The history of Spain for the last three hundred years affords an illustration of the proposition established by Lecky[28] that “the period of Catholic ascendancy was on the whole one of the most deplorable in the history of the human mind.” In no country in Western Europe has the Church of Rome been so entirely absolute and dominant, since the Reformation, as in Spain, where the Inquisition instantly and finally crushed out all freedom of thought and all opposition to theological orthodoxy. The Church in Spain to-day enjoys the unique position of holding a monopoly of the spiritual direction of the nation. Although other creeds and forms of worship are tolerated, there is no religious liberty. Everywhere else, even in Catholic countries, there is a vigilant and hostile body of opinion, of more or less weight, which necessarily contributes by its very existence to moralise the Church and to enforce on the priesthood a certain standard of duty. In Spain this check is absent. There is no rival Church, for the Spanish Protestants are too few in number and too insignificant in position to make their influence felt, and the working classes, who, as has been shown, are bitterly hostile to the priesthood, are inarticulate, and powerless as an influence corrective of abuses, while the middle classes, who might do something towards enforcing a higher standard, are generally speaking, indifferent.
To what extent the corruption of the spiritual power in Spain is responsible for the low moral standard of the laity is an exceedingly difficult question, on which I am not capable of pronouncing an opinion. There is no doubt that Spain for the last three hundred years has suffered from a succession of some of the worst, the most incompetent, and the most corrupt rulers known to history. During all this time, except perhaps during the thirty years when Charles III. was on the throne, the Church was supreme. If the clergy, the directors of the conscience of the nation, armed with the power of the confessional and supported if necessary by the secular arm, had deliberately set their faces against the system of public venality and corruption instituted by Lerma and Olivares and continued by their subordinates and successors, it is difficult to believe that the upas-tree would have grown so tall and struck its roots so deeply as it has.
The excessive centralisation of the whole administration in Madrid, coupled with the Spanish habit of writing long letters and reports about every trivial question, which reports are referred for further information from one official to another before the Minister or other authority gives his final decision, paralyses all initiative and causes infinite delays and annoyances over the simplest matters. On the other hand, if effective local self-government were given under existing conditions, the Cacique would be even more powerful than he now is, and Spain would be ruled, not by a single bureaucracy, but by a number of irresponsible autocrats.
Thus before Spain can effectually reform herself there is needed a change of heart, a vital conviction that only through honest and fearless administration is redemption possible. An educated Spaniard once observed to me, when discussing this matter: “In England you act on the supposition that a person in office is an honest man, and if you find that he is not, you punish him severely. In Spain we presuppose dishonesty, and do not chastise the rogue when he is found out.” This is perfectly true. There are swarms of official inspectors who are supposed to inspect everything connected with the public administration. But the inspectors themselves are venal, and for a sufficient consideration will report that all is well when it is far from well. Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? It is the rarest thing to hear of any official being punished for peculation or receiving bribes.
Every educated Spaniard is fully aware of this canker, which is rotting the whole body politic: they talk to each other and to foreigners about it with the utmost frankness, entirely recognising the greatness of the evil and usually despairing of any amendment.
To turn to another side of the same question. In a different way the bullfight is responsible for an amount of moral degradation that no one but a Spaniard can adequately estimate. It is not only that the spectacle of broken-down horses gored to death and a wild beast worried for half an hour at a stretch is in itself debasing, but the whole atmosphere created by the amusement is thoroughly vicious and degrading. This is not merely my private opinion: I repeat what has been told me by cultured and thoughtful Spaniards, who see in its popularity one of the many obstacles to the growth of a higher standard of morality. Happily there are indications that the taste for the sport is on the wane. I know numerous members of the upper middle class and many working people, both men and women, who object strongly to the institution, and never attend a bullfight, and bullrings have been closed in many of the smaller towns during the last ten years or so, for want of support. But the vested interests—the cattle-breeders who make their living by breeding the bulls, the impresarios who get up the shows, the companies who have invested millions of pesetas in building bullring’s, the thousands of men employed in them in various capacities, and the bull-fighters themselves—form together a very powerful combination with a good deal of political influence, and it will be many years yet before this blot on civilisation disappears.[29]
One deplorable fact connected with the bullfights is the extent to which they are patronised by foreign visitors, and of these the English are among the worst offenders. I have been told, though I cannot vouch for the truth of the statement, that one bullring close to Gibraltar is practically kept going by the English spectators, and that but for their support it would be closed. I know that Englishmen and English women, in scores and hundreds, every year, some of them ardent supporters at home of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, make a point, when they come to Spain, of going to see the show. “No, I daresay I shan’t like it,” they will say, “but when one is in Spain it is one of the things one ought to see.” Let us hope that they do not realise that their example goes to make the task of the Spanish social reformers even more up-hill and heart-breaking than it need be.
I may instance an University professor who was wearing himself out in the endeavour to raise the moral and intellectual standard of his pupils. He himself was educated in England, and had the highest respect for English customs and institutions and for the general code of English honour. He told me that he had lain awake all one night trying to find a reply to his lads when they said: “If the English, whom you hold up to us as an example in so many ways, support the bullfight, there can be no reason why we should condemn it.”
“And meanwhile,” said the professor bitterly, “your English ladies come out of the bullring and tell me that what they have seen there proves us to be a nation of barbarians.”
In this connection it should be remembered that Spaniards of all classes have a great admiration for England and English institutions, which has been recently increased thanks to the popularity of the Queen. One sees this in all directions. English is beginning to replace French as the first foreign language a young Spaniard learns; English games and English fashions are rapidly being introduced; and one of the leaders of the Republican party has proclaimed a democratic Monarchy on English lines to be the best compromise possible under existing conditions in Spain. So that the support which English visitors give to the bullring is probably more influential for harm than that of other foreigners.