A letter from prison
Letter from Francisco Ferrer written from Modelo Prison in Madrid in 1907
Statue of Francisco Ferrer in Brussels
Photo: Aline Franck, 2005
When, six years ago, we had the great pleasure of opening the Modern School of Barcelona, we clearly emphasised that its teaching system would be rationalist and scientific.
Above all, we had warned the public, pointing out that reason and science are the antithesis of any dogma, that our school would teach no religion. We knew that this declaration would provoke the hatred of the priestly caste and that we would be fought with the weapons used by those who live by lies and hypocrisies, abusing the influence granted to them by the ignorance of their followers and the power of governments. But when we were told that we were too bold in confronting the ruling Church so frankly, we felt an even greater need to persevere in our aims, convinced that the greater the evil and the more powerful the tyranny, the more vigour we would employ to combat them, and the more energy to destroy them.
The general outcry led by the clerical press against the Modern School — which earned me a year in prison — proves to us that we were right to choose this method of teaching. It should give all rationalists new impetus to continue our work with even greater determination than ever, and to develop and spread it as far as possible. It must be said, however, that the mission of the Modern School is not limited solely to removing religious prejudice from people's minds. For although this is one of the prejudices that most strongly opposes the intellectual emancipation of individuals, we will not thereby achieve the preparation of a free and happy humanity, since one can conceive of a people without religion but still without liberty.
If the working class freed itself from religious prejudice but retained the prejudice of property as it exists today; if workers believed the prophecy that there will always be poor and rich; if rationalist teaching were limited merely to spreading knowledge of hygiene and the sciences and only trained good apprentices, good employees, and good workers in all trades — then we might live as more or less healthy and robust atheists, according to our modest purchasing power, but we would continue to live as slaves of capital.
The Modern School aims to combat all prejudices that prevent the total emancipation of the individual. That is why it adopts humanist rationalism, which consists in instilling in children the desire to understand the origin of all social injustices so that, through this awareness, they may later fight and oppose them. The rationalist and scientific teaching of the Modern School must embrace, as we indicate, the study of everything that favours the freedom of the individual and the harmony of the collective, under a system of peace, love and well-being for everyone, without distinction of class or sex.
Francisco Ferrer y Guardia
Cited by Ramón Safón,
in Le rationalisme combattant, Francisco Ferrer y Guardia,
Paris, Éditions CNT-Région parisienne, 2002, p. 26-27.