In 1931, José Gil Fortoul, in a letter addressed to the former president of the National Academy of History, Vicente Lecuna, praised the intellectual contribution of the late teacher Adolfo Ernst with the ultimate intention that he consider commemorating the centenary of his birth in the coming year of 32.
The expressions of “intellectual love” uttered by Gil Fortoul to his teacher revealed a clear break with other prevailing academic ideologies of that historical moment. Ernst (as did Rafael Villavicencio) shaped the social consciousness of some young people of the time on theoretical and methodological foundations of the social and natural sciences in order to refute anti-positivist views and interpretations.
For example, in letters to Pascual I, the intellectual from Lara criticized the moralizing airs of literary currents against positive science: “In literary circles (…) it is stated that experimental science is bankrupt and that there is no other possible salvation for the human spirit than to return to idealism and mysticism.”
In his customary biting style, he expressed that decadent, symbolist, impressionist, instrumentalist, and other writers demanded moral canons from science that they themselves did not practice in their professional work: “Each era has its own special morality, and, moreover, the only effective morality is that which is immediately translated into actions. Literary moralists should begin by practicing themselves the precepts they want to impose on others.”
Consequently, he called upon novelists to bear ethical and moral responsibility for blaming scientific rationality for the ills suffered by humanity; thus, he exhorted them to abandon emotional attitudes and seriously study the philosophy of science: “Besides, who are those who are disgusted with science? Not a single wise person! Only a group of writers who haven't even had time to form an accurate concept of what the scientific spirit means (…) There are unknown novelists who believe they have found the solution to all the moral and philosophical problems of the time, conversing with others of their ilk in the beer halls of the Latin Quarter, and without ever having attended a course in anthropology.”
