 ,and what a violinist6 ,he was one of the most effeminate and grotesque individuals in the world4 ,i can see him yet1 strutting along with his long hair1 his ample rear1 and his shoes with their little quarter-heels1 which gave him the appearance of a fat cook dressed up in men's clothes for ,carnival4 ,when ,sarasate died he left a number of trinkets which had been presented to him during his artistic career--mostly match-boxes1 cigarette cases1 and the like--which the ,town ,council of ,pamplona has assembled and now exhibits in glass cases1 but which1 in the public interest1 should be promptly disposed of at auction4 ,,robinson ,,crusoe ,,and ,,the ,,mysterious ,,island ,during my life in ,pamplona1 my brother ,ricardo imparted his enthusiasm for two stories to me4 ,these were ,robinson ,crusoe and ,jules ,verne's ,the ,mysterious ,island1 or rather1 ,i should say they were ,the ,mysterious ,island and ,robinson ,crusoe1 because we preferred ,jules ,verne's tale greatly to ,defoe's4 ,we would dream about desert islands1 about manufacturing electric batteries in the fashion of the engineer ,cyrus ,harding1 and as we were not very certain of finding any ,granite ,house during the course of our adventures1 ,ricardo would paint and paint at plans and elevations of houses which we hoped to construct in its place in those far-off1 savage lands4 ,he also made pictures of ships which we took care should be rigged properly4 ,there were two variations of this dream of adventure--one involving a snow-house1 with appropriate episodes such as nocturnal attacks by bears1 wolves1 and the like1 and then we planned a sea voyage4 ,i rebelled a long time at the notion that my life must be like that of everybody else1 but ,i had no recourse in the end but to capitulate4 ,,ix ,,as ,a ,,student ,i was never more than commonplace as a student1 inclining rather to be bad than good4 ,i had no great liking for study1 and1 to tell the truth1 ,i never entertained any clear idea of what ,i was studying4 ,for example1 ,i never knew what the word preterite meant until years after completing my course1 although ,i had repeated over and over again that the preterite1 or past perfect1 was thus1 while the imperfect was thus1 without having any conception that the word preterite meant past--that it was a past that was entirely past in the former case1 and a past that was past to a less degree in the latter4 ,to complete two years of ,latin grammar1 two of ,french1 and one of ,german without having any conception of what preterite meant1 demonstrated one of two things3 either my stupidity was very great1 or the system of instruction deplorable4 ,naturally1 ,i incline toward the second alternative4 ,while preparing to take my degree in medicine1 when ,i was studying chemical analysis1 ,i heard a student1 who was already a practising physician1 state that zinc was an element which contained a great deal of hydrogen4 ,when the professor attempted to extricate him from his difficulty1 it became apparent that the future doctor had no idea of what an element was4 ,my classmate1 who doubtless entertained as little liking for chemistry as ,i did for grammar1 had not been able throughout his entire course to grasp the definition of an element1 as ,i had never been able to comprehend what a preterite might be4 ,for my part--and ,i believe that all of us have had the same experience--,i have never been successful in mastering those subjects which have not interested me4 ,doubtless1 also1 my mental development has been slow4 ,as for memory1 ,i have always possessed very little4 ,and liking for study1 none whatever4 ,sacred history1 or any other history1 ,latin1 ,french1 rhetoric and natural history have interested me not at all4 ,the only subjects for which ,i cared somewhat1 were geometry and physics4 ,my college course left me with two or three ideas in my head1 whereupon ,i applied myself to making ready for my professional career1 as one swallows a bitter dose4 ,in my novel1 ,the ,tree of ,knowledge1 ,i have drawn a picture of myself1 in which the psychological features remain unchanged1 although ,i have altered the hero's environment1 as well as his family relations1 together with a number of details4 ,besides the defects with which ,i have endowed my hero in this book1 ,i was cursed with an instinctive slothfulness and sluggishness which were not to be denied4 ,people would tell me3 ,now is the time for you to study2 later on1 you will have leisure to enjoy yourself2 and after that will come the time to make money4 ,but ,i needed all three times in which to do nothing--and ,i could have used another three hundred4 ,,professors ,i have not been fortunate in my professors4 ,it might be urged that ,i have not been in a position1 being idle and sluggish1 to take advantage of their instruction4 ,i believe1 however1 that if they had been good teachers1 now that so many years have passed1 ,i should be able to acknowledge their merits4 ,i cannot remember a single teacher who knew how to teach1 or who succeeded in arousing any interest in what he taught1 or who had any comprehension of the student mentality4 ,no one learned how to reason in the schools of my youth1 nor mastered any theory1 nor acquired a practical knowledge of anything4 ,in other words1 we learned nothing4 ,in medicine1 the professors adhered to a system that was the most foolish imaginable4 ,in the two universities in which ,i studied1 subjects might be taken only by halves1 which would have been ridiculous enough in any branch1 but it was even more preposterous in medicine4 ,thus1 in pathology1 a certain number of intending physicians studied the subject of infection1 while others studied nervous disorders1 and yet others the diseases of the respiratory organs4 ,nobody studied all three4 ,a plan of this sort could only have been conceived by ,spanish professors1 who1 it may be said in general1 are the quintessence of vacuity4 ,what difference does it make whether the students learn anything or not8 every ,spanish professor asks himself continually4 ,unamuno says1 apropos of the backwardness of ,spaniards in the field of invention3 ,other nations can do the inventing4 ,in other words1 let foreigners build up the sciences1 so that we may take advantage of them4 ,there was one among my professors who considered himself a born teacher and1 moreover1 a man of genius1 and he was ,letamendi4 ,i made clear in my ,tree of ,knowledge what ,i thought of this professor1 who was not destitute1 indeed1 of a certain talent as an orator and man of letters4 ,when he wrote1 he was rococo1 like so many ,catalans4 ,sometimes he would discourse upon art1 especially upon painting1 in the class-room1 but the ideas he entertained were preposterous4 ,i recall that he once said that a mouse and a book were not a fit subject for a painting1 but if you were to write the words ,aristotle's ,works on the book1 and then set the mouse to gnawing at it1 what had originally meant nothing would immediately become a subject for a picture4 ,yes1 a picture to be hawked at the street fairs6 ,letamendi was prolixity and puerile ingenuity personified4 ,yet ,letamendi was no different from all other ,spaniards of his day1 including even the most celebrated1 such as ,castelar1 ,echegaray and ,valera4 ,these men read much1 they possessed good memories1 but ,i verily believe that1 honestly1 they understood nothing4 ,not one of them had an inkling of that almost tragic sense of the dignity of culture or of the obligations which it imposes1 which distinguishes the ,germans above all other nationalities4 ,they nearly all revealed an attitude toward science which would have sat easily upon a smart1 sharp-tongued ,andalusian young gentleman4 ,i recall a profoundly moving letter by the critic ,garve1 which is included in ,kant's ,prolegomena4 ,garve wrote an article upon ,the ,critique of ,pure ,reason1 and sent it to a journal at ,gttingen1 and the editor of the journal1 in malice and animosity toward ,kant1 so altered it that it became an attack on the philosopher1 and then published it unsigned4 ,kant invited his anonymous critic to divulge his name1 whereupon ,garve wrote to ,kant explaining what had taken place1 and ,kant made a reply4 ,it would be difficult to parallel in nobility these two letters1 which were exchanged between a comprehensive intellect such as ,garve and one of the most portentous geniuses of the world1 as was ,kant4 ,they appear to be two travellers1 face to face with the mystery of ,nature and the ,unknown4 ,no such feeling for learning and culture is to be met with among our miserably affected ,latin mountebanks4 ,,anti-,,militarism ,i am an anti-militarist by inheritance4 ,the ,basques have never been good soldiers in the regular army4 ,my great-grandfather ,nessi probably fled from ,italy as a deserter4 ,i have always loathed barracks1 messes1 and officers profoundly4 ,one day1 when ,i was studying therapeutics with ,don ,benito ,hernando1 my brother opened the door of the class-room and motioned for me to come out4 ,i did so1 at the cost1 by the way1 of a furious scene with ,don ,benito1 who shattered several test tubes in his wrath4 ,the cause of my brother's appearance was to advise me that the ,alcalda del ,centro1 or ,town ,council of the ,central ,district1 had given notice to the effect that if ,i did not present myself for the draft1 ,i was to be declared in default4 ,as ,i had already laid before the ,board a copy of a royal decree in which my name was set down as exempt from the draft because my father had served as a ,liberal ,volunteer in the late war1 and because1 in addition1 ,i was born in the ,basque provinces1 ,i had supposed that the matter had been disposed of4 ,one of those ill-natured1 dictatorial officials who held sway in the offices of the ,board1 took it upon himself to rule that the exemption held good only in the ,basque provinces1 but not in ,madrid1 and so1 in fact1 for the time it proved to be4 ,in spite of my furious protests1 ,i was compelled to report and submit to have my measurements taken1 and was well nigh upon the point of being marched off to the barracks4 ,i am no soldier1 ,i thought to myself4 ,if they insist1 ,i shall run away4 ,i went at once from the ,alcalda to the ,ministry and called upon a ,guipzcoan politician1 as my father had previously advised me to do2 but the man was a political mastodon1 puffed up with huge pretensions1 who1 perhaps1 might have been a stevedore in any other country4 ,so he did nothing4 ,finally1 it occurred to me to go and see the ,conde de ,romanones1 who had just been appointed ,alcalde del ,centro1 having jurisdiction over the district4 ,when ,i entered his office1 ,romanones appeared to be in a jovial frame of mind4 ,he wore a flower in his button-hole4 ,two persons were with him1 one of whom was no other than the ,secretary of the ,board1 my enemy4 ,i related what had happened to ,romanones with great force4 ,the ,secretary then answered4 ,the young man is right1 said the ,count4 ,bring me the roll of the draft4 ,the roll was brought4 ,romanones took his pen and crossed my name off altogether4 ,then he turned to me with a smile3 ,don't you care to be a soldier8 ,no1 sir4 ,but what are you1 a student8 ,yes1 sir4 ,in which branch8 ,medicine4 ,good6 ,very good4 ,you may go now4 ,i would willingly have been anything to have escaped becoming a soldier1 and so be obliged to live in barracks1 eat mess1 and parade4 ,,to ,,valencia ,i failed in both ,june and ,september during the fourth year of my course1 which was a mere matter of luck1 as ,i neither applied myself more nor less than in previous years4 ,in the meantime my father had been transferred to ,valencia1 whither it seemed wise that ,i should remove to continue my studies4 ,i appeared at ,valencia in ,january for a second examination in general pathology1 and failed for the second time4 ,i began to consider giving up my intended profession4 ,i found that ,i had lost what little liking ,i had for it4 ,as ,i had no friends in ,valencia1 ,i never left the house2 ,i had nowhere to go4 ,i passed my days stretched out on the roof1 or1 else1 in reading4 ,after debating long what ,i should do1 and realizing fully that there was no one obvious plan to pursue1 ,i determined to finish my course1 committing the required subjects mechanically4 ,after adopting this plan1 ,i never failed once4 ,when ,i came up for graduation1 the professors made an effort to put some obstacles in my way1 which1 however1 were not sufficient to detain me4 ,admitted as a physician1 ,i decided next to study for the doctor's degree at ,madrid4 ,my former fellow-students1 when they saw that now ,i was doing nicely1 all exclaimed3 ,how you have changed6 ,now you pass your examinations4 ,passing examinations1 you know1 is a combination1 like a gambling game1 ,i told them4 ,i have found a combination4 ,x ,,as ,a ,,village ,,doctor ,i returned to ,burjasot1 a small town near ,valencia1 where my family lived at the time1 a full-fledged doctor4 ,we had a tiny house1 besides a garden containing pear1 peach and pomegranate trees4 ,i passed some time there very pleasantly4 ,my father was a contributor to the ,voz de ,guipzcoa of ,san ,sebastian1 so he always received the paper4 ,one day ,i read--or it may have been one of the family--that the post of official physician was vacant in the town of ,cestona4 ,i decided to apply for the place1 and dispatched a letter accompanied by a copy of my diploma4 ,it turned out that ,i was the only applicant1 and so the post was awarded to me4 ,i set out for ,madrid1 where ,i passed the night1 and then proceeded to ,san ,sebastian1 receiving a letter from my father upon my arrival1 informing me that there was another physician at ,cestona who was receiving a larger salary than that which had been offered to me1 and recommending that perhaps it would be better not to put in appearance too soon1 until ,i was better advised as to the prospects4 ,i hesitated4 ,in any event1 ,i thought1 ,i shall learn what the town is like4 ,if ,i like it1 ,i shall stay2 if not1 ,i shall return to ,burjasot4 ,i took the diligence1 which goes by the name of ,la ,vascongada1 and made the trip from ,san ,sebastian to ,cestona1 which proved to be long enough in all conscience1 as we were five or six hours late4 ,i got off at a posada1 or small inn1 at ,alcorta1 to get something to eat4 ,i dined sumptuously1 drank bravely1 and1 encouraged by the good food1 made up my mind to remain in the village4 ,i talked with the other doctor and with the alcalde1 and soon everything was arranged that had to be arranged4 ,as night was coming on1 the priest and the doctor recommended that ,i go to board at the house of the ,sacristana1 as she had a room vacant1 which had formerly been occupied by a notary4 ,,dolores1 ,,la ,,sacristana ,dolores1 my landlady and mistress of the ,sacristy1 was an agreeable1 exceedingly energetic1 exceedingly hard-working woman1 who was a pronounced conservative4 ,i have met few women as good as she4 ,in spite of the fact that she soon discovered that ,i was not at all religious1 she did not hold it against me1 nor did ,i harbour any resentment against her4 ,i often read her the ,aalejo1 or church calendar1 which is known as the ,gallofa1 or beggars' mite1 in the northern provinces1 in allusion to the ancient custom of making pilgrimages to ,santiago1 and ,i cooked sugar wafers over the fire with her on the eve of feast days1 at which times her work was especially severe4 ,i realized in ,cestona my childish ambitions of having a house of my own1 and a dog1 which had lain in my mind ever since reading ,robinson ,crusoe and ,the ,mysterious ,island4 ,i also had an old horse named ,juanillo1 which ,i borrowed from a coachman in ,san ,sebastian1 but ,i never liked horses4 ,the horse seems to me to be a militaristic1 antipathetic animal4 ,neither ,robinson ,crusoe nor ,cyrus ,harding rode horse-back4 ,i committed no blunders while ,i was a village doctor4 ,i had already grown prudent1 and my sceptical temperament was a bar to any great mistakes4 ,i first began to realize that ,i was a ,basque in ,cestona1 and ,i recovered my pride of race there1 which ,i had lost4 ,,xi ,,as ,a ,,baker ,i have been asked frequently3 ,how did you ever come to go into the baking business8 ,i shall now proceed to answer the question1 although the story is a long one4 ,my mother had an aunt1 ,juana ,nessi1 who was a sister of her father's4 ,this lady was reasonably attractive when young1 and married a rich gentleman just returned from ,america1 whose name was ,don ,matas ,lacasa4 ,once settled in ,madrid1 ,don ,matas1 who deemed himself an eagle1 when1 in reality1 he was a common barnyard rooster1 embarked upon a series of undertakings that failed with truly extraordinary unanimity4 ,about #ahgj1 a physician from ,valencia by the name of ,mart1 who had visited ,vienna1 gave him an account of the bread they make there1 and of the yeast they use to raise it1 enlarging upon the profits which lay ready to hand in that line4 ,don ,matas was convinced1 and he bought an old house near the ,church of the ,descalzas upon ,mart's advice4 ,it stood in a street which boasted only one number--the number #b4 ,i believe the street was1 and still is1 called the ,calle de la ,misericordia4 ,mart set up ovens in the old building by the ,church of the ,descalzas1 and the business began to yield fabulous profits4 ,being a devotee of the life of pleasure1 ,mart died three or four years after the business had been established1 and ,don ,matas continued his gallinaceous evolutions until he was utterly ruined1 and had pawned everything he possessed1 remaining at last with the bakery as his only means of support4 ,he succeeded in entangling and ruining that1 too1 before he died4 ,my aunt then wrote my mother requesting that my brother ,ricardo come up to ,madrid4 ,my brother remained in ,madrid for some time1 when he grew tired and left2 then ,i went1 and later we were both there together1 making an effort to improve the business and to push it ahead4 ,times were bad3 there was no way of pushing ahead4 ,surely the proverb ,where flour is lacking1 everything goes packing1 could never have been applied with more truth4 ,and we could get no flour4 ,when the bakery was just about to do better1 the ,conde de ,romanones1 who was our landlord in those days1 notified us that the building was to be torn down4 ,then our troubles began4 ,we were obliged to move elsewhere1 and to undertake alterations1 for which money was indispensable1 but we had no money4 ,in that predicament1 we began to speculate upon the ,exchange1 and the ,exchange proved a kind mother to us2 it sustained us until we were on our feet again4 ,as soon as we had established ourselves upon another site1 we proceeded to lose money1 so we withdrew4 ,it is not surprising1 therefore1 that ,i have always regarded the ,stock ,exchange as a philanthropic institution1 or that1 on the other hand1 a church has always seemed a sombre place in which a black priest leaps forth from behind a confessional to seize one by the throat in the dark1 and to throttle him4 ,,my ,,father',s ,,disillusionment ,my father was endowed with a due share of the romantic fervour which distinguished men of his epoch1 and set great store by friendship4 ,more particularly1 he was wrapped up in his friends in ,san ,sebastian4 ,when we discovered that we were in trouble1 before throwing ourselves into the loving arms of the ,bourse1 my father spoke to two intimate friends of his who were from ,san ,sebastian4 ,they made an appointment to meet me in the ,caf ,suizo4 ,i explained the situation to them1 after which they made me certain propositions1 which were so usurious1 so outrageously extortionate1 that they took my breath away4 ,they offered to advance us the money we needed for fifty per cent of the gross receipts1 while we were to meet the running expenses out of our fifty per cent1 receiving no compensation whatever for our services in taking care of the business4 ,i was astonished1 and naturally did not accept4 ,the episode was a great blow to my father4 ,i frequently came face to face with one of our friends at a later date1 but ,i never bowed to him4 ,he was offended4 ,i was tempted to approach him and say3 ,the reason that ,i do not bow to you is because ,i know you are a rascal4 ,if either of these friends of ours were alive1 ,i should proceed to mention their names1 but1 as they are dead1 it will serve no useful purpose4 ,,industry ,,and ,,democracy ,the bakery has been brandished against me in literature4 ,when ,i first wrote1 it was said3 ,this ,baroja is a crusty fellow2 naturally1 he is a baker4 ,a certain picturesque academician1 who was also a dramatist1 and given to composing stupendous quintillas and cuartetas in his day1 which1 despite their flatness1 were received with applause1 had the inspiration to add3 ,all this modernism has been cooked up in ,baroja's oven4 ,even the ,catalans lost no time in throwing the fact of my being a baker in my face1 although they are a commercial1 manufacturing people4 ,whether calico is nobler than flour1 or flour than calico1 ,i am not sure1 but the subject is one for discussion1 as ,maeztu would have it4 ,i am an eclectic myself on this score4 ,i prefer flour in the shape of bread with my dinner1 but cloth will go further with a man who desires to appear well in public4 ,when ,i was serving upon the ,town ,council1 an anonymous publication entitled ,masks ,off1 printed the following among other gems3 ,po ,baroja is a man of letters who runs a bake-shop4 ,a ,madrid critic recently declared in an ,american periodical that ,i had two personalities3 one that of a writer and the other of a baker4 ,he was solicitous to let me know later that he intended no harm4 ,but if ,i should say to him3 ,mr4 ,so and ,so is a writer who is excellently posted upon the value of cloth1 as his father sold dry-goods1 it would appeal to his mind as bad taste4 ,another journalist paid his respects to me some months ago in ,el ,parlamentario1 saying ,i baked rolls1 oppressed the people1 and sucked the blood of the workingman4 ,it would appear to be more demeaning to own a small factory or a shop1 according to the standards of both literary and non-literary circles1 than it is to accept money from the corruption funds of the ,government1 or bounties from the exchequers of foreign ,embassies4 ,when ,i hear talk nowadays about the dues of the common people1 my propensity to laugh is so great that ,i am apprehensive that my end may be like that of the ,greek philosopher in ,diogenes ,laertius1 who died of laughter because he saw an ass eating figs4 ,,the ,,vexations ,,of ,a ,,small ,,tradesman ,the trials and tribulations of the literary life1 its feuds and its backbitings are a common topic of conversation4 ,however1 ,i have never experienced anything of the kind in literature4 ,the trouble with literature is that there is very little money in it1 which renders the writer's existence both mean and precarious4 ,nothing compares for vexation with the life of the petty tradesman1 especially when that tradesman is a baker4 ,upon occasion1 ,i have repeated to my friends the series of outrages to which we were obliged to submit1 in particular at the hands of the municipal authorities4 ,sometimes it was through malice1 but more often through sheer insentient imbecility4 ,when my brother and ,i moved to the new site1 we drew up a plan and submitted it to the ,ayuntamiento1 or ,city ,government4 ,a clerk discovered that no provision had been made for a stall for a mule to run the kneading machine1 and so rejected it4 ,when we learned that our application had not been granted1 we inquired the reason and explained to the clerk that no provision had been made for the mule because we had no mule1 as our kneading machine was operated by an electric motor4 ,that makes no difference1 no difference whatever1 replied the clerk with the importance and obtuseness of the bureaucrat4 ,the ordinance requires that there be a stall for one4 ,another of the thousand instances of official barbarity was perpetrated at our expense while ,snchez de ,toca was ,alcalde4 ,this gentleman is a ,siamese twin of ,maura's when it comes to garrulousness and muddy thinking1 and he had resolved to do away with the distribution of bread by public delivery1 and to license only deliveries by private bakeries4 ,the order was arbitrary enough1 but the manner in which it was put into effect was a masterpiece4 ,it was reported that plates bearing license numbers would be given out at the ,ayuntamiento to the delivery men from the bakeries4 ,so we repaired to the ,ayuntamiento and questioned a clerk3 ,where do they give out the numbers8 ,there are no numbers4 ,what will happen tomorrow then1 when we make our deliveries8 ,how do ,i know8 ,the next day when the delivery men began their rounds1 a policeman accosted them3 ,have you your numbers8 ,no1 sir2 they are not ready yet4 ,well1 come with me then1 to the police station4 ,and that was the last of our bread4 ,the ,caid of ,mechuar in ,morocco favoured his subjects in some such fashion several years since1 but the ,moors1 being men of spirit1 fell on him one day1 and left him at death's door on a dung heap4 ,meanwhile1 ,snchez de ,toca continues to talk nonsense in these parts1 and is considered by some to be one of the bulwarks of the country4 ,i could spin many a tale of tyranny in high places1 and almost as many1 no doubt1 of the pettinesses of workingmen4 ,but what is the good8 ,why stir up my bile8 ,in progressive incarnations1 ,i have now passed through those of baker and petty tradesman4 ,i am no longer an employer who exploits the workingman1 nor can ,i see that ,i ever did so4 ,if ,i have exploited workers merely because ,i employed them1 all that was some time ago4 ,i support myself by my writings now1 although it is quite proper to state that ,i live on very little4 ,,xii ,,as ,a ,,writer ,my pre-literary career was three-fold3 ,i was a student for eight years1 during two a village doctor1 and for six more a baker4 ,these having elapsed1 being already close upon thirty1 ,i began to write4 ,my new course was a wise one4 ,it was the best thing that ,i could have done2 anything else would have annoyed me more and have pleased me less4 ,i have enjoyed writing1 and ,i have made some money1 although not much1 yet it has been sufficient to enable me to travel1 which otherwise ,i should not have been able to do4 ,the first considerable sum which ,i received was upon the publication of my novel ,the ,mayorazgo of ,labraz4 ,henrich of ,barcelona paid me two thousand pesetas for it4 ,i invested the two thousand pesetas in a speculation upon the ,bourse1 and they disappeared in two weeks4 ,the money which ,i have received for my other books1 ,i have employed to better purpose4 ,,bohemia ,i have never been a believer in the absurd myth called ,bohemia4 ,the idea of living gaily and irresponsibly in ,madrid1 or in any other ,spanish city1 without taking thought for the morrow1 is so preposterous that it passes comprehension4 ,bohemia is utterly false in ,paris and ,london1 but in ,spain1 where life is difficult1 it is even more of a cheat4 ,bohemia is not only false1 it is contemptible4 ,it suggests to me a minor ,christian sect1 of the most inconsequential degree1 nicely calculated for the convenience of hangers on at cafs4 ,henri ,murger was the son of the wife of a concirge4 ,of course1 this would not have mattered had his outlook upon life not been that of the son of the wife of a concirge4 ,,our ,,own ,,generation ,the beginner in letters makes his way up1 as a rule1 amid a literary environment which is distinguished by reputations and hierarchies1 all respected by him4 ,but this was not the case with the young writers of my day4 ,during the years #ahih to #aijj1 a number of young men suddenly found themselves thrown together in ,madrid1 whose only rule was the principle that the immediate past did not exist for them4 ,this aggregation of authors and artists might have seemed to have been brought together under some leadership1 and to have been directed to some purpose2 yet one who entertained such an assumption would have been mistaken4 ,chance brought us together for a moment1 a very brief moment1 to be followed by a general dispersal4 ,there were days when thirty or forty young men1 apprentices in the art of writing1 sat around the tables in the old ,caf de ,madrid4 ,doubtless such gatherings of new men1 eager to interfere in and to influence the operations of the social system1 yet without either the warrant of tradition or any proved ability to do so1 are common upon a larger scale in all revolutions4 ,as we neither had1 nor could have had1 in the nature of the case1 a task to perform1 we soon found that we were divided into small groups1 and finally broke up altogether4 ,,azor,n ,a few days after the publication of my first book1 ,sombre ,lives1 ,miguel ,poveda1 who was responsible for printing it1 sent a copy to ,martnez ,ruiz1 who was at that time in ,monvar4 ,martnez ,ruiz wrote me a long letter concerning the book by return mail2 on the following day he sent another4 ,poveda handed me the letters to read and ,i was filled with surprise and joy4 ,some weeks later1 returning from the ,national ,library1 ,martnez ,ruiz1 whom ,i knew by sight1 came up to me on the ,recoletos4 ,are you ,baroja8 he asked4 ,yes4 ,i am ,martnez ,ruiz4 ,we shook hands and became friends4 ,in those days we travelled about the country together1 we contributed to the same papers1 and the ideas and the men we attacked were the same4 ,later1 ,azorn became an enthusiastic partisan of ,maura1 which appeared to me particularly absurd1 as ,i have never been able to see anything but an actor of the grand style in ,maura1 a man of small ideas4 ,next he became a partisan of ,la ,cierva1 which was as bad in my opinion as being a ,maurista4 ,i am unable to say at the moment whether he is contemplating any further transformations4 ,but1 whether he is or not1 ,azorn will always remain a master of language to me1 besides an excellent friend who has a weakness for believing all men to be great who talk in a loud voice and who pull their cuffs down out of their coat sleeves with a grand gesture whenever they appear upon the platform4 ,,paul ,,schmitz ,another friendship which ,i found stimulating was that of ,paul ,schmitz1 a ,swiss from ,basle1 who had come to ,madrid because of some weakness of the lungs1 spending three years among us in order to rehabilitate himself4 ,schmitz had studied in ,switzerland and in ,germany1 and also had lived for a long time in the north of ,russia4 ,he was familiar with what in my judgment are the two most interesting countries of ,europe4 ,paul ,schmitz was a timid person of an inquiring turn of mind1 whose youth had been tempestuous4 ,i made a number of excursions with ,schmitz to ,toledo1 to ,el ,paular and to the ,springs of ,urbin2 a year or two later we visited ,switzerland several times together4 ,schmitz was like an open window through which ,i looked out upon an unknown world4 ,i held long conversations with him upon life1 literature1 art and philosophy4 ,i recall that ,i took him one ,sunday afternoon to the home of ,don ,juan ,valera4 ,when ,schmitz and ,i arrived1 ,valera had just settled down for the afternoon to listen to his daughter1 who was reading aloud one of the latest novels of ,zola4 ,valera1 ,schmitz and ,i sat chatting for perhaps four or five hours4 ,there was no subject that we could all agree upon4 ,valera and ,i were no sooner against the ,swiss than the ,swiss and ,valera were against me1 or the ,swiss and ,i against ,valera1 and then each flew off after his own opinion4 ,valera1 who saw that the ,swiss and ,i were anarchists1 said it was beyond his comprehension how any man could conceive of a state of general well being4 ,do you mean to say that you believe1 he said to me1 that there will ever come a time when every man will be able to set a bowl of oysters from ,arcachn upon his table and top it off with a bottle of champagne of first-rate vintage1 besides having a woman sitting beside him in a ,worth gown8 ,no1 no1 ,don ,juan1 ,i replied4 ,in the eyes of the anarchist1 oysters1 champagne1 and ,worth are mere superstitions1 myths to which we attach no importance4 ,we do not spend our time dreaming about oysters1 while champagne is not nectar to our tastes4 ,all that we ask is to live well1 and to have those about us live well also4 ,we could not convince each other4 ,when ,schmitz and ,i left ,valera's house it was already night1 and we found ourselves absorbed in his talents and his limitations4 ,,ortega ,y ,,gasset ,ortega y ,gasset impresses me as a traveller who has journeyed through the world of culture4 ,he moves upon a higher level1 which it is difficult to reach1 and upon which it is still more difficult to maintain oneself4 ,it may be that ,ortega has no great sympathy for my manner of living1 which is insubordinate2 it may be that ,i look with unfriendly eye upon his ambitious and aristocratic sympathies2 nevertheless1 he is a master who brings glad news of the unknown--that is1 of the unknown to us4 ,doctor ,san ,martn was fond of telling how he was sitting one day upon a bench in the ,retiro1 reading4 ,are you reading a novel8 inquired a gentleman1 sitting down beside him4 ,no1 ,i am studying4 ,what6 ,studying at your age8 exclaimed the gentleman1 amazed4 ,the same remark might be made to me3 ,what6 ,sitting under a master at your age8 ,as far as ,i am concerned1 every man who knows more than ,i do is my master4 ,i know very well that philosophy and metaphysics are nothing to the great mass of physicians who pick up their science out of foreign reviews1 adding nothing themselves to what they read2 nor1 for that matter1 are they to most ,spanish engineers1 who are skilled in doing sufficiently badly today what was done in ,england and ,germany very well thirty years ago2 and the same thing is true of the apothecaries4 ,the practical is all that these people concede to exist1 but how do they know what is practical8 ,considering the matter from the practical point of view1 there can be no doubt but that civilization has attained a high development wherever there have been great metaphysicisms1 and then with the philosophers have come the inventors1 who between them are the glory of mankind4 ,unamuno despises inventors1 but in this case it is his misfortune4 ,it is far easier for a nation which is destitute of a tradition of culture to improvise an histologist or a physicist1 than a philosopher or a real thinker4 ,ortega y ,gasset1 the only approach to a philosopher whom ,i have ever known1 is one of the few ,spaniards whom it is interesting to hear talk4 ,a ,,pseudo-,,patron ,although a man may never have amounted to anything1 and will probably continue in much the same case1 that is to say never amounting to anything1 yet there are persons who will take pride in having given him his start in the world--in short1 upon having made him known4 ,seor ,ruiz ,contreras has set up some such absurd claim in regard to me4 ,according to ,ruiz ,contreras1 he brought me into public notice through a review which he published in #ahii1 under the title ,revista ,nueva4 ,thus1 according to ,ruiz ,contreras1 ,i am known1 and have been for eighteen years6 ,although it may seem scarcely worth while to expose such an obvious joke1 ,i should like to clear up this question for the benefit of any future biographers4 ,why should ,i not indulge the hope of having them8 ,in #ahii1 ,ruiz ,contreras invited my co-operation in a weekly magazine1 in which ,i was to be both stockholder and editor4 ,those days already seem a long way off4 ,at first ,i refused1 but he insisted2 at length we agreed that ,i should write for the magazine and share in meeting the expenses1 in company with ,ruiz ,contreras1 ,reparaz1 ,lassalle and the novelist ,matheu4 ,i made two or three payments1 and moved down some of my pictures and furniture to the office in consequence1 until the time came when ,i began to feel that it was humorous for me to be paying for publishing my articles1 when ,i was perfectly well able to dispose of them to any other sheet4 ,upon my cutting off payments1 ,ruiz ,contreras informed me that a number of the stockholders1 among whom was ,icaza1 who had replaced ,reparaz1 took the position that if ,i did not pay1 ,i should not be permitted to write for the magazine4 ,very well1 ,i shall not write4 ,and ,i ceased to write4 ,previous to my connection with the ,revista ,nueva1 ,i had contributed articles to ,el ,liberal1 ,el ,pais1 ,el ,globo1 ,la ,justicia1 and ,la ,voz de ,guipzcoa1 as well as to other publications4 ,a year after my contributions to the ,revista ,nueva1 ,i brought out ,sombre ,lives1 which scarcely sold one hundred copies1 and1 then1 a little later1 ,the ,house of ,aizgorri1 the sale of which fell short of fifty4 ,at this time1 ,martnez ,ruiz published a comedy1 ,the ,power of ,love1 for which ,i provided a prologue1 and ,i went about with the publisher1 ,rodrguez ,serra1 through the bookshops1 peddling the book4 ,in a shop on the ,plaza de ,santa ,ana1 ,rodrguez ,serra asked the proprietor1 not altogether without a touch of malice3 ,what do you think of this book8 ,it would be all right1 answered the proprietor1 who did not know me1 if anybody knew who ,martnez ,ruiz was2 and who is this ,po ,baroja8 ,seor ,ruiz ,contreras says that he made me known1 but the fact is that nobody knew me in those days2 ,seor ,ruiz ,contreras flatters himself that he did me a great favour by publishing my articles1 at a cost to me1 at the very least1 of two or three duros apiece4 ,if this is to be a patron of letters1 ,i should like to patronize half the planet4 ,as for literary influence1 ,ruiz ,contreras never had any upon me4 ,he was an admirer of ,arsne ,houssage1 ,paul ,bourget1 and other novelists with a sophisticated air1 who never meant anything to me4 ,the theatre also obsessed him1 a malady which ,i have never suffered1 and he was a devotee of the poet1 ,zorrilla1 in which respect ,i was unable to share his enthusiasm1 nor can ,i do so today4 ,finally1 he was a political reactionary1 while ,i am a man of radical tendencies4 ,,xiii ,,parisian ,,days ,for the past twenty years ,i have been in the habit of visiting ,paris1 not for the purpose of becoming acquainted with the city--to see it once is enough2 nor do ,i go in order to meet ,french authors1 as1 for the most part1 they consider themselves so immeasurably above ,spaniards that there is no way in which a self-respecting person can approach them4 ,i go to meet the members of the ,spanish colony1 which includes some types which are most interesting4 ,i have gathered a large number of stories and anecdotes in this way1 some of which ,i have incorporated in my books4 ,,est,,vanez ,don ,nicols ,estvanez was a good friend of mine4 ,during my sojourns in ,paris1 ,i met him every afternoon in the ,caf de la ,fleur in the ,boulevard ,st4 ,germain4 ,when ,i was writing ,the ,last of the ,romantics and ,grotesque ,tragedies1 ,estvanez furnished me with data and information concerning life in ,paris under the ,second ,empire4 ,when ,i last saw him in the autumn of #aiac1 he made a practice of coming to the caf with a paper scribbled over with notes1 to assist his memory to recall the anecdotes which he had it in mind to tell4 ,i can see him now in the ,caf de la ,fleur1 with his blue eyes1 his long white beard1 his cheeks1 which were still rosy1 his calm and always phlegmatic air4 ,once he became much excited4 ,javier ,bueno and ,i happened on him in a caf on the ,avenue d',orleans1 not far from the ,lion de ,belfort4 ,bueno asked some questions about the recent attempt by ,moral to assassinate the ,king in ,madrid1 and ,estvanez suddenly went to pieces4 ,an anarchist told me afterwards that ,estvanez had carried the bomb which was thrown by ,morral in ,madrid1 from ,paris to ,barcelona1 at which port he had taken ship for ,cuba1 by arrangement with the ,duke of ,bivona4 ,i believe this story to have been a pure fabrication1 but ,i feel perfectly certain that ,estvanez knew beforehand that the crime was to be attempted4 ,,my ,,versatility ,,according ,,to ,,bonafoux ,speaking of ,estvanez1 ,i recall also ,bonafoux1 whom ,i saw frequently4 ,according to ,gonzlez de la ,pea1 the painter1 he held my versatility against me4 ,bonafoux1 remarked ,pea1 feels that you are too versatile and too volatile4 ,indeed8 ,in what way8 ,one day you entered the bar and said to ,bonafoux that a testimonial banquet ought to be organized for ,estvanez1 enlarging upon it enthusiastically4 ,bonafoux answered3 ',go ahead and make the preparations1 and we will all get together4' ,when you came into the caf a few nights later1 ,bonafoux asked3 ',how about that banquet8' ',what banquet8' you replied4 ,it had already passed out of your mind4 ,now1 tell me3 ,is this true8 inquired ,pea4 ,yes1 it is4 ,we all have something of ,tartarin in us1 more or less4 ,we talk and we talk1 and then we forget what we say4 ,other ,parisian types return to me when ,i think of those days4 ,there was a ,cuban journalist1 who was satisfactorily dirty1 of whom ,bonafoux used to say that he not only ate his plate of soup but managed to wash his face in it at the same time4 ,there was a ,catalan guitar player1 besides some girls from ,madrid who walked the tight rope1 whom we used to invite to join us at the caf from time to time4 ,and then there was a whole host of other persons1 all more or less shabby1 down at the heel and picturesque4 ,,xiv ,,literary ,,enmities ,making our entrance into the world of letters hurling contradictions right and left1 the young men of our generation were received by the writers of established reputation with unfriendly demonstrations4 ,as was natural1 this was not only the attitude of the older writers1 but it extended to our contemporaries in years as well1 even to those who were most modern4 ,,the ,,enmity ,,of ,,dicenta ,among those who cherished a deadly hatred of me was ,dicenta4 ,it was an antipathy which had its origin in the realm of ideas1 and it was accentuated subsequently by an article which ,i contributed to ,el ,globo upon his drama ,aurora1 in which ,i maintained that ,dicenta was not a man of new or broad ideas1 but completely preoccupied with the ancient conceptions of honesty and honour4 ,one night in the ,caf ,fornos--,i am able to vouch for the truth of this incident because1 years afterwards1 he told me the story himself--,dicenta accosted a young man who was sitting at an adjacent table taking supper1 and attempted to draw him into discussion1 under the impression that it was ,i4 ,the young man was so frightened that he never dared to open his mouth4 ,come1 shouted ,dicenta1 we shall settle this matter at once4 ,i have nothing to settle with you1 replied the young man4 ,yes1 sir1 you have2 you have stated in an article that my ideas are not revolutionary4 ,i never stated anything of the kind4 ,what is that8 ,no1 sir4 ,but aren't you ,po ,baroja8 ,i am not1 sir4 ,dicenta turned on his heel and marched back to his seat4 ,sometime later1 ,dicenta and ,i became friends1 although we were never very intimate1 because he felt that ,i did not appreciate him at his full worth4 ,and it was the truth4 ,,the ,,posthumous ,,enmity ,,of ,,sawa ,i met ,alejandro ,sawa one evening at the ,caf ,fornos1 where ,i had gone with a friend4 ,as a matter of fact1 ,i had never read anything which he had written1 but his appearance impressed me4 ,once ,i followed him in the street with the intention of speaking to him1 but my courage failed at the last moment4 ,a number of months later1 ,i met him one summer afternoon on the ,recoletos1 when he was in the company of a ,frenchman named ,cornuty4 ,cornuty and ,sawa were conversing and reciting verses2 they took me to a wine-shop in the ,plaza de ,herradores1 where they drank a number of glasses1 which ,i paid for1 whereupon ,sawa asked me to lend him three pesetas4 ,i did not have them1 and told him so4 ,do you live far from here8 asked ,alejandro1 in his lofty style4 ,no1 near by4 ,very well then1 you can go home and bring me the money4 ,he issued this command with such an air of authority that ,i went home and brought him the money4 ,he came to the door of the wine-shop1 took it from me1 and then said3 ,you may go now4 ,this was the way in which insignificant bourgeois admirers were treated in the school of ,baudelaire and ,verlaine4 ,later again1 when ,i brought out ,sombre ,lives1 ,i sometimes saw ,sawa in the small hours of the morning1 his long locks flowing1 and followed by his dog4 ,he always gripped my hand with such force that it did me some hurt1 and then he would say to me1 in a tragic tone3 ,be proud6 ,you have written ,sombre ,lives4 ,i took it as a joke4 ,one day ,alejandro wrote me to come to his house4 ,he was living on the ,cuesta de ,santo ,domingo4 ,i betook myself there1 and he made me a proposition which was obviously preposterous4 ,he handed me five or six articles1 written by him1 which had already been published1 together with some notes1 saying that if ,i would add certain material1 we should then be able to make up a book of ,parisian ,impressions1 which could appear under the names of us both4 ,i read the articles and did not care for them4 ,when ,i went to return them1 he asked me3 ,what have you done8 ,nothing4 ,i think it would be difficult for us to collaborate2 there is no possible bond of unity in what we write4 ,how is that8 ,you are one of these eloquent writers1 and ,i am not4 ,this remark gave great offence4 ,another reason for ,alejandro's enmity was an opinion expressed by my brother1 ,ricardo4 ,ricardo wished to paint the portrait of ,manuel ,sawa in oils1 as ,manuel had marked personality at that time1 when he still wore a beard4 ,but here am ,i1 said ,alejandro4 ,am ,i not a more interesting subject to be painted8 ,no1 no1 not at all1 we all shouted together--this took place in the ,caf de ,lisboa--,manuel has more character4 ,alejandro said nothing1 but1 a few moments later1 he rose1 looked at himself in the glass1 arranged his flowing locks1 and then1 glaring at us from top to toe1 while he pronounced the letter with the utmost distinctness1 he said simply3 ,m4444 and walked out of the caf4 ,some time passed before ,alejandro heard that ,i had put him into one of my novels and he conceived a certain dislike for me1 in spite of which we saw each other now and then1 always conversing affectionately4 ,one day he sent for me to come and see him4 ,he was living in the ,calle del ,conde ,duque4 ,he was in bed1 already blind4 ,his spirit was as high as before1 while his interest in literary matters remained the same4 ,his brother1 ,miguel1 who was present1 happened to say during the conversation that the hat ,i wore1 which ,i had purchased in ,paris a few days previously1 had a flatter brim than was usual4 ,alejandro asked to examine it1 and busied himself feeling of the brim4 ,this is a hat1 he exclaimed enthusiastically1 that a man can wear with long hair4 ,some months subsequent to his death a book of his1 ,light ,among the ,shadows1 was published1 in which ,alejandro spoke ill of me1 although he had a good word for ,sombre ,lives4 ,he called me a country-man1 said that my bones were misshapen1 and then stated that glory does not go hand in hand with tuberculosis4 ,poor ,alejandro6 ,he was sound at heart1 an eloquent child of the ,mediterranean1 born to orate in the lands of the sun1 but he took it into his head that it was his duty to make himself over into the likeness of one of the putrid products of the ,north4 ,,semi-,,hatred ,,on ,,the ,,part ,,of ,,silverio ,,lanza ,a mutual friend1 ,antonio ,gil ,campos1 introduced me to ,silverio ,lanza4 ,silverio ,lanza was a man of great originality1 endowed with an enormous fund of thwarted ambition and pride1 which was only natural1 as he was a notably fine writer who had not yet met with success1 nor even with the recognition which other younger writers enjoyed4 ,the first time that ,i saw ,lanza1 ,i remember how his eyes sparkled when ,i told him that ,i liked his books4 ,nobody ever paid any attention to him in those days4 ,silverio ,lanza was a singular character4 ,at times he seemed benevolent1 and then again there were times when he would appear malignant in the extreme4 ,his ideas upon the subject of literature were positively absurd4 ,when ,i sent him ,sombre ,lives1 he wrote me an unending letter in which he attempted to convince me that ,i ought to append a lesson or moral1 to every tale4 ,if ,i did not wish to write them1 he offered to do it himself4 ,silverio thought that literature was not to be composed like history1 according to ,quintilian's definition1 ad narrandum1 but ad probandum4 ,when ,i gave him ,the ,house of ,aizgorri1 he was outraged by the optimistic conclusion of the book1 and advised me to change it4 ,according to his theory1 if the son of the ,aizgorri family came to a bad end1 the daughter ought to come to a bad end also4 ,being of a somewhat fantastical turn of mind1 ,silverio ,lanza was full of political projects that were extraordinary4 ,i remember that one of his ideas was that we ought all to write the ,king a personal note of congratulation upon his attaining his majority4 ,it is the most revolutionary thing that can be done at such a time1 insisted ,lanza1 apparently quite convinced4 ,i am unable to see it1 ,i replied4 ,azorn and myself were of the opinion that it was a ridiculous proceeding which would never produce the desired result4 ,another of ,lanza's hobbies was an aggressive misogyny4 ,baroja1 my friend1 he would say to me1 you are too gallant and respectful in your novels with the ladies4 ,women are like laws1 they are to be violated4 ,i laughed at him4 ,one day ,i was walking with my friend ,gil ,campos and my cousin ,goi1 when we happened on ,silverio ,lanza1 who took us to the ,caf de ,san ,sebastin1 where we sat down in the section facing the ,plazuela del ,angel4 ,it was a company that was singularly assorted4 ,silverio reverted to the theme that women should be handled with the rod4 ,gil ,campos proceeded to laugh1 being gifted with an ironic vein1 and made fun of him4 ,for my part1 ,i was tired of it1 so ,i said to ,lanza3 ,see here1 ,don ,juan 7his real name was ,juan ,bautista ,amors71 what you are giving us now is literature1 and poor literature at that4 ,you are not1 and ,i am not1 able to violate law and women as we see fit4 ,that may be all very well for ,caesars and ,napoleons and ,borgias1 but you are a respectable gentleman who lives in a little house at ,getafe with your wife1 and ,i am a poor man myself1 who manages as best he may to make a living4 ,you would tremble in your boots if you ever broke a law1 or even a municipal ordinance1 and so would ,i4 ,as far as women are concerned1 we are both of us glad to take what we can get1 if we can get anything1 and ,i am afraid that neither of us is ever going to get very much1 despite the fact--,i added by way of a humorous touch--that we are two of the most distinguished minds in ,europe4 ,my cousin ,goi replied to this with the rare tact that was characteristic of him1 arguing that within the miserable sphere of tangible reality ,i was right1 while ,lanza moved upon a higher plane1 which was more ideal and more romantic4 ,he went on to add that ,lanza and he were both ,berbers1 and so violent and passionate1 while ,i was an ,aryan1 although a vulgar ,aryan1 whose ideas were simply those which were shared by everybody4 ,lanza was not satisfied with my cousin's explanation and departed with a marked lack of cordiality4 ,since that time1 ,silverio has regarded me with mixed emotions1 half friendly1 half the reverse1 although in one of his latest books1 ,the ,surrender of ,santiago1 he has referred to me as a great friend and a great writer4 ,i suspect1 however1 that he does not love me4 ,,xv ,,the ,,press ,,our ,,newspapers ,,and ,,periodicals ,i have always been very much interested in the newspaper and periodical press1 and in everything that has any connection with printing4 ,when my father1 my grandfather1 and great grandfather set up struggling papers in a provincial capital1 it may be said that they were not printers in vain4 ,because of my fondness for newspapers and magazines1 it is a grief to me that the ,spanish press should be so weak1 so poor1 so pusillanimous and stiff-jointed4 ,of late1 while the foreign press has been expanding and widening its scope1 ours has been standing still4 ,there is1 of course1 an economic explanation to justify our deficiency1 but this is valid only in the matter of quantity1 and not as to quality4 ,comparing our press with that of the rest of the world1 a rosary of negation might easily be made up in this fashion3 ,our press does not concern itself with what is of universal interest4 ,our press does not concern itself with what is of national interest4 ,our press does not concern itself with literature4 ,our press does not concern itself with philosophy4 ,and so on to infinity4 ,corpus ,barga has told me that when ,seor ,groizard1 a relative of his1 was ambassador to the ,vatican1 ,leo ,,xiii once inquired of him1 in a jargon of ,italo-,spanish1 in the presence of the papal secretary1 ,cardinal ,rampolla3 ,does the ,seor ,ambasciatore speak ,italian8 ,no1 not ,italian1 although ,i understand it a little4 ,does the ,seor ,ambasciatore speak ,english8 ,no1 not ,english1 ,i do not speak that1 replied ,groizard4 ,does the ,seor ,ambasciatore speak ,german8 ,no ,german1 no ,dutch2 not at all4 ,no doubt then the ,seor ,ambasciatore speaks ,french8 ,french8 ,no4 ,i am able to translate it a little1 but ,i do not speak it4 ,then what does the ,seor ,ambasciatore speak8 asked ,leo ,,xiii1 smiling that ,voltairian smile of his at his secretary4 ,then ,seor ,ambasciatore speaks a heavy back-country dialect called ,extramaduran1 replied ,rampolla del ,tindaro1 bending over to ,his ,holiness's ear4 ,the ,spanish press has made a resolution1 now of long standing1 to speak nothing but a back-country dialect called ,extramaduran4 ,our ,journalists ,our journalists supply the measure of our journals4 ,when the great names are those of ,miguel ,moya1 ,romeo1 ,rocamora and ,don ,po1 what are we to think of the little fellows8 ,speaking generally1 the ,spanish journalist is interested in politics1 in theatres1 in bull fights1 and in nothing else2 whatever is beyond these1 does not concern him4 ,not even the feuilleton attracts his attention4 ,a wooden1 highly mannered phrase sponsored by ,maura1 is much more stimulating to his mind than the most sensational piece of news4 ,the ,spanish newspaper man is endowed with an extraordinary lack of imagination and of curiosity4 ,i recall having given a friend1 who was a journalist1 a little book of ,nietzsche's to read1 which he returned with the remark that he had not been able to get through it1 as it was insufferable drivel4 ,i have heard the same opinion1 or similar ones1 expressed by journalists of ,ibsen1 ,schopenhauer1 ,dostoievsky1 ,stendhal and all the most stimulating minds of ,europe4 ,the wretched ,saint ,aubin1 wretched certainly as a critic1 used to ridicule ,tolstoi and the illness which resulted in his death1 maintaining that it was nothing more than an advertisement4 ,the most benighted vulgarity reigns in our press4 ,upon occasion1 vulgarity goes hand in hand with an ignorance which is astounding4 ,i remember going to a caf on the ,calle de ,alcal known as la ,maison ,dore one afternoon with ,regoyos4 ,felipe ,trigo1 the novelist1 sat down at our table with a friend of his1 a journalist1 ,i believe1 from ,america4 ,i have never been a friend of ,trigo's1 and could never take any interest either in the man or his work1 which to my mind is tiresome and commercially erotic1 besides being absolutely devoid of all charm4 ,regoyos1 who is effusive by nature1 soon became engaged in conversation with them1 and the talk turned upon artistic subjects1 in which he was interested1 and then to his travels abroad4 ,trigo put in his oar and uttered a number of preposterous statements4 ,in particular1 he described a ship which had unloaded at ,milan4 ,when ,regoyos pointed out that ,milan was not a seaport1 he replied3 ,probably it was some other place then4 ,what is the difference8 ,he continued with a string of geographical and anthropological blunders1 which were concurred in by the journalist1 while ,regoyos and ,i sat by in amazement4 ,when we left the caf1 ,regoyos inquired3 ,could they have been joking8 ,no2 nonsense4 ,they do not believe that such things are worth knowing4 ,they think they are petty details which might be useful to railway porters4 ,trigo imagines that he is a magician1 who understands the female mind4 ,well1 does he8 asked ,regoyos1 with nave innocence4 ,how can he understand anything8 ,the poor fellow is ignorant4 ,his other attainments are on a par with his geography4 ,the ignorance of authors and journalists is accompanied as a matter of course by a total want of comprehension4 ,a number of years ago1 a rich young man called at my house1 intending to found a review4 ,during the conversation1 he explained that he was a ,murcian1 a lawyer and a follower of ,maura4 ,finally1 after expounding his literary ideas1 he informed me that ,ricardo ,len1 who at that time had just published his first novel1 would1 in his opinion1 come to be acknowledged as the first novelist of ,europe4 ,he also assured me that ,dickens's humour was absolutely vulgar1 cheap and out of date4 ,i am not surprised that you should think so1 ,i said to him4 ,you are from ,murcia1 you are a lawyer and a ,maurista2 naturally1 you like ,ricardo ,len1 and it is equally natural that you should not like ,dickens4 ,persons who imagine that it is of no consequence whether ,milan is a seaport or not1 who believe that ,nietzsche is a drivelling ass1 and who make bold to tell us that ,dickens is a cheap author--in one word1 young gentlemen lawyers who are partisans of ,maura1 are the people who provide copy for our press4 ,how can the ,spanish press be expected to be different from what it is8 ,,americans ,unquestionably1 ,spaniards suffer much from the uncertainty of information and narrowness of view inevitable to those who live apart from the main currents of life4 ,in comparison with the ,english1 the ,germans1 or the ,french1 whether we like it or not1 we appear provincial4 ,we are provincials who possess more or less talent1 but nevertheless we are provincials4 ,so it is that an ,italian1 a ,russian1 or a ,swede prefers to read a book by a mediocre ,parisian1 such as ,marcel ,prvost1 to one by a writer of genuine talent1 such as ,galds2 it also explains why the canvases of second rate painters such as ,david1 ,gericault1 or ,ingres are more highly esteemed in the market than those of a painter of genius like ,goya4 ,to be provincial has its virtues as well as its defects4 ,at times the provincial are accompanied by universal elements1 which blend and form a masterpiece4 ,this was the case with ,don ,quixote1 with the etchings of ,goya and the dramas of ,ibsen4 ,similarly1 among new peoples1 provincial stupidity will often form a blend with an obtuseness which is world-wide4 ,the aridness and infertility characteristic of the soil combine with the detritus of fashion and the follies of the four quarters of the globe4 ,the result is a child-like type1 petulant1 devoid of virtue1 and utterly destitute of a single manly quality4 ,this is the ,american type4 ,america is par excellence the continent of stupidity4 ,the ,american has not yet outgrown the monkey in him and remains in the imitative stage4 ,i have no particular reason to dislike ,americans4 ,my hostility towards them arises merely from the fact that ,i have never known one who had the air of being anybody1 who impressed me as a man4 ,you frequently meet a man in the interior of ,spain1 in some small village1 perhaps1 whose conversation conveys the impression that he is a real man1 wrought out of the ore that is most human and most noble4 ,at such times one becomes reconciled to one's country1 for all its charlatans and hordes of sharpers4 ,an ,american never appears to be calm1 serene and collected4 ,there are plenty who seem to be wild1 impulsive creatures1 driven on by sanguinary fury1 while others disclose the vanity of the chorus girl1 or a self-conceit which is wholly ridiculous4 ,my lack of sympathy for ,spanish-,americans extends to their literary productions4 ,everything that ,i have read by ,south ,americans1 and ,i bear in mind the not disinterested encomiums of ,unamuno1 ,i have found to be both poor and deficient in substance4 ,beginning with ,sarmiento's ,facundo1 which is heavy1 cheap1 and uninteresting1 and coming down to the latest productions of ,ingenieros1 ,manuel ,ugarte1 ,ricardo ,rojas and ,contreras1 this is true without exception4 ,what a deluge of shoddy snobbery and vulgar display pours out of ,america6 ,it is often argued that ,spaniards should eulogize ,south ,americans for political reasons4 ,this is one of many recommendations which proceed from the craniums of gentlemen who top themselves off with silk hats and who carry a lecture inside which is in demand by ,ibero-,american societies4 ,i have no faith that this brand of politics will be productive of results4 ,citizens of old1 civilized countries are still sensible to flattery and compliment1 but what are you to tell an ,argentine who is fully convinced that ,argentina is a more important country than ,england or ,germany1 because she raises a large quantity of wheat1 to say nothing of a great number of cows8 ,whenever ,unamuno writes he decries ,kant1 ,schopenhauer and ,nietzsche1 and then promptly eulogizes the mighty ,general ,anbal ,prez and the great poet ,diocleciano ,snchez1 who hail from the pampas4 ,to these fellows1 such praise seems grudging enough4 ,salvador ,rueda himself must appear tame to these hide-stretchers4 ,,xvi ,,politics ,i have always been a liberal radical1 an individualist and an anarchist4 ,in the first place1 ,i am an enemy of the ,church2 in the second place1 ,i am an enemy of the ,state4 ,when these great powers are in conflict ,i am a partisan of the ,state as against the ,church1 but on the day of the ,state's triumph1 ,i shall become an enemy of the ,state4 ,if ,i had lived during the ,french ,revolution1 ,i should have been an internationalist of the school of ,anacarsis ,clootz2 during the struggle for liberty1 ,i should have been one of the ,carbonieri4 ,to the extent in which liberalism has been a destructive force1 inimical to the past1 it enthralls me4 ,the fight against religious prejudice and the aristocracy1 the suppression of religious communities1 inheritance taxes--in short1 whatever has a tendency to pulverize completely the ancient order of society1 fills me with a great joy4 ,on the other hand1 insofar as liberalism is constructive1 as it has been for example in its advocacy of universal suffrage1 in its democracy1 and in its system of parliamentary government1 ,i consider it ridiculous and valueless as well4 ,even today1 wherever it is obliged to take the aggressive1 it seems to me that the good in liberalism is not exhausted2 but wherever it has become an accomplished fact1 and is accepted as such1 it neither interests me nor enlists my admiration4 ,,votes ,,and ,,applause ,in our present day democracy1 there are only two effective sanctions3 votes and applause4 ,those are all4 ,just as in the old days men committed all sorts of crimes in order to please their sovereign1 now they commit similar crimes in order to satisfy the people4 ,and this truth has been recognized from ,aristotle to ,burke4 ,democracy ends in histrionism4 ,a man who gets up to talk before a crowd must of necessity be an actor4 ,i have wondered from time to time if ,i might not have certain histrionic gifts myself2 however1 when ,i have put them to the test1 ,i have found that they were not sufficient4 ,i have made six or seven speeches during my brief political career4 ,i spoke in ,valencia1 in a pelota court1 and ,i delivered an address at ,barcelona in the ,casa del ,pueblo1 in both of which places ,i was applauded generously4 ,nevertheless the applause failed to intoxicate me2 it produced no impression upon me whatever4 ,it seemed too much like mere noise--noise made by men's hands1 and having nothing to do with myself4 ,i am not good enough as an actor to be a politician4 ,,politicians ,i have never been able to feel any enthusiasm for ,spanish politicians4 ,we hear a great deal about ,cnovas4 ,cnovas has always impressed me as being as bad an orator as he was a writer4 ,when ,i first read his ,bell of ,huesca1 ,i could not contain myself for laughing4 ,as far as his speeches are concerned1 ,i have also read a few1 and find them horribly heavy1 diffuse1 monotonous and deficient in style4 ,i hear that ,cnovas is a great historian1 but if so1 ,i am not acquainted with that side of him4 ,castelar was unquestionably a man of exceptional gifts as a writer1 but he failed to take advantage of them1 and they were utterly dissipated4 ,he lacked what most ,spaniards of the #aith ,century lacked with him2 that is1 reserve4 ,when ,echegaray was made ,minister of ,finance1 he was already an old man4 ,a reporter called one day to interview him at the ,ministry1 and ,echegaray confessed that he was without any very clear idea as to just what the duties of his office were to be4 ,when the reporter took leave of the dramatist1 he remarked3 ,don ,jos1 you are not going to be comfortable here2 it is cold in the building4 ,besides1 the air is too fresh4 ,echegaray replied3 ,yes1 and your description suits me exactly4 ,this cynically cheap joke might have fallen appropriately from the tongues of the majority of ,spanish politicians4 ,among these male bailarinas1 nearly all of whom date back to the ,revolution of ,september1 we may find1 indeed1 some men of austere character3 ,salmern1 ,p y ,margall and ,costa4 ,salmern was an inimitable actor1 but an actor who was sincere in his part4 ,he was the most marvellous orator that ,i have ever heard4 ,as a philosopher1 he was of no account1 and as a politician he was a calamity4 ,p y ,margall1 whom ,i met once in his own home where ,i went in company with ,azorn1 was no more a politician or a philosopher than was ,salmern4 ,he was a journalist1 a popularizer of other men's ideas1 gifted with a style at once clear and concise4 ,p y ,margall was sincere1 enamoured of ideas1 and took but little thought of himself4 ,as to ,costa1 ,i confess that he was always antipathetic to me4 ,like ,nakens1 he was a man who lived upon the estimation in which he was held by others1 pretending all the while that he attached no importance to it whatever4 ,aguirre ,metaca once told me that while he was connected with a paper in ,saragossa1 he had solicited an interview with ,costa1 and thereupon ,costa wrote the interview himself1 referring to himself here and there in it as the ,lion of ,graus4 ,i cannot accept ,costa as a modern ,european1 intellectually4 ,he was a figure for the ,cortes of ,cadiz1 solemn1 pompous1 becollared and rhetorical4 ,he was one of those actors who abound in southern countries1 who are laid to rest in their graves without ever having had the least idea that their entire lives have been nothing but stage spectacles4 ,,revolutionists ,whether politicians or authors1 the ,spanish revolutionists always smack to my mind of the property room1 and especially is this true of the authors4 ,zozaya1 ,morote and ,dicenta have passed for many years now as terrible men1 both destructive and great innovators4 ,but how ridiculous6 ,zozaya1 like ,dicenta1 has never done anything but manipulate the commonplace1 failing to impart either lightness or novelty to it1 as have ,valera and ,anatole ,france1 succeeding only on the other hand in making it more plumbeous and indigestible4 ,speaking of ,luis ,morote1 against whom ,i urge nothing as a man1 he has always been a bugbear to me1 the personification of dullness1 of vulgarity1 of everything that lacks interest and charm4 ,i can conceive nothing lower than an article by ,morote4 ,what talent that man has6 ,what a revolutionary personality6 they used to say in ,valencia1 and once the janitor at the ,club added3 ,to think ,i knew that man when he was only this high6 ,and he held out his hand about a metre above the ground4 ,spain has never produced any revolutionists4 ,don ,nicols ,estvanez1 who imagined himself an anarchist1 would fly into a rage if he read an article which concealed a gallicism in it4 ,do not bother your head about gallicisms1 ,i used to say to him4 ,what do they matter1 anyway8 ,no1 we have never had any revolutionists in ,spain4 ,that is1 we have had only one3 ,ferrer4 ,he was certainly not a man of great mind4 ,when he talked1 he was on the level of ,morote and ,zozaya1 which is nothing more nor less than the level of everybody else2 but when it came to action1 he did amount to something1 and that something was dangerous4 ,,lerroux ,my only experience in politics was gained with ,lerroux4 ,one ,sunday1 seven or eight years ago1 on coming out of my house and crossing the ,plaza de ,san ,marcial1 ,i observed that a great crowd had gathered4 ,what is the matter8 ,i asked4 ,lerroux is coming1 they told me4 ,i delayed a moment and happened on ,villar1 the composer1 among the crowd4 ,we fell to talking of ,lerroux and what he might accomplish4 ,a procession was soon formed1 which we followed1 and we found ourselves in front of the editorial offices of ,el ,pais4 ,shall we go in8 asked ,villar4 ,do you know ,lerroux8 ,i had met ,lerroux in the days when ,el ,progreso was still published1 having called once with ,maeztu at his office2 afterwards ,i saw him in ,barcelona in a large shed1 which1 if ,i recall rightly1 went by the name of ,la ,fraternidad ,republicana1 and then ,i was accompanied by ,azorn and ,junoy4 ,villar and ,i went upstairs and greeted ,lerroux in the offices of ,el ,pais4 ,estvanez has spoken of you to me1 he said4 ,is he well8 ,yes1 very well4 ,a few days later1 ,lerroux invited me to dinner at the ,caf ,ingls4 ,lerroux1 ,fuente and ,i dined together1 and then fell to talking4 ,lerroux asked me to join his party1 whereupon ,i pointed out the qualifications which were lacking in me1 which were necessary to a politician4 ,shortly after1 ,i was nominated as a candidate for the ,city ,council1 and ,i addressed a number of meetings1 although always coldly1 and never at high tension4 ,while ,i was with ,lerroux1 ,i was never treated save with consideration4 ,why did ,i leave his party8 ,chiefly because of differences as to ideas and as to tactics4 ,lerroux wished to organize his party into a party of law and order1 so that it might be capable of governing1 and also to have it friendly with the ,army4 ,i was of the opinion that it ought to be a revolutionary party1 not in the sense that ,i was thinking of erecting barricades1 but ,i wished it to contest1 to upset things1 and to protest against injustice4 ,what ,lerroux wanted was a party of orators who could speak at public meetings1 a party of office-holders1 councillors1 provincial deputies and the like1 while ,i held1 and still hold1 that the only efficacious revolutionary weapon is the printed page4 ,lerroux was anxious to transform the radical party into something aristocratic and ,castilian2 ,i desired to see it retain its ,catalan character1 and continue to wear blouses and rope-soled shoes4 ,i withdrew from the party for these reasons1 to which ,i may add ,lerroux's attitude of indifference upon the occasion of the execution of the stoker of the ,numancia4 ,not many months after1 ,i met him on the ,carrera de ,san ,jernimo1 and he said to me3 ,i have read your diatribes4 ,they were not directed against you1 but against your politics4 ,i shall never speak ill of you1 because ,i have no cause4 ,yes1 he replied1 ,i know that at heart you are one of my friends4 ,,an ,,offer ,a number of years ago1 when the ,conservatives were in power and ,dato was ,president of the ,ministry1 ,azorn brought me word that ,snchez ,guerra1 then ,minister of the ,interior1 wished to see me and to have a little talk1 as perhaps some way might be arranged by which ,i might be made deputy4 ,during the afternoon1 ,i accompanied ,azorn to the ,ministry1 and we saw the ,minister4 ,he informed me that he would like to have me enter the ,congress4 ,i should like to myself1 ,i replied1 but it would appear to me rather difficult4 ,but is there not some town where you are well known1 and where you have influence8 ,no1 none whatever4 ,how would you like then to be deputy to represent the ,government8 ,as a regular8 ,yes4 ,as a ,conservative8 ,yes4 ,i thought a moment and said3 ,no1 ,i can never be a ,conservative1 however it might suit my interest to be so4 ,try as hard as ,i might1 ,i should never succeed4 ,that is the only way in which we can make you deputy4 ,well1 it cannot be helped6 ,i must resign myself then to amount to nothing4 ,thanking the ,minister for his kindness4 ,azorn and ,i walked out of the ,ministry of the ,interior4 ,,socialists ,as for ,socialists1 ,i have never cared to have anything to do with them4 ,one of the most offensive things about ,socialists1 which is more offensive than their pedantry1 than their charlatanry1 than their hypocrisy1 is their inquisitorial instinct for prying into other people's lives4 ,whether ,pablo ,iglesias travels first or third class1 has been for years one of the principal topics of dispute between ,socialists and their opponents4 ,fifteen years ago ,i was in ,tangier1 where ,i had been sent by the ,globo1 and1 upon my return1 a newspaper man who had socialistic ideas1 reproached me3 ,you talk a great deal about the working man1 but ,i see you were living in the best hotel in ,tangier4 ,i answered3 ,in the first place1 ,i have never spoken of the workingman with any fervour4 ,furthermore1 ,i am not such a slave as to be too cowardly to take what life offers as it comes1 as you are4 ,i take what ,i can that ,i want1 and when ,i do not take it1 it is because ,i cannot get it4 ,,love ,,of ,,the ,,workingman ,to gush over the workingman is one of the commonplaces of the day which is utterly false and hypocritical4 ,just as in the #ahth century sympathy was with the simple hearted citizen1 so today we talk about the workingman4 ,the term workingman can never be anything but a grammatical common denominator4 ,among workingmen1 as among the bourgeoisie1 there are all sorts of people4 ,it is perfectly true that there are certain characteristics1 certain defects1 which may be exaggerated in a given class1 because of its special environment and culture4 ,the difference in ,spanish cities between the labouring man and the bourgeoisie is not very great4 ,we frequently see the workingman leap the barrier into the bourgeoisie1 and then disclose himself as a unique flower of knavery1 extortion and misdirected ingenuity4 ,deep down in the hearts of our revolutionists1 ,i do not believe that there is any real enthusiasm for the workingman4 ,when the bookshop of ,fernando ,f was still fin the ,carrera de ,san ,jernimo1 ,i once heard ,blasco ,ibez say with the cheapness that is his distinguishing trait1 laughing meanwhile ostentatiously1 that a republic in ,spain would mean the rule of shoemakers and of the scum of the streets4 ,,the ,,conventionalist ,,barriovero ,barriovero1 a conventionalist1 according to ,grandmontagne--yes1 and how keen the scent of this ,american for such matters6--attended the opening of a radical club in the ,calle del ,prncipe with a party of friends4 ,we were all drinking champagne4 ,like other revolutionists and parvenus generally1 ,lerroux is a victim of the superstition of champagne4 ,aha1 suppose those workingmen should see us drinking champagne6 suggested some one4 ,what of it8 asked another4 ,i only wish for my part1 ,barriovero interrupted with a show of sentiment1 that the workingman could learn to drink champagne4 ,learn to drink it8 ,i burst out1 ,i see no difficulty about that4 ,he could drink champagne as well as anything else4 ,not at all1 said ,barriovero the conventionalist1 very gravely4 ,he has the superstition of the peasant2 he thinks he must leave enough wine to cover the bottom of the glass4 ,i doubt whether this observation will attract the attention of any future ,plutarch1 although it might very well do so1 as it expresses most ,i clearly the distinction which exists in the minds of our revolutionists between the workingman and the young gentleman4 ,,anarchists ,i have had a number of acquaintances among anarchists4 ,some of them are dead2 the majority of the others have changed their ideas4 ,it is apparent nowadays that the anarchism of ,reclus and ,kropotkin is out of date1 and entirely a thing of the past4 ,the same tendencies will reappear under other forms1 and present new aspects4 ,among anarchists1 ,i have known ,elyse ,reclus1 whom ,i met in the editorial offices of a publication called ,l',humanit ,nouvelle1 which was issued in ,paris in the ,rue des ,saints-,pres4 ,i have also met ,sebastien ,faure during a mass meeting organized in the interests of one ,guerin1 who had taken refuge in a house in the ,rue de ,chabrol some eighteen or twenty years ago4 ,i have had relations with ,malatesta and ,tarrida del ,marmol4 ,as a matter of fact1 both these anarchists escorted me one afternoon from ,islington1 where ,malatesta lived1 to the door of the ,st4 ,james ,club1 one of the most aristocratic retreats in ,london1 where ,i had an appointment to meet a diplomat4 ,as for active anarchists1 ,i have known a number1 two or three of whom have been dynamiters4 ,,the ,,morality ,,of ,,the ,,alternating ,,party ,,system ,the only difference between the morality of the ,liberal party and that of the ,conservative party is one of clothes4 ,among ,conservatives the most primitive clout seems to be slightly more ample1 but not noticeably so4 ,the preoccupations of both are purely with matters of style4 ,the only distinction is that the ,conservatives make off with a great deal at once1 while the ,liberals take less1 but do it often4 ,this is in harmony with the law of mechanics according to which what is gained in force is lost in velocity and what is gained in intensity is lost in expansion4 ,after all1 no doubt morality in politics should be a negligible quantity4 ,honest1 upright men who hearken only to the voice of conscience1 never get on in politics1 neither are they ever practical1 nor good for anything4 ,to succeed in politics1 a certain facility is necessary1 to which must be added ambition and a thirst for glory4 ,the last is the most innocent of the three4 ,,on ,,obeying ,,the ,,law ,it is safe1 it seems to me1 to assume the following axioms3 ,first1 to obey the law is in no sense to attain justice2 second1 it is not possible to obey the law strictly1 thoroughly1 in any country in the world4 ,that obeying the law has nothing to do with justice is indisputable1 and this is especially true in the political sphere1 in which it is easy to point to a rebel1 such as ,martnez ,campos1 who has been elevated to the plane of a great man and who has been immortalized by a statue upon his death1 and then to a rebel such as ,snchez ,moya1 who ,was merely shot4 ,the only difference between the men was in the results attained1 and in the manner of their exit4 ,hence ,i say that ,lerroux was not only base1 but obtuse and absurdly wanting in human feeling and revolutionary sympathy1 when he concurred in the execution of the stoker of the ,numancia4 ,if law and justice are identical and to comply with the law is invariably to do justice1 then what can be the distinction between the progressive and the conservative8 ,on the other hand1 the revolutionist has no alternative but to hold that law and justice are not the same1 and so he is obliged to subscribe to the benevolent character of all crimes which are altruistic and social in their purposes1 whether they are reactionary or anarchistic in tendency4 ,now the second axiom1 which is to the effect that there is no city or country in the world in which it is possible to obey the law thoroughly1 is also self-evident4 ,a certain class of common crimes1 such as robbery1 cheating and swindling1 murder and the like1 are followed by a species of automatic punishment in all quarters of the civilized world1 in spite of exceptions in specific cases1 which result from the intervention of political bosses and similar influences2 but there are other offenses which meet with no such automatic punishment4 ,in these pardon and penalty are meted out in a spirit of pure opportunism4 ,i was discussing ,zurdo ,olivares one day with ,emiliano ,iglesias in the office of ,el ,radical1 when ,i asked him3 ,how was it that ,zurdo ,olivares could save himself after playing such an active role in the tragic week at ,barcelona8 ,zurdo's salvation was indirectly owing to me1 replied ,iglesias4 ,but1 my dear sir6 ,yes1 indeed4 ,how did that happen8 ,very naturally4 ,there were three cases to be tried2 one was against ,ferrer1 one against ,zurdo1 and another against me4 ,a friend who enjoyed the necessary influence1 succeeded in quashing the case against me1 as a matter of personal favour1 and as it seemed rather barefaced to make an exception alone in my favour1 it was decided to include ,zurdo ,olivares1 who1 thanks to the arrangement1 escaped being shot4 ,then1 if an influential friend of yours had not been a member of the ,ministry1 you would both have been shot in the moat at ,montjuich8 ,beyond question4 ,and this took place in the heyday of ,conservative power4 ,,the ,,sternness ,,of ,,the ,,law ,there are men who believe that the ,state1 as at present constituted1 is the end and culmination of all human effort4 ,according to this view1 the ,state is the best possible state1 and its organization is considered so perfect that its laws1 discipline and formulae are held to be sacred and immutable in men's eyes4 ,maura and all conservatives must be reckoned in this group1 and ,lerroux too1 appears to belong with them1 as he holds discipline in such exalted respect4 ,on the other hand1 there are persons who believe that the entire legal structure is only a temporary scaffolding1 and that what is called justice today may be thought savagery tomorrow1 so that it is the part of wisdom not to look so much to the rule of the present as to the illumination of the future4 ,since it is impossible to effect in practice automatic enforcement of the law1 especially in the sphere of political crimes1 because of the unlimited power of pardon vested in the hands of our public men1 it would seem judicious to err upon the side of mercy rather than upon that of severity4 ,better fail the law and pardon a repulsive1 bloody beast such as ,chato de ,cuqueta1 than shoot an addle-headed unfortunate such as ,clemente ,garca1 or a dreamer like ,snchez ,moya1 whose hands were innocent of blood4 ,it was pointed out a long time ago that laws are like cobwebs2 they catch the little flies1 and let the big ones pass through4 ,how very severe1 how very determined our politicians are with the little flies1 but how extremely affable they are with the big ones6 ,,xvii ,,military ,,glory ,no1 ,i have not made up my mind upon the issues of this war4 ,if it were possible to determine what is best for ,europe1 ,i should of course desire it1 but this ,i do not know1 and so ,i am uncertain4 ,i am preoccupied by the consequences which may follow the war in ,spain4 ,some believe that there will be an increase of militarism1 but ,i doubt it4 ,many suppose that the crash of the present war will cause the prestige of the soldier to mount upward like the spray1 so that we shall have nothing but uniforms and clanking of spurs throughout the world very shortly1 while the sole topics of conversation will be mortars1 batteries and guns4 ,in my judgment those who take this standpoint are mistaken4 ,the present conflict will not establish war in higher favour4 ,perhaps its glories may not be diminished utterly4 ,it may be that man must of necessity kill1 burn1 and trample under foot1 and that these excesses of brutality are symptoms of collective health4 ,even if this be so1 we may be sure that military glory is upon the eve of an eclipse4 ,its decline began when the professional armies became nothing more than armed militia1 and from the moment that it became apparent that a soldier might be improvised from a countryman with marvellous rapidity4 ,,the ,,old-,,time ,,soldier ,formerly1 a soldier was a man of daring and adventure1 brave and audacious1 preferring an irregular life to the narrowing restraints of civil existence4 ,the old time soldier trusted in his star without scruple and without fear1 and imagined that he could dominate fate as the gambler fancies that he masters the laws of chance4 ,valour1 recklessness1 together with a certain rough eloquence1 a certain itch to command1 lay at the foundation of his life4 ,his inducements were pay1 booty1 showy uniforms and splendid horses4 ,the soldier's life was filled with adventure1 he conquered wealth1 he conquered women1 and he roamed through unknown lands4 ,until a few years ago1 the soldier might have been summed up in three words3 he was brave1 ignorant and adventurous4 ,the warrior of this school passed out of ,europe about the middle of the #aith ,century4 ,he became extinct in ,spain at the conclusion of our ,second ,civil ,war4 ,since that day there has been a fundamental change in the life of the soldier4 ,war has taken on greater magnitude1 while the soldier has become more refined1 and it is not to be denied that both war and the fighting man are losing their traditional prestige4 ,,down ,,goes ,,prestige ,the causes of this diminution of prestige are various4 ,some are moral1 such as the increased respect for human life1 and the disfavour with which the more aggressive1 crueler qualities have come to be regarded4 ,others1 however1 and perhaps these are of more importance1 are purely esthetic4 ,through a combination of circumstances1 modern warfare1 although more tragic than was ancient warfare1 and even more deadly1 nevertheless has been deprived of its spectacular features4 ,capacity for esthetic appreciation has its limits4 ,nobody is able to visualize a battle in which two million men are engaged2 it can only be imagined as a series of smaller battles4 ,in one of these modern battles1 substantially all the traditional elements which we have come to associate with war1 have disappeared4 ,the horse1 which bulks so largely in the picture of a battle as it presents itself to our minds1 scarcely retains any importance at all2 for the most part1 automobiles1 bicycles and motor cycles have taken its place4 ,these contrivances may be useful1 but they do not make the same appeal to the popular imagination4 ,,science ,,and ,,the ,,picturesque ,upon taking over warfare1 science stripped it of its picturesqueness4 ,the commanding general no longer cavorts upon his charger1 nor smiles as the bullets whistle about him1 while he stands surrounded by an ornamental general staff1 whose breasts are covered with ribbons and medals representing every known variety of hardware1 whether monarchical or republican4 ,today the general sits in a room1 surrounded by telephones and telegraph apparatus4 ,if he smiles at all1 it is only before the camera4 ,an officer scarcely ever uses a sword1 nor does he strut about adorned with all his crosses and medals1 nor does he wear the resplendent uniforms of other days4 ,on the contrary1 his uniform is ugly and dirt coloured1 and innocent of devices4 ,this officer is without initiative1 he is subordinated to a fixed general plan2 surprises on either one side or the other1 are almost out of the question4 ,the plan of battle is rigid and detailed4 ,it permits neither originality nor display of individuality upon the part of the generals1 the lesser officers1 or the private soldiers4 ,the individual is swallowed up by the collective force4 ,outstanding types do not occur2 nobody develops the marked personality of the generals of the old school4 ,besides this1 individual bravery1 when not reinforced by other qualities1 is of less and less consequence4 ,the bold1 adventurous youth who1 years ago1 would have been an embryo ,murat1 ,messina1 ,espartero or ,prim1 would be rejected today to make room for a mechanic who had the skill to operate a machine1 or for an aviator or an engineer who might be capable of solving in a crisis a problem of pressing danger4 ,the prestige of the soldier1 even upon the battle field1 has fallen today below that of the man of science4 ,,what ,,we ,,need ,,today ,there are still some persons of a romantic turn of mind who imagine that none but the soldier who defends his native land1 the priest who appeases the divine wrath and at the same time inculcates the moral law1 and the poet who celebrates the glories of the community1 are worthy to be leaders of the people4 ,but the man of the present age does not desire any leaders4 ,he has found that when someone wears red trousers or a black cassock1 or is able to write shorter lines than himself1 it is no indication that he is any better1 nor any braver1 nor any more moral1 nor capable of deeper feeling than he4 ,the man of today will have no magicians1 no high priests and no mysteries4 ,he is capable of being his own priest1 his own soldier when it is necessary1 and of fighting for himself2 he requires no specialists in courage1 in morals1 nor in the realm of sentiment and feeling4 ,what we need today are good men and wise men4 ,,our ,,armies ,prussian militarism has been explained upon the theory that it was a development consequent upon a realization of the benefits which had accrued to ,prussia through war4 ,as a matter of fact1 however1 it is not possible to explain all militarism in this way4 ,certainly in ,spain neither wars nor the army have been of the slightest benefit to the country4 ,if we consider the epoch which goes by the name of contemporary history1 that is to say from the ,french ,revolution to the present time1 we shall perceive immediately that we have not been over fortunate4 ,the ,french ,republic declared war upon us in #agic4 ,a campaign of astuteness1 a tactical warfare was waged by us upon the frontiers1 upon occasion not without success1 until finally the ,french army grew strong enough to sweep us back1 and to cross the ,ebro4 ,we took part in the battle of ,trafalgar in #ahje4 ,spain presented a fine appearance1 she made a mighty gesture with her ,gravinas1 her ,churrucas and her ,alavas1 but the battle itself was a disaster4 ,in #ahjh the ,war of ,independence broke out1 providing another splendid exhibition of popular fervour4 ,in this war1 the regular ,army was the force which accomplished least4 ,the war took its character from the guerrillas1 from the dwellers in the towns4 ,the campaign was directed by ,englishmen4 ,the ,spanish army suffered more defeats than it won victories1 while its administrative and technical organization was deplorable4 ,the intervention of ,angoulme followed in #ahbc4 ,the ,army was composed of liberal officers1 but it contained no troops1 so that all they ever did was to retire before the enemy1 as he was more numerous and more powerful4 ,the ,spanish cause in ,america was hopeless before the fighting began4 ,the land was enormous1 troops were few1 and in large measure composed of ,indians4 ,what the ,english were never able to do in the fulness of their power1 was not to be accomplished by ,spaniards in their decadence4 ,our ,first ,civil ,war1 which was fierce1 terrible1 and waged without quarter1 called into being a valorous liberal army1 and soldiers sprang up of the calibre of ,espartero1 ,zurbano and ,narvez1 but simultaneously a powerful ,carlist army was organized under leaders of military genius1 such as ,zumalacrregui and ,cabrera4 ,victory for either side was impossible1 and the war ended in compromise4 ,the ,second ,civil ,war also resulted in a system of pacts and compromises far more secret than the ,convention of ,vergara4 ,the ,cuban war and the war in the ,philippines1 as afterwards the war with the ,united ,states1 were calamitous1 while the present campaign in ,morocco has not one redeeming feature4 ,from the ,war of the ,french ,revolution to this very day1 the ,african ,war has been the only one in which our forces have met with the slightest success4 ,nevertheless1 our soldiers aspire to a position of dominance in the country equal to that attained by the ,french soldiers subsequent to ,jena1 and by the ,germans after ,sedan4 ,a ,,word ,,from ,,kuroki1 ,,the ,,japanese ,gentlemen1 said ,general ,kuroki1 speaking at a banquet tendered to him in ,new ,york1 ,i cannot aspire to the applause of the world1 because ,i have created nothing1 ,i have invented nothing4 ,i am only a soldier4 ,if these are not his identical words1 they convey the meaning of them4 ,this victorious1 square-headed ,mongolian had gotten into his head what the dolichocephalic ,german blond1 who1 according to ,german anthropologists is the highest product of ,europe1 and the brachycephalic brunette of ,gaul and the ,latin and the ,slav have never been able to understand4 ,will they ever be able to understand it8 ,perhaps they never will be able4 ,,epilogue ,when ,i sat down to begin these pages1 somewhat at random1 my intention was to write an autobiography1 accompanying it with such comments as might suggest themselves4 ,looking continually to the right and to the left1 ,i have lost my way1 and this book is the result4 ,i have not attempted to correct or embellish it4 ,so many books1 trimmed up nicely and well-padded1 go to their graves every year to be forgotten forever1 that it has hardly seemed worth while to bedeck this one4 ,i am not a believer in maquillage for the dead4 ,now one word more as to the subject of the book1 which is ,i4 ,if ,i were to live two hundred years at the very least1 ,i might be able to realize1 by degrees1 the maximum programme which ,i have laid down for my life4 ,as it scarcely seems possible that a man could live to such an age1 which is attained only by parrots1 ,i find myself with no alternative but to limit myself to a small portion of the introductory section of my minimum programme1 and this1 as a matter of fact1 ,i am content to do4 ,with hardship and effort1 and the scanty means at my command1 ,i have succeeded in acquiring a house and garden in my own country1 a comfortable retreat which is sufficient for my needs4 ,i have gathered a small library in the house1 which ,i hope will grow with time1 besides a few manuscripts and some curious prints4 ,i do not believe that ,i have ever harmed any man deliberately1 so my conscience does not trouble me4 ,if my ideas are fragmentary and ill-considered1 ,i have done my best to make them sound1 clear1 and complete1 so that it is not my fault if they are not so4 ,i have become independent financially4 ,i not only support myself1 but ,i am able to travel occasionally upon the proceeds of my pen4 ,a ,russian publishing house1 another in ,germany1 and another in the ,united ,states are bringing out my books1 paying me1 moreover1 for the right of translation2 and ,i am satisfied4 ,i have friends of both sexes in ,madrid and in the ,basque provinces1 who seem already like old friends1 because ,i have grown fond of them4 ,as ,i face old age1 ,i feel that ,i am walking upon firmer ground than ,i did in my youth4 ,in a short time1 what a few years ago the sociologists used to call involution--that is1 a turning in--will begin to take place in my brain2 the cranial sutures will become petrified1 and an automatic limitation of the mental horizon will soon come4 ,i shall accept involution1 petrification of the sutures and limitation with good grace4 ,i have never rebelled against logic1 nor against nature1 against the lightning or the thunder storm4 ,no sooner does one gain the crest of the hill of life than at once he begins to descend rapidly4 ,we know a great deal the moment that we realize that nobody knows anything4 ,i am a little melancholy now and a little rheumatic2 it is time to take salicylates and to go out and work in the garden--a time for meditation and for long stories1 for watching the flames as they flare upward under the chimney piece upon the hearth4 ,i commend myself to the event4 ,it is dark outside1 but the door of my house stands open4 ,whoever will1 be he life or be he death1 let him come in4 ,,palinode ,,and ,,fresh ,,outburst ,,of ,,ire ,a few days ago ,i left the house with the manuscript of this book1 to which ,i have given the name of ,youth and ,egolatry1 on my way to the post office4 ,it was a romantic ,september morning1 swathed in thick1 white mist4 ,a blue haze of thin smoke rose upward from the shadowy houses of the neighbouring settlement1 vanishing in the mist4 ,meanwhile1 the birds were singing1 and a rivulet close by murmured in the stillness4 ,under the influence of the homely1 placid country air1 ,i felt my spirit soften and grow more humble1 and ,i began to think that the manuscript which ,i carried in my hand was nothing more than a farrago of foolishness and vulgarity4 ,the voice of prudence1 which was also that of cowardice1 cautioned me3 ,what is the good of publishing this8 ,will it bring you reputation8 ,certainly not4 ,have you anything to gain by it8 ,probably not either4 ,then1 why irritate and offend this one and that by saying things which1 after all1 are nobody's business8 ,to the voice of prudence1 however1 my habitual self replied3 ,but what you have written is sincere1 is it not8 ,what do you care1 then1 what they think about it8 ,but the voice of prudence continued3 ,how quiet everything is about you1 how peaceful6 ,this is life1 after all1 and the rest is madness1 vanity and vain endeavour4 ,there was a moment when ,i was upon the point of tossing my manuscript into the air1 and ,i believe ,i should have done so1 could ,i have been sure that it would have dematerialized itself immediately like smoke2 or ,i would have thrown it into the river1 if ,i had felt certain that the current would have swept it out to sea4 99 99 99 99 99 ,this afternoon ,i went to ,san ,sebastian to buy paper and salicylate of soda1 which is less agreeable4 ,a number of public guards were riding together in the car on the way over1 along the frontier4 ,they were discussing bull fighters1 ,el ,gallo and ,belmonte1 and also the disorders of the past few days4 ,too bad that ,maura and ,la ,cierva are not in power1 said one of them1 who was from ,murcia1 smiling and exhibiting his decayed teeth4 ,they would have made short work of this4 ,they are in reserve for the finish1 said another1 with1 the solemnity of a pious scamp4 ,returning from ,san ,sebastian1 ,i happened on a family from ,madrid in the same car4 ,the father was weak1 jaundiced and sour-visaged2 the mother was a fat brunette1 with black eyes1 who was loaded down with jewels1 while her face was made up until it was brilliant white1 in colour like a stearin candle4 ,a rather good looking daughter of between fifteen and twenty was escorted by a lieutenant who apparently was engaged to her4 ,finally1 there was another girl1 between twelve and fourteen1 flaccid and lively as a still-life on a dinner table4 ,suddenly the father1 who was reading a newspaper1 exclaimed3 ,nothing is going to be done1 ,i can see that2 they are already applying to have the revolutionists pardoned4 ,the ,government will do nothing4 ,i wish they would kill every one of them1 broke in the girl who was engaged to the lieutenant4 ,think of it6 ,firing on soldiers6 ,they are bandits4 ,yes1 and with such a king as we have6 exclaimed the fat lady1 with the paraffine hue1 in a mournful tone4 ,it has ruined our summer4 ,i wish they would shoot every one of them4 ,and they are not the only ones1 interrupted the father4 ,the men who are behind them1 the writers and leaders1 hide themselves1 and then they throw the first stones4 ,upon entering the house1 ,i found that the final proofs of my book had just arrived from the printer1 and sat down to read them4 ,the words of that family from ,madrid still rang in my ears3 ,i wish they would kill every one of them6 ,however one may feel1 ,i thought to myself1 it is impossible not to hate such people4 ,such people are natural enemies4 ,it is inevitable4 ,now1 reading over the proofs of my book1 it seems to me that it is not strident enough4 ,i could wish it were more violent1 more anti-middle class4 ,i no longer hear the voice of prudence seducing me1 as it did a few days since1 to a palinode in complicity with a romantic morning of white mist4 ,the zest of combat1 of adventure stirs in me again4 ,the sheltered harbour seems a poor refuge in my eyes1--tranquillity and security appear contemptible4 ,here1 boy1 up1 and throw out the sail6 ,run the red flag of revolution to the masthead of our frail craft1 and forth to sea6 ,itzea1 ,september1 #aiag4 ,,appendices ,,spanish ,,politicians ,,on ,,baroja',s ,,anarchists ,,note ,,spanish ,,politicians ,the ,spanish alternating party system has prevailed as a national institution since the restoration of the monarchy under ,alfonso ,,xii4 ,ostensibly it is based upon manhood suffrage1 and in the cities this is the fact1 but in the more remote districts the balloting plays but small part in the returns4 ,upon the dissolution of the ,cortes and the resignation of a ministry1 one of the two great parties--the liberal party and the conservative party--automatically retires from power1 and the other succeeds it1 always carrying the ensuing elections by convenient working majorities4 ,spain is a poor country4 ,during the half century previous to the restoration of the ,bourbons1 she was a victim of internecine strife and factional warfare4 ,she is not poor naturally1 but her energy has been drawn off2 she has been bled white1 and needs time to recuperate4 ,the ,spaniards are a practical people4 ,they realize this condition4 ,even the lower classes are tired of fine talking4 ,no people have heard more1 and none have profited less by it4 ,the country is not like ,russia1 a fertile field for the agitator2 it looks coldly upon reform4 ,such response as has been obtained by the radical has come from the labour centres under the stimulus of foreign influences1 and more particularly from ,barcelona1 where the problem is political even before it is an individual one4 ,for this reason the ,spanish ,republicans are in large part theorists4 ,the land has been disturbed sufficiently4 ,they would hesitate to inaugurate radical reforms1 if power were to be placed in their hands1 while the possession of power itself might prove not a little embarrassing4 ,behind the monarchy lies the republic of #ahgc1 behind ,cnovas and ,castelar1 ,p y ,margall2 the republic has merged into and was1 in a sense1 the foundation of the constitutional system of today4 ,even popular leaders such as ,lerroux are quick to recognize this fact1 and govern themselves accordingly4 ,the lack of general education today1 would render any attempt at the establishment of a thorough-going democracy insecure4 ,francisco ,ferrer1 although idealized abroad1 has been no more than a symptom in ,spain4 ,such men even as ,angel ,guimer1 the dramatist1 a ,catalan separatist who has been under surveillance for years1 or ,pere ,aldavert1 who has suffered imprisonment in ,barcelona because of his opinions1 while they speak for the proletariat1 nevertheless have had scant sympathy for ,ferrer's ideas4 ,it would be interesting to know just to what extent these commend themselves to ,pablo and ,emiliano ,iglesias and the professed political ,socialists4 ,of the existing parties1 the ,liberal1 being more or less an association of groups tending to the left1 is the least homogeneous4 ,its most prominent leader of late years has been the ,conde de ,romanones1 who may scarcely be said to represent a new era4 ,he has shared responsibility with ,eduardo ,dato4 ,among ,conservatives1 the chief figure has long been ,antonio ,maura4 ,he is not a young man4 ,politically1 he represents very much what the cordially detested ,weyler did in the military sphere4 ,but ,maurism today is a very different thing from the ,maurism of fifteen years ago1 or of the moat of ,montjuich4 ,the name of ,maura casts a spell over the ,conservative imagination4 ,it is the rallying point of innumerable associations of young men of reactionary1 aristocratic and clerical tendencies throughout the country1 while to progressives it symbolizes the oppressiveness of the old rgime4 ,,on ,,baroja',s ,,anarchists ,baroja's memoirs afford convincing proof of his contact with radicals of all sorts and classes1 from stereotyped republicans such as ,barriovero1 or the ,argentine ,francisco ,grandmontagne1 correspondent of ,la ,prensa of ,buenos ,aires1 to active anarchists of the type of ,mateo ,morral4 ,morral was an habitu of a cafe in the ,calle de ,alcal at ,madrid1 where ,baroja was accustomed to go with his friends to take coffee1 and1 in the ,spanish phrase1 to attend his tertulia4 ,morral would listen to these conversations4 ,after his attempt to assassinate the ,king and ,queen in the ,calle ,mayor on their return from the ,royal wedding ceremony1 ,baroja went to view ,morral's body1 but was refused admittance4 ,a drawing of ,morral was made at the time1 however1 by ,ricardo ,baroja4 ,in this connection1 ,jos ,nakens1 to whom the author pays his compliments on an earlier page1 was subjected to an unusual experience4 ,nakens1 who was a sufficiently mild gentleman1 had taken a needy radical into his house1 and had given him shelter4 ,this personage made a point of inveighing to ,nakens continually against ,cnovas del ,castillo1 proposing to make way with him4 ,when the news of the assassination of ,cnovas was cried through the city1 ,nakens knew for the first that his visitor had been in earnest4 ,he was none other than the murderer ,angiolillo4 ,this anecdote became current in ,madrid4 ,years afterwards when the prime minister ,canalejas was shot to death1 the assassin recalled it to mind1 and repaired to the house of ,nakens1 who saw in dismay for the second time his radical theories put to violent practical proof4 ,the incident proved extremely embarrassing4 ,the crime of ,morral forms the basis of ,baroja's novel ,la ,dama ,errante4 ,he has also dealt with anarchism in ,aurora ,roja 7,red ,dawn74 ,the mutiny on the ship ,numancia1 referred to in the text1 was an incident of the same period of unrest1 which was met with severe repressive measures4 ,,note ,the ,madrid ,ateneo is a learned society maintaining a house on the ,calle del ,prado1 in which is installed a private library of unusual excellence4 ,it has been for many years the principal depository of modern books in ,spain1 and a favourite resort of scholars and research-workers of the capital4 ,,the ,,works ,,of ,p,o ,,baroja ,po ,baroja1 recognized by the best critics as the foremost living ,spanish novelist1 is without doubt the chief exponent of that ferment of political and social thought in ,spain which had its inception in the cataclysm of #ahih1 and which gave rise to the new movement in ,spanish literature4 ,of course this modern movement was not actually born in #ahih4 ,it dates back as far as ,galds1 who is in spirit a modern4 ,but it marked the turning point4 ,benavente the dramatist1 ,azorn the critic1 ,rubn ,daro the poet1 ,po ,baroja the novelist1 all date from this period1 belonging to and of the new generation1 and1 together with the ,valencian ,blasco ,ibez1 form the ,a ,b ,c of modern ,spanish culture4 ,baroja stands for the modern ,spanish mind at its most enlightened1 says ,h4 ,l4 ,mencken4 ,he is the ,spaniard of education and worldly wisdom1 detached from the mediaeval imbecilities of the old regime and yet aloof from the worse follies of the demagogues who now rage in the country 444 the ,spaniard who1 in the long run1 must erect a new structure of society upon the half archaic and half ,utopian chaos now reigning in the peninsular4 ,po ,baroja was born in #ahgb at ,san ,sebastian1 the most fashionable summer resort of ,spain1 the ,spanish ,summer ,capital4 ,baroja's father was a noted mining engineer1 and while without reputation as a man of letters he was an occasional contributor to various periodicals and dailies4 ,he had destined his son for the medical profession1 and ,po studied at ,valencia and ,madrid1 where he received his degree4 ,he started practice in the small town of ,cestona1 the type of town which figures largely in his novels4 ,but the young doctor soon wearied of his profession1 and laying aside his stethoscope forever1 he returned to ,madrid1 where1 in partnership with an older brother1 he opened a bakery4 ,however he was no more destined to be a cook than a doctor1 so1 encouraged by interested friends1 he succeeded in getting a few articles and stories accepted by various ,madrid papers4 ,it was not long before he won distinction as a journalist1 and he presently abandoned baking entirely1 devoting all his energies to writing4 ,his first novel1 ,camino de ,perfeccin1 published in #aijb1 was received with but little enthusiasm4 ,however he closely followed it with several others1 and ,spain soon realized that she had a new writer of unusual merit4 ,today he is pre-eminent among contemporary ,spanish authors4 ,his books have been translated into ,french1 ,german1 ,italian and ,english4 ,alfred ,a4 ,knopf1 ,seor ,baroja's authorized publisher in the ,english-speaking countries1 has published to date two of the novels3 ,,the ,,city ,,of ,,the ,,discreet4 ,translated by ,jacob ,s4 ,fassett1 ,jr4 #b4jj net4 ,around ,cordova1 the fascinating and romantic city of the discreet1 ,baroja has spun an adventurous tale4 ,he gives you a vivid picture of the city with her tortuous streets1 ancient houses with their patios and tiled roofs and of her discreet inhabitants4 ,in a style that is polished where ,ibez' is crudely vigorous1 and with sympathy and understanding1 he portrays ,quentin1 the natural son of a ,marquis and a woman of humble birth2 ,pacheco1 the ambitious bandit chief2 ,don ,gil ,sabadia1 the garrulous and convivial antiquarian1 and a host of other characters4 ,unforgettable pictures are spread in a rich background for the action--,cordova at twilight1 with its spires showing against the violet sky1 the narrow streets with white houses leaning toward each other1 its squares with sturdy beggars squatting around and its gardens heavy with the scent of orange blossoms1 where old fountains quietly drip4-- ,indianapolis ,news4 ,this fine novel 444 shows us the best features of the modern ,spanish realistic school4--,the ,bookman4 ,,caesar ,,or ,,nothing4 ,translated by ,louis ,how4 #b4jj net4 ,this is the story of ,caesar ,moncada1 a brilliantly clever young ,spaniard1 who sets out to reform his country1 to modernize it and its government4 ,in depicting ,caesar's preparation in ,rome1 where his uncle is a ,cardinal1 for the career he has planned for himself1 ,seor ,baroja etches vividly and entertainingly a typical cosmopolitan society--witty1 worldly1 prosperous and cynical4 ,the second part of the book describes ,caesar's political fight in ,castro ,duro4 ,not only ,spain's greatest novelist1 but his greatest book4 ,it is the most important translation that has come out of ,spain in our time in the field of fiction and it will be remembered as epochal4--,,john ,,garrett ,,underhill1 ,representative in ,america of the ,society of ,spanish ,authors of ,madrid4 ,ranks ,baroja as a master of fiction1 with a keen sense of character1 constructive power and an active1 dynamic style4--,philadelphia ,ledger4 ,i read ,caesar or ,nothing with a profound admiration for its power and skill4 ,it is a great novel1 which you deserve our thanks for publishing4--,,harold ,j4 ,,laski1 of ,harvard ,university4 ,a brilliant book--amazingly clever and humorous in its earlier chapters1 gradually accumulating depth as it moves along until it becomes the stuff of tragedy at the close4 ,the character he has created in ,caesar ,moncada is one of the few really notable portrayals in recent fiction4--,chicago ,post4 ,translations of three other novels by ,baroja are in preparation in the competent hands of ,dr4 ,isaac ,goldberg4 ,the first1 ,,la ,,dama ,,errante1 will be ready in the ,fall of #aibj4 ,probable price1 #b4jj4