Salamanca (Spain), 19 March (LaPresse) – ‘Even amidst the crisis of values afflicting the continent in a century that has witnessed the horrors of Nazism, Fascism and Communism, culture remains a bulwark, as evidenced by the courageous speech delivered by Miguel de Unamuno’ at the University of Salamanca on 12 October 1936: “Venceréis, pero no convenceréis”: words that have become a symbol against authoritarian forces and in defence of reason and free conscience". This was stated by the President of the Republic, Sergio Mattarella, during the lectio magistralis delivered at the University of Salamanca after receiving the academic honour of Doctor Honoris Causa. “No less powerful, following the Second World War, were the words of Primo Levi and María Zambrano, representing two different yet converging responses to the barbarities of the century. Levi, a survivor of Auschwitz, made writing an act of testimony and defence of human rights. Zambrano, a philosopher of exile, developed a conception of Europe as a spiritual homeland, founded on the individual and on compassion. In the dialogue between these two thinkers, a Europeanism emerges that precedes a strictly political sense and is defined in ethical and cultural terms,” remarked the Head of State.
© Copyright LaPresse
