REVISTA eee eS MODERNANOTAS MANUEL GONZALEZ PRADA: DEVOTED FOLLOWER OR INSUBORDINATE PARTISAN OF AUGUSTE COMTE?* Since the arrival of Columbus, European ideas have played a decisive role in Latin ‘American intellectual life. After the wars of independence, many Latin American {intellectuals still felt subservient to the residual influence of Medieval European Scholasticism. As a liberating response, some thinkers would look to the positivism of Auguste Comte (1798-1857) or Herbert Spencer (1820-1908) for guidance, It was Comte, however, who would exert the greatest influence with his system of the three stages of humanity, the third characterized by a call for order and progress, guided by a hierarchy of poets and artists. ‘To understand the positivism of Manuel Gonzalez Prada (1844-1918) it becomes necessary to examine Comte’s system of the three stages through which humanity ‘must pass. The first stage, the theological, is characterized by a complete lack of empirical data. To understand life, a series of mythological beliefs are woven together to elaborate an a priori explanation of life. This theological stage is itself subdivided into three periods, the fetishistic, the polytheistic and the most advan ced, the monotheistic. After the theological stage, we find the metaphysical, the second stage of humanity. This stage begins to admit a few empirical facts, yet fils in the blanks with theological concepts to complete the world view. This second stage is merely a transition between the first and the third. The final stage, the positive, is achieved through the complete rejection of theological and metaphysical Concepts, the inevitable reaction of increasingly instructive physical research, Science is the only key to understanding society. The positive stage finds itself opposing the theological stage due to its complete a posteriori foundation (Comte V: 158-68) Gonzlez Prada echoed Comte by exhorting his countrypersons to support science (Paginas, 45). Scientific research would solve the problems which caused Pera to loose the nitrate rich provinces of Tacna and Arica to Chile in the War of the Pacific (1879-1888). He defined this science as being “Positive Science,” placing i higher on the evolutionaty scale than theology or metaphysics (Péginas, 45) The preference for “Positive Science” would seem to align Gonsilex Prada’s thought as A direct successor to Comte’s system of the three stages. It would also seem to demonstrate, as Robert G. Mead suggests, a predilection on the part of Gonzalez Prada for the third stage of humanity, the positive (Perspectivas 110). “This article is a revised version of a paper given in a session, “Spanish American Letters “The History of Ideas,” at the Mid-America Conference on Hispanic Literature, November 4.11, 1989, The University of Kansas, Lawrence.MANUEL GONZALEZ PRADA 215 With this philosophical heritage in mind, it is not hard to see how various commentators of Latin American thought could call Gonzélez Prada a positivist. For Leopoldo Zea, Gonzélez Prada represents the link between Latin American romanticism and positivism (Ik: 59). To the mind of Augusto Salazar Bondy, Gonz4- lez Prada lies within the “positivist and naturalist conception” of the world in the tradition of the Nineteenth Century in Europe (: 10). Phyllis Rodriguez Peralta also asserts that “Gonzalez Prada adhered to positivist philosophy” (150). However, among these three critics arises a seeming contradiction. Even though Zea classifies Gonzalez Prada as a positivist, he notices an attitude which rejects Comte (II: 59). On the surface, this assertion seems to be incorrect because ‘Comte, in the words of Will Durant, was the “founder of the ‘positivist’ movement” (265). Salazar Bondy discusses Gonzalez Prada’s ability to speak about natural reality in terms of metaphysics (I: 15), even though he has called him a positivist in the European tradition. And although Rodriguez-Peralta characterizes him as an adhe- rent of positivism, she also notes that “Gonzdlez Prada’s ideology underwent constant change” (150). As Salazar Bondy explains so well, this apparent ideological decentering “puts in crisis” the postulates of Comte’s rigid positivism (I: 18) ‘What then is the nature of Gonzdlez Prada’s thought? And what is the relation ship of his thought to Comte and did the Peruvian social medium come to bear on that relationship? These are the questions that I hope to clarify in this study. To answer these questions, we must first look at Gonzélez Prada in relationship to politics and religion. Gonzalez Prada was born into a tumultuous political and religious system which organized society into a rigid hierarchy, supported by the military. When he was very young, his family experienced exile in Valparaiso, Chile. His father, a partisan of the expresident, José Rufino Echenique, had to flee Peru at the election of Ramén Castilla in 1854 (Sanchez, 26-27, 88). Gonzilez Prada caught the political bug from his father, and as a young man he associated himself with the intellectual wing of the civilista political party (Kristal, 144). As Charles Hale points out in The Cambridge History of Latin America many of the pensadores of this party were familiar with the writings of Auguste Comte (Hale, 417). After becoming disillusioned with the absence of ethics in the civilsta party, Gonzalez Prada attempted a more moral political party by forming the Unién Nacional. Later, again because of corruption, he renounced his ties to the Unién, proclaiming a need for social reform over po: litical movement. Now if Gonzalez Prada renounced politics, did he also renounce positivism? IF he did not, then the nature of his positivism must be defined. Yet before that can be done completely, Gonzilez Prada must also be examined within the context of Catholicism. Besides the abuses of political power which Gonzilez Prada observed first hand, religious fanaticism would also leave an indelible mark on his thought. Luis Alberto Sanchez, Prada’s biographer, portrays his home environment as being markedly religious, even fanatical (Sanchez, 23, 26, 29, 78, 95-6). From this background, Gonzalez Prada came to discern the temporal aspect of spiritual power. Even at a very early age, the adulteration of the spiritual by the temporal struck a dissonant chord within him. ‘As with Gonzdlez Prada’s political and temporal life, a central question arises concerning the nature of his spiritual tendencies. He fled from the seminary and spent most of his life criticizing the Catholic Church some of the most powerful276 ‘THOMAS BUTLER WARD REM, XLIV (191), diatribes against the Catholic Church that had even been written in Peru. Was he, then, an atheist? This is an important question because materialist positivism would seem to lend itself quite easily to atheism. One of the principal characteristics of Comte’s third stage of society, the positive, is hierarchy. It is through this hierarchy that order and progress can be achieved. We also know that Comte was something of a closet Catholic. This fact is evidenced by the sacerdotal structure of his Religion of Humanity and his love for the concept of hierarchy. It was precisely the hierarchic nature of Catholicism that seduced Comte. In fact, in Comte’s analysis of history, it was Catholicism which oriented the morals of society in the proper direction. Comte took the hierarchy of Catholicism and molded it into his positive hierarchy. Because Comte was at heart a Catholic who admired the hierarchical structure of earthly power by the Church, Gonzdlez Prada’s understanding of Comte seems muddled or confused, leading to a paradox in his particular brand of positivism. This is true because he spent his life criticizing Catholicism, while praising the pos- itivism of Comte. It seems that the term “positivism” came to evoke a meaning entirely different for Gonzalez Prada than it did for Comte. This incongruousness becomes difficult to interpret because Gonzaler Prada was never able to grow out of the system of terminology devised by Comte. This is demonstrated by his call for a “Positive Science” while demonstrating an agnostic posture toward theological precepts such as the immortality of the soul and the existence of God (Paginas, 191). This problem is not limited to the philosophical differences between agnosti ism and scientism. Gonzélez Prada created further antagonism with orthodox positivism by espousing in his later years the social theories of anarchism. This is the very same social tendency that Comte wanted to eradicate with his positive hierarchy. This anarchy seems to put Gonzdlez Prada in a trajectory leading from Pierre Joseph Proudhon (1809-1865), not from Comte. This ambiguity of tradition can only be resolved by examining Gonzalez Prada’s own understanding of the sequence of Comte’s three stages of humanity. If Comte thought that that positive stage was just on the horizon in France, Gontilez Prada found Peru to be siill in the earliest period of the theological stage of society, the fetishistic (Paginas, 29). Gonzdlez Prada believed this to be true be cause of retrograde politics (Figuras 227) and regressive Catholicism (Paginas, 82). Both the religious and political systems lacked spiritual elements because of their mutual corruption. Lacking moral direction, the political and religious aspects of temporal power worked together intimately (Horas 946) to repress individual freedom. ‘The problem for Gonzalez Prada was that there was not yet a division of power betwen the political and religious powers. This characteristic of Peruvian society parallels the polytheistic religions, which for Comte, had not yet achieved the division between the temporal and spiritual powers. For Comte the all-important separation of power did not come until Jesus Christ (V: 258-259). This division is derived from Christ's monotheistic axiom, give unto Caesar that which is Caesar’s, and unto God, that which is God’s If, by judging American Peru according to Comte’s European theories, Gonzalez Prada could not verify the division of power that should characterize the monotheistic period of the first stage of humanity, it is not hard to see how, in his frustration, he would exaggerate a bit and locate Peru in the earliest period of the theological stage, the fetishistic.MANUEL GONZALEZ PRADA 277 Gonzalez Prada’s proposition that Peru had not yet experienced the division of power put forth by Jesus Christ implies that the Messiah had not yet come to knock down the temple, embodied in Peru by the Catholic Church. It further suggests that, this “Messiah” would ignore Caesar, represented by the Peruvian State. Yet Jesus Christ’s influence on Gonzdlez Prada does not only come from Comte’s theories. During a trip to France, Gonzilez Prada studied under Ernest Renan and also devoted much time to mastering the anarchist thought of that period. Among the ‘most influential of those anarchists were Bakunin, Tolstoi, and the aforementioned Proudhon, all three students of Jesus Christ. Renan’s Vie de Jésus! became a point of departure for much of Gonzilez Prada’s later thought. Litde by litde, che anarchists’ ideas coupled with Renan’s anarchist Christ were influencing the organi: zational concept of the third stage of humanity in Gonzalez Prada. Whereas in Comite society is organized around a hierarchy which extinguishes intellectual and moral anarchy (IV: 50, 459, 512-18), in Gonzalez Prada, theoretical anarchy opposes the hierarchy of the Peruvian Church and State (Horas 271; Anargufa 16, 33). Itis in this view of the third stage that Gonzalez Prada challenges the model proposed by Comte. Anarchy in Comte is perceived as a detriment to the order of society. Anarchy in Gonzélez Prada, on the other hand, is regarded as freedom from State and Church. This anarchy provides the highest form of freedom because, as Renan suggests, free from Church and State as Christ was, it allows freedom of the soul (Vie 122), With the soul free from the dogmas of Church and State, the individual can experience sexual and racial equality. In both thinkers, behavior in the third stage would be guided by a very “high” morality. Even though morality in both thinkers is derived from science, a diver: gence of meaning between the two becomes apparent. Although both believed in a personal morality, Comte postulated that the hierarchy should define that morality. Gonzilez Prada, on the other hand, proposed an interior origin for morality, the soul. Comte praised the Catholic concept of morality, because it lead to uniform intellectual moral concepts. The more spiritual morality of Gonzalez Prada reacted against the standardized and sometimes formulaic morality of Catholicism. Comte criticized freedom of the press because it led to anarchy (VI: 78, 91-2) Conversely, Gonzilez Prada found himself in favor of freedom of the press to promote knowledge. On several occasions, Gonzdlez Prada’s personal presses were shut down for publishing his essays. This happened as early as 1899 when the government of Nicolds Piérola closed Gonzdlez Prada’s newspaper Germinal (San- chez 151), He founded another newspaper, Fl Independiente in August of 1899 (Sanchez 152), yet before the end of 1900 it was also suppressed (Sanchez 155). Many institutions that published his essays also suffered the Latin American plague of censorship. For example, in 1909 the government of Augusto Leguia closed down Los Parias for publishing Gonzdlez Prada’s “Otra vez La Prensa” and “Por mal camino”. These closings demonstrated the power of the hierarchy of the few in Peru and the difficulty in achieving the free flow of ideas. * For an excellent study of nom positivist tendencies in Renan, see Keith Gore, “Ernest Renan: A Positive Fuhies?” French Studies 41 (1987) 141-154.278 ‘THOMAS BUTLER WARD REM, XLIV (891) President Piérola, who made a hobby of censuring Gonzélez Prada’s essays, represented for Gonzélez Prada the lack of division between the spiritual and temporal powers. Gonzilez Prada knew Piérola personally from his days in the Seminary at Santo Toribio. He criticized Piérola for investing enormous amounts of public money to refurbish churches (Figuras 191) instead of attending to temporal ‘matters, This confusion of the two powers caused Gonzalez Prada to dub President Pigrola as the “Defender of Jesus in Tahuantisuyu” (Figuras 176), This politico religions fanaticism impeded the free flow of ideas. The lack of free speech restricted mental processes which in turn lead to a reduced spirituality, The free flow of information proposed by Gonzélez Prada could, and should, be used to srimulate a higher level of personal growth for the masses. In this way, Gonzilez Prada stood apart from Comte and his hierarchy guided from above by artists and wisepersons, ‘This interior morality of Gonzalez Prada should not be confused with mysticism, @ concept he criticized (Prosa 59-61). It is derived from pure empirical science (Paginas, 82). The more the individual learns through science, the higher his or her intellectual capacity can become, and consequently, the higher the level of morality achieved. This attitude of Gonzalez Prada is a direct result of his life ‘experience in Peru and his French studies. The ideological divergence between Comte and Gonzalez Prada is the result of the two very different social mediums in which they lived. Peruvian society was controlled rigidly by the Church and the State, Comte, on the other hand, lived during the time immediately after the French Revolution and experienienced a desire to create order out of chaos. When comparing the two thinkers, products of two very different social mediums, itis hard to imagine that they both could conceive the term positivism from the same perspective. The third stage of humanity in Gonzalez Prada is characterized by the harmony of all humans guided by an individual morality enhanced by intellectual develop. ment through science. This harmony is free from political or religious hierarchies. It must be called spiritual or moral anarchy. It is the freedom of the individual, the free flow of ideas, the equality and subsequent harmony of the races and the sexes that characterized the third stage of humanity in the world view of Gonzalez Prada. ‘The seeming contradiction between Gonzalez Prada’s use of the term “Positive Science,” which would make him an intellectual heir to Comte and the term anarchy, which would make him a subconscious opponent to Comte can be resolved by understanding “Positive Science” as a tool for the empirical gathering of know. ledge. This expansive “Positive Science” proposed by Gonzdlez Prada ‘opposes the restrictive “Positive Philosophy” devised by Comte. The term positivism, let loose in the social medium of Latin America, found its center of meaning modified to agree with a very different social circumstance. Gonsales Prada was not a positivist, in the sense applied to that term by Comte. He used theoretical positivism as a weapon against the hierarchy of Catholicism. This is not the practice of atheism, it is anticlericalism. For Gonzalez Prada, the hierarchy of Catholicism was the antithesis of spiritual growth. He could not, then, be an atheist. He was a pantheist. Nor was Gonzilez Prada a politician. He employed his anarchist and radical Christian ideas to delegitimize the political systems he learned about in his youth and from his associations with the eivilistasuv nn essays, ual and in the mporal esident volitico- speech he free ased to onzaler sts and sticism, science or her rorality ence in te and ch they Comte, olution ing the nagine mony exelop: chies. ividual, sad the onzdlez Positive ‘aarchy, ved by know: ses the t loose fied to Comte, dlicism, da, the t then, an. He litical tuilistas, MANUEL GONZALEZ PRADA 279 ‘This is why in later years he would renounce all connections to his own political party, the Unién Nacional. What Gonzalez Prada never realized, was that his neo. 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