From a historical point of view, Teles’ main studies were the ones he published between 1899 and 1905. We do not know much about the way in which his thinking evolved after this. We are above all unaware of his opinion about the events that followed the 5th of October 1910 – the date of the official creation of the Portuguese Republic and the implementation of the regime on which he had pinned all his hopes. For instance, we do not know why he turned down an invitation to be Minister of Public Works, Trade and Industry in the recently formed Provisional Government. In 1918, speaking about the economic situation and the moral state of the country, Teles referred to the hardships of life and the existence of a depressing and depressive feeling that had dominated people’s minds since 1911. He also added that, as a republican, he was not interested in factions, programmes or flags: “ideas and not phrases, work and not promises: it is only this that today may perhaps be able to move us and perhaps also persuade us” (Na Flandres [In Flanders], 1918, p. 81). This testimony seems to reveal a certain disillusionment in relation to the Republic.

During the First World War Teles published a set of didactic studies on the conflict and the powers involved in it. Without taking a stance in favour of any of the latter, Teles displayed a deep feeling of sympathy for the peoples of the north – British and German – to the detriment of the Latin peoples. He praised the former’s desire to raise themselves up by merit; and pointed to the latter’s faults, such as political servility, the lack of true leaders, and the profound ignorance of the masses (A França e a guerra de 70 [France and the war of 1870], 1916, pp. 60-63). In these opuscules we can also clearly see Teles’ conviction of the superiority of European culture, with the argument that Europe had imposed itself on the world because it possessed a human elite that was admirable for its intellectual and moral skills (Acquaviva, 1917, p. 78). This was why he considered the US entry into the war an intolerable foreign intrusion, inasmuch as he was afraid that, as the fratricidal struggle weakened the European powers, America would affirm its hegemony over Europe.

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