This fact has greatly struck Emile f.a.guet. "Almost all the thinkers of the nineteenth century," he says, "were not democrats. When I was writing my Politiques et moralistes du XIXe siecle this was my despair. I could not find one who had been a democrat; yet I was extremely anxious to find one so that I could give the democratic doctrine as formulated by him."
The eminent writer might certainly have found plenty of professional politicians, but these latter rarely belong to the category of thinkers.
2. Natural Inequalities and Democratic Equalisation.
The difficulty of reconciling democratic equalisation with natural inequalities const.i.tutes one of the most difficult problems of the present hour. We know what are the desires of democracy. Let us see what Nature replies to these demands.
The democratic ideas which have so often shaken the world from the heroic ages of Greece to modern times are always clashing with natural inequalities. Some observers have held, with Helvetius, that the inequality between men is created by education.
As a matter of fact, Nature does not know such a thing as equality. She distributes unevenly genius, beauty, health, vigour, intelligence, and all the qualities which confer on their possessors a superiority over their fellows.
No theory can alter these discrepancies, so that democratic doctrines will remain confined to words until the laws of heredity consent to unify the capacities of men.
Can we suppose that societies will ever succeed in establishing artificially the equality refused by Nature?
A few theorists have believed for a long time that education might effect a general levelling. Many years of experience have shown the depth of this illusion.
It would not, however, be impossible for a triumphant Socialism to establish equality for a time by rigorously eliminating all superior individuals. One can easily foresee what would become of a people that had suppressed its best individuals while surrounded by other nations progressing by means of their best individuals.
Not only does Nature not know equality, but since the beginning of the ages she has always realised progress by means of successive differentiations-that is to say, by increasing inequalities. These alone could raise the obscure cell of the early geological periods to the superior beings whose inventions were to change the face of the earth.
The same phenomenon is to be observed in societies. The forms of democracy which select the better elements of the popular cla.s.ses finally result in the creation of an intellectual aristocracy, a result the contrary of the dream of the pure theorists, to beat down the superior elements of society to the level of the inferior elements.
On the side of natural law, which is hostile to theories of equality, are the conditions of modern progress. Science and industry demand more and more considerable intellectual efforts, so that mental inequalities and the differences of social condition which spring from them cannot but become accentuated.
We therefore observe this striking phenomenon: as laws and inst.i.tutions seek to level individuals the progress of civilisation tends still further to differentiate them. From the peasant to the feudal baron the intellectual difference was not great, but from the working-man to the engineer it is immense and is increasing daily.
Capacity being the princ.i.p.al factor of progress, the capable of each cla.s.s rise while the mediocre remain stationary or sink. What could laws do in the face of such inevitable necessities?
In vain do the incapable pretend that, representing number, they also represent force. Deprived of the superior brains by whose researches all workers profit, they would speedily sink into poverty and anarchy.
The capital role of the elect in modern civilisation seems too obvious to need pointing out. In the case of civilised nations and barbarian peoples, which contain similar averages of mediocrities, the superiority of the former arises solely from the superior minds which they contain. The United States have understood this so thoroughly that they forbid the immigration of Chinese workers, whose capacity is identical with that of American workers, and who, working for lower wages, tend to create a formidable compet.i.tion with the latter. Despite these evidences we see the antagonism between the mult.i.tude and the elect increasing day by day. At no period were the elect more necessary, yet never were they supported with such difficulty.
One of the most solid foundations of Socialism is an intense hatred of the elect. Its adepts always forget that scientific, artistic, and industrial progress, which creates the strength of a country and the prosperity of millions of workers, is due solely to a small number of superior brains.
If the worker makes three times as much to-day as he did a hundred years ago, and enjoys commodities then unknown to great n.o.bles, he owes it entirely to the elect.
Suppose that by some miracle Socialism had been universally accepted a century ago. Risk, speculation, initiative-in a word, all the stimulants of human activity-being suppressed, no progress would have been possible, and the worker would have remained as poor as he was. Men would merely have established that equality in poverty desired by the jealousy and envy of a host of mediocre minds. Humanity will never renounce the progress of civilisation to satisfy so low an ideal.
CHAPTER II
THE RESULTS OF DEMOCRATIC EVOLUTION
1. The Influence upon Social Evolution of Theories of no Rational Value.
We have seen that natural laws do not agree with the aspirations of democracy. We know, also, that such a statement has never affected doctrines already in men"s minds. The man led by a belief never troubles about its real value.
The philosopher who studies a belief must obviously discuss its rational content, but he is more concerned with its influences upon the general mind.
Applied to the interpretation of all the great beliefs of history, the importance of this distinction is at once evident. Jupiter, Moloch, Vishnu, Allah, and so many other divinities, were, no doubt, from the rational point of view, mere illusions, yet their effect upon the life of the peoples has been considerable.
The same distinction is applicable to the beliefs which prevailed during the Middle Ages. Equally illusory, they nevertheless exercised as profound an influence as if they had corresponded with realities.
If any one doubts this, let him compare the domination of the Roman Empire and that of the Church of Rome. The first was perfectly real and tangible, and implied no illusion. The second, while its foundations were entirely chimerical, was fully as powerful. Thanks to it, during the long night of the Middle Ages, semi-barbarous peoples acquired those social bonds and restraints and that national soul without which there is no civilisation.
The power possessed by the Church proves, again, that the power of certain illusions is sufficiently great to create, at least momentarily, sentiments as contrary to the interests of the individual as they are to that of society-such as the love of the monastic life, the desire for martyrdom, the crusades, the religious wars, &c.
The application to democratic and socialistic ideas of the preceding considerations shows that it matters little that these ideas have no defensible basis. They impress and influence men"s minds, and that is sufficient. Their results may be disastrous in the extreme, but we cannot prevent them.
The apostles of the new doctrines are quite wrong in taking so much trouble to find a rational basis for their aspirations. They would be far more convincing were they to confine themselves to making affirmations and awakening hopes. Their real strength resides in the religious mentality which is inherent in the heart of man, and which during the ages has only changed its object.
Later on we shall consider from a philosophical point of view various consequences of the democratic evolution whose course we see accelerating. We may say in respect of the Church in the Middle Ages that it had the power of profoundly influencing the mentality of men. Examining certain results of the democratic doctrines, we shall see that the power of these is no less than that of the Church.
2. The Jacobin Spirit and the Mentality created by Democratic Beliefs.
Existing generations have inherited, not only the revolutionary principles but also the special mentality which achieves their success.
Describing this mentality when we were examining the Jacobin spirit, we saw that it always endeavours to impose by force illusions which it regards as the truth. The Jacobin spirit has finally become so general in France and in other Latin countries that it has affected all political parties, even the most conservative. The bourgeoisie is strongly affected by it, and the people still more so.
This increase of the Jacobin spirit has resulted in the fact that political conceptions, inst.i.tutions, and laws tend to impose themselves by force. Syndicalism, peaceful enough in other countries, immediately a.s.sumed in France an uncompromising and anarchical aspect, which betrayed itself in the shape of riots, sabotage, and incendiarism.
Not to be repressed by timid Governments, the Jacobin spirit produces melancholy ravages in minds of mediocre capacity. At a recent congress of railway men a third of the delegates voted approval of sabotage, and one of the secretaries of the Congress began his speech by saying: "I send all saboteurs my fraternal greeting and all my admiration."
This general mentality engenders an increasing anarchy. That France is not in a permanent state of anarchy is, as I have already remarked, due to the fact that the parties by which she is divided produce something like equilibrium. They are animated by a mortal hatred for one another, but none of them is strong enough to enslave its rivals.
This Jacobin intolerance is spreading to such an extent that the rulers themselves employ without scruple the most revolutionary tactics with regard to their enemies, violently persecuting any party that offers the least resistance, and even despoiling it of its property. Our rulers to-day behave as the ancient conquerors used; the vanquished have nothing to hope from the victors.
Far from being peculiar to the lower orders, intolerance is equally prominent among the ruling cla.s.ses. Michelet remarked long ago that the violence of the cultivated cla.s.ses is often greater than that of the people. It is true that they do not break the street lamps, but they are ready enough to cause heads to be broken. The worst violence of the revolution was the work of cultivated bourgeoisie-professors, lawyers, &c., possessors of that cla.s.sical education which is supposed to soften the manners. It has not done so in these days, any more than it did of old. One can make sure of this by reading the advanced journals, whose contributors and editors are recruited chiefly from among the professors of the University.
Their books are as violent as their articles, and one wonders how such favourites of fortune can have secreted such stores of hatred.
One would find it hard to credit them did they a.s.sure us that they were consumed by an intense pa.s.sion for altruism. One might more readily admit that apart from a narrow religious mentality the hope of being remarked by the mighty ones of the day, or of creating a profitable popularity, is the only possible explanation of the violence recommended in their written propaganda.
I have already, in one of my preceding works, cited some pa.s.sages from a book written by a professor at the College of France, in which the author incites the people to seize upon the riches of the bourgeoisie, whom he furiously abuses, and have arrived at the conclusion that a new revolution would readily find among the authors of such books the Marats, Robespierres, and Carriers whom it might require.
The Jacobin religion-above all in its Socialist form-has all the power of the ancient faiths over feeble minds Blinded by their faith, they believe that reason is their guide, but are really actuated solely by their pa.s.sions and their dreams.
The evolution of democratic ideas has thus produced not only the political results already mentioned, but also a considerable effect upon the mentality of modern men.
If the ancient dogmas have long ago exhausted their power, the theories of democracy are far from having lost theirs, and we see their consequences increasing daily. One of the chief results has been the general hatred of superiority.
This hatred of whatever pa.s.ses the average in social fortune or intelligence is to-day general in all cla.s.ses, from the working- cla.s.ses to the upper strata of the bourgeoisie. The results are envy, detraction, and a love of attack, of raillery, of persecution, and a habit of attributing all actions to low motives, of refusing to believe in probity, disinterestedness, and intelligence.
Conversation, among the people as among the most cultivated Frenchmen, is stamped with the craze for abasing and abusing everything and everyone. Even the greatest of the dead do not escape this tendency. Never were so many books written to depreciate the merit of famous men, men who were formerly regarded as the most precious patrimony of their country.
Envy and hatred seem from all time to have been inseparable from democratic theories, but the spread of these sentiments has never been so great as to-day. It strikes all observers.
"There is a low demagogic instinct," writes M. Bourdeau, "without any moral inspiration, which dreams of pulling humanity down to the lowest level, and for which any superiority, even of culture, is an offence to society... it is the sentiment of ign.o.ble equality which animated the Jacobin butchers when they struck off the head of a Lavoisier or a Chenier.