GRACIÁN Y MORALES, BALTASAR. - Spanish Jesuit and writer, b. at Belmonte on 8 Jan. 1601, d. at Tarazona on 6 Dec. 1658. He entered the Society of Jesus at Tarragona (1619) and, after being ordained a priest, lived alternately in Huesca, Zaragoza, Lérida, Gandia, Valencia and, at intervals, in Madrid, where he distinguished himself as a sacred orator.
In his religious conduct and in his literary taste he did not always have serenity of judgment. Thus he was reluctant to accept the censorship of his books by the Order, and, in his works, he combined his merits with excesses of concision and of acuteness.
His books are programs of social education for the different types of men of the world: El Héroe (Madrid 1637), El político Fernando (Zaragoza 1604), El discreto (Huesca 1646), El oráculo manual y arte de prudencia (ibid. 1647), El Criticón (Zaragoza 1651; Huesca 1653; Madrid 1657). The latter is a philosophical novel in three parts, corresponding to the three ages of man, inspired by Pellegrini's Acutezze and by Tesauro's Canacchiale aristotelico, in which G. displayed all his critical spirit, analyzing the types, the regions, the customs of his time, with sententious, profound and, at times, implacable satire.
G. contributed greatly to the diffusion of culteranismo and conceptismo, especially with his Agudeza y arte de ingenio (Huesca 1648).
Free, instead, from the usual formal defects is the Comulgatorio (Zaragoza and Madrid 1655), in which G. reveals his devout spirit and the sincere depths of his character.
Bibliography14 worksWorks: El discreto, Oráculo manual, El Héroe, in Bibl. de autores españoles, LXV; El Héroe, El discreto (with introd. by A. Farinelli), Madr
BIBL.: Works: El discreto, Oráculo manual, El Héroe, in Bibl. de autores españoles, LXV; El Héroe, El discreto (with introd. by A. Farinelli), Madrid 1900; Cartas autógrafas (edited by A. Bonilla), in Rev. crit. hisp., 2 (1916), pp. 212-35; El Criticón (edited by M. Romera-Navarro), Philadelphia 1938-40 (Italian trans. by E. Mele, Bari 1927); Sommervogel, III, coll. 1646-56. Studies: B. Croce, I trattatisti italiani del concettismo e B. G., Naples 1899; F. Rahola, Estudio critico sobre B. G. y an « Criticón », Barcelona 1908; A. Morel Fatio, Les moralistes espagnoles du XVIIe siècle et en particulier sur G. B., in Bull. hisp., 12 (1910), p. 377 ff.; A. Coster, B. G., in Rev. hisp., 20 (1913), p. 347 ff.; F. Maldonado, B. G. como pesimista y político, Salamanca 1916; A. F. G. Bell, B. G., Oxford 1921; G. Marone, Morale e politica di B. G., Naples 1925; E. Sarmiento, La estetica de B. G., in Bull. hisp., 37 (1935), p. 27 ff.; A. Farinelli, G. y la literatura dalica en Alemania, in Divagaciones hispánicas, II, Barcelona 1936, p. 97 ff. A bibliographical survey on G. edited by M. Romera-Navarro is found in Hisp. rev., 4 (1936), p. 11 ff. Cf. also: A. Ferrari, Fernando el católico en B. G., Madrid 1945; J. M. García López, G. B., Barcelona 1947.
Eguia, Costanzo. “Gracián Y Morales, baltasar.” In Enciclopedia Cattolica, vol. VI, coll. 981–982. Città del Vaticano: Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico, 1951. https://azioneromana.com/article/gracian-y-morales-baltasar.
MLA
Eguia, Costanzo. “Gracián Y Morales, baltasar.” Enciclopedia Cattolica, vol. VI, Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico, 1951, coll. 981–982. Azione Romana, https://azioneromana.com/article/gracian-y-morales-baltasar.
BibTeX
@incollection{ec6_gracian_y_morales_baltasar,
author = {Eguia, Costanzo},
title = {Gracián Y Morales, baltasar},
booktitle = {Enciclopedia Cattolica},
volume = {VI},
pages = {981--982},
note = {Cited by column},
publisher = {Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico},
address = {Città del Vaticano},
year = {1951},
url = {https://azioneromana.com/article/gracian-y-morales-baltasar}
}
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