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Spanish Freemasonry undoubtedly participated in the interest of all types of organizations during the 19th century in having periodical publications, both for the internal functioning of the Obediences and lodgesas a vehicle for the exchange of ideas and approaches, establishing filters through subscriptions, since they were not distributed following the classic channels of periodical publications of the time.
In reality, it was not intended to reach the general public, but rather the objective was the people themselves. masonsas well as those citizens who felt the need to know Freemasonry, either with the interest of getting started, or because they shared themes and issues that were not only its heritage but that were part of similar ways of seeing or understanding life, and, in general, having to do with positions that we would classify as progressive (emancipation of women, social or worker issues, death penalty, slavery, secularism, etc.) as opposed to the more traditional ones, impregnated, moreover, and in Spain, with religious approaches. So, Bulletins, newspapers and magazines, as well as pamphlets and pamphlets, would proliferate.
In any case, despite the obvious interest of the Spanish masons Publishing was not easy because due to the difficulties inherent to all publications and which would have to do, in many cases, with their financing, we are talking about a press that is very harassed like Freemasonry itself by the ideological, political and religious sectors of a fundamentalist nature. , but also simply conservative, if not directly in power on some occasions and periods.
In this sense, the air of freedom that the Glorious Revolution of 1868 brought, and the beginning of the Sexennium known as Democratic or Revolutionary, was reflected in a true triumph of the freedom of the pressand that was extended to the field of masonic publications. This favorable climate was in force during the reign of Amadeo of Savoy and during much of the short-lived First Republic, but it was already disrupted in the final period of Castelar, with the Serrano Dictatorship and at the beginning of the Canovista Restoration because they were moments of strong restrictions and censorship.
The arrival of Sagasta to power, precisely a brother masonwould make possible, along with other liberalizing provisions in other areas, a return to freedom of the press, and that logically favored Masonic publications.
The Masonic press had limitations. Firstly, for the Masonic idea of not institutionally influencing public opinion, of making demands in one political, social, economic or cultural sense or another. But, it is evident that opinions, ideas and approaches were expressed in it that, in reality, by the fact of being published influenced the readers, and many of them had obvious responsibilities or roles in all fields, but, without ever forgetting that we would talk about minorities or elites. On the other hand, it is important to highlight that, although different visions could appear in the Masonic press, readers, especially if they were Masons, clearly knew that said press disseminated principles that everyone knew well and that they shared, something that did not happen with the press. profane, because, although the political type was very marked in one sense or another, it was more heterogeneous and also in its contents.
For all this, it is indisputable that the Masonic press constitutes a fundamental source for historians and for those interested in order to know what Spanish Freemasonry was like from the Democratic Sexennium until the outbreak of the Civil War, that is, in its best era. And it is because in it we can learn about internal organizational aspects, the thoughts of the authorities of the different obediences or of other Freemasons, and, finally, because of the multitude of informative news from both Spanish and foreign Freemasonry itself. . But it is also because, sometimes, it can be the only or almost the only source available for the study of Freemasonry.
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