The record-union., 1899-05-28
CASTELAR,.


lost her most brilliant and accomplish
ed man Of letters. He occupied the
unique position Of being at once a hit
erary genius and statesman That
in statecraft he was not always con-
sistent, yielding for sake of peace where
a bold front and courageous adhesion
to his cause might have won him vic
tory, is true enough. On the other
hand he advocated and fought for re-
publican principles when it required
true courage to do so, and he so far
gained his point that he saw a republic
established upon the thrones of the
Moors
That Castelar,, later in life, abandoned
the party of which he was a builder and
went partly over to the monarchists, is
explained by his admirers in this wise
that Castelar, realizing the hopelessness
of his struggle to establish a perma-
nent republic in Spain, preferred his
country to his ambition and the pur-
suit of vain hope, and, therefore, de-
voted himself to labors intended to ac
complish reforms under the crown,
which would under a republic have been
principles.
However, it is as a literary man,
rather than a politician, that we prefer
to consider Emilio CASTELAR,, as a great
essayist, an orator and a scholar. He
was all these. But whatever his weak
nesses as a politician, though they are
by no means conceded, he is entitled to
the gratitude Of journalists for making,
as he did in his sketch of Girardin, the
most eloquent and sincere defense of
journalism and journalists. all toilers
in newspaper life, that ever came from
the pen or lips of man. Certainly in
the whole range of letters there has
been no tribute paid to journalists and
the art of journalism so eloquently,
gracefully and fervidly.
That he was a patriot cannot be de-
MED, even by his bitterest foes. He
enjoyed the distinction of having suffer
ed banishment after the revolution Of
1866 because of his espousal of the doc
trines of self government and freedom
He enjoyed the further distinction Of
as President of the Spanish republic
and in the office proved himself a hu-
name, kindly and sincere lover of his
country. 1t is conceded that in the
ha 6n
ness of nature essential in such a po-
sition suddenly erected in one of the
oldest of monarchies. That subsequent
ly on the accession of Alfonso XII. he
put away his hopes of a republic and
lent his energies to his country under
a monarch, advising Cancellation and
opposing any further attempts at rev.
olution is certainly true
But if he erred in that Judgment: if
he should have continued in the field of
republican aggression and have plotted
and battled against monarchis1n, never
| theless his change of policy did not
ing republic for Spain. He simply
! reached the conviction that it vas not
to be possible in his day, perhaps in no
| other, and that while he lived he would
devote himself to the good of his native
land under the crown
That in the late war he was the
friend of Spain is precisely what was
to have been expected of him. lie was
of
their country even when convinced that
it is wrong. But CASTELAR,, however in
consistent as politician, was never
anything else but the clean, pure spir-
lted man; man of conscience the
thinker who loved mankind, the writer
whose pages glowed with eloquence, the
defender of the press and the eulogist
of its workers wherever found.