Greater interest has been manifested in public education in late years.[XXX-20] Larger appropriations have been made, and competent teachers procured.[XXX-21]
The retrogressive government which ruled over Guatemala for more than thirty years, down to 1871 when it was overthrown, not only failed to make adequate provision for the education of the masses, but endeavored to keep them in a state of ignorance and fanaticism. The new régime hastened to bring on a change, being convinced that without an educated people, democratic institutions would be impossible. Primary schools were accordingly established as fast as circumstances and the condition of the treasury permitted, in every town and village. In 1876 their number had already reached 600, and progress was uninterrupted after that.[XXX-22] Secondary and professional education have also been fostered. There are three national institutes of secondary instruction for males and two for females, a normal school for training teachers; also several of special instruction, namely, agriculture, design, arts, and trades; one for the deaf and dumb and two of law, one of medicine, and one of engineering. Since 1882 schools of music and elocution and a mercantile academy[XXX-23] have been added. Special mention should be made of the Politécnica, or military academy, in which a liberal education is afforded, comprising English and French, a thorough course of science, including mathematics and drawing, in addition to the specialties of the military profession.[XXX-24]
The national university, which during the old régime had been governed by the ordinances of Cárlos II., the Bewitched, who ruled in the latter part of the seventeenth century, was placed under regulations more in consonance with modern ideas. The establishment has been since imparting the highest order of instruction. The old Sociedad Económica, whose mission is to advance agriculture, and the fine and mechanic arts, likewise has undergone improvements.[XXX-25] The expenditure for public instruction has increased from year to year, as appears in the note below.[XXX-26]
Notwithstanding the retrogressive policy of the oligarchic rule, Guatemala was not devoid of men of ability and learning. Several works have issued from Guatemalan pens, the writers deserving special mention being José Valle, Domingo Juarros, Alejandro Marure, Pedro Molina and his sons, Francisco Barrundia, Lorenzo Montúfar, José Milla, and others, including the brothers Dieguez as poets.[XXX-27]
Newspapers as a rule have had a precarious life, though several of them often contained productions from able Central American pens. The government has at times afforded aid with subsidies.
RELIGION AND THE CLERGY.
It is hardly necessary to mention the fact that the catholic religion was the only form of worship recognized or tolerated in Central America during the Spanish domination. Its clergy enjoyed here the same privileges, and were subject to the same duties and restrictions, as in Mexico. In the short period that the country was an appendage of the Mexican empire, no change took place in the relations between church and state. But soon after the establishment of the Central American confederation, and while the liberal democratic party was in power, efforts were made to do away with the privileges of the clergy, and to bring them under subjection to the civil authority.[XXX-28] Pursuant to this policy several laws and measures were adopted against the clergy in general, and Archbishop Casaus in particular,[XXX-29] which irritated the anti-liberals and roused the ire of the clericals, who at once gave utterance to the most fanatical language; and there were even liberal-minded men who took up the cause of the friars and abused in the press some of the wisest measures.[XXX-30] Serious troubles ensued; but during several years the legislative action was sustained, and still more radical resolutions were adopted. In 1829 the archbishop and a portion of his clergy being detected in plotting against the government were forthwith sent out of the country. Two months later the general congress declared religious orders at an end in the republic.[XXX-31]
RELIGIOUS FREEDOM.
Finally, in 1832, religious freedom was proclaimed,[XXX-32] and it was moreover declared that the appointment to church dignities pertained to the nation, and should be made by the executive.[XXX-33] The church was thus brought low; but a reaction came erelong, and with the practical dissolution of the confederation, the serviles, then in power, undid what their opponents had done, and among other acts restored the privileges of the clergy, and also the monastic orders.[XXX-34] For all that, the church had been struck blows from which it never fully recovered. It is true that the masses still cherished a portion of their former religious bigotry, but from year to year it has been giving way to move liberal sentiments, and foreigners never encountered any difficulty to remain on the score of religion, so long as they respected the prejudices of the people.[XXX-35] The shameless immorality of the priests has tended to develop a feeling of indifference to religion, and to weaken the reverence formerly felt toward its ministers. Being shielded by the fuero eclesiástico from trial by the common courts, the clergy were practically exempt from deserved punishment, provided they were submissive to their superiors.[XXX-36] Superadded to which was the repeated interference of the clergy in political affairs, which had been so baneful that the people came to learn what was the proper orbit of church and state respectively.
Archbishop Casaus died November 10, 1845, aged eighty years.[XXX-37] During his absence, the archdiocese of Guatemala was in charge of Francisco de Paula Pelaez, archbishop of Bostra in partibus infidelium and coadjutor with right of succession, who became Casaus' successor[XXX-38] and held the office till his death, on the 25th of January, 1867.[XXX-39] The next occupant of the see was Bernardo Piñol y Aycinena, late bishop of Nicaragua, from September 1868. The expulsion by the provisional government, in 1871, of the jesuits, together with the confiscation of their estates, and the apprehension of further action against the clergy, prompted the archbishop and many of his subjects to promote a counter-revolution; their plans failed, and the archbishop, together with Mariano Ortiz y Urruela, bishop of Teya in partibus infidelium, was expelled from the country; neither of them ever returned.[XXX-40] The Guatemalans have been since without a pastor.