(361 “ZE HIMOLDO, "IIVW' VNIHƆ-BHL
CHINA MAIL
WINDSOR HOUSE
A BETTER WORLD
eyes
How The Nazis
What ought you to do when a fire breaks out in your neighbour's
your own roof, doused with water?
€g-
do
Will Fail
or
to
life.
tions.
want а
looks to the serene eye of the his- torian, no matter how true it is that "the more things change, the Americans are giving house? Go to his help, or keep
more they are the same,” such simple. philosophical determinism serious thought to their Wars and revolutions, and
pecially the combination of war
rightly goes against our grain. |"Even though the grand aims of part in world affairs. They with revolution, have for a long
extrême revolutionists are never time brought such metaphors into are pondering what might political argument. In this coun-
achieved, what they do achieve is have been had the United ry we heard them in the earliest fundamental changes running thr- mental German, devoted to pum- at least some slight alteration in
days of the republic. Should we ough the gamut of human activit-pernickel, Schubert, and Kantian human habits, institutions, valua
ories, high and low,
metaphysics.
And that alteration, if the help States cast the weight of should we let him burn up the
extinguish Napoleon,
Nazis have even as much success its influence into the bal-world, or at any rate Great Brit: the past, which is all anyone can invite us to the task, pleasant even cans must feel is likely to be a To judge from revolutions in Such reflections may seem to as the Jacobins had, we Ameri- ain? Even then, there were those ance of international jus- who urged that there ought to be sensibly judge from, they will not to such energetic people as our most undesirable alteration. The
succeed Whatever metaphor some sort of international fire de conceptual scheme you wish
selves, of doing nothing about the Nazis will not make men Nietzs tice through the League partment. Unfortunately, it was
present crisis. Let the Nazis alone. chean Supermen. But, apart from of Nations. They are eval- not until after the fire had burn-use in an attempt to understand Time will take care of them it the fact that in trying to do, so
ed out that men tried to organise Western society, one thing comes
the course of revolution in our always has taken care of such re- they have already brought miff uating with impartial for common protection against inevitably out of such a study attitude is, however, at present, cess they may attain will create volutionists. No such Laodicean ering to millions, the limited suc- . the aftermath of such fires. And, fortunately or Especially at their height, in their justified.
unfortunately, we Americans have crisis periods, revolutions ask too
and perpetuate human types, non-cooperation, isola- refused to have anything to
human ways of living, profound much of the ordinary human be- tionism, and high tariffs with these very imperfect fire de- ing. They demand from him the In the first place, the actually distasteful to us. We do not in United States foreign League of Nations.
partments-the Holy Alliance, the impossible energy needed to trans process of revolution is a harsh want a world of Hitlers, Goerr
and cruel one, which, in spite of Ings, Rosenbergs and Mussolinis policy. They are thinking
our own revolutionary origins, not even of quiet and "appeared" most of us feel is an undesirable Hitlers, Goerings, Rosenbergs and that perhaps America will
Mussolinis. We do not method, of effecting social chan-
this world of Aryan-worship, even it, not be held entirely guilt-
ges. We are dedicated, in
by a kind of fiction not unknown country, to a belief in the less of responsibility for
pos- sibility of ordered change, slow- to older religions, the worship gets the present war in the
ly and perhaps erratically produc- softened by the invention of all
To sorts of honourary Aryans.”. ed by discussion and vote.. analyses by future histor-
revert to the metaphor with which ians.
this article began: We do not In the meantime, the least we want, our house burned down, can do is to take measures to keep even if the burning does give us our own roof wet, tą prevent the Although not fully
a chance to build a new one, spread of the fire to this country. agreed upon how far the
What seems good in the profess. We must keep the revolution from to routine. Almost with certainty, ed aims of the totalitarians--not- our shores. This is a hard task, United States ought to go,
his responses, limited in time ably the complex measures. sug- and one which makes full de- American public opinion, Great social revolutions do seem and space, return to something gested by such words as "order" mands on our wisdom and initia- to lend themselves to a predict- like their usual course. The Jaco- and "security"-we shall hope to tive. It means military defence, evidently has concluded able trend. There are the "causes" bin gives up trying to be "always work out for ourselves without and perhaps even more, it means that American moral and of the revolution; the outbreak; a at the height of revolutionary cir-recourse to revolutionary violence. recognising signs. of totalitarian series of ups and downs culminat cumstance," and becomes a con- We should, be strengthened. in revolution among ourselves and material support, short of ing in the crisis, the violence of ventional French bourgeois. The such a hope by the obvious fact doing something to correct them. participation with man-
the Reign of Terror; a period of Bolshevik ceases to live as if in that revolutions are poor ways to "And there is always the possibility gradual return to more stable a "classless society" and, adapts attain security. The current lot that we may have to do sóme- power in the war, should conditions, and finally, a new himself to the tradition of Russian of the Germans looks far from thing about_the_original focus of
a formal bureaucracy. The Nazi will pro- secure
inflammability. Revolutionary fire be liberally afforded to equilibrium, perhaps
"restoration," at any rate, a society bably some day give up trying to
no doubt. ultimately yields to the Great Britain. Meanwhile compounded of old elements and be the hard, clear Superman of In the second place, no matter fire hose. But it does not, again many are earnestly pon- vastly less important than dur- again the gemutlich
new. but with the new elements Nietzschean tradition, and become how automatic the process of to judge from the past, yield to
and senti- action and reaction in revolution appeasement. dering what form of or- ing the most violent period of the ganisation shall follow the revolution,
war.
of
form all the details of his Annoying though such metaph-They permit him no healing pri- vacy, no laziness, no attachment ors are to the literal-minded, in- though adequate and inaccurate they may be for the purpose understanding the phenomena in-
in war and revolution, | volved they are not necessarily limited in their use to the purposes of blind partisan debate. In the still undeveloped state of the social sciences such metaphors are per-
haps the nearest we can get to the sort of conceptual scheme the natural scientist uses so profitably.
and very different from what the extreme revolt- tionists had planned. As for the inflammability, the great. French revolution, the Russian revolution of our own time, certainly caught well beyond the borders of old France and old Russia. There are signs that the current Fascist re- volutions in Germany and Italy are also highly inflammable.
Two possible worlds rise in vision before us. One is the world of hate which Hitlerism is even now forging The pattern is already cut, and the That what is happening in the machinery for fashioning totalitarian states is a real revolu it is grinding out its pro-to those of us who don't like duct. That would be a what is going on there. Heirs of
tion" ought now to be clear even
the English Puritan, the Ameri- an can and French revolutions, most of us Americans have come at a safe distance in time-to think
of
world without peace outward. semblance peace perhaps, dictated by fear of death and worse--but no peace in the breasts of men.
The grimmest facts must be faced squarely, At best, a victorious Ger-
of revolutions as A Good Thing. But what Herr Rauschning made
clear in the abstract in his "The
Labour Fronts, policemen with the
Revolution of Nihilism," recent events, and pronunciamentos of totalitarian leaders, have made only too concrete. The Nazis and the Fascists are trying to make over the world in their own im- age, to supplant democratic socie- ties everywhere with totalitarian! many would turn America societies that is, in specific terms, to supplant the Boy Scouts into an armed camp. with the Balilla and the Sons of Standards of living would the Wolf, Labour Unions with shrink to undreamed-of Gestapo, random outings and auto depths..
trips with Kraft durch Freude and Dopo Lavoro, Christianity with worship of race and state There is another world marriage for love, or even con that may be to-morrow's venience, with marriage for. breed- ing soldiers, universities dedicat- -a better one, brightened, ed to the pursuit of learning (and doubt, innocent tribal by peace, permanent also, no
pleasures) with universities
de- peace and good will. dicated to the pursuit of totalitar- Christian ideals have the an efficiency, Rotary, Kiwanis, 'Masons, horticultural societies, power to build such a women's clubs-all the incredible world. Paganism must be profusion of democratic group life with properly supervised dispelled if this better and, carefully regimented organs The life is to be. There can be of the "corporative state."
totalitarians mean revolution, a world of freedom, of abundance for all man- kind, of light-hearted joy. illusion of ruthless might
must be shattered.
What is the price? The Ir not, Hitler and Mus- price is international co-solini, and perhaps Stalin, operation, some kind of a will dictate the peace union of nations, perhaps treaty with no help want- an entirely new structure ed. The world of to-mor of international justice row will be their kind of and organisation for world. Americans must peace. But before that can decide which, of two pos- come about the forces of sible worlds they want, in aggression must be com- the to-morrows which lie pletely stopped and the ahead.
By Crane Brinton
(Author of the Anatomy of Revolution")
Selain
IS IT ALL RIGHT NOW, HENRY ? 'YES, NOT EVEN SCRATCHED.