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“How are you, sir?”

“How are you, Florencito? When did you arrive?”

“Yesterday.”

“I am greatly pleased that you have called to see me. What have you studied this year?”

“The Aztec language; here is the invitation to my public examination. The program was as fine as usual, since my teacher, Señor Don Agustin de la Rosa, spoke splendidly, as every year, of the philosophy and richness of the Aztec tongue.”

“Thank you. And how many students were there in the subject?”

“This year we were so many, last year there were so many, the year before so many, and the same, more or less, so I have heard, in years gone by.”

“What a pity! They are few, almost nothing in comparison with the necessity that exists in our Republic for men who study the native tongues. But these few, at least, attend the exercises every school day?”

“No, sir; far from it! Some attend, and others not, just as they please.”

“And, the days they do attend, they study the Aztec grammar and hear it explained?”

“No, sir; by no means. Many days the teacher and we occupy ourselves in the Levilon.”

“And what is that?”

“Levilon, levilon, ton, ton.”

“I understand you, even less.”

“It is a sort of a marsellaise against cleanness and neatness of person and dress; that is to say, against politeness.”[2]

“But, man, in a college for the instruction of youth—however, let us return to our subject. In the three years you have studied Aztec, have you learned to speak it?”

“No, sir; by no means.”

“Then, what have you learned?”

“The philosophy and richness of the Aztec tongue.”

“But you must have studied the four divisions of Aztec grammar—analogy, syntax, prosody, and orthography—and by this complete study arrived at an understanding of the philosophy and richness of the language.”

“No, sir.”

“But have you not had a public examination?”

“Yes, sir; but those who were publicly examined in past years, have as little, made a complete study of the grammar, but have also learned the philosophy and richness of the Mexican tongue.”

“Come! let us see. How many years has the chair of the Aztec language been established in the Seminario at Guadalajara?”

“About thirty.”

“And during about thirty years has some priest gone forth from the institution to preach to the Indians in their native language?”

“Why, no sir! During the thirty years what has been, and is, learned is the philosophy and richness of the Aztec language. You must have seen the precious little work, by my professor, upon the beauty and richness of the Aztec language, elegantly bound, which was sent to the Paris Exposition.”

“But man—Florencito,” (rising, pacing, and puffing at my cigar) “really, all this and nothing are much the same. These programs, in which one speaks eloquently of the beauty and richness of the Aztec language are no more than pretty theories. This book upon the richness and beauty of the Aztec language, with all its elegant binding, is but a pretty theory. The practical! The practical! Let me give you my opinion in the matter briefly, and in four propositions: First, the ecclesiastical government and the civil government have the obligation and the mission of civilizing the Indians; second, for this, in each bishopric and in each State there ought to be chairs of the Indian languages spoken in the territory—for example, in the Seminary and in one of the State Colleges of Mexico, there ought to be a chair of the Aztec language; in the Seminary and State College of Queretaro, there ought to be a chair of Otomi; in the Seminary and in the State College of Morelia, there ought to be chairs of Tarascan and Matlazinca; in the Seminary and in the State College of Guadalajara, there ought to be a chair of the Cora language; in the Seminary and State College of San Luis Potosi, there ought to be a chair of the Huastec; in the Seminary and the State College of Puebla, there ought to be a chair of Aztec; in the Seminary and the State College of Jalapa there ought to be a chair of Totonaco; in the Seminary and in the State College of Oaxaca there ought to be chairs of the different indigenous languages spoken in the territory—chiefly the Mixtec and Zapotec, etc.; third, it ought to be, that from the seminaries there shall go forth priests to be curas in the Indian towns of the bishopric, who shall preach to the Indians and catechize them in their own language; fourth, it ought to be, that from the State Colleges, primary teachers shall go forth to teach the elementary branches to the Indians of the State, in their own idiom—and shall go forth jefes politicos, who shall be able to treat with the Indians, talking to them in their own languages.”

“Sir, these things appear to me impossible.”

“Yes, I know that there can be given but two answers to my proposition and my arguments. The first is the ‘non possumus,’ ‘we cannot.’[3] One can preach in cathedrals and other magnificent temples, to an elegant gathering, afterward print the sermon and distribute copies liberally to select society; but to subject one’s self to the task of learning an indigenous tongue, and to go to preach to the Indians—that, one cannot do. One can be a jefe politico in a city, where comforts abound, and draw a fat salary; but the abnegation and patriotism of exercising the administrative power in an Indian town—a despicable thing! Sad reply. Unhappy Mexican nation during the colonial epoch! and, unhappy Mexican nation, still, in 1891, because you yet preserve many—even very many—remnants of the colonial education, and this is the principal hindrance to your progress and well-being. We Mexicans, because of the education which we received from the Spanish, are much given to scholastic disputes, to beautiful discourses, pretty poems, enthusiastic toasts, quixotic proclamations, projects, laws, decrees, programs of scientific education, plans of public amelioration, in Andalusian style and well-rounded periods; but, as for the practical—the Spanish sloth, the Spanish fanaticism for the statu quo, the Indian idleness and cowardice, do but little. In theories we have the boldness of Don Quixote, and in practice we have the pusillanimity, the inability to conquer obstacles, and the phlegm of Sancho Panza.”

“My teacher, Don Agustin,” said Florencito, “has told us that Padre Sahagun and many other missionaries of the sixteenth century dedicated themselves to the study of the native tongues because they found them highly philosophical and adapted to express even metaphysical ideas.”

“That is true,” I replied, “but the Padre Sahagun and the other missionary philologists of the sixteenth century dedicated themselves to the study of the Indian languages of the country, not to detain themselves ... (in) the philosophy and richness of the Aztec language, without moving a peg to go and teach some Indian; but in order that they might use them as means for the practical—to wit, to preach, to catechize, and to teach the Indians the civilizing truths of Christianity.”