The Enlightenment Surfaces in Nineteenth-Century Mexico: Scientific Thinking Attempts to Deliver Order and Progress

On 16 September 1867, a Mexican man of science rose to make a far-reaching debut on his national stage by giving an independence day address in Guanajuato. He spoke in the context of a nation still reeling from a decade of warfare preceding independence in 1821, followed by decades of chaotic government, American invasion resulting in territorial dismemberment (1846^48), followed by civil war (1858-60), and, finally, the defeated French military intervention (1862-67). The orator, Gabino Barreda, a medical doctor and student of philosophy, affirmed that, despite all its travail, Mexico had been following a necessarily correct historical path, dictated by the laws governing the development of societies.Barreda based his historical analysis on the teachings of Auguste Comte. His speech marked the public entry of Comtean positivism into Mexican national life, where its emphasis on the use of science and reason was welcomed by many, along with the like-minded thinking of John Stuart Mill, Alexander Bain, Herbert Spencer and others. Shortly after his independence day speech, entitled a "Civic Oration", Barreda appeared as a prominent figure in the Juarez entourage in the Restored Republic of 1867. President Benito Juarez, elected in 1861 following a Liberal victory in a civil war with Conservatives, had returned to power after defeating the Imperial government installed by the French after their armed intervention beginning in 1862. Barreda needed only seven weeks from his appointment as director to open the Escuela Nacional Preparatoria (ENP) in Mexico City for the purpose of offering Comte's positivist curriculum. The ENP formed a cadre of leaders, called "cientificos", who with like-minded allies, would try to apply scientific thinking to the problematics of governance and society.This paper argues that the thinking of the cientificos was influenced, not only by Comtean and related positivistic thinking, but also by a longstanding eclectic effort by Mexican thinkers, shadowing European thinking, to extend the influence of science and reason in national life, a process dating from the post-independence period and even further back, into colonial times. Their eclecticism sometimes expressed itself in an interest in Protestantism, seen as an essential factor in the building of a modem state and economy. The emphasis of Comtean positivism and other forms of positivism on the use of science and reason to build nations and order societies also influenced much of the rest of Latin America. In Mexico, the key to the rise of positivism was Juarez, a yet insufficiently recognized advocate of applying science and reason to national life as a committed educator, in addition to his documented roles as politician and statesman. Juarez had an overlooked off-stage inner circle of positivists around him. Many Liberals and Catholics, while respecting the need for updated use of science and reason, objected to positivism's philosophical exclusivity and consequent rejection of Christianity and other values. Their opposition gave rise to a sophisticated debate, current with European thinking, over the philosophical implications of the use of science and reason.Some Conservatives, as well as some centralist Liberals like Juarez, sought to apply science and related knowledge to chart the course of Mexican society. Aspects of positivism's centralism and scientific thinking appealed to pragmatic, scienceoriented centralist Liberals, in a process in which these pragmatic Liberals eventually replaced traditional, federalist Liberalism in Mexican governance, beginning with the Restored Republic in 1867 and succeeding totally in thePorfiriato, in effect, the 35-year "reign" (1876-1911), of President Porfirio Diaz.1 What Barreda and some of his associates apparendy had in mind was the establishment of a complete Comtean society, including Comte's secular Religion of Humanity, which, historians have suggested, had most institutional impact in Brazil. …