THE CHINA MAIL, OCTOBER 22, 1940
CHINA MAIL How
WINDSOR HOUSE DE
A BETTER WORLD
*
1
What ought you to do when fire breaks out in your neighbour's house? Go to his help, or keep
your own roof doused with water?
Wars and revolutions, and res-
pecially the combination of war
with revolution, have for a long|
time brought such metaphors into
political argument. In this coun-
League of Nations.
Page
The Nazis
Will
the course of revolution in
By Crane Brinton
or
Fail
metaphysics.
looks to the serene dye of the his- torian, no matter how true it is that the more things change,' the more they are the same," such Americans are giving
simple philosophical determinism rightly goes against, our grata. serious thought to their
'Even though the grand aims of extreme revolutionists are never part in world affairs. They
achieved, what they do achieve is are pondering what might try 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 have been had the United help extinguish Napoleon, ories, high and low.
tions. And that alteration," If the States cast the weight of 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 Nazis have even as much success should we let him burn up the
To judge from revolutions in Such reflections may seem to as the Jacobins had, we Ameri- its influence into the bal-ain? Even then, there were those
who urged that there ought to be sensibly judge from, they will not to such energetic people as our most undesirable alteration. The selves,, of doing nothing about the Nazis. will not make men Nietzs- ance of international jus- some sort of international fire de- succeed. Whatever metaphur conceptual scheme you wish partment. Unfortunately, it was
to present crisis. Let the Nazis alone. chean Supermen, But, apart from tice through the League 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 of Nations. They are eval- ed out that men tried to organist Western society, one thing comes volutionists. No such Laodicean ering to millions, the limited suc
our always has taken care of such re- they have already brought suff- for common protection against inevitably out of such uating with impartial such fires. And, fortunately or Especially at their height, in their justified.
a study attitude is, however, at present.cess they may attain will create
and perpetuate human unfortunately, we Americans have crisis periods, revolutions ask too
types, eyes the aftermath of refused to have anything to do
human ways of living, profound- non-cooperation, isola- with these very imperfect fire de ing. They demand from him the much of the ordinary human be-
In the first place, the actually distasteful to us. We do not tionism, and high tariffs partments--the Holy Alliance, the impossible energy needed to trans process of revolution is a harsh want a world of Hitlers, Goer- in United States foreign
form all the details of his life and cruel one, which, in spite of ings, Rosenbergs and Mussolinis
own revolutionary origins, not even of quiet and "appeased" They permit him no healing pri- our Annoying though such metaph-- policy. They are thinking
most of us feel is an undesirable Hitlers, Goerings, Rosenbergs and attachment ors are to the literal-minded, in-vacy, no laziness, no
method of effecting social chan Mussolinis. We do not want a that perhaps America will adequate and inaccurate though
world of Aryan-worship, even if ges. We are dedicated, in this not be held entirely guilt- understanding the phenomena in- they may be for the purpose of
country, to a belief in the pos- by a kind of fiction not unknown sicility of ordered change, slow- to older religions, the worship gets less of responsibility for volved in war and revolution,
ly and perhaps erratically produc- softened by the invention of all the present war in the they are not necessarily limited
ed by discussion and. vote. To sorts of "honourary Aryans." in their use to the purposes of
revert to the metaphor with which analyses by future histor-blind partisan debate. In the still
this article began: We do not ians.
undeveloped state of the social
want our house burned down, sciences such metaphors are per-.
even if the burning does give us haps the nearest we can get to
a chance to build a new one. spread of the fire to this country. the sort of conceptual scheme the
What seems good in the profess-We must keep the revolution from natural scientist uses so profitably to routine. Almost with certainty, ed aims of the totalitarians-not- our shores. This is a hard task,
his responses, limited in
full time ably the complex measures sug and one which makes Great social revolutions do scem, and space, return to something gested by such words as "order" mands. on our wisdom and initia- able trend. There are the "causes" bin gives up trying to be "always work out for ourselves to lend themselves to a predict-like their usual course. The Jaco and "security"-we shall hope to tive. It means military defence, without and perhaps even more, it means 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 ing in the crisis, the violence of ventional French bourgeois. The such a hope by the obvious fact doing something to correct them. strengthened in revolution among ourselves, and the Reign of Terror; a period of Bolshevils ceases to live as if in that revolutions are poor ways to And there is always the possibility gradual return to more conditions, and finally, a new, himself to the tradition of Russian of the Germans looks far from thing about the original focus of
stable' a "classless society" and adapts attain security. The current lot that we may have to do equilibrium, perhaps # formal bureaucracy. The Nazi will pro-secure.
inflammability. Revolutionary fre "restoration," at any rate & society bably some day give up trying to
no doubt ultimately yields to the compounded of old elements and be the hard, clear Superman of In the second place, no matter fire hose. But it does not, again new, but with the new elements Nietzschean tradition, and become how automatic; the process of to judge Trom the past, yield - to ing the most violent period of the vastly less important than dur- again the gemütlich and senti-action and reaction in revolution appeasement. revolution, and very different from what the extreme revolu- 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.
Although not fully agreed upon how far the United States ought to go, American public opinion evidently has concluded that American moral and material support, short of participation with man- power in the war, should be liberally afforded to Great Britain. Meanwhile many are earnestly pon- dering what form of or- ganisation shall follow the
war.
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 machinery for
for fashioning it is grinding out its pro- duct. That would be a world without peace an outward semblance of 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- many would turn America into an armed Camp. Standards of living would shrink to undreamed-of depths.
That what is happening in the totalitarian states is a real revolu tion ought now to be clear even what is going on there. Heirs of the English Puritan, the Ameri- can and French revolutions, most of us Americans have come at a safe distance in time-to think
to those of us who don't like
of revolutions as A Good Thing. But what Herr Rauschning made clear in the abstract in his "The
Revolution of Nihilism," recent of
events, and pronunciamentos totalitarian leaders, have made only ton concrete. The Nazis and the Fascists are trying to make over the world in their own im- age, to supplant democratic socie-
societies that is, ties everywhere with totalitarian in specific terms, to supplant the Boy Scouts
with the Balilla and the Sons of
de-
the Wolf, Labour Unions with Labour Fronts, policemen with the trips with Kraft Gestapo, random outings and auto durch Freude and Dopo Lavoro, Christianity with worship of race and state! marriage for love, or even con- There is another world venience, with marriage for breed-. that may be to-morrow's, ed to the pursuit of learning (and ing soldiers, universities dedicat- a better one, brightened also, no doubt, Innocent tribal
pleasures) with universities by peace, permanent dicated to the pursuit of totalitar- peace and good will. lan efficiency, Rotary, Kiwanis, Christian ideals have the women's clubs-all the incredible Masons, horticultural societies, power to build such a profusion of democratic group world. Paganism must be and carefully regimented organs life with properly supervised dispelled if this better of the "corporative state." 'The life is to be. There can be a world of freedom, of abundance for all man- kind, of light-hearted joy
totalitarians
mean revolution,
illusion of ruthless might
must be shattered. What is the price? The If 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.
(Author of "The Anatomy of Revolution")
Sellun
In the meantime, the least we can do is to take measures to keep our own roof wet, to prevent the
IS IT ALL RIGHT NOW. HENRY?! YES, NOT EVEN SCRATCHED.
de-
some-