ARISTODEMOCRACY WALD STEIN THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA RIVERSIDE ARISTODEMOCRACY ARISTODEMOCRACY FROM THE GREAT WAR BACK TO MOSES, CHRIST, AND PLATO AN ESSAY BY SIR CHARLES WALDSTEIN M.A., LITT.D. CANTAB.; M.A., L.H.D. COL. UNIV., NEW YORK; PH.D. HEIDELBERG HON. LITT.D. THIN. COLL., DUBLIN LONDON JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET, W. 1916 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED TO THE MEMORY OF MY BROTHER, LOUIS WALDSTEIN, M.D., BORN IN NEW YORK, U.S.A., APRIL 15, 1853, DlED AT POSINGFORD, SUSSEX, ENGLAND, APRIL n, 1915 \ CO 373 1*8 PREFACE THIS Essay is not the work of a laudator temporis acti. In spite of its title it is not reactionary or romantic in spirit. Nor is it meant to advocate a return to conditions of the past, but, emphatically, to prepare for the future a new state of things responding to the needs of an advancing age. There is one possible misunderstanding which I wish above all to avoid. Though the book is a protest against war and maintains the possibility even the certainty of international peace in the future, and though it is directed against militarism as the arch-enemy of humanity, I firmly hold that the question of peace is not to be obtruded on the consciousness of our people while actually engaged in a desperate struggle, requiring the concentration of all the energy the nation possesses upon the fight itself. As long as the war lasts all " Pacifist " agitation is out of place. First we must win this war. We must even be pre- pared, if necessary, to substitute conscription for our voluntary system, which served us so well in the past. The issue between our so-called " Pacifist " friends and those who think as I do is a very simple one. We protest that we hate war and love peace with the same sincerity and intensity as they do. But we think it not only right but our sacred duty to fight German militarism with all the means of fair war- fare which human ingenuity can devise and human courage can bring into the fight. We cannot believe vii viii PREFACE that passive submission to German aggression can be heroic or in any sense wise or moral. We should think it criminal in the highest degree were we to stand with hands folded like the hapless Armenians and see our wives and children slaughtered before our eyes and receive the death-blow without a murmur. But, perhaps even more disastrous than the loss of our wives and children and our miserable selves, we should see swept away before our very eyes all the ideals of civilisation and morality which our traditions have established among us, upon which our moral consciousness has been based for centuries of human effort in the establishment of political and social freedom and moral and intellectual culture. The Armenians have been thus massacred by their Turkish rulers after they had been prevented from arming themselves and preparing the means of manly self-defence. The hordes of German Huns could massacre the inhabitants of Belgium as cruelly as the Turkish official mob could brain and burn and drown the helpless Armenians. They could still more effectually annihilate the Pacifist inhabitants of England. But the essential difference between the Armenians and ourselves is, that we are able to arm ourselves ; and it is therefore our sacred and supreme duty to do this most effectually not only by supplying the most efficient arms, but the best of fighting material in soldiers. We deplore with equal intensity of sorrow and passionate regret, as do the Pacifists, that from the Eugenistic point of view the slaying of the young and healthy is the greatest loss to the nation and to mankind. The older men among us may have offered to fight and been (wisely) refused. They could say, and did say, to the military authorities, as did that brave and patriotic Jewish octogenarian during the American Revolutionary War " My body can stop PREFACE ix a bullet as well as that of a young man." But it is right to point out that older men do not provide the best fighting machine ; that a single night in the trenches might send them to the hospital behind the fighting line with rheumatism or pneumonia, to block the way of the wounded soldier. Nor do we think, much as we deplore the loss of the younger celi- bate, that those who have the responsibility and care of a family immediately dependent upon them ought to precede the unencumbered bachelor in the fighting line. In any case the alternative to effectual warfare against German militarism is Armenian passivity which spells a huge crime. We therefore believe in warfare for us as a sacred duty until a true safe- guard to peace can be devised and realised. Even after the war, our military preparedness must not be relaxed or weakened, unless some In- ternational Court backed by power, such as is advo- cated in this Essay, is established. Not even a European alliance will take its place. The more we consider alliances in past history, and even in the light of our present experiences of the working of such alliances under the constraining influence of a common enemy in the field, the less faith can we have in the security of such alliances. Only such a definite organisation as that which I have attempted to outline here will justify disarmament. Meanwhile the British Empire will have to increase its military strength, and, above all, retain unimpaired its command of the sea. The United States will no doubt follow our example of military and naval pre- paredness, until the day arrives when interest, reason and justice will alone lead to an efficient safe-guarding of international peace. By that time the political consciousness of the whole world will probably be greatly altered, mainly owing to the results of this war. The war will, I venture to predict, prove to be x PREFACE the swan-song of the older conception of nationality ; for it is the misconception of nationality which has in great part produced it. Ultimately a new con- ception of nationality and internationality will be ushered in, in which loyalty to the narrower relations will in no way prevent loyalty to the wider. It will be the Era of Patriotic Internationalism. Not so very many years ago, as human history goes, the Scotsman, for instance, could not have conceived it possible to have loyally upheld the interests of a great British Empire, even at the sacrifice of Scottish local or personal interests, as he is now prepared to do. The same, I believe, will be true as regards the wider international unit of the future in its relation to the nations of to-day. In some respects the actual events of this war have made the realisation of such a scheme more remote than in the period preceding it. I am not alluding so much to the attitude of the German belligerents, as to that of the Administration of the United States of America. One of the greatest perhaps the greatest oppor- tunity in history to affect the course of humanity towards the attainment of highest good ever placed within the reach of a few individuals by means of one definite action has been lost by them. I pass no judgment upon the action of President Wilson's Administration in refraining from active intervention in the war, nor upon the question of how far national honour was involved, nor yet would I decide how far it is the duty of nations to protect their honour at all costs. But a paramount duty to the cause of humanity has been shirked from the very outset with the most disastrous results. Had it been fulfilled, it might have marked a great epoch in the history of humanity. It was surely the duty of that Administration to protest against every clear PREFACE xi and flagrant violation of international law and of the decisions of the Hague Convention to which the United States was a signatory. Had the United States thus protested against the action of Germany in Belgium, the numerous and undoubted contraventions of these laws and decisions in the bombardment of unfortified towns by ordnance or aircraft, or the sinking of peaceful merchantmen, etc., etc., a new era might have been initiated. Such a protest need not have been followed by armed intervention, and might have remained purely aca- demic and platonic ; but made it ought to have been. The sinking of passenger and merchant vessels ought not to have evoked protest merely on the ground of their belonging to the United States or because they carried American goods or passengers, but purely and wholly on the ground that the United States was a co-signatory of the Hague Convention. The United States, as the only remaining great neutral Power, would have become the centre to which the combined opinion and support of all the numerous smaller and less powerful neutral States also co-signatories of the Hague Convention would have been drawn ; thus producing a united expression of civilised opinion and moral force throughout the world. It would perhaps only have formed a nucleus to a germ-cell of international justice and peace ; but out of this germ a great and sturdy organic body of civilised opinion and power might subsequently have developed. Such action has not been taken. The great world-opportunity has been lost. The cause of human peace has not been advanced. Worse still : the sin of omission has had the positive effect of retarding the realisation of the just hope of civilised humanity formed before this war, and has confirmed the divorce between right and might for years to come. xii PREFACE This Essay attempts to trace the origin of this war back to the Bismarckian policy which initiated the inordinate development of Teutonic Chauvinism, out of which has grown the Alldeutsche policy of world conquest, together with the method of German ruth- lessness as adopted by the War Party and defined by Bernhardi. It also contains a picture of the Old Germany as contrasted with the New. The more ultimate causes of this war are to be found in the inadequacy of European, especially German, morals, which in no way respond to the development of civilised life in all other spheres. An attempt is made to lay down the principles of European ethics, ensuring such adequate reform in the present and preparing for normal evolution in the future. It is the principle of Conscious Evolution in human affairs, which differs essentially from Nietzsche's system, of which a searching criticism is made. This book was written during the winter and spring of 1914 to 1915. Events subsequent to that date have not necessitated the making of any essential alterations or additions. Where such additions are made they are made in footnotes. My sincere thanks are due to my friend and col- league, Dr. J. B. Bury, Fellow of King's College, and Regius Professor of History in the University of Cambridge, as well as to my wife, for numerous suggestions and corrections. THE AUTHOR. NEWTON HALL, NEWTON, CAMBRIDGE. January 1916. P.S. (March 10, 1916). I must also thank my friend, Mr. George Leveson Gower, for his most valu- able help in correcting the proofs and for making numerous useful suggestions, as well as Mr. John Murray and the printers for seeing the manuscript through the press in so short a time. C. W. PART I THE DISEASE OF WAR AND ITS CURE PAGE INTRODUCTION . . . ... . . . I CHAPTER I THE IMMEDIATE CAUSES OF THE WAR THE DOMINANCE OF GERMAN STREBERTHUM AND ALLDEVTSCHER MILITARISM .... 5 CHAPTER II THE OLDER GERMANY . . . . .21 CHAPTER III PRUSSIAN MILITARISM AND THE GROWTH OF GERMAN CHAUVINISM SINCE 1870 THE GLORIFICATION OF WAR . . . 4-1 CHAPTER IV THE CONCEPTION OF THE STATE AND OF INTER- NATIONAL RELATIONS .... 86 xiii xiv CONTENTS CHAPTER V PACB THE HUMANITARIAN CONSCIOUSNESS OF THE MODERN MAN . . . . . IOO CHAPTER VI PATRIOTISM AND COSMOPOLITANISM THE PER- PENDICULAR AND HORIZONTAL DIVISIONS OF HUMAN SOCIETY . . . . . I 1 1 CHAPTER VII RECONSIDERATION OF THE TRUE MODERN MEAN- ING OF STATE AND OF PATRIOTISM . 11$ CHAPTER VIII CORPORATENESS THE ABUSE OF CORPORATE AND INDIVIDUAL LOYALTY . . I2O CHAPTER IX THE WRONG AND THE RIGHT NATIONALISM . 132 CHAPTER X THE DISEASE OF WAR ..... 144 CHAPTER XI THE CURE OF THE DISEASE OF WAR . . . CONTENTS xv PART II THE INADEQUACY OF MODERN MORALS: NIETZSCHE CHAPTER I PAOB THE NEGATIVE CHARACTER OF SOCIAL REFORMERS THE MONSTROSITY OF NIETZSCHE'S SUPERMAN 1 68 PART III THE MORAL DISEASE AND ITS CURE CHAPTER I THE CODIFICATION OF MODERN MORALS 2OO . 2O8 CHAPTER III THE TEACHING OF CHRIST . . , . . . 224 CHAPTER IV THE NEED FOR ETHICAL EVOLUTION IMPLIED IN THE TEACHING OF CHRIST PLATO , 239 CHAPTER V PLATONIC IDEALISM APPLIED TO ETHICAL EVOLU- TION THE ETHICS OF THE FUTURE . . 247 xvi CONTENTS PART IV (a) MAN'S DUTIES AS A SOCIAL BEING CHAPTER I PAGE DUTY TO THE FAMILY ..... 266 CHAPTER II DUTY TO THE COMMUNITY AND TO SOCIETY THE ART OF LIVING THE IDEAL OF THE GENTLEMAN . . . . . .271 CHAPTER III DUTY TO THE STATE . . . . .313 CHAPTER IV DUTY TO HUMANITY . . . . -325 (5) THE DUTIES WHICH ARE NOT SOCIAL AND THE IMPERSONAL DUTIES CHAPTER V DUTY TO OURSELF . . . . . 331 CONTENTS xvii CHAPTER VI PAGE DUTY TO THINGS AND ACTS .... 336 CHAPTER VII DUTY TO GOD ...... 347 EPILOGUE 355 APPENDIXES APPENDIX I PASSAGES ON CHAUVINISM FROM PREVIOUS PUBLICATIONS . . . . .357 APPENDIX II PASSAGES ON COSMOPOLITANISM . . , 375 APPENDIX III THE WORLD'S CHANGES IN THE PAST FIFTY YEARS 378 APPENDIX IV THE " TRANSPORTATION " OF CAPITAL . .382 2 xviii CONTENTS APPENDIX V PAGE HOW I PLACED A CONCESSION IN LONDON , 396 APPENDIX VI THE ESTHETIC ELEMENT IN THE EDUCATION OF THE INDIVIDUAL AND OF THE NATION . 413 INDEX 427 ARISTODEMOGRAGY PART I THE DISEASE OF WAR AND ITS CURE INTRODUCTION WHAT is the real cause of this war ? How can we The true find the true diagnosis of the disease which has cul- JhtTwar minated in this dissolvent crisis, threatening the is to be health and normal progress of modern civilisation ? t he defec- Some in fact, the vast majority, not only of those tive moral . J J ' / . . consaous- concerned, but of neutrals as well say it is to be ness of found in the militaristic aggression of Germany J others in the steady pursuit of an end, perhaps more remote, of the Pan-Slav domination by Russia. Be it one or the other, or both, the fact remains, that Austria, Turkey, France, and England, prospectively * Italy and the Balkan States as well, are all concerned. It takes two or more to make a quarrel. That others should have joined in this internecine war is only partially explained (it is only a moral " symptomatic diagnosis " of the disease) by pointing to the various combinations of alliance and ententes, to avowed or secret treaties, to the various moves on the diplo- matic chessboard of Europe during the last few generations, or by the consideration of such phrases as the " European Balance of Power," of the develop- ment of colonisation, commerce and trade, and of 1 These have become belligerents since the above was written. 2 INTRODUCTION endless proximate causes, such, especially, as the influence of the armament industry. The moral consciousness of the vast majority of the population of the civilised nations of the West is directly opposed to this barbarous, irrational, immoral arbitrament of right by the uncertain, fatuous, grotesquely stupid appeal to the brute forces of savagery and destruc- tion, however much these be raised to the sphere of scientific forethought and mechanical ingenuity, however much to use the happy phrase of the French Ambassador in London barbarism may have be- decked itself with the showy attributes of intellectual pedantry. To the vast majority of the civilian population (with the exception, perhaps, of professional soldiers and those directly dependent for their living upon war or the promise of war) war is not only a survival of barbarism and savagery, but an absurdity. Though all recognise the right of self-defence, the duty to protect home and family and the community in which they live, to defend honour and ideals, none who are sane and sincere would admit that you must slay those who are not endangering your own life, whose aims and ideals are practically the same as yours. To create a state in which the whole life of the community is subordinated to the one great aim of slaying neighbours generally related by race, religion and ideals ; with whom the people lived in friendly intercourse ; and to do this by subverting all principles of morals, all standards of right and wrong, of fair dealing, of honour, chivalry, and gener- osity, on which life in times of peace has been based, is not only cruel and immoral, but grossly stupid and insane. And yet, in spite of these views held by all sane people, such a war is actually raging : families lose fathers, sons, and brothers ; misery penetrates into all layers of the population in every civilised THE PARADOX OF CIVILISATION 3 country in Europe ; the rule of morality and sanity is suspended for the time ; millions of pounds a day are expended without any economic return, dissolved into empty space sums in one day, or one week, or one month, which would have advanced social re- forms, alleviated suffering and misery of the poor and feeble, provided for Science and Art and all spiritual improvements, sums which in times of peace can never be appropriated to such uses for the welfare of humanity for ages to come. Was there ever such a tragic paradox, such glaring contradiction between conviction and actual profession, between faith and action, between what we believe and what we do ? How came modern civilisation to end in such a paradox ? For the true answer to this question we must consider not only the direct actions of Germany and Russia, but also the less direct international policy of all the other civilised nations ; it is to be found much deeper down and much farther afield in the moral state of national, social, and individual life within all the peoples of the Western world. I shall endeavour to show that the real cause, the real " etiology " of this universal disease, are to be found in the fact that we have no efficient common ideals or that we have false ideals, prejudices, and one-sided figments of diseased or unbalanced brains, which we have raised to the rank of ideals, when they really are the outcome of brutal and lower in- stincts. But, more than this, it is to be found in the undeniable fact that the modern world has no faith no religion if you like no clearly adopted higher code of ideal striving in which we believe whole-heartedly, and which can not only lead us on to action, to great things, noble enterprise, complete self-sacrifice, but will also regulate our actions even in the smallest demands of daily life : moral stan- dards which are in complete harmony with the 4 INTRODUCTION firmly established and clearly recognised faith in such unassailable ideals, intense and pervasive and capable of resisting every onslaught of doubt or scepticism in even the smallest constituent elements of our wider faith. What is needed, above all things, is to reconsti- tute our faith, so that it should have the potency to guide and to control our actions in every aspect of life, unfailingly, as in bygone days (and even now with less civilised and even savage people) there was complete harmony between what people believed and professed and what they considered the right thing to do. It is my object in this essay thus to show that in this absence of ideals and of religious faith, truly expressive of our best thought and of the civilised conditions of modern life, is to be found the real cause of this one sudden and universal crisis in European history. It is also my object to endeavour in all humility to indicate, at least, the direction in which the reconstitution of our ideals and the estab- lishment of an effective Faith for the future can be found. CHAPTER I THE IMMEDIATE CAUSES OF THE WAR. THE DOMIN- ANCE OF GERMAN STREBERTHUM AND ALL- DEUTSCHER MILITARISM IMMEDIATELY after that most acute crisis in the re- The lations between England and Germany in 191 1, when great the railway strike in England threatened to develop Europe . war in into a general strike, paralysing trade and communi- 1911. cations throughout the British Isles, and when this critical moment was seized by Germany, through the Agadir incident, for action which nearly provoked a war, I had a most interesting and deeply significant conversation with one of the leading German statesmen then resident in England. I am firmly convinced that he was not only a most honourable man, who combined an intense and loyal patriotism with high ideals for humanity as a whole, but was also truly and sincerely an Anglophile, anxious to maintain cordial relations between Germany and Great Britain, two nations whose vocation in history it was jointly to advance the cause of civilisation. Besides ourselves there was present one other person, deeply and intimately concerned in adjusting labour disputes and thor- oughly acquainted with labour difficulties all over the world. The crisis threatening the maintenance of peace between Germany and England had by that time practically passed away, and our own labour troubles were on the way to final settlement. My friend, the authority on labour questions, had just 5 6 THE IMMEDIATE CAUSES OF THE WAR informed us that there were signs of a threat of similar troubles in one of the continental countries, and had dwelt upon the sympathetic responsiveness of every country to the strikes and labour troubles of their neighbours. He predicted that this respon- siveness would grow and might lead to more thor- oughly organised international labour movements. It was then that I ventured to express my con- viction as regards the possibility of a great, if not a universal, war in the future. To me it then appeared and I endeavoured to formulate my views that the future history of civilisation depended on the relative rapidity in progress and realisibility of two opposed movements and aims, held by the two chief contending forces and camps : the peaceful workers in the world and the militarists. It was entirely a question which of the opposed purposes held by the two forces determining the fate of the world would arrive at fruition first : whether militarism which made for war or true democracy the people realis- ing its own power, and conscious not only of its interests, but its ideals which made for peace, would win the day. The fate of the world hung upon the question of time as to which of these two forces would realise itself first in power and organisation so as to impose its aims upon the world. Since the general strike, though abortive for the time, had been resorted to in St. Petersburg in 1905, the labour men throughout the world had realised the power in their hands to decide eventually upon war or peace ; and even though war were declared by any country, to make it impossible for any government to wage it. The labour parties all over the world were becoming internationalised, as capital on its side was more and more effectually internationalised. Moreover, it was equally manifest to me that the several governments and military authorities were LABOUR ORGANISATION AND MILITARISM 7 beginning to realise this fact of primary importance. It therefore appeared to me that in the immediate future it was all a question as to whether the labour men (the practical, not the theoretical pacifists) would arrive at the realisation of their power before the militarists had forced a war upon us, or whether the military powers would anticipate this result, and within the next few years would force a war upon the world. If they delayed in their purpose, and even a few more years were to pass without conflict, the world would no longer tolerate such a war, and some form of permanent peace though not neces- sarily peace from internal and wider social revolu- tions would be ensured. What I feared was, that those convinced of the need for war and those inter- ested in the maintenance of armies and military prestige, and all that it implied, would anticipate events in the undisturbed development of social forces and would precipitate a war upon us. My German diplomatic friend listened attentively, and for an answer, nodding his head with a suggestion of consent and approval, simply and with manifest reticence remarked : Sie konnen nicht unrecht haben (You may not be wrong). Now German militarism has won the day and has German brought about this disastrous war more disastrous f^^b than any the world has yet seen. Not wishing to war upon delay war (the possibility of which in the future thus hung in the balance) any longer than necessary, and deeming the autumn of 1914 the most propitious moment for the coincidence and confluence of many factors favourable to German aggression, war was declared, and was forced upon Europe at exactly that date. It was one of the doctrines, openly admitted by the German war-party, that the reasons for a declaration of war, if they do not manifestly exist, can always be created. This is borne out by 8 THE IMMEDIATE CAUSES OF THE WAR past history, and is clearly put by Nippold in his book on German Chauvinism 1 when he wrote in 1913 : " The quintessence of their [the German Chau- vinists'] doctrine is always the same : A European war is not only an eventuality against which one must guard oneself, but a necessity, moreover one which in the interest of the German nation one ought to accept with joy. . . . In the eyes of these agitators the German nation requires a war ; a long peace is to their mind in itself regrettable, and it does not matter whether a reason for such a war exists or not ; therefore, such a cause must if necessary simply be produced." August That August 1914 was thus the most favourable most B moment is clear from the fact that the new army favour- organisation was completed and in working order ; ment for that the strategic railways on the eastern and western Ger ~ , frontiers were completed ; and that the extension many s premedi- of the Kiel Canal had also been carried out. As re- war^ gards the unfavourable position of the Powers of the Triple Entente : Russia had not developed her own strategic railways, nor reorganised her army, both of which she was actively engaged in doing, and expected to have completed about three years later ; moreover, at that moment she was in the throes of labour difficulties, corresponding in some degree to those of England two years previously, which had then set in motion aggressive movements against us by Germany. France could not yet count upon the complete fruition of the revised Army Bill which would bring her numbers to the required proportion for resistance against Germany ; moreover, scandals concerning the equipment of the army had been brought before the public through debates in the 1 Der Deutsche Chauvinismus. THE PROPITIOUS MOMENT 9 Chamber, and had shown great unpreparedness for war, weakness and disorganisation in the French Army. Finally, England was in the throes of one of the most serious internal crises, owing to the dead- lock in the solution of the Irish question, and, in the eyes of incompetent German diplomats, a revolu- tion seemed not improbable, and even more probable should a war be forced upon England at that moment. I have the best authority for maintaining that the ruling powers of Germany were absolutely convinced that England was not prepared to join the other Powers of the Triple Entente, and would in all circumstances remain at least neutral. Thus the only factor in which that moment was least favour- able to German aggression, namely, the exceptional readiness of the mobilised British Fleet, could in the estimation of the Kaiser and the German Foreign Office be discounted, because they felt confident that England would not join in a war, at any rate not at the beginning. But, over and above all these considerations, which The most made that moment the most propitious for a declara- l $? a ' t tion of war on the part of Germany, was the very neither fact for which the Germans might be able to claim nor^ng- disinterestedness of motive namely, that the war land, but on the face of it was caused by a question primarily concerning Austria-Hungary and not Germany, and desi g- J u u nated as that its immediate cause was clearly one which the pri- appealed to the sense of law and morality in people maf y. the all the world over. For in the first instance it meant sive a protest against murder and the vilest form of enemy> assassination of a man and a woman who were repre- sentative of the sovereignty of the great Austrian Empire. It could be claimed apart from all the political bearings of that assassination, its origin and connection with the anti-Serbian policy of Austria in the immediate past and for many years before io THE IMMEDIATE CAUSES OF THE WAR that date, and even with the suspicion that Austria herself was not free from collusion in this political crime of assassination it could be claimed, I say, that morally a great Power was justified in punishing a heinous crime, recognised as such by the whole civilised world, and in taking steps that such crimes should not occur again. The Slav There was thus a favourable element in this appeal and the ^ o common justice, as regards the individual inci- dent out of which this war, concerning the national interests and aspirations of all the countries, grew. There was further a claim to disinterestedness on Germany's part as the matter primarily concerned her ally and not herself. But above all and this I wish to emphasise the most important element was the fact that the chief antagonist of the Germanic powers in this international quarrel with the Entente Powers was not Anglo-Saxon England or Latin France, but the Slav world Serbia, behind whom stood Russia. The chief antagonists in this great war could thus be clearly and distinctly defined as Russia and the Teutonic powers, the Slav and the Teuton. This was the most important and decisive factor in the whole confluence of circumstances which made for war and could justify it in the eyes of the Ger- man people and of the whole world. At the beginning of the war this element was utilised to the full by the German Government, the German press, and every organ of publicity which could affect the German nation itself and the neutral peoples of the civilised world. The antagonism was clearly defined as lying between Germany and her allies and Russia and her allies, between the Teuton and the Slav, between Germanic culture and Slav culture. Further- more, on the wider political side it could be used to symbolise the conflict between benighted autocracy and despotism, represented by Russia, and the en- SLAV AND TEUTON n lightenment of progressive Germany. This fact was of supreme importance in the beginnings of this war and remains so to this day. It not only won over all the possible liberal opponents to war in Germany itself, but it also won over, or at least caused to waver in their adherence and sympathy, the liberal elements in many of the neutral countries especially those who appreciated and valued German culture, science, and art, and equally opposed and deplored the autocratic rule and the benighted social degrada- tion of the Russian people. Had this war been primarily declared by Germany against France or against England on any contentious issue between Germany and these countries, not only the socialists, but the mass of the liberal-thinking Germans, would have been opposed in feeling and sympathy to such a war, or would at least have been lukewarm in their support of it. But when it could be clearly impressed upon the national consciousness that the fight meant the self-preservation of Teutonism in its struggle with Pan-Slavism, that the ever-present danger to Germany of being crushed by its all-power- ful autocratic neighbour had come to an imminent climax, and that the actual war was wantonly forced on Germany by the Russian Tsar, who had treacher- ously mobilised his forces against Germany in con- travention of his plighted word, we can understand, not only that the pacifists were silenced for the time being, but even that a wave of patriotic enthusiasm and of warlike determination swept over the whole of the German nation, who from that time on rose like one man to defend the fatherland, and their Teutonic culture and ideals against the ruthless and deceitful foe. But here comes one of the most striking and singular incidents in the history of national psy- chology, as illustrating the facility, the stupendous 12 THE IMMEDIATE CAUSES OF THE WAR At a given levity, with which a whole nation can be duped and England its deepest convictions turned from one direction to is substi- another within a few days, even to the very opposite tuted for . J . . . . . . r j Russia as pole of the dominant passion which had before swayed m 6 PI foe m iHi ns - At a given moment Russia was deposed from the post of supreme culpability and enmity and England was substituted in her place. Since then there are manifest signs of attempts (such as those made in the letters of Herr Ballin published in the Times of April 23, 1915) to deny the initial antagonism against Russia, because of equally manifest diplo- matic motives, if possible to drive a wedge into the Triple Entente and to bring about an understanding between reactionary, autocratic Russia and mili- taristic and autocratic Germany. But the one out- standing fact is that the doctrine of hate against England, established and preached for a number of years in the immediate past in more or less open and avowed forms, has now become the all-powerful and all-pervading motive of German official and popular patriotism. Evidence now furnished proves beyond all possible doubt that this plan and its supreme end were in the mind of the militaristic section of the German people for a number of years past, and that this militaristic section has gained full domin- ation over the whole of the united German people. The long- The programme of the Alldeutsche Partei, the Wehr- Shedpro- ve ' re ^ n i an d other smaller organisations, as laid down, gramme not only in the well-known book of Bernhardi, but Att _ in numerous documents and in all the speeches made deutscke by the representatives of these parties, was step by carried step adopted in its completeness by the German Srtsfn- Government with the Kaiser at its head. The tirety Alldeutsche Partei, which in the past was supposed to present ^e, anc ^ definitely maintained by German authorities Govern- to be, a negligible minority, now has absolute and ment * undisputed control of the fate of the German nation. GERMAN EXPANSION 13 But even at the time that diplomatic negotiations preceding the outbreak of the war were progressing, and on the actual declaration of war, this aggressive programme had for all practical purposes already been adopted. It can be shown beyond all doubt that the war was begun by Germany, not because of the danger threatening the self-preservation of Germany and of German culture from the Russian and the Slav ; that the Teuton had no place in the Balkans, where the claims of the Slav must be admitted to be paramount ; and that, so far from the Western Powers of the Triple Entente (certainly England and probably France) being a party to Slav aggres- sion, which endangered the independence of Germany and her people and the development and expansion of its culture, they had intimated clearly their opposi- tion to such an aggression and even their readiness to enforce it. The war was beyond all doubt forced upon the world by those who were convinced that the German race and German civilisation must expand in extent and in power all over the world on the same scale as the British Empire. Wherever this expansion might be impeded or blocked by British power and British interests such obstacles should be removed by force of arms. Above all, that the Teutonic race and Teutonic civilisation should supersede the world-hegemony of Britain and should wrest from its hated rival the possessions and pre- dominance which English forefathers, under favour- able circumstances of history, had won for England, together with the numerous and grave responsibilities and duties which Great Britain thereby owed to the civilised world. How, within the last ten or twenty years, this national programme, this " destiny " of the German peoples, had been impressed upon the German nation, with what systematic organisation among the adult population, and with what thorough 14 THE IMMEDIATE CAUSES OF THE WAR and far-reaching pedagogic training it had been spread and fostered among the youthful population, who are now fighting the German battles, in schools and universities, Professor Nippold's book amply proves by documentary evidence. The glorification of might, irrespective of right, is the leading moral, or immoral, factor in this national movement ; and it has ended, as is now finally proved, in this ruthless war of frightfulness by land and sea, ignoring all human feeling, human pity, all Christian charity, all chivalry and military honour, dealing at the outset with treaties as scraps of paper, and breaking the national plighted troth in repudiating those inter- national agreements to which Germany was a signa- tory. It has led to the complete demoralisation, or rather, amoralisation, of the German people. German In the light of this supreme result of German Kultur. Alldeutsche patriotism, the invocation of higher moral aims, conveyed by the cant use of the term Kultur, does not only strike the impartial observer as in- sincere, but as grotesquely paradoxical. The highest flight to which the apologists of German ruthlessness can soar in upholding the cause of German civilisa- tion is embodied in the letters published by the Times, in which Herr Ballin and Herr Rathenau (the director of the large commercial electrical works at Berlin) extol German culture and German moral elevation as compared with English degeneracy and the idleness of the English nation, whose conception of life and all the aims of science and art do not exclude the cultivation of leisure, physically and spiritually, in developing the amenities of civilised existence. English culture and life are contrasted with a German conception of science and human existence entirely subordinated to commercialism, to industrial progress and wealth in one word, a life of banausic materialism. But these captains of GERMAN KULTUR 15 industry who, with the ruthless militarists and the penurious Alldeutsche Streber, now rule Germany show, with singular naivete, how their conception of science, art, and social life, entirely subordinated to the immediate and ultimate aim of material wealth, has superseded all other ideals of German Kultur on which the Germans once prided themselves, and which they even now occasionally claim with mani- fest insincerity, when extolling so-called " German idealism." Let us consider the comparative weight and value of this German Kultur which is arrogantly put for- ward as so superior to that of all other nations, that it ought, in the Tightness of things, to supersede all other forms of civilisation. Concomitant with the spirit of antagonism as its more positive complement, the Germans cultivate an inflated national pride and exalt, far beyond its intrinsic and comparative value, German Kultur. Kultur, be it noted, is not quite synonymous with our term "culture"; but connotes the individual state of civilisation to which each nation has attained. In the first instance, they contrast their Kultur with that of Russia, and rightly maintain that it would be a misfortune to the whole world if their Germanic civilisation were superseded by that of the Slavs. We may at once admit that we should all regard such an eventuality as a loss to humanity. But, as we shall see, there never was, and never will be, any danger especially as regards the power of Great Britain to regulate or influence the course of his- torical events of such a catastrophe. Much as we appreciate and prize the civilisation represented by Pushkin, Gogol, Llermontof, Turgenev, Tolstoy, Dostoievsky, Solovev, Yakovlev, Chekhov, Gorky, Merezhkovsky, Krylov, Kolstov, Nekrasov ; of Glinka, Dargomijsky, Rubinstein, Tchaikovsky, 3 16 THE IMMEDIATE CAUSES OF THE WAR Moussorgsky, Boroudin, Cui, Rimsky-Korsakov, Rachmaninov, Glazounov, Stravinsky, Scriabin ; of Mendeleyev, Metchnikov, Pavlov, Lebedev, Hvolson, Kovalevsky, Lobachevsky, Minkovsky, and Vino- gradov we do not think that the Russia of to- day, and for some time to come, can, with any advantage to the world at large, effectually impose its civilisation on any one of the Western civilised powers. But these Chauvinists claim moral and intellectual pre-eminence for German civilisation, and, appealing to the world history which is " the final tribunal of the world " (Die Weltgeschichte ist das Weltgericht], they are convinced that the predominance of Germany is thus morally justified, nay, is a necessary conse- quence of any reasonable and equitable regulation of the destiny of the world. Let us at once deal with this chimera of German Kultur and assign to it its right place. It is futile and childish to institute such comparisons in things of the mind, which are im- ponderable and ought never to be compared with a view to establishing comparative claims of pre- eminence. As Heine has said : " Who can weigh flames ? " But when such a childish comparison is forced on us, let us make it truthfully. Many of us The hege- gratefully and unstintingly recognise and acknow- German* l e dge the hegemony of Germany in several depart- cuiture in ments and aspects of civilised life and higher mental depart- activity. We have profited by German achievement ments. and have endeavoured to learn and to absorb the spirit of it. The foremost and most characteristic achievement of the German mind, for which the world must thus be grateful and by which we have profited, is the thorough and rational organisation of thought and science, especially on the pedagogic side, as embodied in their educational system from schools to universities. This has resulted in the ORGANISATION OF THOUGHT AND SCIENCE 17 most striking and effective modification of the whole life of the German people, and is the source of all the success which they have achieved even in the most material and practical aspects of their existence. It means the realisation of the value of the highest, and even the most abstract, thought and science, by the whole population, including the industrial and commercial world. In this respect we have all learnt from Germany and are still endeavouring to follow her lead. But in the actual advancement of Science NO such and Thought itself, in the imposing of new directions ^|" in of thought, which puts a stamp on the spirit of the other as- age as it directly advances each department of human chdiisa- knowledge, Germany has no pre-eminence over France tion. and England. Our thinkers have thus contributed as much to the advance of civilisation as have those of Germany. Probably a strong case might be made for the pre-eminence of both England and France in this respect. In the domain of art we may at once admit that p r e- Germany has in modern times led the way in music, ^^f 6 We need not go the lengths of Nietzsche and deny man this by asserting that " a German cannot know what m music is. The men who pass as German musicians are foreigners, Slavs, Croats, Italian, Dutchmen, or Jews." Even if (as he asserts) Beethoven was Dutch in origin, and even if Wagner, as he suggests, had Jewish blood, the Dutchman certainly became an Austrian German, and if Wagner had Jewish blood, he was as much of German nationality as most modern Teutons, and much more so than a Prussian semi-Slav. The latter, by the way, has hardly pro- duced any of the great men upon whose achievements German Kultur rests its claims. But in all the other arts and in literature, especially within the last century, the place of Germany is distinctly second to that of France and England. i8 THE IMMEDIATE CAUSES OF THE WAR in the More than all this, however, in all that concerns the aSniT tS " Art of Living," in the political and social education political of the people, Germany has much to learn from the standards Western European nations. The average political the education of the British people has for centuries Living" been, and is at present, higher than that of the Germany Qe rma ns : and their domestic and social life, the second to ' " France true art of living and their home-life, all tending to England an< ^ conforming with the higher standards of social ethics, which have as their ideal the type of the " gentleman " are such, that it would be a sad day, not only for England, but for the world, if military efficiency and power were to replace these by the Kultur dominating Germany. 1 ignorance But ^ tne Art and Literature of France and Eng- of the land and all that home and social life in England German mean, the German professors who have made them- and the selves the mouthpieces of the Chauvinists know very Ic3.ni cd. men as little, if anything. How many of them have even a n dding acquaintance with British architecture not Kultur only Mediaeval and Renaissance, but since the days and ran e f Christopher Wren of the paintings of Gains- England. borough, Reynolds, Romney, Raeburn, Hoppner, Turner, not to mention contemporary masters ? How many have read (though they may know Byron) Keats and Shelley, Wordsworth, Browning and Tennyson ? They apparently do know the works of Wilde and Bernard Shaw ; but are they acquainted with any of our leading contemporary writers and poets ? And, as far as our national life and our life at home are concerned, how many of them have lived among us and entered into the life of every class of the community ? I am told on the best of authority that the coryphaeus among the political and official university professors, who for years has written 1 Further exposition of these facts will be found in later portions of the book. GERMAN MISINFORMATION 19 and, as an authority, has been listened to with con- vinced respect by the German public on England and English affairs (Professor Schiemann), visited England for the first time two years ago, when he took part in the Historical Congress held in London. On the other hand, I venture to state that there are very large numbers of people in England and in the United States who have spent years in study and in travel in Germany, and have had opportunities of intimate acquaintanceship and intercourse with repre- sentatives of every class and occupation among the population of that country. The question must have forced itself on the minds of many, after the experiences since the war began, how men with the best of training in scientific discipline should have proved so incapable of forming an unbiassed opinion as was manifested by the various proclamations signed by the most distinguished names in modern science and learning. What to my mind is still more astonishing is the fact that with the highly developed sense of truth such as a scientific training ought to give, they should have at all ventured to express decided opinions when they had not at their disposal the facts and sources of information upon which an induction could be made or a judgment formed. For I am informed that, while we here had before us the German White book and published accounts of the German communiques concerning the war, our own White and Blue books and similar publications of our allies were, until quite recently, forbidden in Germany, a fine of 3,000 marks or thirty days' im- prisonment being imposed upon any person found in possession of such publications. It would lead us too far astray to account for the mentality of the German man of learning and his preparatory training to explain the singular phenomenon of his incapacity to judge fairly of matters political and international. 20 THE IMMEDIATE CAUSES OF THE WAR But in this one definite case, it is enough to say that most of them were not possessed of the true facts upon which to base a fair judgment. In any case we can account for the almost arrogant assump- tion of superiority assigned by them to the Kultur of Germany over that of the Western States, though this assumption is in no wise justified. CHAPTER II THE OLDER GERMANY THERE was and there still exists a German Kulturihe which we all acknowledge and respect. This national civilisation had its roots deep down in the historic the past past and produced the generation which achieved by^h?^ German unity, established the German Empire, deep- spirit of ened and widened German thought, raised on high Germany, and carried far afield the torch of science and of learning, and, above all, instilled into the whole of the German people and into the very air they breathed the spirit of thoroughness. The Germans of to-day did not achieve these results themselves ; but they have received them as a priceless gift from their fathers and grandfathers, and from these results whatever success they may have achieved in peace or in war has come to them. They have, in the present generation, directed this vital and elevating force exclusively into the channels of material interest, have tarnished its brightness, have materialised its spirituality, and have, and are, continuously dimin- ishing the rich patrimony which the Germans of old handed down to them. The Germany of to-day is the Germany of com- German mercial Streberthum in the service of military force . s * reber - The age which has grown up to initiate and to carry on this war will be marked as the apotheosis of Stre- berthum. Now the Streber is not the impostor or adventurer of old. He has learnt something and 22 THE OLDER GERMANY knows something, and he might learn and know much more. But no time is left for the deepening of his knowledge and the elevation of its uses, because he is swayed by the premature and superlative desire if I may be forgiven a modern vernacular phrase " to make it pay at once, and to get there at once." The English and the Americans have their " climbers " and " pushers," and the French have their struglifers and their arrives. But these repulsive off-shoots of modern commercialism are with us free from cant and self-deception ; they are clear-cut types who openly, and often with coarse cynicism, repudiate all higher professions. But the German Streber uses great phrases : he plays the part of the poor man of science or scholar, nobleman or diplomat, or even soldier. In the spirit of these individual Streber the nation as a whole, which aims at power and nothing more, whose professed goal is commercial and financial expansion, will pose before the world as the champion of Kultur ; and, a revolver in the one hand, raises high with the other the school- master's birch, threatening the world with pedagogic chastisement to improve its mind and manners ; while speedily dropping the friendly swish, it grasps at the money-bags of its recalcitrant pupils. This is the world and these are the aims of the Alldeutsche Streber who have made this war. But it would be as inaccurate and untrue, as it is unfair and misleading, to believe or maintain that the whole German nation is made up of such Streber, though, for the time being, they have won the day in Germany and have succeeded in imposing their own would-be ideals upon the bulk of the nation. The older type of the true German not the Prussian junker, the learned or unlearned adventurer still exists and represents the majority of the German nation. His ideals still persist in moving and guiding the mass of the people, THE GERMAN STREBER 23 however much they may be cast into the remote and invisible distance for the time, and however much his eyes may be bedimmed by the untruths, the sup- pression of facts, and the misdirection of patriotic devotion which the militarists have spread over the nation. When the eyes of the sane majority among the Germans can again stand the bright light of truth which has been withheld from them, and they revive from this fit of barbarous madness which has come upon them, they will return to their true selves and the fatherland will again be the country and the nation which so many of us have loved and admired. The Germany of old that has been swept aside or T h e effect submerged by the Germany of modern Slreberthum of d .ecen- and militarism, the domination of German Chauvin- ism, with Berlin as a centre of influence and focus of vision, was really the product of the Germany that consisted of numerous small States and principalities. Through these and through the consequent system of decentralisation, their Kultur which we admired was called into existence and received its differentiating stamp. It was at once individualised in these several centres, giving varied character to the different forms of spiritual life, and at the same time diffusing such spiritual life into every distant part of the country and into every social layer of the nation. It differed in this from the culture of France and England and every other nation, where the large capital, the metropolis, was the dominant home and centre draw- ing to itself all intellectual forces and all talent and diffusing from this centre that one dominant form of civilisation and even way of thinking. In the other European countries culture was not only stereotyped into one dominant form, but, by irre- sistibly attracting and centralising the spiritual life within the metropolis, the various provincial centres were drained of their talent and of their spiritual 2 4 THE OLDER GERMANY vitality, and the nation at large, outside the metro- polis, fell into apathy and lethargy in matters of the mind, resigning itself to narrowness and inactivity and spreading an atmosphere of vulgar materialism and provincialism. German culture did not thus become metropolitan ; it did not depend upon one capital with a huge population, concentrating all culture as well as all misery, but was diffused over the whole country and throughout the whole people. Idealism could thus thrive ; and out of this idealism grew the quality of thoroughness which is the greatest spiritual asset which the German nation possesses. These forces again were favoured in their growth and persistency by the decentralisation and particular- isation of national life throughout the numberless principalities, the smaller capitals with their great universities and their highly organised schools. Each principality had its leading theatres, opera-houses, and concert halls, with highly trained artists, dramatic and musical ; its poets and men of letters ; its com- posers, painters, and sculptors. These were not attracted to the one national metropolis, but pre- ferred to live in the smaller towns and principalities among the congenial society where they were honoured and appreciated. The tradition of paying tribute and honour and of conferring tangible and manifest dis- tinction upon these leaders of culture was created and fostered by the petty princes and rulers, even by the civic authorities of these numerous centres of higher life. No general or cabinet minister, or judge, still less a successful financier and captain of industry, could rob them of the distinction conferred upon them from above and which was reflected throughout the population. There was thus bred and fostered, as a potent reality among the population, the hero-worship of the " Knights of the Mind," of the representatives of art and science ; and the young man of the day THE OLD AND NEW IDEALS 25 in his dreams of glory turned to the vision of the great personalities of a Schiller, a Goethe, a Heine ; of a Beethoven and Mozart ; of an Alexander Humboldt and of the great band of philosophers and men of science ; and his imagination and his longing dreams of fame were fired by these monumental figures in the Valhalla of German greatness. He would have preferred to wear the mantle of their sovereignty to that of any of the great statesmen or generals in Germany's past. What a change in spirit has come over the German people within the last decade or two, through the influence of the Chauvinists, may best be appreciated in their own words when, as quoted by Nippold, one of their spokesmen, Medizinalrath Dr. W. Fuchs, addresses the German youth in the following words : l " Who are the men who soar to the greatest heights in the history of the German people, whom do the heart-beats of the German encircle with the most ardent love ? Do you think Goethe, Schiller, Wagner, Marx ? O, no ; but Barbarossa, the Great Frederick, Bliicher, Moltke, Bismarck, the hard men of blood (Blutmenscheri) . They who sacrificed thousands of lives, they are the men towards whom, from the soul of the people, the tenderest feeling, a truly ador- ing gratitude wells forth. Because they have done what we now ought to do. Because they were so brave, so fearless of responsibility, as no one else. But now civic morality must condemn all these great men ; for the civilian guards nothing more jealously than his civic morality and, nevertheless, his holiest thrills are evoked by the Titan of the blood-deed ! " The supreme expression of the last phase in this The Em- earlier glorious tradition of the German people con- ^j.g^ centrated round the court of the Crown Prince Fred- erick. 1 Die Post, January 28, 1912. 26 THE OLDER GERMANY Frederick and his consort. It was through their influence that Germany undertook, as a great national feat in peace, the excavations of Olympia which aroused such interest throughout all layers of Ger- man society and filled the nation with just pride, initiating a movement in that one department of the study of the Hellenic past which caused renewed activity and emulation in every other civilised country. In the palace of the Crown Prince, and later of the Empress Frederick, the great men of the day in literature, science, and art were the familiar and welcome guests. Helmholtz and Virchow, Curtius and Mommsen, von Ranke, Joachim in fact, every leader of art and thought in Berlin were drawn to this imperial centre ; and every person of distinction who came as a visitor, even those from distant countries, found an honoured welcome there. It has been said by more than one observer of Ger- man affairs, not only that this war would have been inconceivable had the Emperor Frederick survived ; but that German national life would, on the lines of its true eminence, have advanced to greater heights in our own days and would have had a last- ing and elevating influence on the life and civilisa- tion of all other European countries and of the world at large. No greater loss has been sustained by the world at large in the death of one man, per- haps in the whole of history, than by the premature death of the Emperor Frederick. Theedu- Above all, however, was this spirit of ideal thor- ou g nness fostered in the Germany of old by the system of education. The distinctive advantage which Germany thus possessed is again closely knit up with the decentralisation of its smaller States and principalities. This distinctive advantage, in which Germany differs from all other countries in modern times, is to be found in the fact that in those days FRUITS OF THE OLDER EDUCATION 27 the educational system was constructed from its highest manifestation downwards it was, as it were, deductive and theoretical and not inductive and empirical. Education did not begin from below, arising out of elementary or elemental needs of daily life, and then, spasmodically and unsystematically, work its way upwards in slow and uncertain and irrational progression, as was and is the case in most other countries ; but the direction was given, the keynote was struck, by the highest institutions of learning in their purest and highest spiritual form, namely their universities. Pure knowledge and systematic thoroughness were aimed at as the ulti- mate goal, and up to this all the lower and more elementary stages were to lead. Every one of these smaller principalities thus had its university, where pure science and learning were studied thoroughly for their own sake. In those days, to a lesser degree even in the present day, the smaller provincial uni- versities could retain on their staff the higher repre- sentatives of science and learning, and they produced more remarkable work than did the great metro- politan universities of Berlin and Vienna. The same applied to their schools, especially their higher schools or gymnasia. Many a small town (not by the excep- tional possession of rich and aristocratic foundations, such as some of our public schools have) was famed for having some of the best schools in Germany. It is a noteworthy fact that the present Emperor and his brothers were sent to the gymnasium of Ploen, a small provincial town, even the name of which is unknown to most foreigners. Step by step, from the universities downward, the schools and the whole educational system of Germany was thus built up on the thorough and systematic conception of purest and highest knowledge. In spite of all endeavours to the contrary, the Chauvinists and Streber have 28 THE OLDER GERMANY not been able utterly to destroy this spirit ; but, in spite of themselves, and unknown to themselves, they have been able to profit by it in skilfully using this spirit in their militaristic and wholly mercenary tendencies and aims. Though they wish to replace the spirit of pure science, learning, and philosophy by the narrow standards of applied science only, and though in their hearts they despise the bene- factors upon whose efforts they live and succeed, they have not been able to suppress the successors of men like the mathematician Gauss, who drank a toast to the study of pure mathematics in extolling that study as " the only science which had never The older been polluted by a practical application." In recent entirely * years, however, the university is being more and lost, but more replaced by the technical schools, the scientific super- 7 pursuits of which are directly made subservient to seded by the ruling spirit of commercialism, as the gymnasia, material- the homes of the humanities among schools, are ^streber- being more an ^ more replaced by the schools directly thum. ministering to material gain. The spokesmen for science and its claim to respect in Germany are now the captains of industry like Herr Rathenau and Heir Ballin, 1 who glorify before the world the achievements of German Kultur and limit it to the complete subordination of all spiritual effort to the increase of industrial activity and of material wealth. They glory in the fact that their scientific researchers have been ensnared and enslaved entirely in the service of their great industries, and that the German worker forgoes all the other amenities and recreative refinements of life in the subordination of the soul's forces to this one and only criterion of material success and the final goal of all culture. That the British people, like the ancient Greeks, could culti- vate physical vigour and a common spirit of recrea- 1 Letters quoted above, p. 12. THE TRUE SPIRIT OF SCIENCE AND LEARNING 29 tive social impulse in their national games and sports, is to them a clear mark of national inferiority and degeneracy. Some of their more far-sighted countrymen always regarded the results of our national sports and pastimes as a great national asset in our favour and endeavoured, during the years preceding the war, to introduce these British institutions into Germany. They would do better were they to remind us of their past inheritance in their national and civic theatres and concert-halls and museums throughout the country, and the facility with which the popu- lation at large can enjoy these means of spiritual relaxation. It is in this one particular sphere that other nations can learn from them and are willing to learn from them. But their industrial success and the realisation of the spirit of thoroughness which underlies it was the product of the Germany of the past, the very existence of which they have been undermining, and against which their militarism and the present war with its barbarous and degrading methods of warfare are striking the death-blow. Year by year, since 1871, Berlin is asserting itself as the centre of German Kultur, destroying or sap- ping the vitality of all these numerous centres from which emanated the true vitality of the German spirit. It is the home and fountain of all Streberthum, which means the undoing of the moral and spiritual vitality of the German nation. Let us pause for a moment and endeavour to recall a picture of the German as we have known him, and let me endeavour in a few strokes to recall to memory the various types of Germans who existed before and who, I repeat, still exist in great numbers. To begin with the most prominent and most powerful caste. I can vividly recall to mind in memory the personality of one of the rulers of the 30 THE OLDER GERMANY lesser German States, who died at an advanced age shortly before the war. He was, like the Prince Consort of England, a successor to those princes who created the Court of Weimar in which Goethe lived, and from which an atmosphere of most refined cul- ture emanated over the world. Well over six feet in height and of military and commanding erectness in stature, he had none of the stiffness and assertive awkwardness of the typical Prussian soldier. A soldier he was, however, having fought through the whole of the Franco-Prussian War in a high com- mand, and having profitably devoted much time and thought to the theoretical and scientific study of military matters ever since. But he restricted such activities and interests to his military duties and occupations and never carried the manners or tone of the soldier into his civil life as the ruler of his country, and still less into his private and social intercourse. With his clean-cut and refined features, his bright clear eyes and fair complexion, his long, silvery beard, he presented a most attractive per- sonality and combined to the highest and fullest degree dignity, kindness, and gentleness. This gentle- ness was carried so far as to produce a strong element of almost childlike sensitiveness and shyness in his nature, which his own imposing bearing and the visible attributes of his exalted position could not quite obscure or hide. I can hardly recall among the many people I have met in my life one whose range of education and intellectual interests were at once as wide and deep, as versatile and as thorough, for an example of which one naturally turns back to the great personalities of the Italian Renaissance. One figure in modern times at once occurs to one's mind as being of the same calibre and quality, namely, that of a woman, the Empress Frederick. His school and university studies had been most AN ENLIGHTENED GERMAN RULER 31 systematic and thorough, and were completed in his youth by extensive travels. General education was supplemented by almost professional training in drawing and painting, which led to such proficiency that the leading German painter of his time, the elder Kaulbach, expressed his regret " that the Prince could not devote himself entirely to the pursuit of the painter's craft, as he would certainly have won for himself a prominent place among the artists of his day." In music his catholic and refined appreciativeness covered the whole field of past and contemporary art and led him to sympathetic sup- port of the new movements which he stimulated and encouraged, he himself being a distinguished per- former. None of the arts were foreign to him, in- cluding sculpture, architecture, and the decorative arts. In literature his interest, appreciation, and understanding covered the same wide field, far beyond the limits of his own country and its lan- guage. Well versed in French and Italian, his English was imperfect ; and yet he strove to master and to follow the great movements of English letters and thought, and was one of the most thorough Shakespeare scholars in Germany. The same interest was manifested in science and philosophy. He sought the company and friendship of the leading scholars and scientists in the neighbouring university, took the keenest and most active interest in learning and research as pursued there, and was himself a direct supporter of the more practical application of science to the higher optical production of scien- tific instruments, which have not only made his small capital the centre of one of the most advanced and scientifically refined industries for the whole world, but have at the same time given an example for economic co-operation and the direct bestowal of commercial profit for the social betterment of the 32 THE OLDER GERMANY community. Besides this, he was a keen sportsman with the true sportsman's spirit, fond of horses, an exceptionally good shot, who even when eighty years of age stalked and bagged his stag in the woods and laid him low in the most perfect style, avoiding all cruelty and pain. From his earliest days to his recent death he made of his principality and its capital a centre of highest culture. He attracted to it and held there, by the material and social induce- ments which he could offer, the leading representa- tives of art and culture. From the early days when Otto Ludwig, the novelist and critic (whose essays on Shakespeare will always remain a classic), was resident in his capital, he invited thither the poets Geibel and Bodenstaedt, the dramatist Paul Lindau, and many others. He drew to his capital the musician Hans von Buelow and many of the now prominent conductors of Germany, to all of whom he gave official positions in order to enable them to devote themselves to their art without material care, and at the same time made their homes the centres of highest culture for the community over which he presided. Brahms became his personal friend, con- stantly visited the capital, so that his own home was one of the centres from which the music of that great master emanated over the world . The orchestra of that small town was one of the foremost in Europe and astonished audiences as far away even as London by the perfection of their rendering of classical mas- terpieces. The most widely known, however, among these peaceful achievements was the theatre ; and here, under his personal direction, a new phase of modern dramatic art was initiated, which, owing to the visits paid by the company to most of the capitals of the world, marked a distinct epoch in dramatic presentation. When we add to this that the capital of this thinly populated principality was not long THE GERMAN ARISTOCRAT 33 ago inhabited by not more than 15,000 people, and now does not exceed 20,000, it will be understood what the influence of this one leading personality meant. To these qualities must be added the gracious, kindly, and warm-hearted attitude which he held towards all those who came in contact with him. He was a true gentleman. Finally, I must add that he was strongly opposed to the modern spirit which he identified with Prussia and with Berlin, even though his first wife was a Prussian princess, and that he deplored the change in morals and in tone which he saw coming over Germany from that direction. I can further call up to my mind many Germans of the aristocratic class, narrow though they may have been, and bred in a restricted atmosphere of to us an unnatural survival of the feudal system. These are distinct from in fact, may be contrasted to the Junker-class out of which many a Streber has been enlisted. Through their education they sincerely believed that, by their birth and traditions, they were differentiated in character, in manners, and in habits from the rest of the people among whom they lived. To the modern Englishman or American the sincerity of such a conviction is not quite intelligible. What makes it most difficult for us to understand is the fact that, in spite of their education, thought, and experience, their wide range of knowledge and interest, their acquaintance with other countries and peoples, and the widening of their mentality through travel and reading, such a conviction could still remain intact and sincere. But the fact that they held it truly is beyond all doubt, and is apparently explained by the fact that they only applied it to their own country and people, and admitted that it might not apply to other countries. Yet, with the limitation of this narrowness of personal 34 THE OLDER GERMANY outlook as it concerned their own social relation to their own people, there was associated, as an out- come of it, a high development of the sense of honour and of the social responsibilities which rested upon them. The merchant and money-making classes and the pursuits which they followed did not in their eyes favour the lofty integrity of their own principles and conduct. They were pronouncedly unmercenary, despisers of money, and would spend their gold freely en grand seigneur or bear their poverty un- complainingly and with dignity. Many of them were men of cosmopolitan culture, students of the arts and sciences, with the most profound respect for achievements in every direction. Next to their own immediate caste the " Knights of the Mind " held the first place. In fact, in most cases they would, if the choice had been put before them, have sought the company, and valued the regard of, the repre- sentatives of higher culture even more than those of the feudal magnates. Many of them were keen sportsmen, and, if only on this ground, bestowed admiration and sympathy on Englishmen above all foreigners. Their home-life, though retaining most of the simple German characteristics, was chiefly modelled on the pattern of the English country house. Their bearing and manners were marked by reserve and dignity, with strict maintenance of politeness and affability, with slight reminiscence of German stiffness, but with the avoidance of the typical and assertive formality of the Prussian officer. Such men would at once be characterised as men of refine- ment and distinction and would be called in Ger- many " Vornehme Herren." I can next recall brilliant representatives among the merchant class and manufacturers and the old- established bankers. They generally belonged to the former free cities, where their class had maintained THE GERMAN MERCHANT OF OLD 35 social superiority continuously from the Middle Ages to the present time, from Hamburg and the Hanseatic cities, through Frankfort and Nuremberg, even to the Swiss towns. The traditions of the old German merchant, and even the leading craftsman, absorbed by the modern manufacturer and upheld by the best representatives of finance which dominated the mediaeval life of the free cities, still pertained and opposed their obstinate vitality of business honour to the onslaught of modern commercial degeneracy. To them a man's word was as good as his bond ; the prospect of insolvency or bankruptcy was to them as great a calamity as death itself. When shortly after 1870 the whole of Germany and the world at large were scandalised by the revelations of the promoting swindles (Gr under schwindel) , a cry of indignant reproval came from the representative merchants, manufacturers, and financiers who upheld the older traditions of commercial morality. 1 These men of sterling moral character had received a sound education, generally classical, at the gymnasium and at the university ; they had travelled much and were conversant with several languages ; and they made of their homes centres of higher culture in which the arts were practised and appreciated, and in which the literatures of foreign countries, as well as of Germany, were cultivated by its members, including the women. I can recall such homes where the Revue des deux Mondes and the best English periodicals were always to be seen and read, together with the leading authors of France and England, and even Italy and Russia. Few homes of such cosmopolitan culture could be found in any other country. But, not only in the towns I have mentioned, but even in Berlin itself, such homes and 1 In the Reichstag it was especially the National Liberal party, headed by Lasker, who held up these promoters to public contempt. 36 THE OLDER GERMANY such social centres existed and carried on traditions of previous generations reaching back even to the eighteenth century. The letters of Varnhagen and the memoirs grouping round the Mendelssohn family give a picture of the cultured life of such circles at Berlin. The social tone, moreover, was more gracious and graceful, more distinctly expressive of the men and women of the world, than that of the higher bureaucratic, militaristic, and even aristocratic world of the Berlin of those days. I now gratefully turn to another group of German personalities : namely, the men of science and learn- ing. Many of these were in the past, as they are to-day, narrow and underbred craftsmen, who hap- pened to have chosen a more intellectual craft in lieu of a handicraft, upon which they have specialised to the exclusion of all other humanising, refining, and elevating pursuits and practices. But a large number in those days were men of the highest character, of refined general education, and of the loftiest ideals and practices of life. Moreover, how- ever interesting, typical, and expressive the type of the poor German professor immortalised by Carlyle's Teufelsdrockh may have been, the men I have now in mind were not poor or circumscribed in their means of living, with corresponding habits ?nd manners of life. It ought to be more widely known for it has frequently led to important and far- reaching misconceptions that the German univer- sity professor and man of science and learning was in the past, and is in the present, in his material and financial position, as well placed as the highest representatives in the military, bureaucratic, judicial, and even the ministerial walks of life. The men whom I have in mind lived on the same scale of affluence, and cultivated the amenities of life to the same degree, as those of the wealthy upper classes. THE TRUE SCHOLAR AND MAN OF SCIENCE 37 They travelled and widened the horizon of their ex- periences and sympathies. But the whole of their existence and mentality was dominated by higher spiritual aims, which they recognised as being the same for all nationalities. I have endeavoured to portray such a man in " Professor Baumann " in my book on Herculaneum, 1 and have made him the mouthpiece for the ideals of the true German scholar and scientist. Such men will ever remain the types of what is highest and best in human nature, and will always be the upholders of the higher interests of civilisation, however much they may for the time being be diverted from their true course by passion and ignorance of the truth. When we now recall the tradesmen and shop- keepers of the older days, there rise before us men most capable in the pursuit of their own business, thoroughly versed in its every detail, who took a definite pride in their life-work. The tradesman brought system and high intelligence to bear upon the sale of his goods and considered the needs of his customers, taking a pride in meeting their wants and tastes. Where could there be found such book- sellers as existed in every one of the towns and especially in university towns ? The purchaser who asked for some new book was not met with the eternal, irritating questions in order to identify author and publisher, usually ending up with the statement that " it is not in the shop, but can be procured in a few days." Such booksellers kept in touch with the production of all their goods in every country and every language. You were greeted by them almost as a literary friend and met with new information or new suggestions about books that might possibly interest you and to which your attention was drawn. 1 Herculaneum, Past, Present, and Future, pp, 181 seq (C. W. and Leonard Shoobridge). 38 THE OLDER GERMANY They made a point of knowing your own inclinations and your own pursuits, as they studied thoroughly the markets of production. " Something new has arrived from England (or from France) which I am sure, sir, must interest you." Many of these book- sellers were living bibliographical reference books themselves, men of wide reading and high standing. Some still exist in England and in France, but are quite exceptional ; whereas in Germany of old they were the rule. Now all these tradesmen and crafts- men, outside of the sphere of their own business, had their higher intellectual and artistic interests. They were members of the glee clubs, were most of them musical performers, and regular attendants at the theatre and opera, which their municipal or national institution made accessible to their class. Even if we go lower down in the social scale to the least intellectual occupations, the smallest trades- man, artisan, and labourer, through his school educa- tion and through the intellectual atmosphere about him, was at least in sympathetic touch with the higher domains of learning and of art, appreciated and valued them and respected those who repre- sented the spiritual capital of the nation. I shall never forget how, when a student at one of the German universities, during a walking tour with a party in the Black Forest, we came to a small village inn and were greeted by the burly inn-keeper. When he learnt that we were students, he showed the greatest interest in the universities whence we came and asked us to which of the faculties we belonged, whether the theological, the philosophical, the juridical, or the medical faculty. To this man, and men of his stamp, the universities were national institutions in close touch with national life ; and, though they could not pretend to follow the higher studies, they took a deep and sincere interest in the work that was carried THE TRADESMEN AND ARTISANS 39 on and did not feel that such higher intellectual work was divorced from the actual life of the people. Throughout the whole nation in those days there was reverence and respect for knowledge ; not so much because of the material advantages which it brings (as is the case now), as because of the spiritual, and hence the social, value which it presents to national life. Among all these people collectively there was, in the last generation, a spirit of friendliness and cor- diality, which indicated a kind heart and produced what they call Gemuthlichkeit ; and this friendly spirit was also extended to the foreigner. There was an understanding of, and even an admiration for, the " foreign " as such, the Fremdartige, not the ignorant English opposition to the foreigner and to what is foreign. At one time perhaps as a result of the dominance of Louis XIV over the life and fashion of the princeling-courts throughout Germany, as well as the heritage of Napoleonic rule this admiration of the foreigner and the foreign may have led to a preference over what was indigenous and national, and may have encouraged a certain absence of self- confidence, if not of servility, which led some true German patriots to combat what they considered the signs of Lakaien-natur in the German. But in those days the German mind, like the Ger- man language, showed its assimilative power and its appreciation of the life and thought of all other civilised nations. The wide-reading public in Ger- many kept in touch with, and enjoyed fully, the literature of every other country. The cheap popular translations (sixpence or sevenpence per volume), such as those published by Reklam, brought within their reach, not only the most recent books of Eng- land and France, but also Italian, Scandinavian, and Russian authors. The wider public thus became 40 THE OLDER GERMANY acquainted with the national psychology of even the Russian mujik, as depicted by a Gogol, as they appre- ciated the national music of every country. And this widened their own national sympathies. There was no country in the world where the mass of the inhabitants were to the same degree capable of sympathetic understanding of the life of foreign nations, and where they brought towards all foreigners such friendly curiosity, a readiness to understand, to tolerate, to admire, and to welcome their foreign fellow-men. All this healthy growth of moral, intel- lectual, and artistic humanism underlying a friendly feeling towards other nationalities has been checked, weakened in its growth, and finally extirpated, and has been replaced by an over-weening arrogance and pride in their own superiority through the growth of Chauvinism and Militarism, and has at last been fanned into consuming hatred of the foreigner, especi- ally the foreigner whose prosperity or position they envied. We are thus convinced that Germany is the aggres- sor in this war ; but we believe that this war has not been forced on the world by the German nation as a whole, the heirs of the past spirit of Germany, but by that section of the nation which represents militarism and has for the time being effectively gained power over the German mind. The mind of Germany, more- over, has been prepared to receive these baneful influences by the steady growth of Chauvinism since 1 870. From another point of view it means the domi- nance of Prussia and the Prussian spirit over the rest of the empire the prussianising of Germany. CHAPTER III PRUSSIAN MILITARISM AND THE GROWTH OF GERMAN CHAUVINISM SINCE I 870 THE GLORIFICATION .OF WAR. WE all know what is meant by militarism in the Mmtar- narrower acceptation of the term. In its wider ^^_ n acceptation it includes a modification or an exag- vinism. geration in the conception of the State both as regards internal as well as foreign policy. On the one hand, the guardians of national security, the v\atce<; as the ancient Greeks called them, become the rulers, and their own special function, which ought only to be concerned with one side of national life, becomes the all-absorbing end of national existence : all national life is subordinated to the chief object of wars. On the other hand, under the militaristic domination, the State as a whole in its relation to other States naturally assumes an antagonistic char- acter, regarding all other nations as their actual or potential enemies and fostering this inimical and warlike attitude of mind throughout the people. In one word, it leads to Chauvinism. I have on more than one occasion defined Chauvinism, as distinguished from patriotism. 1 Patriotism is the love of one's country and one's people ; Chauvinism is the hatred of other countries and other people. The culmination of this spirit of militarism, pene- trated and saturated by Chauvinism, has found its 1 See Appendix I. 42 THE GROWTH OF GERMAN CHAUVINISM The clear, forcible, and uncompromising expression in the of Mmtar- writings of Treitschke and Bernhardi and many other ism and prominent authors. However much it may be denied, vi^dsmin the fact remains that these historico-philosophic modem views, elevated to a definite theoretical system of life y< and morals, have penetrated into the national life of Grermany and have gained practical vitality. This has been brought about, in the first instance, by the action of the State in matters military and diplo- matic ; by the systematic corruption of the press both at home and abroad ; by the elaborate and costly army of secret agents, spread all over the world in times of peace, in order to undermine the national life and solidarity of possible future enemies ; by the State-subventioned penetration of commerce and trade in all parts of the world directly subservient to the chief military aims. Not only in these mani- festations of military Machiavellism does this nefarious spirit show itself ; but it has been systematically and directly introduced into national pedagogics through the schools, with a well-drilled and subservient army of masters, even in the most elementary phases of education. It has also found its way, through all intermediate branches, to the very pinnacle of German Education in their great universities. There the leaders of thought in the highest regions of science and learning become the responsive tools of tyrannous State-administration ; and prove to the world how scientific and literary education may be entirely divorced from political education, and how these leaders of thought have not yet acquired the political insight and training of many a humble and illiterate citizen or subject of a truly free country governed on constitutional principles. Those who have known the Germany of the past and the Germany of the present realise this complete change in the whole character and moral of its people. They also realise GROWTH OF MATERIAL WEALTH 43 that, compared with the national life of the past, Moral in addition to this dominance of the militaristic and modern. * Chauvinistic spirit, there has been insinuated into Germany, the very heart of civil life a moral degeneracy more marked and more virulent in its form than the diseases of social life manifested in any other civilised state of modern times. That it should have attacked the German people in a form so much more virulent than is the case elsewhere is, perhaps, due to the fact that, since the great victories of the Franco- Prussian War which made Germany a great empire, and the concomitant and unique rapidity of industrial development leading to the influx of great wealth, the German people, previously poor and possessed of all the virtues that go with simple conditions of life on moderate means, have been subject to all the physical and moral diseases of the nouveau riche, the parvenu. Wealth has come to them unprepared to withstand its temptations, and the virus which dis- solves the moral fibre has, in their case, not been gradually and continuously administered by weaker solutions of its potent venom to ensure some immunity. It is a curious phenomenon, that the Germans have charged us with this very disease of moral degeneracy from which they are suffering in so acute a form. We are surely not untainted as regards this modern morbus occidentalis ; and there certainly is danger, in view of the more spasmodic and more localised manifestations of the disease among us, that we may diffuse and cultivate its germ still further, and even that, through this very war and its final results, we may suffer from the contagion of those German dis- eases which have led to this huge moral crime in the world's history. For, even at an early stage of the war, even before it had properly begun, there had been danger signals lest we should be inoculated with militarism, the spirit 44 THE GROWTH OF GERMAN CHAUVINISM Danger of of which will surely grow as the war proceeds. We J5j**have growing among us, and spreading its fibre Miiitar- throughout all classes of the community, the malig- Chau- nd nant disease of Chauvinism from which in the past vinismin we were comparatively freer than other nations ; England. t j loug j 1 we mav ^ope that the symptoms of moral degeneracy so clearly manifest before the war may be checked by the sternness of the national uprising and of our sacrifices, and by the lessons which we may learn from its sinister effects in the corruption of the old healthy German life of the past. I have said that even at the beginning of the war there was fear of contagion from the militaristic spirit of a Treitschke or a Bernhardi. Paradoxical as it may appear, this peril has come, in the first instance, from high-minded and high-spirited prophets who vainly warned us against the Teutonic danger, which so many of us failed to realise, and which we must now admit they wisely foresaw. Nevertheless, in their own anti-militaristic teaching there may be found the insidious and hidden dangers of such contagion. I will but take one leading type of these wise men as manifested in the writings of the late Professor Cramb. Treit- I n impressing upon British people in the most schke^s forcible manner the peril threatening our very national on Pro- existence from the growth of German military power, Samb anc ^ m warnm g us m time to defend our homes and our position in the world as an empire, he has been carried away by his dramatic instinct, and the exer- cise of that rare function of intellectual sympathy and altruistic imagination, to put the case of our enemies in so glowing and favourable a light, that the result upon the impressionable reader may be to engraft on his imagination the spirit and essence of militarism as Treitschke conveyed it to the German people. Perhaps also Professor Cramb himself, evidently TREITSCHKE AND PROFESSOR CRAMB 45 endowed with an ardent imagination, attended the lectures of Treitschke during the impressionable period of his youth, and came under the spell of that powerful personality, until he lost sight of the clay feel of his idol, and, while opposing the doctrines of the master as they affected the national life of the pupil's country, unconsciously became, at least in part, a disciple himself. 1 For my own part I cannot understand that Treitschke should have had any such influence upon anybody, excepting a born Prussian with violent Prussian prejudices. Nor can I understand the high estimate which so learned a scholar and versatile a man of the world as was the late Lord Acton should have formed of Treitschke as an historian. I attended several courses of his lectures during the most impressionable years of my student life when, fresh from my American home, I studied at the University of Heidelberg from 1873 to 1876. The effect which he then had upon the large number of foreign students attending his lectures at that uni- versity, and even upon the mass of South Germans, in fact upon those who were not purely Prussian by birth or in spirit, was distinctly one of antagonism. His enthusiasm, his emphatic diction, and violent 1 This conjecture is strongly confirmed by a passage in Mr. W. H. Dawson's book, What is Wrong with Germany ? perhaps the ablest book produced by this war. On p. 38 and the following pages Mr. Dawson, who attended Treitschke's lectures in 1875, gives a masterly portrait of Treitschke, the lecturer, and shows the influence he had on his audience. He endeavours to distribute light and shade, praise and blame, justly, and ends his strong summary with the following words : " Even at this long distance of time, the instincts of loyalty and gratitude refuse to be overborne, and I confess that I, for one. am still as unredeemed, that were I required to throw stones at Heinrich von Treitschke, I should wish my stones to be pebbles, and when I throw them I should want to run away." This passage does much credit to the sense of delicacy and the loyalty of Mr. Dawson. But such was not the effect produced upon my English and American fellow-students who attended Treitschke's lectures at Heidelberg in 1873- 46 THE GROWTH OF GERMAN CHAUVINISM assertiveness were all expressive of the Prussian spirit in its most unattractive form ; and the ruth- lessness (tactlessness would be too mild a term, as he would have repudiated any claims to such refined social virtues) with which he disregarded and directly offended the national or social sensibilities of many of his hearers showed how he was imbued, not necessarily with the greatness, but certainly with the brutal force, of Bismarckian principles of blood and iron. 1 To summarise the chief impression which his per- sonality made upon us foreigners, I should say that we were all strongly impressed with the fact that he was not what we should call a gentleman. On the other hand, I believe he himself would have accepted this stricture and would have gloried in the fact that he did not approve of such an ideal. Were he still alive he might himself have urged, as recently has been done if the report be true that that term, hitherto adopted in the vocabulary of the German language, should be expunged and replaced by a new German word ein Ganzermann (a wholeman) 1 It also appeared to us, and does so to many highly qualified historical scholars now, that he was not a true historian, according to the old-established higher conception of that type, of which so many represen- tatives have been given to the world by Germany. I mean those who were primarily and ultimately 1 Let me but quote one illustrative instance, though I could show how (with many English, American, and French students among his pupils) he constantly made insulting, and sometimes grossly ignorant, remarks about their national characteristics, their political ideals, and even their social habits. In referring to the Balkan peoples, though he knew that there were several Bulgarian, Servian, and Rumanian students in his class, he roared out in a voice and with gestures indi- cative of a mixture between anger and contempt : " Serben, Bulgaren, und Walachen und wie diese schweinetreibende Volker alle heissen mogen I " ("Serbians, Bulgarians, and Walachians, and whatever else these swine-driving peoples may be called "). TREITSCHKE'S POLITICAL SUBSERVIENCY 47 imbued with the scientific Eros, the almost religious striving for pure and unalloyed truth, the devout and humble servants of the goddess Wissenschaft (Science). At best he could be called a publicist, swayed by the spirit of the journalist (whom he despised), consciously subordinating his search after truth and his study of the past to the fixed demands of a living policy ; full of what the Germans in science and art stigmatise as a grave fault, the dominance of Tendenz, the fixed aim, prejudicial to the appreciation of truth, direct- ing the tendency towards an immediate and personal goal. He was thus one of the many who since 1870 have The de- consciously endeavoured to undermine the highest ^man Germanic spirit of philosophy and thoroughness in idealism science, of purity in ideal strivings the real Kultur, ^fh'the which with its army of scholars and students Germany influence gave to the world. He thus became one who in- mar ck. directly led to the establishment of that Streber- thum, to which I referred above, centred in Berlin, and percolating through all the towns and villages of the provinces, which has been destroying all Ger- man idealism and has put into the hands of the militaristic leaders the tools with which to effect their nefarious purposes. Frequently appealing to the authority of Bismarck in his lectures, I remember his quoting a saying of the great statesman, directly affecting the system of education in the German universities, and this applied to the faculties of juris- prudence, history, and political science : " Ich will keine Kreisrichter haben " ("I do not want trained magistrates " marking the first step in the juridical and administrative career) ; nor did he want pure scientists or scholars, unless they could be made subservient to his political ends ; but he did want diplomatic and skilful politicians who could be directly used for State purposes. How different this 5 48 THE GROWTH OF GERMAN CHAUVINISM spirit is from that in which the high ideals of science, scholarship, and philosophy reigned supreme in the universities, where the pure, supreme, and ultimate goal of university life was untainted by ulterior and lower motives a spirit which we in England and in America, and even in France, admired and respected, and which for some years past we have been en- deavouring to infuse into our own academic life. Germany, on the other hand, has been and is doing her best to quench its fire and to exalt the lower mentality arising out of the natural conditions of English and American enterprise, the dominance of which the best minds in both these nations are endeavouring to counteract, in part by the inspira- tion which came from the older Germany. Bismarck This spirit of disintegration which has steadily thepo- undermined the good which Germany possessed litical before 1870 though, of course, great bodies and the education b ' ' & . . of the very nature 01 the Good are slow in dying, this disin- te g rat i n > working more rapidly and effectively in recent years, began about the year 1871 and was not due only to the new school of militaristic leaders and of servile professors grouping round the Kaiser with his Real and Interessen-politik and his com- mercial materialism. It was really initiated by Bis- marck himself, in his attempt to supplement his successful foreign policy by (what the future will recognise as the great failure in the life-work of that statesman) his home policy. What was needed to crown his great achievement in founding the German Empire after 1870 was the development of a great nation within, the political education of the people and the consolidation of the truly national German Kultur in its highest form as it already existed. In these lofty and most important aims the Great Chancellor failed. And he failed, not only because he gave an inadequate constitution to BISMARCK'S RESPONSIBILITY 49 the German Empire, and because he did not estab- lish a clear and efficient system of political education for the German nation ; but also because, in his personal conduct as the leading statesman, in the example which his own character and his every act could give to the people, directly affected by the one great personality who had their reverence and grati- tude and whose every word and act became to the whole nation a lesson to learn and an example to follow, because he repressed rather than developed their sense of political freedom and responsibility, the rights as well as the duties of a citizen in a modern constitutional State. The tone of his speeches before the Reichstag in which he would even venture to refer to his own health or the state of his nerves for the consideration of those who opposed his definite political proposals was always that of the Prussian non-commissioned officer, wounding to the self-respect of the elected representatives of the people and ultimately crushing in them their inde- pendence and their training in the thoughts, customs, and habits of parliamentary government. Naturally the people as a whole were a fortiori repressed in their political aspirations and deprived of the political education which they so sorely needed. Only one section of the community withstood him ; and they, who would have formed the constitutional pro- gressive section, were forced into the more violent forms of socialistic agitation, claiming for all practical purposes to be inimical to the State and to society as well, outside the state in fact, if not outside of society as it exists. Still more did he contribute to the destruction of the ideals of pure and high thought as established in the academic life of Germany. The foundation-stone of this huge national structure, the very core and centre of the national life of the whole country, was 50 THE GROWTH OF GERMAN CHAUVINISM Academic Liberty, the German Lehr- and Lern- freiheit (freedom to teach and to learn). Though the universities were State institutions, nominally under the Ministry of Education, they were practically self- governing in their own administration, and the election of the professors was practically in the hands of the body of academic teachers themselves. This tradition was rudely broken by Bismarck's action, when he forced his own personal physician, Schweninger, into academic honours. The professors, the independent men of science of old, had to obey and to submit to military discipline. Bismarck But still more destructive, though more insidious, Hshed the t nan this direct crushing of the spirit of academic worship independence was the manner in which science was manen- made subservient to the will of the State, the research an< ^ t ^ ie thorough spirit of scientific investigation, the it mo- purity and single-heartedness of all the striving after noio Sal" truth in its highest and unadulterated form, which Chau- guided (and to a great extent still guides) the life- 5m - work of the German savant. These were curbed to the pragmatical service of a definite line of policy which the great Chancellor knew how to impress upon the whole nation and to make the dominant idea of all life and thought. During my student days this dominant thought was expressed by the term Germanenthum. Not only political science and history were defiled and tainted into conformity with the demands of Bismarck's political views ; but the studies most remote from practical politics were made to fall into line with the advance of the Teuton army. Chauvin- ism, which in some form or other may always have existed among the nations and the communities of the world who looked upon their neighbours as rivals or enemies, now took a more thoroughly scientific and philosophic form, and widened its basis on a POLITICAL PERVERSION OF LEARNING 51 broad ethnological and scientific foundation in the spirit of Teuton pedantry. National Chauvinism claimed an ethnological foundation. It was no longer the German State, with its history throughout the Middle Ages, a fusion of so many races constantly changing their territories and dwellings as they rushed to and fro over Central Europe, which claimed the allegiance and love and patriotism of the German people. Nor was it on the ground of the numerous separate States and principalities and their variegated, almost kaleidoscopic, history during the last centuries, which were at last, by the supreme and heroic effort of Bismarck, his predecessors and his followers, welded into the unity of a German Empire, welded together by their very diversity out of which grew the fructifying spirit of their potent and character- istic Kultur, made one by the very sufferings and sacrifices through which they had passed during centuries of cruel wars. In all this common life of suffering, achievement, and heroism was not to be found the moral justification for the foundation of a German Empire ; but in a racial unity that could be measured in terms of the dominant natural sciences of the day, and of the youngest, least developed of them all, the conclusions of which we must doubt, namely, the study of ethnology. The distinctive solidarity of the Teutonic race had to be established. On this unity of race was to rest, not only the claim for the unity of the German Empire, but also its separate and antagonistic interests in regard to the other nations, its rivals and potential foes. From 1870 and onwards it is of melancholy interest to note how the German professors, the free upholders of truth and pure science, bent their every effort to establish and to prove the claims of this Germanen- thum. It was not only opposed to the Latin world, to France and to Italy (which had not yet become a 52 THE GROWTH OF GERMAN CHAUVINISM part of the Triple Alliance), not only to the Slavs ; but, in so far as Great Britain was not purely Saxon, to Great Britain as well. While on the one side Germanenthum could thus be identified with a nation opposed to the Italian Papacy, on the other side it proved most expedient for the time to use it as a lever, perhaps even a bait, to be thrown to the socialists and to lead them to concentrate their antagonism in a single groove and so to liberate the main current of policy against the Jews. Ger- manenthum, as the supreme expression of the Teuton world thus stood in direct opposition to the Jews, the Semites. The anti-Semitic party was then organised. It mattered not that a great part of Prussia, and of other German states as well, could be shown to be of Slav origin ; that the names of many of its greatest men should end in " ow " and other Slav endings ; l that some of its leaders of life and thought, and even its soldiers, were of recent French origin ; that among the foremost men in every department of life, from whom emanated the actual German Kultur, were of Jewish origin ! The modern world had to be split up into its prehistoric ethnical con- stituents by a most inaccurate and misleading scientific induction, so that the modern German State should not only be confirmed in its imperial unity, but should foster in its people an antagonism which should be based on physical, anatomical, and physiological foundations, and bring them nearer to the animal world, where the difference of species implies animosity. The response and echo to this wave of ethnological Chauvinism was soon to be heard throughout the whole of Europe ; it aroused in France and in Italy the same spirit of pedantic intolerance, and gave 1 Treitschke is a Slav name. ETHNOLOGICAL CHAUVINISM 53 life to the Pan-Slav movement in Russia. Even in Great Britain there were isolated and less powerful attempts at a revival of the Anglo-Saxon spirit, which in Freeman and others took the less violent and more poetic form of the antiquary's and his- torian's love for his own country. But in Germany, during the whole of the period preceding our own, though it bore some beneficent fruit in the growing study of early Germanic literature and language, history, philology, and ethnology were biased and vitiated by the more or less conscious desire to provide a scientific basis for the unity and dominance of the Germanic spirit. Perhaps in the future, when the history of the study of Ethnology is written, this period in German research will be characterised as the " Indo-Germanic wave." The last and most characteristic though certainly caricatured sum- mary of all these efforts the swan-song of German- enthum has been produced by a writer of English birth, Houston Chamberlain, in his Die Grundlagen des XIX Jahrhunderts. 1 According to him even Christ during His sojourn on earth was not a Semite, but embodied the Germanic spirit. It is interesting and suggestive to note (and I can personally vouch for the accuracy of the statement) that this book was considered by the Kaiser the most important work of modern times, and that it no doubt has furnished him with the historical and scientific ground upon which his political aspirations are based. Thus the foundations for this great structure of 1 An English translation of this book has since appeared with an introduction by Lord Redesdale. A more amateurish and unbalanced piece of historical generalisation cannot be found in the whole of historical literature. Lord Redesdale' s introduction, besides bestow- ing most fulsome praise upon the author, summarises and compresses these over-generalisations and thus exaggerates all the faults of this work. 54 THE GROWTH OF GERMAN CHAUVINISM Chauvinism, in a generally theoretical and specially ethnological form, were laid since 1871 by the policy of Bismarck, and on these has been erected the vast and complicated structure of active militarism pervading all forms of national life. It has left its stamp upon the whole spirit of scientific research. It has consciously directed the efforts and the con- duct of the whole bureaucracy, not only in the Foreign Office, but in the home departments as well. It has penetrated and directly modified the varied and huge machinery of their growing commerce and industry ; it has even saturated the very soil of the land and furthered the interests, the financial pros- perity, and the social vitality of the classes who live by agriculture. There is not a single aspect of German life which has not been shaped or essentially modified during the last forty years by this dominant Chauvinistic impulse, steadied and made permanent by calculated pedantic forethought. The Rep- The climax, however, was reached when the policy, fond!' out f which it grew and on which it fed, was directly used by the State, and found ready to hand the most demoralising and depraved machinery, another one of the great inheritances of Bismarck's successful statecraft, arising directly out of the victories of 1871. This has, perhaps more than any other factor, directly tended to vitiate to the very core the national life of the German people, and has even contaminated to some extent the workings of the Foreign Offices of every one of the Western Powers. This inheritance is the so-called Reptilien- fond, the money set apart out of the milliards taken from France for secret service in every form. It has been used not only in the famous, or rather infamous, Press-bureau of the Wilhelmstrasse, which directly gained control of the German press by bribery and corruption or " subvention " ; and, as THE REPTILIENFOND 55 we also know now, of the foreign press in every nook and corner of the globe as well. Not only was and is it used for every form of spying at home ; but it has established a band of secret agents, spreading over the whole civilised, and even the uncivilised, world, to further the ends of the Berlin Foreign Office by seducing into treason the citizen subjects of other countries, friendly allies, and actual or potential antagonists. And, as the World-policy, the Realpolitik, grew, so did this nefarious activity extend beyond the great powers and rivals them- selves, to the colonies and dependencies and neigh- bouring peoples or lands which in the future might turn to be troublesome enemies to any one of the Germanic Powers. We have presented to our horrified moral conscience the picture of a huge web of lying and intrigue, sedition and treachery, at which even a Macchiavelli might have shuddered with horror. And all these evil spirits are now invoked under the banner and in the name of Kultur \ Even in Bis- marck's lifetime the central direction of these forces which were to establish German Kultur must have been most complicated and puzzling ; for every country, even that of the allies, required curbing and perverting into the course of German Chauvinism. Treaties had to be ensured by counter-treaties, as in the famous case of the Russian and Austrian agree- ments. But since then, with the full consolidation and the conscious formulation of Weltpolitik and Realpolitik, the ends as well as the means of German policy have become so varied and confusingly uni- versal, that not a single country or a single people or any of their dependencies remained which they were not forced to consider as potential enemies, and for which their Reptilienfonds could not furnish the means of demoralising activity. From this horrible and grotesque point of view of modern 56 THE GROWTH OF GERMAN CHAUVINISM politics, what country could Germany fail to con- sider its actual or potential enemy, including even its own allies ? Contemporary history has shown, and will still more show in the immediate future, that Italy could not be looked upon as a friend. 1 I myself had it impressed upon me by the very highest authority in German affairs some years ago in reference to a peaceful scientific propaganda, that " Italy cannot be trusted." There remains Austria. But the Dual Monarchy, with its motto Divide et impera, is made up of so many separate races and interests and parties representing them, that a most exacting sphere of enterprise and activity was constantly and continuously furnished to the directors of the Reptilienfond, to further the Teuton claims, to repress both the Magyar and the Slav elements, so that ultimately, through the dominance of Teuton Austria on the road to the East, straight through the Balkans to Salonica, and by rail along the Bagdad Railway, when the Austrian and the Turkish Empires should become a thing of the past, the German Weltreich should push its way towards the East, and swiftly enter its course of encircling the world. Imagine what definite corruption, what huge sums of money it spent successfully to supersede the British and Russian preponderance at Constanti- nople in the time of Abdul Hamid, and then to overcome the effects of the crushing blow to German policy when that tyrant's rule made way for a violent and liberal movement on the part of the Young Turks, whose initial antagonism to Teutonism must have been aggravated by Austrian annexations, lead- ing to a boycott of everything Austrian until finally again Teuton influence at Constantinople became so powerful that it could force the Turks into an alliance and into a disastrous war ! Even their 1 This was written before Italy joined the Entente Powers. IMMORALITY OF FOREIGN POLICY 57 allies thus became their enemies in time of false and perfidious peace, and their action was directly destruc- tive of national loyalty, of truth and honesty within the realms of the friendly country. And as for all the other States, their avowed rivals or enemies, actual documents have revealed the monstrous universal diffusion, their poisonous activity through- out the whole world, civilised and uncivilised, even to the remotest regions of the East and West, the North and South. Think for a moment of the continuous and persistent moral degeneracy which such chauvinistic and militaristic policy implies, and how it directly contravenes the moral principles and the moral consciousness upon which modern civilised life rests. Let me pause here and show how dangerous may The glori- be the exaggeration of that literary and historical ficationof virtue of intellectual sympathy embodied in the fervent appeal of the late Professor Cramb. 1 For he exalts the spirit of war on grounds which approach dangerously near to national Chauvinism, such as 1 The Germans themselves have a strong rendering of our adage " Man is the creature of habit," which exists in nearly every language, Der Mensch ist ein Gewohnheitsthier. It is sad to realise how, even since the above was written, the war with its constant repercussion of impressions of horror evoked by the loss of human life, by treachery and infamy of every kind, has affected the mentality of the civilised world, has blunted feelings, coarsening and hardening the sense of morality and chivalry. When we recall how in times of peace the horror which struck millions of hearts in every country at the loss of the Titanic ; how a mining disaster, in which less than a hundred miners were suffocated in one pit thrilled with sympathy and pity the inhabitants in distant countries ; how the death of Captain Scott and his heroic fellow- explorers was felt like a personal loss by people in every hemisphere, and when we then compare with these experiences the mentality of all civilised people to-day, we realise how this habituation may lead mankind at last to regard with indifference the loss of human life. A few more sinkings of Litsitanias may find us unmoved by such disasters. Nay, worse than this, even people of most refined moral sensitiveness may not be able to repress a thrill of joy when they hear 58 THE GROWTH OF GERMAN CHAUVINISM has dragged Germany from its moral and intellectual heights of the past down to the very depths of the diabolical perfidy of the present. We may admit that every great act of self-sacrifice, individual and collective, must, from some one aspect, produce something good and something admirable, especially when raised through its very mass into heroic dimen- sions. The uprising of millions of people willing to risk their lives for any cause has in itself something inspiring, and points to an ennobling element in human nature. Great masses of treasure and blood cannot be expended without producing some possible good. Institutions and charities that dispose of, and spend, great sums must do some good ; but the question before us is always : "Is there any due proportion between the expenditure and the results ; and what are the evils that arise in the wake of the good which we may admit has been effected ? " There is hardly a single institution, or charity, or business, which disposes of large sums from which some benefit is not derived by somebody. But it may be found that the proportion of such good is ridiculously small ; that the evils which it creates or perpetuates are disproportionately large, and that the employment of such treasures by a more rational or more moral institution or organisation is made impossible because of the existence of what is inferior or almost wholly bad. We are bound, then, to call such institutions, charities, or businesses bad, and must reform or destroy them root and branch, of the death of a mass of innocent enemy munition-workers, even though the disaster may have been caused by treachery in their midst. The greatest curse of war, perhaps, is its lowering of the moral consciousness, not only of the peoples at war, but of the whole neutral world as well. The whole moral fabric, built by the efforts of ages of good men, is apparently razed to the ground. How long will it take to rebuild it ? THE IGNOBLE ASPECT OF WAR 59 and erect in their stead institutions expressing the rational and moral convictions of our own days and conditions of life. Where is to be found in modern warfare the nobility in outlook or in practice ? See what it en- genders before the actual war breaks out, in the preparation for hostilities, not only in the concentra- tion and the hypertrophy of the armament industry and traffic, the evils of which in our economic and social life have been so amply and convincingly shown by many able writers ; but by the activity of home and foreign policy subservient to militaristic ideals, as I have sketched them in the case of Ger- many. Consider the degradation of all the funda- mental virtues upon which the moral conscience of civilised people rests, the sense of truth and honesty and loyalty for all those concerned, for all who con- sciously lead, and for all the mass of the people who semi-consciously or unconsciously follow 1 Is there anything heroic to be found in such duplicity cluster- ing round the poisonous plant of financial interests, of gold and silver, of money in its vilest form and uses ? As to war in itself, though there be numerous instances of individual and collective heroism, even of chivalry, consider what this war of ingenious and stupendously effective machinery for destroying life, of broken pledges, of deception and trickery, means ! Are not the heroic valour and self-sacrifice entirely submerged in the cruelty and deceit of modern war- fare, so that the total result is complete dissolution of all moral fibre ? We need not invoke the contra- ventions of the plighted word given at The Hague by Germany when unfortified towns are bombarded, asphyxiating gases used, and Lusitanias sunk. It is enough to realise what emotions and passions are stirred up in battle in the breasts of people who were presumably normally moral human beings in 60 THE GROWTH OF GERMAN CHAUVINISM time of peace. I cannot do better than to give a passage from J* Accuse by a German writer to bring home to the imagination of readers the real influence of actual warfare. He says (pp. 300-2) : " A very interesting contribution to the solution of the question, whether war develops the noblest virtues of man [Field -Marshal Moltke] or whether it does not on the contrary produce more bad men than it removes [Kant], is furnished by the account of a battle published in the Tageblatt of Jauer on October 18, 1914. The author of this account is the non-commissioned officer Klemt of the ist Company, i54th Regiment, and his statements are vouched for and subscribed to by the Company- Commander Lieut, von Niem. The heading of this letter in the newspaper is : ' A Day of Honour for our Regiment, September 24, 1914.' The account deserves as a human, or rather a bestial, docu- ment to be printed in extenso ; but I regret that space will only permit me to give extracts : " ' Already we are discovering the first Frenchmen. They are shot down from the trees like squirrels, and are warmly welcomed below with the butt-end of rifles and bayonets ; they no longer need a doctor ; we are no longer fighting against honest foes ; but tricky robbers. With a jump we are over the clear- ing here ! there ! in the hedges they are crouching ; now, on to them ! No quarter is given. Standing free, at most kneeling, we shoot away, nobody troubles about cover. We come to a hollow : in masses dead and wounded red-breeches lie about ; the wounded are clubbed or stabbed to death ; for we already know that these rascals will fire at us from behind. There lies a Frenchman stretched out at full length, his face to the ground ; but he is only shamming death. A kick from a lusty Musketier teaches him that we are there. He turns and begs for his life ; but already he is nailed to the earth THE HUN 61 with the words : " Do you see, you B . . ., this is how our bodkins prick." Beside me an uncanny cracking sound comes from the blows of the butt-end of a rifle which one of our 154*5 rains on a French bald-head. Prudently he uses a French rifle for the purpose, not to smash his own. Some of us, especi- ally tender-hearted, finish the wounded Frenchmen off with a charitable bullet, others strike and stab as much as they know. Bravely our enemies fought, they were crack regiments we had before us. They allowed us to come on from 30 to 10 metres, then it certainly was too late. ... At the entrance of the watch-huts they lie, lightly and seriously wounded, vainly begging for quarter, but our good Musketiers save the fatherland the expensive maintenance of so many enemies.' " The account concludes with the picture of the tired troops lying down to sleep after the " blood work " : the god of dreams paints for some of them a lovely picture. " A prayer of thanks on our lips, we slept on towards the coming day." I must add the further comments of the author of J' Accuse : " The most horrible features of this account are not only the incidents narrated, but almost more than these the brutal naivete with which they are represented as feats of heroism, especially acknow- ledged by superior officers and published in the most prominent part of the official newspaper of the dis- trict. It is possible that brutalities were committed by the other side as well. When the beast in man is set free it is not astonishing that bestialities should be committed. But I have sought in vain in the foreign press for the publication of such ' heroic deeds.' That, after such murderous work, one can sit down in cold blood and report such low horrors to one's fellow-citizens at home, one's friends, to one's own wife and children, makes the whole affair infinitely sadder than in itself it already is. Of 62 THE GROWTH OF GERMAN CHAUVINISM course the ' prayer of thanks ' to God could not be omitted from the German battle-report. His Royal Highness Prince Oscar of Prussia had to be cited by Sergeant Klemt as admirer of the ' heroic action ' : ' With these Grenadiers and 1 54*8 one can storm hell itself,' the Prince exclaimed, and assured the two regiments that they were worthy of the name 1 The King's Own Brigade.' The Jauer Report unites as is the case in veterinary handbooks where a horse is drawn showing all possible diseases all the ' noblest virtues ' which war can produce and must produce : bestiality, bragging, false piety, etc. Whether ' the world would degenerate and would be lost in Materialism ' if these qualities remained undeveloped, I leave to the decision of the wise." Did not the men who risked their lives when aviation started, so as to develop such an invention for the use and advancement of the world at large, did they not show courage indomitable the aes triplex and more than triplex of which the soldier marching to attack shows no loftier or more self- sacrificing form ? Nor doctors and nurses in the sick-room ; the researchers who on their own person make dangerous experiments for the benefit of man- kind ; every policeman on his beat ; every one who day by day curbs his instincts of selfishness and greed out of due regard to the claims of his fellow- men do these not give ample opportunities for the development of altruistic enthusiasm ? When we look forward to the day when, consciously brought up to a higher level by a universal education based upon the ideals of modern times, not only will the rich willingly give their larger quota of taxes to further the needs of the State and of an advancing society, but even the poorer and the poorest will directly pay their contributions to the State so that others should be saved from hunger and thirst. Then will the sick, the halt, the needy be comforted, SELF-SACRIFICE IN PEACE 63 the aged live out their lives without anxiety for the morrow, the honest unemployed no longer wander aimlessly along the roads. All great causes of com- mon humanity may then be fostered by the immediate sacrifice of the individual. Consider also the effects of war (whether it end in victory or defeat) upon those who have engaged in it, upon all those who in reality or in imagination have passed through this hell of internecine bloodshed ; when " Thou shalt not kill " as a fundamental tenet for all civilised life has lost all constraining meaning through the con- stant repercussion of the slaughter of thousands, fathers of children, sons of parent?, and husbands of wives ; when to deceive and to spy and to try every trick that may mislead and bring one nearer to a destructive goal becomes a virtue ! Where is the heroism ? It is noble to be a patriot, nobler than to limit one's affections to one's county or one's village ; it is even nobler to show active affection for one's village than to concentrate it only upon one's family. A good son, a devoted father, a con- siderate brother, is surely nobler than the pure egoist who is only absorbed in his own life and desires. But the man who encourages himself to hate and to slay his fellow-man, not because he is vile or because he endangers his own existence, but because he lives in another country and talks a different language ; whose feelings for humanity, whose ideals for the human race, whose striving after divine perfection throughout the world are not only limited to his own country and the people living in it, but who develops active and violent antagonism towards all people and all things beyond this narrow range, such a man cannot be called a patriot ! Patriotism then turns to Chauvinism ; it no longer is the love of one's own country and one's own people, but the hatred of others. There is nothing ideal in 6 64 THE GROWTH OF GERMAN CHAUVINISM war, certainly not in modern warfare ; and, though every one of us must feel that it is our duty and our privilege to fight for our country and to offer up our lives when our national existence is in danger, we should do it because it is our duty, as a means to safeguard what is best and most holy in our national existence, but we are never to turn this means into the end of civilised existence. We should go to the operating-table with composure and fortitude when it may dispel disease, prolong our life so that we can continue to support those who depend upon us ; but we cannot consider the torturing and maiming of our bodies as a supreme end of our physical existence. The patriot must never allow himself to be carried away by the hysterical enthusiasm of the panegyrists of war ; he must not admit Bellona into the cycle of his divinities ! Every patriot must beware lest he become a Chauvinist who learns to hate the stranger so intensely and effective^ as to lose all power of loving, and that the absorbing in- tensity of his hatred will lead him at last to loathe his neighbour and grow cold towards his wife and children. For this is the end of the doctrine of hate. Now this militaristic Chauvinism has found the most fertile field for its growth on German soil. No other country and no other people, certainly not E n gl an d an d the English, could show conditions so Germany, favourable. Perhaps until the " German scare " began some years ago, no people were freer from this antagonistic attitude towards those of other nation- alities than were the English. They were hospitable in spirit, and hospitality became a national charac- teristic in every layer of society. Definite human envy and jealousy may unavoidably have arisen and shown themselves, especially where certain trades or larger groupings of occupations may have suffered by the sudden intrusion of more or less alien bodies in Militar- vinism ENGLISH FREEDOM FROM CHAUVINISM 65 definite localities, whether they were " foreign," whether they came from abroad or from Scotland into England, or from the neighbouring town or county. But Englishmen were ever ready to receive, and even to acknowledge the qualities, in some cases even the superiority in definite lines and character- istics, of those who came among them from foreign parts. Perhaps it may have been due to an under- lying consciousness of our own merits, if not of our own ultimate superiority, which made us indifferent to those incitements of envy and jealousy. If so, such self-confidence, even if at times unfounded in fact, is not a grave national vice. But the truth re- mains that we were thus and let us hope will con- tinue so in the future the least Chauvinistic of modern civilised peoples. Of all peoples manifesting this disease to a greater or lesser degree, the Germans were certainly foremost. The main reasons for its growth on German soil Further are to be found in two national characteristics ; the f^ the* one is the prevalence and intensity of envy as a growth of national characteristic; the other is the absence, v inismin from the national education in all its aspects, of the German sense of Fair Play, which might have been the one STthe element exercising a salutary counteracting influence ndi ~ f to the spirit of envy. The Germans have their idea recent life of honour, they even have their courts of honour, and the duel, especially in military circles ; but these are not effective in modern life to counteract envy and to foster generosity. On the contrary, within such social groups, ruled by such courts of honour and appealing to the duel as the arbiter, they de- veloped truculence, which is most directly opposed to the spirit of Fair Play. Militarism, in its effect upon the nation, counteracted the establishment and the rule of Fair Play, until at Zabern and after, the official Seal of State was stamped upon the prevailing power 66 THE GROWTH OF GERMAN CHAUVINISM of the bully. One of the curses of militarism is, that, while it, to a certain extent, democratises the people collected together in military service to the State, by the establishment of fixed ranks and gradations, the higher grades having unquestioned authority over the lower, it naturally leads to bullying and weakens the sense of social fairness and justice among the whole population. Envy. If we were to attempt to single out, among the numerous causes which have led to this war, one primary and underlying factor in the national charac- ter of the Germans, which, more than any other, has led to this catastrophe, it undoubtedly is Envy. It has almost become a platitude to say that people are most prone to ascribe to others the faults which they have themselves ; and we need not therefore be astonished to hear it frequently stated of late that England's antagonism towards Germany, and which led to the war, was her jealousy, and conse- quent fear of German rivalry in commerce and in political power. It is quite possible that among in- dividuals and among certain groups of people competition and rivalry may lead to jealousy, and that, as human nature goes, English trades and occupations which have suffered from German com- petition may thus have produced jealousy in those suffering from this very competition. These cases, natural though they be, are limited and isolated, and certainly have not sufficed to produce a national characteristic or a movement which in any way would have driven the country into war. I venture to repeat that there is hardly a nation among the civilised peoples as ready, on the whole, to welcome the foreigner, admit his qualities, and, by the exer- cise of the supreme national virtue of fair play, to counteract all the impulses of national jealousy. Let us only hope and pray that the results of this GERMAN ENVY 67 great war, the over-stimulation of the sense of antagonism and of hatred towards others, the sus- picion of the foreigner in moments of great national danger, may not counteract this comparative freedom from that most dangerous and lowest of national vices, and may not end in encouraging the growth of national Chauvinism among us. The symptoms of such a danger are rife at this moment when the nerves of the people are shaken into abnormal irritability by the constant pressure of suffering and anxiety. But with the Germans the national vice of envy has been greatly stimulated by the recognition of the fact that, in spite of their rapid and stupendous advance in every direction within the short period since their victory over the French, they have not as yet acquired a colonial empire such as Great Britain possesses ; that, owing to what might be considered the accident of historical fate, Germany came too late, after the colonial possessions throughout the world had already been divided among all the other peoples. This one fact, though it may naturally lead to regret and sorrow in the heart of the patriotic German who loves his country and believes in its great mission in the world, and though it may move us to understand and sympathise, does not justify the envy and hatred towards Great Britain, nor their criminal action which has plunged the whole world into misery. Though we can understand the conditions which might create envy or encourage it in the hearts of the Germans, we recognise that they have fallen upon the fertile soil of a national vice which the Germans, as Germans, possess to the highest degree. As such it does not only turn collectively outwards towards other nations, but it undermines and disturbs the whole inner social life of the nation. This fact is recognised by their own thinkers and statesmen and appears to have 68 THE GROWTH OF GERMAN CHAUVINISM been their ruling vice in the early days of their racial ancestors, when, as is noted by Prince Biilow, 1 Tacitus tells us that " the Germans destroyed their liberators, the Cherusci, propter invidiam." The Imperial Chancellor, who knew his people well, says of them : * " Just as one of the greatest German virtues, the sense of discipline, finds special and dis- quieting expression in the social democratic move- ment, so does our old vice, envy." I remember that one of the wisest of the German diplomats, for some time German Ambassador in London, singled out this vice as being the national fault of his country- men. Envy necessarily produces hatred. The Hebrew composite word Kinah-Sinah combines envy with hate in one word and points to this causal pro- cess in the psychology of man. For it means envy- hatred, the hatred which follows upon envy. And when this passion penetrates into the national system of Chauvinism, intensifies its violence, and directs its animosity, we can well understand the otherwise singular phenomenon of the rapidity with which the all-absorbing antagonism and hatred of Russia at the beginning of the war, then held up as the one supreme cause and justification of the national up- rising, should within a short time have disappeared from the public press and the consciousness of the German people, and have been entirely supplanted by the hatred of England, which finds its supreme expression in the Hymn of Hate. This " Hymn " has since been officially established as the national War Hymn by a German prince and military leader. This is, by the way, a very striking instance of the ready servility of the press and the effectiveness with which the Press Bureau can manipulate the public 1 Bismarck referred to the same passage in Tacitus and also con- sidered envy a national characteristic. Imperial Germany, p. 184. ENVY OF ENGLAND 69 opinion of a whole nation. In a few months, or even weeks, the Russian " bogy " and the old French animosity were completely dropped, and, at the word of command, were at once superseded by an- other " battle-cry " throughout the whole nation, culminating in the most passionate and violent hatred that even the history of barbaric periods can recall. But though, for the time being, the an- tagonism to the Slav may have superseded the in- grained historical animosity to the French, from whom they suffered so much in Napoleonic days, both these national antagonisms but thinly covered the hatred towards their " racial " kinsmen and former allies, because this hatred was based upon, and intensified by, the envy so ingrained in their natures. No doubt some disappointment and the frustra- tion of monstrously stupid plans may have had something to do with the momentary intensification of their hatred of England. They may have been sufficiently blind or unwise to assume that, in spite of the gross breach of Belgian neutrality, and in spite of the recognised fact that some agreement existed between England and France, we would stand aside without lifting a finger and see Belgium crushed, her liberties trampled upon, and France crushed as well. I do not think that England has ever been more grossly insulted than by the assumption quite apart from the Belgian crime that she would follow only her instincts for peace, national security, and pro- sperity, and would not stand by her moral agreement with France to shield her in any case of unjustifiable aggression. Whatever the exact legal definition of this entente cordiale may have been, an entente cor- diale did exist ; and if England had stood aside, she would have merited the ridiculously unjust epithet of Perfide Albion, and the world would justly have 70 THE GROWTH OF GERMAN CHAUVINISM stigmatised us as a " nation of shopkeepers." What- ever disappointment (and such disappointment could only be felt by those wilfully blinded by the expecta- tion of utter subservience of everybody and every- thing to their own interests) may have been felt by the Germans, and thus intensified their passion against Great Britain, the real cause is to be found in their national vice of envy. Class- As the spirit of Chauvinism develops the passion andenv ^ natre cl in the people collectively towards other in Ger- nations, and as we realise at the present moment iny ' how this is concentrated upon ourselves, this passion manifests itself also as a dominant factor in their whole internal life. If we take their characteristic modern poetry as an expression of popular senti- ment, we can find many an instance of a most flagrant kind in which hatred inspires the lyric imagination of their poets. We search in vain in the contemporary literature of other nations and in our own for such expressions. To find them at all in ours we must look to the depiction, by an appeal, of historical sympathy, of other ages and other con- ditions of life, in which hatred as a passion is forcibly conveyed in dramatic lyrics, such as those of the poems of Robert Browning. We can thus recall how that poet imagines himself a tyrant who finds one independent spirit blocking his way and whom he cannot subdue. 1 Or again, Browning, where in his ' In a Spanish Cloister " he shows us the narrowing life with its compressed passion of jealousy when monks are herded together and personal antipathy fans the fire of hatred in the breast of one of them for another. But we have nothing in modern litera- ture like the notorious Hymn of Hate evoked by this war, and nothing in daily life like that powerful poem of Liliencron's, the exponent of the spirit of 1 The poem is called " Instans Tyrannus." ILLUSTRATIONS IN MODERN POETRY 71 modern Germany, which expresses as a dream the most intense personal hatred. It is called " Unsur- mountable Antipathy," and describes the almost animal hatred felt by two people, causing them to spring at each other's throats like wild beasts. But this hatred springing from envy and it is to this that Prince Biilow refers in the passage quoted is especially marked in Germany by the envy of one class towards another, leading to burning hatred between them. It is only natural that those who are poor and ill-favoured should covet the blessings of those upon whom fortune has copiously showered her gifts. This is but human, and has existed in all times, and it exists with us as well. The recognition of such inequalities in the possession of the good things of this world may make socialists or even anarchists of us. However, fortunately for us, we cannot say that resentment and envy of the better fortune of our neighbours have led to manifest antagonism between classes in the daily life of our people. It may be because with us the rich have been more manifestly conscious of the duties which their better fortune imposes upon them, and the poor are fairer-minded and more generous of heart. It may also be due to our free political institutions, which through countless ages have given to every man his chance before the law and his opportunity of expressing his will and pursuing his interests by constitutional means in the government of the country. No doubt also our national sports and pastimes have effectively brought us all together in common games which rest upon the spirit of fair play as the foundation of all British athletics. I can recall that even during the heat of Nationalist agitation and resentment about 1886, when the peasant classes in Ireland were filled with the strongest hatred of the landlords and the wealthier classes, that, 72 THE GROWTH OF GERMAN CHAUVINISM while riding to or from hounds, the sportsmanlike spirit was nevertheless too strong in the peasants one met, and evoked a smile or a twinkle in the eye of the brother sportsman, to be found in the poorest labourer, and venting itself in a cheery greeting and the question : " Had you good sport, and did you catch him ? " Whatever the cause, the fact remains, that the actual life of the British people in town and country has not to any marked degree been vitiated by the spirit of class antagonism and of social envy. On the other hand, I can also recall how, while riding through woods in Prussia with my German hostess, I was struck by the resentment and scowl in the eyes of the labouring people and the peasantry we met, which seemed to express clearly the hatred they felt towards all who were possessed of more wealth ; until, passing through a village, we were met by a shower of stones from the boys who looked upon us as representatives of the favoured classes. Envy Jealousy is unfortunately a rudimentary passion mgTeven" * n man ' s breast and may exist wherever there are into the human beings congregated together. But in Germany Science! the Brodneid, the jealousy of trade and professional envy, for which they have invented so definite a term, is most rampant. It permeates all classes, in themselves regulated by bureaucratic gradations of rank, and sets one class against the other. Even in the highest and most enlightened spheres, where we might least expect it, owing to the atmosphere per- vading regions of lofty thought, occupation, and habits of mind, such as in the scientific world, this spirit has of late years encroached. It has disfigured the pure and noble type of the German scholar and scientist who, though fortunately still surviving in some splendid instances of a simple life, is gradually t receding and making room for the new type of the militaristic Streber in science and in learning. The THE GROWTH OF MONEY-GREED 73 temptations of profit are too strong in a world con- sciously ruled by commercialism, in which from Kaiser and Reichs-Chancellor onwards Real-Politik and Inter essen-Politik are preached to dispel the sup- posed prevalence of idealism or dreamy Utopianism which have long since departed from among the German people. These temptations and the possi- bilities of power coming from wealth have completely altered the spirit of the old German savant, the Teufelsdrockh of Carlyle, whom we read about and admired in our youth. And thus in the laboratories and in the " seminars," where the free interchange of ideas and of work, when the spirit of unity in one supreme endeavour, bound the commilitones of former days into one serried rank of a scientific army advanc- ing boldly towards the summit of truth these have all given way to a petty and envious spirit of seclusion and of distrust among the workers, jealously guard- ing each new fact that might lead to important material results, until the rivalry and struggle for priority becomes the dominant passion of the workers, the modern successors to the noble and generous- spirited men of old. We saw it coming after 1870, when, for some years, there were signs of discontent with the old order of things, leading to the prevalent pessimism of that period. I endeavoured to define it in 1878 in an article on "The Social Origin of Nihilism and Pessimism in Germany " ; but ventured to hope that it would tend to a more healthy change and revival. In that article I said i 1 " The German's nature is essentially and incontest- ably an idealistic one. Idealism is an essential coefficient of his well-being ; rob him of this, and he will always feel its want. Everywhere our German finds himself repulsed in his innermost longings. We have seen how it is as to family, society, and woman. 1 The Nineteenth Century Review, April, 1878. 74 THE GROWTH OF GERMAN CHAUVINISM What aspect does the inner man present on this point ? His idealism is soon cut off by stern reality. The young man who formerly lived from hand to mouth, happy with the honour paid him, now experiences, without such compensation, the mean and depressing cares for bread which life from hand to mouth must necessarily bring. The romantic age has passed, when youths walk about with long flowing locks and threadbare coats, and so entered even the princely drawing-room, respected in spite of their nonconformity, or even perhaps because of it. Formerly a young man's poverty brought him respect, and such a delicious vain self-contentment. He had no money, nor did he wish for any ; it would soil his philosophical or poetical hands. He had enough to eat and drink and live on ; and was he not beloved by the fair-haired, blue-eyed, dreamy Marguerite ! When age drew on he became a ' philister,' and, either as a small official in some little town, or as a professor or a librarian, he lived quietly on with his wife and family, and revelled in the luxury of the recollections of his youth ; his drooping spirits were revived, and the material cares cast off, as then by facts, so now by the remembrance of them. " Such was the Elysian life of the German thirty years ago, and he was happy. In his cries and lamentations against political institutions and social states, one could always trace the inner self-content. He was perhaps not satisfied with his surroundings, but he was satisfied with himself. At every moment the feu sacre burst forth in a flame of youthful poetical eccentricity, Hegelian fanciful speculation, or political martyrdom ; but in himself there dwelt the sweetest harmony. His imprecations were directed against that life, but not against life in general. The Wer- therian melancholy was only adopted for its aesthetically beautiful dark cloak. He, if we may use the word, had lived himself into that melancholy, because he admired it, but it did not spring from those deep physical and social conditions from which the modern melancholy springs. His romantic lamentations and invectives were the outbursts of a SYMPTOMS FORTY YEARS AGO 75 too great energy and vital force, not the apathetic reasonings of to-day's pessimist. He felt Welt- schmerz ; our pessimist professes to be indifferent. He pointed out the causes of his woe, for they lay not in himself. He was like the philosopher who says, ' That is not the way to cognition,' and not like the sceptic who says, ' There is no way to cognition/ He was what Carlyle would call a ' worshipper of sorrow,' who waged internecine warfare with the 4 Time Spirit,' while the other, our pessimist, combats against the whole spirit, because he feels himself a child of his time. The misanthrope loves man and hates men. " How different is it at present from what the romantic idealist's life was then ! The admiration of the poor, threadbare-coated poet or philosopher has disappeared. What was formerly a source of pride is now the opposite. The writer himself knows a German poet of great worth and repute, who is not treated by society with the honour due to him, because he is not in the position to offer expensive hospitality to his friends, while others, acknowledged to be smaller, are the lions of the day. To-day, young idealist, your genius will not suffice. You must be a business man, and make money, and wear a new coat, and cut your hair short like everyone else, or you will be laughed at ; for a schwdrmer is out of fashion. This kills the very idealism which he needs. He finds all romance ridiculed. Like Hamlet, he is not understood by his surroundings, and so becomes indifferent towards the outer world, a despiser of mankind, as Schopenhauer was. Whither, in his distress, does he fly with his idealism ? Not to his home, nor to his family, nor to his maiden, for he has them not. Into himself ! Here he buries all his treasures. Here there is no Griinderschwindel, no insolence of office, no law's delay ; here he who was wont to float on the high paths of idealism need not stoop down and pick up the tiny piece of copper that lies in the dust on the roadside, and that buys bread. Here he is lord, and he revels in the feeling : ' everything is bad ; only I am good (for he who can 76 THE GROWTH OF GERMAN CHAUVINISM see the bad must stand outside it).' This is prob- ably unknown to themselves, the basis of all their pessimist reasonings. Pessimism is the highest stage of Romanticism. Only he is nihilist who has done away with all the desires of life, who has relinquished everything, because to him everything must be nothing. No one is more in need of fulness than he who feels the universal emptiness. No one is more in need of the world than he who weeps for it or inveighs against it. The only true nihilist is the indifferent and the laugher, the blase and the satirist ; but the pessimist is the schwdrmer par excellence. Both Optimism and Pessimism are, so to say, forms of motion, while Nihilism is stagnation. Optimism and Pessimism are like plus and minus, while nihilism is the only zero." Growthof Since 1878 the commercial spirit has made still f urtner strides in its predominance throughout the and ma- whole life of the German people. Practically it ^ means the desire for wealth, the greed of money, the realisation of the power of money. The Real and Interessen Politik, preached by the rulers, writ large on the national banner of the people, claiming national expansion in the world to increase the material wealth, and fostering the envy and hatred of those more for- tunate in the possession of such a world empire, and above all, the hatred of England, these have con- tributed to the materialisation of the German spirit. I remember how astonished I was, some sixteen or eighteen years ago, at an answer I received from a German prince, who had been sent to study for a time at one of our great English univer- sities. I asked him what he would choose to be, if he had the power of effecting his choice directly ; what was his ideal of future activity ? His answer was : " I should like to become a Cecil Rhodes." Cecil Rhodes (long before his death and the founda- tion of the Rhodes scholarships) or Pierpont Morgan REAL AND INTERESSEN POLITIK 77 were the ideal types of many a young German who were supposed to be, and for themselves claimed to be, actuated by the highest ideals ; who were thought to be by their political leaders fantastic dreamers and unpractical Utopians. There are, no doubt, many young men living among us who have the same ideals ; but we have never had the reputation abroad of being idealists and dreamers, and those young men would hardly understand what an idealist means. It is precisely among the upper classes who assert the feudal conditions of life and the prestige which it bestows upon them, and who also would shrink from the actual struggle and toil of honest com- mercial or industrial work (which they more or less despise), that this desire for gold and the wish to possess the inordinate means with which their industrial magnates are blessed it is among these that crass materialism shows itself and that the value of money is most clearly realised. But it is also in the upper middle classes, among those who have gathered all the fruits of the best education and thought, and who, in the Germany of old, held high the torch of idealism, where the want of money is most keenly felt and the desire to possess it is one of the strongest passions. But here again it is not coupled with the simple and stern determination to cast off all pretensions and honestly to enter into commerce or industry as a noble vocation in itself. They must base their social claims on being "officers of the reserve," and fly the colours of militarism for social distinction. Out of this class grows the band of malcontents and agitators ; and in this class are to be found the haters of England, who are moved by violent envy towards the economic prosperity of the English Empire and its subjects. This lust of gold on the part of those not favoured by its possession, is most powerfully put, again in lyric form, in a poem 78 THE GROWTH OF GERMAN CHAUVINISM by that same exponent of the militaristic spirit of modern Germany, Liliencron. I need not say that I in no way wish to reflect on the personality of this vigorous poet ; nor am I blind to the fact that to depict the passions and moods of all manner of people and in all conditions of life is one of the great tasks of the poet ; and that we should be absurdly wrong in ascribing to him the vices and faults which he describes with powerful poetic self-detachment. Nevertheless, in his poem called " Auf der Kasse " he does present to us a typical instance of the modern life about him, from which, according to Goethe's injunction, the poet seizes the subjects of his art. He there presents to us the sudden impulse of the poor man who is drawing his few shillings from the bank. Upon seeing the masses of gold which the cashiers are sorting he suddenly imagines how, if only they were all blind, he would dive into this mass of gold and carry it off, filling his pockets with it, pursued by the policemen whom he evades, and how he then would enjoy the fruits of his theft. The impulse and the momentary dream pass, and he returns to the bare reality and the mean conditions of his life. It is all both natural and human and is expressed with forcible poetic power. The impulse may have come to many people all over the world. But the mood of this poem and of many others by this same author expresses directly, in the subjective form of personal experience (as the poems of Heine directly expressed the romanticism of his age), mental conditions which are most characteristicof the develop- ment of modern Germany, and certainly show, not only this insidious spirit of envy and hatred, but also the direct material form, the desire for wealth, so foreign to the spirit of Teutonic life and of the German people of the past. Furthermore, however, this sudden growth of MORAL DEGENERATION 79 wealth has led to a degeneration of the social life Depravi of the people on a wider scale, especially in the degene material and sensual depravity prevalent at Berlin tion and in many of the larger provincial towns. Always remembering what the Germany of old Berlin. was and keeping before our minds the attractive picture of its healthy simplicity, its solidity, coupled with its lofty idealism, if we then turn to the Germany of to-day as seen in the life of Berlin and the larger provincial cities, such as Hamburg, Frankfort, and Munich, the contrast will be most striking. These centres again affect the life of other towns as patterns of metropolitan elegance and culture, and, by direct contagion, the life of all the inhabitants in smaller towns and in rural districts who pay occasional visits to these centres of recreation and pleasure, and carry away with them the germs of degeneration which there find such favourable pabulum for their " culture." If we recall the pictures of the life and the entertainments at court and in the upper circles at Berlin in the days of the old Emperor William, the simplicity (which was not, therefore, necessarily attractive or refined), the absence of display, the meagreness of the means of entertainment, and the comparatively small cost which it entailed, with the present expense and luxury, the change will impress itself more forcibly. Not only have the ordinary expenses of daily life grown in huge proportions, from house-rent onward ; but the change shows itself in the lavish entertainments, which are not domestic in character, and partake of a tone of dissipation. These entertainments do not reflect, as they may in other countries, the well-founded wealth which has become habitual and is directly in proportion to the more luxurious and brilliant conditions of life in which the wealthy classes pass their normal existence. They are given at the restau- 7 80 THE GROWTH OF GERMAN CHAUVINISM rants and hotels, or are sent from there to the homes. But far more significant of moral de- cadence are the social disintegrating excesses in the desire for amusements and display of Berlin dis- tinctly tending towards the abnormal and morbid. I boldly venture to maintain that of all the great capitals of the world, including Paris, London, Vienna, and New York, Berlin is the most patently and crassly depraved, and this depravity is admittedly organised and recognisable. The night-life of Berlin stands quite by itself among the cities of the world. Night is not devoted to sleep, but to the seeking of pleasure in all its forms. It may be said as has often been replied to the critics of Paris, the Paris of old that it chiefly concerns the visitors and strangers, and is organised for them. No doubt the life of depraved amusement in Paris during the Second Empire, still surviving to some extent in our day, was chiefly provided for the hosts of foreign visitors. Yet in Berlin these strangers and visitors are not foreigners ; but constitute the mass of the German people from every part of the German Empire, who thus are contaminated and depraved. Nor is it true that these amusements are meant to meet the demands of visitors only ; for the night- clubs cater chiefly for the residents of Berlin ; and among the habitues are representatives of old historic houses, even the princes of the Empire, government officials and officers, as well as representatives of great wealth, or those who not having great wealth have the facilities of making great debts. This life of dissipation, in its worst and most degenerate forms, goes on all night. The managers of the leading hotels assert that, when their work is started at six o'clock in the morning, about two-thirds of the keys in the hotel are still hanging on the board in the office, showing that the inmates of the hotel DEPRAVITY OF BERLIN 81 have not yet returned. Novels have been published telling how this poison has filtered through the whole of the country, even to the distant provinces. I cannot continue to dwell upon the character of some of the clubs frequented by men of high rank. I have said enough, and I only say it to point out the contrast between the life of recent years and that of Germany before 1870. Nor, as I have said above, is it limited to Berlin, as London and Paris are recognised as the only centres in England and France where flagrant vice flourishes in a huge city. I have had it on good authority that some of the Palais de Danse in certain of the more important towns of the provinces attract even a large proportion of the Bourgeoisie. The sums expended and received in these Palais de Danse are incredibly large. We all know that such places of amusement, and even worse ones, are to be found in Paris, and, though not to the same extent, in London. As many a German feared, the nation has lost some of the warlike efficiency possessed by their fathers of 1870, and to this degeneracy is perhaps to some extent to be traced the revolting forms of excesses which their cruelty has taken in Belgium and in France, and which, in some cases, is only to be explained by a pathological perversion of sensuality. In France, on the other hand, it cannot be denied, that since the days of the Second Empire there has been a regeneration of the moral fibre of the French people, especially among the young men of to-day. The infusion of the athletic spirit and all that it means morally, as consciously adopted from England, fostered by the direct efforts of several individuals, among whom I may single out the Baron Pierre de Coubertin, the Vicomte de Jansey, and others, in their Association pour I' Encouragement des Sports Athletiques, and the seriousness with 82 THE GROWTH OF GERMAN CHAUVINISM which the youth of France has been beginning to recognise its duty towards the State, have done much to prove them far different adversaries from those whom the Germans met in 1870, and I venture to predict that this war will have a still more salutary effect in the moral regeneration of the French people. Still, there remains in France the great blot of financial corruption in the political life of the past, the dominance of the haute finance in every form of public activity ; and, above all, the evil traditions of a Press which is admittedly in so many, if not in most, cases representative of a definite financial group of interests. The reform, of all others, which is most needed in France, as it may be elsewhere, is that by new laws, corruption in the election of national repre- sentatives should be made impossible, and the immunity of the people's representatives from the disease of financial enterprise and speculation should be jealously safeguarded and maintained. As for us here in England, we may also take timely warning. The tone of certain " sets " in the huge society which centres in London has of late drawn dangerously near to degeneracy and decadence. London is fortunately so large that it can never be said to be dominated in its social character by any one group of people or any so-called set. The Court no doubt exercises, and will always exert, a powerful influence as a type and example to direct the social aspirations of the people ; but it cannot be said that its tone of intercourse and habits of life in any way strike the dominant keynote to the symphony or cacophony of the social world, as is to a far greater extent the case in the society of Vienna or Berlin, or as was the case in the time of monarchical France. No doubt, however, it also exercised considerable influence on the " surface ethics " of the people. DANGERS IN FRENCH AND ENGLISH LIFE 83 There were and still exist, however, so many varied groups, based on similarity of rank, wealth, occupa- tion, or amusements, that no one set could be said definitely to lead and to prescribe as the case may be the tone or the pace. This multiplicity of social influence and social standards has made it quite impossible, with any approach to truth, to speak of " society " in London with any idea of accuracy, certainly not in the sense in which it was applied by our forefathers in the eighteenth and earlier centuries, or even in the earlier part of the nineteenth century. Nor could the term " Society " be used in the sense in which self-complacently the residents in a small provincial town or village use it. On the other hand, owing to the modern system of publicity, certain cliques have attained to a con- spicuousness before the world, which no doubt has led to their setting the tone and establishing a tra- dition among wider social groups, if not for the general public. But it must always be remembered that these sets form a very small minority ; and that numerous other sets in London and in the country, more completely representative of true British traditions of life and morals, command the respect of a wider public, and far outweigh that minority in numbers, eminence, and influence. These latter still represent what is best in English life. The tone of this minority in London society, constantly before the public, was decidedly lowering to public morals and public taste. Their outer life was luxurious, pleasure-seeking, and even dissolute. Especially was it opposed to the fundamental tradi- tion of home-life, which has ever been essentially private and unconcerned with publicity and display. Their lives were pre-eminently lived in public. The restaurant had with them superseded the home ; 84 THE GROWTH OF GERMAN CHAUVINISM and their amusements and entertainments were thus enjoyed before the eyes of the multitude. The traditions of the modern press, with its advertising publicity, came in to diffuse still further the elements of luxury and of profligacy and the dissolution of the traditional home. As foreign habits of restaurant-life were engrafted, so also foreign tastes in art were established, which not only hampered the natural growth in expression of national character in art, but actually fostered exotic tastes which exercised deeper influences on life itself. It is no doubt good to broaden one's taste towards catholicity and to increase the capacity of appreciat- ing, not only the life and art of bygone ages, but also of contemporary peoples remote from ourselves in every way. To have had presented to us the characteristic art (and through it the characteristic life as well) of modern Sicily, Belgium, and even of China and Japan, through the masterly performances of Sicilian, Belgian, Chinese, and Japanese plays enacted by their own people, was an artistic delight and a step towards an extension of aesthetic and intellectual sympathy. Not so, however, the position which was assigned to the Russian ballet. The Russian ballet and the masterly and exquisite performances witnessed in London of late years presented us with superior art of its kind. But it would be a mistake to assign too prominent and re- presentative a position to this particular form of art even in the general national art of Russia. It is well to appreciate and to enjoy such artistic pro- duction. But to assign to it a central or dominant influence on our artistic nature, by submitting con- tinuously and for a long period to its charm, until it pervades our whole taste, is a dangerous exaggera- tion which may have deeper and far-reaching effects upon national taste and national morals. The bril- SALUTARY EFFECT OF THE WAR 85 liancy and oriental sensuousness of such displays, though justified in due proportion in our artistic experience, cannot be healthy for us when they be- come predominant, and must, should they take hold of our moral, destroy the essential elements of our national character as expressed and confirmed by art. The Arabian Nights are a classic in the world's literature. But to make them the ordinary daily literary pabulum of Western readers and the central standards of Western taste can only pervert the moral as well as the artistic side of our national life. It appears that, with the recent exaggerated pro- minence given to the Russian ballet, such influences have already been at work and have permeated into the life of its devotees, even to the modification of taste in dress. These dangers of degeneracy from the example of social minorities and from exotic interference with the true and natural expression of our national life, character, and tastes have been checked by the war. With all its horrors, miseries, and degradations, it has certainly, by the self-sacrifice of our manhood, the devotion and inwardness of eifort of our women in fact, the temporary moral revival of the whole nation brought us back to our elemental principles of national morals. May it thus pave the way for a lasting national regeneration in every walk and sphere of life in the future ! All these menaces in the social life of contemporary England to which I have referred were dangerous to the continuance of a healthy national life. In view of the degeneration observable in Germany within the last thirty years, we ought to take heed and coun- teract these evil influences which tend to undermine our own national health. CHAPTER IV THE CONCEPTION OF THE STATE AND OF INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS Contra- WE have hitherto considered the direct and immediate between causes, national, social, and moral, which have led to the cur- this war. But, as I urged from the beginning of this ceptions" book, there are more remote and less manifest causes sta? e H ^ a more general, though more fundamental, nature of inter- which are to be found in the constitution of the relations mora ^ an ^ social life, not only of the Germans, but of and of the Western civilised peoples throughout the world. moral 116 Though these causes are of such a general and remote con- character, they are none the less the factors which SC1OUS~ ness of have directly contributed to this catastrophic climax modern m ^he international relations of all civilised peoples. man. They concern the general ideas and ideals which at once express and regulate the national and inter- national conscience of civilised peoples. Though definitely formulated and effectively fixed, so as to regulate and determine the political life of the several nations, they are in reality in direct contradiction to the true consciousness, political and moral, of the several peoples upon whom they are imposed. Such contradiction applies, in the first instance, to the con- ceptions of the State, and the international relations between the States. In spite of the firm foundation and the wide diffusion of democratic principles throughout the civilised world ; in spite of Lincoln's epigrammatic 86 THE GERMAN CONCEPTION 87 summary of the object and ultimate aim of govern- Theposi- ment, as " Government of the people, by the people, thestlte and for the people," in the mind of the Germans and at vari- of more autocratically governed nations, the State is still regarded as an entity apart from and above cpncep- the people ; its authority is conceived as being absolute and autocratic and, in some of its aspects, opposed to its citizens who are to bow down before its authority. Even with ourselves, in some aspects of our political life, especially those that develop patriotic Chauvinism, this idea of the State some- times shows itself. In this conception there is a distinct line drawn between the rulers and the ruled. Even when the governed revolt against their rulers, or harbour the spirit of revolt, they thereby affirm this difference, until they look upon the State and government as criminals look upon the police, not as representatives and guardians of the people's laws laws made by the people and guardians appointed by them to watch over these laws but as the inimical representative of an outside interest opposed to their own. In all these cases, in any event, the State is conceived of as an entity in itself, independent of the people whose unity derived from whatever causes, geographical, ethnological, legislative, social, or moral constitutes the essence of the State. This concep- tion of the State as " a thing in itself," confirmed in the life and history of early peoples and consciously and intellectually by the Greek writers on history, politics, and philosophy, has survived, in spite of all the huge developments of political thought and liberty, and of the democratic spirit manifested in the writings of publicists and philosophers from the Renaissance onwards and notably in the eighteenth century and since the French Revolution. In the writings of many modern historians, especially Ger- man, accentuated in those of a militaristic turn 88 STATE AND INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS of mind, to whom we have to such a great degree traced the responsibility for this war, the autocratic and theocratic view of the State survives in a more or less manifest form. With these later historians and constitutional historians, however, an intermediate stage has been developed between the ancient concep- tion of the absolute unity of the State and the demo- Xhe cratic principles of government. This intermediate national conception or compromise is found in the term " national " (Nazional), or rather " racial " (Rassen- staat), which, as we have seen, to a great extent accounts for the chauvinistic spirit dominating the German world. Whether this modern idea of Nationality, as the chief justification for the existence of the State and as an effective ideal in political life, national and international, is to be traced back to Napoleon or Mazzini, or to a confluence of many historical and political currents in the nineteenth century, the fact remains, that it has been, and is, the most powerful factor in political life and in the formation of political theory. Its influence in modern times can be traced in numerous international movements and crises. In the Balkans it has been both modified and intensified by the fusion of racial with religious differences, and has thus been the cause of continuous international complications and diffi- culties, the final solution of which is remote in the future and threatens the world's peace for some time to come. The modern German development of Nationality found full expression since the days of Bismarck, and its development is not only to be seen in such historians as Treitschke, who was taken up by the publicists and the teachers of constitutional history throughout Germany, but has been, and is, the current German conception in modern times. I well remember how it formed the central idea in the lectures of the late Professor Bluntschli of Heidel- National- ism. RACIAL NATIONALISM 89 berg, who, though a native of Switzerland, still re- sponded directly to the exactions of Bismarckian policy. The justification for the German Empire The was that it directly responded to, and expressed, the racial unity of the German people ; and this racial tion of . > T "- - unity drew a fixed and marked line, as regards the { interests and the very existence of the State, between it and other States of different racial origin. Wher- ever among the inhabitants this racial unity was not clearly expressed, in fact was made doubtful or weak- ened, it naturally led to internal antagonism ; and thus grew up within the people the anti-Semitic party, while the Poles and Danes and any other element that could assert itself, or could at all be recognised in its supposed solidarity, was persecuted and suppressed. If this suppression was not com- pletely successful, it naturally led to disquieting elements of disruption and of party contest. It thus favoured antagonism, leading through dislike to hatred without and within. In any case the unity of the State and the close ties Racial of affinity and of national affection which give vitality JJJJJ^ b to its national life give a soul to the nation are claimed very much endangered when they rest upon suchB,T itis h ethnological grounds. For when we ask the question, Empire, ' Which one of the civilised states of modern times f or Eng- can claim, and truly realise its claim to, racial unity ? " land * the answer must be, " Not one of them." While this is being written, there are appearing a series of letters in the Times, grouping round a controversy waged by eminent men, as to the position which the Anglo- Saxons held in the formation and development of the English nation and of the British Empire. Such discussions appear to me futile and childish, especi- ally when their result is to have a direct bearing upon the inner social and political life, and upon the actual foreign relations of our State. Subdivide as you will 90 STATE AND INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS the subjects of the King of England into the original and aboriginal predecessors of modern Englishmen, of palaeolithic and neolithic inhabitants of Great Britain and Ireland, the Celts and their varied ramifi- cations, Bretons, Picts and Scots, Saxons, Danes and Norsemen, Normans and other races ; add to these, in more clearly historical times, the more peaceful incursions of other immigrants, who, from their leadership in thought and in trade and in all forms of industry, or by highly educated social groups or by individual men, have left their mark upon English history subdivide as much as you will, you cannot thereby destroy the unity of the British Empire, the soul of the nation, welded together by its past history, its political constitution, its spirit of liberty, its customs and traditions, and its ideals of living. Not only the ethnological groups of its inhabitants in the remote past, but these more recent accessions to British nationality have had the most powerful influence in giving definite character and in directing the development of English national life. These comprise the Jews, who no doubt in the Middle Ages in the time of Isaac of York and the other " bankers " of those days, before their expulsion, exercised a most powerful civilising influence on the develop- ment of English life. But since their return in the time of Cromwell, they have produced leading indi- viduals in every walk of life, culminating in the per- sonality of Disraeli, who, whether admired or con- demned by the partisan, certainly left his imprint on the history and political character of his age as perhaps no other individual has done since the days of Pitt. We have also to consider the immigration into England both from the Low Countries and from France, of the weavers and skilled artisans, Dutch, Flemish, or Huguenot, who undoubtedly gave a favour- able turn to the character of British trade and industry. THE ENGLISH PEOPLE 91 These immigrants also furnish us with individual men and families who have duly risen to eminence and who have added most perceptibly to the formation of our national character in our own days. It is puerile, as well as absolutely inept and ineffectual, to endeavour to apportion the good or the potently effective in our national life and character among the several ethno- logical sources from which the truly formative elements in national history are supposed to be derived. Burke, Wellington, and Palmerston may or may not have been of pure Celtic origin, but they were practically of Irish descent, though they had their full share in the making of England, as much as did Cromwell, Pitt, Fox, and Gladstone. Were one to adopt experimental and observational methods, such as the field-geologist is capable of applying in rapid observation to the theoretical study of geology, one would be absolutely confused and puzzled were one to try to segregate into the various ethnological strata any given number of people in any one of our towns not to speak of London at all and even in our country villages, according to the ethnological types which they are supposed to represent. The whole structure of such generalisation in theoretical study, still more in the practical application of such distinctions to the differ- ent problems of the social and political life of the country nay, the very basis of the existence of the State as a unity would at once topple to the ground. And this is not only true of Great Britain, it is Equally true of every single nation of Western Europe, per- ^ nded haps of even Slav Russia. Germany and France are in Ger- in their ethnological constitution as mixed and disparate as any nation claiming national unity can any one well be. There may be more difference of physique European and character, of habits of life, of emotionality, of states. intellectual predisposition, of temperament and taste, constituting what we call personality, between the 92 STATE AND INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS South Germans of Bavaria and Wiirtemberg and Baden and the East Prussian, between them again and the Holsteiner and the Westphalian and those from the Rhine provinces, than between any one of these and citizens of Denmark and Poland, Switzer- land or Holland. And their different dialects, though all form part of the German language, their pro- nunciation and intonation of this same language, are so different that I, though a foreigner, have had to act as an interpreter between the dwellers of the chalets in the Bavarian highlands and the Tyrol and the North German tourists who vainly endeavoured to make themselves understood. I do not in any way maintain that the inhabitants who thus differ from one another should not collec- tively form a State, as little as I maintain that, be- cause in language, and perhaps in race, there may be great affinity between sections of the German people and the Swiss, or between other sections and the Flemings and Dutch, they are necessarily to form one State : that Switzerland, Belgium, and Holland should therefore be deprived of their inde- pendence and be incorporated into the German Empire. It is amusing to note how, when would-be scientific and philological principles suit the purposes of German Weltpolitik, they can at once be made subservient to national greed. In an article which has recently appeared, the criminal breach of Belgian neutrality and the prospective annexation of Belgium by the German Empire is supported on the grounds of such philology and ethnology. Does anybody in his senses honestly believe that such unsound, pretentious, and pedantic efforts of the ethnologist establish a moral and practical ground for the claims of any State to absolute power, to the commands of which every individual citizen, all classes of the population, all groups and interests of DEMENTED IMPERIALISM 93 economic and social life, are to bow down in un- questioning obedience ? Are the rights of the people dependent upon this flimsy and fantastic structure of pedantic schoolmasters aspiring to be master- builders of States ? And when we turn from the State in itself to the relations of the several States to one another, how can any one of these, on the ground of an utterly false ethnological generalisation, claim ascendancy over all the others ? What is the conception in the mind of such thinkers and politicians of the relation of the State to the whole inhabited globe with its millions upon millions of human beings, each claim- ing their own right to live and to think and to act in freedom ? On these shadowy figments of narrow and destructive brains they claim the supreme moral right to subjugate other peoples and nations to the interests and desires of one small group of people calling themselves a State, with unrestrained ambi- tion to bend the whole world to their own desires 1 Why should a relatively small section of land, a district in Europe marked on the map as Germany, with its sixty or seventy millions of people among the untold millions of human beings, become the absorbing centre of the world's collective life, so that all the world should minister to its desires and swear allegiance to its national exactions, to become, not so much the guiding brain and the sentient heart, but the absorbing stomach to which all life is to be subordinated ? It is Imperialism gone mad 1 Nor does The German may answer that his justification for Q^ en o f world-power lies in his Kultur, and that the civilisa- civilisa- tion represented by the German people has the ta'biish'a comparatively highest claim among civilised nations, claim for and ought therefore to dominate the world. Quite ^nto" apart from the fact that we should absolutely deny absorb this primacy of German civilisation, which, as we 94 STATE AND INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS have seen before, even their own philosophers deny, how can they diffuse and advance their own Kultur by the barbarous and degrading methods of war ? But even if, argumenti causa, we were to admit that they were thus fitted to lead, then let them lead onwards and upwards ; but not push and drive with brutal as well as deceitful and utterly demoralising force their peaceful neighbours and distant peoples back into the fold of their own selfishness, to serve their own interests, increase their wealth and power, to satisfy the lust of dominance, nay, the vanity of this sixty or seventy millions of people in that small portion of the globe. I may be allowed to repeat what in substance I have already written with refer- ence to the Jews : 1 " If there is anything good in you you who may, with more or less doubtful accuracy, be supposed to be the direct descendants of one of the greatest races of the past show it and let the world benefit by the spirit which moves you and has moved you in the past ; hold on high the torch of your ancestors and let it illumine the world for the good of the world ! But you are most likely to accomplish this, not by segregating yourselves into separate social or political groups in the States of which you are citizens, still less by endeavouring to become a separate nation with all the pretentions, the actual or potential antagonisms to other States which such corporateness implies ; but by being perfectly deve- loped and high-minded individuals, affectionate and helpful members of your family, devotedly attached to its prosperity and its good name, beneficent dwellers in any community where you may happen to live, and loyal citizens of the State in which, whether for many centuries or even for a few years, you have been active national units, contributing as such units to the free development of the laws and 1 See the chapter (II, pp. 54-99) on the Mission of the Jews in my book The Jewish Question and the Mission of the Jews. JEWISH NATIONAL PRETENSIONS 95 the national life of such a State. Let your poetic imagination and your pride of descent, and the duty which you owe to the good fame of your ancestors, beautify and strengthen your lives, as the works of art or the beauties of literature in due proportion add their refining element to your life of leisure. Sentiment is all, because it groups round the idea, the ideal essence, of material things. If any natural evolution of the human kind and any sequence of historical events (though, in your case, generally sad) have made you what you are, and what you are is good, let this good permeate into the life about you as individual factors in a complex State, and let all together ultimately lead to the advance of the human race and the diffusion of happiness through- out it 1 " Deutsche Kultur if you like, whatever be best in it ! But not the Kultur of the Prussian Junker, or bureaucrat, the grasping Alldeutscher pauper who wants more money, the beer-heavy stump speaker in a frowsy inn who, indolent in all but his unassuaged rapacity, fans his sentimental Gemuthlichkeit of old into hysterical passion, until it at last bursts forth into a Hymn of Hate ! Such, however, is the con- tagion of the chauvinistic idea, of the so-called Nazional-Staat, to which I have before referred, that the Jews themselves have been affected, and a small section of them must needs strive for a Jewish Empire in the conception of the Zionist movement. The objection may be made, that all that I have The just said and urged against the vicious spirit of All- deutschland is also directed against all Imperialism, and the including British Imperialism. But I would except the British Empire, because it has, in pursuing its own national destiny as a great colonising State, gone as far as, under the dominant condition of national and racial ideas of our days, it could go towards the realisation of our true ideals of politics. It aims in 8 g6 STATE AND INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS every case at establishing freedom and self-govern- ment for each colony, of giving of the best to each one of these which in the course of history have come under its influence and dominion, and, fulfilling its mission as long as Free Trade and the " Open Door " rule its policy of ignoring the selfish call of the immediate interests in the Mother Country. What always remains in welding the numerous and varied peoples of the British Empire together is the national sentiment, the feeling of a common past, of a common origin, of common traditions, and of a united struggle for the realisation of definite ideas and ideals in government and social life. Just as the members and descendants of one family are bound together, but are thereby in no way excluded from their vigorous endeavours to be good citizens of their country and of the world at large, to realise the tasks in the life set before them, and to contribute as individuals to the advancement and betterment of the whole world, so are all the citizens of the British Empire bound together ; and this war to the un- doing of German Chauvinists has proved the reality and strength of these bonds more forcibly than ever before. I repeat : sentiment is a great power and has its direct practical uses and effectiveness, especi- ally in larger collective bodies. It is more real and more effective, and less likely to lead to discord and the clashing of interests, than the manifestly prac- tical aims and allurements of colonial preference or of protective tariffs. German But why should Germany, after driving like a 1 " we dge its commercial penetration into Asia Minor, or one of the South American Republics, and naturally and organically affecting the life of these countries, until the good that may thus arise will of its own force survive, why should force and brutal com- pulsion destroy the national life of the people in- NATIONAL TYRANNY 97 habiting these countries, and artificially engraft the conditions which prevail in Germany so as mechani- cally to supersede by force (not by persuasion and evolution) the living civilisation which has grown up out of the soil and out of the history of Asia Minor or South America, arising from legitimate traditions and national sentiments? Above all, finally, why should the Germans succeed in establishing such colonies, should these become merely the means to develop the commerce and wealth, to swell the pockets and paunches of the German officials and manufacturers and merchants, all ending in discord and endless war and bloodshed within and without and over the whole world ? But this is the real picture which those who have made, and those who are carrying on, this criminal war, have drawn for the edification of the German people. The spirit of German culture is not the aim in itself, and never was, even if they were convinced of its absolute superiority over all other forms of civilisation. The accumulation of irrefutable evidence from every quarter of the globe, the definite statements and docu- ments revealed since the war began, and the more recent pronouncements of the King of Bavaria con- cerning Belgium, leave no doubt of the aggressive plans of annexation and land-grabbing of the domi- nant leaders of Germany which have matured for years past. Moreover, it has been shown by their own official statements that there is no real pressing need for colonisation and " the place in the sun " to find employment for the surplus population of Ger- many. Emigration has decreased, not increased, within recent years in fact labour has been con- tinually imported into Germany from other countries. 1 1 See Helfferich in Soziale Kultur und Volkswohlfahrt wdhrend der ersten 25 Regierungsjahre Wilhelms II, p. 17 ; also G. L. Beer, in the Forum, May 1915, p. 550 ; and ]' Accuse (German edition), pp. 41 seq. g8 STATE AND INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS If German Kultur is the best of all existing forms of civilisation, it will assert itself by its intrinsic worth, weight, and power. If the German language is the best means of conveying human thought, it will assert itself and supersede all other languages. But we shall not adopt them at the command of the German Junker or the German drill-sergeant, or stand by to see them forced upon weaker States, who themselves may possess even an older and nobler civilisation of their own, in order to satisfy the school- boy vanity of German thinkers of second, third, or fourth-rate capacity, devoid of all genius, whose only merit and use, great though it be, consists in tabu- lating and making handy for the world the achieve- ments of the great geniuses, most of them not German, who marked an epoch in the world of thought and art and invention ; nor shall we head the vociferous band of intellectual followers, drunken with the A II- Deutsche ideals of a Treitschke, a Bernhardi, or a Nietzsche. Why, to satisfy German national and racial vanity, should Holland, and Belgium, and Switzerland ultimately Denmark, and Norway, and Sweden as well be expunged from the political map of Europe ? Why should Northern France disappear as the courageous and imaginative leader of modern thought and taste ? Why should German ambitions be unchecked as regards South America, Asia Minor, China, and Japan, and their envious rapacity push on to grasp the colonies and dependencies of Great Britain, happy in their political kinship with their political and social parent land, loyal to its dominion and leadership, and ready as the present war has proved to fight her battles and to assert her might ! The British Empire has, up to the present moment, recognised and acted upon the principle of the Open Door with regard to its colonies and dependencies, THE OPEN DOOR 99 and it would be nothing short of a political crime, as well as economic folly, to abandon this broadest principle of Free Trade, upon which morally as well as materially the prosperity of the British Empire has hitherto rested. CHAPTER V THE HUMANITARIAN CONSCIOUSNESS OF THE MODERN MAN The in- THIS principle of the Open Door has formed the very tionai essence of the policy of the United States, when it had principle been drawn into the vortex of international struggle ojjjj 5 in the case of China, and was clearly expressed in the Door. lasting and classic pronouncement of that great and wise political leader, the late John Hay. It has been, and will ever remain, the dominant principle of the government of the United States in its relation to the expansion of Western civilisation. With the recog- nition of this principle and the absence of all those international intrigues and smouldering, or flaming, antagonisms for which in the past Germany has been chiefly responsible (though Russia and ourselves and all other States are not free from guilt in the methods and work of their Foreign Offices), there is no reason why the commercial penetration of Asia Minor and all that the building of the Bagdad Railway meant might not ultimately have provided Germany with a vast field for enterprise, for commercial expansion at home, and for the employment abroad of men with energy and talent from the Mother Country. Of course they would in justice be bound to consider and to respect the well-established claims established through many years of fruitful activity which Great Britain pos- sessed on the Persian Gulf and in the adjacent centres bordering it, such as Koweit and Busra. In spite of 100 THE OPEN DOOR 101 the Monroe Doctrine, why should not Germany have continued the commercial penetration of more than one of the South American republics with large groups of German settlers forming, de facto, German colonies ; until, again de facto, by the exercise of free and peace- ful activity these colonists would have gained actual control in directing the course of life and in setting its tone in such countries ? Moreover, if their own Kultur, the civilisation which they collectively repre- sent, was actually superior to the civilisation which they found and which had before been dominant, it would of itself have changed, and ultimately have superseded, the lower forms ; and we might in due course have seen the actual transplantation of German Kultur into distant parts of the globe. History has repeatedly shown how the superior civilisation will prevail over the lower forms which it meets in any given country. Ultimately, however, it is possible, nay probable, that such an off-shoot from the parent stock in peaceful colonial development will sever itself from the parent stem and establish an indepen- dent existence and growth of its own ; but the civili- sation remains the same in its original essence and in the blessings of superiority which the parent nation has conferred upon its off-shoot. Was not the United States a direct off-shoot of the English parent stem, and may not in the future the British colonies more and more assert their political and social independence and develop their own local and peculiar characters, enriching the world by a distinct and new form of civilisation or an equality of height with the parent culture, until they may even react upon the old world and modify it in many forms ? So the civilisation of the Greek colonies in Magna Grsecia and Sicily reacted upon the Mother Country ; while, in great part through these Greek colonies, the Latin civilisa- tion of the Italic Peninsula was infused with Hellenism. 102 HUMANITARIAN CONSCIOUSNESS OF MAN Then, through the vast Roman Empire, nearly every part of the world was modified to the very depths of social and political existence in the spirit of Hellenism, as it passed through, and was modified and enlarged by, Rome. Finally, after the Italian Renaissance, the submerged classic spirit again arose in a new, yet pristine, glory ; and the classical spirit of humanity has ever since dominated and been the most potent factor in modern European civilisation, both in Europe itself and in America, and will ultimately penetrate into the farthest East and West and North and South of this earth of ours. Patriot- But here the cloven foot of Chauvinism in a seem- national ingly noble and more justifiable form shows itself vanity, again ; and now it is in the spirit of " national patriotism," as it may be called, or of national vanity as it might more properly be termed. The members of a living modern State do not wish to lose one particle of the credit and the glory which comes from seeing themselves and what they consider their own Kultur carried away from them by their migrating sons. Whatever prosperity may come to these colonising sons, whatever the good which may flow from them and their efforts into the new home of their adoption, however marked the step in advance which through the new community may thus be made in the civilisation of the whole world through its infusion into distant parts, that of itself is not enough. It must immediately and in every case reflect the glory of those at home ; it must contribute directly to the prosperity or the fame of the parent hearth, nay of the parent himself. The unwise father thus is tempted to play the part of Providence and to project his will far into the future ; as the " dead hand " in the will of a self-assertive testator endea- vours in every detail of life to bind the beneficiaries of his testament and to direct and to modify the NATIONAL VANITY 103 will, the reason, and the actions even the sense of justice of those who succeed him. Consider it as you may, the fact remains, that fun- damentally this so-called national patriotism, which insists upon definite and distinct national expansion, is but the outcome of supreme national vanity, nar- rowed down by a selfish and petty sphere of vision, if it be not the grosser form of clear-sighted selfish- ness, which only aims at its own immediate material aggrandisement, increase of wealth and comfort, to be derived, not only from the colony as such, but from every individual sent out supposedly for his own good and whose activity it is desired to limit and to hamper to the sole good of the Mother Country. As it has been this antiquated and false conception of the State in its relation to its citizens which is in great part accountable for the growth and develop- ment of Chauvinism in Germany, and has led to this catastrophic war, so it is especially this distorted view of colonial expansion, mistaking national vanity for patriotism, which is even more directly responsible for German aggression throughout the world ; and, when fanned into the raging heat of passion through the characteristic vice of envy, has produced the spirit of hatred against the British Empire and its inhabit- ants which has thrown the modern German nation back to the savagery of the primitive Hun. And what will every right-minded German citizen say when, without even considering the injustice and savagery shown to his fellow-men of other countries, nor the initial injustice of German aggres- sion in this war, he realises through untold suffering the misery and financial ruin of his own country, the torture and suffering ending in the death of millions of his own kith and kin, and the sadness which will come to every German home, not one of which will be free from intense anguish 1 What will these right- 104 HUMANITARIAN CONSCIOUSNESS OF MAN minded and clear- thinking Germans say when the scales have fallen from their eyes and they fully realise for what imaginary, what trivial and inanely stupid motives this huge sacrifice of life, wealth, and happiness a greater sacrifice than has ever been made in the world's history has been made, this criminal war has been waged ! The Remember, moreover, that the German workman inter- jj a( j continuously and for many years been gaining charac- the conviction (and the determination to act upon Labour **) tnat ^Y nature, interest, and morality he was and of not severed from his fellow-workmen living in other Capita . coun t r i es anc j belonging to other nations, that so far from regarding them as his natural enemies he actually felt them to be his brothers, his friends in arms. Within recent times, day by day and year by year, he became conscious of his power to act in accordance with these true feelings guiding the labouring man all over the world. The International Socialistic Brotherhood was not a mere name without substance or without power. What this power meant and how it could effectually be used against the action of his militarist tyrants became clearly manifest from the moment that in Russia in 1905 the first attempt was made on a large scale to organise a general strike. Though on that occasion the general strike was not completely successful, still it did produce a consider- able effect in Russia itself, and was one of the most important events in modern history. It proved to the world what might in the future be done by the united action of the labouring men in any country who knew their own minds, were clear in their purpose, and well organised in carrying out their plans. Moreover, as the years rolled on, the international aspect of the union of labouring men, leading to con- certed action in the interests of the whole body, grew more clearly pronounced and promised more definite GENERAL STRIKES 105 international action. The so-called sympathetic strikes spreading from one country to the other grew in frequency. It thus became clear to a great many thinkers, and to many of the leaders of the Labour Party themselves, that the so-called pacifist tenden- cies and aims of these powerful bodies all over the world might in the near future effectually prevent any great European war in fact any war between civilised and well-organised modern States. I have referred above (p. 6) to the opinion held by one of the greatest living authorities on the labour question and the international character which strikes were assuming. These facts were a confirmation of my own opinion, shared by a leading German states- man, that in the near future wars between civilised nations might thus become impossible. There can be no doubt that the true consciousness of the mass of the labouring men in Europe at all events the most intelligent and most influential amongst them was utterly opposed to any great war between civilised nations and had no feeling of opposition, animosity, or violent hatred to the population of any other country on the grounds of national, racial, or imperial differences. On the contrary, they were distinctly anti-Chauvinistic and were cultivating feelings and actions of international comity among all workers in all civilised States. More and more they were preparing themselves to check and to counteract in every way international aggression and internecine war. At the same time the action of capital as such and intema- of the capitalistic class, in spite of the potent and charac- overwhelming interests of those concerned in arma- ter of ments, was working in the same direction to make war in future between civilised nations impossible, almost inconceivable. Mr. Norman Angell and many other writers have forcibly impressed upon the world io6 HUMANITARIAN CONSCIOUSNESS OF MAN the constraining influence of international capital and industry in its opposition to war and the disas- trous effects which war would have not only upon the nations concerned, but upon neutrals as well. They have also shown how even the victorious nation cannot in modern times gain the fruits of its victory. No doubt in bygone ages the greed of possession and acquisition were generally the motives which led to warlike aggression and immediately rewarded the victor by the increase of his own wealth and of all other amenities of life. But with the modern appli- cation of capital and its penetration from one com- mercial centre into all foreign parts and distant nations, the sensitiveness and interdependence of financial, commercial, and industrial bodies in every nation offered no such inducements to the aggressor and made it the universal interest of every nation to prevent a war. Apparently all the prophecies of these pacifist writers have been belied by the course of recent events. But this is only apparent, and not actually true. The truth is that, perhaps, on the one side the materialistic interests were too strongly backed by that section of the economic world directly inter- ested in armaments ; and that, on the other side, the contingency to which I have just referred namely, that in the race for time the militaristic competitor literally " stole a march," and that this war was thus brought about. It may perhaps only have been a question of a few years that the hoplite runner would have been completely outdistanced and beaten by the unarmed, yet fleet and sure-footed, toiler in the fields and in the factory. I must here reproduce the exposition of this ques- tion as published by me twenty-one years ago (The Jewish Question and the Mission of the Jews, 6th ed. London and New York, 1894, p. 82 seq.}. INTERNATIONAL CAPITAL AND LABOUR 107 " The present foreign policy of European States shows a disastrous confusion which marks a transition. It is the death-struggle of nationalism, and the tran- sition to a more active and real form of general inter- national federation. In this death-struggle we have the swan-song of the past dynastic traditions in monarchy giving form, and often heat and intensity, to the contest upheld in certain customs of diplomatic machinery, with, on the other hand, the birth-struggle towards the organisation of international life, the needs of which are at present only felt practically in the sphere of commerce. This birth-struggle at present manifests itself chiefly in narrow and undig- nified jealousy and envy for commercial advantages ; and this, unfortunately, is growing the supreme ulti- mate aim of all international emulation. We can trace nearly all the diplomatic rivalry ultimately to the interests of commerce and the greed for money. One often hears it said that Jewish bankers make and unmake wars. This is not true. Money makes and unmakes wars ; and if there were not this greed of money among the contending people the bankers would not be called upon at all. There are, of course, further complications favouring the older spirit of national envy, which is dying, though far from being dead. Such are the influences of the huge military organisations, definite wounds unhealed (such as the feeling of reprisal on the part of France), and, finally, the last phases of the artificial bolstering up of the idea of the National-Staat in Germany and Italy. But the whole of this conception of nationalism, in so far as it implies an initial hatred and enmity towards other national bodies, is doomed. A few generations, perhaps, of disaster and misery accompanying this death-struggle will see the new era. " Now, there are several practical factors which are paving the way indirectly towards the broader national life of this coming era. They are, strange to say, the two main opposite forces of the economical life of the day : Capital and Labour. Each of these, separately following the inherent impulse of its great forces, which constantly run counter to one another, io8 HUMANITARIAN CONSCIOUSNESS OF MAN tends towards the same goal, especially in its pro- nounced forms. Capital does this in the great inter- national houses and in the Stock Exchanges ; Labour, since the first International Convention of 1867, in its great labour organisations. The highly developed system of modern banking business and of the Stock Exchange, favoured by the rapid and easy means of intercommunication without regard to distance, has made all countries, however far apart, sensitive to the fate which befalls each ; and this tends more and more to make Capital an international unit, which can be, and is being, used, whatever its origin, in all the different quarters where there seems a promising demand for it. 1 " On the other hand, the growth of organisation among the representatives of labour is fast stepping beyond the narrow limits of national boundaries, and the common interests tend to increase the direct- ness of this wider institution. I am not adducing these facts in order to suggest any solution of the numerous problems which they involve, nor to direct the attention to the interesting historical, economical, and political questions to which they may give rise ; but simply to draw attention to the one fact that in this respect both capital and labour are effectively paving the way, perhaps unknown to the extreme representatives of either interest, towards the increase of a strong and active cosmopolitan spirit of humani- tarianism. And this spirit, at least as an ideal, is certainly dominant in the minds of the best and wisest people of our generation." Such is the united tendency and action of the two main factors in modern economic life which are 1 But let no man from the camp of the capitalist (as some anti- Semitic German politicians have endeavoured to do) charge the Jews with being the instigators to Socialism, nor let a Socialist urge his fellow-partisans to an anti- Jewish' riot ; for the leading spirits of both these antagonistic forces were Jews : the bankers, such as the Roths- childs ; and the economists, such as Lassalle and Karl Marx. The capitalists cannot curse the Jews, and the Socialists cannot dynamite the Jews without disowning their very leaders. DECLINE OF NATIONAL ANTAGONISM 109 supposed to be, and usually are, directly opposed as inimical forces in the minds of the extreme repre- sentatives of each factor namely, capital and labour. But in this great issue, following out their separate and, at times, divergent courses and interests, they definitely tend to unite in one common goal of inter- national federation and of opposition to war. More important still, however, than these two The forces in economic modern life has been the growing consciousness of the whole population of the world stious- as represented by all people of right feelings and of human normal and clear thought. The sense of a common ^ oli :, danty. humanity, moved by the same feelings, aspirations, and ideals and with essentially the same goals and interests to work for, has been growing in extent and in intensity throughout the whole world, irrespective of local, racial, or national differences. Without any Utopian pretensions, this fundamental conviction is so strong and real among even the least thoughtful, that, unless they are blinded by momentary passions and relapses into bygone savagery, it is the leading attitude of mind in which all people consider their fellow -beings in every part of the world. More- over the actual facilities of intercommunication and of travel have grown to such an extent in every civilised country, for even the larger mass of the people, that they have established affinities and direct relations, numerous actual points de rattachement, with the dwellers beyond the boundaries of their own country or nationality, and these bonds of affinity and of moral or material contact have become so real that they actually count for more than mere propin- quity or even consanguinity within the one country and nation where no such affinity or contact exists. Passionate antagonism and hatred may be more intense between two neighbouring villages, between two families, and sometimes even between the members no HUMANITARIAN CONSCIOUSNESS OF MAN of one family than between the inhabitants of distant countries. I should like to anticipate here what will be dealt with farther on, and to add that such individuals and villages would at once enforce their enmity by violence were it not for the power of the law backed by the police. Of course this feeling of human solidarity exists especially among those who have attained a higher degree of moral and intellectual development through the channels of higher educa- tion in literature, science, or art, and it exists still more between those who in their habits and their tastes are guided by the same leading principles, and have assimilated into their very moral system the same rules and preferences of conduct in every detail of living. It is here that the formal side of modern national life is antiquated, in fact directly at variance with the inner substance of the life itself as it exists in the consciousness of modern people. 1 1 Since the above was written I find that the author of /' Accuse (p. 316, German edition) has expressed the same idea, even including the terms " perpendicular and horizontal division of humanity." But such agreement ought not to astonish, considering that it is the conception of truth which we chose and that not only two people but all right-minded people ought to agree. CHAPTER VI PATRIOTISM AND COSMOPOLITANISM THE PERPEN- DICULAR AND HORIZONTAL DIVISIONS OF HUMAN SOCIETY To put it into a crude geographical formula : the subdivisions in the grouping of people have hitherto been on the perpendicular principle ; to correspond to what actually exists, they ought to be, and cer- tainly will in the future be, on the horizontal prin- ciple. Human beings can no longer be subdivided by lines cutting into the earth and delimiting the fron- tiers of nations, still less by imaginary and inaccurate lines of established or hypothetical racial origin. The Modern communications have, as a matter of fact, erased these lines, and military frontiers can only Division, artificially restore them to importance for a short time . Even the sea no longer separates . As a matter of fact, the sea as a means of intercommunication and of commercial transportation binds together more than it divides. It is often cheaper to send goods to distant countries thousands of miles by sea than scores of miles by rail in the same country. Nor can human hearts and human minds, human tastes and habits of living, be united or kept asunder by a geo- graphical line. On the other hand, the horizontal line, which TheHori- marks the moral and intellectual phases regulating the lives of human beings all over the world, does really provide us with the principle of grouping H2 PATRIOTISM AND COSMOPOLITANISM corresponding to actuality. To put it grossly : an Englishman of the criminal classes has as little in common with an honourable, noble, and high-minded Englishman, as a German, Frenchman, or Italian of the same low standards has with that of the higher representatives of those nations. On the other hand, the criminals in each country can readily form a brotherhood with harmonious aims of life and habits, as the high-minded gentlemen of each nation will at once find a common ground for living, for free, profitable, and pleasant intercourse, and, above all, for the higher aspirations of life and living among those of the same type in other countries. These are extreme cases ; but the principle applies to all the finer shadings in the scale of population, of the living, and thinking, and feeling of the nations all over the world. if true of It is thus in direct contradiction to the actual duals'* consciousness of the peoples of Europe and America fortiori to feel enmity towards those in other countries with states, whom, on the contrary, there exist the strongest links Antagon- o f mutual regard and of brotherhood, and certainly tween so-called national differences cannot justify an actual/ 116 anta g n i sm which goes to the length of bloodthirsty not based attempts to destroy their very lives. thegeo- If this is true of the individual men and women graphical composing the several States and nations, it also ticaicon- applies to the collective unity of population in the stitution State. In spite of the German conception of the so-called Nazional-Staat, of the difference in origin and race upon which the separateness of the several States is to be based, the States thus belie their very principles of union if they base antagonism which leads to war upon ethnological grounds. For, as Germany is now constituted, the inhabitants of Holstein, shoulder to shoulder with Slav Prussians, might have to fight the Dutchmen and the Saxon NEITHER ETHNOLOGICAL NOR GEOGRAPHICAL 113 Englishmen with whom they claim a common racial origin an origin which they might also claim with the Flemings and the inhabitants of Northern France. Perhaps even many Lombards in Northern Italy might thus have to meet in battle their racial brothers from Germany, who have joined the Prussian Slav. Nor can these antagonisms be based upon geo- graphical grounds, and the political boundaries thus marked, for then Canada and Australasia could on these grounds not make common cause with Great Britain and Ireland. Nor even in the present con- dition of military powers can the coalition of States as units be based upon identity or similarity in the essential conception of what a State is and what its aims are. For the alliances and ententes belie any such principle of selection in their formation. The alliance between Germany, the Nazional-Staat, and the German section of the Hapsburg Empire would be perfectly intelligible and logical. But when we come to the Magyar and Slav and Rumanian con- stituents of that Empire, the logical ground for such an alliance entirely vanishes, and may even in itself constitute antagonism rather than unity or harmony of national aspirations. On the other hand, when we consider the essential nature of the State and of government and find the Republic of France, with its vigorous aspirations towards political progress and reform, allied with the Russian autocracy, hitherto of all European States most clearly identified with political reaction ; when we realise that but a short time ago the Republic of France manifested a most acute phase of political antagonism to Eng- land ; when we consider the natural antagonism between Western Liberalism and Eastern Autocracy, and the affinity of principles and aspirations between the German democratic section and those of France H4 PATRIOTISM AND COSMOPOLITANISM and England, we meet with a confusion so complex and dense that, at least, one fact rises clearly before our mind : namely, that in the political grouping of the several States there is the same paradoxical dis- crepancy between the professed political conscience, the essence of political life, and the direct resultant activities of each State in realising its would-be pro- fessions of national existence and of national aspira- tions. 1 We actually do not know where we are and on what principle our national alliances are based : and still less why we should fight each other, except- ing that the so-called State or rather a section of its rulers has commanded us to do so. The manifest net result of these convincing and constraining political conclusions, both as regards the position of individual citizens and of the State as a whole, is that our fundamental conception of what a State is and ought to be is wrong, and that we must bring it into harmony with the clear and well-founded conception of modern man as in his sane moments and with the courage of his convictions he must formulate it. 1 Since the above was written Italy has left the Triple Alliance and has joined the Entente Powers, while Bulgaria has actually joined with Turkey and the Central Powers to fight the Serbians and the Russians. CHAPTER VII RECONSIDERATION OF THE TRUE MODERN MEANING OF STATE AND OF PATRIOTISM IT thus becomes quite evident that all our ideas con- cerning the State, and our consequent duties to the State, must be reconsidered in the light of the entirety of our modern life and our moral and social consciousness. This consideration of our duties raises the whole question of patriotism, no doubt one of the cardinal virtues of civilised man. No term has been used to stimulate man to higher and nobler deeds, and at the same time been abused to cover, under the specious garb of enthusiasm and of unsel- fishness, the narrow and even unprincipled passions of designing self-seekers. The term " patriot " readily recalls to mind the words of Dr. Johnson : " the last resort of a scoundrel." 1 Though we may feel that when nations are at war Patriot- the time is not suited to a critical consideration of^J patriotic duties, we do feel that in more normal man's times, and when we are able dispassionately to ex- amine political ethics and our own attitude with 1 In an excellent article on Patriotism by Dr. Inge, Dean of St. Paul's (Quarterly Review, July 1915), with which I am in hearty agreement, the writer quotes some moralists " who have condemned patriotism " as pure egoism magnified and disguised. " Patriotism," says Ruskin, " is an absurd prejudice founded on an extended selfish- ness." Mr. Grant Allen calls it a vulgar vice the national or col- lective form of the monopolist instinct. Mr. Havelock Ellis allows it to be " a virtue among barbarians." For Herbert Spencer it is " reflex egoism extended selfishness." n6 MEANING OF STATE AND PATRIOTISM regard to patriotism and our obligation to the State, it is our bounden duty seriously to reconsider these fundamental conceptions and to modify public opinion in accordance with our feeling for right and wrong as produced by the development of modern civilised life. I would premise two general principles, which ought really to be axiomatic, in dealing with our political duties : (i) Our first duty to the State is, individually as citizens, to keep it up to the essential purposes of its existence. As the State is based upon community of past history, of present laws and customs, political and social, and of future aspira- tions, political, social, ethical, and cultural, we must contribute our share individually to keep these essential aims before the Government, as the " soul " of the nation or State. We must take heed that they are not submerged into lifeless formalism by the established powers of the State, or that the State does not become actually subversive of its moral principles, its national soul. (2) That each group of human duties must always be kept in harmony with the higher and more fundamental because universal duties. Our patriotism need never clash with our duties to humanity and re- ligion, provided we keep the State up to its essential purpose and ideals. Origin of When once man has risen above the animal stage amTpo- * n wn i cn he is entirely guided by unconscious in- uticai stinct, by the need for self-preservation, which is lcs> extended, through the course of his instincts for propagation, to the support and advance of his off- spring, until the family is evolved as a distinct social entity, and through the family, the clan, the tribe, the community, and the nation ; when once he has risen above this purely selfish instinct to the establishment of social laws, in which the interests ORIGIN OF SOCIAL ETHICS 117 of the individual are co-ordinated and the common interests of wider and even less tangible and mani- fest groups of individuals assert themselves, and lead to the establishment of social and moral laws, which all tend to check the powerful and unimpeded course of selfishness, then begins the higher phase of civilisation. This is marked, above all, not only by the recognition of ethical codes, in which reason- able altruism supersedes unreasoning egoism, but such moral codes transfuse the consciousness of men through the earliest phases of their infantile educa- tion, through every stage of their growth and life down to old age, until the civilised being develops, as an essential feature of his whole moral nature, the recognition of such an ethical code, and this con- verts the pure animal into what Aristotle called the social animal (%roorate sucn organised corporate existence will be exerted bodies, and make themselves felt in directions and in regions for which the activity and purpose of such bodies were in noway destined, in fact in spheres and objects different from, and often diametrically opposed to, their original purpose : so that the effect and the influence of the extended or perverted corporate activity become distinctly retarding and even des- tructive of effective social and moral ends. Perver- The actual channel of this nefarious activity of the sionof corporate spirit all the more dangerous and sub- the ideas . . . . .,. , . of versive because it is not manifest and is hidden from Ssdpiine t ^ ie v ^ ew ^ tnose wno believe its course to be in the and right direction marks a general virtue, in itself of 'de'corps. the highest order, called loyalty, discipline, or esprit de corps. Loyalty to a body whose interests and aims are unsocial and bad ; discipline which sub- ordinates the will as well as the reason and the 120 PERVERSION OF LOYALTY 121 moral sense to the advancement of a body or an institution which may clash with reason and morality in any given case ; the esprit de corps which, through thick and thin, bids and forces the members of the corps to act only in the interest of the body or the individual members of that body, overriding and wronging the claims of other bodies and the rights of other individuals, these all become harmful and may end in criminality. Of course, in such mis- guided action loyalty always remains as a virtue in itself, which will satisfy the conscience of those thus misguided, and will blind them to the unsocial and disastrous results of the definite allegiance which they show to a mistaken selfish or even criminal interference with wider duties and higher ultimate aims, to which all actions whether corporate or in- dividual ought to be subordinated. I venture toxhein- believe that if we seriously consider the ordinary ^^ a problems that meet us in our daily work and inter- done by course with our fellow-men, we may be astonished, and shall be shocked, to find how much actual harm, in every conceivable direction and manifestation of our life, is done by the misapplication of this cor- porate sense, blinding us to the consequence of our action and insinuating itself into the approval of our conscience under the garb of the one great virtue of loyalty. In the appointment to an office, humble or exalted, from that of an ordinary servant to a great public official, the just claims of the aspirant or applicant, based upon the suitability to perform the tasks of such an office, are wholly ignored or seriously affected by the fact that other competitors directly or indirectly appeal to the corporate spirit on other grounds. They may have belonged to the same religious sect, come from the same district, town, or village, have attended the same school or university in short, have had some local or social 122 CORPORATENESS association with the person or persons who have the right of disposal or election with the result that this would-be sense of loyalty may be decisive in turning the scales in favour of the less suitable can- didate and in counteracting the serious and just efforts, the long preparation and suitability of the absolutely best claimant, ultimately ruining or em- bittering his life. Dangers I must at once, in this connection, anticipate and fe er~at answer a possible objection and admit the claims of ing evil " corporate " association and knowledge to be con- corporaife sidered where a well-balanced choice is to be made, loyalty, namely, in admitting that, ceteris paribus, the per- sonal knowledge and confidence which may come from such corporate association, and may be wanting in the case of those with whom it does not exist, is clearly and justly in favour of a candidate, where all other claims are truly equal. We need not go so far into the regions of travestied impartiality as the would-be just man who would disfavour and ignore the claims of anybody because they were closely related to him by blood or otherwise, however well fitted for the position or the favour he might be. The extreme and perverted moral rigorism of Kant and its harmful effects were thus held up to ridicule by Schiller in one of his epigrams : Gerne dien ich den Freunden, dock thu' ich es leider mil Neigung, Und so wurmt es mich oft, dass ich nicht tugendhaft bin. and the answer : Da ist kein anderer Rath, Du musst suchen, sie zu verachten, Und mil Abscheu alsdann thun wie die Pflicht dir gebeut. Gladly serve I my friends, alas, though, I do it with pleasure. And thus often I fear that I not virtuous am. There is no other course, you must learn to despise your friends, And with dislike you must do what stern duty demands. PARTISAN LOYALTY 123 What I mean, however, is, that constant and widespread injustice and definite harm to the fulfil- ment of the world's needs in every aspect of human life result from the misapplication of this sense of corporate loyalty into directions with which the corporate existence, the aim and spirit of the body to which one thus shows this virtue, have had nothing whatever to do. One of the commonest forms which this insidious " Sec- virtue takes, with the most disastrous results, is^J an sectarian and party loyalties. You will constantly party hear people say : "I was born and bred in such a oya y ' faith and I must stick to it. It would be disloyal and treasonable I should feel something of a traitor were I to relinquish the sect and step out of the religious community in which I was born even if I no longer believe in its dogmas and articles of faith." So also : "I was born and bred a Tory, or an old Whig, or a Conservative, or a Liberal, and I mean to die one. I should be a traitor were I to change parties." Now, it is just in these two domains of life that, by being loyal to a sect or party, we are disloyal to our highest function and duty as in- telligent and moral social beings, that we are betray- ing the supreme trust of humanity and of the divinity in man his obligations to truth and justice. To lead people to believe that we are of a faith we have discarded, that we approve of political principles or definite political enactments which we do not deem to be conducive to the good of national life and the improvement of society are acts of treason, not of loyalty. It is obstructing duty and truth, besides retarding all progress and stultifying, or at least delaying, the advancement of the human race and human life. The more you consider the effects of this mis- applied corporate spirit in every conceivable aspect 124 CORPORATENESS Further of life, the more will you find that you have come oTim C6S to the root of one of the greatest social evils. Con- moral sider the actual life of any community, and the interests and social claims of the inhabitants in each, with a view to realising how the normal, reason- able, and just conditions of social life, even the business and working side of it, are interfered with, misdirected, and distorted by influences and con- siderations which have nothing whatever to do with the actual course and development of that life itself. It will then be seen how they retard, not only the harmony and higher development of social existence, but how they impede the work and business of the community. All this mischief may spring from a mistaken sense ultimately arising out of the virtue of loyalty. Moreover, this influence of subconscious loyalty may be associated with the highest forms of organisation in spiritual life, such as religion, political convictions, social traditions all good in themselves, but misdirecting the functions for which originally and essentially they were called into being. The marriage of two people, drawn to each other by true affection and harmony of aspirations and tastes, may be made impossible, because they happen to belong to different sects in formal religion, though their religious beliefs might inwardly be the same. Indi- viduals and families and those naturally destined to be friends may be kept asunder because of these reasons ; social conditions stereotyped and formalised, until they have lost all the spirit out of which they grew in the life of the past, may act in the same way. Party politics, even intensified in their antagonisms by would-be religious or social tradition, directly interfere with the free flow of social life, create antagonisms, and even prevent co-operation for an end which both parties deem just and advisable, to the detriment of the common life about them. Even EVIL EFFECTS OF "LOYALTY" 125 in a great war, and with the imminent danger to a whole nation of its very existence, petty partisanship in various forms may intrude its disintegrating influ- ence and weaken the strength of united effort to save the country. Fortunately for us, up to the present, party antagonism has to a great extent been kept under and in abeyance, but we can see it lifting its head and ready to spring at any moment. And the worst of it is, that he who manifests loyalty and esprit de corps in one of these narrow corporate bodies is pleased with himself for doing so and is praised by others for his loyalty. It is not only the coarsened and hardened " jobbing " politician who lives and lets live by " graft," who considers it right, and is called trustworthy and loyal by his henchmen, because he will override all the claims of municipal justice and good government, the interests of his fellow-townsmen, and the dictates of purity and honesty to which the conscience of the com- munity has subscribed, in order to further the party ends and the material interests of his fellow-conspira- tors. In a lesser and more refined degree you will meet with this spirit everywhere, and in the definite cases that will come to your notice day by day. Justice and reason and morality are trampled under- foot because of this distorted ideal of loyalty. The way to remedy this widespread evil, striking Continu- at the very roots of justice, of social good feeling, of ^ s ^ st " happiness and prosperity for individuals, communi- corporate ties and nations, is, in the first place, carefully tOco-o? test, whether the corporate bodies are fulfilling the din ation ideal functions for which they were instituted ; and, with 7 * 1 ** in the second place, to guard against the misappli- oth ? r cation of the purpose, methods and aims of one such body encroaching upon the sphere of another with which it has nothing to do, and in which its action thus becomes detrimental. Above all, we must so 126 CORPORATENESS co-ordinate the different spheres of duty and loyalty, that the wider and higher, the ultimate and univer- sally accepted aims and ideals, are not sacrificed to the narrower and lower interests, however urgent the claim of the more proximate duty may be upon us. What is most needed in the well-regulated life of individuals, as well as in larger social bodies, is co-ordination, in which the several duties are har- monised and regulated in due proportion, so that the rational and moral scale is clearly established, which avoids all artificial antagonism and unreasonable clashing, and thus conforms to the harmonised de- velopment of life. All will then tend to the final realisation of the highest ideals which humanity can establish in each period of its growth and development. It will then be found that each individual call of duty, including that of loyalty to the collective body with which we are associated, fits into the wider and harmonious ethical whole, and that the fulfilment of the one duty need not clash with that of the other, provided always that we can maintain that sense of proportion in which the higher and wider comprises the narrower and lower manifestations, and receives its real moral justification from the fact that the several constituent parts all tend to the advancement of the great whole. The Here too and above all here the subdivision of f ( TT.~i.pJ zontai" bodies and institutions must be horizontal and not to super- perpendicular. They must not be due to the thought- " Per- less, unreasonable and unjust accidents of locality, pendicu- o f contiguity, even of supposed consanguinity, our principle associates must be chosen, not because they happen ordinal to dwell m tne same street, have been thrust into the tionof same occupation in making their living, or because their fathers or grandfathers happened to have be- longed to one or the other association ; but because of the similarity of social character and tastes, be- CO-ORDINATION OF CORPORATE DUTIES 127 cause of the moral and intellectual affinity in thought, in habits and in ultimate ideals. On the other hand, when we are called upon to act together for a definite purpose in business or for public and political purposes, local as well as national, or a definite task that requires the concentrated effort directed by expert knowledge, we must concentrate our efforts upon the task itself, and not be distracted by the social affinities which guide us naturally and rightly into the groupings regulating our social life. I have just said that even the considerations of Claims of consanguinity are not to act out of place and out of proportion in the general scale of our duties. And this may help me to make clearer in a partial, though general, outline the practical working of such a scale of collective duties, the need for which constantly thrusts itself forward in actual life. There can be no doubt that we all have duties to our immediate family. We must guard its integrity, add to its prosperity, maintain its good fame, support those members who require our help, and further their interests to the best of our ability in every direction. This is a paramount duty from which no right-minded man or woman however unprejudiced and advanced in their habits of thought and in their critical insight into the very foundations of all laws governing the world can escape. But there is no reason why obedience to this fundamental commandment of civilised life should clash with our wider duties towards the community in which we live and towards the nation of which we are citizens. Above all, there is no reason why it should clash with those wider and general duties to Truth, Charity, Honesty, Self-respect, and the higher realisation of the har- monious life of humanity fitting into our widest conception of a still wider cosmical harmony. On the contrary, I venture to say that, in the humble 10 128 CORPORATENESS and old-fashioned sense of the word, a good son and a good daughter are most likely to be most efficient workers in the locality in which they may live ; that they make the best citizens for the nation or the Empire, and, in their several walks of life whether concerned in manual, intellectual, or artistic work they will be the more efficient from thus being good sons and daughters. On the other hand, I maintain with equal confidence, that those who raise this one and only and restricted form of corporate duty towards the family to a fetish, draw high and dense and imper- meable barriers round their affections, sympathies and obligations, thereby stunt the growth of their moral and social powers. They block out from their view and hearing all the sights and calls upon their activity and sympathies in the wider regions of communal existence, and the higher and ultimate ideals of human life. They not only cripple their manhood and womanhood and impede the growth and development of their true nature as human social beings, but, by this very restriction and compression of their sympathies and their power of altruistic affection, they w r ill actually not be such good sons and daughters, such affectionate and un- selfish members of a family, which they would have been had they co-ordinated this one group of duties in their proper place and in their proper proportion to the scale of duties, rising to the highest religious phase of man's conception of human society and the world at large. 1 Sym- As the Chauvinist is inferior to the patriot because andai. ne nas lifted the range of his altruistic imagination truism and his habits of unselfish activity, and will be, stances! within the State itself the more violent partisan, and within the party the more intense self-seeker, so the people whose interests and sympathies are entirely 1 See in Appendix passage from Jewish Question. ALTRUISM AND EGOISM 129 limited to the advancement of their own family will be more selfish, when the clash comes between their own desires and those of the other members of their own family. And this is so, because the power of affection and of altruistic devotion must be practised and strengthened in every direction in order to increase their vitality and vigour ; while, the more they are limited and contracted, the less do they become efficacious when tested in any given instance. Those who believe and maintain that the best hater is the best lover ; that those love best who con- centrate their affection upon one being or one friend and shut themselves out from the rest of the world ; that those who diffuse their feelings and passions among a wider range of friends and objects and aims are supposed thereby to weaken the concentrated energy of their affection and devotion when turned upon any one definite recipient of their love, are really misled by a false analogy. Consciously or un- consciously they are led to believe that affection, sympathy, enthusiasm and altruism exist in the human breast in a certain quantity, like a substance, solid or fluid, of which each individual can expend a certain amount and no more. The larger the field over which you expand and spread it, the thinner the layer in each definite point of the field covered. Thus he who loves many, they believe, can love no one as much as he who loves only one. But the analogy fails, because it is not a substance but a function and power which underlies our affections and our sympathies, and even our passions ; and powers grow with use, as they dwindle and atrophise with the restriction of such use. There may be extreme limits to either ; but the power of affection and of sympathy in the heart is like the strength of the muscles which increase as we develop them. And it is thus that the good son will be a better member I 3 o CORPORATENESS of his family through extending his interests and his affections far beyond the limits of his own hearth. If charity begins at home, it must not remain at home. Thus, without clashing, we can proceed upwards and beyond the narrower limits of our duties towards the community in which we live, and beyond that, to the State of which we are citizens, and so there need be no clashing of well-directed interests. Nor are we better sons from not listening to the dictates of honesty and of honour as guiding our every act, and of living up to our ultimate ideals as far as possible for ourselves and for humanity at large. Co-or- In this progression of duties, from the narrower and dination i mme diate to the wider and ultimate, the same of pa- triotism considerations with regard to our duty to the State mopoli-" anc ^ to humanity at large hold good as those which we tanism. have just noted in our duties to our family in their rela- tion to the wider duties. The questions here involved concern the duties of the true patriot. We are con- fronted by that much-discussed and difficult problem of the relation between true patriotism and what has been called cosmopolitanism. The two are sup- posed to clash ; and it has justly been said, in the passage quoted (p. 117) from George Eliot, that " The time is not yet come for cosmopolitanism to be highly virtuous, any more than for communism to suffice for social energy." As the epithet of patriot is so frequently abused by him who wishes to escape from ordinary duties, so cosmopolitanism has often been used by those who wish to shirk the duties of citizen- ship and pride themselves upon a wider vision and a higher scale of morality than those who, without assertion or pretence, follow the dictates of the traditional duties in the conditions in which they live. As Tennyson says : He is the best cosmopolite Who loves his native country best. THE TRUE COSMOPOLITAN 131 On the other hand, I have ventured to supplement these lines of the great poet in maintaining that He loves his native country best Who loves mankind the more. As we have just seen in regard of the family and the wider community, so we shall find that the citizen whose scale of morality reaches far beyond his own country and embraces the whole of humanity, nay, even includes wider cosmical and religious concep- tions and ideals, is more likely to be a good citizen and a true patriot. CHAPTER IX THE WRONG AND THE RIGHT NATIONALISM The right WE have already considered the effect of Chauvinism istence of u P on gd citizenship. To be a good citizen also the state, implies, first, that we should have an intelligent and thoroughly thoughtful conception of what the State means and what, in consequence, its laws enact ; and, secondly, that we should do our share to make this State a true expression of its purpose and to fashion its laws in accordance with the progressive needs of highest human nature and the ultimate ideals of humanity. No State has a right to exist the aims and objects of which run directly counter to those of humanity at large. When a State develops, or rather degenerates, into such a condition it changes from a moral State to an immoral State, and ought to be reformed or removed from the face of the earth. It might be an over-statement to say that a State is formed for the definite and direct purpose of confirming and advancing the moral aims of humanity ; but I doubt whether any political cynic or modern Macchiavelli would venture to hold that the aims of any State are avowedly immoral and clash with the supreme interests of humanity. It may be put as the first duty of every citizen, so far as he can and to however minimal a degree, to affect the constitution and function of the State of which he is a citizen, to bring the laws of his country and its government into harmony with the 132 THE GOOD PATRIOT AND THE GOOD SON 133 universally valid and recognised interests and morals of a wider humanity. He can then rest assured that, in following this course, he is performing the chief duties of a patriot. " My country ! right or wrong ! " may be a good epigrammatic and therefore exaggerated state- ment of the duties arising out of a peculiarly abnormal condition. Just as a good son or a devoted wife might say " My father," or " My husband, right or wrong." The son and the wife can never escape from certain duties which this close relationship imposes upon them. They may provide for the best legal advice, minister as far as possible to the com- forts which their criminal relative needs when he is confined in prison, and even support him as he is led to gallows ; but they dare not uphold and thus become party to the crime which he has committed. Before he had become a criminal and after he had been released, however, it was their duty to do all in their power to prevent him from falling or relapsing into crime. Though we must follow the call to arms when our country is at war, we must do our best to prevent an unjust war and to make war among civilised people impossible in the future. The ana- logy which I have just adduced fails, however, in one most important point : namely, in that the family is a body definitely fixed by manifest and immutable biological laws of consanguinity, while the State is not. The individual has nothing to do with the estab- lishment of such a relationship in the family ; he is born a son ; and the paternal relation of the father to the child is a definite physical fact. But humanity has risen above the purely patriarchal con- ception of the State. The modern State is a volun- tary creation of intelligent human beings, based upon fundamental ideas, to the realisation of which they all give their consent, guided by their best 134 THE WRONG AND RIGHT NATIONALISM thought and confirmed by their moral consciousness. Whatever it may have been in the past, however varied and numerous may have been the different forms under which that great creation of social beings manifests itself in history, not one of the earlier conceptions will fit the facts and the needs, the political convictions of modern man. Kenan's In the very able and lucid discourse, Qu'est-ce Qrfest-ce q u > une Nation ? Ernest Renan answers the ques- qu une * * Nation? tion as to the essence of what a State or a nation really is. After convincingly proving that the modern State does not depend for its essence upon race, language, interests, religious affinities, geo- graphy, or military necessity, he then declares that a nation is a " soul," a spiritual principle : " Une nation est une ame, un principe spirituel " : and he then defines what constitutes such a " soul," such a spiritual principle. The soul arises out of the common possession of a rich inheritance of memories ; the spiritual principle is the actual consent, the desire to live together, the will to continue and to realise in the common life the undivided heritage which has been thus received. I strongly recommend the reader to study the eloquent exposition of this philo- sopher and great master of style. The memories, the inheritance of the past, the sufferings and struggles which have given the soul to a nation and constitute one of its strongest elements of unity, culminate in what we call its civilisation (Kultur), the degree of civilisation to which each country has attained. Race and country, language and religious affinities, interests, and, above all, self-preservation (which cor- responds to what Renan called military necessities) may all have contributed in the past to produce this unity and may powerfully urge, as they justify, each citizen to preserve that unity. Each one has its claims But we must guard against urging the THE TRUE ELEMENTS OF NATIONALITY 135 claims of each out of proportion to the wholeness of this organism. It is a far-reaching error to believe that the more apparently fundamental, tangible, and patently manifest one of these elements is, the more urgent become its claims to consideration for the State and for the support of such claims on the part of the individual. The very fact that country is often synonymous with State, that people or nation are used indifferently to convey the idea of race, that religious differences were frequently in history the direct causes of antagonism and war between States, might make each of these elements appear decisive and essential connotations in the conception of a State. But there are other elements which go to the making of a nationality, apparently remote, but none the less effective. There is the history of morals as well as the common intellectual achieve- ments of the several peoples themselves. They may be more directly and potently creative of the " nation's soul " than the other physical factors mentioned above. We again have the horizontal, and not the perpendicular, division forced upon us. In the epigrammatic perhaps the exaggerated form of two mottoes to a book/ I attempted to convey this truth by maintaining, first, " that the Abolition of Slavery and the Renaissance are as much a fatherland as are England, Germany, France, or the United States " ; and, secondly (with the doubtful introduction of a newly coined word), " that there is a strong bond of humanity ; but there is also the golden chain of gentlemanity." I endeavoured to suggest in these epigrams that the common achieve- ments of civilisation, upon which the actual con- sciousness of the people in a civilised State rests, are as direct and potent a tie and certainly ought to be so in binding together into a social and political 1 The Jewish Question, etc. New York, 1894. 136 THE WRONG AND RIGHT NATIONALISM unity the people with whom these achievements of a common humanity have entered into the very bone and marrow of their moral and intellectual exist- ence, as are race, geography, formal religion, or interests. What I miss in the excellent exposition of Renan though I thoroughly agree with his critical examina- tion and rejection of the several elements that are commonly supposed to determine the conception of a State, and though I agree with the soul-giving importance of common memories and common suffer- ing in the past what I miss is, that he has not clearly considered the present and future activities of such a collective entity as a State in confirming these memories and in preparing for more definite activities and ideals in the future. We must add in the first place to the elements which he has adduced the common laws and customs, and, in the second place, the moral consciousness of this " soul " of a State. These common laws and customs do not only direct the actual life, the public opinion, the tone and moral of a community or a nation, and give it a The con- common consistency and individuality ; but they stitution a j so j eac j directly to the formation of a political andlaws. J . . ,.~ , consciousness, manifesting itself in the codified or un- codified constitution of each nation. And it is this immediate self-expression of a State in its political constitution, itself the outcome of all these several State-forming elements, which gives it its most clearly manifest individuality and personality in its relation to the citizens within and to other States without. The But the second element of equal importance in the ^^J and making and maintenance of a State is the fact of its ideas. moral and social ideals, towards which as a whole it tends, and which give it the ultimate sanction of the best that is in each one of its citizens. For as it is not enough now to say that the greatest happiness to PATRIOTISM AND COSMOPOLITANISM 137 the greatest number satisfies our political conscience as it did that of the doctrinaires of the Manchester school, it is not even enough to say that we wish to realise our Kultur within ourselves and even to impose it upon others ; for this must imply that we are satisfied that our Kultur is worthy of thus being realised and desirable in the interests of those upon whom we wish to impose it. In one word, it means, Relation that we must bring our national and political ethics Jjjj^i into conformity with general human ethics. Unless ethics to we can honestly convince ourselves that the ultimate etSS? aim of the State is, not only to satisfy and to elevate its citizens, but to contribute to the welfare and advancement of humanity at large, we cannot feel honestly convinced that our legislative and political activities are following the right course. But when we are satisfied that our national activities are thus harmonised with the wider and ultimate ethical laws of humanity, we can actually adopt, not only Patriot- cosmopolitan ideals, but definite cosmopolitan duties J^^* 1 and aims without in any way clashing with our duties poiitan- as patriots. In any case, we then find that race and geographical position are not enough to separate or isolate us from the rest of mankind ; that what I have called the perpendicular subdivision must be replaced by the horizontal ; and that our ideals, even as applied to the State itself as a separate entity, recognise Humanity and the supreme laws of ethics in the light of humanity that is, and the desirable humanity that is to follow, and are to be subordinated under these supreme laws and adapted to these supreme ends. We then find that not only is war between such civilised nations a monstrosity, but that actu- ally there is the strongest bond uniting all those who hold the same convictions and who cherish the same aspirations for the future of man and the ad- 138 THE WRONG AND RIGHT NATIONALISM vancement of civilisation as powerful as, if not more powerful than, those which bind human beings to- gether in active or in passive community on the ground merely of race, topography, or local propin- quity, or community of material interests. Such cos- Cosmopolitanism thus becomes a fact which in no tanism'in wav c ^ asnes with patriotism and with loyalty to the inde- State of which we are citizens. We shall then have ESvidu- a rea l federation based, not upon fortuitous con- aiity of ditions and fluctuating interests, but upon common States 1 ideals which are more real and more lasting than and . .. the supposed practical and opportunistic motives in ties. the daily life of the unthinking. There is no danger, moreover, of the destruction of individuality in each separate State as a result of such wider and actual federation. Nor does such wider federation in any way imply absorption of the smaller States and nationalities by the larger. On the contrary, the freedom and individuality of the smaller States will thereby be assured and strengthened. Roman- There is an insidious fallacy in the reasoning of false*' man Y people who worship the picturesqueness and concep- variety in a manifestation of individual character individu- fr m a supposedly artistic, but really from a theatrical and sham-artistic, motive and point of view. They fear the loss of picturesqueness in the world when through such federation the human races are brought actually more closely together. Such romanticists deplore the spread of freedom and equality in the opportunities of life, of sanitary improvements, of saving of arduous and degrading labour, of the increase of all comforts in living to the wretched toiler of the field or artisan, as compared with the misery of mediaeval servitude, which they glorify through the distorted and falsified vision of a degraded cowardice as regards the present and of an illusory mental obliquity as regards the past. They selfishly would " PICTURESQUENESS " IN NATIONALITY 139 like to keep, for their own puny theatricality and artistic enjoyment, the hind and serf dwelling in the most wretched squalor in his picturesque hovel and issuing thence in his picturesque costume, as, with cringing servility, he salutes his over-lord, and shuffles to and from his wretched toil from morning unto weary night in order to keep body and soul together for himself and his starving children. He deplores the introduction of all those improvements in living, in education of mind and character, which rob people of this " picturesque " individuality and raise them collectively to a higher standard of human existence ; as he regrets the facile means of modern transporta- tion, not only rightly when they wantonly destroy the beauties of nature, but because they make more accessible to the masses of even ignorant and un- appreciative toilers the opportunities of raising their physical vitality and their spiritual taste. And, more or less consciously, he deplores this because it interferes with the quiet and secluded enjoyment of these rare beauties by those who deem themselves the supremely privileged aesthetic aristocracy of the world, and whose enjoyment in its concentrated seclusion from all interference is disturbed by the wider participation, as the mystic and sacred circles of the chosen lose their exclusive solidarity. 1 1 The following passage from The Work of John Ruskin (by the Author) deals with this question, p. 151 : "There is a truth strongly put by Ruskin for which he would have gained more universal recogni- tion if the statements of it had been more moderate and in conformity with fact, namely, the duty of maintaining the land which we inhabit in the conditions conducive to health, and with the careful guarding and preservation of the natural and historical beauties, which are, to omit all their spiritual qualifications, real national possessions of the highest economical value. To allow the smoke from the chimneys to turn pure air into pestilential miasmata, to see beautiful streams and rivers defiled, to witness the most lovely and unique scenes ruthlessly robbed of their chief charms of natural beauty these are losses which, if they do not bear comparison with actual industrial loss to individual members or groups of the community, will outweigh them heavily. 140 THE WRONG AND RIGHT NATIONALISM But there is no danger that among the States those forms of justified and desirable individuality, or among communities, localities, or individuals will be destroyed by the realisation of such wider federation towards a common end for the whole of humanity. On the con- trary, war and conquest are the levellers, and this war does not only mean the clash of arms and the destruction of lives, but it also means a commercial and industrial war as pitiless and as destructive as that of rifles and cannon which is being waged mercilessly throughout the modern world by the upholders of the highest Militar- civilisation. Militarism and commercialism are the merciai' enem i es f a ll individuality, as, on the other extreme, ism, and are socialism and the blind and unintelligent tyranny th^ene ^ tne trades unions. Freed from these levellers of mies of ail all superiority and genius, the human individual and aiity? " the collective groups, local or ethnical, and also the separate States, will more freely and more effectually develop their own individualities and contribute to the harmony and progress of humanity as a whole. The separate States all possessing their " souls," as Renan has called them, will assert, refine, and strengthen their national souls. They exist now in The day may come when one of the most important functions of the government concerned with the internal affairs of a nation will be to secure and guard the public lands for the purposes of national health and of national delectation. ' ' But when Ruskin complains that the delightful silence which reigned in some rural districts is now disturbed by the life of industry, and that portions of Switzerland which he and other kindred spirits could once enjoy in comparative seclusion are vulgarised by numbers of uneducated tourists ; when he complains of the very facility of approach to many of these sacred haunts brought about by the rail- ways, and the picnics which do not agree with the exquisite musings of the solitary votary of nature, we cannot help feeling that this arises not only from a romantic but from an essentially unsocial spirit. There can be no doubt that our enjoyment must be impaired by the reduction of what stimulates our highest emotions to a commonplace ; but we must willingly make this sacrifice when we consider the great gain accruing to hundreds or thousands where before it but reached units." INDIVIDUALITY OF NATIONS 141 spite of all the forces that go to their undoing, and we can readily recognise them ; and each one of them contributes to the health and vigour and the ennobling of the soul of humanity nay, of the World- soul. I may perhaps be allowed here to quote the words which I addressed to the Congress of German Journalists when they met in London in 1906 : " The positive aim, on the other hand, which we must have before us in this meeting is the safeguard- ing and the advancement of that Western European civilisation which rests upon us all together. I do not mean by this that this civilisation is tied down to the European Continent. The United States is an integral part of it, and, to single out one personality, I am sure you will all agree that no living man is more truly and effectually moved by these ideals than President Roosevelt. Moreover, if in the Far East Japan shows her sincere eagerness to adopt and make her own the best that is in our civilisation the best of our ideals, not merely our material achievements they, too, will form an organic part in this great con- federation. Yet, to feel this community and to further its aims, it is not at all necessary that we should all be the same. On the contrary, it is here, within this sphere of common union, that true Nationalism has its fullest and most effective play. We are each of us, in our peculiar national charac- ter and individuality, necessary to the maintenance and advance of this common civilisation. If, to take but our three great Western nations, I might venture upon a bold generalisation they are always inaccurate I would say that in the past history of thought and culture and public life, England has often performed the function of invention and initiation ; this was the achievement of a Shakespeare, of a Bacon, a Newton, a Darwin, and, in public life, of the birth of Parliamentarism. Germany has with glorious vigour stood before the world as the country of intellectual depth and sincerity of mind, of thor- oughness and spiritualisation of man's achievements 142 THE WRONG AND RIGHT NATIONALISM in all spheres, of unending perseverance in the fight for truth, carrying everything into the realm of highest and widest conception. France is the nation of artistic imagination and courage, which leads them not to fear the attempt of carrying into actual life, into palpitating realisation, the bold ideas conceived by the intellect ; it has, as a nation, the artistic, the creative, the passionate courage in giving actual form to the world of thought. Germany educates the mind, England the character, France the imagination which gives vitality to both. In the peaceful interpenetration of these forces our ethical life will be raised. All three of us, fighting with our several weapons, working in our several methods, approaching the common goal from our different roads, lead mankind to what we are bound to consider the best and the highest." Unity of The unity and solidarity of the federation of civil- tion nsa ~ ised States is the great reality even now in the The consciousness of all right-thinking men all over the Tribunal. world. At this moment it rises in the hearts of countless men, from the illiterate unskilled labourer to the philosopher, in violent though helpless pro- test, not only against the barbarism, cruelty and treachery, but against the absolute stupidity, of a war such as is now devastating Europe, jeopardising the prosperity of the countries farthest removed from the scene of war, and setting the hands of the clock back for generations in the progress of the world. Para- And the irony of it all is that this unity has received contra- deliberate and powerful expression in the actual diction to international politics of our own days namely, in versai m ~ tne Hague Convention. But what have we witnessed con- within the last few months ? That the deliberate nessTby resolutions passed in concert by all the powerful War - States and subscribed to by them with their sign- manual and political authority in the same spirit that a bond and contract is recognised as binding FEDERATION OF STATES 143 in the business of daily life between individuals, corporate commercial bodies, and all other organisa- tions of civilised States, have been ignored, spurned, and set ruthlessly aside, and have made way for the practice of most savage barbarians without even the chivalry that these may have possessed man turned to beast, and adding his cunning to the savagery of the hungry animal. We ask ourselves : How was this possible ? How could the whole civilised world with its so-called public opinion, its moral consciousness, even its common interests, stand aside and see itself ignored and flouted in the face of its all-powerful will ? The answer is : first, because there are many people even would-be philosophers and psychologists who maintain that war is an inevitable incident in the life of nations, that it is essential to man, even man who has risen from the prehistoric savage to the citizenship of the most highly civilised States ; and second, that there is no right without might, or rather that the right cannot prevail unless there is might to enforce it. ii CHAPTER X THE DISEASE OF WAR IT has actually been stated, that war is a " bio- logical necessity." Who has ever heard, or who can ever conceive of a biological necessity which means the survival of the unfittest the slaying of those who are, not only physically, but morally the superior members of the community ? It is a wanton perver- sion by man of nature's primary law of the Survival of the Fittest. As Dr. Inge has pointed out : l " Its dysgenic effect by eliminating the strongest and healthiest of the population, while leaving the weaklings at home to be fathers of the next generation, is no new discovery. It has been supported by a succession of men, such as Tenon, Dufau, Foissac, de Lapouge, and Richet in France ; Tiedemann and Seeck in Germany ; Guerrini in Italy ; Kellogg and Starr Jordon in America. The case is, indeed, over- whelming. The lives destroyed in war are nearly all males, thus disturbing the sex equilibrium of the population ; they are in the prime of life, at the age of greatest fecundity ; and they are picked from a list out of which from 30 to 40 per cent, have been rejected for physical unfitness. It seems to be proved that the children born in France during the Napoleonic wars were poor and undersized 30 millimetres below the normal height. War combined with religious celibacy to ruin Spain. ' Castile makes men and wastes them,' said a Spanish writer. ' This sublime and terrible phrase sums up the whole of Spanish history.' Schiller was right : Immer der Krieg ver- schlingt die besten." 1 loc. cit. 144 WAR AND LAW CONTRADICTORY 145 We may add that, in countries with voluntary enlistment, like England in normal conditions, the dysgenic effect with regard to the transmission of moral qualities is still more pronounced. For it is the bravest and all those possessed of the highest sense of duty who enlist, while the moral " wasters " remain at home. Those who maintain the justice of war as an in- War eradicable element in the constitution of the human neitt "-r a phy- being can claim logical consistency when, in defining sioio- war, they maintain that it is the arbitrament o superior power and not of reasoned justice. The moral and moment reasoned justice is introduced in any degree, there is no logical reason why it should not be intro- sit Y- duced in its entirety. You cannot deal with justice as with the curate's egg. There is no partial justice. The in _ If you have the power in any way to curb the realisa- justice of tion of might in this struggle of adjudicating right, Might there is no reason why the whole of might should not divorced be subordinated to reasoned right and bow to its right commands . War governed by law is a contradiction in terms. It may be said that in the duel of former days, as in the prize-fight, certain laws have been enforced regulating the contest and establishing a subdivision of law within the clashing of powers to satisfy the sense of fair play. But it must never be forgotten that in the case of the duel and of the prize-fight there was a superior legal power outside and beyond, which could at any moment have caused the appeal to a decision by power to be entirely quashed and discontinued. Moreover, from a wider point of view, even the introduction of this partial aspect of law in the form of an assurance of fair play in the process of the actual fight did not remove the iniquity that the contestants might not be fairly matched through mere physical preparation or by the concentration of practice, ending in professional 146 THE DISEASE OF WAR skill on the part of one of the contestants who sacri- fices the whole of his normal humanity and claims to social eligibility by turning himself into a mere righting machine. The analogy, therefore, does not hold good when it comes to States with no superior constraining power to impress the controlling dictates of equity and law such as exists in the case of contests between individuals. If, therefore, the whole element of reasoned justice is eliminated from the arbitrament of power in war, it is quite consistent to maintain (as has frankly and cynically been done by German historians and politicians) that power must be made as fearful as possible, and there is thus no limit to brutality and savagery. History That this is in flagrant contradiction to the moral confirm consciousness and to the public opinion of all the im- civilised nations need hardly be insisted upon. Nor biiity'of can we believe that the theories and practices of the war- the German militarists who are responsible for this spirit. war are really endorsed by the vast majority of the German people and would not be repudiated by the thoughtful and highly moral representatives of that nation. The chief fallacy of those who consider war a neces- sary occurrence in the organisation of human society is based upon a fundamental misconception of fact in history concerning the action of States towards one another, as well as the social development of the individuals within each State. Those who are thus misled point to the past and ask the question, whether there ever was a period in man's past when there was no war. Their views would apparently receive some support as regards progress in the moral development of political units throughout history when we realise the sudden relapse into barbarism and savagery in our own days and at this compara- HISTORICAL FALLACY OF WAR 147 tively advanced stage of development in civilisation. But this astounding modern phenomenon in the history of mankind is to a great extent to be accounted for by the prevalent inadequacy of the very concep- tion of what a State is. Furthermore, when history is no longer measured by a few centuries, but a much wider range of study and generalisation is admitted, the claims to immutability of customs, laws and interests lose all justification, and we no longer dare speak of " natural " and " essential " attributes of human beings and human society. If we turn back to prehistoric times, we shall onthe find that this fighting instinct of man dominated, JhJ^v not only individual life at a time when it formed dence a necessary impulse to self-preservation, but also ruled the communal existence of each period, the it was family, the clan or tribe, or race, or nation. Fight- dominant ing and war were constantly present in the minds ^ ct ? r in and life of the peoples of bygone ages. It was the early ruling factor, directing their earliest education for P enods * which man prepared himself in every stage, and the skill and superiority he attained in it formed the chief basis of all social distinction and moral praise, and, even, through the further effect upon sexual selection, directed and modified the survival of the fittest and the character of races as they advanced in the course of time. The direct act of mere physical fighting was ever present to the conscious and the subconscious habitual life of bygone peoples. In the earliest stages of man's history it would have been quite impossible to convince men or communities that they were not to look upon their immediate neighbours or the people living but a few miles distant as enemies, whom at any time it might be their duty to subdue by physical force ; that their possessions would be secured even for generations to come ; that justice in their claims to possession would be 148 THE DISEASE OF WAR enforced without physical intervention, hundreds of miles away, nay, beyond the seas, among peoples and races whom they might never see and whose exist- ence and institutions were completely foreign to them. Imagine the effect upon a man living we will not say in the palaeolithic, but in the neolithic age, nay, even upon the inhabitants of Central Europe for some centuries in the Middle Ages if you were to tell him that he could assert and maintain his rights and secure his life and independence in every aspect of his existence, from the lowest phases up to his power of selecting his own rulers, and that these claims would be based upon the principles of reasoned justice for which all beings crave from the moment they become sentient and intelligent ! Surely, had it been possible to describe such a state of things to our earlier ancestors, they would not only have con- sidered us Utopians and dreamers, but deliberate liars. At all events, they would have met us, had they been given to generalisation, with the dogmatic statement that it was " contrary to human nature " thus to be subdued by general law ; and, on the narrow analogy of their own immediate and lower experience in which such radical change would appear to be impossible, they would have asserted the absolute impossibility of transferring such conditions to wider and still higher spheres. The step from some conditions prevailing even a few centuries ago, when witches were still burnt and their existence was vouched for by the mass of credulous people, to those ruling our present life to such a degree, that we cannot conceive of their not having existed before us, is, I maintain, much greater than from the international warlike attitude of the present day to the day when war between nations has become inconceivable. To give but one further instance of the unfounded- ness of such negative prediction with regard to future WARFARE AND DUELLING 149 developments of human society, based upon the Analogy narrow experience of lower conditions of life pre- ^ u vailing at the time, we need but turn to the considera- tion of one social institution which dominated the life of the highest class of human beings in civilised countries but a short time ago and which, strangely enough (though upon examination we shall find that it is not so strange !) still survives in Germany. This is the duel. Three generations ago the duel was still the customary means of righting wrongs among a certain section of society in England. It has entirely vanished from our lives. Not only our children, but we ourselves of the present generation, can no more think of it as a means of redress for wrongs done to us than we would turn to augury for direction in battle, or to the " Judgment by God " to maintain the justice of our individual claims. Had you asked any gentleman a hundred years ago, whether he could dispense with the duel, he would have said : " Cer- tainly not ; it is essential to human nature to fight, and it is still more essential for a man of honour to stand up for his rights in certain contingencies at the risk of his life to punish the aggressor and to defend his honour." This same view prevails to-day among some of the most highly intelligent, honour- able, and distinguished people in Germany. More than once I have had certain Germans, whom I hold in the highest esteem and in whose intelligence and sense of justice in all other respects I have the greatest faith I have had such men ask me : " How can you get on in England without the duel ? It is impos- sible to do so." In spite of all the reasons one could give, they considered our attitude to be almost " against nature," certainly against higher nature. But we can well understand, in the light of what we now know, why a Bernhardi should uphold this effete and absurd institution, even why a Bismarck 150 THE DISEASE OF WAR and (as I have heard him do on the authority of that great statesman) a Treitschke, should have praised the grotesque survival of the attenuated form of duelling practised by German students, as a most beneficent influence in the development of their social life and character. One can understand why the Kaiser and his immediate military advisers should uphold it, and why the judiciary bench should have committed such a legal crime in dealing with the Zabern affair. But surely when the definite example is before their eyes of other civilised nations like the English and the Americans, emerging from this lower and more barbarous survival of earlier days and clearly demonstrating that, in spite of the fighting instinct in man, the duel is entirely expunged from the records of our civilised life, it can then no longer be main- tained that the duel is an essential, necessary institu- tion which will maintain itself for all times. War be- Now, the same applies, a fortiori, to war between nations States. For the quarrels and the righting between is less of individuals, and the causes which lead to them, are sity^ha'n so frequent and imminent in the diversified conditions the duel o f human intercourse that they must constantly between indivi- occur, however readily they may be suppressed by duals. the hand of justice. And when we consider the variation in personal impetuosity and passion among millions of men and women living together, we can understand how the violence of passion and the haste of action may constantly produce transgression of the law, even crime in its most destructive forms. But remember : large bodies move slowly. In spite of the " psychology of the crowd," and the diffi- culty of calming or subduing the collective passion of a moving mass, when once it begins its onward rush, the action of States especially those blessed with representative government must be compara- tively slow and deliberate and give time for reflection MIGHT AND RIGHT 151 and for the consideration of the claims of justice. A man, even the most self-controlled and temperate, may strike a quick blow in a fit of passion ; a State cannot go to war without forethought and deliberate preparation. At all events, the possibility of such an outburst which may in the end become most passionate, is not conceivable in the case of a modern State, and therefore justice, in the case of international differences and contests, can always prevent ; while in the individual life within the State it can only menace by general enactments, or punish after the crime has already been committed. It is thus more possible not less in the relation between States, to counteract and check the instinct for fighting and the antagonism to law and justice, than it is in the case of individuals. The only remaining difference is that in the one case there is the constraining power behind the law, and in the other it does not yet exist. CHAPTER XI THE CURE OF THE DISEASE OF WAR The IT thus remains for us and the end of this terrible onion of war wjjj mar k the initiation to add the element of nugnt and might to that of right, and thus to wipe war among infer-" 1 civilised nations from off the face of the world for national all times. What Kant and so many philosophers la ' dreamt of will, nay, must, in the necessity of events, now become a reality. We must add to the Hague Tribunal the power of enforcing its enactments and of policing international relations. It has been admitted on all sides in fact, it has almost become a commonplace to say that some- thing must be done in the future to assert the collec- tive will of civilised humanity in order to convert the arbitrament of war into the arbitrament of justice. It has been urged by experienced statesmen, practical and at the same time thoughtful and high-minded, Federa- that there must be some form of federation of at states in- least the European States, or of the civilised States sufficient. o f the world, asserting the unity of interests and the unity of ideals which they all have in common, and thus to provide for a tangible safeguard of peace. I venture to doubt whether such a federation by itself would prove practically efficacious. The evil tra- ditions of international diplomacy are so strongly established that, reform them as you may, the separate interests dominating each one of the States, and within each State powerful bodies, whether 152 INTERNATIONAL ALLIANCES INSUFFICIENT 153 political, commercial, or financial, would all make for the undoing of this spirit of unity. The avowed or implied, the secret or public, formation of groups of alliances or ententes, corresponding to the community of certain interests (themselves temporary and changeable), the affinities of race and religions, and many other disintegrating causes, will make themselves felt and affect the solidarity of such a federation. A closer federation in some form may come, and it will come in the course of evolution when once the menace of war is removed, and will then be more firmly based on the actual growth of the lasting factors which make for humanitarian harmony. But the first and supreme necessity is to add, hiAninter- the most direct and effective form, the element of a ^ t nal might to that of right, the power of constraining the backed world to bow to the judicial enactments of an Inter- quate 6 " national Court. Then, and only then, will there power is be practical efficiency : and this practical advance safe- n y towards an ideal end will be strengthened by the fact g uard of DCcLCC that it conforms to material interests and requirements, to economy of public treasure, in the case of each State. The economic principles of co-operation, of The division of labour, organisation and concentration of energy and resources, have been dominant in modern modern commerce and industry mainly for the good and make's for sometimes for the bad. But they certainly commend such c ?- themselves to the intelligence and the interests of the among 1 modern world. Disarmament, or partial disarma- states - ment, is called for by the workers all over the world. The burden of taxation which armaments imply Burdens had already become intolerable and in itself led to tforTbe^ effective opposition in every one of the States apart cause of from all the other evil consequences of its effects mentsun- which have so frequently been pointed out and have bearable, been so fully realised of late. The history of the Prussian Army since the days 154 THE CURE OF THE DISEASE OF WAR Mere of Frederick the Great and Napoleon has shown tkmof now eas ily an Y restrictions regulating the sizes of armies armies and navies can be evaded. Nor can it be an maments advantage to encourage interference with the internal not affairs of any State and thus to jeopardise its inde- enough. , pendence. More It will be more effective, as well as more economical, 1 ' an d in conformity with the spirit of our age, to create mical.and international armies and armaments, towards which effective i <-> -i 1-1 to create each State pro rata contributes its portion, which will interna- b e so m uch more powerful than those of any one tional , _T r i armies State or group of States, that they can enforce the " enactments f an International Court beyond all doubt or cavil. The international unity within national freedom and independence nay, safe-guard- ing and strengthening the independence of each State must find direct and forcible expression in the establishment of an International Court backed by an international army and navy which are placed entirely under its control. Nature I may perhaps be allowed to quote what on this stitution point I published in 1899 (The Expansion of Western of such Ideals, etc., p. 105) in a sketch of how this federation an Inter- . ' . ' r Jl . . . ...... . . . national of civilised States might be realised in the institution of Court. one cen tral international tribunal with a corresponding power to enforce its decisions : " It is thus that the expansion of Western ideals will ultimately tend towards the supreme goal of the World's Peace ; and I maintain, in all sincerity of conviction, that it is through the introduction of the United States into this great expanding move- ment, and through, as a first step, the realisation of the English-speaking Brotherhood that this ultimate goal is most likely to be attained. " When, within the last decade, colonial expansion more and more asserted itself as the dominant motive- power in the policy of European nations, the lovers ENGLISH-SPEAKING BROTHERHOOD 155 of progress and peace were struck with horror at the appearance of this new Leviathan, this great enemy of humanity, that threatened to furnish a continu- ance of causes for internecine warfare after the dynastic rivalries had died away, and when the racial and territorial differences seemed to be gradually losing their virulent energy in Europe. It looked as if we were entering into a chaotic period of Universal Grab, in which each nation would rush in to seize all the spoils it could carry, and would frequently have to drop them in order to fight its equally voracious neighbour. This gloomy view has been completely dispelled by the prospect of a real English-speaking Brotherhood. For, as regards colonial expansion, I can see the English-speaking conception of colon- isation in clear opposition, in the domain of material interests as well as in that of ideas and ideals, to that of the Continental European Powers. And this common ground of thought, feeling, and action will of necessity tend to bind the English-speaking peoples together. Through it I look forward to much more than an Anglo-Saxon Alliance. I can see the day when there will be a great confederation of the inde- pendent and self-governing English-speaking nations, made clearly recognisable and effective to the outer world by some new form of international corporation, which statesmen and jurists will be able to devise when the necessity of things calls for it. For, day by day, this union of the English-speaking peoples is becoming more of an accomplished fact in the social and economical life of the people themselves. Consider the strength of such a confederation ! Who will say nay to it ? And the stronger it is, the better for the peace of the world ; it will ensure this more effectually than any number of Peace Congresses con- voked by the mightiest of monarchs. " Step by step this power will advance, binding the nations together, not severing them. For it will be based upon ideas which unite, and not upon race which severs. And all those who share these ideas are ipso facto a part of this union ; Germany, which stands before the world as a great leader of human 156 THE CURE OF THE DISEASE OF WAR intelligence, will be with us. France, which over- threw mediaeval feudalism and first raised the torch of freedom, will be with us in spite of the tragic crisis through which it is at present passing, when vicious reaction is contending with delirious anarchy ; for it must never be forgotten that the France of to-day produced the Picquarts, Zolas, and many other heroes who fought for the sanctity of justice. Thousands of Russians, their numbers constantly swelling, will be with us in spirit, and the spirit will force its essence into inert matter ; these leaders will educate the people until they will modify (let us hope gradually) the spirit of their own government. " Then we shall be prepared to make an end of war ; because behind the great humanitarian ideas there will be the power to safeguard these ideas. ' No right without might ' is a cynical aphorism of which history has proved the truth. To be effective, the law must have behind it the power to enforce its decisions. It is so in national law, and it will be so in international law. " Let us allow our ' dream ' to materialise still further. I can see this great Confederacy of the future established permanently with its local habi- tation, let us say on one of the islands the Azores, Bermuda, the Canaries, Madeira. And here will be sitting the great Court of Arbitration, composed of most eminent men from all the nations in the Con- federacy. Here will be assembled, always ready to carry into effect the laws enacted, an international army, and an international fleet, the police of the world's highways. No recalcitrant nation (then, and only then, will the nations be able to disarm) could venture to oppose its will to that of this supreme representative of justice. Perhaps this Court may develop into a Court of Appeals, dealing not only with matters of State. The function of this capital to the great Confederacy will not only concern war, but peace as well. There will be established here ' Bureaux ' representing the interests which all the nations have in common. As regards commerce and industry, they will distribute throughout the world THE NEW AMPHYCTIONIC COUNCIL 157 important information concerning the supply and demand of the world's markets, and counteracting to some extent the clumsy economical chaos which now causes so much distress throughout the world. Science and art, which are ever the most effective bonds between civilised peoples, will there find their international habitation, and here will be established the great international universities, and libraries, and museums. There will be annual exhibitions of works of art and industry, so that the nations, compara- tively so ignorant of each other's work now, should learn fully to appreciate each other. And at greater intervals there will be greater exhibitions and international meetings, the modern form of the Olympic games. The Amphyctionic Council of Delphi, as well as the Olympic Games of the small Greek com- munities, will find their natural and unromantic revival in this centre of civilisation, this tangible culminating point of Western Ideals. Thus will the World's Peace be ensured, the nations be brought together, and the ancient inherited prejudices and hatreds be stamped out from the face of the earth." The great Amphyctionic Council, into whose hands all the civilised States will, by mutual consent, place the power to enforce its enactments, will consist of the supreme judges delegated by each State. It may at once be questioned whether these international delegates are to be appointed for life or for a definite term ; by whom they are to be appointed ; and in what proportion they are to represent the several states. i . As to the duration of their office, it appears to The me advisable that the first appointment be made for a definite period ; but that after this test they the inter- should receive the security of tenure and the conse- fudges. quent status, prestige, and independence which accom- pany a life position. Of course there would be definite grounds, of incompetence or dishonesty, on which they could be removed from office. 158 THE CURE OF THE DISEASE OF WAR The 2. It might prove most practical that the first appoint- appointment, as a privilege and a grave responsi- ment. bility, be vested in the head of each State, and that it should clearly be understood that, by personal capacity, by training, and by achievement, by pro- minence in the State, and by integrity of character, the appointee be the highest representative whom each head of State can select for such an office. In any case, it would always be desirable that he should not be tainted from the outset by party politics and be merely the representative of the Government which happens at the time to be in power in each State. In fact, one supreme qualification should be that the administration of justice in its highest conception should be the ruling function of one thus chosen to represent each nation on this highest tribunal, and that he distinctly does not hold the mandate to act as counsel for each separate State in asserting and pushing the interests of that State irrespective of general justice. It therefore becomes desirable that the body of these international judges itself should, as a body, have some power in the selection of the individual judge. Though it would not be practical to put into their hands the initial selection in each country, there ought to be given to the body as a whole the power to determine whether the appointee is persona grata or not, a practice such as is now followed as regards acceptance of a foreign diplo- matic representative by a State. Whatever method of appointment in each country, and the admission into the body as a whole, may be adopted at all times the fact ought to be impressed that the national representative on this body is to be truly represen- tative of the highest character and standing in the eyes of the nation from which he comes, and of the world at large. 3. It would, furthermore, have to be decided in INTERNATIONAL LAW BACKED BY POWER 159 what proportion the several States are to be repre- Propor- sented. Great care will have to be taken especially rep^e- in the light of our most recent experiences that the sentation smaller States be duly represented and their interests ?he ng be not entirely submerged beneath those of the greater several States and Empires. Still, unless good reasons can be urged to the contrary, it would probably be most practical and just that the representatives be chosen in proportion to the number of inhabitants of each country. For, after all, in the ultimate conception of such an International Court it would be humanity at large which is represented, and each man in every one of the several States could thus claim a share of representation. In the suggestion which I published some years The local ago for such an international organisation, and which l^ 1 ^" I have reproduced above, I enumerated for the local the inter- habitation of this International Court several islands, Of course it is desirable that topographically the neutrality and international character of such a habitation and centre of jurisdiction and power should be duly regarded and accentuated. From this point of view it would be desirable that, out of consideration for the American Continent, this abode should not be too near to Europe, or so near that it, as it were, forms a dependency of any one State or group of States. Still, considering how the facilities of intercommunication constantly are increas- ing, and the fact that the sea no longer separates but even unites, this consideration need not weigh too heavily. Moreover, other attributes may be of still greater importance. These are the suitability of any one site to respond to the full and varied life in every aspect of its expression, and the dignity and importance and general amenities of life to which it ought to attain. To this must be added the strategic efficiency of such a centre for purposes of defensive 12 160 THE CURE OF THE DISEASE OF WAR and offensive power to carry out the enactments of the Court. There would, of course, be subsidiary military and naval stations distributed all over the globe and under the immediate control of the Central Tribunal, so that, in every part of the world, the decision could without loss of time be effectively enforced. It might not be necessary even to choose an island, though large and well fortified harbours for the fleet would be an indispensable condition in the choice. Among the islands, however, it might be suggested that, unless for the reason stated above, the United States might object, one of the larger Channel Islands or the whole group of them might prove most appropriate. To recommend them still further ; the admirable temperate climate and the natural beauties which they enjoy would be a great recommendation in their favour. interna- Of supreme importance for the main purposes of Army and such an International Court would be the Army and Navy. Navy, always at the beck and call of this Court, and ever ready to coerce or to strike in support of the maintenance of International Law. Such an Army and such a Navy, international in character, to which each State would contribute pro rata, would, of course, have to be far stronger than any one of the armies which by mutual consent each State would be autho- rised to maintain within its own borders. Indeed it should be even stronger than any combina- tion of several of these States. It would, of course, include military and naval air-craft and would con- stantly be kept in the highest state of efficiency. At any moment this great power could be hurled at any delinquent State to crush the culprit. Even if it were conceivable that the recalcitrant State or States should muster their forces in opposition to its authority, it is hardly conceivable that, with the co-operation of all the States siding with this central authority, any OPPOSITION TO THE COURT UNLIKELY 161 one State or group of States could long hold out. But, as a matter of fact, when once duly and actually established and when continuous practice and autho- rity had in the course of years impressed this authority upon all civilised nations so that its existence and traditions forme'd part of the consciousness of all the peoples throughout the civilised world, opposition to such a Court would be even much more unlikely than an occasional revolt of individuals or bodies against the police or law within a well-regulated State. As I have urged before, one of the strongest arguments in favour of such an international Organ- isation, which will and must carry weight with every nation throughout the civilised world, is not based upon abstract justice or reason and the revolt against the senseless slaughter of human beings (which all right-minded people are now feeling), but upon concrete facts and economic necessity. Thus armaments, as they now exist and which have been supposed to be the means of keeping the peace and the only means of avoiding the lawlessness of man left to his fighting instincts, are sapping the re- sources of every State and casting unbearable bur- dens upon the labourers and producers of national wealth. The cost to each individual nation for its contribution to these international armaments will be infinitesimal compared with that now weigh- ing upon each separate State, and could be easily borne by each one of them. It is nothing more than the simple application of co-operation and eco- nomy of power which has been ruling and is ruling the development of modern commerce and industry. I may leave it to the imagination of every reader Further to build up for himself the wonderful display ofjSJthe civilised life which such an international centre will life and create for the world, such as in a few words I have JJ ^f ht endeavoured slightly to indicate in the passage nations: 162 THE CURE OF THE DISEASE OF WAR quoted above. The beneficent activity of such an international centre in directions other than those of immediate legislation and of the protection of inter- national right and law will readily be realised. The genius of ancient Athens, though no doubt primarily Greek (and this ancient Greece of those days already includes the conflux of many different civilisations), in the hey-day of Athenian culture, was to a great extent due to the fact that the various people workmen, artisans, artists, philosophers flocked thither from Asia Minor and other parts of the ancient world, and contributed their share of new creative impulse and of vigorous co-operation in the cause of art and culture to the making of the Periclean Age. The common habitation would lead to the facile intercourse of representatives from every nationality ; the consequent attraction of visitors from all parts of the world, who would feel that this was no strange country, but that they shared in its common life, would not only counteract narrowness and provin- cialism of feeling and thought, but would actively stimulate a widening and intensified advance in the direction of human sympathy, culture, and brother- hood. It would become, and rightly, the supreme home and centre for all intellectual life, as there would be created here a clearing-house for all higher endeavour, centred in vast buildings and institutions representing the best and the most beautiful that modern civilisation can produce. The final and less immediate outcome of the activities emanating in every direction of human life from this common centre is so stupendous and far-reaching, that the imagination staggers in the beatitude of vision rising before our eyes. And it is not only in the great and manifest actions of international and common life, but even in every one of the smallest byways of human activities and human interests that these influences THE LANGUAGE DIFFICULTY 163 would actually and practically be operative, not merely in the world of dreams. I fully realise that there is one great stumbling- The lan- block to this advance in civilisation and the substanti- difficulty. ation of such unity of international effort and power. The This is to be found in the question of language. It is Babel, typified by the Tower of Babel . The ancient Hebrews were led by a correct instinct when they attempted to erect such a tower. But we all know that they failed in this endeavour. Languages will always unite or separate, and difference of language may prevent complete understanding between the peoples. In so far it will prevent complete international understanding and international fusion. On the other hand, as I insisted upon the desirability of developing and maintaining individuality throughout the nations which of itself would in no way suffer from wider federation so I do not think that it would in any way be desirable to check the expres- tion of national individuality by obliterating national language. Still less could it be ever contemplated to deprive ourselves of the treasures of human thought and art which have taken actual form in the national literature of each people. But we cannot doubt that the need of one common language for all civilised peoples remains. Even the Hague Conven- tion has been enabled to do its work in spite of the great divergence in the languages of its representa- tives. More and more as time goes on, and the more real the need and the feeling for a great international confederation becomes, until finally we attain to its realisation in such an International Court endowed with the power to coerce all nations into confor- mity with its supreme decrees, the necessity for one common language, co-existing with all other national languages, will make itself felt. Whether this will lead to the establishment of such a language as 164 THE CURE OF THE DISEASE OF WAR Volapuk or Esperanto, whether it will be naturally developed by the action of physical and mental conditions within the civilised world by a slow process of evolution, or whether any one existing modern language will, for one reason or the other, assert its predominance and become established as this language of international intercourse, the fact of its undeniable need will make itself felt more and more as time goes on. The French language has for a long time been adopted as the language of dip- lomacy ; but there exists considerable opposition to its universal use. The Middle Ages, or rather the beginnings of the Renaissance, prove the value and the efficiency of such a dominating language. In this case it was the property of the lettered or learned, or of the superior classes, beginning with the clerks who held in their hands the all-powerful factor in life, namely, the education of the young. Moreover, they had, as a substratum of such international unity, the organisa- tion of the Catholic Church spread over the whole civilised world. Beginning with the Church and its priests, however, the knowledge of this common language extended to a considerable degree among the ruling classes. The result was to take but one type of most definite and direct influence on the national mind throughout the whole world by one man or a group of men, the bearers of great thought the result was, that Erasmus could travel, converse, and lecture throughout the whole of Europe, occupy a chair in the University of Cambridge, influence the leaders of thought, at one with him in his great endeavour of world reform (not only, or chiefly, reform of sectarian religion), in his native Holland, in Germany, in Switzerland, and in Italy, directly affecting by his thought and his teaching people of every class in all these countries, and finally fixing REVIVAL OF LATIN 165 and perpetuating this influence in laying down in his books what he had to say in a language intelligible to the readers of all nations. He and the Oxford reformers realised this international power and cherished international aims not very distant from those which we cherish at this moment. He and his fellow-militants also realised fully the power for good which was vested in a Church that was catholic i.e. universal, international, human. But his chief object was to use it for the humanising of humanity, not the vicious confirmation of separatism, whether nationalistic or sectarian, in religion. The supreme aim of these great men was to humanise and to educate the clerks who were the teachers of the rising genera- tions and, through them, ultimately to raise mankind. So clear and strong was the faith of these men in this final mission, that More really sacrificed his life, because he was opposed to nationalism, to Chauvinism which threatened to rob humanism of its catholic and universal effectiveness, to dehumanise the spirit of refining love in mankind, and to give full sway to the spread of national and local hatred, ending, as it did, in endless wars throughout the world. Erasmus and his followers possessed the one great asset of a common international language, which, though it was not destined to help them directly and completely to realise their great and beneficent aims, did undoubtedly contribute to what may perhaps be the greatest advance in civilisation which the world has yet seen since the days of ancient Hellas. Is it quite impracticable and utterly unrealisable to restore the Latin language to life, and, after spreading it throughout the whole world in the educa- tion of the young, to leave it in the course of actual evolution to widen out and modify itself in this process of life, so that it should adapt itself to all the needs of modern intercourse and thus contribute 166 THE CURE OF THE DISEASE OF WAR a most powerful element to the realisation of our final ideals ? It cannot be a disadvantage that Latin was the disseminator of great ideas throughout the Middle Ages, and the vehicle of expression of the whole of the Christian civilisation ; that it was the linguistic expression of the widest diffusion of civilisation through the greatest organised instrument of civil- isation, namely, the Roman Empire. Nor can it even be a disadvantage that it should, to a certain degree, contain and reflect in itself sometimes only the shadow instead of the reality the highest spirit of Hellenism. Personally, I confess that I should have preferred Greek to Latin, because I deem those elements of higher culture embodied in the term Hellenism more important for humanity than are to be found in any other language. But a moment's thought will tell us that practically this would be impossible. The mere fact of such a difference of alphabet between Greek and Latin would be of the greatest practical effect as regards the comparative facilities of introducing either. But the Latin alphabet and the Latin script have penetrated through- out the whole of the civilised world and must be acquired by every school-boy and school-girl to what- ever nation they may belong. It was not merely pedantry or theatrical romanticism which led Bis- marck to attempt to drive out the Latin alphabet from writing and printing as far as he was able to do so in Germany, and to restore Gothic characters. It was not merely meant to be an aid internally to consolidate Germanenthum : but it was already a direct anticipation of the dreams of the present Alldeutsche party, to force Pan-Germanism upon the whole civilised world ; first, by blood and iron ; then by gold and commercial concessions and pro- motions ; and finally by the forcible supremacy of THE LATIN LANGUAGE 167 the German Kultur, which even a Nietzsche con- sidered inferior to that of the Latin races. In spite of his efforts, no German who can read and write is unacquainted with Latin script. Surely we need not construct a modern language in our study when for countless ages and in the present day the ancient Latin language, never for one moment dead in European history, is still with us, and, though asleep, still lives, and can readily be aroused from its slum- bers and assist in the great and peaceful battle which will lead to the final victory of civilised humanity. PART II THE INADEQUACY OF MODERN MORALS ; NIETZSCHE CHAPTER I THE NEGATIVE CHARACTER OF SOCIAL REFORMERS THE MONSTROSITY OF NIETZSCHE'S SUPERMAN ALL that I have written hitherto to define the con- ditions now prevailing in civilised life which have led to this disastrous war has confirmed what I have said at the beginning in the Introduction (p. 4) : that we have to go deeper down to find the essential and underlying causes. For the one great fact must have impressed itself through all the phases and aspects of the inquiry as we have hitherto pursued it namely, that there is a hiatus, if not a direct contradiction, between our faith and professions and our actions, which did not exist in former ages to the same degree ; that civilised humanity is at sea regarding its most important ideas and ideals ; and that we are no longer possessed of efficient Faith, the Faith which inspired the Crusaders in the past, or the Mahdists in modern times. Yet, we all of us, the representatives of Western civilisation, manifest this conflict and contradiction between our ultimate beliefs and our direct course of action. Nor is the fault merely or mainly to be sought for in our actions and in our inability to live up to principles on the part of the best and the most thoughtful among us ; 168 NEGATIVE CHARACTER OF MORAL REFORMS 169 but it lies chiefly in the fact that our ideals are no longer believed in, that they are not our actual ideals. When we consider the writings or the intellectual achievements of philosophers, social reformers, and artists, who have either had the greatest influence in the fashioning of the intellectual temper of our age, or are at least most indicative of its peculiar trend, we find that their main strength and their main influence lie in a negative direction, namely, in the revolt against the dominance of our rules, canons, and philosophies of life, which no longer fit the needs of the modern world and no longer respond to our actual convictions of what is truest and best. There can be no doubt that the social reformers, the great writers and thinkers on philosophy, politics, and social questions in the second half of the nine- teenth century down to our own days, have in the main not been constructive, but critical and negative. The nineteenth century and our own days will be noted in history, not so much for their positive achieve- ment in world-reform, not for the solution of ques- tions and problems, as for the putting and formula- tion of these questions and problems. 1 It corre- sponds very much in this respect to the eighteenth century in France and elsewhere, in which the " Ency- clopaedists," political philosophers and educational reformers of the type of Rousseau formulated the main questions by means of their criticism of the ancien regime, the positive answers themselves being given by the French and American Revolutions at the end of that century. This criticism of the fundamental standards and ideals governing modern life, culminating in the definite putting of the question to which the future is to give an adequate reply, does not only concern the economic aspect of modern life, the distribution 1 See Appendix III. i;o NEGATIVE CHARACTER OF SOCIAL REFORMERS of wealth, and the freedom of asserting the right to physical existence on the part of individuals ; it is not only represented by the writings and the direct influence of Lassalle and Karl Marx and of the theorists and publicists of modern economical schools forming the theoretical basis for socialist and even anarchist agitation ; it is not only manifested in the powerful impeachment of commercialism and capitalism which tyrannise over the inner economic life of each nation and community and which extend their dominating influence over all international relations ; but it clearly shows itself in the main character and direc- tion of thought in the writers and historians on philosophy, on ethics, individual and social, in the direct preachings of historians and social reformers nay, even in the spirit of the work of great artists and in the theories of writers on art. The one point which all these leaders and fashioners of modern thought have in common, however diver- gent their positive and more definite views may be, is a protest against the existing order of things, the more or less conscious feeling and conviction that the fundamental and guiding principles of our life are not truly expressive of the needs of modern man, of the best that he can feel and think and do. They thus vary in the directness and truthfulness, and even the bluntness, with which they attack the traditions and conventions which the modern world retains and accepts from the past and to which, in conformity with the laws of a well-regulated society, moral, or at least decent and respectable, members bow in slavish obedience. From August Comte (who boldly ventures far beyond into the construc- tive realm of a positive philosophy which endeavours to supply a system to replace what his criticism destroys), through Schopenhauer and von Hartmann to Wagner, Ibsen, and Nietzsche, and to Tolstoy NINETEENTH-CENTURY REFORMERS 171 (who is the antithesis to Nietzsche), and also to Maeterlinck, we have the same protest as regards the recognition of the inadequacy of our ideals, our faith and religion as bearing upon the social ethics of the modern civilised world. These writers and artists differ only as regards the characteristic and personal divergence in the intensity with which they oppose the existing order of things according to the intellec- tual atmosphere of their professed style of work or the artistic temperament of their personalities. In a more attenuated, though none the less powerful and effective, form, the same spirit and ethos are manifested in England in the writings of Herbert Spencer and Mill, of Carlyle, Ruskin and Morris, of George Eliot and even of Matthew Arnold ; while the stupendous achievements in the natural sciences, notably in the establishment of the Dar- winian theory, immediately incited their application to moral and social problems by such brilliant ex- ponents as Huxley and W. K. Clifford, finding a powerful echo in Germany in the writings of Haeckel. At the same time, the continuous attacks of the numerous writers directly opposing religious ortho- doxy throughout the last century, beginning with Strauss and Renan, received the most powerful, though involuntary, support from the growth of scholarly historical criticism, sharpened and strength- ened by all the methods of modern scientific inquiry, within the theological camp itself nay, within the very strongholds of sects and churches ; until we find that the Roman Catholic Church itself is aroused to the full exertion of all its energy and power to quell the modernist movement within its own body. What- ever divergence may exist among these great men, their mentalities and their writings, the main fact stands out clearly and irrefutably : that the existing order of things is recognised as inadequate and must 172 NEGATIVE CHARACTER OF SOCIAL REFORMERS be reformed and adapted to the new order of the world. Where these pioneers or iconoclasts differ is in the degree in which they consciously manifest this opposition and in the boldness of their attack upon the traditions hitherto recognised as indispensable to the maintenance of civilised society and morality. The attention which they arouse and the effect which they produce are, from the nature of great movements in man's history (alas that it should be so !) dependent upon the boldness nay, the exaggeration with which they thus attack the common traditions in which man lives at the time. Luther will always have a more immediate and powerful influence than Erasmus, though the confirmed optimist may console himself with the fact that ultimately though after a long time Erasmus will prevail ; and though it may even be shown that Luther's influence would not have been what it was, unless he had absorbed some of the best that was in Erasmus. Thus it is that of all these writers and thinkers three may for the time being have had the greatest influence, at all events in Germany, namely, Ibsen the Dane, Wagner, and Nietzsche ; while Schopenhauer and von Hartmann are their immediate precursors. Ibsen Though Ibsen is concerned with many other aspects Wagner ^ modern life, in which he wishes to substitute for dead and utterly inadequate traditions, the living and hopeful freedom of man's natural instincts and justified desires to self-realisation, it is chiefly concerning the relation between the sexes that his dramatic writings have exerted the greatest influence upon modern society. The same applies to Wagner. Both, either by the ruthlessness of their attacks or by the penetrating forcefulness of their artistic forms, succeeded in arresting the attention of the thinking world, nay, far beyond this world, the large mass of unthinking, but strongly feeling, men and women. WAGNER 173 Still, it was chiefly in this particular aspect of modern life that their criticism of existing standards was most effective. Wagner no doubt began his attack on the sterile formalities of our past inheritance in his own narrower and immediate domain of art when, as a most perfect typical rendering of his own artistic struggle, he produced the immortal creation of Die Meistersinger in which his new art comes to a glorious birth in breaking through the fetters of a conventional- ised and respectable bourgeois art that blocked the way. No doubt also in the Ring of the Nibelungen Siegfried stands as the embodiment of vigorous, untrammelled power of human life and courage, filled with truth as with energy, whom, like a new Prometheus, the powers of the effete gods could no longer withstand. It appears to me to be beyond all doubt that, however independent may be the creative genius of Nietzsche, it is from Siegfried that he derived the inspiration for his Superman. And we can well understand how he should have turned against his great artistic inspirer when the latter produced his Parzifal. For Parzifal is a cor- rective afterthought, in which the rule of nature and of pure force in man is supplemented by charity, by the spirit of altruism, so hateful to Nietzsche, by the spirit of service to our fellow-men and to mankind at large, the core and centre of Christian faith. Though artistically the theoretical embodiment of such an idea in a dramatic and musical form is a failure, and marks in so far a downward step in the artistic achievement of Wagner, despite great individual beauties of some of the music, there can be no doubt that it is thus meant to be a supple- ment and corrective to his world philosophy. Still, except through the direct or indirect influence upon Nietzsche, Wagner's effect upon the world at large as a social reformer was, like that of Ibsen, 174 MONSTROSITY OF NIETZSCHE'S SUPERMAN mainly concerned with the relation between man and woman, and finds its highest expression, both philo- sophically and artistically, in Tristan and Isolde. Nietz- But in Nietzsche we have the complete, fearless, The ot>- an< ^ logical construction of this general revolt against trusion of the whole fabric of the religious, moral, and social person^ traditions ruling the modern world. It is put, more- aiity- over, in a form made lyrically dramatic in his own personality which is essentially obtruded into every phase of his theoretical exposition, professedly philosophical. His writings primarily belong to the domain of art, to almost the same degree as do the works of Wagner ; and, if he live at all in the future, it will chiefly be as a prose poet, such as, in a vastly different character and atmosphere, Ruskin will live among the English-reading public. His His personality, probably in real life, and un- doubtedly in the lyric and dramatic form in which it manifests itself in the enunciation of his philosophic views, is, above all, filled with the desire for absolute truthfulness and fearlessness in the enunciation of truth. His aim is, above all, to assert independence and absolute freedom from prejudice, which he finds prevailing and dominating the respectable world in which he lives. This truthfulness of diction takes the form of bravado, by insistence upon his fear- lessness, in flying in the face of established conven- tions, in shocking the sensibilities of his audience ; and he wishes to assert this fearlessness, not only to his hearers, but also to himself. He is thus constantly spurring himself on and insisting on the correctness of his views and aims ; not perhaps consciously, to attract the attention of his astonished readers, but to keep up his faith in his own cause and to keep out the enemy of compromise and conformity, or of con- sideration for the feelings of others. He thus tells himself, as well as the world, how right he is and truthful- ness. NIETZSCHE'S EGOISM 175 constantly affirms it. The difference in this respect between him and other writers is that most authors assume that they must be right or else they would not write at all. Others proceed impersonally to give their own convictions to the world. But Nietzsche must be personal above all things, and must give consistency and artistic unity to his ideas (though he constantly and glaringly fails in this from the very obtrusion of his fickle and nervous personality), by pushing his ego into the foreground of artistic com- position and making it the bearer of uncompro- mising truthfulness in face of the dominant prejudice and conventions of the world. It therefore becomes, not an eccentric whim or trick, but an organic element in the artistic composition and exposition of his work, that he should boldly assert and constantly repeat the fact, that he is " so wise," " so skilful," " that he writes such excellent books," and, in short, is " a Fatality." Still, his assertions and statements, always to be understood as the direct emanations from his own individuality, are subject to the variations and moods of a personality, especially of one so highly nervous and imaginative ; and his most emphatic statements are therefore not necessarily the truest, either to himself or to his doctrine. In fact, his constant opposition to idealism and his i n spite hatred of it clash with the central idea of his whole of hls . opposi- human doctrine as embodied in the Superman. For tion to his Superman is distinctly and directly the outcome of idealism ; though it be the one-sided idealism of a idealist. narrow and distorted kind, in which the process of isolation of phenomena, when applied to the organic world or to human nature, deprives man of his very organic quality in omitting or ignoring some of his essential attributes. He may tell us distinctly and emphatically that 13 176 MONSTROSITY OF NIETZSCHE'S SUPERMAN " idealism is foreign to me " l ; he may again and again inveigh against idealism as the arch enemy ; but he still remains a pure idealist. Yet his is the Nietz- idealisation of physiological man, not moral and Super- intellectual man the ideal of the strong man devoid man is of all feeling for his fellow-men, as well as chivalry ideaiisa- towards his equals and his weaker brethren. This tion of absolutely one-sided conception of the human being, Biological and the consistent idealisation of this one side only to the ex- m human nature and in human life, lead to the gro- clusion of the moral tesque caricature of the organic nature of human social ^ e ' ky depriving it of its essential and leading char- acteristics which differentiate man from animal. It is a misapplication and a misconception of Darwinian principles of evolution, or it is an anticipation (for, in his case, it would have been such) of the modern principles of eugenics, in which only physical and physiological conditions are contemplated in the improvement of the individual man and of the human race. The Superman is thus an idealisation of man ; but the fundamental mistake is that it idealises only the forceful and physical side, and omits in his mental and moral constitution those essential elements of love and spirituality, of social and intellectual altruism, which are the crowning results in man's evo- lution, leading to the advancement of the human race, society, and mankind as a whole towards the realisa- tion of most perfect manhood, the true Superman. Limita- There is always this danger in forecasting the future his ideal- ^ rnan and in directing the improvement of the race ism in by the application of exact science : that the more ing the complex the constituents in the study of nature are super- (when once we enter the organic sphere or rise still higher into that of sentience, will, intelligence, morality, and idealism), these more complex and none the less essential attributes cannot receive their 1 Ecce Homo, p 82. EUGENISTIC DIFFICULTIES 177 due consideration in our forecasts of the prospective direction of present life to mould the future. It is most difficult, in fact practically impossible, to determine the ' ' ideal ' ' of each species in the animal world . But even when we come to comparatively so simple a phase of eugenistic activity as the breeding of animals, whose sphere of utility and admitted purpose that what Aristotle would have called their eVreXe^eta are clearly manifest and clearly admitted, we may fail, as breeders are constantly failing, in our con- clusions and purpose, because we do not consider the more elusive and uncontrollable " moral factors." The horse, the dog and similar animals are intelli- gently bred for purposes of strength, or fleetness, or appearance (itself essentially modified by these primary considerations). But, as the horse is to be used by us to draw vehicles, to be an agreeable and safe mount as a hack, or a skilful, intrepid, and equally docile hunter, or even as a draught horse to be readily guided and turned by his attendant for a variety of uses, the temper and " moral nature " which are conditions of such docility and use, are of supreme importance in its ultimate purpose and in the ideal of its existence. And yet how many breeders ever consider the question of producing the desirable " character " in the breeding of horses ? They may go so far as occasionally to exclude the grossly vicious horse for purposes of breeding, as the useless and even destructive criminal in " equine society." Yet, when does it occur to the breeder seriously and practically to contemplate and consider the question of temperament and the mixing of temperaments of courage with docility, of rapid intelligence with steadiness of control to produce and improve the race of animals, the destination of which, the ideal purpose of whose existence, is so clearly defined by human use and so simple and 178 MONSTROSITY OF NIETZSCHE'S SUPERMAN recognisable in the limited number of such uses ? When, however, we come to the human being to civilised man living amid all the varied and complex conditions of modern life, of vast societies and nations, and of the recognisable future of humanity to eliminate from the ideal type of man the moral and social elements which are to guide and direct his instincts and passions and health what we call morality and idealism implies a farcically inadequate conception of a human being as such. Still, Nietzsche in this dithyrambic and rhapsodical, this lyrical and dramatic exaggeration of his bold and wide philosophic, or as he would call it " psycho- logical " generalisation, escapes this manifest con- demnation of elementary nonsense when we remember that the main purpose and motive, if not justification, of his whole theory of life is to be found in his bold and uncompromising protest against the inadequacy of contemporary moral standards. As an instance of intellectual courage in his own personality (the dramatic centre of all his writings) he puts this protest in the clearest and most emphatic form l : " My life-task is to prepare for humanity one supreme moment in which it can come to its senses, a Great Noon in which it will turn its gaze backwards and forwards, in which it will step from under the yoke of accident and of priests, and for the first time set the question of the Why and Wherefore of humanity as a whole this life-task naturally follows out of the conviction that mankind does not get on the right road of its own accord, that it is by no means divinely ruled, but rather that it is precisely under the cover of its most holy valuations that the instinct of negation, of corruption, and of degenera- tion has held such a seductive sway. The question concerning the origin of moral valuations is therefore 1 Ecce Homo, p. 93. Translated by A. M. Ludovici and edited by Dr. Oscar Levy. PROTEST AGAINST CHRISTIAN MORALITY 179 a matter of the highest importance to me because it determines the future of mankind. The demand made upon us to believe that everything is really in the best hands, that a certain book, the Bible, gives us the definite and comforting assurance that there is a Providence that wisely rules the fate of man, when translated back into reality amounts simply to this, namely, the will to stifle the truth which main- tains the reverse of all this, which is that hitherto man has been in the worst possible hands, and that he has been governed by the physiologically botched, the men of cunning and burning revengefulness, and the so-called ' saints ' those slanderers of the world and traducers of humanity. The definite proof of the fact that the priest (including the priest in disguise, the philosopher) has become master, not only within a certain limited religious community, but everywhere, and that the morality of decadence, the will to nonen- tity, has become morality per se, is to be found in this : that altruism is now an absolute value, and egoism is regarded with hostility everywhere. He who disagrees with me on this point, I regard as infected. But all the world disagrees with me. To a physiolo- gist a like antagonism between values admits of no doubt. If the most insignificant organ within the body neglects, however slightly, to assert with absolute certainty its self-preservative powers, its recuperative claims, and its egoism, the whole system degenerates. The physiologist insists upon the removal of degenerated parts, he denies all fellow- feeling for such parts, and has not the smallest feeling of pity for them. But the desire of the priest is precisely the degeneration of the whole of mankind ; hence his preservation of that which is degenerate this is what his dominion costs humanity. What meaning have those lying concepts, those handmaids of morality, ' Soul,' ' Spirit,' ' Free will,' ' God,' if their aim is not the physiological ruin of mankind ? When earnestness is diverted from the instincts that aim at self-preservation and an increase of bodily energy, i.e. at an increase of life ; when anaemia is raised to an ideal and the contempt of the body is i8o MONSTROSITY OF NIETZSCHE'S SUPERMAN construed as ' the salvation of the soul,' what is all this if it is not a recipe for decadence ? Loss of ballast, resistance offered to natural instincts, selfless- ness, in fact this is what has hitherto been known as morality. With the The Dawn of Day I first engaged in a struggle against the morality of self-renunciation." We can well understand how, with this spirit of antagonism to the moral laws and ideals that now govern civilised society, his Superman should have taken this one-sided and caricatured form. If Nietz- sche were now alive and would allow me to use the German vernacular of which he is such a master I am sure he would admit a gentle modification of his views on the ideal man of the future. The terms of which I would remind him in his own language would be understood by good Germans, of whom there must be many, who will condemn this war when once they have realised how it was begun, the forty years of systematic brutal and immoral, nay, perfidious, preparation for it by the leaders of their own people. When the materials for judging are no longer with- held from them, they will be able to recognise the rights and wrongs of its immediate beginnings, the fact that the much-hated England was free from all responsibility for it (though the German officers for years asserted premeditated animosity against us), when they have realised the monstrous injustice towards Belgium and the inhuman pillages perpe- trated by their arms during this war upon defence- less people : all these will understand, what Nietzsche the man, I am sure, understood and felt, when I appeal for the making of the ideal future man to Menschenliebe (love of mankind) ; that their hearts will thrill in response at the simple phrases : ein guter Mensch, ein gutherziger Mensch (a good man, a kind- hearted man) ; and their best taste will appreciate the supreme value of ein feiner Mensch, ein fein- HIS INFLUENCE IN GERMANY 181 fiihlender Mensch (a man of refined feelings). For all these terms there is no room in the composition of Nietzsche's Superman ; though I strongly suspect that Nietzsche the man and Nietzsche the gentle- man would at once have responded to these terms, however much he endeavoured to suppress and hide his approval of them in theory. It is difficult to gauge the exact extent of the Nietz- influence of Nietzsche upon the moral views and the ghare S in practical conduct of the present generation of Ger- the mak- mans. Some judges, who are in a position to know, modem maintain that it is very great ; others that it is not. Germany. There can be no doubt that since his death in 1889 he has been very widely read all over the world and especially in Germany, and that to some of the younger generation his Also sprach Zarathustra has become almost a bible, and, that not only men, but women as well, have been strongly affected in their morals and their views of life, if not their conduct, by the powerful rhetoric and the undoubted beauty of his passionate German prose. Some may have fondly thought that they had the elements of the superman or superwoman in themselves, others may have been genuinely convinced of the claims of the superman as an ideal and may even have resolved that they would follow the master's dictates by their own suppression (Untergang) to further the advent of the superman. But most of them were attracted by the promised freedom from the moral conventions of the society in which they lived, which pressed heavily upon their strong, self-indulgent aspirations, and by the convenient belief that to follow the natural instincts and passions was of itself right. To a stronger and deeper degree than was the case with Ibsen's dramas and their opposition to the binding laws of conventional morality, there can be no doubt that the persuasive and lofty strength of Nietzsche's 182 MONSTROSITY OF NIETZSCHE'S SUPERMAN rhetoric must have acted as a strong dissolvent to the moral sense as we understand it and to every sense of impersonal duty and self-restraint. His share Still more difficult is it to determine how far ^ hls Nietzsche is responsible for the part taken by the German people as a whole in this war and in the frightfulness with which it is pursued. In so far as it is a popular war, it is based upon the conviction and the confidence of the people and their rulers of the existence and the absolute entity and unity of what they call their German Kultur ; and further- more of the superiority of this Kultur over the civilisa- tion of all other nations. From this conviction the step is but a natural one to conclude, that not only must it be guarded against destruction, interference, or domination on the part of inferior civilisations such as that of the Slav and even of the French and British ; but that it ought to supersede and domi- nate like a collective superman the civilisation of the rest of the world. And as physical health is the first requirement for the production and the dominance of the superman, so physical or military power is the first requirement for the dominance of the superior German Kultur. Such, for instance, was, in a bold summary, the political philosophy of Treit- schke and his followers. His estj- B u t Nietzsche did not consider German Kultur mate of . , German superior to all others. On the contrary, he formed a vel y i ow estimate of German Kultur and the Germans, whom he called the Kultur-Philistines. He herein agreed with Goethe who, in his talk with Eckermann, said : " We Germans are of yesterday. No doubt in the last hundred years we have been cultivating ourselves quite diligently ; but it may take a few centuries yet before our countrymen have absorbed sufficient intellect and higher culture for it to be said of them that it is a long time since they were HIS LOW ESTIMATE OF GERMAN KULTUR 183 barbarians." Nietzsche's estimate of German culture is a very low one. He values French thought and civilisation much more highly. As regards what I should like to call the Art of Living he even placed the Slav higher than the German, and was singularly proud of being descended from the Polish gentry. He is astonished that Schopenhauer could live in Germany. " Wherever Germany extends she ruins culture," he maintains. He even goes so far as to maintain that " a German cannot know what music is. The men who pass as German musicians are foreigners Slavs, Croats, Italians, Dutchmen, or Jews." He even hinted that Richard Wagner, the glory of German nationalism, was of Jewish descent, since his real father seems to have been the step- father Geyer. 1 He believes only in French culture ; all other culture is a misnomer. Of English culture he apparently had a limited and no first-hand know- ledge. It would, therefore, be difficult to claim Nietzsche in support of the German ideal causes of this great war. All German politicians and historians he regarded with aversion and contempt, especially the so-called anti-Semites. " There is," he says, " such a thing as the writing of history according to the lights of Imperial Germany ; there is, I fear, anti- Semitic history there is also history written with an eye to the court, and Herr von Treitschke is not ashamed of himself." * Moreover, in contradistinction to the conception His op- of the State as the absolute entity from which all gj^ right of individual existence is derived, which forms state." the foundations of the theories of German historians and the practice of German statesmen, Zarathustra loathed the State. To him " the State is the coldest 1 See Brandes, Friedrich Nietzsche, pp. 1 14 seq. 1 Ecce Homo, p. 134. 184 MONSTROSITY OF NIETZSCHE'S SUPERMAN of all cold monsters. Its fundamental lie is that it is the people. In the State, the slow suicide of all is called life. The State is for the many, too many. Only where the State leaves off does the man who is not superfluous begin ; the man who is a bridge to the superman." l He even inveighs against the love of country. 1 " Exiles shall ye be from the father- lands and your forefatherlands. Not the land of your fathers shall ye love, but your children's land." Never- In spite of this, we must believe that those who theiess have been indoctrinated with Nietzsche's philosophy his doc- trines of the superman were morally well prepared to c l amour f r this war and to pursue it with the bar- barian ruthlessness which has characterised it hitherto on tne German side. Not because, after all, he was war and a n artilleryman in the war of 1870 ; and, whether of ruthless Slav origin or an admirer of the French or not, he methods. was s tjn undeniably German in much of his men- tality ; nor even because he extolled war as such. In this latter respect he corresponds to his older contemporary, the philosopher Eduard von Hart- mann, who exercised a great influence upon the German youth in the second half of the nineteenth century, and who may to some extent have influenced Nietzsche as well. I cannot do better than quote George Brandes' luminous exposition of the teachings of both these German philosophers : " Eduard von Hartmann believes in a beginning and end of the ' world process.' He concludes that no eternity can lie behind us ; otherwise everything possible must already have happened, which accord- ing to his contention is not the case. In sharp contrast to him, on this point as on others, Zarathustra teaches, with, be it said, a somewhat shallow mysti- cism which is derived from the ancient Pythago- reans' idea of the circular course of history and 1 Brandes, op. cit., pp. 45 seq. * Op. cit., p. 47. HIS RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE WAR 185 is influenced by Cohelet's Hebrew philosophy of life the eternal recurrence ; that is to say, that all things eternally return and we ourselves with them, that we have already existed an infinite number of times, and all things with us. The great clock of the universe is to him an hour-glass, which is constantly turned and runs out again and again. This is the direct antithesis of Hartmann's doctrine of universal destruction, and curiously enough it was put forward at about the same time by two French thinkers : by Blanqui in L'Eternite par les Astres (1871), and by Gustave Le Bon in L'Homme et les Societes (1881). Friedrich Nietzsche, p. 48. The real influence of Nietzsche in producing the Nietz- Germany of to-day, which is responsible for this war, reaf share is not so direct as regards the national attitude in th . is towards war, but is none the less effective in producing in those who have come under his influence a moral of im ~ , . , ..... , , moral and which would account for its inception and the inhuman methods of its prosecution. On the negative side all idea of self-restraint, of the suppression of those ideals. instincts and passions which necessarily encourage envy and rapine, all consideration of the rights, the interests, or the feelings of one's neighbour, all love and pity for man all these hitherto accepted guides to conduct, are entirely suppressed. 1 1 " Spare not thy neighbour ! My great love for the remotest ones commands it. Thy neighbour is something that must be surpassed. " Say not : I will do unto others as I would they should do unto me. What thou doest, that can no man do to thee again. There is no requital. " Do not believe that thou mayst not rob. A right which thou canst seize upon, shalt thou never allow to be given thee. " Beware of good men. They never speak the truth. For all that they call evil the daring venture, the prolonged distrust, the cruel, nay, the deep disgust with men, the will and the power to cut into the quick all this must be present where a truth is to be born." See Brandes' Friedrich Nietzsche, p. 46. " Zarathustra is without mercy. It has been said : Push not a leaning waggon. But Zarathustra says : That which is ready to fall, shall ye also push. All that belongs to our day is falling and i86 MONSTROSITY OF NIETZSCHE'S SUPERMAN The wm On the positive side, however, the Will to Power Power * s tne su P reme moral aim, as the desire for health and strength, for physiological life, are the supreme physical goal. Between the ideal of the superman and its uncompromising, colossal individualism, and those of the socialists, who consciously and definitely extol the supremacy of the proletariat as such, German national morals have contended with narrow Chauvinistic militant religious sects, unchristian in their fundamental spirit. Whenever these social forces divided among themselves the moral dominion of the people, the German ship of state would be cast from side to side in its course, rudderless, to the destruction of itself and of the civilised world. Nietzsche's Individualism on the one side, and un- compromising Socialism on the other, united in the Chauvinistic spirit ; both claim, and aim at, Power, and desire to wage relentless war against all opponents who stand in their way ; Power is the immediate and supreme end of their aspirations. Of course between these two extremes lie, not the unthinking, low- minded, selfish, bourgeois Philistien without ideals ; but the many clear-headed, warm-hearted, and cul- tured Germans who have hitherto evoked the respect, the admiration, and even the affection, of the civilised world. These have not produced this war, excepting in so far as they have been completely misled by the suppression of truth and positive and decaying. No one can preserve it, but Zarathustra will even help it to fall faster. " Zarathustra loves the brave. But not the bravery that takes up every challenge. There is often more bravery in holding back and passing by and reserving one's self for a worthier foe. Zarathustra does not teach : Ye shall love your enemies, but : Ye shall not engage in combat with enemies ye despise. " Why so hard ? men cry to Zarathustra. He replies : Why so hard ? once said the charcoal to the diamond ; are we not near of kin ? The creators are hard. Their blessedness it is to press their hand upon future centuries as upon wax." Friedrich Nietzsche, p. 47. THE WILL TO POWER 187 systematic propagation of falsehood, not only in the immediate present and past, but for many years before. As Brandes has pointed out l : " Nietzsche replaces Schopenhauer's Will to Life and Darwin's Struggle for Existence by the Will to Power. In his view the fight is not for life bare existence but for Power. And he has a great deal to say somewhat beside the mark of the mean and paltry conditions which those Englishmen must have had in view who set up the modest conception of the struggle for life." Here is to be found Nietzsche's contact with Darwin Hismis- and his opposition to him ; though there can be no g^ndVng doubt that the Darwinian theory was to a very great of Bar- extent responsible for his first conception of the superman. In the first place, however, it is based on a complete misunderstanding of Darwin's own views. Darwin's theory of evolution was meant to furnish a scientific explanation of natural phenomena from a purely theoretical and scientific point of view. In so far it was not meant to be a practical or ethical guide to future conduct for man. It was eminently concerned with causation. Nietzsche's theory of the superman is nothing if not a practical and ethical attempt at fashioning man's conduct to lead to the production of the superman. It is chiefly teleological in character. The fundamental difference between the two standpoints has long since been established, and has received the clearest exposition of their antithesis, in Kant's Kritik of Pure Reason on the one hand, and in his Kritik of Practical Reason on the other. Nietzsche's misunderstanding of Darwin's theory if not his unfairness to him consists in his attributing to Darwin's thoughts and writings a direct bearing upon ethical and practical problems of human life. This mistake has often been made before, and is constantly being made at the present 1 op. dt., p. 35. i88 MONSTROSITY OF NIETZSCHE'S SUPERMAN moment by writers on ethics and pragmatics. It must always be remembered that science and pure philosophy endeavour to give a purely intellectual explanation of the world of phenomena, as well as of the world of noumena, the world of facts and of thoughts, including even the theory of the universe as well as of theology. Ethics, on the other hand, deals with what may be called ideal states, not with things as they are, but with things as man's best thought leads him to believe they ought to be : not with TO ov, but with TO &eov, as the Greeks put it. In its widest aspect this ethical activity leads to the problem as to the final aim of all human existence, if not of the universe. But even this final aim such will ever remain the limitations of man must be the aim of the universe from man's point of view, the terrestrial man, not even the inhabitants of Mars ; though it must be from man's highest and ultimate power of thought. The To Nietzsche the final aim of existence is the pro- superman duction of the superman. He is the Endzweck (Final the 8 Purpose). " Humanity must work unceasingly for the idea of production of solitary great men, this and nothing else evolution, f . . _. T, T . , is its task. But Nietzsche s superman could not have been conceived without the prevalent idea of evolu- tion as established by Darwin for the age in which Nietzsche lived. During the period of Nietzsche's life the main ideas of Darwinian evolution, with additional diffusion through the writings of Herbert Spencer, nowhere received greater currency and penetrated more widely among all layers of society than in Germany. This does not mean that its true depth and meaning, its accurate scientific limita- tion in generalisation, its spirit of conscientious and sober induction, which produces the highest spirit of intellectual morality among esoteric adherents, penetrated among the people at large. Nor did it NIETZSCHE AND DARWIN 189 even reach Nietzsche himself, who, on the contrary, revolted against, and was opposed to, the tyranny, the scientific spirit of persistent induction. But it did mean the diffusion of some of the leading ideas, such as those of progressive advance in the develop- ment of species throughout the ages, based upon the survival of the fittest. Such phrases, moreover, as " the survival of the fittest," more especially in the particular aspect of " the struggle for existence " (der Kampf urn's Dasein], were the commonplace pro- perty of vast numbers of even illiterate Germans and were constantly on their lips. From an ethical point of view their application was not always happy or morally beneficial ; and they not infrequently formed the intellectual justification of the moral selfishness and unscrupulousness of many an unsocial Streber. From a much higher point of view perhaps to him not always quite consciously active in the for- mulation of his theories Nietzsche applied the theory of evolution to his establishment of the theory of the superman in that he assumed the advance in the human species through the conscious action of human individuals and human society as a whole. In the beautiful symbolic language of Zarathustra : " Man is a connecting-rope between the animal and the superman a rope over an abyss. " A dangerous crossing, a dangerous wayfaring, a dangerous retrospecting, a dangerous trembling and halting. " What is great in man is that he is a bridge and not a god ; what can be loved in man is that he is a transit and an exit. " I love such as know not how to live, except as those making their exit, for they are those making their transit. " I love the great despisers, because they are the great venerators, and arrows of aspirations for the other shore. igo MONSTROSITY OF NIETZSCHE'S SUPERMAN " I love those who do not first seek a reason beyond the stars for making their exit and being sacrificed, but sacrifice themselves to the earth, that the earth of the superman may arrive some day. " I love him who lives in order to know, and seeks to know in order that the superman may hereafter live. He thus seeks his own exit. " I love him who labours and invents, that he may build the house for the superman, and prepare for him earth, animal, and plant ; for he thus seeks his own exit." The man The practical forerunner of the fully achieved andThis 8 5U P erman is the man of genius. Those who are not followers, of the species genius (this means human society as a whole) have, as their aim of existence, to favour and to facilitate the realisation of genius, so that the final goal in the production of the superman may be reached. It will, of course, be difficult for the individual to determine whether he is to obey or to command, whether he is of common clay or of the stuff of which the genius is made. In the determina- tion of this fact lies many a pitfall in the actual course of human life. The pro- But the main question as regards the practical duction ethics of Nietzsche is how the superman is to be superman produced ; not he who is to obey and follow, but he throu h wno * s to comman d and lead. It is here that, to my misappli- mind, the whole theory of Nietzsche's superman fails, nar D of I venture to surmise, because of a complete mis- winian apprehension of the Darwinian theory of evolution pies. 01 an d its misplaced and crude application to ethics. Darwin's fhe Darwinian theory of evolution, which, I repeat, not con- was emphatically not meant to be teleological, but cerned strictly causal, simply accounted for the survival of with * ... ethics, the fittest in nature s great struggle for existence, chiefly through adaptation of the organism to its environment. Darwin himself repeatedly points out DARWINISM AND ETHICS 191 the unethical, if not immoral, cruelty of nature in this process. Bacon took quite a different point of view when he upheld the great aim of man placed in nature as the establishment of the Regnum Hominis, the reasoned victory of man over the unreasoned course of nature. But Darwin deals with no such prospect of man's activity, and is simply concerned with the natural progress arising out of such an adaptive principle which leads to the survival of the fittest. From man's point of view, however, if he wishes consciously to apply the principle of the adaptation to the environment, there is no chance of advancement or progress unless the environment itself, as, if I might say so, almost a planetary body, advances. For man may adapt himself to physical conditions that are " lower " instead of " higher." As a matter of fact a good deal of the political and social ethics of our own days is nothing more nor less than this ethical opportunism, of adaptation of man's life to the surrounding conditions of nature, the final goal of which is merely physical subsistence or at most increase of comfort. In one aspect of his powerful writings Nietzsche fulminates against this ideal of comfort. We are thus in a vicious circle if we apply the Darwinian principle of evolution direct to ethical principles. Our only hope would be in a fatalistic renunciation as regards all ethical progress, in which we hope that the environing nature itself may " improve " ; so that by adapting himself to his environment man himself may improve and ultimately rise to greater heights of human existence. For Nietzsche's superman, however, this environment does not only consist in the physical conditions in which the human animal finds himself living and by which he is surrounded ; but in the physical con- ditions of man's own body and his own instincts, his inner force of living. These are to guide him. 192 MONSTROSITY OF NIETZSCHE'S SUPERMAN He is to follow these as his true friends and to deny them no claims which they may press upon his conscious will. They thus really become the " en- vironment " to the central personality of the indi- vidual, which we may call soul, spirit, or whatever else we like. But here again we are placed in the vicious circle, though a circle one step higher than, or perhaps only nearer to, the central core of individual man. For we can hardly see how mere physical health by itself or the following of our individual instincts and passions can ensure progress and lead us to the true superman, unless we can assume that these instincts and passions themselves and in themselves " improve " and go to the making of the superman. 1 On the contrary, not only the unbiassed study of anthropology, ethnology, archaeology, and history, but also our daily experience of life, teach us that the pursuit of our instincts and passions, unrestricted and unhampered by any further consideration or guiding principle, leads, not only to the misery, if not the destruction, of other individual life ; but in no way produces the type which approaches the concep- tion of even the meanest imagination of what a superman ought to be. Nietzsche apparently has forgotten or ignored (excellent Greek scholar though he was) the simple statement of Aristotle that man is a Qpov 7ro\iTitc6v. Were each man completely isolated and destined to live the life of an absolute anchorite, without any relationship to other men, it might perhaps be maintained that his chief task would then be to adapt himself to his environment, which includes his body and his instincts. But even then as I 1 I may at once anticipate here, what will be dealt with in the course of this inquiry, and say, that only when idealism is called in to supplement evolutionism, when Plato and Aristotle or rather Plato and Darwin are reconciled and united, can the theory of evolution be applied to ethics. THE ETHICS OF SLAVES 193 shall have occasion to show there is a point of view from which this would be grossly immoral, if not grossly untrue to human nature as such. The chief and perhaps lasting importance of Nietz- Nietzsche does not lie in his positive, but in his imp^ch- negative activity. It lies not so much in his appli-mentof cation of the Darwinian principle of evolution to ethics^ ethics and sociology as in his powerful indictment of Christian f . . \ ethics the actual state of the social and ethical environ- of ment of man, the adaptation to which forms the o a posi- process of evolution. He shows that this ethical and tionto social environment is unfavourable to the advance- ment of the best : that Christian ethics consistently followed are ethics for slaves, for the weak, both physically and morally, the inferior, both physical and moral ; and that in truth it retards, rather than advances, the progress of the human type. As many have thus done before and since, he perhaps with more uncompromising truthfulness and powerful rhetoric has shown up the immorality of the ascetic ideal. With deep insight and learning, as well as with acute critical incisiveness, he has traced the real origin of this ideal in the past back to the dominance of the inferior masses and has called it the ethics of slaves. It is the hatred and envy of the weak in body towards the healthy and strong, of the down-trodden and morally servile towards the ruling and lofty spirits. Its ideal has been to repress and to crush bodily health and all that makes for its advancement and increase. It thus necessarily leads to the survival of the unfittest. It has en- deavoured to make of the human body a thing of ugliness worthy of contempt and suppression ; whereas it is a thing of beauty, worthy of reverence and claiming worship and freedom for all its natural functions. So, too, the morally weak and lowly are not to be protected, encouraged, and exalted ; but 194 MONSTROSITY OF NIETZSCHE'S SUPERMAN they are to be superseded by the strong and the lofty spirits. This constitutes the strong aristocratic principle in Nietzsche, first recognised by Brandes, whose essay on that philosopher is entitled Aristo- cratic Radicalism. Aristo- We must always remember that, though in the Radical- relentless struggle of the modern economic world the ism. financially fittest survive and crush the financially unfit, our individual and social morality and the firmly established sway of democratic principles distinctly support and favour the aims of " the people," or at least their " greatest number." There is thus a direct contradiction between actuality and ideality, between the existing rule of life and the ethical rule. By far the greatest and most important aspect of modern economic and social struggle centres round this dualism and antagonism. Nietzsche boldly and uncompromisingly takes his stand against the masses. " Significant of Nietzsche's aristocratic tendency, so marked later, is his anger with the deference paid by modern historians to the masses. Formerly, he argues, history was written from the standpoint of the rulers ; it was occupied exclusively with them, however mediocre or bad they might be. Now it has crossed over to the standpoint of the masses, but the masses they are only to be regarded as one of three things : either as copies of great personalities, bad copies, clumsily produced in a poor material, or as foils to the great, or finally as their tools. Other- wise they are matter for statisticians to deal with, who find so-called historical laws in the instincts of the masses aping, laziness, hunger, and sexual im- pulse. What has set the mass in motion for any length of time is then called great. It is given the name of an historical power. When, for example, the vulgar mob has appropriated or adapted to its needs some religious idea, has defended it stubbornly NIETZSCHE'S CRITICISM OF HISTORY 195 and dragged it along for centuries, thfcn tfys originator of that idea is called great. There' is the testimony' of thousands of years for it, we are told, i - But-r-this is Nietzsche's and Kierkegaard's idea the noblest and highest does not affect the masses at all, either at the moment or later. Therefore the historical success of a religion, its toughness and persistence, witness against its founder's greatness rather than for it." Brandes' Friedrich Nietzsche, p. 19. The advent of the superman is thus not only retarded, it is completely checked. All our moral values are out of focus, they merely tend to produce these false and nefarious moral results. Pity, altruism, generosity, and even justice, are mere figments created to support this rule of the weak, the lower individuals, and the masses, low in the aggregate, all blocking the way to the free develop- ment of the superior individual who leads to the superman. Nietzsche, who in his earlier essays, Thoughts out Nietzsche of Season, criticises with most ingenious incisiveness ^s S Ws- by the dominance of the historical elements in German torical education, to which he attributes all that is defective in the preparation of his countrymen for a healthy principles and advancing practical life, here falls into the very eiiminat- pitfall against which he wishes to guard his country- f n what men, when dealing with the fundamental elements sentiai to and qualities which make up the higher human being. His own historical bias blinds him to the needs of the present and the aspirations of the future in the creation of a superman. He has deceived himself into believing that, by accounting for the origin of a human institution or ideal, he has destroyed its intrinsic value and nobility in the present and its beneficent effectiveness in the future. Whether his theories of the origin and dominance of the ideas of pity, of altruism, and of justice, be well founded in 196 MJONSTROSITY OF NIETZSCHE'S SUPERMAN fact, as, regards the; past or not, the highest conception of .man as such in the highest phases of man's his- toVical .' evolution in the past, and certainly in the present, and fbr any future projection of man in the imagination of the loftiest types of the present, has and will maintain the elements he thus spurns as essential to the conception of a superman. To us who fundamentally believe in the superman as a true, just, and elevating ideal for the future : A superman without love and pity is a monster ; A superman without self-restraint, without the control of the mind over the body, is a monster ; A superman without self-effacement in view of the good of humanity and the world in which he is but a unit and mite, is a monster or will soon grow into one ; A superman who believes that the aim of the existence of others is merely to facilitate his own self-realisation is a monster ; A superman who knows that he is one or believes that he is becoming one is a monster and must go to the madhouse or the gallows ; A superman who, in becoming one, does not hold before him an impersonal model of superiority and perfectibility or, at least, an ideal of him- self, but merely follows his natural instincts, is a monster ; A superman who in this idea of his perfect self does not include self-discipline and social altruism is a monster. Yet in this condemnation of Nietzsche's immorality and his distorted apprehension, not only of social man, but of individual man, we must not fall into the same error of negative and positive exaggeration which prevents the life-work of this genius from producing the full fruits of his labours for the advance- NIETZSCHE'S ACHIEVEMENT 197 ment of mankind. He has once and for all clearly Nietz- established the rights of the instincts to self-preser- ^af s vation, physical and moral, to be considered in every achieve- ethical system, even the loftiest, as not being bad,xhe but noble and good. They have in themselves the ri g hts inalienable right to be considered, to move and to instincts guide man even in his most conscious activity, unless to self ~ f -11- preserva- some other current of higher social duties, recognised tion, and admitted by man's reason, leads him to suspend their sway. Every system of ethics which denies this moral. and lowers the sanctity of the body and the Tightness of man's instincts in themselves is either immoral or unreasonable and degrading to man. His other lasting achievement in the domain of The morals and sociology is his advocacy of the aristo- cStic" cratic principle in social evolution, which raises the principle whole domain of ethics from a fatalistic sphere of evolution. stagnation, if not retrogression, for man and mankind, to a higher sphere of progress in life, of unbroken advance in the ethics of society, and of a continuous approach to the realisation of a higher type in the human nature of the future. But this higher type will not be guided by blind instinct or passion, or by the desire for power as such, but will necessarily mean the morally higher man. Nietzsche's personality and its expression in his His works will, however, stand out most markedly in the history of our age, because of his uncompromising truthfulness in his impeachment of the current standards of morality and their inadequacy in ex- pressing the best and highest in us, as well as of their inefficiency to regulate the actions of the individual and of society at large in the directions which lead us on towards a superman, instead of down to the barbarian and the vicious brute. I have selected him and his views for fuller treat- ment and criticism, not only because his teachings 198 MONSTROSITY OF NIETZSCHE'S SUPERMAN The need may have a more direct bearing on this tragic war, because he is thus the clearest and most emphatic struction exponent of the inadequacy of the practical morals of our day and the crying need for a bold and truthful reconsideration of public and private ethics. Such a treatment, however, must not follow the lines hitherto adopted of vague and general speculation from a purely scientific and theoretical point of view, dealing with the origin of ethics and the basis of human morality ; nor must it merely be concerned with the historical inquiry into the ethical systems of the past ; but it must definitely and boldly aim at the establishment of the moral code which, with our clearest and best thoughts, we can recognise to be dominant in the present, in order to prepare for an advance in the moral health of the individual and of society at large in the future. On the other hand, we need not, as Nietzsche wished us to do, deny our past, sever ourselves from it by a violent cataclysmal denunciation ; nor need we forego the indubitable virtue of reverence which his superman must have in his composition, at least in contemplating a still higher superman, and which his " obedients " must feel for the superman. We must not deny our origin and must gratefully recognise what was good in our past. I have, therefore, chosen the three great types who, to my mind, embody the essential elements in all ethics of the past, of the present, and for the future from which to focus the three general elements which make up the moral life of man in its widest aspect : Moses, Christ, and Plato. They typify Duty, Charity, and Ideality. Inseparably interwoven, acting upon one another and modifying each other, these three main aspects of the moral world, as it lives in man's soul or may, we hope, exist beyond the spheres terrestrial, will help us to an understanding of man in the past, harmonise our MOSES, CHRIST, AND PLATO 199 actions to ennoble ourselves and to benefit our neigh- bour, while increasing the happiness of each ; and will make of each one of us, and through us of our surroundings, forces, however weak, which will lead to the perfecting of future man. What is needed now, above all the crying needs of civilised humanity, is that those who can think best and are most repre- sentative of the civilisation in which we live, should hold up a mirror to their age, so that humanity can see itself truthfully ; and that they should truthfully and boldly tabulate what in their best belief consti- tutes the good and the right, irrespective of what was held of old, irrespective of dominant traditions and institutions. Difficult as it always will be to express the most complex thoughts clearly and con- vincingly by means of faltering human language, they should nevertheless attempt to fix these thoughts, so that he who runs may read. PART III THE MORAL DISEASE AND ITS CURE CHAPTER I THE CODIFICATION OF MODERN MORALS Not WHAT modern man and modern society require theoreti- aDove a \\ things is a clear and distinct codification cal dis- . -..,., quisitions of the moral consciousness of civilised man, not principles mere ly m a theoretical disquisition or in vague and of ethics, general terms, which evade immediate application to codifica- the more complex or subtle needs of our daily life ; tion of b u t one which, arising out of the clear and unbiased highest study of the actual problems of life, is fitted to meet and the every definite difficulty and to direct all moral effort most practical towards one great and universally accepted end. It ethical j s ^ e a b sence o f such an adequate ethical code, truly expressive of the best in us and accepted by all and the means of bringing such a code to the knowledge of men, penetrating our educative system in its most elementary form as it applies even to the youngest children and is continuously impressed upon all people in every age of their life it is the absence of such an effective system of moral education which lies at the root of all that is bad and irrational, not only in individual life, but in national life, and that has made this great war at once barbarous, pedantically cruel, and unspeakably stupid possible in modern times. 300 RELIGION AND ETHICS 201 The reason why such an adequate expression of moral consciousness has not existed among us, in spite of the eminently practical and urgent need, is that the constitution and the teaching of ethics have been relegated to the sphere of theoretical study of principles, historical or speculative, and have not directly been concerned with establishing a practical guide to conduct. No real attempt has been made to draw up a code of ethics to meet the actual prob- lems of daily life. Or, when thus considered in its immediate and practical bearings, this task has been relegated to the churches and the priests. It cannot be too emphatically stated that, though Religion never divorced from each other, religion and ethics ethics envisage quite different spheres, and that when in Differ- their practice and activity they are indiscriminately thees mixed up with one another, this fusion does not tend sential to the good of either. The confusion of the primary attitude attitude of mind which they imply and the definite m each - spheres of activity which they are meant to control results in the lowering or weakening of the spirit and the practice of each. Ethics alone can never replace religion. Religion alone, when wholly dominating the heart and mind of man, cannot prepare him to solve the problems of ethics with a clear and unbiased mind, intent upon the weighing of evidence and the searching inquiry into the practical needs of society and of individual life. The at once delicate and exalted moods of religious feeling and of religious thought not to mention the complex and remote dogmas of each religion are, to say the least, not favourable to the sober, dispassionate, and searching analysis of motives, of actions and their results in the daily life of man, or the relations between communities and States. 1 Moreover, this 1 An almost caricatured illustration of the inadequacy of sectarian morality is furnished by the sermons of several German divines of 202 CODIFICATION OF MODERN MORALS strictly logical, unemotional, and sober analysis and its prospective application to the regulation of material prosperity, as well as spiritual health, is of itself destructive of the very essence of that emotional exaltation and that touch of mysticism which forms an essential element of the religious mood. Its intrusion into the domain of pure religion is of itself lowering to such exaltation and destructive of its most delicate and, at the same time, most powerful spiritual force. inherent Furthermore, it has undeniably been an element tionto~ in a11 religions of the past, that they should be change in strongly conservative, and, at all events, fervently ligions reverential towards the past teachings of their founders and tenacious of this teaching converted into dogma in bygone ages. In so far they are not fully adapted to consider, with clear and unbiased receptiveness, the actual problems of the present, which are generally strongly contrasted to the life high repute, representing the Lutheran Church, preached since the above was written and which I here quote from the Spectator of January 22, 1916. They were translated by the Rev. W. Burgess. They remind us forcibly of the standards of morality based upon the Christian religion as adopted by the Inquisition. There is hardly a single religious sect perhaps with the exception of the Society of Friends which in its past history does not supply some grotesquely immoral results of religious fervour. Pastor Froebel, preaching in the well-known Lutheran church at Leipsic, spoke of German guns as beating down the children of Satan and of German submarines as " instruments to execute the divine vengeance." The mission of the submarines, he explained, was to drown thousands of the non-elect. Professor Reinhold Suberg, in a sermon preached in the cathedral at Berlin, said that Germans, in killing their enemies, burning their houses, and invading their territories performed a " work of charity." Divine love was everywhere in the world, but men had to suffer for their salvation. Germany " loved other nations," and when she punished them it was for their good. Pastor Fritz Philippi, preaching in Berlin, said that as God allowed His Son to be crucified that the scheme of redemption might be accom- plished, so Germany was destined to " crucify humanity " in order that salvation might be achieved. The human race could be saved in DANGERS OF THE RELIGIOUS MOOD 203 of the past ; while much of this lucidity will be lost when an attempt is made to translate the com- plex life of to-day into the simpler conditions of the past. Moreover, in religion all is seen through a veil of antique mysticism. Nor, still less, can such a conservative attitude of mind be favourable to the essential spirit of change, to the adaptation to new conditions implied in the conscious evolution of man towards the higher conditions of a progressive society, and to the continuous flow implied in the very principle of life which, in the moral and practical spheres, are the organic element of a normal, rational, and healthy society. No doubt we may rightly hold that, from one point of view, religion enters into every aspect of man's existence, and that it may form the ultimate foundation of our whole moral and intellec- tual activity. But it does not and cannot deal directly with the practical world, and cannot intrude itself into our consciousness when we are bound to con- no other way : " It is really because we are pure that we have been chosen by the Almighty as His instruments to punish the envious, to chastise the wicked, and to slay with the sword the sinful nations. The divine mission of Germany, O brethren, is to crucify humanity. The duty of German soldiers, therefore, is to strike without mercy. They must kill, burn, and destroy, and any half-measures would be wicked. Let it then be a war without pity. The immoral and the friends and allies of Satan must be destroyed, as an evil plant is up- rooted. Satan himself, who has come into the world in the form of a Great Power [England], must be crushed. . . . The kingdom of righte- ousness will be established on earth, and the German Empire, which will have created it, will remain its protector." A nation dependent for its moral guidance upon Nietzsche on the one side and "pastors" on the other must drift into amorality. It may be said that these are perversions of religious morality due to the moral obliquity of those professing such views. But the fact remains that, as in the Inquisition and other sectarian persecutions of the past, the crime is committed by official representatives of the Churches, invoking the very authority of their religious tenets. If even such trained leaders can so misinterpret the moral laws of their creeds, it does not speak well for the constraining, practical efficacious- ness of such moral codes and the logical and practical foundations on which they rest. 204 CODIFICATION OF MODERN MORALS centrate all our mental and even physical energies upon the consummation of some definite task in the ever varying changes of our actual life. It is con- cerned with man's relation to his highest ultimate ideals and is based upon his higher emotional, and not his practical and strictly logical, consciousness. It implies no adaptation to surrounding and varying conditions, no compromise within the struggle of contending claims. In his truly religious moods, in his communion with the supernatural, with his ultimate ideals, there is no room for compromise, practical opportunism, and the adaptation to the ever-changing conditions of actual life. Result Hence, the priest is not directly fitted to be the ethical transmitter of this moral code of a healthy society education in directing the young and in advising adults as ^i^i" a minister of a definite religious creed. His ethical teaching teaching must always be directly subordinated to the 'dogmatic creed which he professes ; and his habit of mind, as well as his conscious purpose, must in so far unfit him for the problem of establishing a living code of practical ethics and of impressing it clearly as a teacher upon young and old. Moreover, in the present condition of the modern world, we are brought face to face with a definite fact which, perhaps, more than anything else, has stood in the way of effective and normal advancement of moral teaching among us . For in every community we have not only one creed, but a number of creeds ; and, whatever their close relationship to one another may in many instances be as regards fundamental religious tenets, they differ in organisation and administration and in the personality of their minis- trants to such a degree, that such difference not infre- quently involves rivalry and antagonism. The most practical result in our own national life is clearly brought before us in the promulgation of the various ETHICAL TEACHING IN SCHOOLS 205 Education Acts which, in great part, were merely concerned with the adjustment of the claims of the varied sects among us. They have thus led to the exclusion of direct religious teaching and the reten- tion of mere scripture reading as the only directly spiritual and moral element in public instruction, or they have led, and may lead, to the division of spheres of activity of each one of these sects and their clerical representatives of differing forms of religious and moral instruction among separate groups of children. That the impression upon the youthful mind, in so glaring and manifest a form, of fundamental differences in religious and moral principles between them (perhaps suggesting and establishing false standards of social distinction as well), cannot be considered in itself a moral gain to the establishment of a healthy social instinct in the hearts of the individuals or the development of a healthy and harmonious national and social life for the community at large, can hardly be denied. At all events, such a state of affairs does not bring us nearer to the formulation of a common ethical code, expressive of the highest national life on the ethical side within each age, and the promise of a growing development for the future. Meanwhile, whatever may exist among us of ethical principles and moral practices to which we all subscribe, is eliminated from the activity of our educational institution ; and the younger generation grows up without any instruc- tion in common morality and without any clear knowledge of its definite principles. On the other hand, I should not like it to be thought Good that I ignore, or am unmindful of, the good work ^Jkb which the priests of all denominations have done on priests, the moral side in the past and are doing in the present. Whether priests of the Church of England or of the Church of Rome, or ministers of the numerous Chris- 206 CODIFICATION OF MODERN MORALS tian sects, or rabbis, they have in great numbers devoted themselves to the betterment of their fellow- men, they have held aloft the torch of idealism, and many of them stand out as the noblest types of a life of self-abnegation devoted to progress towards a lofty ideal with complete self-effacement. The posi- tive good which they have done and are doing is undeniable. 1 The picture of an English village with- out its church, not only as a symbol of higher spiritual aspirations, but as an active means of providing for the dull and often purely material daily life of the inhabitants a gleam of elevating life and beauty, must make him hesitate who ruthlessly would destroy it by missiles of cold thought, as those of German steel have actually destroyed the churches in Belgium and France, and shudder at the devastation he might cause. But the firm conviction that what he has to offer is not sheer and wanton destruction ; but that the growth and spread of true morality will clear the way for a brighter, higher, and nobler life, ending in the expansion and advancement of pure and un- contaminated religion, removes all doubt and fear and strengthens our conviction in the Tightness of the cause for which we also are prepared to lay down our lives. 1 On the other hand, it is equally undeniable that strictly clerical morality has gone hopelessly astray. The type of the clergyman and his family, far from extravagantly drawn, and the result of what I should like to call catechismal ethics have never been more power- fully presented than in the history of the Pontifex family in Samuel Butler's The Way of all Flesh. This uncaricatured satire of the results of catechismal morality gives an intensely tragic picture of life far from uncommon in the immediate past and far from obsolete in the present. Nor are the Pontifexe8 types of a lower order of Christian or clerical society. They are good people of the worst kind. The ethical teaching which denied all right to health, pleasure, brightness in life, prematurely and disastrously introduces into the pure mind of the young the idea of Sin, its prevalence, and its dominance, fills us with revolt and loathing against such a code and such a system of ethics, which we must consider one of the worst crimes which adult man can commit, namely, crime against the young and the helpless. DIFFICULTIES IN SECTARIAN MORALITY 207 We cannot admit that a morality, however adequate The and high it may have been for the Jews living man centuries ago, can be adapted and fitted to the the an- requirements of modern society without great con- j 1 ^ not fusion and loss in this process of adaptation. This sufficient is especially the case when, as a chief ground for its modern unqualified acceptance, religious dogma steps in and need s. maintains that it is of direct divine origin. Even when thus accepted, and effective as a guide to conduct by many, many remain who do not honestly accept the evidence of this direct divine origin. The effect upon these latter is one of clear opposition to the binding power of such moral laws, and may end in an opposition to all moral laws. CHAPTER II THE TEACHING OF MOSES Piety to- WE must recognise with reverence the existence of achieve? 6 mora l laws, such as those of Moses, in the past, and ment of the fact that, in the evolution of history, they form ethics. the basis of our progressive moral consciousness in the present. We must also regard with gratitude and admiration the achievement of those who estab- lished such an ethical code for our ancestors, upon which our moral consciousness ultimately rests, and from which we are bound to work onwards and upwards as the conditions of life and the growth of human knowledge bid us and enable us to do in the present. The Whatever may have been the achievements of ment V of Khammurabi and of other law-givers, kings, priests, the Ten and philosophers, in the dim antiquity of mankind, to us and to the preceding ages of our own civilisa- ments. tion, the Ten Commandments of Moses mark the greatest feat in the establishment of law and morality. To him who casts his eye over the evolution of man, from the earliest prehistoric ages onward, the more or less chaotic conditions of human intercourse and incipient social organisation, the summarisation in definite human language, reduced to the shortest and most compact form and responding to the essential needs of human society in these Ten Commandments is one of the greatest feats of the human mind in the past. The very fact of their constraining 308 THE GREAT MORAL ACHIEVEMENT 209 influence throughout all the changes of centuries and of ethnical, climatic and racial conditions, differing so widely from those which obtained when Moses proclaimed them to the people of Israel, is so wonder- ful, that in itself it approaches the miraculous. It is well, however, to remember that Moses was the law-giver and Aaron was the priest. On the other hand, we must recognise that if the Usurpa- task of moral teaching had not been completely ^ e n by usurped by the churches, with the exception of the churches, legal element, which has been taken over by the legal functions of the State and the establishment of judiciary powers, there would have been or certainly ought to have been a succession of moral codes promulgated in various countries and periods and accepted by the people. Yet the Mosaic laws, having been incorporated as a moral code into the body of the doctrine of the Jewish, Christian, and even the Mohammedan churches, not only preserved their binding quality, but also effectively prevented their future development, modification, and adaptation and the infusion of newer moral codes into the life of successive societies. Herein lies one of the peculiarities of Jewish religion Pecuiiari- and ritual, and the consequent effectiveness of the j^sh religious morality among the Jews in all times. In religion Biblical days Israel was a theocracy, and the priests ritual in were at the same time the rulers of the people and their effects their guides in all conditions of national and social upon life. In Rabbinic times the rabbi, besides being the morals - minister of religion, was, above all, the teacher of the people and the head of the community. Down to our own days the truly Jewish communities (I am not referring to the Christianised and modernised re- formed sects, who in so far are not distinctly Jewish) the synagogue is called the schul, which is the school for secular teaching as well as religious. It is from 210 THE TEACHING OF MOSES this school and the presiding rabbi that the Rabbinic and Talmudic teaching, succeeding and supplementing the Mosac teaching, have emanated. The Jews have thus always had the elements of moral evolution and have progressed in their general social organisation with the advance of ages. Their law and their morality effectively penetrated into the actual life of the people and produced for them higher spiritual standards and definite ethical codes which fitted them for the conditions of life in which they found themselves ; while always providing a spiritual stimulus towards moral progress, in spite of the occasional retrogressions caused by lowered standards of the actual life about them, as well as the formalisation and deadening to which such theo- logical and ritual teaching naturally tends. It is thus that in the Talmudic and other writings we have the striking mixture of lofty moral aspira- tions subtle, intellectual, refining thought with an active and penetrating application to the actual demands of daily life, its business and its pleasures ; and all dialectic formalism tied down to precedents of former dicta of earlier rabbis, as well as the pro- nouncements of the Bible itself, raised more or less to the weight and importance of religious authority. In the course of time this formalistic element grew, until the slightest ritual aspects of the functions of daily life, for instance as regards the keeping of the Sabbath, were not only raised out of all propor- tion in moral significance and value, but were even robbed of what dignity and importance they may have had in their relation to actual daily life. Never- theless, it is to this effective and progressive moral life of the Jewish people in all ages, and to the approximation between their higher moral codes and the practice of daily life, that I venture to attribute the tenacity of their survival as a people, and the LAW AND MORALITY 211 superiority and success which have been theirs in all times, wherever they have lived, even amid perse- cution and conditions most unfavourable to the development of a higher life. But the Ten Commandments of Moses have been The Ten embodied in Christian ethics, and have become J^d- canonical in the religious writings of the Christian merits world. Their importance for the world will ever be the idea that they are the first general and abstract pronounce- of dut Y ment and expression of the ideas of duty and justice justice as such. This is what they mean in their totality for the ... . J modern and is a summary of their injunction. They thus world, imply and recognise the sense of duty in man as opposed to his instinctive tendencies, those of the mere animal in man, and lead to the establishment of civilised society ; and, I repeat, that they have thus formed the foundation for the moral consciousness, not only of the Western world, but of Mohammedanism as well. Some of these injunctions no longer belong to the domain of ethics, but have been completely merged in our laws. In the evolution of social organisms, ending in the Ethics full establishment of the State, the judicial function, Thei^re- the promulgation of laws, and the administration of lationto justice, become, together with the establishment ofo ther security from inimical aggression from without, the chief functions of the State. Law becomes the principal guide to public and individual conduct. But laws can only deal with broad and manifest acts, they are not concerned with the inner moral con- sciousness of man or his more delicate relations in daily life. We may say that, so soon as actions directly enter the province of law, they no longer enter the domain of ethics which is far from mean- ing that they become unethical, but that their premisses assume another validity before ethical thought begins. They are admitted and taken for 212 THE TEACHING OF MOSES granted ; and the responsibility of the individual to establish their Tightness, or to enforce obedience to them, no longer exists. Inter- On the other hand, when the moral consciousness between ^ tne people finds that these laws are antiquated, ethics that their action no longer conforms to ethical demands or even runs directly counter to them, a general impulse is created towards the modification of such existing laws in conformity with the ethical consciousness of the people and the age. In great part this process marks the progressive legislative function of the State. When moral tenets have become of such universal importance and validity that they distinctly modify the actions of larger groups of people, they may then produce laws. For instance, when the moral feeling of the public revolted against the tyranny of the employer over the employed, the Factory Acts were introduced and became law, insisting upon the moral responsi- bilities of the employer towards his workmen. Under the same category would come all the encroachments of public laws on the personal and domestic freedom of the individual. So, too, it may be found that certain established laws evoked by the temporary conditions in which civilisation finds itself at a given moment, are no longer useful, and may even be harmful and immoral, when the social conditions have altered. They will then have to be repealed or modified. Thus the laws against witchcraft and those upholding the privileges of certain classes to the detriment of others, against which the moral consciousness of the people revolted, have been repealed or altered. This interaction between ethics and law forms to a great extent the very life of the State and the progressive spirit in its evolution. Now the progressive spirit thus manifested in the inter- action between ethics and law must be carried into NEED FOR CODIFICATION OF MORALS 213 the life of ethics itself. New conditions should be Progress established for this organic development of ethics ; ^ n g^J and it is the establishment of such conditions which I for . am advocating as the supreme need of modern times, codifica- We thus require such codification as may be recognised ^? n ' mo t by all people ; and this must be the essential condition crying for a possible and even a facile modification of ourjj^^ common ethical code in response to the needs of our times, social life and the advancement of our ethical con- sciousness. A great and important part of the Mosaic Com- The mandments has thus reached the phase of law : " Thou shalt not kill " ; " Thou shalt not steal " ; Mosaic " Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neigh- m ^d- bour " ; even " Thou shalt not commit adultery " ments ctlrccLclv these Commandments practically need no longer make been em- an appeal to the ethical consciousness of most of us bodied m who are not born criminals, because they have been embodied in our public laws ; and conformity to them is exacted by all the constraining power of the State. On the other hand, public law is not concerned with inner morality and man's relation to his fellow-men, which, for instance, are summarised under the term of covetousness, a condition which may lead, when that impulse is followed, to most degrading actions as regards the perpetrator and most harmful deeds as regards the victims, even culminating in crime. The inner moral state, though it be the cause of even criminal action (of which latter the State takes cog- nisance through its laws) is of itself not the concern of law, but purely of ethics. But the Mosaic Com- mandments already deal with these more subtle and recondite spiritual factors, and in a short and con- centrated form touch upon, if they do not cover, the main groupings of all moral states and duties. The Ten Commandments, as a canon of human duties, naturally fall under three main heads, which 214 THE TEACHING OF MOSES The Ten remain the three natural groupings of human duties mand- ^ or a ^ times. The first is the duty to God, the second ments. the duty to oneself, the third the duty to man and mankind. After inquiring into the adequacy with which they respond to these three groups of duties, and the modifications and additions in the teaching of Christ, I shall endeavour to set forth the need of further ethical codification in our own times. The duty i. One of the great and lasting achievements of Spiritu- tne Mosaic law and of the Jewish religion in all times ality of is, that it established the spiritual conception of the Deity. Deity in so far as the people of that age were able to rise into the domain of pure spirituality. The essence of the First and Second Commandments is the insistence upon the spiritual nature of the Deity in opposition to the lower practice of " idolatry " prevalent among the other peoples of which the people of Israel had knowledge, and, no doubt, prevalent within the Jewish communities in the earlier stages of their development to which earlier state there are occasional relapses censured and opposed by their spiritual rulers. The Jews thus had forcibly enjoined upon them the duty of living up to the highest ideals to which their moral imagina- tion could attain in the conception which they formed of their Deity. That this is in itself one of the highest moral achievements no right-minded and unbiased thinker can deny. The actual worship of an image wrought by man's hand, or selected by him casually from the realm of nature, often an object possessing no higher spiritual quality of any kind all of which is implied in the term " idolatry " cer- tainly marks a lower stage in the development of intel- lectual imagination, and, beyond all doubt as well, in the creation of a moral imagination. On the positive side this effort of the human mind to rise to the con- ception of an ideal and perfect world is a distinctive SPIRITUALITY OF THE DEITY 215 mark of intellectual as well as moral superiority, and, as we shall see, may be considered the crowning point of all spiritual and moral effort in the functions of the human mind. On the other hand, it must equally be beyond all Spiritu- doubt, that the conception of the Deity formed byj^ ed this comparatively advanced people in that early by an- stage of social evolution, corresponds to the more morph- elementary and, in so far, lower, conditions of the lsm - social life prevailing in those times, and indicated the intellectual and moral position to which it was pos- sible for them to rise. Though one of the most emphatic injunctions of the duty to God in the first Commandment is directed against " the graven image or any likeness to things in heaven or on earth," and the worship of such, the conception of such a spiritual Godhead is nevertheless so distinctly anthro- pomorphic, so clearly tied down to the semblance of a human being, however spiritual and exalted that being may be, that its spirituality is to a great extent tainted by the material, earthly, and human con- ception, so as almost to become in its turn a " graven image." This anthropomorphism is still further increased by the specially racial and national relation which it is claimed the Godhead holds to the Jews. This element, which detracts from the pure spiritu- ality of the Mosaic Deity, is still further emphasised to such a degree in one of the Commandments that there can hardly be any intelligent orthodox believer who has not hesitated, or even drawn back sharply at one important passage in the Commandments, and who, if retaining the passage within his accepted faith, has not made endeavours to expunge it from his consciousness, or its significant bearing on the main conception of the Divinity. This passage deals with the consequences of disobedience to the First and Second Commandments, and affirms that God 216 THE TEACHING OF MOSES is " a jealous God, and visits the sins of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth genera- tion of them that hate Me, and shows mercy unto thousands of them that love Me and keep My com- mandments." This is not, as has often been main- tained, merely a general statement of fact in the causality of things natural, and the consequence of human action in which it may no doubt be shown that the responsibility for evil acts is carried on through generations from the perpetrator of the crime ; but it is embodied in the moral command- ment, enjoined by the Deity Himself, in which justice and mercy must form the leading moral attributes ; and, whether just or unjust, the intrusion of reward and punishment as a consequence of worship shows a comparative lowness in the conception of a divine being, intelligible in the people who represented an early and lower stage of civilisation, but inadequate as the expression of the higher moral consciousness of our own time. Furthermore, the inadequacy, as regards ourselves in our own time, implied in this conception of the Deity from the very outset, of a distinctly national or racial bias as the God of Israel, though amply accounted for and justified by the state of civilisa- tion prevailing at the time, must be repugnant to the religious sentiment and the moral consciousness of the mass of thoughtful people whose civilisation has benefited by the higher intellectual efforts of the many centuries out of which we have grown. It is, to say the least, purest anthropomorphism, and, in so far, directly opposed to any spiritual conception of a divine ideal. The I cannot here enter into a discussion of the exact meaning of the Third Commandment, which enjoins mand- that we shall not use the name of the Lord in vain. ment - How far this has a direct theological or ritual signi- THE THIRD COMMANDMENT 217 fication,and is in so far merely an enlargement of the preceding commandment, or how far it must be taken in connection with the Ninth Commandment, which would give it a distinctly human and social signifi- cance, I do not, and need not, venture to determine. If it be the latter, and be mainly concerned with the making of solemn asseveration by associating it with the name of the Deity such as is the case in the taking of an oath, it might be considered under the heading of our duty to truth. But, intrinsically and by actual practice in Jewish and Christian life, it seems to me to be rather concerned with the need of keeping the Deity and all that concerns man's relations to God high and pure in practice, so that the Godhead in man's thought and speech should not be lowered and blunted by frivolous use and abuse. 2 . The duty to our self, which forms so important Duty to a part of an ethical code, is practically only repre- ^ e self '' sented by one commandment, and in one very limited Fourth sphere. It is, moreover, based upon so inadequate a theological reason, and has become so thoroughly ment. formalised by a merely ritual conception, that its adequacy moral weight and significance have become weakened, imodern if not lost. It is needless to say that, for us, the injunction to keep a day of rest, based upon the fact that God created the universe in six days, cannot be valid. Nor can the insistence upon one day, and that day definitely fixed however convenient and suggestive the association with astronomical and chronological division may make it be considered by us as essential to a moral conception of the duty to our self. Still less is this moral aspect impressed upon us by the dead formalism which later Jewish, as well as Christian, ritual impressed upon this chronological selection. The racial and ritual formalism to which Jewish practice led in later years 218 THE TEACHING OF MOSES Moral is most strikingly illustrated by the laws enacted by appiica- orthodox Judaism concerning the keeping of the tionof Sabbath. From sunset on Friday evening to sunset man C d- m " on Saturday evening the strictly observant Jew was ment. not, and is not, allowed to do any manner of work, and this, in the commandment, is even extended beyond the immediate family to the servants and the domestic animals, as well as to " the stranger within thy gates." Thus orthodox Jewish families even did, and still do, their cooking before the advent of the Sabbath ; they dare not light their lamps, or extinguish them, or open a letter, or perform most of the ordinary functions which modern life brings with it. But, on the other hand, when the lamp is to be lit or extin- guished on the Sabbath, they call in some " Gentile " to perform this act for them. Such an action can only be based on one of two alternatives. Either these commandments, and in consequence the favour of the Deity, are strictly limited to the Jewish race and do not apply to the rest of mankind, or, if they do, the orthodox Jew does not concern himself with the sin of his non- Jewish neighbour and the conse- quent disfavour brought upon him in the eyes of his Deity. Either of these consequences must be revolting to the moral consciousness of civilised and right-thinking man, and are, in so far, grossly immoral. Still the undeniable and most important fact remains : that this Fourth Commandment, which impresses upon us the duty to our self in providing for that refreshment and reinvigoration of our physical and mental powers, does recognise such a duty to our self. It recognises and directly provides for the maintenance of bodily health as a sacred duty on the part of man, and, in so far, elevates physical life and the cult of the body into higher moral spheres. The same applies to our mental life, in which the com- SOCIAL MORALITY 219 mandment counteracts the abnormal and unhealthy, as well as exclusive, development of the sense of duty in work, which suppresses all instincts towards recreation and the claims of the more passive and receptive side of our mental life. In so far this com- mandment is directly opposed to the ascetic ideal. Important as we may consider the inclusion of such a commandment in the Decalogue at this early date, we now must feel that it is not an adequate expo- sition of such duties in a full codification of moral laws to apply to the actual needs of our advanced stage of existence. The consideration of the duty to our self, developed by means of a searching and truthful inquiry into its relative claims, forms one of the most important parts of our moral requirements. 3 . We now come to the third division of ethical Duty to injunction as conveyed by the Ten Commandments, bour Glg which deals with man's relation to his fellow-men, and to Social Morality. Beginning at the more proximate and intimate Duty to sphere, in the relation of the individual to the family, family. it naturally puts, as a foremost injunction, the duty of children to parents. To honour one's father and mother is an ethical and social law which has been valid in all times since man evolved the institution of the family. The Tightness of the family being admitted, Duty of the desirability and even the necessity of all that can ^^rents be summarised under the injunction to " honour " and of the heads of the family, needs no further comment y^ to or support. Where the family is no longer recognised the aged. as a social or ethical unit, indispensable to the advance- ment of society as a whole, such a commandment would lose much of its absolutely binding power and of its moral validity. That the family is, and, as far as we can project our thoughts, ought to be, an essential unit of civilised society, I am firmly con- vinced. But, even if this were not admitted, it 220 THE TEACHING OF MOSES cannot be doubted that the moral habit of man, as well as the discipline attached to it, of showing gratitude, or at least deference and consideration, to father and mother, and, by implication as well, to the aged, on the part of the young, are elements that can never be eliminated from the development of higher morality in social beings in whom the moral sense is at all elevated and refined. Duty of On the other hand, the complete silence as regards children anv duties which parents owe to their children, duties and other varying with the different ages to which they attain, relation- an d the relations which these hold to the family and ships. the world outside, may give an appearance of incom- pleteness and one-sidedness which might produce, if not justify, opposition to the absoluteness of this commandment. Moreover, the regulation of other family relations is an ethical problem of most prac- tical import to the establishment of valid and efficient Doubts social ethics. Be it that some doubt may in our times Urrdta- be felt by many as regards the justification of the tions con- family as an essential, or at least an important, element in social organisation, or be it merely from Com- the tendency towards self-indulgence or the gradual mentun- atrophy of all sense of duty among us, there are justified, many thoughtful people, in no sense devoid of the higher ethical principles, who completely deny the constraining authority of this Fifth Commandment. We have all heard it put bluntly that " We were in no way responsible for being put into the world, and, having no say in the matter, the re- sponsibility rests with the parents, and with them the responsibility to look after their children ; so, on that account, there is no debt of gratitude." Quite apart from the sober, if not jejeune, considera- tion of the need for the disciplinary organisation of any household corresponding to that of any other organisation in which people must live together and THE FIFTH COMMANDMENT 221 regulate all aspects of life, and therefore require graduation of authority and discipline, the continuous manifestation of affection and of self-abnegation on the part of normal parents, at least throughout the years measured by the childhood of their offspring, the sacrifices necessarily implied by those who have children, as compared to those who have none, ought to appeal to the sense of justice and fair play, and in so far call for gratitude and consideration, if not for more, on the part of the children. Moreover, who would deny that in the same development of a human soul, corresponding to the healthy develop- ment of a human body, the growth and refinement of affection and of the sense of reverence form an in- tegral part to the organic completeness and social and moral fitness of such a soul. A child brought up without any sense of filial affection, of gratitude, or of reverence, is morally incomplete, if not crippled and monstrous. In so far this commandment will ever remain a most important element in every moral code. What must, however, estrange, if not shock, the advanced moral sense of modern man is the passage accompanying this injunction and supporting it : " That thy days may be long in the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee." Whatever meaning he attributed to this passage, it cannot be denied that it is meant to convey consequent reward to those who follow this commandment. Though this be quite intelligible in a comparatively early stage of social and ethical evolution for a people for whom these commandments were promulgated, they can- not appeal to the more advanced and refined moral sense of those who live in our age. The four following commandments are fundamental The to the organisation of society, and have since had binding authority upon civilised communities in Com- all ages, including our own times. As has already ' 222 THE TEACHING OF MOSES been said, their validity is so unquestioned that with us they no longer form a part of our ethical code, because they are embodied in our laws ; and we thus need not include them in our ethical con- sciousness of which they form an admitted substratum. Duty to The last of these four, enjoining that " Thou shalt truth. no t. Dear false witness against thy neighbour," pro- nounces the importance of truth as affecting the most apparent and tangible relations of social life in which the infringement of such a commandment brings most manifest and evil results. The duty to truth is here denned and limited to the " bearing of false witness against thy neighbour." It is this commandment, perhaps taken in conjunction with the Third Commandment, which is concerned with truth. It cannot be irreverential and unreason- able to express surprise that, in the definite and succinct form in which the preceding commandments deal with human life and human property, the commandment did not read simply, " Thou shalt not lie." The abstract and absolute duty to truth is an ethical injunction which would and must form the corner-stone of the ethics of modern man truth in itself and quite apart from its restricted practical application to those actions which might directly injure our neighbours. But we cannot expect that in those early stages of social evolution this height of ethical development should have been attained. The su- But the last commandment enters more fully into preme actual social relations, and does not only manifest import- deep knowledge of human nature and of human life, ? c ,* but has also revealed with deep insight one of the the 1 enth . , ... Com- very fountain-heads of evil in the social intercourse between men. It is more purely ethical than almost any of the other commandments, in the sense that it rises above the constraining power of law and points to the ethical process within the very heart of man IMPORTANCE OF THE TENTH COMMANDMENT 223 and the secret founts whence action flows. It is intended to counteract the sinister effects of jealousy and envy, from which hatred and malice, and per- haps most of the evils which man inflicts upon man, are derived. The searching importance attached to this last and most comprehensive of moral com- mandments is shown by the enumeration of all the chief groups of possessions reflecting the life of the day, from home and wife even to the very domestic animal in man's possession. In so far this com- mandment may be considered the very first guide and landmark to the ethical activities of thinking man for all ages to come. 16 CHAPTER III THE TEACHING OF CHRIST Sum- THOUGH we have seen that most of the Ten Com- Resuitof rnandments have, in the advancement of human the Mo- society since the early date of their tabulation, been is the e embodied in what we call law in contradistinction to tabiish- ethics, and though we feel that the conception of the ment of _ the sense Godhead and the Commandments emanating irom of duty, such a conception are inadequate to the spiritual needs of modern man ; though we, furthermore, feel that the commandment which refers to the duty to ourselves does not adequately serve as a guide for the moral consciousness of modern man ; and though, finally, while recognising the supreme moral import- ance of the last commandment, counteracting our unsocial instincts in covetousness, we must recognise that the mere formulation of this commandment is not enough to act as an efficient moral guide in the modern conditions of life. In spite of these natural, and even necessary, limitations, we must feel con- vinced, with equal strength, that the summary and total influence of the Mosaic Commandments for the Jewish people of that day, and for the whole civilised world ever since, has been the clear recognition of the sense of duty and justice in man as a corner-stone to the whole structure of human morals and human conduct. This is one of the greatest achievements in the history of mankind. This sense of duty and sense of justice must be trained in man, so that he 224 THE SENSE OF DUTY 225 should manifest his direct humanity, and they cannot be dispensed with, even in Nietzsche's ideal of the superman a moral postulate to which the conduct of every man must be subordinated. The Will to Live, the following of the natural instincts, can be no guide to man as he is, and still less to man as we must recognise that he ought to be that is the ideal of man, the superman. To follow the natural in- To follow stincts consistently and logically must lead to one of two alternative results, namely, to the mere instincts ruminating or bovine state of complete physical t he dis- health and negative mental peace, perhaps to the solution Nirvana which Schopenhauer borrowed from Buddh- society. ism ; or to the war of all against all, internecine conflict, which the upholders of the contract social recognised as the necessary preliminary condition out of which orderly society grew. Now the only power which can be applied to the guidance and regulations of instincts and passions is, ultimately, Reason. Reason is by its very nature outside and above instincts, the great forces which blindly and often ruthlessly make for self-preservation and self- advancement. It must thus permeate the instinctive passions and give a new direction to them. This implies an outgoing, a centrifugal current of the Altruism mind, which the Greeks characterised by the term 7rp6pa)v , and for which we can find no better term than that of Altruism. It means the subjugation and regulation of each instinct, however much we may regard the justice of its claims, and not consider the instinct in itself bad because it is natural. This regulation of our instinct must be in conformity with an idea which human reason (than which we can find no better guide) establishes and justifies. Moreover, such guiding ethical ideas cannot, and need not, be consciously appealed to nor applied to every definite act on the part of man, interrupting 226 THE TEACHING OF CHRIST The and weakening, if not wholly dissolving, the strength sense 1 anc ^ s P nt aneity of action and of will, by their inter- habit' cession ; but they must by education and practice, manners, ending in habit, be transformed into emotional states which, in what we may call the moral sense, or taste, or even manners, modify our passions, our emotive forces, and turn them into the ethical and social channels regulated by these guiding ideas sanctioned Ethos, by Reason. They must create what the Greeks called charac- e thos, and produce in man what we call his "character." I endeavoured to show the importance of the proper balance between this relation of emotion and intellect in man in an essay published many years ago. 1 The task To make such a moral and social ethos effective is in "such tne tas k f a ^ ethical education, whether supplied in an ethos the home, the school, or by life itself. The most f^the^ahn efficient focus for such education and for the of ail discipline which favours or produces such ultimate tkm. results is the home. It is here that the conditions of The home iif e> m which individuals are thrown together con- family, stantly and continuously with strong ties of affection and duty always impressed upon them, and the curbing of the selfish instincts, are from the earliest a ge, by daily repercussion, produced and developed. Of itself and in itself this effect of family life, intimate and penetrating and all pervasive within the home, is one of the most efficient and important, if not the chief, justification for the existence of the family within each larger social body or group. No institu- tion or regulation of social life that exists, or none that can be devised and proposed, can replace this. Be- Discipiine ginning with the relation of children to parents, as obedi- already laid down in the Fifth Commandment, it ence. teaches the young the important discipline of learning to obey ; and this quality itself, even when it is 1 The Balance of Emotion and Intellect. (London, Kegan Paul & Co. 1878.) DISCIPLINE AND OBEDIENCE 227 entirely dominated by the recognition of what is just and best as the rational justification of obedience, is one of the most important human qualities which must be developed in every perfect being as a habit and an emotional state. Even the superman and not only the obeying ones, whom Nietzsche groups round the genius or superman is not, and can never be, a realisation of the highest human qualities and forces unless he possesses this characteristic. For it will be through self-discipline and obedience that he will be enabled to curb and to subdue all those instincts and passions (perhaps even those of pity and love) in order that he should mould his life towards the great purpose which as a superman he holds before himself. Perhaps more than any other aspect of contem- contem- porary social ethics, it is the neglect of this develop- 3^ ment of discipline and the sense of duty which is the duty and most noticeable feature in the moral disease from ^j~ which we are suffering ; and the work of Lord Meath and his supporters in founding the Duty and Disci- pline movement among us is amply justified in fact. Amid all the undoubted material and moral evils produced by this terrible war, we may be comforted in recognising that, to a certain degree though not to the extent which some warlike enthusiasts fondly hope the sense of national duty and discipline has been aroused throughout the country, if not the world, in spite of the lowness of ideals and the unspeakable baseness of moral practice which every day and every hour and in every aspect the war itself produces and impresses upon the minds of all the combatants, as well as the non-combatant portion of every nation. Admirable as in many directions the organisation School of our public schools and the life among the pupils insuffici- may be, the conditions of such life are still regulated ent in this . respect. too exclusively from the point of view of the boy- Home community itself, and, though it establishes its own llfe neces " 228 THE TEACHING OF CHRIST discipline (not in every respect on grounds which justice or wisdom will always ratify), it can in no way replace the constant curbing of selfish instincts and of self-indulgence, or develop obedience to more unselfish purposes, which the life in a family circle provides. Without this training, afforded from the earliest youth upwards by family life, where the per- formance of duties and services is so constantly required by members of the family as to create an emotional state or a habit, the discipline of curbing selfish instincts can never be effectively impressed. The Montessori system fails in this respect in not develop- ing duty, though no doubt excellent in producing love for things taught. The Without it there is produced the imperfect human egoist. being, the monstrous moral and social cripple whom we call the egoist. He is not only essentially unlov- able, but he becomes socially impossible, even unjust to himself as well as to others, and hence less likely to be normally happy. While deficient in the power of self-control, self-detachment, and positive self- repression in dealing with ideas or general duties, he is less efficient in performing the ordinary impersonal tasks of life self-imposed or imposed by circum- stances. From an almost physiological point of view he is bound to become abnormal, if not pathological. The unchecked realisation of selfish instincts inevit- ably leads to what, from a pathological point of view, is technically called hysteria, or, as applied to physical consciousness, hypochondriasis. 1 If, as a conscious disciple of Nietzsche's or as an unconscious worshipper of the Will to Live or the Will to Power, he thinks that he has discovered in himself the elements which produced a Caesar, a Napoleon, or a Wagner, he 1 George Meredith's great satire of The Egoist, and Mr. Maxwell's novel In Cotton Wool, illustrate forcibly this pathological development ; whilst dealing with widely different characters and productive of different results. THE EGOIST 229 becomes one of that numerous breed of malignant social cripples who generally bring disaster upon them- selves. They also produce discord and unhappiness in all their relations of human life, because they think that all things and the wills and interests of all their fellow-men ought justly to be subordinated to the advance of their own little selves or the great causes with which they have, by a fond, though none the less grotesque, illusion identified their own lives and their own interests. Besides this pronounced and sometimes pathological development of the egoist, who has not learnt by earlier and by con- tinuous practice in duties from which he cannot escape, to curb his will and his instincts in all the nice shadings of altruistic action, the experienced observer of life must realise the loss incurred for such moral training without the institution of marriage and of the family. He may often observe that amongst his unmarried acquaintances, the typical " old bachelor " and " old maid," and even in the happily married childless couples who have developed a strong, though limited, affection for one another, the paucity in opportunities for continuous practice in actual unselfish discipline which family life affords, not only diminishes their adaptability and needs, of pliancy to meet the needs, even impersonal daily activity in complex social life, but also, in so far, weakens their general power of complete self-detach- ment in any given task, and is likely to accentuate abnormal personal idiosyncrasy, if not eccentricity. Quite apart from the great question of sexual love Love the and its rational and social regulation upon which I fo^e^n do not wish to enter here the justification, nay, the man and essential necessity, of the institution of family and nature - of marriage are entirely established by this aspect of ultimate social ethics, both as regards the normal development of the individual man as such, as well 230 THE TEACHING OF CHRIST as the best development of social groups and society as a whole. The great Eros (love in its widest accep- tation) which is and will ever remain the centrifugal or emotional force in humanity and in the world, is actually and continuously developed and strength- ened, if not produced, by conditions which are pri- marily found in filial relations and in the family. This central power of the soul strengthens the emotionality of man in an altruistic direction, or at least controls the directly selfish impulses ; and this growth and power of love, this increase of cardiac vitality and passion, make a man capable of doing great things and of ultimately becoming a superman or at least of contributing to his development. The superman is above all the man with the biggest heart, the strongest capacity for loving, and the greatest power of controlling his forceful and pliant affections in any direction which his reason and its ultimate ideals may dictate. This love is, if not the only factor, certainly one of the essential ones in the development of a great human being. Trained and strengthened in the family and concentrated in personal and individual affection, it rises beyond these to embrace further spheres, extending beyond the community to the wider country in the form of patriotism, and beyond this to the love of man as such, the love of humanity which, above all other powers, makes man a true human being. in es- It is especially in two aspects that Christianity the h cen ng supplements Judaism and marks an ethical advance, trai ideas an upward step, towards the ultimate ideals of the andhu- human species. Beyond the sense of justice and of manity duty, the central teaching of Christ and the very anity " spirit of Christianity in its purest and noblest form supple- j s this all-pervading spirit of love. And, together ments , i /- i /- Judaism, with the duty towards God and family and nation and the love of them, the spirit of Christ's teaching CHRISTIAN LOVE 231 impresses the whole of mankind and spurns the narrower limits of racial preference. It is no doubt untrue and unfair to Judaism to maintain, or even to imagine, that its teaching did not inculcate love and pity, and that it excluded from the purview of our duties and our feelings " the stranger within our gates " or even beyond our gates. Hillel may have anticipated the golden rule of " doing unto others as we would they should unto us," and many passages may be found in Jewish moral teachings which distinctly imply that our feelings and duties are not to be bounded by the family or the race. But there cannot be any doubt that, in this natural process of ethical evolution, Mosaic ethics were supplemented and advanced by the clear and emphatic insistence upon the love of man, upon pity and sympathy with him, and that the conception of this relation to man was widened far beyond the bounds of race and even included the enemies of the Jewish people, and the enemy of the individual also. On the other hand, it cannot be denied that, however much may be said of the social and ethical attitude of the Jewish people as extending beyond their racial limitation, in the eyes of their God, as well as in their popular beliefs, some preferential posi- tion was assigned to the people of Israel ; and that in so far this racial or nationalistic attitude counter- acted the wider ideals of human love contained in Christ's teaching. The true teachings of Christ will always thus be identified with the opposition to the limitations imposed by race or nationality upon man's duties towards mankind and his affection for man as his brother. 1 1 It is one of the ironies of history, one of the many historical absurdities in human profession as contrasted with human action, that during the controversies and passions grouping round the Dreyfus case in France a more isolated and attenuated instance of so-called Christian persecution of their fellow-men of the race which produced 232 THE TEACHING OF CHRIST The Ser- mon on the Mount. The Ser- mon on the Mount con- sciously meant to make an advance in ethical teaching. No part of Christ's teaching conveys more clearly and more definitely and with the true ring of authen- ticity this great moral achievement, than the Sermon on the Mount. Whatever the results of modern Biblical criticism may be as to the direct author- ship of this sermon, its date and composition and relation to the other parts of the New Testament and the degree of its authenticity, the fact remains : that this Sermon on the Mount will ever stand forth as a great monument in the ethical and religious teaching of mankind. It definitely marks the great step in ethical development, in the recognition of love and charity, not only as a ruling principle in the relations of man to man, but also as a power within man which advances him in his perfectibility and without which no ideal of a human being can be conceived. It is thus this central doctrine of love with which the Sermon on the Mount is intended to supplement the Mosaic commandments ; but, at the same time, it must be beyond all doubt to any fair-minded student of that sermon, that it is consciously directed in opposition to the process of formalisation which took the life and spirit out of the old-established moral laws and which no longer responded to the new needs created by the advance of the later generations and the newer conditions of life. It emphatically implies the insufficiency of the earlier Christ the anti-Dreyfusards, representing the claims and interests of the Church, should have summarised their chief antagonism against the Jews by the term of opprobrium sans-patries. Christ Himself was the greatest of all sans-patries in respect of urging the claims of a wider humanity ; while, on the other hand, it can be noted even in the present war in spite of the attempted disingenuous identification of international finance with the whole Jewish race that, fighting with patriotic zeal in every one of the opposing armies, and often pro- tagonists in urging the political claims of each of the several contending nations, Jews are foremost in patriotic ardour. ADVANCE IN MORALS 233 moral code to respond to all these new conditions. Even in Christ's time many of these moral command- ments had passed into what we call law, and could be taken for granted. Mere conformity to them was not enough to elevate the moral standards of the individual and to comply with the social needs of the community. Christ did not mean to destroy these accepted laws, but to develop them still further. " Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets : I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil." On the other hand, the mere formal compliance with the old laws was not enough. It could only satisfy the formalists whom He called Scribes and Pharisees. " For I say unto you, that except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the Scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven." " Thou shalt not kill " was not enough to counteract the evil in the social feelings of man to man ; He enjoined that we must go deeper down into our feelings towards our fellow-men for the seat of the evil, and we must not kill his self-respect or wound his feelings. " Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not kill ; and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judg- ment ; but I say unto you, that whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment : and whosoever shall say to his brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council : but whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire." So, too, the Seventh Commandment did not adequately respond to the higher moral con- sciousness : " Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not commit adultery ; but, I say unto you, that whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart." And thus what was merely recognised as illegal is carried still further into the 234 THE TEACHING OF CHRIST ethical sphere of the motive which leads to the illegal deed. Moral in- He carries this moral inwardness, this further wardness. re fj nemen t; an( j development of the moral sense, still deeper when he definitely condemns the formalism in those who merely clung to restricted and outwardly manifest laws and did not respond to the higher ethical needs. " Take heed that ye do not your alms before men, to be seen of them : otherwise ye have no reward of your Father which is in heaven. Therefore, when thou doest thine alms, do not sound a trumpet before thee, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may have glory of men. But when thou doest alms, let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth. . . . And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are : for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. . . . But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father. . . ." The But, above all, He wishes to oppose whatever forces lov^su- mav counteract the positive love of one's fellow-men, preme. These forces are the spirit of enmity and the spirit of hate and vengeance. This is impressed with the greatest strength, far beyond the confines of mere justice. Justice is, if not superseded by love, sup- plemented as far as man's heart goes by love which is to rule there. " Judge not, that ye be not judged." And there is added to it the beautiful warning against selfishness which distorts the truthful judgment of other claims, in the " beholding of the mote that is in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye ? " Justice can in no way destroy the spirit and the demand of human love : " An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth " cannot destroy the claims of charity : and there follow the CATHOLICITY 235 sublime words that " whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if any man will sue thee at the law, and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also." He combats chiefly the spirit of hate and venge- The ex- fulness : and the spirit of love is not to be confined th^T'lrit to your neighbour, but is to be extended even to your of love to enemies: " Ye have heard that it hath been said, jjj^even Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy, to the But I say unto you, love your enemies, bless them ei that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and perse- cute you." The purity and inwardness of His moral teaching is shown in His opposition to mere outward semblance and conformity. " Moreover, when ye fast, be not as the hypocrites, of a sad countenance : for they disfigure their faces, that they may appear unto men to fast. . . . But thou, when thou fastest, anoint thine head, and wash thy face ; that thou appear not unto men to fast. ..." Throughout this exalted Sermon, which establishes The Ser- for all time the dominant position of love as the mon m ~ . ., . . . ,. ,. fluenced chief factor in human relationship and in ethics, there by the is also established for man the ideal of inner moral & ^ ga ~ purity irrespective of outer manifestation and recog- whom it nition. But, at the same time, we must recognise Dressed as has before this been recognised by so many The poor impartial critics that the sermon is essentially * modified, if not directly and completely evoked by, the character of the audience whom Christ is address- ing : and by the satisfaction of that very impulse of charity in Him to comfort and console those fellow- beings so much in need of comfort and consolation, the poor and the suffering. It is these whom He wishes to uplift. To this impulse are to be ascribed the opening paragraphs not only meant to console, but 236 THE TEACHING OF CHRIST even to exalt the position of those who are bowed down and whose worldly fate is that of the unfavoured by fortune : " Blessed are the poor in spirit : for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are they that mourn : for they shall be comforted. " Blessed are the meek : for they shall inherit the earth. " Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness : for they shall be filled. " Blessed are the merciful : for they shall obtain mercy. " Blessed are the pure in heart : for they shall see God. " Blessed are the peacemakers : for they shall be called the children of God. " Blessed are they which are persecuted for right- eousness' sake : for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. " Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake. " Rejoice, and be exceeding glad : for great is your reward in heaven : for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you. " Ye are the salt of the earth : but if the salt have lost his savour, wherewith shall it be salted ? It is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men. " Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on an hill cannot be hid." The kingdom of heaven is to belong to those who are poor both in material wealth and in spirit, not to the mighty and the prosperous and the leaders of intelligence. In His enthusiasm for the lowly life and His opposition to worldly prosperity, power and riches, He is carried away to make a positive virtue of the life which does not bring these ; and His injunction OPPOSITION TO WEALTH AND POWER 237 is that one should spurn all efforts which lead to such qpposi- prosperity and success, invoking as an example the tlonto life of nature and the organic beings devoid of intelli- perity, gence, imagination, forethought, and after-thought. It is the longing of the romanticists driven by oppo- strength, sition to the degeneracy of the dominant forms of the civilisation in their age to the cry of " Back to nature " qualities and to the simplicity, even unintelligence, of such produce natural life : these - " Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal : " But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal : " For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. " The light of the body is the eye : if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light. " But if thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness ! " No man can serve two masters : for either he will hate the one, and love the other ; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon. " Therefore I say unto you, take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink : nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment ? " Behold the fowls of the air : for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns, yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they ? " Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature ? " And why take ye thought for raiment ? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow : they toil not, neither do they spin : 238 THE TEACHING OF CHRIST " And yet I say unto you, that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. " Wherefore, if God so clothed the grass of the field, which to-day is, and to-morrow is cast into the oven, shall He not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith? " Therefore take no thought, saying, what shall we eat ? or, What shall we drink ? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed ? " For after all these things do the Gentiles seek : for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things. " But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and His righteousness ; and all these things shall be added unto you. " Take therefore no thought for the morrow : for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof." CHAPTER IV THE NEED FOR ETHICAL EVOLUTION IMPLIED IN THE TEACHING OF CHRIST. PLATO IT is clear that this position in social ethics is directly At vari- at variance with the moral consciousness of our own ^odem th age and of almost all the ages representing higher ethics. civilisation in the past. For, whether we believe in p etence, the right of property or not, whether we admit the industr y. doctrine of absolute socialism and collectivism or of are soda) unalloyed individualism and laissez faire, the econo- virtues - mical standards obtaining in the world and the conception of labour which we hold is that they pro- duce the common measure of value in the form of wealth individually or collectively ; and that such labour and such effort cannot be considered bad, and must be recognised by the approval of society and the corresponding reward which they receive. From every point of view it must be admitted that competence, industry, and thrift are social, as well as individual virtues. And though society must guard against the abuses of certain immoral and un- just developments in definite directions, it must equally recognise the virtue of competence, industry, thrift, and forethought. At all events, it cannot extol those qualities in man and the results arising out of them which would directly produce their contraries. It is against this aspect of Christian ethics that so many thinkers and writers have protested, and that, in the most violent and uncompromising form, Nietzsche has hurled his powerful rhetoric and fiery 17 239 240 THE NEED FOR ETHICAL EVOLUTION invective. The glorification of the incompetent and of the mentally deficient, leading to the survival of the unfittest, has led him to maintain that Chris- tianity had produced the morals for slaves. Still more is this the case in the attitude which in other The cult parts of the New Testament, and as a leading feature of Christian ethics, is maintained towards the physical life of man, the cult of the body, the natural instinct towards physical self-preservation. Not only Nietz- sche, but the common consciousness of modern man, revolts against the degradation of the body, and up- holds its rights and claims to intelligent cultivation ; they almost establish the sanctity of the body. The natural instincts are in themselves not bad, but good ; their claims are just, provided they are main- tained in due and moral organic proportion. No instinct is of itself bad, as no earth is unclean ; it only becomes dirt when " out of place." Instincts must be controlled and must even be repressed in accordance with the claims of other instincts, in- stincts social and moral. In so far the eugenistic movement is highly moral ; and we are all endeavour- ing to combat physical degeneration. However sincere and fervid our sympathies and our consequent actions in various directions with regard to the mass of the people, " the labouring classes," the " prole- tariat," may be, it is definitely directed towards the betterment of their condition ; and this betterment implies that we recognise and strive for the best for man, individual and collective. No champion of the " proletariat " would venture to draw the logical conclusion of the exaltation of the conditions of life which have produced the lowly, the miserable, and degraded type of individual out of which it is com- posed, and would maintain that the weak, inefficient, and unrefined are higher and better than the strong, the powerful, the intellectually and morally refined. CHRIST'S REFORM IMPLIES FUTURE REFORMS 241 Christ's Sermon on the Mount and His other teach- Christ's ings were evoked to meet the formalised abuses of Aching inefficient moral standards prevailing in His day, aimed ata and of consoling and uplifting those who were bowed down by unjust social conditions and by adversity, natural And the justification and eternal fitness of such ainlc- divine impulse was the spirit of true humanity, i 11- i , T T i i wlth the love and charity, which He has brought into the new re- moral consciousness of man as an essential element ^^g O f of His humanness for all times. Marking, as it does, His age. an advance in ethical evolution over the older moral code of Moses, it confirms the unquestionable belief ne ed of in us, that the evolution of man would be retarded future or directly thwarted if later ages, with essentially a g es - different social conditions, needs and aspirations, grounded upon centuries of varying physical con- ditions and of civilisation, did not require supple- menting and modification in order adequately to respond to the ethical needs of society. It still further impresses upon us the conviction, by the very influence which for so many centuries Christ's teaching has exercised upon the world, of the need, the absolute necessity, for the clear and adequate and effective formulation of the moral standards for successive ages, so that each age should become clearly conscious of its own ethical forces, and, allowing them by con- scious interaction to penetrate effectively the conduct of individual and collective human life, to prepare each periodic group in this social evolution for the progressive establishment of ethical conceptions which would favour the advance of civilisation and make of future man and of future society what to their predecessors would have appeared as the superman and the society of supermen. But the adequate expression of the moral conscious- ness of an age or a people will, from the very nature of the task, always be most difficult of realisation. 242 THE NEED FOR ETHICAL EVOLUTION Difficui- To the difficulties of clear apprehension of an in- tiesmthe tellectual world so delicate and complex, and still clear . . Y formula- more of clear and convincing expression by means newmorai f language must not be added the difficulties inherent code. in a code destined for people of entirely different bebSmd* origin, living under physical conditions so varied from by the our own, and representing social and intellectual life so and lan- far removed from that of later ages. Moreover their guageof i mm ediate dependence upon, and interpenetration previous . . ' r ages. with, religious conceptions and doctrines to which, in their actual form and in the true meaning which they had for these alien people of bygone days, so many of us cannot subscribe and which we even disbelieve, make the task still more difficult. The expression of the moral consciousness in the highly complex conditions of modern life, and the difficulty of its just and ready application to the infinitely multiform needs of daily routine, present of them- selves so arduous and elusive a task that a trans- lation into less familiar regions of thought essentially counteracts their effectiveness. Such a clear codi- fication of the ethical consciousness of each age cannot therefore be achieved by translation into the mystical language of bygone ages or thoughts. It must in every moment be tested by the actualities of life ; as its own recognition and establishment must arise out of the most thorough, unbiassed, and concentrated study of the actual conditions of such life. In so far it must be absolutely rational : it must be based on empirical induction, strengthened by the test of logic ; and cannot be directly sub- ordinated to the mystical, and often illogical, con- ditions of purely religious doctrine. Moreover, as I maintained before, the practical, sober, almost opportunistic, nature of such social laws, when interfused with our higher religious aspirations and our material daily wants and activities can only FATALISTIC AND CONSCIOUS EVOLUTION 243 tend to rob the religious consciousness and life of its essentially emotional and its mystically super- natural elements, which are inseparable from the truly religious spirit. Nor must such clear and universally convincing expression of the moral con- sciousness of each age be put in the literary form of involved and suggestive maxims. Such vaguer generalisations, capable of varied interpretation, as is given by the oriental garb in which Nietzsche has transferred his principles of individual and social ethics to the lips of Zarathustra, rob his moral teach- ing of practical effectiveness. The first task in this great ethical need of ours The eu- is the establishment of the true facts and data of^ ent s " f life, individual and collective, out of which the the facts ethical consciousness of the age grows and to the ofmoder* needs of which it is to respond. The historical andji fe . a s a . , , . , , . . , basis for inductive methods, carried on in their purity and ethics, severity, are to establish the facts of social evolution and the moral needs which it involves for man to produce a harmonious adaptation of his life to the physical and social conditions in which he lives. But, having recognised this evolution, his ethical task does not end there ; he must not be a slave to Fatalistic Evolutionism, which cannot apply to the intelligent world, to the ethical and social needs of the "social animal." He must establish Conscious Conscious Evolution, and must crown his sober, and yet noble, t ionism. induction by the application of his deductive faculties, in his ideal imagination. Here lies the domain, the powerful and just domain, of man's imagination, tion - which, whatever evidence the eminently successful inquiries of the great biologists in our age may have established, remains the distinctive power differen- tiating man from the rest of the organic world, animal and vegetable. Our sober and conscientious induction establishes 244 THE NEED FOR ETHICAL EVOLUTION Actual the facts with regard to our actions and their motives f g Q an and their relation to human society and its needs ; The ideal our imagination shows us for every act and its motive life. " an ideal of perfection. Even for every unfulfilled desire, the realisation of which has never been at- tempted, and even for those which reason consciously or subconsciously tells us cannot be realised or attempted, there is, by implication, an apprehension of the potential or possible realisation of such desires in a world unlimited by the incompleteness of hu- man power. The absurd impulse to transplant our- selves across the ocean in one moment nay, to span the globe which an unfettered imagination may suggest, is at once checked and removed from the sphere of possible desires by rational man. But the possibilities of such perfect and unlimited power must be present to the imagination of man, though he at once realises, by the habitual consciousness of his own limited organism, that it is not within his grasp. It exists in his imagination as an idea. This imagination is regulated and limited though never extirpated by reason and logic. Every act thus has its ideal ; and the collective acts emanating from one conscious centre which we call a personality, or an individual, have their ideal in the perfect man. Still further, each social group of such individuals, leading us up to the State and to humanity as a whole, each have their ideal ; until we come to the universe and to God, in which the imagination out- strips more and more our inductive faculty, which already, through the highest physical and mathe- matical speculation, transcends the empirical and rises to pure metaphysics and ends in religion. Darwin The highest expression of induction and of this Hato imagination are the intellectual achievements of man which we call science and art. They represent our imagination led by the logical and aesthetic faculties ; PLATO AND DARWIN 245 and these together, when turned to the life of man, lead to ethics and establish the laws of conduct. The scientific side of ethics leads to the adaptation of the human organism to the surrounding conditions of nature and the inter-relation of man in his social and political organisation ; the aesthetic side of ethics enables him to realise and to project before his consciousness the most perfect image for man's activities on the basis of logic and truth with which science has provided him. To use two personal types from the actual history of past thought : the principle upon which the adequate and efficient codification of ethics should be based to meet the needs of our present life and to fulfil the hopes of future progressive generations (while never discarding, but emphatically embodying, the lasting principles of Mosaic and Christian ethics) is to be the mental fusion of Darwin and Plato. Mere induction, fatal- istic evolutionism, as applied to man's conscious life, can never lead us to a true ethical code. Pure idealism, even when based upon the highest religion nay, because of its very transcendental character cannot respond to the actual needs of terrestrial life and human society, and cannot control the potent currents of man's instincts and passions, nor even the instincts and passions of wider social groups and of political bodies. It is, therefore, that, besides Moses and Christ, I Platonic have added the third great mental type in the history ideaUsm - of human thought, namely, Plato. I do not propose to enter into the minute problems of Plato's theory of Ideas, nor is this essential to my purpose. Nor do I wish to inquire into the fact of how far Plato himself, or his followers, recognised the objective, almost material existence, of such ideas. The whole mediaeval question of Nominalism and Realism does not affect us. Whether the ideas have an actual 246 THE NEED FOR ETHICAL EVOLUTION " objective " existence or not, Plato's philosophy has confirmed for all times their actual existence in the human mind. It is with the effect (as their conscious realisation in our mind), which such ideas and ideals have in regulating our thoughts and our actions, that we are here concerned. These thoughts and actions, however, are based upon saturated with the inductive realisation of the facts of human life, as scientific and historical experience convey them to us. Evolution made conscious js to become a force directing mankind in its ethical progress to- wards a more perfect state, both as regards individual man and human society. Plato, for us, thus means Rational and Practical Idealism, neither retrospective nor mystical, neither romantic nor Utopian, but idealism all the same, which will safeguard the progress of mankind. CHAPTER V PLATONIC IDEALISM APPLIED TO ETHICAL EVOLUTION. THE ETHICS OF THE FUTURE BEFORE attempting to indicate the general outline and character which the codification of our ethical system will require, I should like to premise two isolated instances and experiences, the direct applic- ability of which to the main question before us may not be so evident, but of which in due course I shall illustrate the bearings. The second instance I wish to premise has a very Episo- different, if not almost the opposite bearing to the first, stance 1 " The first instance is meant to show the possibilities, iiiustrat- by means of the creation of favourable material con- gduca- ditions and of direct education, of the moral and ^ty of intellectual improvement to which the less favoured masses, classes, including even the unskilled and illiterate labourer may attain. I can vouch for the absolute truth of this statement, free from all exaggeration, from personal experience. The Gilchrist Educational Trust has for many years provided lectures for the labouring classes of Great Britain and Ireland which, by intelligent and careful management on the part of the trustees and secretaries, have won for themselves a popularity which ensures for every Gilchrist lecturer in every part of the United Kingdom huge audiences. They consist almost exclusively of working men and women, the average attendance being about 15 per 347 248 THE ETHICS OF THE FUTURE cent, of the inhabitants of every town or village where these lectures are held. The lowest number of attendants that I can remember would be between four and five hundred : while a single lecturer has often had as many as five thousand. The lectures are held in the largest room available, from the drill halls and exhibition halls to the crowded schoolrooms, or, where no such public places are to be found, in chapels. The entrance fee is one penny per lecture, and not infrequently the tickets are sold out at once and admittance has had to be refused to large numbers. These audiences consist of miners, mill-hands, and factory-hands in the various industrial districts, from Scotland to Land's End, from the west to the east coast, and have also included fishermen and agricultural labourers from fishing villages and agricultural districts, in which the same eagerness to learn has shown itself. Moreover, this desire is seen most markedly in the fact that, whereas every lecturer of experience will admit that the attention of the more highly educated audiences elsewhere can hardly be held for more than an hour, these Gilchrist audiences are not satisfied with less than one hour and a quarter, and will often willingly sit through a longer period. The absolute stillness and the keen responsiveness of these men and women are most remarkable and exceptional. The Gilchrist lecturers are not of the type of the popular lecturer, but are generally themselves leading authorities and specialists in their own subject. The most successful Gilchrist lecturers have been men like Huxley and Sir Robert Ball. Not only science in all its branches has thus been brought before these large audiences of labouring men, but they have even been introduced into the higher realms of literature and art. It is an un- deniable fact that thousands of these roughest colliers and miners, sitting in rapt attention, often EDUCABILITY OF THE MASSES 249 with their caps on, for well over an hour, have been made to appreciate not only history and poetry even the poetry of Robert Browning properly read and explained to them but also the sublime beauty of Greek art more than two thousand years old, presented to them in lantern illustrations by the fragmentary remains of the Parthenon sculptures ; and this interest and appreciation have been sincere and lasting. That it has been possible to lead men, with but scanty preparation in elementary education, whose usual form of relaxation and amusement, when not confined to the public-house, has been a fight between bull terriers, to appreciate the highest forms of art, which are generally supposed to be the exclusive birthright of the most highly educated portion of the community, furnishes undeniable encouragement to those who believe in the power of social legislation and such forms of education which tend to the advancement of the moral, intellectual, and artistic side of human nature. The second incident, the bearing of which, as will Episo- perhaps readily be seen, is upon the general question ^^ n " of social improvement for the great mass of the mustrat- people, and concerns the fundamental point of view centraf in which this question of betterment is opposed, view of with exaggerated emphasis, to the prevailing attitude eoiu- U held chiefly by the professed socialists and by those tionin who publicly or privately are concerned in the work and of of social reform. I here give it in the words of the cratac narrator himself : demo- cracy in "Though suffering from a temporary breakdown politic8 ' in health, I had promised the organisers of the Summer Extension Meeting in my University to give the opening address in one section of their courses of lectures. They were all addressed to widely varied audiences of students from all over England, as well as from foreign countries, who flocked to these 250 THE ETHICS OF THE FUTURE centres to acquire some of the learning which a University can give them. My condition in accepting the invitation to open the course of lectures was, that I would do this if I was at the time within two hundred miles, and only in case an eminent colleague of mine, the late Sir Richard Jebb, was unable to do so. It turned out that my colleague was thus prevented. I, on the other hand, after a rest-cure in the Black Forest, was completing my further cure at one of the other German watering-places several hundred miles distant from my University. Never- theless, I decided to fulfil my promise, to interrupt my cure, to travel direct to England, deliver the lecture, and to return to Germany to continue my cure the very next day. " I had settled myself comfortably in a first-class carriage which, moreover, I fortunately found empty, with sufficient reading material and every other comfort, when, on arriving at Cologne, I found the railway station crowded with people all anxious to enter the express bound for England. The numbers were so great that second and even first class carriages had to be filled with many third-class passengers. There rushed into my compartment five men with much hand luggage, who filled every available seat and who at once began noisily to take possession of the carriage, and not only ostentatiously made themselves at home in every way but pro- ceeded to eat and drink in a manner which was far from attractive. A coarse-faced German of the aggressive half Teuton, half Slav type of labouring men, fiat-faced and brutal in features, took out his sausage and cheese, cut them into largish squares with his clasp-knife, and ate with ostentatious appetite. Though I endeavoured not to show my displeasure at this incursion upon my comfort, I soon felt, emanating from my five fellow-travellers, an atmosphere of antagonism to me, which was made still more noticeable by their remarks in German, a language which they evidently thought I did not understand. " I soon discovered that they were delegates to ARISTODEMOCRACY 251 the Great Socialist Congress about to be held in London, and it was equally clear that they looked upon me as a blatant and luxurious bourgeois, if not capitalistic aristocrat, the embodied representa- tive of all the principles which they held in odium and the personal type most antagonistic to them- selves. It was also manifest that they rather enjoyed my discomfiture. But the conversation grew more and more interesting, especially owing to the part taken by one member of the party, whose physiog- nomy and manner, as well as the acuteness of thought and wide range of knowledge displayed in well-chosen and beautiful German, were in strong contrast to the remarks of his companions. He was sallow-faced and had dark hair, with a well-cut, thin aquiline nose, and luminous dark eyes the superior and refined Semitic type, strongly contrasted to the more vulgar Teutonic and Slav type of the others. As I after- wards learnt, he was one of the leading socialist delegates from Saxony. " As the conversation continued, an irrepressible desire arose in me to take part in it incidentally to correct their misapprehension as to my own nature and principles, and to punish them for the injustice they had done to me, and through me to my kind, and finally, perhaps, to do some good through these leaders of socialist thought, by correcting some of their views. Still more there arose in me a certain humorous and paradoxical mood, perhaps not entirely free from a sense of superiority and mastery in the very sphere which they professed as exclusively their own. This mood was in some respects akin to the irony of Mephistopheles when dealing with the school- boy. " When at last the opportunity offered itself in the course of the discussion, I cut in with exaggerated quiet and simplicity of manner, apologising for my intrusion, and, in the course of my remarks, lightly threw in with unaltered naturalness and simplicity : ' As my late friend Karl Marx often said . . .' The effect was most startling, as if a bomb-shell had exploded amongst them. They all eagerly turned to 252 THE ETHICS OF THE FUTURE me and shouted : ' What, you knew Karl Marx ? And he was a friend of yours ? ' I answered in the same quiet tone, unmoved by their almost passionate eagerness : ' Oh yes, even a Dutz-freund ' (an intimate friend to whom in Germany one says ' thou ' instead of ' you '). " I must here explain that in my young days, when I was little more than a boy, about 1877, tne eminent Russian legal and political writer, since become a prominent member of the Duma, Professor Kovalevsky, whom I had met at one of G. H. Lewes and George Eliot's Sunday afternoon parties in London, had introduced me to Karl Marx, then living in Hampstead. I had seen very much of this founder of modern theoretic socialism, as well as of his most refined wife (nee von Westphal) ; and, though he had never succeeded in persuading me to adopt socialist views, we often discussed the most varied topics of politics, science, literature, and art. Besides learning much from this great man, who was a mine of deep and accurate knowledge in every sphere, I learnt to hold him in high respect and to love the purity, gentleness, and refinement of his big heart. He seemed to find so much pleasure in the mere fresh- ness of my youthful enthusiasm and took so great an interest in my own life and welfare, that one day he proposed that we should become Dutz-freunde , and I still possess one of his photographs on which he has thus addressed me. " But the effect of this revelation upon these wor- shippers of Karl Marx was so intense and instan- taneous that, from that moment, they hung upon my lips and showed humble regard and keen interest. The conversation grew more and more interesting, and I was especially attracted by the personality of the Saxon deputy, towards whom, do what I would to include the others, my own conversation was chiefly addressed. " Before we parted, however, I decided to have the main question out in a most direct and personal form. I then openly returned to the incidents of our trip from the moment they had entered the ARISTODEMOCRACY 253 carriage and charged them with having assumed that I was their natural enemy, was no friend of the people, and that they had monopolised all the love for mankind and the sympathy with human suffering ; that I was one of those selfish, self-indulgent, luxurious capitalists who battened on the misery of the poor worker. They had to admit that I was right. " ' Well then/ I continued, ' let us compare notes. Who are you, and who am I ? What are you doing, and what am I doing ? ' I then gave them truth- fully a sketch of my own life and activities, and ended by telling them the mission on which I was engaged at that moment, and the peculiar conditions under which I was fulfilling the definite task which I had undertaken. ' When I had finished my account they turned to me and said : ' But you are one of us. You are a socialist, whatever you may say. There can be no difference between us.' And my Saxon friend con- tinued : ' You may say what you will, in Germany you would be considered a socialist, merely from your attitude and action towards the working classes, and those in power would force you into our ranks ; for there would be no room for you in any other party. You, at all events, not only love the people, but you have faith in them.' " My answer to him was : ' You are right in your last remark, but you are all wrong if you think that I am at one with you socialists, and that there is no difference between us.' And here I felt driven, perhaps by an oratorical impulse, to make my point doubly clear through paradoxical exaggeration of the difference between us, putting this difference in an almost brutal form. " ' The difference between us, in spite of my love for the people and my faith in them, is that I think it more important for the world that one man should be made ein feiner Mensch, should be made more refined, than that hundreds, nay perhaps even thou- sands, of ordinary men should have more food to eat than they have at present. I believe that, in all prosperous and civilised communities, every man 254 THE ETHICS OF THE FUTURE should have the right to live and even the right to work. I also hold that much will have to be done by direct legislation to check the power of capitalism in finance and in the other forms of manipulation of capital, which lead to that excessive accumulation in the hands of individuals, giving them an unbounded power in public life without corresponding responsi- bilities ; that such accumulation of capital in single hands is " against good policy." " ' I am thus, perhaps, a socialist at the bottom and the top. But I am an absolute individualist in between. Now, having made this concession, I think it more important for me that, by whatever work I am able to do, I should continue to develop, if not in man in general, at all events in certain men, those higher spiritual attainments, the totality of which constitutes a higher human being and produces a higher community, and ultimately a higher type of mankind, than that which our own days present. These higher and more refined men are to be the leaders of man- kind ; and, by their work, impersonal and indirect as well as personal and direct, they are to draw into their higher circle whoever from the mass of the proletariat is capable of such advancement : and by this constant action and reaction (Wechselwirkung) the whole of the proletariat, the mass of the people, is to be raised. " ' But, mark you, these higher individuals are to be the leaders. Let me tell you that Karl Marx was not out of sympathy with this view, even in its nega- tive attitude as regards the claims of the lower orders ; and it was he who was fond of quoting those verses of your great Goethe from his ' West-ostliche Divan ' on the presentation to a lady of a small bottle containing attar of roses.' I then recited, over the din of the train, Goethe's verses. They clustered round me, their heads eagerly bent forward while they listened. I can still see the eyes of the flat-faced Slav Prussian, whose way of eating had at first repelled me, close to mine. Their limpid brightness was soon dedimmed by tears evoked by the melody of the verses. ARISTODEMOCRACY 255 Au Suleika 1 Dir mil Wohlgeruch zu kosen, Deine Freuden zu erhohn, Knospend mussen tausend Rosen Erst in Glut hen untergehn. Um ein Fldschchen gu besitzgn, Das den Ruch auf ewig halt, Schlank we deine Finger spitxen, Da bedarf es einer Welt. Einer Welt von Lebtnstriebtn, Die in ihrer Fulle Drang Ahndeten schon Bulbuls Liebtn, Seeltrregenden Gesang. Sollte jene Qual uns qudlen, Da sie unsre Lust vermehrt ? Hat nicht Myriaden Seelen Timur's Herrschaft aufgezehrt? " ' The action of consistent socialism, with which I am entirely out of sympathy, is lowering, not only to the strong, good, wise, and great individual ; but it 1 I must subjoin this imperfect translation of an untranslatable lyric : Thee to woo with perfume sweetest, And thy love to cherish, Blossoming, one thousand roses, Glowing, had to perish. Thus to give a graceful phial. E'er to hold the scent. Slim and tapering like thy fingers, A whole world was spent. A whole world of living forces, Striving full and long, Prescient of Bulbul's loving And soul-stirring song. Why then grieve at loss and sorrow Which increase our joy ? Doth not myriad souls of living Timur's rule destroy ? 18 256 THE ETHICS OF THE FUTURE is also lowering to mankind as a whole, and gives no hope of an advance towards the ideals which man as man must form for the future. In so far I am your enemy, and we are opponents. 1 ' The Saxon deputy thoughtfully shook his head, and said : ' Well, there is much to be said for your point of view, but you must allow me to refuse to be your enemy, and to hope that you will be our friend.' " The ab- We have seen and, because of the vital importance proper * ^ ne mam purpose of this book, I have repeated the moral statement more than once the crying need for mg ' what I have called the codification of contemporary morals, or at least the clear and intelligible (intelli- gible even to the average man) expression of the moral consciousness of each age and each country. The great need in this respect has hitherto been that the treatment of ethical subjects in the hands of the The philosopher-specialist in ethics has almost exclu- phik>- llSt s i ve ly been concerned with the discussion of the main sopher. or abstract principles and foundations of ethics, the mere prolegomena to ethical teaching which should be of direct practical use as a guide to conduct. Such practical and efficient guidance to conduct and teaching of morality has generally been by means of ephemeral or casual moral injunction on the part of the priests of every denomination. It thus not only received a sectarian or dogmatic bias often causing the whole moral structure to collapse when the founda- tions of belief in these dogmas were no longer valid for the person thus instructed or, in any case, introducing the element of mysticism and the need for translation into the remote language of bygone ages, races, or conditions of life, and thus making more difficult the arduous task of applying clear principles of action to the complicated exigencies of THE CODIFICATION OF MORALS 257 actual and present life, on the clear understanding of which such principles ought to be based. Furthermore, the cognisance which the State has The hitherto taken of this paramount factor in the life tate ' of the people and the direct action which the State has taken, has generally been confined to that aspect of " Social Legislation " chiefly or exclusively con- cerned in counteracting extreme poverty and social inefficiency and the evil results arising out of these, again chiefly from a purely economical point of view. The State has not directly considered the positive moral and social betterment of the conditions of life and living and of the people themselves, nor directly aimed at the highest conceivable goal for social improvement. The most crying need before us, therefore, is the clear recognition of such an expression of the moral consciousness of the age, and, without any interfer- ence with the established religious creeds and their practices as the expression of religious life, to provide for, first, such an expression of our moral require- ments, and, secondly, for the effective dissemination of contemporary ethics throughout all layers of human society. The action of the State in this respect must be The directly educational, and this educational function ^naT must be concerned, first, with the young and their action of lives, and, secondly, with the adult population and ^^ its life. However limited the time set aside in schools for Moral the teaching of ethics may be, certain hours should t^ ^,,. thus be devoted to the teaching of morals. The text- the book of such elementary ethics should, above all, be young ' clear and concise, and must contain those moral The ele- inj unctions which would be universally accepted by ^ tary all right-thinking people within the nation and books of admitted by every religious sect or creed. The morals ' 258 THE ETHICS OF THE FUTURE teachers themselves should be provided with ex- planatory additions to the text-books, containing or suggesting instances from actual life which should convincingly illustrate each moral injunction from the short text-book in the hands of the pupils. Of course, it will be left to the well-qualified teacher to increase and to enlarge upon such definite and illu- minating examples. Even the question of moral casuistry the conflict or clashing of the various duties are to be definitely treated. Episode Though I cannot attempt the actual production of casuistry suc ^ a te xt-book here, and can only discuss the general principles upon which it should be based and carried into effect, I may yet touch upon some of the difficulties of moral casuistry without entering too fully into problems which in all ages have led to interminable discussion. The way to deal with such moral casuistics is the purely positive, and not the negative method. By that I mean that one valid moral injunction is not eliminated by the fact of its clashing with another. Each one remains valid ; though at times reason and the application of a general sense of justice and proportion may have to decide whether the one injunction is not stronger than the other. " Thou shalt not lie " retains its validity, even though " Thou shalt not endanger the life and the permanent happiness of another " may lead the physician or the friend for the nonce to tell an untruth to an insane person or an invalid when the truth would undermine life or life's efficiency. A practical moral test can always be transmitted to the pupil, in bringing him conscientiously to ask himself whether, imagining that when the cause which led him to tell such an untruth or to commit an infraction of an ethical law is removed, he would be prepared to lay before the person to whom he told the untruth or to independent and disinterested people TREATMENT OF ETHICAL QUESTIONS 259 whom he respects, the course of action which he had pursued. That such moral casuistry presents many diffi- culties is undeniable. But who has ever assumed, or had any right to assume, that life can be lived with- out difficulties ? Which one of the studies of science or art or human learning is free from complications and almost unsurmountable difficulties which open the door to doubt and scepticism ? Are we there- fore not to include even mathematics and the natural sciences, history, and all other studies in our educa- tional system, because such difficulties exist ? The several aspects under which ethical questions are to be treated in this elementary form, and which I shall further discuss, are : 1 . Duty to the family ; 2. Duty to the immediate community in which we live, and social duties ; 3. Duty to the State ; 4. Duty to humanity ; 5 . Duty to self ; 6. Duty to things and actions as such ; and 7. Duty to God. Of course I must here assume that the school- The posi- masters entrusted with such a task are of high in- efficiency tellectual capacity, well prepared and qualified by of the ^ , . , u u u teachers superior education, the very highest which each O f ethics, country can give. Here, again, lies one of the most important and crying needs of reform. With great readiness not always sincere the political repre- sentatives of the people will, on the platform at public meetings, recognise and fervently uphold the supreme claims of national education. But how many are prepared to carry such professions into effect, and to insist that this is perhaps the most important function of national life ? To educate the young requires in the teachers themselves, as instruments of supreme 260 THE ETHICS OF THE FUTURE precision, the most complete preparation for this important and delicate task. All No teachers who are directly, as well as indirectly, ought 6 to to influence the youth of the nation, however ele- have the mentary the immediate subject which they are to uifiver- teach even to the youngest, are properly qualified, sit y . unless they have had the opportunity of attaining to the highest culture which the age can give. The most elementary teacher ought to have had all the advantages of the highest university instruction, and to have been brought to the level of grasping and of assimilating the highest mental and moral achieve- ments of the age. We might almost say and it is not purely paradoxical to say this that in con- sideration of the fact that in the earliest stages of childhood are laid the foundation of the indestructible and ineradicable elements of character and intelli- gence, the training of the elementary teacher is of the highest importance, in order to make him or her, in their mentality and whole personality, completely representative of the best which the age can give. Teachers, Were the State and the public to recognise this meTtary they would be driven to admit that, from the econo- teachers. mical point of view, as well as from that of social receive* recognition and reward, those entrusted with the compara- mO st important and valuable functions in our national tivclv high pay life ought to receive higher remuneration and the and social mar k s o f greater public distinction directly by the tion were Government and indirectly in the market which m> to the* determines values, than the work of the financier or true stan- the successf ul promoter and most of those functions our be- in modern life which now receive the highest remunera- tion and distinction. But such is the insincerity, the flagrant contradiction of our true inner beliefs and convictions and our admitted and persistent activity in the common life of the present, that this statement of mine would be received by most of my TEACHERS OF ETHICS IN SCHOOLS 261 readers with a smile of compassionate and patronising incredulity and doubt which, at most, admitting its truth in an ideal world, would deny the possibility of its realisation in this actual world of ours and would stamp the temerity of all who should con- template the possibility of carrying such principles into practical life as indicative of the unbalanced mind of the fantastic visionary. But history has proved again and again that truth may be delayed but cannot be suppressed for ever. True ideas are the only things in the life of man which last ; and, as the machinery of State is improved and simplified so that it can with readiness eliminate abuses and inaugurate improvements, the public will find ways and means to carry into effect what is clearly recog- nised as being most essential to its ultimate interest. Beside this direct teaching of ethics in schools and Educa- households, there remains another province, less J^eans^f directly bearing upon moral life, but most important the re- in its contributory effect to it. This is the other gideol* side of the two-fold division of our conscious life, the hfe - one of which is our life of work. It concerns ourductionof life of play, the recreative or more passive side of re ^ m ^s our existence. It is commonly and generally believed, vating by those responsible for the education of the young ^ ltal parents and schoolmasters that they are only physical concerned with the serious aspect of existence, the practices, preparation for the working side of life, efficiency and duty. The importance of these in our educational system is beyond all question. But it must be equally undoubted that the proper regulation of the recreative side in the life of the young and of the adult population as well is of equal importance. Many unwise parents and teachers often think that the instinct for recreation, play and pleasure, is of itself so strong, so constantly potent and effective, in the young, that it is their chief duty to repress it, 262 THE ETHICS OF THE FUTURE The result is, as in the case of any natural force which is unduly repressed until it finds vent in spontaneous combustion through its inherent energy, that the irrepressible and ineradicable instincts rightly existing in man's nature, which are thus unduly checked, seek for and find expression in violent and detrimental forms, destructive to society as well as to the health and refinement of the individual. This side of youth- ful nature must not only not be ignored, but it must be consciously cultivated. The instincts which make for " play " are to be led into channels, without interference and pedantry (which rob them of their very essence), in which they lend to healthy, elevating and refining forms, adding to strength of character refinement of taste. The recreative and leisure hours are to be filled with forms of interests and amuse- ments increasing physical health as well as moral, intellectual, and social refinement. Even in Though the great and lasting advantage to the development of a sense of duty in the young to be tion, derived from the concentration upon each task, the aims at struggle with difficulties, and the repression of all mental forms of self-indulgence, is one of the most important and results of school work, discipline and study, the strength bearing which these studies have upon the recreative the ' side of human nature, the life of play, must never sight of. It cannot in any way diminish tiveside the great advantages which the teaching of every positively department of human knowledge thus has upon the con- development of the sense of duty, to aim at producing sidered , , . . ,, and by such teaching a new intellectual interest which furthered. WO uld respond to, and satisfy, the sense for play, recreation itself, and increase the moral and in- tellectual resourcefulness of man from his earliest age onwards, so that he can find joy and refreshment in such pursuits and such thoughts that will lie out- side of the direct sphere of his productive working EDUCATIONAL REFORM 263 existence in after life. Above all, the love of thought, of knowledge, and of art in itself must be stimulated as a result of the direct teaching from the elementary school up to the university. These are the broad outlines of the duties of the State as regards the education of the young in securing the moral health of a nation. But, as regards the adult population as well, the Educa- State has the duty directly to provide for, and to thTadu stimulate and satisfy, the need for higher education, popuia- It does this by directly producing or supporting the tlon< higher institutions of culture, be they universities or other institutions, for the purest and highest research in science or schools of art in every form, including, of course, musical and dramatic art in one word, in all that immediately responds to culture, i.e. the cultivation of things of the mind for their own sake. Still more direct in its bearing upon ethics is the The moral example of the State itself. Truthfulness in word and deed, justice without compromise, must of the apply to every public function and enactment of the State. This applies to war as well as to peace. The action lasting degradation, if not total inhibition, of morality expressed by the commonly accepted saying that " All is fair in war " is perhaps one of the greatest evils to mankind which war brings in its wake. But in time of peace, any miscarriage of justice on the part of the State has an effect detrimental to the moral consciousness of every citizen in that State, out of all proportion to the individual wrong which it causes. Still more insidious and solvent of the public moral fibre is the cynical attitude which many departments of the administration actually put into practice. There are cases on record in which individuals or public bodies have desisted from carrying on a law- suit against the State because of the disparity of pecuniary means between themselves and the endless 264 THE ETHICS OF THE FUTURE resources of the administration from whom they seek justice and equity. The " law's delay," as applied to many a public servant or private civilian, has kept them from urging their just claims ; and they have ended in resigning themselves to bear unfairness with a sense of injustice against the State. Moreover, the practice in several departments, such as that of customs and public revenue, of not rectifying an undue payment until a claim is made and persistently demanded by the individual, the fact that no obli- gation is felt by such departments to point out an error made in their favour and against the interests of individual citizens, and perhaps even inquisitorial methods and activities which do not come, and are not meant to come, directly to the cognisance of the citizen affected by them all this impresses a lowness of moral standard on the part of the collective power of the people, to which they look for authority and guidance, which is most lowering to the morals of the whole nation. We must It is thus by less tangible and far vaguer influences beTthat that morality is affected and modified, if not pro- ethical duced. And we must therefore always bear in mind, tcTbe 116 ' even when considering the direct teaching of ethical effective, principles in homes and at schools, for which I have through just pleaded, that the efficient result of moral teach- charac- [ n g f differing to some extent in this from the teaching of any skill of hand or pliability and accuracy of mind, cannot be so direct and directly applied. In order to be effective, it must pass through the whole character of man, produce an ethos, a general moral emotional state, which will lead him to become a moral being and to act morally. Nevertheless, to attain this end, the actual apprehension of what are the moral laws of the society in which he lives, is at some stage of his education and training to be clearly established and presented, so that ultimately these INDIRECT TEACHING OF ETHICS 265 laws may permeate his whole being and make him spontaneously feel and act as a moral social being. Finally, there are two facts of great practical im- portance to be borne in mind when the actual teaching of ethics is considered. The one is, that the teacher of ethics need in no way be a specialist in ethical theory or manifestly and obviously by profession a pattern and model of higher life in himself. After all, every parent must be a teacher of morals. The theory of ethics requires scientific treatment in no way differing in method and concentration from the theoretical study of any other group of phenomena. Such theoretical study does not of necessity fit the specialist for the practical application of theory to actual life and to the education of young and old in accordance with theory. Moreover, professed or specialised philan- thropy or a life corresponding to mystical religious emotionality are very trying to the mental and moral balance and health of their votaries. Clergy- men of the " Pontifex " type are warning instances of the moral obliquity, if not degeneracy, to which a life based on dogmatic supernatural principles, removed from the healthy versatility of normal life, may lead. The other is, that, especially with the young, the conception of Sin is as far as possible to be withheld, and that ethics are to be inculcated with a bright and joyful outlook in the positive aspect of right actions and of ideals of perfection towards which man is to strive. We must teach positive and joyful, not nega- tive and comminatory, morals. PART IV OUTLINE OF THE PRINCIPLES OF CON- TEMPORARY ETHICS (a) MAN'S DUTIES AS A SOCIAL BEING CHAPTER I DUTY TO THE FAMILY No other I HAVE in several of the preceding passages already uniiTcan dealt with the moral position of the family as regards replace its efficient training from the very earliest days family, onward in the intimate life of the home. It is here that our training in intellectual and moral altruism is most effectively realised. As a social unit, forming and developing conditions most conducive to the social welfare of all the larger bodies of human society, it cannot be replaced. When once the strictly vital principles and practices which establish the hard- and-fast privileges of definite classes simply by the fact of birth have been discarded, the continuous influence of the family in our own days, and pros- pectively on the future advancement of society, is undoubtedly good. The feudal principle (by which I mean privileges established by birth) did not consider qualifications and efficiency for the social and political functions which its privileges gave ; while, on the other hand, it directly offended man's sense of justice, and can therefore not be supported by any society based upon reason and morality. On 266 CONTINUOUS EFFECT OF THE HOME 267 the other hand, the continuity of collective effort, its effect which with such forcefulness makes itself felt in every d^ang" member of a collective group, achieves results for the continu- good of the State and in consequence receives recog- moral nition and honour. The family as a social unit in res the State is of the greatest use in advancing the The public welfare. No reasonable person can deny the home - moral effect upon the individual and its ultimate influence upon society at large to be made to realise constantly, with more or less complete consciousness, the effect of every single act and of the totality of life-work, not only upon oneself, but upon all the members of a household and a family who by physical propinquity and moral interdependence are directly concerned in the results of man's every act. There is many a loophole through which we can escape from the performance of our more remote duties ; but family life offers no such escape ; and hence arises the revolt against this institution as a whole on the part of those speculative self-deceivers, coquetting with philosophical generalisations to hide from them- selves and others the all-pervading impulse of self- indulgence thwarted by the stern persistency of domestic duties, be they frivolous pleasure-seekers or philanthropic Mrs. Jellabys. Moreover, even those possessed of the dullest imagination can be stirred into projecting the result of their actions into the future, even beyond their own individual life, by the contemplation of the lives of the children who are to succeed them. The home as a lasting unit of private property, and the family, as a social entity, are, among all the possible groups of human institutions, perhaps the most effective in giving the stamp of wider, unegoistic, and hence more social, motive and guidance to human activity. To make this home not only directly responsive to the physical needs of the family, but also, whether cottage or palace, expres- 268 DUTY TO THE FAMILY sive of the best that is in the family, as beautiful as taste can make it, is of itself undeniably good. To curb the impulse to squander one's substance on drink in the public-house, or on yachts or racehorses in order that wife and children may be benefited materially, morally and intellectually ; and, even beyond this, to create, by such sacrifice of personal self-indulgence, conditions which should favour the existence and the improvement of the home and its occupants after one's own death, are surely guides to conduct which directly lead to the future improve- ment of society as a whole. To summarise these considerations in one simple and concrete, yet typical, instance : to plant a tree in a cottage garden or a park, which he who plants can never hope to see in full maturity, but with clear consciousness realises that he is planting for his children and children's children, cannot be considered selfish or unsocial by any right-thinking or public-spirited man. To what- ever development in the future the tendencies towards collectivism and State ownership may lead, the justification of individual property, not only in its intrinsic morality, but from the social even the socialistic point of view, is greater in the case of the cottage with its garden and the country house with its park, than in the share of the capital in any industrial enterprise or state security. 1 Family Not only, however, in this aspect of the family onour. an( j t k e nome j s j ts influence to be found. It is also to be found in a less apparent, yet directly moral and social, aspect none the less effective in its moral bearing through thus being less evident. In this aspect the family, considered as a unit, places upon each member a responsibility and a duty to the family as a whole with regard to his conduct, character and position which the individual member of a 1 See Appendix IV. FAMILY HONOUR 269 family establishes towards the outer world. In one word, this point of view is concerned with family honour. I shall have occasion to touch on this complicated, though most important, moral factor in dealing with man's duty to society and his duty to self. Here, again, the continuous and intimate relationship of people to one another cannot be re- placed, as regards its constraining effectiveness, by any consideration of wider, vaguer and less persistent social relationships. In so far the educative and disciplinary influence of the family is supreme, and, I repeat again, that if the injustice and irrationality of the direct privileges of birth handed on from the Middle Ages be eliminated, this educative and dis- ciplinary influence is wholly for the good of society and its advancement in the future. To know that you are not only injuring yourself and justly lowering your own reputation by dishonest or mean actions or even by self-indulgent idleness and thriftlessness, but that your conduct immediately affects, not only the welfare of the home and the physical existence of those who dwell in it, and further, that it tarnishes the family honour such consciousness is surely conducive to the good of society. On the other hand, to know and to realise, while making any noble effort, that not only joy is brought to those who are nearest and dearest, but that by such effort family honour is assured and elevated, is one of the noblest incentives to moral effort, constantly present in the minds and lives of even the average human being of untrained and lowly imagination. And when, beyond this, the imagination is stirred to realise that even after death the honour of the family will survive, and that the children and children's children will look back with pride and gratitude to the moral integrity, the intellectual achievement and the successful energy of their parents and grand- 270 DUTY TO THE FAMILY parents, an effective incentive to good social action is provided which can hardly be replaced by any other motive, and can at least not be condemned as either harmful or ignoble. The realisation of these moral factors emanating from the family, includes in the practice of life the establishment of a definite group of duties which can be formulated and must be modified by the moral consciousness of each age in their relation to other duties. The first keynote is struck by the Fifth Commandment, with which I have dealt above ; but this must be enlarged upon and formulated so as to serve as a definite practical guide to conduct, and must therefore include the several duties of the various members of a family to each other and to the family as a whole. CHAPTER II DUTY TO THE COMMUNITY AND TO SOCIETY THE ART OF LIVING THE IDEAL OF THE GENTLEMAN WE have dealt with the duties to the family ; but Necessity man's duties do not end here, as little as the just J^ n impulse to self-advancement frees him from these in duties duties. Each narrower group of duties must fit in t he n with and advance the wider sphere of duties. For- family, tunately, there is no inherent necessity why they need clash. For the best member of a family ought also naturally to be the best member of a wider society. On the other hand, owing to the limitations of human nature, the absorbing dominance of single passions and instincts, and the centripetal or selfish instinct which congests the sympathies, each nar- rower sphere of duties ought to be supplemented and rectified by the wider and higher ethical out- look towards which it ought harmoniously to tend. " Charity begins at home," but ought not " to stay at home," is eminently and deeply true. Moreover, it can be proved (and I am sure I shall be borne out by any experienced observer of life) that the narrower and more exclusive are our sympathies the less efficient are they even when applied to the narrower sphere. 1 The absolute and amoral egoist does not love even himself truly and wisely. And those members of a family in whom the family feeling is hypertrophised to an abnormal degree, so that it is 1 See The Jewish Question, etc., p. 94. 19 271 272 DUTY TO COMMUNITY AND TO SOCIETY blunted with regard to the wider life beyond and may even produce an antagonistic attitude towards it, are most likely to be, within this family group, intensely selfish, whenever there arises a clashing of interest and passions between themselves and other members of their family. To them applies what in an earlier portion of this book has been said con- cerning the Chauvinist. Our In the progression of duties from the narrower t tne wider sphere we proceed from the family to the locality immediate community in which we live. I in no way munity in wish here to maintain that the social classifications which we now attaching to birth, wealth, or occupation are to work. be fixed and stereotyped in class distinctions without any appeal to reason and justice, as little as I accept the extreme ideals of absolute socialism, which reduce all life and ambitions to the same level. But, con- sidering our life as it actually is, we must begin our general social duties by performing those several functions which physically and tangibly lie before us according to the position in which we are placed, with a view to the material, moral, and social advance- ment of such a community. However remote the central occupations of our life may be from the life of the place in which we actually live, we must not, and we need not, ignore our immediate duties to the collective life of this group of people or this locality. In many cases, nay, in most cases, our life-work may be immediately concerned, or connected with, a certain locality. Whether as labourers, or as farmers, or as landlords ; whether as artisans, or as managers, or as proprietors of factories, or other industrial enter- prises ; whether as merchants or as tradesmen, employers or employed, we thus have distinct and definite duties towards those with whom we are co-operating, and, outside the interests of the definite work in hand, we are directly concerned in the col- PROGRESSION OF DUTIES 273 lective social life of the place where our work and our interests lie. But even if our home and residence fall within a district far removed from the actual centre of our life-work, even if this work is of so im- material a character that it reaches beyond the locality and even the county, our immediate duty as members of such a community, to do our share in regulating the social life surrounding our home, always remains. Nor is the social duty which we have here to contem- plate merely concerned with our not transgressing the existing laws that emanate from what is called social legislation ; nor is it only concerned with the pro- vision of all that goes to physical subsistence within the community, the fight with poverty, misery and want, or merely with the increase of physical comforts and amenities ; but it is positively and directly con- cerned with the advancement and improvement of the social life as such, in so far as we come into contact with it. It even concerns our relation with every member of such a community in which we live. Hitherto the recognised social activity in what is positive called social reform, as affecting the individual, and still more as leading to State legislation, has been chiefly concerned either with the avoidance of physical misery, or with the removal of injustice, or with the increase of physical comfort. From these broad and more public points of view we rise to the con- sideration of the social relation of individuals among each other in all the complexities of private life and intercourse, not only in business or work, but also in the free and varied inter-relations of purely social existence. But beyond this there is a further task, when we regard human society as a whole. We must then recognise and establish in each successive generation the rules governing such intercourse. These are established by an attempt to adapt life 274 DUTY TO COMMUNITY AND TO SOCIETY to the existing and constraining conditions which we find about us, to make it run smoothly and har- moniously with the least friction so as to avoid conflicts and consequent misery. But, by calling in the help of Plato, such rules of social conduct may be raised to a higher level towards the perfection of social intercourse and of society as a whole. Not only physically, but spiritually as well, each succes- sive generation must be led on to higher expressions of its true humanity, to the highest expression of individual man, and the highest corporate existence of society. Kant's Categorical Imperative, which enjoins upon us to act so that we should guard in everything we do the dignity of our neighbour as well as our own, will ever remain one of the most perfect epigrammatic summaries of the duties of man as a social being. Consider- As I have said before, most of us are not likely to ateness. mur( j er or to steal ; but we are all of us prone to murder the dignity and self-respect of our neighbour, to steal from him that claim to regard and to esteem which is his by right, both human and divine, or to wound his sensibility by our own acts of commission or omission. How often do we not sin from a want of delicate altruistic imagination ? Without directly wishing to hurt or harm, we are led, in selfish preoccu- pation and bluntness, to wound a man to the very core of his self-respect or more frequently to disregard and ignore his harmless vanity. Beyond economical prosperity, even beyond charit- efforts to relieve want and misery, beyond fair preme dealing in business and in social intercourse, lies, for ethical the true conception of an ideal society, the Art of con- Living itself, upon the refinement and constant sidcrcL- tion. realisation of which depend to a great extent the happiness of human beings and the advancement of human society. To make our homes habitations THE ART OF LIVING 275 which should harmonise, and thus favour the free development of, our social instincts and to prepare each individual for such perfect intercourse with his fellow-men, and to educate and to encourage the individual thus to perfect and harmonise his life in order to increase happiness for himself and for others, is the definite duty before us. The claims of such duty are as weighty and the need of dealing with them as urgent as are all the more manifest and serious duties of morality which have hitherto received the sanction of moral society and of its educators. That community and that nation is highest in which this Art of Living is most completely realised in the home itself and in the training of the individual. I venture to say that in this respect, however un- Eng- favourably we as a nation may compare in some aspects of our public education with the other nations tiveiy of Europe, we still stand highest. In certain parts of the United States of America the same high among standard is attained. From the cottages of our na tions. poorest labourers and the small suburban houses our artisans and our clerks, to the town dwellings of our merchants and tradesmen, till we come to the larger country houses standing in their parks all these homes are not only expressive of comparatively greater wealth, but show, on the part of their occu- pants, some desire whether partly or wholly success- ful to beautify the home beyond the mere needs of physical subsistence, to make it respond to the life of its occupants beyond the mere provision of shelter and food. From the strip of cottage garden without, to the interior furnishing of the modest cottage, and so on throughout the dwellings of every layer of society, there is shown here some effort to respond to this important contribution to the Art of Living, which in so far surpasses all other European nations. 276 DUTY TO COMMUNITY AND TO SOCIETY Coilec- Moreover, as a heritage handed down through cen- tive com- turies of political liberty in representative forms of munal ... life. government, however indirect and often very slight Social re- j n j ts effectiveness, the sense of social responsibility sponsi- ... bility. and of collective action in every social group through- out the country is higher than in countries which do not possess as a living tradition the responsibilities, as well as the rights, of the individual as regards communal life. Sport and The social sense, based upon justice and fairness, pastimes nas furthermore been most efficiently developed produc- . J tiveofa among us by our national sports and pastimes, and sense 1 ?! their deep penetration into the life of both men and justice women. Whatever may rightly have been urged ai against the excess of interest shown in sport among the young in our educational institutions, as well as among our adult population, the fact remains that the sense of freely established social discipline (not imposed from without or from above), the steady development in the public consciousness of the sense of justice and of fair play, have been of inestimable advantage to our national life and to the social ethics guiding it, and in which other countries, notably Germany, are grossly wanting. Let us never forget this essential and conspicuous result of our national sports, and cultivate and cherish them accordingly ; though the very realisation of their importance must lead us to combat all abuses and elements of exaggera- tion or degeneracy inherent in some of their forms or consequent upon their disproportionate and in- apposite cultivation. intellec- The more we recognise the importance of these tuai play. forms of collective physical recreation as factors in Art in -111 national the social development of the people, the greater Ufe - becomes the need to supplement them by the culti- vation of the spiritual and moral forms of play, the appreciation and pursuit of science and art, to which, MUSIC AND DOMESTIC ART IN ENGLAND 277 under favourable conditions, even the mass of the people can be made thoroughly responsive. The illustration I gave in an earlier part of this book, in the case of the Gilchrist lectures, will indicate the possibility of such a wide diffusion of culture in all social strata. The undeniable good which during the past centuries in spite of the blighting inter- regnum of iconoclastic Puritanism the Established Church in England has done, by disseminating, through village and town choirs, the appreciation and the practice of music (though chiefly limited to church music), has borne its fruit throughout the whole country and has established, notably in Yorkshire, Lancashire, Staffordshire and Wales, developments of choir-singing, which so competent a judge as the late Professor Joachim proclaimed to be of the best. No doubt on the secular side of musical development we can learn much in this respect from other countries, especially Germany. The same applies to the diffu- sion among the people of the higher forms of dramatic art which in Germany and France are made accessible to the mass of the people. But in all other arts, especially as they are directly reflected in domestic life, whether it be in architecture, in the graphic or decorative arts, their vitalisation in the actual homes and lives of the people at large, British society stands higher than that of Germany. What we are here concerned with is the study of that aspect of these collective human efforts which are connected with the development of the individual towards a higher social ideal, and with those qualities of human character and living which, apart from the mere struggle of material existence, affect the relation- ship between human beings as such in their inter- course with one another. And we hold that this sphere of social ethics is of the utmost importance in the establishment of human morals. 278 DUTY TO COMMUNITY AND TO SOCIETY The summary of the qualities which prepare men for " the art of living," that most important factor in the ideals of human society, is conveyed by the one term, " gentleman." This term has been adopted by most European nations in its English form and is the modern successor of the mediaeval knight or nobleman, of the Italian cavalier e of the Renaissance, the French gentilhomme, and the modern Austrian return to Mediaevalism in the Kavalier. To be a gentleman is an indispensable condition to the pro- duction of the superman. The The ideal of the gentleman includes in its connota- honour. tion, above all, that he should be " a man of honour." l Such a man is one who in all his actions strives to live up to his highest principles in spite of all the dictates of self-interest or convenience which may draw or lead him in another direction. He has embodied in his code, irrespective of utility or advan- tage, the highest principles of social ethics prevalent in his day. Honesty and absolute integrity in all his dealings, and truthfulness, whether it be in the material business of life or in the more delicate relations of social intercourse, are coupled with the generosity and the courage to uphold before the world and in himself those principles which wilfully ignore all expediency. The man of honour is he 1 I have on a previous occasion (Jewish Question, 2nd ed., p. 324) attempted to define honour as follows : " Honour is practical con- science, conscience carried into action ; and the man of honour is one in whom this practical conscience has become second nature, an ineradicable habit. But we must all realise how frequent are the changes in the denotation of this term ' honour.' Each period and every country has its peculiar conception of it, and one age may oppose or ridicule the conception held by another, as one country may deny the code of its neighbour. One country may consider it to be a stern dictate of the code of honour to fight a duel in satisfaction of wounded vanity ; while another country may laugh it away. But what always remains, and will remain, is the connotation of honour the practical conscience as affecting our common social life, so effective that we are prepared to give up our lives in order to follow its dictates." THE IDEAL OF THE GENTLEMAN 279 who can never act meanly, think meanly, or feel meanly. He never can be a moral coward any more than a physical one. He is the embodiment of virility and moral courage. He has developed in himself Plato's TO Qv/juoeiSes true courage, which dominates TO eTriOv/MijTiicov the natural instincts and appetites, and enables him, if need be, to stand alone amidst the ruins of selfishness and iniquity, dominating the life about him : Si fractus illabatur orbis, Impavidum ferient vuincB. But it is in this conception of honour that the need varying for summarising the highest ethical principles sue- ^g 11 ^- cessively in each age, to the insistence upon which honour this whole book is meant to contribute, makes itself ^e^nd most clearly felt. For there can be no doubt that in the need successive generations and under varying social ditions, as well as with the different occupations and revision professions of life, the principles and standards of honour have varied and must naturally vary. They establish the accepted code of honour for men and women living under these changing conditions, until they may become what, in a derogatory sense, is called a convention and what really means the crystallised and sometimes fossilised and social experience of each age, community, or social group. Now, it is against such conventions and their effect Anarch- on life that the revolutionary innovators or reformers in our own day above all make war. These, of whom like Nietzsche is the clearest and most pronounced ex- ample, endeavour with a stroke of the pen to eradicate strike at from human society the sturdy plant of moral growth vention" which has been evolved and strengthened for centuries, not the , . ,. . r essence. grafted upon and improved by the conditions of the progressive and refined life of civilised society. By one stroke of the pen, they wish to extirpate it from 280 DUTY TO COMMUNITY AND TO SOCIETY the moral consciousness of men, calling it a convention which blocks the way to the advent of their favourite superman. But because there is no doubt that the conception of honour thus varies with different social conditions, that it even changes in its character and nature with the different social gradations affected by the life-occupation of groups within the change of wider communities, such change only proves the proves 1 y vitality and all-pervading penetrative effectiveness the of such a conception of social ethics and the urgent and va- need for the constant revision and renewed justification * ts ex i stence by the application of the highest stance, reason, by the action of Practical Idealism. The more The more a later generation, looking back with the nis/thef' unprejudiced clearness of impartial apprehension, inade- can realise the limitations and even distortions former inherent in the conception of honour in previous ages, cpncep- which have become effete social conditions, the tions of . ' honour in greater and the more crying becomes the need to dTs^the moc hfy an d to define a new conception of social greater ethics as embodied in the idea of honour in accordance to^oraiu- with the best that the succeeding age can think and late them realise. The ideals embodied in the Principe of Macchiavelli, even in the Cortegiano of Castiglione, and to some extent in the Letters of Lord Chesterfield to his Son, can no longer be accepted by us. Many of these principles are directly repugnant to our moral sense ; while many others have lost their significance to such a degree that the seriousness and emphasis with which they are upheld appear to us frivolous and inept, because of the complete change in the social con- stitution and the actual life of our own time and society. Still, many of the fundamental principles might re- main, and might be incorporated into a modern code. If we thus consider the conception of honour from the historical point of view, we find that the highest honour in a definite society or State is established by HONOUR 281 the ruling class within that State. The keynote in The es- a community with effective aristocratic classification, men t of from the ruling classes down to the serfs, is struck the c de by the ruling class. Not infrequently the members by the U1 of such a class claim for themselves (and the claims d mi nant may be admitted by the lower and humbler grada- tions of society) the monopoly in the possession of the attributes of honour. Wherever such fixed and stereotyped class dis- The more tinctions exist, the lower and humbler classes may ^usive accept such exclusion from the claim to honour or, claim to at all events, may themselves be lowered in their moral vitality in this respect and to that extent. is ac - . . . cepted, To give but one broad instance, not so remote in the lower time from ourselves : The extreme effectiveness as * he , st , an " dcira lor regards honour pertaining to the ruling class of the the other Samurai in Japan has depressed the moral standards for the commercial and other classes in that country, so that, in spite of the exceptional loftiness of moral standards among the Samurai, the commercial honesty and integrity and all those social qualities affected by the conception of honour have been lowered among the Japanese merchants and traders compared with those of China, although I understand that some improvement has recently been effected in this re- spect. As the uncompromising and stereotyped class exclusiveness in Japan is making way for wider democratic freedom, the higher standards of the Samurai may become inadequate and lose their effectiveness ; but, on the other hand, the ideas of commercial honour and other social and ethical forces will extend and rise as the need for such extension and elevation makes itself felt with the rise in social position of the formerly repressed classes. This process of national and social transformation is one of the greatest problems facing the people of Japan. The same phenomenon may be perceived 282 DUTY TO COMMUNITY AND TO SOCIETY in comparing the social conditions of the free con- tinental towns during the Middle Ages, which were not dependent upon, and were unaffected by, the conditions of life prevailing amongst the nobility in the country, and where, therefore, standards of honour pertaining to commerce, trades, and handi- crafts were evolved, which could not be repressed to a secondary and in so far more degraded position, by the comparative superiority of social conditions and of honour in the nobility. Occupa- In the same way in our own days, the careful their in- observer may note, that in countries and communities fluence on where social consideration assigns a higher position ofhonour! t those occupations and conditions of life remote from commerce and trade, the social standing and the standards of social living, ultimately the con- ception of honour, are not as high as in those com- munities where commerce and trade are not thus placed upon a lower level. It is equally undoubted that occupations in life, and their direct influence upon the mode of living, have established special standards of social morality in themselves. Barter The conditions of direct barter, for instance, are lower" l wer than in commerce, because they leave such a standards wide margin to personal persuasiveness and even deception, which cannot obtain in those larger com- merce, mercial transactions where the object bought or sold cannot be seen or tested on the spot, and where, therefore, the appeal to, and the direct need of, faith and trust in the truthful statement of vendor and purchaser are a necessary condition to all com- mercial transactions. The presentation of a small sample in the hand to represent a shipload of such goods presupposes veracity on the part of the vendor and of faith on the part of the purchaser. Higher principles and commercial integrity, commercial honour, may therefore be evolved in such wider com- COMMERCIAL HONOUR 283 merce and may establish themselves among all those following such an occupation in life. I wish merely to suggest, and leave the reader to work it out for himself, how certain trades among us, from the very nature of the uncertainty inherent in the objects offered for sale, have proverbially produced standards of honour greatly differing from those prevalent in other commercial dealings. On the other hand, the extension of modern Dangers business into these vastly widened spheres, as well as system** the fact that it is almost entirely based upon credit, and of often unsupported by corresponding assets ; and tum^n" furthermore the rapid and enormous increase of modern 1-1 i r corn- speculation, which must always form some part in merce. great commercial transactions, so that it has become the dominant element, have blunted the sense of commercial responsibility, integrity, and honour, and have even opened the door to downright dishonesty. They have also made the prospect of insolvency or bankruptcy so common a possibility as the result of commercial transactions, that they have deadened the moral sense of responsibility and the old-fashioned standards of commercial honour, which shrunk from insolvency and bankruptcy as in themselves dis- honourable. Thus the present state of commerce often results in a lowering of the moral standards of society, and in its ultimate influence upon the life of civilised communities has eaten into the very core of the social morality of the whole world . Moreover, those conceptions of commerce and Methods industry in which they are considered analogous to p^ d war, in which proverbially "all is fair," though to com- actually prevalent, are certainly not sanctioned b the moral consciousness of the people when they face Competi- the question of public and private morality. Com- moral and petition may be the soul of trade and may be recog- immor ai. nised and admitted as such. Its effect in appealing 284 DUTY 'TO COMMUNITY AND TO SOCIETY to energy and arousing mental and moral effort in all workers is undoubtedly to the advantage of society, beyond the economical aspect in which it lowers prices to the advantage of the purchaser. Not only in the production and cost of goods, but in the rapidity and facilities of distribution and in the transportation of capital in all directions where it is required by labour, commercial activity is undoubtedly to the benefit of society. The hard work, the concentration of energy, the application of human ingenuity and inventiveness to produce labour-saving appliances and to facilitate the transportation of goods as well as of capital, are undoubtedly of the utmost advan- tage to society, and worthy of encouragement and recognition ; they rightly bring great rewards in the acquisition of wealth. Moreover, the results of such qualities, good in themselves, are to be encouraged and protected by society at large and by the State, through legislation for their protection and pro- motion. The extension and enforcement of patent laws are wholly just and useful, and so far from being discarded, they ought to be still further developed and enforced. Patent These patent laws must be supplemented by the kpy* nd laws of copyright which ensure the same advantages right. and encouragement to less physically manifest inven- tiveness and originality, to the more immaterial and vaguer goods of the mind, be it in direct literary or artistic production or in the designs and the creation of new fashions, which stimulate industry through the exertion and mental superiority of the worker. Besides being advantageous to society, the protection and encouragement of this kind of human productive- ness directly appeal to our sense of justice. Though competition can thus be recognised and commended as a beneficent element in commercial life, the same does distinctly not apply to the degen- IMMORAL TENDENCIES OF MODERN COMMERCE 285 eration of competition into the unscrupulousness and savagery of warfare, wherein the ruling standards of honesty and honour are discarded or ignored . When Grossly the methods of commerce or industry imply or include ^denc 1 and as is often the case are chiefly concerned in of some deception and lying ; when they encourage activities f'oras^f corresponding in a great degree to those of the spy in modem warfare ; when in dealing between vendor and pur- m^erc'ean chaser and competitors all trust, not only in each industry, other's statements, but in the primary intention on the part of each to deal fairly with each other while recognising the just claims to self-interest and self- advancement for each, when all these are brushed aside, and the attitude is that of pure antagonism and contest, in which all means to win are resorted to, including untruth and deception, then such occupations are distinctly low in the scale of human activities and, if not directly dishonourable, they can lay no claim to honour, and no claim to social recog- nition or regard. Yet, it cannot be denied that a great part of industrial and commercial activity is carried on by successful men to whom (as a high attribute among their clan) the term " cleverness," or, in America, " smartness," or sometimes with a slight dash of subdued disapproval, yet hardly ever with complete condemnation the term " sharp- ness " is applied, it cannot be denied that activity is not compatible with the maintenance of a high conception of honour and of the higher social ideals. Society will have to recognise that such occupations society are low, and show its disapproval in its estimation and ust .. show its treatment of those who pursue them. disap- Now, it must be admitted that the whole sphere of ^hoccu Stock Exchange transactions, in so far as they are pations. founded upon what is called speculation, are essen- tially of this nature. The " bulls " and " bears " must, from the speculative point of view, entirely 286 DUTY TO COMMUNITY AND TO SOCIETY base their success on the ignorance or misjudgment of their competitors. They are, if not directly forced, at least encouraged, to mislead such competitors as to the deciding facts in the regulation of value, and, at all events, they are by this very activity justified in withholding all information which would guide the willingness or eagerness to purchase or to sell on the part of their commercial antagonists. There is but little room for honour in such occupation and none whatever for generosity. And if generosity is an essential element in the composition of a man of honour and a gentleman, there is but little oppor- tunity for its development in the mental ethos of him whose whole conscious activity in his profession is regulated by such a state of social warfare. Now, though it could only be a Utopian dreamer who would maintain that men enter the struggle of commercial competition in order to practise generosity towards their competitors and to cultivate honour and chivalry in themselves, it can and must in sober and deliberate reasonableness be maintained, that no occupation can be good which, so far from encouraging generosity, requires and stimulates the reverse namely, cruelty, ruthlessness, and deception. Such The direct an attitude, however, is the necessary result of that a "? 1 to development of modern industrial and commercial rum the . . . , . 1-11 com- enterprise which is not only concerned with the petitor. expansion and the prosperous development of one's own business, but has, as one of its conscious and direct aims, the destruction and ruin or jeopardising of an opponent's business. Now, the recognised methods developed during the last two generations in the commercial and industrial world, especially through the formation of the larger " trusts," have included attempts thus to eliminate all competition and to destroy and ruin the business of all those who would, and ought to, be the natural com- INDIFFERENCE TO COMMERCIAL STANDARDS 287 petitors. That such a practice and such an attitude of mind are contra bonos mores, and shock and revolt the moral consciousness of the society in which we live, will be admitted by all. Here, however, we meet with one of those flagrant if society moral contradictions referred to in the Introduc- recognises tion, to expose which has been one of the chief such busi- aims of this book. For though it is recognised that such prevailing practices are condemned as morally immoral and unsocial by the moral consciousness of ought to our age, such is the power of wealth, to which these wlthhold encour- practices ultimately lead, and the power, the conse- agement quent social glitter and prestige which can be given ^ive'iy* to the life of those possessing this wealth including combat even the power to make large contributions towards charitable or public needs that ultimately wealth itself, irrespective of its moral or immoral, beautiful Society or hideous, exalted or despicably sordid source, will carry with it social recognition and even the con- confer ferring of the highest distinction on the part of the State. Society as well as social groups, and, above ill-be- all, the State, must reconstitute their scale of social wea lth. valuation. If society and the State are as yet unwieldy and incapable of positively affecting and contra- regulating by unmistakable signs, recognition, ap- Between proval and reward, those forms and traditions of modem activity which themselves directly tend to the advance- modem 1 ment of society and the higher development of moral practice. standards, they ought at least directly to discourage and to combat those forms which are " against good policy " and which distort and vitiate the recognised standards of social morality. I have endeavoured elsewhere l to show how the Finance whole system of what is called finance, besides being ^ d the dangerous to the individual, has had the most dis- portation of capital. 1 The Political Confession of a Practical Idealist. London, 1911. See Appendix IV. 20 288 DUTY TO COMMUNITY AND TO SOCIETY astrous effects upon the natural, intelligent, and normal development of adequate social and moral ideals among us. I have further attempted to show how the important function of the transportation of capital can, not only be most effectually carried out by the State, but would also be a most effective means of levying taxes for public purposes. At the same time it would remove the most threatening economical and social danger namely, the automatic accumulation of excessive capital by individuals and bodies, devoid of the responsibility corresponding to the excessive power conveyed. Its chief effect upon the question which we are now considering is, that it would counteract the prevalence of most effective false ideals which are demoralising every layer and group of society in every one of the civilised countries of the world. intellec- But this reform of the transportation of capital capital: ^ s a ^ so required for the transportation of that less patent manifest and more evasive form of capital in the copy. intellectual, scientific, or artistic achievements of man in so far as they come under the head of patents and copyright in fact all those forms of potential capital which require industrial support to become actual economic values. It is here that the State, by means of its patent and copyright laws, can do much. But vast improvement is required to protect the producer of such goods. As it is, the inventor (unreasonable as he may often be, unpractical and difficult to deal with in his sensitiveness and want of business habits) is at the mercy, not only of the ordinary business man, but of those evil traditions of sharp practice in which all generosity and even all fair- ness are suspended among those men whose co- operation is indispensable if the invention is to be converted into an industrial and commercial success. The share of the inventor in great profits is thus PATENT LAWS, PROMOTING 289 generally reduced to an unfair minimum. The lead given by Germany in her patent laws, as differing from our own, points to the right direction in which these laws are to ensure ordinary justice and to tend to counteract the distinctly immoral practices of modern business. But beyond dealing with patents and those intel-The lectual goods which can be copyrighted, the evil^*^*" traditions of the business of promotion and finance, ideas and perhaps unknown to the mass of the people, are^ 1 ^ 3 " devious, reprehensible and low, and are recognised and cynically admitted by the business world itself concerned in such transactions, to be so, when a less definite though negotiable idea or some potential capital in the form of a concession is offered for exploitation. The current practices in this field of business enterprise are most reprehensible and display low standards of business honour. To illustrate the dominant practices, which, it must be admitted, necessarily exclude any standards of chivalry and honour which go to the making of a gentleman, I cannot do better than to quote in the Appendix l in full an article by one of the most prominent prac- tical and theoretical financiers of varied and wide experience in matters financial throughout the world, which was published in Murray's Magazine in 1889. I venture to say that no one is a greater authority in this sphere ; while I may be allowed to add that _,, no man is possessed of a higher and more refined sense for prac- of honour than is the writer of this article. ethical Whatever hopes we may have regarding the future laws to action of States, we must lay it down as a law of social ethics in order to free ourselves from direct contradic- com- tion in our daily life, which society at large and all ufe and individual men who respect themselves and who have main tain . . . our the general good of society at heart, ought to insist higher social 1 See Appen&x V. ethicg 2QO DUTY TO COMMUNITY AND TO SOCIETY on namely, that no person is to be admitted into an honest and honourable group of society whose private or whose business honour is tarnished ; that wealth and power derived from sources and from practices opposed to higher commercial honour, and even from sources which, if not plainly dishonourable are unsocial in their character, and imply an attitude of mind definitely bent on harming or ruining the com- petitor, that such action should not evoke admiration or approval and should not confer upon the possessors of them a claim to social recognition or regard. I have enlarged upon the commercial aspect of modern life because it is so dominant in our own days, and I have endeavoured thereby to illustrate the actual need for the codification of ethics in response to the varied requirements of modern social evolution. More directly I have endeavoured to show the corre- sponding need for the modification of our conception of honour, an idea so important in social ethics, which the evolution of our life has made necessary. Besides The gentleman is thus, before all things, a man of homfur- h nour - He possesses a highly developed and refined able, the sense of truth, honesty and justice, tempered by a ma^must strong impulse of generosity which goes with strength bechivai-and is the essential element of chivalry. The con- ' * sciousness of superior strength must display itself in its attitude towards weakness. This in no way establishes the rule of the weak, " the ethics of slaves," and the dominance of the inferior ; for the true gentleman has ultimate ideals for society and humanity at large of a distinctly aristocratic char- acter, that is, the predominance of what is best, and will fearlessly work towards the realisation of these Gener- ideals. He will assert his power to this end, though osity to suc h an assertion in no way precludes his generosity ' towards the weak, whom he will thereby raise and not degrade to the slavery which blind and im- CHIVALRY, CONSIDERATION, TACT 291 moral power imposes to the ultimate undoing of its own strength and virtue. I repeat, the superman who is not a gentleman is inconceivable. The same sense of chivalry must show itself in the chivalry attitude of man towards woman. He will always remain conscious of the fact, and manifest this con- sciousness in his actions towards her, that he is physically the stronger and will not take advantage of her weakness. If he does not act thus, he will sin against his sense not only of justice, but of fairness and generosity. On the other hand, he will not insult and degrade woman by excluding her from moral responsibility and from the dictates of reason and pure justice and conceive her as an irresponsible being. All that has been said of honour and all social virtues applies to woman in a form suitable to her nature. Beside and beyond being a man of honour and Consider- responding to the weightier duties of honesty, justice tacTknd and chivalry, the true gentleman will develop in good himself what, from a mistaken view of the needs of The hu^ social life, may be considered the lighter and less vanities, important duties. These are the social qualities upon which the free intercourse of human beings among each other as social beings depends ; and from this point of view of social intercourse and the aggregate daily life of human society they are most weighty. They are the essential elements in man's humanity, in the restricted acceptation of that term, which make him human and produce the humanities. The sins which most of us commit in our ordinary daily life chiefly fall under this category, and from this point of view they are most serious and become almost heinous. In fact, the sins against the humanities are as serious as the sins against humanity ; they demand no less energetic resistance because they are the sins nearly all of us are most likely to commit. To put it epigrammatically, if not with paradoxical 292 DUTY TO COMMUNITY AND TO SOCIETY exaggeration : for most of us it may be as great a sin to commit a rudeness, to show a want of con- sideration, to shirk answering a letter, to refrain from paying a call which might reassure another human being of our regard, or avoid wounding them by ignor- ing them, as to refuse a contribution to a deserving charity or to visit the slums where, it is more than likely, our presence is not required and may do no good. The gentleman manifests breeding, considera- tion and tact ; his whole nature is harmoniously attuned to respond to all the calls from the human beings with whom he comes in contact, and to dispel all discords in the life which immediately touches his own. The meaning of this humanity or human-ness has never been more perfectly expounded than in the following passage of M. Bergson l : 11 Each of us has a particular disposition which he owes to nature, to habits engrafted by education . . . to his profession ... to his social position. The division of labour which strengthens the union of men in all important matters, making them interdependent one with another, is nevertheless apt to compromise those social relations which should give charm and pleasure to civilised life. It would seem, then, that the power we have of acquiring lasting habits appro- priate to the circumstances of the place we desire to fill summons in its train yet another which is destined to correct it and give it flexibility a power, in short, to give up for the moment, when need arises, the habits we have acquired and even the natural dis- position we have developed a power to put ourselves in another's place, to interest ourselves in his affairs, to think with his thought, to live in his life ; in a word, to forget ourselves. These are good manners, which in my opinion are nothing but a kind of moral plasticity. The accomplished man of the world 1 Quoted from the Moniteur de Puy-de-D6me, August 5, 1885, in Henri Bergson, An Account of Life and Philosophy, by Algot Rule and Nancy Margaret Paul, p. 10. BERGSON ON GOOD MANNERS 293 knows how to talk to any man on the subject that interests him ; he enters into the other's views, yet he does not therefore adopt them ; he understands everything, though he does not necessarily excuse everything. So we come to like him when we have hardly begun to know him ; we are speaking to a stranger and are surprised and delighted to find in him a friend. What pleases us about him is the ease with which he descends or rises to our level, and, above all, the skill with which he conveys the im- pression that he has a secret preference for us and is not the same to everybody else. Indeed, the char- acteristic of this man of consummate breeding is to like all his friends equally well and each of them more than all the rest. Consequently our pleasure in talking to him is not without a trace of flattered vanity. We may say that the charm of his manners is the charm belonging to everything that ' Good manners are the grace of the mind.' Like the mani- festation of bodily grace they evoke the idea of limit- less adaptability ; they suggest too that this adapt- ability is at our service and that we can count upon it. Both, in short, belong to the order of things that have a delicately balanced equilibrium and an unstable position. A mere touch would reverse that equilibrium and send them at once into an opposite state. Between the finest manners and an obsequious hypocrisy there is the same distance as between the desire to serve men and the art of using them in our service. . . . The balance is not easy to keep. We need tact, subtlety, and above all a respect for ourselves and for others. " Beyond this form of good manners, which is no better than a talent, I can conceive another which is almost a virtue. . . . There are timid and delicate souls who, because they mistrust themselves, are eager for approbation and desire to have their vague sense of their own desert upheld by praise from others. Is this vanity or is it modesty ? I do not know. But whereas the self-confident man annoys us by his determination to impose on everyone his own good opinion of himself, we are attracted by those who 294 DUTY TO COMMUNITY AND TO SOCIETY anxiously await from us that favourable verdict on their worth which we are willing to give. A well- timed compliment, a well-deserved eulogy, may produce in these delicate souls the effect of a sudden gleam of sunlight on a dreary landscape. Like the sun it will bestow new life, and may even transform into fruit blossoms that without it would have withered untimely. It takes up its dwelling in the soul and gives it warmth and support, inspiring that self-confidence which is the condition of joy, bringing hope into the present and offering an earnest of success to come. On the other hand, a careless allusion or a word of blame, uttered by those in authority, may throw us into that state of black discouragement in which we feel discontented with ourselves, weary of others, and full of distaste for life itself. Just as a tiny crystal dropt into a saturated solution summons to itself the immense multitude of scattered molecules and makes the bubbling liquid change suddenly into a mass of solids, so, at the merest hint of reproach, there hasten from every quarter, from the hidden depths of the heart, fears that were seemingly conquered, wounds of disillusion that were healed over, all the vague and floating griefs which did but await the moment when they might crystallise together into a compacted mass, and press with all their weight upon a soul thenceforward inert and discouraged. Such morbid sensibility is supposed to be rare because it is careful to hide what it suffers ; but who among us, even the strongest and best equipped for the battle of life, has not known at times the pain of wounded self-respect, and felt as though the springs of the action he was about to undertake were broken within him . . . while at other times he was uplifted in joy and a sense of harmony overflowed him, because the right word spoken in a happy hour reached that profound interior chord which can vibrate only when all the powers of life thrill in unison. It is some such word that we should know how and when to speak ; therein lie the heart's good manners the good manners that are a virtue. For they argue the love of our neighbour and the lively desire to win BERGSON ON GOOD MANNERS 295 his love ; they show charity at work in the difficult domain of a man's self-love, where it is as hard to recognise the disease as to have a desire to heal it. And this suggests to us a general definition of good manners, as embodying a regard for the feelings of others which will enable us to make them pleased with both themselves and us. Underlying them is a great and real kindness, but it may very likely remain ineffectual unless there be joined to it pene- tration of mind, suppleness, the power of making fine distinctions, and a profound knowledge of the human heart. " Education, while it increases that mental flexi- bility which is a quality dominant in the man of the world, enables the best among us to acquire know- ledge of the hearts of men, whereby kindliness is rendered skilful and becomes the good manners of the heart. This our forefathers recognised when they termed the studies of the later years of school life the humanities. Doubtless they held in remem- brance the sweetness and light coming of long com- panionship with the best minds of all time and so well summed up in the Latin word humanitas. They had in mind also the profound knowledge of the human heart which may be attained through a sympathetic study of the classics and which, adding penetration to charity, gives it power to move freely along the thousand byways of sensitiveness and self-love. Perhaps, too, they had in mind that high self-control with which men who have read much and thought much . . . give utterance even to their most cherished theories, their deepest convictions. This again is yet another form of good manners. . . . " There is a way of expressing our opinions without giving offence ; there is an art which teaches us to listen, gives us a desire to understand, enables us to enter on occasion into the mind of others in short, to exhibit in discussions, even those on politics, religion, and morals, the courtesy too often reserved for trivial and indifferent matters. Where this courtesy is maintained it seems to me that divisions less acute and disputes less bitter. . . . But such 296 DUTY TO COMMUNITY AND TO SOCIETY respect for the opinions of others is not to be acquired without sustained effort ; and I know no more power- ful ally in the overcoming of that intolerance which is a natural instinct than philosophic culture. Aris- totle said that in a republic where all the citizens were lovers of knowledge and given to reflection they would all love one another. He did not mean by this, I take it, that knowledge puts an end to dispute, but rather that dispute loses its bitterness and strife its intensity when lifted into the realm of pure thought into the world of tranquillity, measure, and harmony. For the idea is friendly to the idea, even to the contrary idea. ..." Culture. The direct cultivation of the moral or social side catioifof f our na ^ ure i s supplemented and strengthened by the gen- intellectual culture. Besides its direct aim to fit ;man. ug Qr some d e fi n ite task which in our adult life we are to fulfil and thus to make us specialists in some definite work, the aim of all education must be to develop the humanities in us, to strengthen and to refine our intelligence, our appreciation of truth, our taste, and, above all, what we can best call our intellectual sympathies. Education must produce this intellectual sympathy to such a degree, that, without becoming a specialist in every department of mental activity or, on the other hand, a pretentious sciolist or superficial dabbler, the gentleman can enter into all intellectual pursuits and sympathise with their aims, their achievements, and the methods which lead to them ; so that as a true citizen of the spiritual world he may say : eques sum ; nihil intelligibile a me alienum puto. We must always remember that, necessary and important for the advancement of human life as the production of the specialist may be, the ideal of the human being is the harmonious and complete development of the humanity within man, which includes, or rather means above all things, the UNIVERSITY EDUCATION 297 spiritual life and achievements of mankind. 1 In so far as he is a specialist he sacrifices something of his humanity, and, as he is an organic and not a mechanical being, he must rectify this defective influence of his specialist activity. By training and discipline in the humanistic side of his nature he restores the normal and complete balance of the humanity within him. Education which exclusively aims at the production of the specialist would destroy its own end in the interest of humanity were it to succeed. I have already touched upon this question as regards the practical activity in our institutions of elementary education. It is most important also to bear this question in mind when we consider our highest educational institutions, our universities. These universities have a clearly recognisable Higher twofold sphere, towards each of which their existence ^n a " and their activity tend, namely, the impersonal andTheuni- the personal aspect of university work. The imper- ^f^f' sonal aspect is the more important ; and it depends personal upon the regulation and co-ordination of studies umver- whether, after fulfilling its impersonal duties, it sitvwork - cannot be made as well to respond adequately to the personal needs. In this impersonal aspect univer- sities are institutions in which the highest pursuits of pure science and research are carried on, irrespec- tive of immediate practical application or use from the material and economic point of view and even from the educational point of view. They are to advance pure knowledge in its highest form with the most effective concentration upon this one great task, and thus they will advance the community, the State, and humanity towards the ideal goal of universal progress. In doing this they will most effectively increase the volume of truth and of human culture, 1 See Specialisation, a Morbid Tendency of our Age, by the present Author. Minerva, Rome, 1880. 298 DUTY TO COMMUNITY AND TO SOCIETY and thereby furnish the material for the increase of the humanities, when the results of such work pene- trate into the actual life of the communities and of the individuals who compose them. Moreover, the pure and concentrated spirituality of such effort, and the atmosphere which emanates from it, will of themselves be of the greatest disciplinary and educa- tional value in the composition of a cultured indi- vidual. I once ventured to put the difference be- tween the school and the university into an epigram : " A school is scientific because it is educational ; a university is educational because it is scientific." l Even if there were no students to benefit by the teaching of a university, its supreme purpose in a civilised community would remain as the living centre for the advancement of science. indirectly On the other hand, the directly personal and educa- aimsof tive use ^ a university is not excluded by this univer- recognition of its impersonal aims. The men whom sitywork. . . ,. , r , , it trains to carry on this lofty and necessary work are not prepared or improved for their supreme task by sacrificing their humanity ; and those who are not destined in after-life to grasp, hold and keep alight the torch of pure science as kindled in the uni- versities, will be all the more complete in their intel- lectual development and more fitted to perform their several functions in society, by having dwelt for one specialist com P arat i ve ty short period of their life in this lofty is also the and attenuated atmosphere of pure and thorough maintain- science and knowledge. But, I repeat, both the ing his potential scientific specialist and the more general humanity worker and explorer of things human in life itself, and by need not sacrifice the normal development of the ing in humanity in them. They will be more efficient, !! wnatever wa lk of life they pursue, by becoming more ties of a versatile intellectual beings and more perfect social gentle- "The Ideal of a University," North American Review. HUMANISTIC STUDIES 299 units who can respond to every aspect of purely social life : they need in no way sacrifice their humanity. They will naturally be the better men of science, and still better statesmen, lawyers, mer- chants, landowners, and even humbler workers by being gentlemen. Humanistic studies will always have to be repre- Human- sented in the universities, not only for those who 1! l tu i. * studies in pursue them, but also for those who wish to specialise theuni- in even the most abstract and least " human " studies. versit y- Those who directly pursue the humanities and aim at a more general education, ought, without falling into pretentious superficiality (which the merely popularised study of science tends to produce) at least to gain some intellectual sympathy with that impor- tant department of human knowledge called Science in the restricted sense, by familiarising themselves with the work and the teaching of the great science-specialists in the universities. They will thereby also gain an inestimable mental training from living in the atmosphere of such pure and exalted work for which their after-life will give them no opportunity. The personal aspect of university teaching, while The per- thus based above all things on thoroughness and ^ n ^ t of concentration of thought, will directly aim at the univer- well-proportioned co-ordination of all aspects of stSdy, as scientific and humanistic endeavour, to produce the it contri- true man of culture, who, however efficient in any one produce specialised department of work, will have assimilated the g en - the principles and methods of the intellectual achieve- ment of the age. In so far the universities will con- tribute their share towards cultivating in their students the idea of the gentleman. This aim has to my knowledge never been put more forcibly and more beautifully than by Cardinal Newman when he says J : 1 The Idea of a University, by John Henry, Cardinal Newman, p. 177 300 DUTY TO COMMUNITY AND TO SOCIETY "... But a university training is the great ordinary means to a great but ordinary end ; it aims at raising the intellectual tone of society, at cultivating the public mind, at purifying the national taste, at supplying true principles to popular enthusiasm and fixed aims to popular aspiration, at giving enlarge- ment and sobriety to the ideas of the age, at facili- tating the exercise of political power, and refining the intercourse of private life. It is the education which gives a man a clear, conscious view of his own opinions and judgments, a truth in developing them, an eloquence in expressing them, and a force in urging them. It teaches him to see things as they are, to go right to the point, to disentangle a skein of thought, to detect what is sophistical, and to discard what is irrelevant. It prepares him to fill any post with credit, and to master any subject with facility. It shows him how to accommodate himself to others, how to throw himself into their state of mind, how to bring before them his own, how to influence them, how to come to an understanding with them, how to bear with them. He is at home in any society, he has common ground with every class ; he knows when to speak, and when to be silent ; he is able to converse, he is able to listen ; he can ask a question pertinently, and gain a lesson seasonably, when he has nothing to impart himself ; he is ever ready, yet never in the way ; he is a pleasant companion, and a comrade you can depend upon ; he knows when to be serious and when to trifle, and he haa a sure tact which enables him to trifle with gracefulness and to be serious with effect. He has the repose of a mind which lives in itself, while it lives in the world, and which has resources for its happiness at home when it cannot go abroad. He has a gift which serves him in public, and supports him in retirement, without which good fortune is but vulgar, and with which failure and disappointment have a charm. The art which tends to make a man all this, is, in the object which it pursues, as useful as the art of wealth or the art of health, though it is less susceptible of method, and less tangible, less certain, less complete in its result." QUALITIES OF ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES 301 Whatever the shortcomings in the organisation and in the work of our older English universities may be from the point of view of the most highly specialised study though these deficiencies have continuously been overcome by the reforms instituted during the last two generations they have retained in them, in their modes of teaching and study, and especially in their modes of living, as well as in the historical associations clustering round their ancient buildings and the genius of the place elements which definitely and directly make for the realisation of this particular com- ponent in the constitution of the gentleman. We may hope that no modifications or reforms, intended to satisfy the more material wants, will counteract or weaken these qualities. In fact there is no need, in spite of all response to modern demands, that they should thus be weakened. But, in adopting from German academic institutions some of the best elements in the pursuit of higher university work, through the recent reforms introduced into English universities, the danger has become imminent that we may lose the important heritage of the traditional character of English university education, and that the tendency may have been to disown spiritual possessions of the highest value so that we may das Kind mit dem Bade ausschutten (to pour the child out with the bath-water), to use a homely German saying. I may be allowed to quote a very instructive passage from the essays of Mr. G. Lowes Dickinson, 1 which have recently appeared, bearing on this point : " Scene, a club in a Canadian city ; persons, a professor, a doctor, a business man, and a traveller (myself). Wine, cigars, anecdotes ; and suddenly, popping up, like a Jack-in-the-box absurdly crowned with ivy, the intolerable subject of education. I do not remember how it began ; but I know there came 1 Appearances, "Culture," pp. 205 seq. 302 DUTY TO COMMUNITY AND TO SOCIETY a point at which, before I knew where I was, I found myself being assailed on the subject of Oxford and Cambridge. Not, however, in the way you may anticipate. Those ancient seats of learning were not denounced as fossilised, effete, and corrupt. On the contrary, I was pressed, urged, implored almost with tears in the eye to reform them ? No ! to let them alone ! " ' For heaven's sake, keep them as they are ! You don't know what you've got, and what you might lose ! We know ! We've had to do without it ! And we know that without it everything else is of no avail. We bluster and brag about education on this side of the Atlantic. But in our heart of hearts we know that we have missed the one thing needful, and that you, over in England, have got it.' ' And that one thing ? ' " ' Is Culture I Yes, in spite of Matthew Arnold, Culture, and Culture, and always Culture.' " ' Meaning by Culture ? ' " ' Meaning Aristotle instead of Agriculture, Homer instead of Hygiene, Shakespeare instead of the Stock Exchange, Bacon instead of Banking, Plato instead of Psedagogics ! Meaning intellect before intelli- gence, thought before dexterity, discovery before invention ! Meaning the only thing that is really practical, ideas ; and the only thing that is really human, the Humanities I ' " Rather apologetically, I began to explain. At Oxford, I said, no doubt the Humanities still hold the first place. But at Cambridge they have long been relegated to the second or the third. There we have schools of Natural Science, of Economics, of Engineering, of Agriculture. We have even a Train- ing College in Psedagogics. Their faces fell, and they renewed their passionate appeal. " ' Stop it,' they cried. ' For heaven's sake, stop it 1 In all those things we've got you skinned alive over here ! If you want Agriculture, go to Wiscon- sin ! If you want Medicine, go to the Rockefeller Institute ! If you want Engineering, go to Pittsburg ! But preserve still for the English-speaking world MR. LOWES DICKINSON ON CULTURE 303 what you alone can give ! Preserve liberal culture ! Preserve the Classics ! Preserve Mathematics ! Pre- serve the seed-ground of all practical invention and appliances ! Preserve the integrity of the human mind 1 ' " Interesting, is it not ? These gentlemen, no doubt, were not typical Canadians. But they were not the least intelligent men I have met on this con- tinent. And when they had finally landed me in my sleeping- berth in the train, and I was left to my own reflections in that most uncomfortable of all situations, I began to consider how odd it was that in matters educational we are always endeavouring to reform the only part of our system that excites the admiration of foreigners. " I do not intend, however, to plunge into that controversy. The point that interests me is the view of my Canadian friends that in America there is no ' culture.' And, in the sense they gave to that term, I think they are right. There is no culture in America. There is instruction ; there is research ; there is technical and professional training ; there is specialisation in science and industry ; there is every possible application of life to purpose and ends ; but there is no life for its own sake. Let me illustrate. It is, I have read, a maxim of American business that 1 a man is damned who knows two things.' ' He is almost a dilettante.' It was said of a student, ' He reads Dante and Shakespeare ! ' ' The perfect pro- fessor,' said a College President, ' should be willing to work hard eleven months in the year.' These are straws, if you like, but they show the way the wind blows. Again, you will find, if you travel long in America, that you are suffering from a kind of atrophy. You will not, at first, realise what it means. But suddenly it will flash upon you that you are suffering from lack of conversation. You do not converse ; you cannot ; you can only talk. It is the rarest thing to meet a man who, when a subject is started, is willing or able to follow it out into its ramifications, to play with it, to embroider it with pathos or with wit, to penetrate to its roots, to trace its connexions 21 and affinities. Questions and answer, anecdote and jest are the staple of American conversation ; and, above all, information. They have a hunger for positive facts. And you may hear them hour after hour rehearsing to one another their travels, their business transactions, their experience in trains, in hotels, on steamers, till you begin to feel you have no alternatives before you but murder or suicide. An American, broadly speaking, never detaches him- self from experience. His mind is embedded in it ; it moves wedged in fact. His only escape is into humour ; and even his humour is but a formula of exaggeration. It implies no imagination, no real envisaging of its object. It does not illuminate a subject, it extinguishes it, clamping upon every topic the same grotesque mould. That is why it does not really much amuse the English. For the English are accustomed to Shakespeare, and to the London cabby. " This may serve to indicate what I mean by lack of culture. I admit, of course, that neither are the English cultured. But they have culture among them. They do not, of course, value it ; the Ameri- cans, for aught I know, value it more ; but they produce it, and the Americans do not. I have visited many of their colleges and universities, and every- where, except perhaps at Harvard unless my im- pressions are very much at fault I have found the same atmosphere. It is the atmosphere known as the ' Yale spirit,' and it is very like that of an English public school. It is virile, athletic, gregarious, all- penetrating, all-embracing. It turns out the whole university to sing rhythmic songs and shout rhythmic cries at football matches. It praises action and sniffs at a speculation. It exalts morals and depresses intellect. It suspects the solitary person, the dreamer, the loafer, the poet, the prig. This atmosphere, of course, exists in English universities. It is imported there from the public schools. But it is not all- pervading. Individuals and cliques escape. And it is those who escape that acquire culture. In America, no one escapes, or they are too few to count. I know MORAL HEALTH OF YOUNG ENGLAND 305 Americans of culture, know and love them ; but I feel them to be lost in the sea of philistinism. They cannot draw together, as in England, and leaven the lump. The lump is bigger, and they are fewer. All the more honour to them ; and all the more loss to America." 1 We all know and value the type of man for whom Mr. Dickinson here pleads. And though our German detractors (whose educational system also fails in this very respect), or those who know us not, charge us with moral degeneracy, I am justified in claiming that, among the vast mass of young men who study in our universities and issue from them, a large number possess, and to a great degree realise, such ideals of higher education on the moral and intellectual side. 1 I cannot in this respect agree with Mr. Dickinson in his opinion of the American people. No doubt the spirit of pure commercialism especially of finance and company-promoting is thus essentially opposed to culture and higher moral refinement. Wherever it domi- nates it must have this effect upon the community. But things must have changed greatly within the last twenty or thirty years, if there no longer exists in America a distinctly and admittedly leading group of society in most of the great centres, which is thoroughly representative of culture and of high ideals. I may be pardoned for recording my own personal experience as far as it concerns friends no longer living. My various visits to America during the eighties and nineties of the last century led me then to the conviction that in no European country in none of the capitals where, by good fortune, I was thrown in contact with people of every class, especially those who could claim, and really possessed, culture and refinement was the cultured tone as high, the manners as good, and the conversation as brilliant, impersonal, and unmaterial, as in some of the houses in America where it also was my good fortune to be a guest. I recall with admiration and delight the intercourse with members of the " Thursday Club " in Boston, the house of the late Martin E. Brinmer, where with men like Lowell, Charles Eliot Norton, Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes, Mr. Ticknor, and Mr. Coolidge, and many others, and with women who in every respect were their equals, the conversation and the general unobtrusive atmosphere of culture, as well as the exquisite manners of these " men and women of the world," surpassed anything I had met with in any of the European capitals. Moreover, these social entertainments took place in settings of refinement and taste which blended the best of the old world with that of the new. (Mr. Howell's novel, The Rise of Silas Laphum, gives a picture of such true 306 DUTY TO COMMUNITY AND TO SOCIETY import- There is, however, one aspect in which, from the good J very seriousness with which they uphold these ideals, manners ; they appear to me to neglect, or wilfully to ignore, premeiy other aspects which go to the making of the gentle- important man. In fact as an illustration of the error into in culture which they fall the very term "gentleman" might thtfmak- ^ e obnoxious an d repulsive to them or unworthy ing of a of serious consideration. In the eagerness and the moral singleness of purpose with which they pursue their lofty ideals of life, they may develop in them- selves and in their views les defauts de leurs qualites. They may spurn in theory and neglect in practice the claims to serious attention of the lighter social virtues for which I claim the most weighty moral justification and most important social consideration. I mean the amenities and graces of life, the conformity to the traditions and customs of refined living and breeding which society in the course of civilisation has with much labour and after many centuries evolved. In one word they have not " cultivated " good manners. In fact, they often have no manners at all, and do not know what good manners are. As they know and rightly too that they are refinement in the Cory family.) The same applied to the homes of the late Mr. Schermerhorn, members of the Draper family, not to mention the literary and artistic centres of the late George William Curtis, and of the late Mr. R. W. Gilder, and to the studio of the sculptor St. Gaudens in New York ; to the salons of the late Mr. S. Gray Ward, John Hay and Francis Adams in Washington ; while I had reason to believe that in the West, notably in such centres as St. Louis, there existed circles in which intellectual and social ideals were manifest and dominant. All this may have altered within the last twenty years I cannot judge. But I can hardly believe that such traditions would vanish so soon. Still sadder would it be if such leaders of men were not recognised as the leaders of American society, looked up to and admired by the American people at large ; and in their stead the possessors of mere wealth, whose ambition was the stage-glitter of tinsel social prominence designed for the publicity of a degraded and personal public press, had by their action entirely superseded the older traditions and were now to direct the social taste, ambitions and ideals of the American people. DECLINE OF GOOD MANNERS 307 superior in their mentality and in their lives to the majority of people with low ideals or no ideals at all, they imagine themselves superior to well-mannered people and above the established customs and tra- ditions of good breeding. They need not pay a visit, drop a card, though this be the well-founded, ulti- mately highly moral, custom of the country. They need not greet a friend or recognise an acquaintance with the established form of salute, open the door for a lady, enter into the spirit of ordinary conversation in short do their share to contribute to the refined and smoothly running course of social life until they really become boors, ignorant, awkward, and banausic in outward, apparent life as far removed from the habits and conduct of the gentleman of old as possible. The sins of omission and commission which the yokel manifests from ignorance, they almost assert from conviction ; until their habits of life become as low as his, and the collective tone becomes the same the only difference between them being that the one's chief work is hoeing mangold- wurzels and the others digging at pure thought, and, perhaps, paring epigrams. We may revolt against the tyranny of social traditions and conventions when once they have lost their meaning and have become stereotyped or died, or are even associated with social injustice. But so long as no such evil effects attach to them they maintain their validity and importance. At all events, as direct and outward expressions of the higher art of social life, they are essential to the advancement of society and civilisation. The dead and stereotyped and malignant form ought to be modified and replaced by new forms which truly express the consensus of opinion in response to this art of social living. To maintain and to cultivate and to advance good manners, be it that they tend to avoid wounding the sensitiveness of those with 308 DUTY TO COMMUNITY AND TO SOCIETY import- the cult of the appear- ance Dress. whom we live, or that they positively increase their self-esteem, or even give pleasure by their inherent grace and kindliness, is a paramount duty for every cultured social being, and is in no way exclusive of loftiness of moral purpose or efficiency of concen- trated life-work. Even to bestow proper care upon outer appearance * n t ^ ie f rm f dress need in no way inhibit or impair our work, and our sincerity and efficiency in the more serious aspects of life. On the other hand, it is a constant and positive expression of regard to those , 11- about us to show such attention to our own personal appearance. And by this reference to the question of dress I in no way mean that the direct application of higher and absolute aesthetic principles, in adopting the standards and the taste of the ancient Greeks or the people of the glorious Italian Renaissance, will respond to the need for which I am pleading, especi- ally if these should be in direct contrast to the ruling standards of taste evolved by modern times and our immediate age. They would thus only accentuate militant originality, or rather eccentricity, and the pro- test against reasonable traditions and good manners as established in our own days. 1 1 The claims to conformity in the lighter usages and amenities of life were most forcibly brought home to me by the late Paul Rajon. He was one of the most successful and leading etchers in France of the last generation. In appearance, manners and dress, nothing obtruded his artistic vocation ; he might have been a professional man, or a man of affairs, or a " man of leisure and refinement." One day, while I was with him in his beautiful studio in Paris, there arrived a young artist who wished to show his work to the master-etcher for criticism. The young man was dressed in the ultra-artistic or Bohemian fashion ; enormous felt hat, fluttering tie, Wertherian cloak, which he wore with an assertion of originality and nonconformity. But it appeared that his work was most commonplace. Rajon care- fully examined alternately the work and the attire of the young man, and at last said : " Vous est-il jamais arrive de penser qu'il faut s'habiller comme tout le monde et peindre comme personne ? " The social frondeur and this is generally the case in matters far beyond dress evidently painted like everybody and dressed like nobody. IMPORTANCE OF DRESS, ETC. 309 I assert, without exaggeration or paradox, but, on the contrary, with a full recognition of the ethical purpose of the subject with which we are dealing, that the custom prevailing in England in almost every class, of washing, and of brushing up or changing one's dress before sitting down to a meal, has produced more good moral and social effects than the superficial observer is likely to admit. I would seriously urge that this custom should not be allowed to die out, and should, on the contrary, be maintained and encouraged in family life. It is a great national asset. With those of comparative affluence, dressing for dinner and for the life of leisure in the evening, has far-reaching beneficent consequences and can in no way be combated on the grounds of undue expenditure, be it in time or in money. I can recall how, many years ago, George Eliot, while depicting graphically some of the ungainly effects and aspects of the British Sunday in the country or country town, dwelt with eloquence and vehement insistence upon the important moral and social effect of " Sunday clothes," and especially the changing from working costumes to better dress. " The labourer hesitates to use coarse language when he has his best coat on," were her words. I would, therefore, urgently plead that all seriously minded men and women should realise their responsi- bility in upholding and cherishing the Art of Living in all its forms, and in developing in themselves the social amenities and graces which are inseparable from our ideal of the gentleman. In his perfect realisation he may be rarely met with, but he does exist among us. 1 " How many who have inner nobility and refine- ment of taste with outer grace of demeanour, con- 1 The Jewish Question, p. 329. 3io DUTY TO COMMUNITY AND TO SOCIETY siderateness, and tact ; whose intellectual education embraces, at least as regards their sympathies, all the varied spheres of noble mental effort ; whose moral culture is so deep and true that they can afford to be light and tolerant on the surface of social conduct without calling in the need of the force- pumps, bucketing up priggishness from the heavy deposit of principles at the bottom of their conscience ; whose nature is strung so that all the notes are true in tone ; from whom we have never received a jar from their blank limitation or from tortuous mal- formation of taste, from meanness or grossness a sudden disappointment or shock to the best cravings within us, putting us out of tune for a whole day, like an ugly picture or a discordant sound ? How many have you met, of whatever class of society you may think ? And the wrestling for distinction and display pointed out by M. Leroy-Beaulieu, the gross- ness of the parvenu he refers to, have you not found some, if not all of them, among your closest friends of the highest social distinction ? They may some- times be found among dukes and nobles whose ancestors go back to the crusaders and among princes of the blood. Thackeray has seen them and has immortalised them. An act such as the attempt to write a book defending a people from abuse, as has been written by M. Leroy-Beaulieu, the tone of fair- ness, refinement, and depth of sympathy with which it is pervaded, brings me nearer in mind to the picture of a true gentleman, sans peur et sans reproche, than many a glaring act of valour, or a life passed among the most refined brilliancy of modern social life. " A gentleman is, after all, as has so often been said, made by the kindness of the heart, the tenderness within strength, the alma gentil. Tact is the rapid and true action directed by ready sympathy, which keeps us from saying or doing what will harm or cause discomfort to our neighbours it is loving- kindness and unselfishness carried into our slightest actions. Having these, any man may become a gentleman in any sense. Failing these, he will never be a true gentleman, however favourable the circum- ETHICAL IMPORTANCE OF THE " GENTLEMAN " 311 stances. But with them, and with intellectual refine- ment and culture, put a boy into noble social sur- roundings, and he will become an ornament to every salon into which he steps. But take care that you do not remind him of the fact that he is tolerated ! " Here lies the difficulty. No man can display these social qualities, nor can he avoid some appear- ance of snobbishness, if by your action you make the social ground upon which he stands and moves unsteady, and rob him of the grace and lightness of intercourse. He will be bound to become assertive in some direction and deprived of his social ease." The gentleman thus conceived is the highest social Practical being. The practical necessity, and, certainly, the ^^T practical advantage, of clearly establishing this ideal effect of and of forcing it into the consciousness of all members l^the " of a community as such an ideal, cannot be over- type and estimated. For no moral education is effective unless the gen- a type of highest morality can be clearly brought to the consciousness of those who are to be affected, aesthetic I may be allowed to recall my own youthful experi- j ence, and at the same time to record my debt of teaching. gratitude to those schoolmasters and schoolmistresses in America not to mention the earliest home-teach- ing in that country who constantly held up before the young people some such ideal of a gentleman, be it by positively stimulating ambition to live up to it by self-repression and by definite courageous assertion ; or, negatively, by conveying their con- demnation of a mean or unworthy act by denying to the delinquent the right to consider himself a gentleman. The appeal is here chiefly made, not so much directly to stern morality and to the conscious weighing and balancing of moral injunctions, as to our aesthetic faculties, to our taste, from which admiration or disgust naturally emanate. And it is in this aesthetic form that moral teaching may 312 DUTY TO COMMUNITY AND TO SOCIETY perhaps be most effective : not by an appeal to duty and theory, but by an appeal to taste. No moral discipline, moreover, has become thoroughly efficient until it has been absorbed into man's natural tastes and preferences ; as we may also say, that no general social laws have become efficient until they have been transformed into admitted social traditions and customs, or even until they have be- come fashionable, and are classified in the prevailing vernacular as " good or bad form." l All these particular and later ramifications of our social duties, however, are summarised in, and naturally lead to, the establishment of wider social ideals, in which the intercourse between human beings, productive of material good, tends to the advance of all social groups towards such final ideals, and facilitates and accelerates the dominance of what is best. In this ascending scale we thus rise beyond the individual and the larger or smaller communities, as well as the social groupings and classes, to the State, and, finally, to humanity as a whole. 1 See Appendix VI. CHAPTER III DUTY TO THE STATE As we have seen, our own Anglo-Saxon conception The con- of the State the French and the Americans haVfcgJgtete virtually the same differs essentially from that and the practically accepted in Germany now, and theoreti- relation cally upheld and developed by those politicians, between historians and philosophers who have led the German and the mind during the last generation. The leading indi- moral vidual exponent of the German conception may be stious- considered to be Heinrich von Treitschke. In the JJJg ^ s lts connotation which the leaders of German thought give to the idea of State, it is an entity final and self- existent, from which all individual and social rights are derived and to which they are absolutely sub- ordinated. The State must thus represent the ruling powers that be, and it is difficult to see how the rights and claims of individual thinkers or social groups, or even of the majority of its citizens, can successfully assert themselves against these powers, and how any changes, modifications and reforms can be intro- duced, without violence or revolution, while the ruling powers representing the State are opposed to them. If the authority of the State is self-sufficient, and if the social groups and classes derive their rights from it and their power is strictly limited by it, there is no rational, legal, or moral right by which the citizens can in their turn oppose the will and the authority of the State. In our conception of the State, on the contrary, its authority is entirely based upon the 313 314 DUTY TO THE STATE rights, as well as the duties, of individuals, groups, communities, classes and occupations, and all ele- ments which constitute the nation. The State and its authority, its laws, its constitution, may thus change, and ought, in a developing State, constantly to change, in response to, and in harmony with, changes in the individual, communal and social life of its citizens. This life alters concurrently with the develop- ment of the body of citizens themselves, as things organic grow and develop so long as they live ; and further, as such changes and developments are directly caused by the conditions of life surrounding these organic bodies, physical and moral by all that may be called environment. The whole political activity of a modern democracy thus directly expresses itself in legislation and administration, which it assigns to its Government, by which act it confers supreme Revolu- authority and power upon the State as the final unit. amu-chy Therefore, in such States revolution and anarchy have no have no place, no moral or legal ground for existence. such 6 ^ The citizen is bound to obey the laws which are made states, by him ultimately ; and if he finds these laws unjust obedi- or inadequate to the actual needs of life, or unsuited th n t ^ t ' ie cnan g m g conditions which the advance of of the human society has produced, the constitution provides Duty'of ki m w ith tne means of enforcing his will by his par- the state ticipation in the direction of the authority of the State, spo^d to an d riot by destroying it. On the other hand, the the moral State itself must always remain in touch with its foun- sicai tain of life, that is, the individual life of its citizens. needs From this the State draws the very right of its exist- ofits .._./ i citizens, ence. It must summarise in a higher, purer and more JJjjJJ*** unimpeachable form, not only the physical and manse grossly tangible aspects of life, but also the morality morality f these smaller units within its wider orbit. The in a State should never present a lower, but always a higher, form! 1 morality. It is not only concerned with the material OBEDIENCE TO THE STATE 315 needs of the population, but with its higher and spiritual needs as well. It should uphold and intensify indi- vidual honour, being itself the source of all public honour. It has the supreme and all-important function of establishing and confirming the moral values for all its citizens, for all communities, for all public bodies, and for social life as well. Therefore, our moral consciousness must clearly consider and establish our duties to the State, both the passive and the active duties of citizens. The first duty is obedience. The fact of the legis- The more lative power of the State having been derived from^iesto the body of individual citizens does not lessen, but the state, increases, the need for and justification of obedience ence " to these laws. Nor does the knowledge of such an^sp 60 *. origin diminish the claim to respect and even rever- rever- ence towards the democratic State as compared to en ?^ ; t the absolutist State. The modern democrat and ism. constitutionalist can repeat the words of Louis XIV and say, " L'Etat c'est moi." But his realisation that he individually is thus a part, however small, of this supreme authority, and that it represents the totality of the whole mass of his fellow-citizens, need surely not diminish his reverence and respect for such a supreme unit as compared with the personal authority, self-invested or supposedly conferred by the grace of God, of a Grand Monarque. Nor will intelligent and self-respecting human beings be less inclined to offer unlimited obedience to such authority when their own free-will has been called into activity in its establish- ment, in contrast to the absolute domination imposed upon them from without by one human being. In addition to such obedience and respect the citizen can even feel affection and love for the impersonation of the State, culminating in the most intense and self-sacrificing patriotism. When called upon, he will be prepared to sacrifice his life for his country, 316 DUTY TO THE STATE his president, or for his constitutional king, who rules with his direct sanction, as readily as, and even more readily, than for the country in the making of whose laws he has had no part or for the absolute monarch whose will is with persistent assertion superimposed upon his own. The state This being the case, it is most important that in the be looked ethical training of such citizens, not only obedience upon as t o t ne j aw o f the land and the authority of the State an outside . J body op- should be constantly impressed upon them, so that tnTindU ^ Decomes an inner habit of mind ; but also that viduai. they should never be allowed or encouraged to look and au* u P n the State and its authority as outside bodies thority opposed to their own interests and will, whom they anVthe may thus readily come to consider an antagonistic exactions b oc jy or an enemy, until, like the proverbial Irishman ried out they are " agin' the Government," always ready to PP se or to evade authority. Even in countries with a long and continuous tradition of personal liberty, the mass of the people may be inclined to look upon the State official as their enemy. Even some of the most law-abiding citizens find occasionally welling up in them an antagonism to the police, the guardians of their own security, ready to sympathise with, and even to abet, the pursued criminal. This instinct illustrates the survival of traditions from the bygone days of tyranny when the officers of the law were in fact the enemies of the people, imposing upon them the alien will and interests of rulers com- pletely severed from them by their position. We pis- are s tiii f ar removed from that state of political honesty . . . x towards education in which the mass of our citizens, even the state; t h e most educated and affluent, are so imbued with the spirit of law and civic morality, that it would be impossible for them to evade the just payment of the Customs-dues which, by the laws they have sanctioned, the State is bound to claim. Even the PASSIVE AND ACTIVE DUTIES 317 highly moral and refined member of society, who would shrink with horror from any manifestly dis- honest act, is not fully aware of his dishonesty, and may at times even exult, when he successfully cheats the Custom House official. In the same way, illegally and wrongfully to pay the State less taxes than is its due, by falsifying returns of income, or in yielding to seductive self-deception, is a practice to which many of our best and most highly trained citizens will have to plead guilty. The moral education of our future generations must be such, that it will be impossible for them to establish different standards of morality for their dealings with their fellow-men or with the State and its officials. In addition to the more passive aspect of our duties Active to the State, which lead to obedience and respect for Restate: its authority, there is the more active sphere of immedi- directly ate duty. We must in every way contribute our own integrity individual efforts, however small and inappreciable an< * purity in they may be, to make the State worthy of obedience, the ad- respect, and reverence. We must jealously uphold its purity and integrity both in its legislative and the state. administrative functions. We must resent and com- bat every delinquency of duty on the part of its administrators, whether it directly affect us and our interests or not. It is indifference to the maintenance of the highest standards of purity and efficiency which is at once one of the most insidious as well as disas- trous outcomes of liberty in democratic communities. The less we wish to be dominated by a stereotyped, self-assertive, and tyrannical bureaucracy, the more ought we to guard the integrity and the efficiency of office, the more ought we to make each office worthy of the obedience and respect which we willingly offer to them collectively as our chosen administrators of the law. 3i8 DUTY TO THE STATE The duty But in a truly democratic and constitutional nation ingiegis- ^ ne m st important and effective function of the lators, citizen will always be his power of electing his law- through making representative. It is here that his most them, the distinctive right comes into action, and, at the same adminis- . tration. time, his most imperative responsibility. The really it is good citizen is bound to exercise his function as a r&fram voter. It is a singular fact how little this supreme from responsibility of the citizen is recognised, and, more- over, how often it is ignored in many cases by the very men who possess the greatest power of thought, deliberation, and judgment. In a book on the pre- liminaries of the present war, purporting to give inac- cessible facts and information derived from the very leaders in European politics, that popular and success- ful author, William le Queux, writes the following passage : " Now, at the outset, I wish to say that I am no party politician. My worst enemy could never call me that. I have never voted for a candidate in my life, for my motto has ever been ' Britain for the British.' ' He claims that all his actions have been inspired by true patriotism. Moreover, his writings imply that he is qualified to judge in matters political. And yet, at the same time, he informs us that he has never exercised that most important function which in a constitutional country is the chief duty of every citizen. But there is one saving clause in his state- ment, conveyed by the term " party politician." The diffi- All that is implied in the terms " party," " party sentecFby Phtics," and "party politician" make it most party difficult at times for the conscientious voter to fulfil to the^ 8 this primary and supreme duty to the State. Singu- conscien- larly enough, this difficulty is increased in the older patriot, and more highly developed democracies where the constitutional machinery is most perfect and works most efficiently ; where there have been generations and even centuries of constitutional practice, and the PARTY POLITICS 319 principles of freedom and self-government are firmly and clearly established. In the younger, and less developed democracies, less secure in the continuity of their freedom, still influenced by the traditions and survivals of more autocratic or tyrannical forms of government, these difficulties do not arise to the same degree. In such countries there are so many parties, The Two- often merely representative of different leading individuals, that each voter can adequately and accurately make his choice coincide with his own political convictions at each election. The more highly organised and firmly established democracies, such as Great Britain and the United States, however, have developed the two-party system ; and this twofold division, moreover, has implied complete and more or less permanent organisation within each party. It is not necessary to discuss here whether such organisations of party government are essential or desirable. For us the fact, as it is, remains. Yet, though we may accept it, it does not alter the fact that, as regards our political morality, our duty towards the State, we ought to do all in our power to make our parliamentary vote correspond as com- pletely as possible with our political convictions in the light of the needs of the nation as they present themselves to us at the time. One thing is absolutely clear and indubitable : that we have no right to give our vote to the party with which we have hitherto been associated if their programme or platform does not correspond to what, according to our best thought and our truest conviction, we consider the good of the nation. It is here again (as we have seen in Part I of this book) that a misapplied sense of would- be loyalty, unreasoning and unguided by the dictates of duty and justice, is most vicious in its effect and most destructive of our sense of political morality, in fact of all morality. The man who is expected to 22 320 DUTY TO THE STATE give his vote for the best cause and for what he con- siders the crying need of the country, and who will not hesitate to relinquish his party when its principles are directly opposed to these, is untruthful to himself and to his country, and is personally as well as politi- cally immoral. As we have seen before, he will justify his action by professing to sacrifice himself for the sake of " loyalty " to the party to which he has always belonged, or even because his father and grandfather had belonged to that party. As if this cringing to the hereditary or stereotyped authority of fossilised interests of the past did not fly in the face of every idea of constitutional freedom and of political duty, and as though he were not under- mining the rational and moral bases of all constitu- tional government by eliminating the principles of reason and justice from the most essential functions Duty to of national life. This misplaced and grossly ex- agatnst aggerated " tyranny of loyalty " has been most the party disastrous in its results as it is constantly applied when T i i i -i differing to political leaders and to parliamentary repre- fromiton sentatives themselves. In spite of the persistent tion at experience and numerous examples in English his- Chaneeof t orv > exemplified by both Disraeli and Gladstone, party by who changed their parties within their political life, Sans "and a sl ur > if n t a deeper stigma, is at once and readily voters, applied to every political person who ventures to change his party on grounds, however serious, of conscientious deliberation and conviction. If, how- ever, even the politician by profession, in spite of the many restraining considerations which the nature of the political mechanism brings with it, is bound to act up to his convictions, there are far fewer deterrent causes which ought to prevent the mere elector from conscientiously transferring his vote in accordance with his political faith. The whole theory of repre- sentative government rests upon this assumption, THE MORALITY OF THE "MUGWUMP" 321 The chief difficulty which meets us, however, is pre- sented by those cases in which we may retain our conformity with the main principles of the party to which we have hitherto belonged, but for the time being differ from it and agree with the opposing party on the main issue before the country at the time. There can be no doubt that in the future The whatever may be urged against the system the machinery for taking a referendum on the leading The questions of importance must be evolved. But, meanwhile, what in the history of American politics move- has been called the " mugwump " movement will have to become more universal and more actively established among us. Every thoughtful and con- scientious citizen ought to be a potential " mug- wump." The chief result will at all events be that the established parties themselves will become more immediately responsive to the best thoughtful opinion throughout the country ; that the step from the deliberate will and intelligence of the people to its realisation in practical politics will become shorter, and that finally the political party leaders themselves, hardened and crystallised in their obdurate, almost bureaucratic machine-work and authority, will be forced to take cognisance of the thought and judg- ment of the best and the most competent citizens within the nation. No doubt the uncertainty and difficulty presented to the party rulers to forecast results and marshall their forces will be infinitely greater when a large body of voters are fluctuating in their opinions and political support. But this will only mean that the party will no longer be stereo- typed and fossilised, ruled by its formal laws and interests ; and that, on the other hand, the party leaders will have to remain in touch with the true intelligence and morality of the country, to whom much power will thus be transferred. 322 DUTY TO THE STATE In our fundamental conception of the State and its functions we shall less and less limit ourselves to one single aspect of democratic government, namely, the advancement of personal liberty which is a purely negative conception of its function, cir- cumscribing its activity as far as possible so as to avoid all interference with personal liberty, until the ideal becomes that of fatalistic laissez faire. It has Extension long suice been realised that a great part of the tegisia^ 1 function of the State necessarily means direct inter- tion. ference with personal liberty, and that such positive only to be legislation is not completely summed up in the final concerned a i m o f the so-called good of the largest number, that with the . poor and it does not spell mere opportunism, the adaptation weak and o f tne wno i e machinery of State to immediate and the ex- . J tension of crying needs ; but that one of the supreme aims and goods!* 1 objects of the State is the betterment of the lives of individuals, as well as of the collective life of human society so far as it comes within the range of such political influence. The whole sphere of social legislation comes under this head. But social legis- lation and administration are not only concerned with the poor and the helpless, with the betterment of the conditions of life of those citizens who are in direct need of support and guidance, to sustain life and to save them from the brink of abject misery or crime ; it is not only concerned with what are called the lower classes, but with the claims of every class which are to be regulated in due proportion and harmony for the good of human society as a whole. Toregu- We are but at the initial stages of that political daims^of development in which the claims of the separate all classes social groups, classes, and occupations are justly recog- pations U " n i se d an d organised. As yet these have only been clearly expressed, formulated and frankly avowed by what is called the Labour Party. But that party will have to realise that, like its own claims to recog- PRACTICAL IDEALS OF THE STATE 323 nition and realisation of its own corporate body, similar claims can with equal justice be urged for the collective representatives of other social groups and occupations in a fully developed organic society. It will, above all, have to realise that all these claims can and must be recognised and harmonised by the State ; and that such harmony, blending into the unity of a well-organised modern State, is possible and necessary and does not presuppose violent clash- ing and conflict of interests. Social legislation will more and more come to mean the direct endeavour of the body politic to advance the social life of the community in every direction ; to improve the standards of living while improving the conditions of life, and to approach more closely to the rational ideals of what a perfect State and a perfect society ought to be. I know that it may be thought that thus to The prac- put before practical politicians as a definite aim a^jj, of spiritual object, directly and practically tending the ideals towards the advance of humanity in the more in- state 6 tangible moral spheres, may be considered to be Utopian and the theory of a dreamer far removed from the actualities of life. But fortunately history affords numerous and undoubted instances in which whole nations have joined in a supreme effort to work for, to fight for, and to die for, such moral objects. To select but two historical instances which were of world-wide importance and called for the greatest sacrifices : the Crusades of the Middle Ages and the American Civil War stand out most forcibly. No doubt it can be shown that there are many more proximate and more material causes for these great upheavals. For instance, in the American Civil War the question of federation or confederation, and the consequent divergence of material interests between the North and South, played a great part. But there 324 DUTY TO THE STATE can equally be no doubt that all these nations were moved to action and to self-sacrifice by the ideals which concerned humanity at large : the religious faith of the Crusaders, and the conviction of the unionists of the North that slavery was incompatible with their higher ideals of humanity. It is not Utopian or fantastic to maintain that every single political act, which interest may dictate and oppor- tunism condone, which flies in the face of humanity, which, as an action of individuals or the State, lowers or retards the advance of humanity, is a crime. CHAPTER IV DUTY TO HUMANITY IN several earlier passages, dealing with International Relations, Chauvinism and Patriotism, and with Social Duties, I have already entered upon the wider aspect of humanity as well as the duties which thus present themselves. But I wish now more definitely to summarise these principles. Through our duty to the State we are necessarily made to face our duty to humanity at large. Nor will the fulfilment of our duties in the narrower spheres, which we have hither- to traversed and which have led us through the State to the infinitely wider region of humanity, clash with these ultimate duties with which they can be, and must be, harmonised. The real difficulty in the activity of the State and in the relation of States to human society as a whole will always be to reconcile the due care and regard for the mass of the people who require protection and support in the conflict of individualities of unequal strength, with the encourage- ment of the strong and higher individualities, through whom human society is actually advanced and humanity draws nearer to its ideals. It is the great problem of reconciling Socialism with Individualism. Such a reconciliation is often considered to be hopeless and is given up as such. But it is possible, nay necessary ; only the two principles apply to different layers of human society. The socialistic point of view, in which the individual is restrained in deference to the 325 326 DUTY TO HUMANITY The main rights of existence of all, in which the stronger is the state checked in his dominating course in order to protect internally and support the weaker, is right, if we consider only tect the the weaker members of human society ; and it is weak and right that our social legislation, the direct interven- courage tion of the State in the processes of human competition, ^on should be in the socialistic spirit and should be wholly To recon- concerned with the poor and the weak. Old Age ciaUsm" Pensions and National Insurance are clearly socialistic and in- in character, and it is right that the State should thus ism. l " fulfil one of its primary duties of supporting and protecting those who require such support and pro- tection. It is equally right, and it will be realised still more in the future, that the State must protect itself and the community at large against the undue power which, owing to dominant economical con- ditions and the protection which the State affords, tends to accrue to individuals in such a form and to such a degree that it endangers the welfare of society and the security of the State itself is, in fact, against " good policy." Congestion of capital into single hands to such a degree that the power it affords, without responsibility or control, becomes a danger to society, must be checked by the constitutional means which the State has at its disposal. As I have previously said, I thus plead for socialism at the top and bottom ; but for pure individualism in between. Excess of wealth and excess of poverty must be checked by collective legislation from a collective point of view ; but when society is thus secure at its two extremes, where the prohibitory action of the State is called in to produce such security, full freedom must be left to the individual to assert and to realise superior powers, through which effort the individual and society at large advance and are perfected. Within the two extremes of the human scale inequality is to be encouraged in order to give free scope to moral LIBERTY, FRATERNITY, AND INEQUALITY 327 and intellectual forces. Until trade unions recognise this, their activity will be immoral and retrograde. Our motto must be : " Liberty, fraternity, and Liberty, inequality." Democracy must never degenerate into fr * ter : . nity, m- ochlocracy. Every democracy must be aristocratic equality. in tendency and aim ; for with equality of oppor- tunity it must encourage the realisation of the best. Socrates, as recorded by Plato and by Xenophon, has put the point in the simplest and most convincing form by the parable of the flute-player who is good and useful, and the helmsman who is good and use- ful ; but we do not call in the helmsman to play the flute, and we do not entrust the ship to the flute- player. The claims of the poor and humble, for which Christ Christ pleaded, can be reconciled with those of the . superman. As in the moral consciousness of the ciled. individual charity and high ambition can and must go hand in hand, so in the State the care of the poor and feeble, their protection from the rapacious on- slaught of the strong and grasping, all those acts of legislation and administration which not only recog- nise the lowly and the lowest, but ever tend to establish and maintain equality of rights, must, on the other hand, encourage the advance of strong and superior individuals and corporate bodies, and raise the standard of living and social efficiency. In so far the State will confirm and encourage inequality. All its functions will converge in ultimately raising the ideals of humanity. Plato will then be reconciled with Christ. With the international relations of the State and the duties of its citizens as patriots and as human beings, I need not deal here, as the subject has been discussed in the earlier parts of this book. (b) THE DUTIES WHICH ARE NOT SOCIAL AND THE IMPERSONAL DUTIES The pro- IN all our ethical considerations hitherto we have isnfof 1 " considered man, if not from the exclusively altruistic human- point of view, at least from the social point of view. We have conceived man too exclusively as Aristotle's social animal (foW TroXm/coV). If this were the only conception we form of man, our ethical system, human morality, would be imperfect, if not com- pletely at fault, both from a practical as well as a theoretical point of view. As a matter of fact both our ethical systems and the ethical thought and the prevailing habit of mind among thinking and conscientious people are defective, because they conceive man exclusively, or at least too predomi- nantly, merely as a social being, merely in his relation to human society and to his fellow-men. Our ethical thought thus suffers from " Human Provincialism " or perhaps more properly put, the " Provincialism of Humanity." Our philosophy is, in the first place, too social, and, in the second place, too psychological. To introduce man where he is not needed is false, as it blocks the way to the attainment of ultimate truth. If this be so, even from the highest philoso- phical point of view, it is also so in the ordinary course of daily life ; for we do not, even in practice, follow the purely social and psychological conception of our duties. The labourer who works at a definite task does not think of man, or the relation of his work to man, while he is engaged upon it. Still less 328 EXAGGERATION OF THE SOCIAL ELEMENT 329 does the student of higher science allow the thought of man to intrude into his search for truth. Thus neither practically nor theoretically are we guided by this primary conception of man's social nature. In fact one of the supreme and most arduous tasks of the scientific student and the philosopher is to discard the personal equation, all human bias, the various " idols " (as Bacon called them), which distort and falsify truth and block the way to its secure establish- ment. What we really do in practical life and strive to do in the life of pure thought is, without consider- ing human and social relationships and duties, to perform the action and to solve the task we are working at as perfectly as it can be performed, and, as men, to approach as nearly as we can to the perfect of the man we ought to be. We do this more or less consciously, and we have before our minds more or less clearly this pattern or ideal of ourself to live up to. If this is so in our life, as we live it from an ethical point of view, there is no doubt also that it ought to be so. Our ethics would thus not be complete, unless we Man must adjust this one-sided exaggeration of the social, as ^ered'in well as the psychological, bearings of the problem, himself Man must be considered in himself, in his relation f^per 1 - to himself, and also to his ideal self ; also in his sona -i relation to the world of things, to his actions, to things functions, and duties in themselves, irrespective of an ^ . i , actions. their social bearing. Man must also be considered in his relationship to Man in nature and to the world, irrespective of the definite 1 5 n r ^ a ~ relationship which these on their part may hold to Nature, man and to humanity, he must break through the m o S C and crust or tear the veil, pass beyond the restrictive God. boundaries of " Humanitarian Provincialism." To put it into philosophical terms : his final outlook must not only be psychological, but must ultimately 330 DUTIES NOT SOCIAL, ETC. lead him to that intellectual eminence where he can become cosmological, metaphysical, and theological the climax of his whole spiritual life being now, as it was in the past and as it will be in the future, his religious life. The psychologist may remind us that, after all, man can only think as man, neither as a stone nor a plant, nor as a being from Mars or any other planet, nor as a demi-god. But surely, as men, we can and must conceive man not as a purely and exclusively social being and we constantly have before us, without in any way appealing to our philosophical thought, man's relation to nature and to the universe and to infinity. Vast as this prospect may appear to us, it will be found that it is applied in our ordinary daily life, not only by thinkers and leaders of men, but even by the humblest and most thoughtless among us. We have thus finally to consider : i . Our duty to our self ; 2 . Our duty in respect of things and acts ; 3. Our duty to the world and to God. Plato our In the ethical aspect of this threefold relation- guide. s hip, we must be guided by Plato. In realising, both as regards ourselves and the definite functions and activities of man, and finally as regards our conception of the universe and the ultimate infinite powers of all, the highest and the purest ideals which we can form of each, with which we thus establish a relationship, we may realise and emphasise our own imperfection and our remoteness from such ideals. But, all the same, such high mental activity on our part will not end in an idle and resultless play of the imagination and a dissipation of intellectual energy ; but will be, and is, of the greatest practical value in the sober and unfailing guidance of human action towards the highest ethical goal. CHAPTER V DUTY TO OUR SELF THIS duty to our Self, as we here conceive it, really means the supreme and constraining power which, through the exercise of the imagination, an ever- present image of an ideal self has over us. Such an active imagination and its power of enforcing itself even upon the most sluggish temperament and understanding is not limited to the most highly developed among us, but is the possession of prac- tically all human beings. In its lowest and, perhaps, Vanity, reprehensible form, it manifests itself in vanity : in self ~ r ' J ' respect, the higher forms it leads to self-respect and practical idealism, idealism. It, of course, includes, and is to a great m ^ e i or extent made up of, man's conception of himself as a ideal of social being. But it occupies the mind and stimulates 01 and guides action, not because of any definite social relationship, but because of the relationship which we hold to our self as a whole, to our own personality, as it manifests itself to us in all acts of self-conscious- ness. Our vanity, our self-respect, and our idealism are gratified in the degree in which we are successful or in which our individual achievement, or the wholeness of our personality, conforms to the model, or pattern, the ideal which we form of our self. This even includes the essence of what we call con- conscience. For whether conscience originally springs science - from fear, or assumes a relation to beings outside and beyond ourselves, its essence really is to be found in the dominance which our ever-present conception of 331 332 DUTY TO OUR SELF a perfect self has over our faltering and imperfect self. The degree of the discomfort or pain which conscience may evoke in us is measured by the discrepancy between our actual self and the image of our perfect self. Far more than most people would admit, the effectiveness of our imagination in thus appealing to a quasi-dramatic instinct in us, in which we are acting our part, not so much in life's play of which " all the world's a stage," but in that smaller microcosmical world (infinitely great to us), circumscribed by our actual and better self, in which, under the promptership of imagination, the two selves are at once actors and audience. Far more than we would admit are we thus always acting a part, evoking alternate applause and reproof, and fashioning our course of action towards good or evil. And if this is actually the case, it is right that it should be so ; and what may in one aspect feed our lowest vanity, in another produces our highest aspirations and leads us onward and upward to the noblest and best that is in man. Moral it may even be held and I for one do hold that SCll-QC- pendence the purest and, perhaps, the noblest guide to conduct efficient* an< ^ to ^ e ru ^ e ^ tne highest morality is to be found standard in the establishment of such a relationship to our t/ve^no"- se ^ m a direct and effective intensity of moral raiity. guidance. When our moral efforts be it in the repression of the lower instincts and desires or in the exertion of all our energy and power towards work and deeds that are good are wholly independent of a relationship to others, to their regard or approval, but are determined by our self-respect and self- realisation, they are more secure in producing truly moral results. They are then established by our well- trained habit or by our conscious determination to live up to the most perfect image we have of our self ; and, not only have we attained to a higher ITS MORAL EFFICACIOUSNESS 333 stage of ethical development than when our eyes are constantly turned to the social world about us, but also, as moral social beings, as members of society, we shall be more perfect and more secure in our course of moral action. We shall thus strive to make both body and mind perfect in their form and in their function ; we shall endeavour to main- tain that supreme harmony of being which the ancient philosophers held up as the goal of man's efforts. But more than this, we shall establish the greatest security for our every act, and under all the most fluid and varying conditions of environment, main- tain the loftiness of our moral standards. This will not only guide us in choosing in life those occupations which are most likely to bring out the best that is in us, that which brings us nearest to the totality of our highest self, the ideal of our self ; not only will it urge us to do our best work and to struggle against fate and untoward circumstance in overcoming opposition within and without ; but it will securely confirm those social qualities which we must develop in the interest of a harmonious society. The habits which we thus form, the self-control we thus impose upon ourselves, the amenities which we strive to culti- vate to please our fellow-men and to improve social intercourse, will have their perennial origin, justifica- tion and vitalisation within ourselves, and will not be affected by the uncertainty and mutability of for- tuitous outer circumstances or depend upon confir- mation from without. We shall be clean of body, clear of mind, and delicate of taste, not to please others or to win their approval, but because our own self would not be perfect without such effort and achievement. And we shall thus be furnished with an efficient guide, not only in the loftier and more spiritual spheres of our life and being, but even in the humblest and most commonplace and lowly actions 334 DUTY TO OUR SELF Not only of our varied existence. To cultivate our habits highest f bodily cleanliness ; to dress as appropriately and moral 6 f taste f u Hy as we can m conformity with our position effort, but and activities ; to eat and drink, not only in modera- Du t * n a manner expressive of refinement and duties repressive of greed and animal voracity to do all amenities t ^ s ' even if we were placed on a desert island, of daily isolated from all social intercourse, simply because life we wish to uphold in ourselves the best standards of human civilisation and to make ourselves perfect human beings, marks the highest, as well as the most efficient, phase of ethical culture. I cannot refrain from pointing these truths by definite illustrations which in their very slightness will emphasise my meaning. I have been assured by a friend that, when he finds himself in a state of moral indisposition and depression, his cure is to retire from his friends, to work hard all day, and then in the evening to dress with the greatest care and punctilious- ness, arrange his room as perfectly as possible with flowers bedecking the table, and after his evening meal to turn to beautiful books or beautiful thoughts. When, as a boy, he for the first time left his home, his wise mother begged him as a personal favour not to take even a hasty meal without washing ; and, if others did not do it for him, that he should lay his own cloth, be it only with a napkin, if he could not find a tablecloth. She rightly felt how important it was to guard, as a spontaneous and vital habit of mind, the higher forms of civilisation and refinement. On the other hand I have heard of a case where a man, brought up and accustomed to civilised habits, was found in the backwoods of Canada, where he had lived as a lonely settler for some years without even washing the plates after meals because, as he put it, " the food all came from the same place and went to the same place." UNALTRUISTIC DUTIES 335 There is perhaps no phase of ethical teaching and The su- discipline which requires more emphasis, develop- portance" ment and insistence than the group of duties which of un- ignore the social and directly altruistic aspect, and duties. " deal with the duties to ourselves, making them ulti- Mistake ' . . of the ex- mately, through conscious recognition, an efficient aggera- ethical habit. For it appears to me that our ethical tl n . of , . altruism. vision has been distorted as regards true proportion, its correctness and soundness impaired by the exclusive, or at all events exaggerated, insistence upon its moral, social and humanitarian province. It has justified the strongest strictures and condemnation of professed amoralists like Nietzsche, their oppo- sition to the prevalent morality and the degeneracy to which so-called altruism must lead. At the same time such one-sided theories of social altruism cannot tend to sane happiness : they can only main- tain such a state of artificial euphoria by feverish and continuous activity, submerging all consciousness of self, in which we deceive or flatter ourselves into believing that we are doing good to others. And when we cease to act and stop to think, we are thrown into a maze of restless querying as regards our own relation to our fellow-men, which ends in depression or even in despair. We can only be saved by following Matthew Arnold's commandment to Resolve to be thyself, and know that he Who finds himself loses his misery. CHAPTER VI DUTY TO THINGS AND ACTS BUT we must at times go still farther in our efforts of self-detachment. Not only beyond the social aspect of our duties, but even beyond our own per- sonalities, must we realise our definite duties to things and our relation to our own acts. In this form of supreme self-repression and self-detachment for the time being, we must forget ourselves either in pure contemplation or in definite activity and produc- Absorp- tiveness. Pure contemplation finds its highest tionand ... . . T concen- expression in science and in art. It constitutes man s m theoretic faculty. To realise this faculty in spiritual and and in intellectual activity makes of thought and work al em tion an activity in itself, and has led mankind to its highest sphere of human achievement, namely, the development of sciences and arts. But we are chiefly concerned with action and achievement them- selves as distinct from thought and pure emotion. Such action is likely to be the more sane, perfect and effective the more vigorous and concentrated it is in its energy, the more our will commands and directs our energies, as well as our passion and physical strength, to do the thing before us, and to forget ourselves in the doing of it. " Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might." Now, as there is an ideal of a human being, the ideal or type for animal and organic beings, in fact for all forms in nature, so there is a type and ideal 336 INVENTIONS AND IMPROVEMENTS 337 for each definite act the perfect act. This is a neces- sary conclusion of the Platonic idea and of Aristotle's tvT\exeia. The degree in which, while acting, we approach this ideal perfection of the act itself deter- mines our triumph or failure, our satisfaction or dis- content. The dissatisfaction and depression which we feel when we are not successful, the divine dis- content out of which all great effort and great achievements grow, produces in us a conscience, irrespective of our social instincts, irrespective even of our own personality, and is, perhaps, of all our sonal moral impulses the highest as it is the most effective, science. Besides this ethical bearing, it has the most supreme practical bearing in life ; for only through it does man do his best, individually and collectively. All improvements, inventions and discoveries find their unassailable justification and effective origin in this principle of human activity. No doubt there are no new achievements, no dis- The coveries or inventions, which from the mere fact of their novelty do not alter the existing state of invention things to which they are related, do not in their turn destroy what actually exists and affect adversely P rove - those who have depended upon the existing state of things. In so far as this is so they may produce pain and want and misery, and much may be urged against their claims from other points of view. But we must ever strive to produce new inventions and new improvements, not so much to increase the for- tunes of the discoverers or promoters, not for the j merchants, not even for the labouring populations, to ' whom the exceptional control of such improvements or facilities of production gives an advantage over others ; but because perfected production of objects, man's increased control over chance, over nature, man's defiance of restricted time and space, are thereby advanced. It is therefore immoral artificially to 338 DUTY TO THINGS AND ACTS immor- impede or to retard improvements or to lower the impeding q uan tity or quality of production. To take a definite best pro- instance, which the individual artisan and the or- ganised union of working-men should remember : The bricklayer's duty is to do his best work as a brick- layer, to lay as many bricks and to lay them as per- fectly as possible in as short a time as possible ; not so much to increase the wealth of his employer (though this too is his duty, and his definite com- pact), or his own wealth ; but because of the ideal of bricklaying, which must be the ideal of his active existence. The supreme and final justification of his work is to be found in the work itself, irrespective even of human beings, of human society, of humanity. Social But I feel bound to qualify what I have considered which from one aspect only, though in its absolute and may unassailable truth, by not only admitting, but by ourac> urging the facts that there are other duties with tions as which man individually, and men collectively, have affected . . , ,, . , by the to deal ; though these in no way weaken the abso- imper- hiteness of our ideals of impersonal work. We must sonal . . . duties, also consider, recognise and be guided in our action by, the incidental and temporary suffering frequently following in the wake of discoveries and inventions. It will, therefore, devolve on society to alleviate and, if possible, to remove such incidental suffering brought upon a limited group of individuals for the benefit of society and absolutely justified by the impersonal improvement of human work and pro- duction. Social legislation will here have to step in and to supplement insurance against old age, against disease, and even unavoidable unemployment, by insurance against acute and temporary forms of unemployment and dislocations of labour caused by such improvements and inventions. Such social legislation and the relief given to the unavoidable suffering of groups of people will be exceptional ; PERFECTION OF WORKMANSHIP 339 but it is moral and practically justifiable, if not imperative, on the ground that the community at large, and even future generations, will benefit by the introduction of the improvements which necessarily cause temporary individual suffering. To give but one definite instance : The undoubted blessing which motor traffic has bestowed upon mankind has neces- sarily brought suffering and misery to groups of people entirely dependent upon the superseded means of transport ; while it has also caused discomfort to the mass of the population. It was but right that all efforts should have been made, on the one hand, to support the cabmen and others who live by horse traffic during the period when these new inventions forcibly deprived them of the very means of sub- sistence ; while, on the other hand, public effort ought at once to have been directed towards securing the lives of pedestrians threatened by the new invention and the danger to health and comfort caused by the production of dust on the roads. But these separate duties, called into being by the The duty improvement of production and the expansion of Jj^jjjj human skill and activity, in no way diminish the mostper- absolute duty to further such improvement and to concentrate the energy which man should bring to the remains perfecting of his work as such. Our supreme duty to things and to acts remains ; and we must act thus, not so much on grounds of human altruism, not as social beings in our direct relation to other beings and our intercourse with them ; but simply in our relation to the objects which we are to produce, to modify or to effect, with a view to making our pro- duction as perfect as possible, even if we were the only human beings in the universe. I may be allowed here to quote two didactic poems which illustrate this ethical principle with forcible truth and with beauty of form. The one is Matthew Arnold's 340 DUTY TO THINGS AND ACTS " Self-Dependence," from which I have already quoted above, the other is George Eliot's poem " Stradivarius ": SELF-DEPENDENCE Weary of myself, and sick of asking What I am, and what I ought to be, At this vessel's prow I stand, which bears me Forwards, forwards, o'er the starlit sea. And a look of passionate desire O'er the sea and to the stars I send : Ye who from my childhood up have calm'd me, Calm me, ah, compose me to the end ! " Ah, once more," I cried, " ye stars, ye waters, On my heart, your mighty charm renew ; Still, still let me, as I gaze upon you, Feel my soul becoming vast like you ! " From the intense, clear, star-sown vault of heaven, Over the lit sea's unquiet way, In the rustling night-air came the answer : " Wouldst thou be as these are ? Live as they. " Unaff righted by the silence round them, Undistracted by the sights they see, These demand not that the things without them Yield them love, amusement, sympathy. " And with joy the stars perform their shining, And the sea its long moon-silver 'd roll ; For self-poised they live, nor pine with noting All the fever of some differing soul. " Bounded by themselves, and unregardful In what state God's other works may be, In their own tasks all their powers pouring, These attain the mighty life you see." O air-born voice ! long since, severely clear, A cry like thine in mine own heart I hear : " Resolve to be thyself ; and know that he Who finds himself, loses his misery ! " STRADIVARIUS 341 STRADIVARIUS Antonio then : " I like the gold well, yes but not for meals. And as my stomach, so my eye and hand, And inward sense that works along with both. Have hunger that can never feed on coin. Who draws a line and satisfies his soul, Making it crooked where it should be straight ? An idiot with an oyster- shell may draw His lines along the sand, all wavering. Fixing no point or pathway to a point ; An idiot one remove may choose his line, Straggle and be content ; but God be praised, Antonio Stradivari has an eye That winces at false work and loves the true, With hand and arm that play upon the tool As willingly as any singing bird Sets him to sing his morning roundelay, Because he likes to sing and likes the song." Then Naldo : " 'Tis a petty kind of fame At best, that comes of making violins ; And saves no masses, either. Thou wilt go To purgatory none the less." But he: ' 'Twere purgatory here to make them ill ; And for my fame when any master holds 'Twixt chin and hand a violin of mine, He will be glad that Stradivari lived, Made violins, and made them of the best. The masters only know whose work is good : They will choose mine, and while God gives them skill I give them instruments to play upon, God choosing me to help Him." " What ! were God At fault for violins, thou absent ? " " Yes ; He were at fault for Stradivari's work." " Why, many hold Giuseppe's violins As good as thine." 342 DUTY TO THINGS AND ACTS " May be : they are different. His quality declines : he spoils his hand With over-drinking. But were his the best, He could not work for two. My work is mine, And, heresy or not, if my hand slacked I should rob God since He is fullest good Leaving a blank instead of violins. I say, not God Himself can make man's best Without best men to help Him. I am one best Here in Cremona, using sunlight well To fashion finest maple till it serves, More cunningly than throats, for harmony. 'Tis rare delight : I would not change my skill To be the Emperor with bungling hands, And lose my work, which comes as natural As self at waking." " Thou art little more Than a deft potter's wheel, Antonio ; Turning out work by mere necessity And lack of varied function. Higher arts Subsist on freedom eccentricity Uncounted inspirations influence That comes with drinking, gambling, talk turned wild, Then moody misery and lack of food With every dithyrambic fine excess : These make at last a storm which flashes out In lightning revelations. Steady work Turns genius to a loom ; the soul must lie Like grapes beneath the sun till ripeness comes And mellow vintage, I could paint you now The finest Crucifixion ; yesternight Returning home I saw it on a sky Blue-black, thick-starred. I want two louis d'ors To buy the canvas and the costly blues Trust me a fortnight." " Where are those last two I lent thee for thy Judith ? her thou saw'st In saffron gown, with Holofernes' head And beauty all complete ? " GUI BONO? 343 " She is but sketched : I lack the proper model and the mood. A great idea is an eagle's egg, Craves time for hatching ; while the eagle sits, Feed her." "If thou wilt call thy pictures eggs I call the hatching, Work. Tis God gives skill, But not without men's hands : He could not make Antonio Stradivari's violins Without Antonio. Get thee to thy easel." I end with another illustration from my Cui Bono ? " . . . ' Have you nothing more to say about the use of science ? ' " ' I have, sir, but before I do so I should like to repeat an interesting confession of one of my friends which will put the arguments in favour of scientific pursuits in a more personal and direct manner. He is a colleague of mine, a distinguished archaeologist, and teaches his subject at our university. Some time ago he made a striking discovery, one of a series he had made in his work. He had found in a foreign museum a marble head, which, by means of his careful and systematic observation and comparison of works of ancient art, a method developed in his science in the most accurate manner by several great scholars, he at once recognised as belonging to a statue by Pheidias in London. A cast of the head was made for him by the authorities of the foreign museum. He took it to London, and there, to his own delight and that of all people who love the masterpieces of Greek art, when he tried this head on the neck of the beautiful female figure, each fracture fitted exactly. The precious work of art from the age of Pericles, of the art of Pheidias, was now com- plete, after it had remained incomplete for centuries. " ' When, one day, I was congratulating him upon his discovery, and saying to him, how happy he must have been thatfmoment,\and how contented he must be with the successful pursuit of the vocation 344 DUTY TO THINGS AND ACTS he had chosen in life, a discussion similar to the one we are now carrying on ensued, and in it he made to me the following confession as to the light in which at various moments his work appeared to him, and the varying degrees of moral justification which he then recognised as underlying his efforts. " ' " When I am quite well in body and mind," he said, " I work on with delight and vigour. It is pure joy : I never question the Tightness and supreme ne- cessity of my work at all. Nothing in this world appears to me of greater importance for me to work at, and I am almost convinced that the world could not get on without my work. ' Convinced ' is not the right word : for I do not think about this general question at all. But at the bottom of this joyous expenditure of creative energy lies this conviction, and all the justifications which I must now enumerate. For, as my moral or physical health sinks, one of them after the other drops off, until I am left with but the feeble support of the last lame excuse for exertion with which I limp or crawl through my deep dejec- tion and melancholy. "< With the first disturbance of moral or physical sanity, I begin to doubt and query. It is the first stage of the disease ; but I am still full of high and sound spirits. Besides all the others, I feel one supreme motive to action which is of the highest religious order, so high that but few people will be able to understand it, and still fewer can sympathise with it and be moved by it. " ' " I look upon my individual work and creation as part of the great universe, even beyond humanity. I even transcend the merely human or social basis of ethics, and I feel myself in communion with the world in all its infinite vastness. " ' " I know this sounds like mysticism, but I assure you it is both clear and real to me. I then feel that if there were in this world no single human being to love or care for, instruct or amuse, my work would still be necessary, in view of the great harmony of things, to which right actions, truth discovered, and beauty formed, contribute, as their contraries detract from it. CUI BONO? 345 " ' " Were there no single person living," he con- tinued, with growing warmth of enthusiasm, " it would be right, nay necessary, for me to discover that head in the foreign museum. That head lay ' pining ' there in the foreign museum for years, and for cen- turies under the earth before it was excavated, until / came, and by the knowledge I possessed (which means the accumulated effort of many learned men establishing the method, as well as my years of pre- paration and education in acquiring it and making it my own), by this science of mine, I joined it to that torso, that imperfect fragment of a thing, and made it whole a living work of art fashioned by the master genius, whose existence, two thousand years ago, became part of the world's richness for all time. So long as that head and that torso remained separate, there was discord and not harmony in the world's great Symphony, the world was so much the poorer, so much the less beautiful and good. I made the world richer by my act, more harmonious, more beautiful ; and thus, without self-love or even love of man, I proved my love of God. That is the Amor Dei. Then we are enthusiastic in the Greek sense of the word, we are full of God. " ' " In the next stage, when my spirits flag some- what, and reflection and then doubt begin to come over me, I cannot feel moved by this widest and grandest assurance of the bearings of my science. But, in addition to the lower justifications, I then quiet my doubts by the feeling that my work and my teaching are one element in the establishment, in- crease, and spread of what we call civilisation, culture, and general education. Human life becomes more elevated and refined by the sum of our efforts. Without good archaeologists, and the consequent of the past, our civilisation would not be as perfect as it is. " ' "Then, when I sink still lower, and can no longer feel this more general conception of human life, I can still feel that the effect upon those for whom I write and those whom I teach will be refining, and will bring true Hellenism (not the pseudo-Hellenism of 346 DUTY TO THINGS AND ACTS morally degenerate sciolists), nearer to them ; and also that I increase their capital of refined intel- lectual enjoyment, their intellectual resources and their taste. " ' " And when I am lowest of all, I say to myself that I am making good professional archaeologists and curators of museums, am training good school- masters for our public schools, and am at least help- ing these young men to a profession, giving them the means of earning a living. " ' "When I have arrived at that stage of dejection and lowness of spirits ; I jog on in a ' from hand to mouth ' existence ; but I feel that, the sooner I can get a good holiday and some rest, the better it will be for me." ' " CHAPTER VII DUTY TO GOD THE duty to things and actions necessarily and cosmical logically leads us to the further and final course to D ^ eS t which, in the rising scale of ethical thought, they God. tend. In man's ethical progression through human e glon * functions as such, through the objects which man wishes to produce or to modify in nature, he is neces- sarily led to his ultimate duties towards the world as a whole, not only the world as his senses and per- ceptions cause him to realise it, as it is, with all the limitations which his senses and his powers impose upon him ; but the world as his best thought, and his imagination, guided by his highest reason, lead him to feel that it ought to be his ideal world. This brings him to his duty towards his highest and most impersonal ideals of an ordered universe, a cosmos, and of unlimited powers beyond the limitations of his capacities his duty to God. Ethics here natur- ally, logically, necessarily, lead to, and culminate in, religion. The supreme duty in this final phase of ethics, Supreme man's religious duties, is truth to his religious ^J^. * ideals. It is here, more than in any other phase of fulness to his activities, that there can and ought to be no^efiT 18 compromise. This is where he approaches the ideal NO com- world in all its purity, free from all limitations and modifications by the imperfections of things tem- poral and material, as well as his own erring senses 347 348 DUTY TO GOD and perceptive faculties. There are no practical or social relationships, no material ends to be considered, no material interests to be served or advantages gained. The only relationship is that between him- self and his spiritual powers and the highest ideals which these enable him to formulate or feel. His duty, therefore, is to strive after his highest ideals of harmony, power, truth, justice and charity. Nor does this function of the human mind and this craving of the human heart require exceptional intellectual power or training. On the contrary, the history of the human race has shown that at every phase of human existence, even the earliest and most rudi- mentary, in the very remote haze of prehistoric times, the presence of this religious instinct and man's effort to satisfy it are manifested, even though it necessarily be in the crudest, the most unintelligent and even barbarous forms of what we call super- stition and idolatry. Man's Man's every desire and every experience neces- u.mita- sarily have a religious concomitant. At every mo- imper- ment of his conscious existence he is reminded of neces- nS imperfection and limitation without, and incapacity sarily within, himself. This very consciousness is the main- thecon- spring of all endeavour, of all will-power, of all the ceptions exertion of his physical or mental capacities. For, in his 11 u J mind of each conscious experience, as well as each desire and limited" enC rt > nas > as a counterpart to its limitation, the and more or less present or complete consciousness of its perfect. p er f ec t fulfilment. Limitation in time and space implies infinity ; limitation in power implies omni- potence ; limitation in knowledge implies omni- science ; injustice, justice ; cruelty, charity. Even if the limitation or the incapacity is admitted, and even if the tutored mind ceases from dwelling upon it as it realises the impossibility clearly to grasp and to encompass the unlimited and relegates such RELIGIOUS IDEALS 349 fantastic cravings to the region of the absurd, through long and continuous rationalistic training and habit, this only confirms the correlative conception of infinite power. The consciousness that we cannot span the world, regulate the powers of nature accord- ing to our will, dominate the seasons and check the course of the tides not to mention the limitations of every individual and commonplace action of ours implies our conception of such power and such complete achievement. The higher our spiritual flight and the more highly The trained we are through experience and through J^ thought in the range of our imagination and our teiiigence, reason, the higher will be our ideals of the infinite JJjJ ^ er and the omnipotent. The Greek philosopher Xeno- penence, phanes said, many centuries ago, that if lions could draw, they would draw the most perfect lions as their thorough . if -, i -, n ^ ur train- god, and that the god of negroes would be flat-nosed i ng , the and black. Thus necessarily individuals, the col- . J , will be lective groups of men, and the different periods within our re- man's history will all vary in their capacity to|jgJJ 8 approach this conception of the highest ideals ; they the more will differ in their theology and in their religion. But their supreme duty, from an ethical point of tionbe re- view, in their attitude towards religion, is truth. They religion. must strive so to develop their religious nature that Duty to it responds to their highest moral and intellectual 9 d capacity. They must not accept any religious ideal above ail that contradicts the rising scale of duties from the lower and narrower spheres upwards as we have man must enumerated them. All duties must harmonise culminate in the ultimate ideals which belong to the this gra- religious sphere. Credo quia impossibile must never O f his mean Credo quia absurdum. Man commits a grave religious sin, perhaps the gravest of all, by lowering his religious ideals, by allowing himself, on whatever grounds of expediency and compromise, to vitiate the divine 350 DUTY TO GOD reason he possesses as the highest gift in human nature, and by admitting the irrational into his con- ception of the Divinity. Ethics, By this I in no way mean to say that either ethics, amfart sc i ence or art can i n anv wa y replace religion : though cannot in their highest ideal flights they closely approach religion, to religion and even merge into it. Of all human Pure activities in science, pure mathematics, which deals matics with the highest immaterial relationships, comes and pure nearest to the ideal sphere of theology, and indicates music. . *. . OJl Pythag- the direction for religious emotion to take ; and of oras. a u tne ar t s> pure music (not programme music), un- fettered by definite material objects and individual experiences in the outer world, also approaches most closely in its tendency to some realisation of cosmical and religious ideals. We can thus divine the depth of effort manifested in the philosophy of Pythagoras, who maintained that number was the essence of all things, and who suggested the music of the spheres. But these are only signposts on the high road of thought, where science and art give lasting expression to the onward and upward course of human reason ; they cannot of themselves satisfy the religious instinct and the religious craving of man which draws him onwards to his highest ideals. Ethics If science and art cannot thus replace religion, ethics, lead to which is directly and immediately practical, is equally religion. ' * * , . unable to do so. In fact, ethics must culminate in religious ideals. Man's duty towards the perfection of his acts, to the universe at large, as we have endeavoured to indicate it above, logically leads us to and in itself presupposes and predemands some conception of a final, summary harmony to which all human activity tends. All our rational and moral activity demands the consciousness of a final end, not in chaos, but in cosmos ; not irrational, but rational ; not evil, but good ; not towards the Evil CULTIVATION OF RELIGIOUS FEELING 351 One, but towards God. Without this infinite boun- dary to all our thought and action, desires and efforts, man's conscious world would not differ from a madhouse or a gambler's den, or a vast haunt of vice and criminality. Without this upward idealistic impulse all conscious human activity would either sink downward to lower animal spheres or errati- cally whirl round and round in drunken mazes ; it would lose all guidance and ultimate direction, and be purely at the mercy of fickle chance or relentless passion and greed. But this upward idealistic impulse itself, as a Emo- lasting and dominating emotion, must be cultivated, just as, we have seen before, ethics must become education emotional and aesthetic to be practically effective. eiigfous We have also seen that each ethical injunction need feelings. not be, and ought not to be, consciously present in the mind of him who is to act rightly ; for it would weaken, if not completely dissolve, our will-power and our active energy. It would ultimately lead to the dreamer or the pedant who dreams while he ought to be awake, and who idly thinks while he ought to act. The step must be made from the intellectual to the emotional sphere ; the moral injunction ought to be made part of our emotional system through habituation it must become subconscious, almost instinctive, if not purely aesthetic a matter of taste. Rational and efficient education must, from our earliest infancy, tend to convert this conscious morality into a subconscious and fundamental moral state. We must not rest on our oars to think while we ought to be rowing, and risk being carried away by the unreasoning current of circumstance. Still, there will be moments when we must thus scale of rest on our oars, when we must set the house in duties - which we live in order, when we must ponder over and test the broad principles upon which we act. We 24 352 DUTY TO GOD must then bring into harmony and proportion the ascending scale of duties, regulating the lower by the higher in due subordination and discarding the lower that will not bear the final test of the higher, until we reach the crown of human existence in our religious ideals. But in all this idealistic ascent we must cultivate the passion for such upsoaring idealism, and it is in our final religious impulses that the emotional, nay the mystical, element must itself be nurtured and cultivated. Without this crown of life, life will always be imperfect. The striving for the infinite, which cannot be apprehended and reduced to intel- lectual formulae, must itself be strengthened and encouraged in the young and through every phase of our life onward to the grave. Let us see that these ideals are not opposed to our highest reason and truth as far as we have been able to cultivate these in ourselves. But whether our ultimate intellectual achievement and our grasp of truth be high or low, we cannot forego the cultivation and strengthening of our religious emotions. Whoever believes in the dogmatic teaching of any of the innumerable sects and creeds that now exist, truthfully and with the depth of his conviction, let him cling to that creed and the usages, rites and ceremonies of the church or chapel, synagogue, mosque, graves, or sacred shrines and haunts in which his religious emotions are fed and strengthened. But, if he does not truthfully believe in the creed and dogmas, he must not subscribe to them, or he will be committing the supreme sin against his best self, " against the Holy Ghost." But for those, however, whose religious ideals cannot be compassed or bettered by any dogmatic creed that is now established and recognised, let them not forego the cultivation of their religious emotions, which, as both past experience and all active reasoning teach AESTHETIC INCENTIVES TO RELIGION 353 us, must be created and strengthened by emotional setting, by an atmosphere removed from the absorbing, interested activities of daily life. The question for these people is, Where and how HOW and can religious emotion thus be encouraged and culti- vated ? It seems to me that there are two possible who methods by which this crying demand can be re- belong sponded to : either in the domestic sphere within to fixed the family, or within the churches themselves, amid secfsand the religious associations of the past and the re- cr f ds ,. . , , . i cultivate hgious atmosphere which is essential to them. religious As regards the home and the family as the centre for religious worship, some indication of the direction which such a domestic and family religious cult might L i j j r u- l, or take can be derived from Japanese ancestor-worship tombs. which is so vital and so potent an element in the life of that people. As has been pointed out by Nobushige Hozumi, 1 Japanese ancestor-worship can co-exist with any variety of religious beliefs, doctrines, and creeds. For us, it has in its turn become stereo- typed in its formal ritual to such a degree that it could never be accepted in its actual form by those who brought unbiased criticism to bear upon its binding injunctions. But the essential fact in its ritual, that it establishes within each family and each household a sacred chamber or altar, of itself sancti- fied by piety and gratitude towards our ancestors, and thus effectively upholding the family spirit, the family honour, with common strivings towards higher moral and ideal ends ; furthermore, that it becomes the natural focus for solemn gatherings and lends spiritual elevation by association and emotional stimulus to the silent prayer of the indi- vidual or the collective worship of the whole family these elements make of it the fit local and physical setting for religious communion or for silent self- 1 Ancestor-worship and Japanese Law, 1913. 354 DUTY TO GOD communion or prayer when the individual desires to establish his solemn relationship with his highest ideals. The ex- Beyond this domestic and family sphere, however, churches. we possess in every country the churches and shrines associated with definite beliefs in the present and with continuous religious aspirations for centuries in the past. Not only these associations, but the aesthetic qualities in the architecture and decorative art within and without, possessed by so many, make them the most suitable places for man's spiritual devotion. If the guardians of these sacred buildings admit, as they must, that religious aspirations and desires are in themselves good ; that it is better for those who differ from them in creed to have some religion, and that they should cultivate their re- ligious aspirations rather than that they should have no religion at all and drift through life without any such higher striving, they will surely lend a hand to support their brethren in their highest efforts, even if they differ from them in form and creed. Let us hope that all our churches and religious buildings will at certain definite times, when not required for the special worship to which they are dedicated, open their doors to those holding different views. These buildings ought in the future, even more than at present, to become the centres of purest art, graphic or musical. These fellow strivers may then receive the inestimable benefit of some stimu- lation in their endeavours silently to commune with their highest ideals, to pray, to think or to feel, and to cultivate their truly religious spiritual emotions. EPILOGUE AT the end of this attempt to put into logical and intelligible form an outline scheme for the moral regeneration of our own times and of the Western civilised nations, a regeneration which of itself would make a war, such as the one from which the whole of civilised humanity is now suffering, impossible in the future, I must ask myself whether any good can come from such an effort, whether the mere exposi- tion of truths, and even the realisation and admission of these truths on the part of those who read what I have written, will in any way alter the course of events or the lives of the millions of people who cause these events to take place as they do ? Is Nietzsche, and are many other philosophers, right in main- taining that the mass of the people do not like what they consider superior to themselves and to the general standard of life about them, that they are in reality opposed to their leaders and inimical to what they consider above average existence ? Even if which is doubtful what I have here written should reach the eyes of the people who rule by sheer numbers, and if I were able to convince them of the Tightness of what is here put before them, would such an achieve- ment in the slightest way modify the course of individual or collective action ? A man must be very young or very arrogant who believes that even the most unassailable truths to which he is able to give expression will of themselves influence the great currents of human passion and action. 355 356 EPILOGUE On the other hand, man's history in the past has proved one truth above all others : namely, that only ideas last, and that truth must prevail in the end. Moreover, it has proved that the great thinkers of bygone days have thus set their stamp and seal upon their own age, and especially upon succeeding ages. In the immediate past, the past that has led up to the present day, in the disasters with which we are all so sadly concerned, we can recog- nise and those who have studied the question must admit it that the Germany of the generation pre- ceding the present one was fashioned in its char- acter, in its ideals, in its collective, and in its individual national life, by the expressed thoughts, the words, and the writings of such disciples of truth as were Kant, Fichte, Shelling and Hegel. The Germany not Prussia of the generation preceding 1870 was made what it was by the thought of such men, filtering through the students of their philosophy down to even the unthinking and illiterate masses of the people. Since then, since 1870, not only Bis- marck and Moltke and the present Kaiser are responsible for the Germany that is, but, perhaps even more than these, Treitschke, and even Schopen- hauer, von Hartmann, and Nietzsche have created the fundamental and ultimate and still the most pervasive and efficient mentality of the young Germany of to-day. If this be true, and if there be virtue in what I have written in this book, there may be some hope that I have not worked in vain, and that some good, though it fall far short of the hopes that have stirred me to make this effort, may come out of what I have done. In any case, I may be allowed to say to myself : Dioci et animam meam liberavi. APPENDIXES APPENDIX I PASSAGES ON CHAUVINISM FROM PREVIOUS PUBLICATIONS From Preface to Expansion of Western Ideals and the World's Peace, 1899 : My greatest fear is that, from the nature of the subject, and from the special conditions which evoked my remarks, I may not have been able on this occasion to give proper emphasis to my positive and friendly feeling for the Euro- pean Powers that are essentially the bearers of Occidental civilisation. In urging the coalition and combined action of England and the United States, I have but seized the opportunity offered of advocating the union of the two civilised Powers who are best fitted by present circumstances to draw nearer to each other, and who, from the fundamental constitution of their national life, are more closely related to one another than any other two Powers in the civilised world. Whatever negative attitude may be manifest in this lecture towards the other civilised Powers of the European Concert is due to the fact that these Powers have, by their recent action, shown themselves to be opposed to any closer union between the United States and Great Britain ; that by several of their institutions, as well as by their foreign and commercial policy, they are not yet prepared for a more general federation of civilised nations ; and that the pre- vailing spirit of Ethnological Chauvinism among them is not only an impediment to wider humanitarian brotherhood, but is destructive of the inner peace and good-will among the citizens of each nation. I feel so strongly what I have said of this curse of Ethnological Chauvinism that if it were possible to create effective leagues and associations among the civilised nations, and, moreover, associations with a negative or defensive object, I should like to urge the institu* 357 358 ETHNOLOGICAL CHAUVINISM tion of a great Anti-Chauvinistic League among the enlight- ened people of all nationalities, to join together in com- bating this evil spirit in whatever form it may manifest itself. But I am not so visionary as to think that such a league could be formed at the present juncture. From The Expansion of Western Ideals and the World's Peace, 1899, pp. 136 seq. : It is interesting to note that the extreme and unbalanced form of so-called patriotism which is now designated by the term Chauvinism had its origin in the time of Napoleon, when Chauvin lived as the unbounded admirer of that great leader of men. But Chauvinism can in no sense be called an outcome, or even a modification, of patriotism. They are two distinct, if not opposed, ideas, the following of either of which points to characters and temperaments as different as the generous are from the covetous. Patriotism is a posi- tive attitude of the soul, Chauvinism is a negative tendency or passion. Patriotism is the love of, and devotion to, the fatherland, to the wider or more restricted home, and to the common interests and aspirations and ideals of these. Chau- vinism marks the antagonistic attitude to all persons, interests, and ideas, not within this wider or narrower conception of the fatherland or home. Patriotism is love, Chauvinism is jealousy. The one is generous, the other is envious. The loving temperament makes for expansion, the jealous tends towards contraction and restriction. While the patriot who loves his people and his country is therefore likely to be tolerant, even generous and affectionate, towards the stranger, the Chauvinist is likely to turn the burning fire of his ani- mosity inwards, within the narrow spheres and groupings of even his own country. Now, this vice of hatred and envy, which may (alas !) be ingrained deep down in human nature, may have existed in all times and places of human history and may have been predominant in some ; yet in our own times it has received a peculiar character, a special formula- tion, with an attempt at justification. I have tried to qualify the general Chauvinism in the form predominant in our time by the attribute of Ethnological Chauvinism. The origin of this social disease within the nations of Europe may be traced back first to Napoleon, when, with the inner growth of France and its power, and his successes in Italy, he coupled the enfeeblement, if not the destruction, of the German Empire by splitting it up into insignificant princi- palities under his own influence. There is no doubt he PASSAGES ON CHAUVINISM 359 conceived the bold idea of the predominance of the Latin race and Empire over the Teutonic race and over the world in general. But he found himself wedged in between two forces which checked the advance of this Latin hegemonia, and which ultimately crushed him. On the one side was the Slav, on the other side was the Anglo-Saxon. He suc- ceeded for the time in repressing the Teuton, but he failed both in Russia and in his struggle with Great Britain. As a reaction against this Latin wave which submerged the Teuton Empire, the German patriots endeavoured to restore the vitality of the sturdy Teutonic oak. But while the Latin Crusade had for its inspiring preacher the great leader and man of action himself, the Germanic revival fell to the lot of the theorist and thinker, and a German philo- sopher and professor, Fichte, in his Reden an die Deutsche Nazion, is the fullest exponent of these views. These, again, are further formulated and carried into the realms of romantic thought, theory, and science by the learned enthusiasts who led the Revolution of 1848 in Germany. But again there turned up a great man of action, who, knowing his countrymen and the trend of the tunes, utilised all these currents to weld together the separate blocks smoothly polished and florid marbles of prince-ridden princi- palities, and clumsy, unhewn stones and rubble-stones of independent cities and towns the huge edifice of the German Empire. The scientific spirit which was pervading the civilised world of Western Europe was recognised by Bis- marck as a useful force which could be turned into practical advantage for the great purpose he had in view. He called upon the German professor even the ethnologist, philolo- gist, and historian and they obeyed his command with readiness and alacrity. The theoretical and scientific lever with which these huge building blocks were to be raised in order to construct the German Empire was to be the scientific establishment of the unity of the German people based upon the unity of Germanic races. An historical basis for German unity was not enough ; an ethnological, racial unity had to be established. The historical and philological literature of German university professors belonging to the time of Bismarck's ascendancy can almost be recognised and classified by their relation to the problem of establishing, fixing, and distinguishing from those of other races, the laws and customs, literature, languages, and religions, the life and thought, the productions and the aspirations of the Germanic race. This influence went beyond the bounds of Germany : by 360 ETHNOLOGICAL CHAUVINISM sympathy in England, the Freemans, and those who felt with him, thumped the Saxon drum ; while, by contrast, in France, the Fustel de Coulanges played variations in softer strains on the theme of the Cite Antique. In course of time and of events Russia, in the growing vigour of her racial and national expansion, formulated and developed her Pan- Slavistic theory and war-cry. The distinctive feature in this modern version of the old story of national lust of power is, that it now assumed a more serious and stately garb of historical justice in the pedantic pretensions of its inaccurate ethnological theories. The absurdity of any application of such ethnological theories to the practical politics of modern nations at once becomes manifest when an attempt is made to classify the inhabitants of any one of these Western nations by means of such racial distinctions. What becomes of the racial unity of the pre- sent German Empire if we consider the Slavs of Prussia, the Wends in the North, and the tangle of different racial occupations and interminglings during the last thousand years within every portion of the German country ? And the same applies to France and England, Italy and Spain. But the German professor, with his political brief wrapped round the lecture-notes within the oilcloth portfolio, pressed between his broadcloth sleeve and ribs, as he walks to his lecture-room, was forced further afield and deeper down in his " scientific " distinctions. The divisions he established for the purposes of national policy were but minor subdivi- sions of broader ethnological distinctions. Here the philolo- gist took the lead and established " beyond all doubt " the difference, nay, the antagonism, between the Arian and the Semitic, which makes the Hindoo more closely related to the German and Saxon than these are to Spinoza, Mendels- sohn and Heine, Carl Marx and Disraeli. We can perhaps now appreciate the singular oversight of the last-named statesman in not having made use of the scientific establish- ment of this fact in order to strengthen his imperialist views of the Indian Empire as an integral part of Great Britain. This last-named classification could further be turned to practical advantage by those in Germany whose interest it would be to set one part of the German people against an- other section, and to create a new party or to strengthen the hands of the decrepit old ones. And thus there grew up the anti-Semitic parties in Germany and elsewhere, who could give strength and some semblance of sober dignity to their party passions or violent economic theories by so re- spectable a scientific justification as a racial distinction fixed PASSAGES ON CHAUVINISM 361 thousands of years ago. This step once made, however, has necessarily led further afield into wider and unsafer regions, the exploration and exploitation of which may ultimately lead to most disastrous results. For, when once the dis- tinction between Arian and Semite led to the anti-Semitic movement, religious prejudices, or, at all events, religious distinctions, are necessarily carried in the wake and tend to serious complications. Were it not for the clamorous in- terests of recent politics in the East and West, as well as in Africa and the Far East, which absorb the attention and the passions of the nations of Europe, I venture to believe that the current Ethnological Chauvinism would have drifted more and more into the channels of religious Chauvinism. And we need but recall the history of the seventeenth and early eighteenth century in Europe to realise the effect of religious and sectarian elements when mixed up with inter- national partisanship ! There were striking indications within the last few years that the ethnological game was played out. In Russia the Pan-Slavistic cry was growing feebler and feebler and was gradually merging into something like a Pan-Orthodox movement, which carried very practical, if not material, plans and purposes within the religious breast of its spiritual de- votion. Feeble echoes of Pan- Anglicanism made themselves heard ; while the Roman Catholic Church followed its old tradition, and the national and Germanic ardour of Berlin, if not of the whole of Germany, was diverted from the monster statues on the hills of the Rhine and the Teuteburger forest to the national Protestant churches in the German capitals. Arminius was after all a Pagan ! And if this new old cry is silenced for a time beneath the din of Gatling guns, the axes of the coloniser, and the hammer of the colonial pro- spector, it is not silenced for good and all, and will shortly be raised again. The result of all this is, that old antagonisms have been intensified by the introduction of these ethnological dis- tinctions, and that new ones, non-existent before, have been created to swell their nefarious phalanx. No doubt other passions have been added to them, the greed of gold and the lust of Empire. The result is that, with all our printing-press and the rapid exchange of thought through its channels, with our railways and telegraphs, which are supposed to bring us together and to thwart invidious distance standing between human hearts and brains, there has never been a period in the world's history when, in spite of triple and dual alliances, 362 NATIONAL ANTAGONISMS every nation feels more opposed to the other, its hand ready to strike. Ask a typical Frenchman whom he loves and feels at one with ? The Russian ? One would like to answer him in his own vernacular : Qu'allez vous me chanter Id ! And whom does the German feel a brother or a cousin to ? Surely not the Englishman ! Let every one go through the list for himself and appeal to his past experience. The con- ception of Humanity as a really potent thought, with meaning and significance, calling forth definite feelings if not images, a conception which pervaded the thought and feeling which were supreme in the second half of the eighteenth century and moved whole nations to action, these are disused and unheard in our day, or are pityingly and incredulously smiled away as cant. If we cannot resuscitate and infuse the spirit of life into the corpse of Humanity, we can at least prick the ethnological bubble and recall the sane nations to the reality of their inner history and the truly effective elements in the actual national and social life of our times. Patriotism is the love we bear to our country and its people, represented by its government ; the love of order and law ; and the submission of the interests and the life of the individual to the State and its government, because they stand for order and law. The modern State is a pro- duct of modern history, and we need not go to the nebulous regions of prehistoric ages to seek for its rationale and the order and law which are its essence. If you wish to go back to the ethnological foundations, you must ignore and wipe out the history of centuries in Germany, France, Italy, England, and the United States. You must ignore the language and literature and the thought and feeling they embody and convey, the form of government evolved, the freedom and integrity of the citizen that are established, if you wish to build your commonwealth upon racial distinc- tions. Arminius did not make the modern German Empire ; the Anglo-Saxon did not make the England of to-day. But government, laws, institutions, customs, habits, language, thought these are clearly defined in each State. Every day of our lives these facts are impressed upon us in the streets of the towns and in the lanes of the country, they make up our feeling of home, our feeling of belonging to this country and not to another. These are not evoked by the stagey picture, all out of drawing, of a Saxon in wolf's-skin with spear and club, which the ethnological brush of a sign- painting politician holds before the eyes of the masses. England is the only country in Europe which has not yet PASSAGES ON CHAUVINISM 363 been affected to any harmful extent by this disease of Chau- vinism ; and there is no fear that, in spite of all the provoca- tion which the attitude of other nations towards us arouses, we shall respond to them in the same tone. But, to call an alliance, or the growing amity between Great Britain and the United States an Anglo-Saxon alliance, and to accept such a term as embodying the essential bond of union between these two great nations, would familiarise us with evil ideas, if it did not create the evil passions. What brings us, and will hold us, together is something quite different, and far more potent than the empty words and the unsound theories with regard to our racial origin. If the forces we have just considered lead to Chauvinism, and are not the essential elements which hold people together, the question must be asked, what these binding elements really are. Sir John Seeley maintained that " the chief forces which hold a community together are common nation- ality, common religion, common interest." I believe that this epitome errs in being too narrow, and in omitting some elements which are perhaps the most efficient in binding people together, while at least one of the three is not essential to national unity or national amity. I should prefer to summarise these elements under the following general headings : A common country ; a common nationality ; a common language ; common forms of govern- ment ; common culture, including customs and institutions ; a common history ; a common religion, in so far as religion stands for the same basis of morality ; and, finally, common interests. Now, I maintain that when any group of people have all these eight elements in common, they ought of necessity to form a nation, a political unity, internally and towards the outside world ; and when a group of people have not the first of these factors (the same country), but are essentially akin in the remaining seven, they ought to develop an inter- national alliance or some close form of lasting amity. In the case of the people of Great Britain and of the United States seven of these leading features that hold a community together are actively present. It may even be held that the first condition, a common country, which would make of the two peoples one nation, in some sense exists for them. At all events, a country is sufficiently common to them to supply sentimental unity in this direction. For, as regards England, Seeley has well remarked, referring to a period when steam and electricity had not yet reduced the separating distance of the ocean : 364 ENGLAND AND THE UNITED STATES " There is this fundamental difference between Spain and France on the one side and England on the other, that Spain and France were deeply involved in the struggle of Europe, from which England has always been able to hold herself aloof. In fact, as an island, England is distinctly nearer for practical purposes to the New World, and almost belongs to it, or, at least, has the choice of belonging at her pleasure to the New World or to the Old." As for the proximity between the two countries for persons travelling and goods interchanged, I can only say that, from continuous experi- ence, the expenditure of money, nerve-tissue, and comfort is higher in a trip from England to Greece or any of the Balkan States, than in a voyage to New York ; while it is a significant fact that the transport of goods from an American to an English port is not only cheaper than from any point in England to a short distance on the Continent, but even from one point of England to a comparatively near point on the same island. But if we turn from this question of mere physical propinquity to the feeling of the American people as regards the country, the actual soil of the British Islands, we come to a sentiment far deeper and more cogent in its binding power. It would be a very small minority of the American people who would not be overcome by a sense of home the moment they arrive on British soil, be it at Cork or Liverpool ; and, after a short halt at Chester, during which they have walked through the streets of that pictur- esque city, they settle down in London and set foot in West- minster Abbey, passing by the monuments of patriots, statesmen, and poets whom they can rightly all claim as essentially their own ! To all these people Great Britain is the " Old Country." But I will go further, and venture to say that this does not apply to the Americans of dis- tinctly British origin, but also to those of German and French and Dutch descent, or from any of the other Euro- pean peoples, whose home has been sufficiently long in the United States for them to have become thoroughly nationa- lised through the language with its literature, the customs and institutions which are practically the same in both countries. Such a one has read his Shakespeare, Macaulay, and Walter Scott, from his childhood upwards ; and thus Westminster Abbey and Stratford-on-Avon, and Kenil- worth, and Scotland strike an old familiar tone in his mind and his heart whether his name be Sampson or Schley or Shafter. Leaving the question of a common country, the bond of union becomes closer the further we proceed with the other PASSAGES ON CHAUVINISM 365 essential features which make for unity, when once we drop the misleading and wholly illusory ethnological basis of nationality, and, instead of flying to the nebulous and un- known regions of prehistoric ages, we take into account the process of real history. We then must acknowledge that the people of Great Britain and of the United States are of one nationality. I say this in spite of the Revolutionary War, and, if I did not fear to be too paradoxical, I should almost say because of it. I mean by this, that the establish- ment of independence in the British Colonies of North America marks a phase in the expansion of international freedom, as the advance of representative government marks the development of national freedom ; and that, as the recognition of the separate household of an adult son, who has been fretting with growing animosity against the domination of parental authority, reasserts, on a new and more propitious basis, the kinship of the two, so it is in the relation of the two nations since America is free. There is but one real and material fact amongst many to which I wish to draw attention in view of the claims of common nationality between these two great peoples, and that is, the question of kinship and intermarriage. If statistics could be established concerning the citizens of each country, as to those who have some member of their kith and kin, however remote, residing in the country over the sea, the numbers of these would be found to be astonish- ingly large at all events, much larger than such relation- ship between any other two nations. And in this respect the importance of the continuous process of intermarriage, which promises to grow even more frequent and effective in the future, cannot be overestimated. For, in the making of nations, intermarriage is the most important factor in weld- ing the diversity of race into the unity of nationality. In the history of England, Germany, France, and Italy it was chiefly this custom which enabled the numerous and dis- cordant ethnological elements to fuse into national unity. Where larger masses of the population, as with the Hun- garians and the Austrians, or smaller sections within a nationality, are kept from intermarriage, from whatever cause, the unity of the nation or of the smaller community is not complete, and no amount of government action and of administrative pressure can supply this want. As regards the actual intercourse between the two nations, a great deal can here be done by individuals to improve and strengthen the relations between us. I would recom- mend a little more tolerance, intellectual sympathy, and 366 PROVINCIALISM AND TOLERANCE fairness of judgment to Americans as well as to Englishmen. We must shift our standards of judgment if we mean to be fair to those who have not put themselves within the pale of our own social often extremely provincial laws. Such provincialism argues a want of education in some and a want of imagination in others. To put it tritely and epigram- matically : Let us charitably remember that there is still some salvation for the man who wears a frock-coat and a round hat if he be a foreigner ! We may be ever so sure that our own rules of life and habits and fashions are the best, but we cannot judge those by them who have never recognised their sway. Also it is well for us to remember that, whatever we may justly feel with regard to our national greatness, the individual citizen even the least distinguished is not necessarily responsible for the superiority of his nation and country. I would recommend every Englishman to read Lowell's essay, "On a Certain Condescension in Foreigners." He there strongly impresses the fact that a first-rate American must not be confounded with a second-rate Englishman. And I should like to add : that a second-rate Englishman will never make a first-rate American. The difficulty will remain, how to recognise " the first-rate American or Eng- lishman ? " Well, there is no wholesale tag attached to them. They are not known through the paragraphs in the newspapers, nor are they always recognised by their own estimate of themselves. We can only meet each other courteously and generously, and find out for ourselves. It takes some time and acuteness of perception to realise that there is a native dignity and quiet modesty in the American, though he may successfully hide it under the boisterous ebullience of his vigorous life and manner ; while I hold that there is a native fund of amiability and genuine cordial- ity deep down in the Englishman's nature only it is often so deep down that it never appears on the surface. It is effectively checked by a narrow, " provincial " education, continued and fixed by stupid social traditions slavishly accepted and followed by all classes. The unity of nationality is expressed in the State, in the laws and the forms of government, which actually hold the people together. Now, though England is a monarchy and the United States a republic, the fact remains that the inhabitants of both countries feel that they belong to the freest nations of the world. This freedom is the outcome of representative government, an idea and a fact born in Eng- land, to the development of which the history of the British PASSAGES ON CHAUVINISM 367 people is one continuous illustration. It does not diminish the glory of the framers of the American constitution to say, that the central idea of liberty and self-government, which that document embodies and develops, was the natural evolution of political principles sunk deep down in their hearts and minds by their English ancestors. And the reality of a common foundation for the government and all political institutions in the case of the United States and of Great Britain impresses itself upon us, not only when we ponder or generalise on things political, but when we are living our ordinary daily lives and follow the natural interests and calls of our several avocations. It is not merely a question of political theory and speculation, it is eminently one of practical experience, and of the action of life, individual as well as collective. At every step, while the Englishman or American travels abroad, even in the most civilised countries, he meets with administrative enactments, privileges, re- strictions, injunctions, and directions, sent from the summits of government into the busy plains of ordinary daily life, which are foreign to him, and which evoke a sense of criticism, if not of irritation and revolt. The same feeling of strange- ness and of foreignness constantly comes over him if he attempts to follow their political life, though the American considers the legislative and administrative proceedings of a European republic, and the Englishman observes the laws and enactments of some other constitutional monarchy. On the other hand, every Englishman becomes readily familiar with the political system of the United States, and feels at home under its rule, as the American lives happily under the laws of Great Britain and can at once follow with interest the legislative work of the House of Commons. Far more potent, however, than the ties of common des- cent, country, and government, is the all-compromising bond of a common language. Nay, so much do I consider this the chief force of union and amity, that I would substitute for Anglo-Saxon, or even Anglo-American, the title English- speaking Brotherhood. For this conception is at once so wide that it comprises, not only Great Britain and Ireland and the United States, but every distant colony where English is spoken, and the same thoughts and feelings, laws and institutions are therefore bound to prevail. From Appendix to The Jewish Question, 2nd edition 1899, P- 343 : Many of us are deeply saddened to find the reactionary turn our age is taking in every sphere of public life. The 25 368 ENGLAND AND GERMANY arch-fiend of our age is Chauvinism. All European nations seem to hate each other. But to find hatred among the constituent parts, groups, races, religions, within each country, nurtured and fostered by men of superior power and fundamentally good intentions is indeed disheartening. ENGLAND AND GERMANY To the Editor of " The Times " SIR, I agree with much your correspondent " English- man " has so forcibly said in The Times of this morning. But I think that the advice he gives would apply chiefly to the quotation of German opinion in so many irresponsible German newspapers and publications, whose very object is gained by the notice which English comment has given to their existence, an existence otherwise ignored even in Germany. I cannot believe that the dissemination and acceptance of all the distorted reports and cruel libels are in any way a national characteristic of the Germans. They are due rather to the absence of certain traditions firmly established for ages among the English and American people which do not exist to the same degree elsewhere. I mean those tradi- tions ingrained in the innermost character of our people, all of which find their expression in the one phrase : fair play. The habit, nay, the cult, of this national virtue has in Eng- land led to the traditions of journalistic morality to which and this your bitterest enemy will have to admit The Times has so effectively contributed, if it has not created them. If the Germans at all possessed such journalistic traditions, the present state of public opinion there and much of the injustice and brutality to which we have been subjected could never have existed. It is indeed hard for all lovers of truth and justice to be forced to realise that slander and injustice, which we have always thought only can exist and thrive when shunning the light of day, should still reign supreme when the elaborate system of publicity in modern journalism is spread over the whole civilised world, and penetrates every district and corner of civilised States. Nothing could be worse, nothing further removed from the methods you, sir, follow in journalism, than the custom of German newspapers even the most respectable among them. Allow me to give one striking, yet typical, instance : During the Turko-Greek War of 1897, I held views as to the claims of the Greeks differing essentially from those PASSAGES ON CHAUVINISM 369 manifested by our Government and supported by The Times. The letters which I then wrote urging more vigorous action in support of the Greeks on the part of this Government were printed by you in spite of your disapproval of my views. In 1898, my attention was drawn to a series of letters written by representative men of all classes and opinions in Germany, in a weekly paper of highest standing, called Die Gegenwart. They all dealt with the Greek War, and all misrepresented the attitude which England took at the time. The climax was reached when the distinguished philosopher Eduard von Hartmann charged England with being the instigator and prime mover (of course, entirely to promote its own selfish interests) of both the Greek and the Armenian agitations. England was made responsible for the Armenian massacres and the Turko-Greek War. This paper was sent to me by a high-minded as well as a prominent personage in Germany, reminding me that I was in a posi- tion to deny these allegations. It did not require much urging on the part of my friend ; for I felt that fair play demanded in this case, that, having vainly endeavoured to bring the Government to take the part of Greece, and having failed, it was not right for me to sit still and hear England charged with actions which I had such good reason to know we never committed. I wrote the reply to Herr von Hart- mann in German and sent it to the paper, giving absolute proof of the unfoundedness of his assertions. My letter was rejected. I then sent it to my German friend, advising that it should be published in some other paper. Even my friend, and my friend's friends, failed in gaining publication for the simple statement of truth in any paper they approached. How can we expect truth to prevail when the mouthpiece of public opinion is thus gagged ? How can the German people possess such a Press, which is, after all, representative of the people, and tolerate the existence of traditions which block the way to the spread of light and truth ? The answer is that, whatever great virtues the German people possess, intellectual and moral, and however much we can learn from them, the sphere of fair play is one in which they can learn from us ; for they are comparatively wanting in the very rudiments of this virtue. Permit me to touch upon one other topic intimately con- nected with this and concerning which much attention has been aroused through Mr. Kipling's " Islanders." I main- tain emphatically that the chief agent in producing, sustaining, and spreading this national virtue in England and America is athleticism in the best sense of the term. Cricket and 370 THE RIGHT ATHLETICS football, rowing, hunting, etc., have trained the people of this country from childhood upwards, from the yokel to the greatest in the land, in the laws and the spirit of fair play until they have entered in succum et sanguinem of the whole people, and have become a general national characteristic as the interest in our games and sports is a public and national feature. If its importance is exaggerated in schools and moral and intellectual pursuits are neglected, while the validity of their standards of value is depreciated among boys, this is no doubt bad and ought to be put right. But, however much Mr. Kipling may be justified in advocating serious education in the art of war, and in combating play- fulness out of place and general amateurishness, he is, if I may translate a German phrase, " pouring the child out with the bath water " when he attacks athleticism. May I finally add one definite instance which has come to my notice ? One of my friends, a distinguished scholar and public servant, joined the yeomanry as a private at the beginning of the war, and was soon made sergeant. He returned home in due course last spring and decided that it was right for him to go back to Africa, which he did, receiv- ing three wounds in a recent engagement. Before leaving he was offered a commission, which he ultimately accepted. But he had grave misgivings whether he ought to accept a commission, because he was not sure that he would make an efficient officer, however sure he was of himself as a private or non-commissioned officer. " You see," he said, " if I had been a hunting man I should not hesitate ; for the experience in the hunting-field produces the qualities which I consider most important in an officer of any grade in such a country as South Africa." I am, sir, Your obedient servant, CHARLES WALDSTEIN. KING'S COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE. January 15, 1900. P.S. I feel bound to add that, not long ago, I ventured as a foreigner to protest against the unfair charges brought against the archaeological authorities of a German museum in the Frankfurter Zeitung, and that my protest was duly published in that paper. -C. W. From The Jewish Question, ist ed. 1892, pp. 21-27 : The prominence which has been given to the question of race in connection with the opposition to the Jews is com- PASSAGES ON CHAUVINISM 371 paratively of recent date. It is the outcome of a movement which, I believe, had its origin in Germany, called forth by the definite political needs of that country, but which has had far-reaching and enduring effects (I believe for the bad), even after the immediate aim which evoked it had been fulfilled. As a reaction against the policy of Metternich, which consisted in neutralising the restless and revolutionary forces of the Austrian Empire by opposing different nationa- lities to one another, which would thus keep each other in check, the national unity of Germany was attained by means of the idea of the national State, in which State was the ex- pression of the unity of the people, and this unity was to be found in a common origin, a common race. This idea of a common origin naturally lent itself to kindle the enthusiasm of a people whose political weakness lay in the division among many petty States and principalities. And thus, in connection with the romantic spirit which reigned supreme fifty years ago, yet with the correct political instinct at the bottom of the artificial and theatrical pose of the patriots of those days, the pure German racial unity, as opposed to Romance and other enemies without, was used as the lever which was to move all the separate blocks (smoothly polished and floridly decorated marbles of prince-ridden principalities, and clumsy, unhewn stones and rubble-stones of independent cities and towns) to construct one huge edifice of the German Empire. The two men who in modern times used this power most effectually were Bismarck and Cavour. It appears to me a blot upon modern German academic science, to which the world owes so much, that, within the faculty of history and political science, many academic leaders have more or less consciously bent their science to the service of current political views. Through Germany and German historical science, France, by reaction (maintaining the claims of Romance nations), and by sympathy some his- torians in England, have followed in this general retrograde movement towards the intensifying and stereotyping of the national unit. The chief difficulty has arisen, and most mischief has been done, by the confusion of the terms " race " and "nation." The word which the German publicists have made, Nazional-Staat, must not be confused, as has been and is so readily done, with Rassenstaat. The Nazional-Staat is one which, we might say, has an historical unity, while the Rassenstaat has an ethnological unity. Germany is at present a Nazional-Staat. The Austrian and Turkish Empires are not such States ; for the distinct and even opposed units of peoples in these empires have remained distinct without 372 NATIONAL AND RACIAL UNITY a common language, and they remain conscious of the separate- ness of their nationalities. But national unity in this sense is not at all identical with racial unity. The actual condition of the German people in our time, and its history for the last centuries, distinctly confirm its claims to be a nation, or one people. History, language, and literature distinctly show it to be such. To confirm this we need not go for sup- port to the science of ethnology, which is much more likely, I may venture to say, sure, to counteract the impression of such a unity ; and, at all events, if you attempt to follow the attractions of this science, you may be led into many quagmires. Ethnology is a most interesting scientific pursuit, but as such it is still in its infancy ; and whatever claims to universal recognition its generalisations and hypotheses may have, it is quite premature and misleading as yet to bring them into anything like practical application. But such unwarrantable application has been and is being made every day with an idea or a desire of invoking the aid of venerable science to objects that are far from being venerable in their character, namely, when it suits a definite political party, or even private interests and purposes. It is then that, uncon- sciously, or unperceived by those who are to be influenced, the idea of nation is merged into the idea of race. Then history is ignored in favour of a counterfeit ethnology ; then it is no more the Germany welded together by common suffering, civilisation, literature, and science since the Middle Ages, the Germany of Lessing, of Goethe and Schiller, of Fichte, of Heine ; but a Germany of pure Germanenthum, purely Teutonic, or, at all events, Aryan. But the serious students of ethnology and comparative philology themselves are becoming more and more cautious of the distinctions and classifications that have hitherto been current, and they all feel that within the next few years there may be forthcoming fundamentally different hypotheses, even with regard to the broadest distinctions of human races. At all events, it is absurd to apply the results of this science to the practical consideration of nations as they are now before us. I certainly venture to state that there is not one country in the West of Europe which can claim purity of race in the present day, or in any period of the Middle Ages. Who will tell what tribes the people now dwelling in Germany are made up of, since the barbarous hordes (Huns, Goths, and Tartars) swept through their country, settled here and there, to be followed in later centuries by invading armies practising warfare in the spirit of their time ? PASSAGES ON CHAUVINISM 373 Travel through the German Empire from north to south and east to west, mingle with the crowds in the streets of the towns and study the people in the country, and I ven- ture to say that if you could for a moment do away with the similarity of dress and fashion, and the manner of wear- ing beards, and accidental habits of the present day which may come from the school or the army, and if you could ignore the fact that they all speak one modern German tongue, the idea of race and unity among them would for ever be destroyed in your mind. Nay, even as it is, the lounger in the streets of Berlin may differ as much from the Tyrolese mountaineers as he does from the cockney of London, and their speech may be almost as unintelligible to one an- other. Still, there is an actual unity among the people of Germany ; but this unity is the modern summary of living conditions to which, in dying, the past ages have given their life, and has nothing to do with the Teutons, or the Hermon- duri, or the Catts, or the Franks. The same applies to Eng- land, with its Picts and Scots and Celts and Saxons and Danes and Normans, and the immigration and assimilation of French, Dutch, German, Spanish, and Jewish elements. And so it is with France, and with Italy, and with Spain, and all Western European nations. From the Preface to The Jewish Question and the Mission of ilie Jews, 2nd edit., p. xxiv : One great service which Dreyfus has rendered to the world, besides standing as the symbol of justice, is that he has given the death-blow to anti-Semitism not, I mean, through the pity and admiration which is felt for him as a Jew, but, above all, because through the Dreyfus affair the anti-Semitic mask has been torn away from the French Nationalists, and has shown the hideous face of the arch- fiend Chauvinism, with all its menace to modern civilisation and progress. This nefarious power has an outward and an inward direction. In its outer aspects it becomes a diseased and caricatured " patriotism," which manifests itself chiefly in a blind hatred towards all foreigners. In its inward direction, Nationalism becomes a convenient term for all groups of people within a nation with common interests, which they push against the existing order of things, treating those opposed to them as aliens or foreigners. This is an epidemic form of disease raging all over the world during the second half of this century, which in our time is attaining an acute form. Let us all take warning, and learn a lesson 374 BRITISH POWER OF ASSIMILATION from what has happened in other countries. The strength of the British nation has to no small extent lain in the fact that, in all its history, it has freely and generously assimi- lated the different groups of people as well as individuals, from whatever country, race, or religion they came ; and it has assimilated these nationally, politically, and socially. There have been no fixed barriers to block the way to com- plete nationalisation ; the English people have ever been ready to receive and to recognise the good that has come to them from abroad. They seem to have said : "If you have merit, prove it, and we will recognise it." Out of this fact and its results, as well as out of the consciousness of this principle as a moral force, flows much of the vitality, the power of growth and development, of sane progress, in the British people. May we never forget this, and may we realise the weakness and the danger which lie in the opposite course, that of Nationalistic Chauvinism. May the people of the United States as well take warning and beware of this most dangerous element. You never know where it will lead you, certainly away from internal unity, peace, and good-will among citizens, away from charity and the love of one's fellow-men ! APPENDIX II PASSAGES ON COSMOPOLITANISM From The Jewish Question, p. 90 : I am also in sympathy with George Eliot when she says that the time is not come for cosmopolitanism to be highly virtuous, but I do look upon a certain form of cosmopoli- tanism as a practical ideal which it is well for us to hold before us. And I venture to believe that this great novelist and philosopher would have agreed with me. I know that many thoughtful people are repelled by the idea of cosmo- politanism because of their love of " individuality." They consider the free and varied expression of the inner and outer capabilities of single men and of larger bodies of men to be one of the most desirable conditions of life. With this I also agree. But I do not consider cosmopolitanism, as I conceive it, as in any way destructive of individuality ; on the contrary, I think it will further it. The analogy, which I do not wish to pursue further, at once suggests itself between cosmopolitanism and restricted nationalism on the one hand, and free-trade and protection in economical life on the other. Cosmopolitanism will, I trust, encourage rather than repress the desirable expression of individuality both for States and for individuals. Federation of States (by which I emphatically do not mean centralisation of life, interest, and of intellectual leadership within one metropolis) gives perhaps a greater chance for the free expression of individual characteristics within the proper channels of activity. The natural conditions, the local differences, will of themselves work in this direction ; and we can see how they are acting in the United States of America, where, I should say, there is, in many respects, a growth rather than a decrease of indi- vidualisation in the various districts. It is true we do notice the dying away of local peculiarities, costume, habits of living and of uncleanliness in the remoter districts of Europe ; but this is not due to the action of the cosmopolitan spirit, 375 376 JUSTIFIED NATIONALISM but to rapid communication, the spread of education, and other influences. And in estimating these changes we must carefully guard against attaching too much weight to our own selfish artistic interest and craving for the picturesque, in which, under the veil of philanthropy, we may be looking upon our fellow-men as puppets that are dancing for our edification upon a miniature stage of our own making. Frenchmen, Englishmen, Italians, Germans, and Americans are pronounced in their individuality, and will remain so for ages to come, in spite of the growth of the cosmopolitan spirit ; and we need not be much afraid of its extinction. But what cosmopolitanism must set itself to counteract is not the positive expression of individuality, but its negative attitude. We hope that national traditions will remain in their inspiring force, but that national antagonisms and jealousies will grow less intense and perhaps cease ; that, as they go, more active steps for friendly intercommunication will be made ; that commercial and industrial life will be ordered and regulated and elevated out of the chaotic state of futile internecine waste and destruction. We hope that civilised peoples will really live up to the feelings, which in all other respects they have, of the common ties of civilisa- tion, and in so far of a common history. This will be the basis of the feeling for cosmopolitanism which we hold as a prac- tical ideal, and from being a feeling it will lead to definite and direct beneficent action. The essence of cosmopolitanism is the widening of human sympathies ; and it is as false to think that it will lead to the weakening of proper national feeling, as it is an error to believe that the widening of our sympathies makes them less intense when at any time they are directed into narrower channels, and weakens our power of affection. If charity begins at home, it might with equal truth be maintained that charity begins away from home ; that in a measure as it is really removed from self does it become charity in the truest sense. The physical analogy which people uncon- sciously have in their minds when they misunderstand the nature of sympathy is drawn from the world of solid or fluid bodies. The more you extend these, the wider you spread them, the less will they have in depth. And so it is supposed that the wider the area over which you extend your sympathies, the less will be their depth at any given point. But this analogy is misleading. Sympathy is force, and not matter ; it is a high function of a highly organised body ; the more you exercise this function, the more you increase your heart's vitality in different directions, the PASSAGES ON COSMOPOLITANISM 377 greater will be the force when concentrated into one effort. The narrowing and cramping of sympathies leads to atrophy of the affections ; give them play, and they will retain their health and vitality. I would appeal to the actual observa- tion and experience of the reader with regard to the life that he knows intimately and can see about him. I venture to hold that the cases in which he finds people whose sym- pathies and affections are bounded by their own families, with a negative attitude towards people beyond these bounds, are not as considerate and sympathetic to the members of their own family as those whose sympathies know no such narrow restrictions. For love, unless guided by sympathy, is closely akin to selfishness. And the further you proceed in the scale the more will you realise this. Wherever there is a marked negative boundary to the affections, be it by the clan, or the township, or the county, or the country, these affections are not proof against trials, they are not so thoroughly permeated by right altruistic thought as where unselfishness has been raised into a positive faculty by being removed habitually away from the centre of self, the further away the stronger. The man who only loves himself does not love himself well. He has not practised putting himself into other people's places, and he will therefore be unjust to himself, and dissatisfied when his immediate desires are thwarted. On this account I maintain that cosmopolitanism, which means an effective widening of national sympathies, will in no way diminish our power of national affection. APPENDIX III THE WORLD'S CHANGES IN THE PAST FIFTY YEARS The following article, written for The New York Times (1910) by Professor Charles Waldstein, of King's College, Cambridge University, England, is contributed in reply to a question put to him by this paper. He was asked to give a short review of the great change in the world that has taken place within the last fifty years. BY PROFESSOR CHARLES WALDSTEIN I find it a Herculean task to answer the great question you have put in your letter to me, and I have hesitated whether it is right to issue any answer for publication at all. It is impossible to elaborate fully in so short a space any of the momentous questions that at once present themselves. But a few suggestions to thought which I may be able to throw out, and, still more, the doubts which such thoughts may evoke as regards the acceptance of a complacent conviction that our age is superior to any other, may be timely and useful. No doubt the world has changed within the last fifty years, as it has often changed within similar periods of tune. The stupendous improvements in means of transportation, in the facilities of wealth-production by the aid of stirring scientific discovery, are a just cause for congratulation. Life has undoubtedly been made easier to live for millions of people deprived of fair opportunities of living before ; the means of actual living, and the security of life, for all but the privileged classes, have immeasurably increased com- pared with former ages especially the Middle Ages, which false historians and insincere poets so often attempt to endow with a halo of beauty and sanctity. Yet there remains the great question : What is this life to be after we are enabled to live it ? Are the means of 378 WORLD'S CHANGES FOR FIFTY YEARS 379 living to be the end of life ? Is the production of steel and of coal, of food supplies, and of materials for clothing and housing, to be the end in itself to which all effort and all education are ultimately to tend ? In one word, are the ideals of life better, higher, more worthy of realisation now than they were fifty years ago ? Well, sir, I believe that the achievements of the last fifty years have been stupendous in preparing the opportunities of living for the vast masses of civilised peoples ; but I think that the ideals of living are lower than they were fifty years ago in every one of the civilised countries. And though it is foolhardy, if not arrogant, to anticipate the verdict of his- tory and to predict the trend which human affairs are taking, I venture to believe that our own age is chiefly noteworthy in that great problems are being powerfully brought before the consciousness of the world, but not for any solution of great problems. Let me merely enumerate epigrammatically a few of these problems. First, the most manifest and most obtrusive though perhaps not the most important of them the rela- tion between capital and labour, the responsibility of the power of accumulated wealth (exceeding in some individuals any power which an autocrat, who could be dethroned, ever had), without corresponding responsibilities, as weU as the responsibilities of organised labour. The general question of the opposing claim of Socialism and Collectivism on the one hand, and, equally important for the progress of humanity, the claims of individual liberty and the development of per- sonality, the intense bond of love, which members of a family feel for one another, which parents have for their children, and, in anticipation, for their progeny forces which have ever and will ever work for the good in man's history all these are claims which will have to be reconciled by man's reason and justice in the future. Then comes the great question of religion which can never be replaced either by science or by ethics, or by art, and which means the formulation of man's ideals of life and thought raised to the spiritual spheres above the actual life with which he contends. These high spiritual ends and feelings and aspirations are not formulated in a manner to satisfy the best that modern man can think, and for this expression will have to be found in the future. The great problem of the position of woman in modern society will have to be solved. She has more and more emancipated herself in her legal and social position. The future will have to solve the problem of her political position. 380 DECLINE OF IDEALS. THE GERMAN DANGER Forgive me if I venture to deal in outline with the problems which you suggest, by hemispheres, beginning with America : In spite of all material progress made in the United States during the last fifty years, it appears to me that the collec- tive ideal of the American people (notwithstanding the splendid efforts of giving a new direction to it made by leaders like Ex-President Roosevelt) is lower than it was in the middle of the nineteenth century, or at the birth of the American Republic at the end of the eighteenth. The American Republic was the positive expression of what the French Revolution cried for in articulate terms of passionate suffering : the denial of privilege by birth, the assertion of the equal rights of man to the opportunities of living, and the development of individual superiority in character or in mind. These ideals were reconfirmed on a broader basis in the Civil War. The thought in speech and in literature of the New Eng- land leaders which led to the abolition of slavery was the terribly real expression of the principle of the brotherhood of man. This thought was the outcome of high-minded living, of a tone of moral and intellectual superiority which per- meated every community in the United States, and set up the standards of taste and of social value for the whole of the Union ; that life in tone and manners and in aspiration is " played out," and with it the occupations which favoured such attitudes of mind. The ideal of power which makes of men the leaders in a community and strikes the keynote of the social tone is to be found in those occupations which, dealing chiefly with the manipulation of large sums of corporate money, lead to the rapid accumulation of vast hoards of wealth. There is a growing and conscious desire for the evolution of a national character out of which all the ideals of wider human brother- hood are eliminated. In Europe the last fifty years have collectively seen the artificial growth of the national feeling as opposed to any ideals of wider human progress which moved the people at the end of the eighteenth century and stirred them again in 1848. Even as regards each nation, wider ideals are elimin- ated, and, with conscious cynicism, Real-Politik is preached from the housetops, which means that each nation has only to see to the increase of its material power and the accumula- tion of national wealth, and leave ideals to the sentimen- talist. Irrespective of any affinity in political aspirations or in culture, Europe is fast approaching the division into two WORLD'S CHANGES FOR FIFTY YEARS 381 hostile camps, which, it appears to be the hope of those who rule the destinies of nations, will soon lead to a bloody con- flict. There will be the military spine of Europe, Germany, Austria, and Turkey, all powerful in directing the movement of the body, as the vertebral column is in animal and man, reaching from the Baltic and the North Sea to the Mediter- ranean, supported by increased naval strength on either side, which may stop all liberal advance of the rest of Europe, whatever combination these may make. In the Far East there seems some distant hope that the supreme patriotic vitality, and the public spirit of abnega- tion, which marks the people in Japan, shall adopt and assimilate what we must call the Hellenic spirit, and realise that love of family and patriotism must be directed toward the production of the highest type of man and human society, in which moral, intellectual, and artistic qualities and powers are freely and fully developed in the individual and in the community. Should Japan infuse such a spirit into China, the yellow peril may be converted into the yellow blessing for the advance of humanity. The only countries which manifest in their political life the consciousness that ideas and ideals are practical, and can be made practical, are, at the present moment, the Republic of France, and, in so far as the people is enabled to express itself, the population of Russia. For the rest, it appears to me that one of the great waves for human history moves by waves in which the world's destiny is carried on within the last fifty years is in a down- ward direction, and marks a period of reaction, the end of which I devoutly hope is near. I would not have it believed that I am a pessimist. On the contrary, my optimism is of the firmest, because I believe in the ultimate victory of the good and the true. This victory will come. But from what I have just said you will realise that I do not believe that the last fifty years mark the ascent of the great wave. APPENDIX IV THE "TRANSPORTATION" OF CAPITAL From The Political Confession of a Practical Idealist. London : Smith, Elder & Co. 1911, pp. 32 seq. I have said before that I am not a socialist. As a remote and ultimate ideal, I do believe that if the three great sources which lead to crime and all misery in social life money, sexual passion, and drink could be removed, the world would be much better. But I also believe that a direct attempt at immediate or proximate realisation of such an ideal is Utopian and quite undesirable. Still, I maintain that, in its present form, the position which money holds in our life as the equivalent and the gauge of successful effort, the common standard of power leading to esteem, the seal of approval stamped upon achievement by society at large, is a complete failure, and leads to most of the evils of our time. It does not further the best needs of our age, as in previous ages of man's history other standards corresponded to what the instinct of society as a whole recognised to be the quality most needed for the public welfare. Such were physical prowess in the early periods of man's development, when the protection from beasts and savage rivals was the immediate and prevailing object of man's existence ; courage and skill-at-arms, together with the power of ruling from his castle the feudal subjects whom he in turn protected and all qualities that went to make up chivalry in the Middle Ages. I can fully conceive of a state of society in which the acquisition of money as the central motive to human effort would no longer exist, and there would still remain every potent incentive to lead man to his best efforts. He would still be incited from other motives to perform the duties imposed upon him, and he would be powerfully stimulated to win the esteem and admiration of his fellow-men. Should wealth ever be dethroned from its dominant position I am convinced that a large section of the evils which mar the harmonious and elevating development of life in human society would be removed. All the same, I believe that any direct attempt to alter 382 THE "TRANSPORTATION" OF CAPITAL 383 the economic foundations of life by any form of collectiv- ism, which levels down instead of levelling up the scale of individual effort, which postulates human equality and endeavours to ensure it by checking the progress of the individual and by undermining the continuity of the family, is in no way desirable, even if it be practicable. I am thus not a socialist. There are good, financial houses with honest traditions in carrying on their complicated busi- ness. There are honest financiers with a high sense of duty and refinement of taste, who have amassed wealth in living up to these good traditions of their business houses, and have by their business activity furthered the cause of com- mercial development. There are even those who have amassed great wealth in finance by methods not so com- mendable, and who have endeavoured to the best of their ability to use part of their wealth for the public good. In spite of these facts, I distinctly am opposed to that aspect of modern economics which leads to what is called " finance " and " promoting," to that source of wealth which comes from the manipulation of other people's money, and which in our days has become beyond all doubt the chief avenue to the speedy acquisition of great and inordinate wealth. I maintain that every legitimate effort may be used, and must be used to remove this incubus, this curse of modern life which retards the best development among civilised com- munities in every direction. Furthermore, it will be found that all this can be attained, not by violent revolution sub- verting the foundations of modern society, not by anarchistic means admitted to be illegal ; but, on the contrary, by legal and equitable procedure on the part of the State, thereby upholding its constitution. Finally, should it be found that, by this same act on the part of the State, the means for carrying on government will be provided by a most equit- able method of taxation, surely every effort ought to be made to bring about such a consummation. As a rule, we may admit the just working of the economic principle of Supply and Demand. On the whole, it acts in the best interests of society, and furthers the ideal aims of humanity as regards its future development. The higher a function in life, the higher ought to be the pay, and the greater the consequent power of him who possesses such qualities. On the other hand, the rarer the possession of such qualities, the smaller the supply, and, in consequence, the more pressing the demand, the greater their value, and the higher the price to be paid for them. But when society becomes aware that certain occupations, receiving the highest 26 384 PRICE AND REAL VALUE prices and consequently endowing the recipient with the greatest power physically and morally, are bad for the indi- vidual and for society at large, it produces what, in one phrase, is best called " the Survival of the Unfittest." To be a leader in any occupation recognised as legitimate and good for society produces a type of which society must approve in its own interest, the production of which it must encourage. This leads to the production and the survival of the fittest. The chiefs of mercantile and industrial enter- prise in commerce and manufacture require qualities superior to those of the clerks and underlings, as they are fewer in number, of smaller supply for the importance of the demand the foreman holds the same position as regards the ordinary artisan. In every profession, again, those who are the leaders, the officers in the army and the navy, the leading lawyers, physicians, teachers, represent a greater demand and a smaller supply. We ought not to begrudge such leaders their higher rewards, nor withhold from them our higher esteem. In fact, the actual expression of this higher esteem, because of the higher value of service, is accorded by society by means of the higher reward. But when recognised activity in civilised communities is discovered to produce a type, and, of itself, to develop qualities injurious to the character of the individual and demoralising to society at large, every effort must be used to convert such activities into less injurious forms, or, if possible, to replace them by new forms which eliminate the type. Such is the case in what, to use one term, I would designate as " finance." I mean all manipulation of the money of others which brings the manipulator an excessive proportion of wealth. It produces a type of individual in modern society, conferring upon him inordinate power and inciden- tally the prestige and esteem which necessarily go with power, which is not the best and fittest either from a moral, a political, or an economical point of view. Let me at once admit that the function of bringing capital and labour together, the task the all-important and most difficult and complicated task of bringing capital into those numerous and often remote quarters where it happens to be needed in order that the natural resources of the world may be developed and used for the good of the community should be encouraged, and that the capital congested in spheres where it may lie idle, or not be turned to the best use, should be properly distributed. I also admit that, in order that the first steps be taken to bring such undeveloped resources within the range of the fructifying influence of remote capital a most THE "TRANSPORTATION" OF CAPITAL 385 complex and difficult task great insight and special know- ledge, intense activity with the assumption of great risks, are demanded, especially during the initial stages, and that these might not be forthcoming unless exceptional rewards were given. But I shall venture to suggest, further on, other means by which these necessary functions of modem economic life could be supplied. If it should be urged against my proposals that they are deficient in supplying the element of rapidity in realising potential natural resources in the system I advo- cate, I will at once answer that rapidity is a much over- estimated factor in modern life ; that, at all events, it is accountable for much of the loss, waste, and demoralising dishonesty of modern financial and industrial enterprise ; and that, in any case, the evils which I shall point out both in individual and in social life outweigh any of the advan- tages which such rapidity of development can offer. The sources of wealth are bound in the course of time to appeal to the economical instincts and necessities of civilised com munities ; and if a wild district with agricultural possi- bilities, another with mineral wealth, if the means of trans- portation in the form of railways and steamships to and from such newly developed centres if these are retarded for what must be a short period in the life of a community, the loss cannot be so great, and may be less, to the community as a whole, than the loss entailed by the haste which the cupidity and unscrupulousness of financial promoters have introduced into the markets of the world. I maintain that there is a check to the natural and free development of life among the civilised people of our day, a hitch in the working of the economical and social machinery, which must be removed ; and that such removal is so far from being subversive of the main principles and traditions of civilised society that only through it can the present order be retained. Without being paradoxical, I claim that this is a conservative and not a revolutionary principle. In the past the working of the social instincts of communities ensured that those qualities which are most needed by the society of the day produced recognised types, within the community to whom all people looked up as leaders, and felt the justification of their prominence because they ulti- mately responded to its chief needs. Thus, to the man possessing the greatest physical power there was acceded, in the conditions of primitive life, the greatest moral and social power in the community, and this was right. The possessors of all those qualities summarised under the head of chivalry formed the aristocracy of the Middle Ages, and 386 SOCIAL DOMINANCE OF THE FINANCIER this was right and just. The type of the aristocrat, who was capable of dealing with the affairs of State, who was the most complete expression of the culture and refinement of the society of the time, and possessed those graces and amenities which enabled him properly to deal with all men and all classes, again rightly received highest recognition. All these types harmonise with the conscious or subconscious recognition by society at large of the elements most needed for its own self-preservation and advancement. A further result was that the public power and consequent esteem bestowed upon the type led the individuals within the com- munity best fitted to fulfil its functions to develop in them- selves those qualities. Thus the fittest within the community, from this point of view, were by a natural process constantly enlisted within the ranks of the leaders. In our days, however, the greatest power, and, whatever may be said to the contrary, ultimately the public esteem which follows it, go to those who possess the greatest wealth. Among all possible careers in modern life which lead to the acquisition of greatest wealth, there is no doubt whatever that the careers of finance, of all the work grouping round the Stock Exchange, of company-promoting, etc., are the supreme and readiest avenue to success. But it is equally beyond all doubt, that the qualities required for such occupa- tion or involved in the pursuit of it are not those which morally and intellectually would be recognised as the best and highest, and that the result of such work is not for the good of the community. From the pulpits of the churches and in our better moments of leisure, as well as with a small minority of people whose voices cannot be heard in the clash of so-called " public opinion," to the possession of great wealth, is denied the approval, the esteem, or the admira- tion accorded to what is best. On the contrary they are assigned to individuals and to lives which turn their back on material and mercenary advantages. But society as a whole, by admitting a usurpation of greatest power to those who do thus acquire greatest wealth, by that very act puts its seal of approval on such a type, and with the power must ultimately come the esteem. Furthermore, it will be found as effective almost as a " natural law," that in assigning such prizes to such occupations the fittest elements of society are turned into such channels of life, and that the superior qualities of character and mind which these may have pos- sessed at the outset are diverted into channels of activity which ultimately demoralise and vitiate them. To illustrate this contention by actual life we need but turn to the examina- THE "TRANSPORTATION" OF CAPITAL 387 tion of what is now happening in the United States. But I wish at once to say that the strictures which I am about to make do not apply to one nation as such, still less to a race ; they apply only to the economical system which produces them and which may be active in any community if they are allowed to be effective. It has nothing to do with the American nation or with the American constitution as such. The production of this form of financier and promoter in America among the purely American citizens is as little an essential characteristic of that nation as, in other parts of the world, the presence and the predominant power of certain financiers of the Jewish race makes such economical disease a characteristic of the Jews. The great power and the numerous rewards in every aspect of life which such financial work brings with it in America has naturally attracted to these occupations a large proportion of the most capable young men, both intellectually and morally. When once, however, they have adopted such occupations and constantly live in such a moral atmosphere, their own mind and character become affected and vitiated, and the great promise of their youth for the development of the finest type of man and for the elevation of the standard of the community in which they live is undone. An American friend of mine, who left his home after he had completed his studies at the University for some years, told me how forcibly he was struck by the fact that nearly all his class- mates of first-rate ability had been enlisted in those occupa- tions which group round finance, stock exchange specula- tion, and company promoting. But a very small propor- tion among his gifted college friends had turned to scientific, professional, or ordinary industrial and commercial work. Even among those who had turned to the law, the most capable again were attracted into that category of legal pursuits (railway lawyers, etc.) which really made their professional activity a part of the great speculative or com- pany-promoting system. He gave me a graphic and impres- sive account of a visit to Newport, the fashionable country resort of wealthy Americans, as the guest of one of the millionaires. While driving with his host along the Ocean drive they met a large number of the wealthy summer residents. His host pointed out these several successful magnates to him, men- tioning the millions which they possessed. The following dialogue ensued : My friend asked his host how many of those wealthy men had acquired their large fortunes in, what he called, honest business. 388 HONEST AND DISHONEST BUSINESS " What do you mean by honest business ? " asked his host. " I mean those forms of business or professional occupation which are recognised by the community as necessary and as clearly for the good of society at large, and success in which implies hard work, intelligence, wide experience, rapid decision and resolution, power of organisation, power of induction in forecasting future conditions, all based upon integrity and fair dealing. I mean the established professions, that of the lawyer, the doctor, the teacher ; I mean the merchant who has studied every aspect of his trade and uses the capital of his firm to order to bring the supply from all quarters to the scenes of demand, thereby earning his just profit ; I mean the manufacturer who develops a large industry, understands every detail in the production of the commodity he supplies, organises and utilises fairly the labour which he requires, and thus directly increases the wealth of the nation ; I even mean the inventor who himself has discovered some new object greatly needed, or some new labour-saving process which cheapens the cost of production of objects required, not those who have merely manipulated his invention, often by doubtful means ; I even mean the man who has had the good fortune to discover or to inherit a site where great mineral wealth has lain hidden (not the promoters of the com- panies). But perhaps I can explain better to you what I mean when I define what I do not consider straightforward business ; it is business which leads to the accumulation of great wealth chiefly by the manipulation of other people's money, by the exploitation of some concession, by the mere manipulation of the shares and stocks of a railway, and by pure speculation. How many of the men you have pointed out to me have, according to my definition, acquired these large sums by honest business ? " After pondering for a long while, the answer of the million- aire, who had himself acquired his fortune by such manipu- lation of capital, was " Not one." My friend then asked one further question : "Do you, who have vast experience in such matters, consider that it is possible for a man to accu- mulate a large fortune, say ten million dollars, within a short period, say ten to twenty years, without having passed through one period, however short a moment, in which there was a risk that he might lose, not only his own money, but that of his friends, or of the public who had confided their capital to him ? " Again there was a long thoughtful pause, in which this successful veteran in the financial fight passed the instances from his own experience before his inner eye. Again the answer came, " No, it is not possible." Well, my THE "TRANSPORTATION" OF CAPITAL 389 friend summarised this short and pregnant conversation, ' Then I do not consider that honest business." But this is the occupation which stands at the very pinnacle of economic and social life of the United States at this moment. The power and, sad to say, generally the con- sideration which this occupation brings are greater than those of any of the highest functions of State, the loftiest and lasting work in science, art, or literature, the self-denying struggle during a whole life of him who devotes himself to the bettering of men. And what is the effect upon the life and character of him who takes up such work, as far as the occupation itself is con- cerned ; who started into life with the freshness and vigour of a clear intellect, and the strength and purity of a sound and manly character ? The whetting and sharpening of those powers called forth in carrying " large deals " to a successful issue, the attitude of militant distrust towards those with whom he deals, the repression of all human impulses and the compression of all passion into the channels which are to lead to this rapid accumulation of great wealth, blunt the moral fibre and produce in all other aspects of life cynicism, which, as it lowers in him the estimation of the character of his fellow-men, lowers most of all his own. A mediaeval autocrat or a prince during the Italian Renaissance may have lived up to the ideals of a Machiavelli and treated his fellow-men as pawns in the great game of power ; but the very nature of such a life, the atmosphere which surrounded them, the bril- liancy and splendour which softened their lurid ambitions, the struggle which constantly called for the defence or the sacrifice of their own lives, the very permeation of life on all sides with the recognised responsibilities which are entailed and of which they were conscious as heads of the State, gave, as it were, a dramatic justification to their existence and, at all events, impressed responsibility towards the whole com- munity, which, in case of revolution or war, would naturally lead to their undoing. These compensating moments are entirely wanting in the lives of the condottieri of the present day, living upon the security of civilised social organisation which the people at large grant them. An occasional assas- sination by some disappointed madman is rightly repudiated and punished by the laws of every land. With all this pro- tection their responsibilities to the community as a whole are none. There is no element of refinement, no saving grace of heroism or devotion or sacrifice in any phase of their occu- pation, which strenuously fills the whole of their conscious existence. Their experience of men leads them to think, 390 DEGENERATING EFFECT OF CAPITALISM and often to say, that there is not a man whom they cannot buy ; and, directly or indirectly by insidious and remote methods, this is not unfrequently the case. It is this cynicism which is one of the leading characteristics of such men and an inevitable result of the spirit in which they must deal with their fellow-men. In the spending of wealth, again, if its accumulation has not produced a type of the miser, there is the coarse and irresponsible lavishness of the gambler, demoralising the standards of expenditure for the whole com- munity as its acquisition demoralises the commercial and economic tone of the wealth-producing world. Their physique as well as their morale, unless it be of the strongest (and then it is likely to be coarsened into brutality), is undermined by the nervous strain. The amenities of life and manners, chivalrous conduct, graces of intellectual intercourse are far below the average. In spite of this want of grace, besides misleading the young men in their ideals of the occupation of life to be followed, they can attract and secure the women, whose ideals of life, whose fundamental outlook upon the duties of a woman, are thereby vitiated. It has recently been said, not without some justice, that many of the problems suggested by what is now called eugenics (the improvement of the race by proper marriage), that many of the evils with which we are now battling, might be removed if the woman were allowed to choose her husband. It is maintained that she would be more likely to be guided in her choice by those elements which not only make for a happy matrimonial state, but would also lead to the improvement of progeny. In one word : It would increase the chances for the survival of the fittest. This would be still more likely if we did not live under the curse of our central economic disease. For the attraction which great wealth brings, especially to the life of the woman, whose function is generally not to acquire but to spend, is so great, that in the long run it will bring her to choose the type whose leading characteristics I have just sketched, generally unfit in body, coarsened in mind and in character, and engrossed in an absorbing (though degrading) occupation, which leaves no time for the cultivation of social amenities or for that consideration, sympathy, and regard which bring happiness to the wife, the mother, and the family. This is the ideal type of man which the vicious development of our modern economical life has produced, and which of necessity has become an ideal for most of the young men in the United States, superseding the ideals of those who founded the great Republic and of the noble generations that succeeded them. THE "TRANSPORTATION" OF CAPITAL 391 The power of those possessors of great fortunes is, by the inner need of capital and its manipulation in commercial life, bound to grow. This power is not only felt in the economic world itself, nor indirectly, as I have just endeavoured to show, in its result upon social life and social ideals ; but also in the remote spheres of our higher national life from which the financier is, or ought to be, furthest removed. I am not referring to the corruption introduced by their practice into the Government of the State. This is manifest and has been clearly shown by many writers and speakers. It has led to the establishment of high protective tariffs, without which many of these great financial enterprises could not have brought the inflated wealth to their individual leaders. It is not an exaggeration to say that nearly aU the corruption which admittedly exists in the Government of the United States can be traced back to this source. But what I mean to emphasise is the power without responsibility which many of these possessors of inordinate wealth have in effecting and modifying the course of more spiritual institutions which uphold the higher life of our communities, a power possessed by no living ruler, and probably not by any ruler in the past. This does not only concern those institutions which we broadly class under the heading of " charities," which they can create or modify at will by throwing their millions into the scales; but the educational institutions, those which provide for the education of the young and the self -education of the adult population, all that concerns science, art, and literature. If such a millionaire is well guided and puts himself into the hands of one who has made such topics his life- study, as he in his life has devoted himself to the making of money, good may come of it ; but if, as is not infrequently the case, the definite view that one form of higher education is useless, and another lower form which may dissipate and vitiate the public mind is the only justifiable one to be encouraged, and is held by one whose occupation and interests have naturally given bias to the whole of his mind, he can modify the whole intellectual life of a nation. In my opinion, for instance, the creation of numerous scholarships in Scotland, which on the face of it sounds generous and all for good, may rob the Scotch people of one of the greatest intellectual and moral assets which the conditions of their life and the traditions of their past have established, namely, the widespread and vivid realisation of the value of higher intellectual training ; and it may lead to what I should call the pauperising of the national intellect. Yet, what scientific or artistic institution is far-sighted enough or strong enough to refuse the offer 392 MEANS OF CHECKING SUCH DEGENERACY of millions ? If such men think that the aim of education and the ideal of a civilised community are finally to be that iron and steel and other commercial goods should be created in vast amounts and transportation be made constantly more rapid desirable as all these may be and nothing more ; and that those forms of education which may for the time being ignore these objects, but aim chiefly and directly at improving and elevating the mind for the individual as well as the intellectual, moral, and artistic life of the community as a whole, such a man has the power of carrying his point by the force of money against all the accumulated experience and the concentrated and self- devoted work of those who have made the direct study of these problems their life-work, as much as the multi-millionaire has made the accumulation of money his own. Such is the power, even in the remotest directions of life, which this cancer in the body-politic of civilised countries has over the development of a healthy nation. The question is, " Can this be stopped by legitimate and not revolutionary means ? " It certainly can, and, moreover, by means which in themselves will remedy other glaring defects in our public machinery. I have referred merely to some of the evils necessarily arising out of our present system of dealing with capital. The chapter of indictments could be greatly enlarged and their numbers swelled. Can this curse be removed ? All attempts at tinkering and at amending the practice are not enough. All preventive and punitive enactments can be circumvented, while the social evils in misdirecting the ideals, as regards the highest occupation of business men and as regards the life and aim of society as a whole, will remain. The whole function of bringing capital and labour together must be taken out of the hands of individuals and be entrusted to the State. This is the only remedy for the disease, and will, at the same time, mark the most powerful and beneficent step in fiscal reform, providing the best means of grappling with the grave problem of raising the funds needed for the good government of the State on the lines of justice to its citizens, that is, by turning for revenue to the sources where the pressure will bear heavily on the poor. At the same time, business enterprise will be encouraged on a sound basis. In one word, the State will have to take over all the functions now performed by the Stock Exchange, by the great financial houses, and by the company-promoters. So far from being in contradiction with our conception of the functions of the THE "TRANSPORTATION" OF CAPITAL 393 State in its essentials, it is a natural and necessary step in the evolution of our conception of the State on modern lines. It implies no anarchistic or socialistic revolution ; it spells reform on the lines recognised by all parties in the successive legislative enactments of modern times for, at least, a century. The development of our postal service, which not so long ago was in the hands of private companies, of telegraphs and of telephones, was in this direction. In many States the nationalisation of the railways, and with us the direct supervision and control of the railways, managed by trustworthy and efficient companies ; even in foreign finance the frequent direct influencing by the State of the Stock Exchange in controlling the introduction of foreign investments (often guided by definite problems of foreign policy) ; the successful intervention of the State in New Zealand regulating the tenure of the land and counteracting the influences of the land- speculator, all this is of the same nature as what we advocate on the side of capital. As regards labour, the more recent effective legislation of our Old Age Pensions, the establishment of the Labour Bureaus, and State Insurance all these are on the same line of evolu- tion. As we have established Labour Bureaus, so we can and must establish Bureaus of Capital. It will, of course, be said that individual enterprise will be stifled ; it will be maintained that it is because of the great rewards now coming to individuals that the great risks are taken, which lead to the rapid development of our resources and that otherwise these would lie dormant and would not contribute to the wealth of our nation. This is absolutely untrue. It will certainly cause to lie dormant the spirit of wild speculation and the hasty establishment of doubtful enterprise. On the contrary, it will make commercial and industrial enterprise all the more secure and sound. It will add to finance and commerce that one element whch is most potent in securing the ready circulation of capital and its fearless application to new undertakings namely, confidence. It has invariably been seen that during financial crises money has been locked up and business has been at a standstill, not because the source of wealth had been dried up and money was not there ; but, with money so tied up in the coffers, or even in the stockings, of those who had it, there was no confidence in the money market, inflated with gassy speculation, unstable because all landmarks of guidance for the direction in which it ought to flow were wiped out. When such confidence is secured, capital will formally and continu- ously flow in the channels where it can do most good. 394 THE CAPITAL BUREAU This great Capital Bureau in the hands of the State will take over all the functions that now belong to the Stock Exchange, all the work of true company-promoting, under- writing of capital, etc. All such companies will be registered, a large staff of able and trustworthy commissioners will have to examine and report on any new enterprise that is brought within its ken. Of course doubts will be expressed as regards the efficiency or honesty of such bodies, but there is no reason why they cannot be made as efficient and as honest as the officials of any other department of State. At all events, the responsibility will always be clearly attached to them, and the public will have the power to watch over the fulfilment of these duties and punish any delinquency. Even in inter- national finance, in which the investment of capital in other, sometimes distant, countries is to be encouraged, our con- sular and diplomatic machinery can be directly utilised for such purposes. Even now they are spasmodically called in for such work. But the very casualness of such use smacks of unfairness and opens the door to partiality and dishonesty. Who will dare to say that this cannot be done ? Remember what has already been achieved in this direction in our days compared with the remote past, especially in the intervention of the State in questions of labour. I believe that the step taken as regards labour in this direction is greater, in pro- portion, than what would thus be done with regard to capital. Finally, the commission, which the State will receive as its just due for this most useful function, will produce by far the greatest part of its revenue, and this will relieve us of many other forms of taxation. All the money which now swells the fortunes of the manipulators of other people's money, all the money earned on the Stock Exchange by the great financial houses and by promoters, will go to relieve from taxation the regular and beneficent business enterprise, and especially the poorer labourers. At the same time the inventor, the discoverer of a mine, the possessor of conces- sions, will no longer have to struggle through the solid, though cryptic, phalanx that stands between them and the realisation of the economic wealth they offer, in the form of the promoter and the financial houses and the immoral tra- ditions prevailing in their methods of work. They will at once know where to go and where to find justice. So far from stifling enterprise, it will facilitate and increase it by the direct, manifest, and practical system with which capital will be distributed, and, especially, by furnishing the most important element in the establishment of values, that is, confidence. THE "TRANSPORTATION" OF CAPITAL 395 Call this socialism if you like ; but it certainly arises out of the actual needs of the day and is in no way subversive of our society and its guiding principles. On the contrary, it is the only means of confirming and strengthening our social order. I know that some will say that if it be not socialism it leads in that direction. They would attribute to me, as they attribute to others, a hidden and insincere purpose of aiming at more in the future, and asking for less at present because one knows one cannot get more. I can say in solemn truth, that I desire to see the present order of society, its fundamental principles and the principles of individualism, established more firmly, and not uprooted. The method of argument applied in putting forward such doubts is of the most nefarious. A good line of progress is checked for fear that it might lead too far. My answer is, " Stop it when it goes too far." But stay where you are and block progress, and the compression of forces that move onward, and rightly move onward, produces violence and leads to revolution instead of reform. If the tyranny of capital and syndicates goes on increasing and the irresponsible power of the crownless millionaire-kings grows, demoralising society from its highest to its lowest layers, the results may be anarchy and revolution ; and all that constitutes the foun- dations of modern society, built up through centuries of civilised struggle, may be shaken and ultimately destroyed. Only by such reforms are the weapons taken out of the hands of the anarchist, and can our laws and our social aspira- tions be safeguarded and strengthened. APPENDIX V HOW I PLACED A CONCESSION IN LONDON Reprinted from Murray's Magazine, June, 1889 I had become a Concessionnaire. A happy thought had one day struck me, on reading of the progressive tendencies of the Toniline Republic as evinced by its apparently unlimited willingness to allow foreign capital to be poured into it under any pretext and for any purpose. I learnt that the municipal authorities of the chief towns of the Republic were most anxious to encourage the improvement and embellishment of their townships, and I saw it curiously noted that, so far, throughout the Republic no proper system of waterworks had anywhere been constructed Although not a business man, I was fired by my idea, and, having a little capital, I determined to start at once for the Torriline Republic in order to secure a Concession the Monopoly of the Construc- tion of Waterworks. I do not wish to dwell on this part of my experiences at all, but merely say that, after the expendi- ture of some money and pains and much time, I met with success. Having secured my Concession, I started back to England in high spirits ; it was, after all, a valuable property, and I intended to realise at once, and, whilst keeping more or less in touch with the working of the Concession, so as to see that it was properly managed, retire upon my hardly earned laurels and rest at any rate, in so far as that particular business was concerned in peace. Accordingly, the day after my arrival in London I sallied down to the City and called at the large and well-known financial establishment of Barter & Co. I knew the active working manager of the firm slightly, Mr. Dibbings, and sent in my card to him. He immediately had me admitted, and affably asked me what my business might be. He heard me patiently out, and then raising his eyebrows and pursing his lips, he said : " I don't wish you to lose your time, Mr. Smith I don't 396 HOW I PLACED A CONCESSION IN LONDON 397 wish you to lose your time. I will therefore tell you at once that I will have nothing to do with your Concession." " Why not ? " I said, a little testily. "In the first place," he answered, " it is Torriline. I have no confidence whatever in Torriline business ; I always have kept clear of it, and your proposals are not such as to induce me to change my views. I will not lend the name of Barter & Co. to anything which I do not consider a first-class sound business. I have the greatest possible objection to being made a stalking-horse by which to get at the public and attract them into putting their money into doubtful con- cerns ; and, begging you to excuse me for being so outspoken, I must flatly decline to take any share in what you now offer to me." " I am obliged to you for your straightforwardness, Mr. Dibbings," I replied ; " but you will allow me to remark that in the first place, if I had not considered this a sound business, I never should have come to you about it at all ; and in the second place, if you suppose I had intended to use you as a stalking-horse you are entirely mistaken. I brought you a good business because I thought you would like it, but I don't want you not in the least. I can get on perfectly well without you, and shall have no difficulty at all in finding money." I said this for effect, and only wished it were true. Mr. Dibbings raised his eyebrows and slightly smiled. " I am very glad to hear it, my dear sir," he replied. " I meant no offence, I am sure ; but I always say exactly what I think. Besides being better business, it saves time both for me and for those to whom I am speaking. Good day." And before I knew where I was, I found myself walking away from Messrs. Barter & Co. with a disagreeable feeling of having played my trump card, failed, and not knowing what to do next. I went to a variety of establishments with whom I had a more or less extensive acquaintance, but at one and all was met with very much the same answer. Many of them asked if I had already a strong financial backing, because in that case (the very one, as I took the liberty of pointing out to them, in which I should not have had recourse to them) they also would not have any objection to taking a certain share. I got weary with explaining that I did not want them to take a direct part in the business themselves, but to bring it out upon the London market, to issue the shares to the public to float the company, in fact. Not one of them would listen to it. One managing director only, seeing me, I suppose, look tired and disgusted when his refusal was added to the many others, advised me to go to brokers, and see what they 398 A BROKER'S OFFICE thought of the matter, and whether possibly they would raise the capital on commission. " You would thus, you see," he said, " form a syndicate perhaps, which would set the thing going, meet the first engagements, and turn it into a company afterwards. There's lots of money sometimes to be made that way," said he reflectively, " lots ! " "Ah! there is indeed," I replied. "Perhaps, Mr. Hard- man," I added, as a sudden and happy afterthought, " Messrs. Guldridge " (that was the name of his bank) " would like to take part in it." " Oh dear no ! " he said decidedly. " I have already told you that it does not lie the least in our way of business. We don't do that kind of thing, my good sir, we don't do it." " But what kind of things do you do ? " I asked incredu- lously. " Other things," said Mr. Hardman. But in spite of his mysterious answers and his shortness, he was more helpful than the others I had seen, and gave me a letter to Messrs. Bluff & Chowse, brokers, whose valuable aid I immediately sought. " Mr. Chowse is out," said a clerk to whom I showed my letter. " I don't know where 'e's gone ; 'e said 'e'd be in in ten minutes ; p'raps 'is brother 'ud do." As I knew neither Mr. Tommy Chowse, to whom the letter was addressed, nor his brother, I said I thought he would do. The clerk then asked me to step in to Mr. Tommy Chowse's room, and wait for a minute or two, and Mr. Alfred would be down directly. The room in which I waited was a dingy little place looking out upon one of those harrow lanes in the City, which give one the idea instinctively that they are crammed with wealth ; it was furnished with a biggish writing-table covered with correspondence, financial papers, prospectuses, and such articles of the trade, two chairs, and one of the Exchange Telegraph self-recording instruments, which kept on an alternate whining and excited ticking as of an irritated wood-pecker continually frustrated by a particularly hard piece of bark. As I was amusing myself by trying to learn some news from a tape- like paper ejected by the machine, the door opened and in walked a tall gentlemanly man with, of course, his hat on, and a most faultlessly spick-and-span hat it was. " Good morning, sir," he said, in rather an abrupt way, " what can I do for you ? " " I have a letter from Mr. Hardman," I replied, handing it to him ; " perhaps you would glance through it before I state my business." HOW I PLACED A CONCESSION IN LONDON 399 It was only a few lines long, but he took as many minutes to read them, and he just once gave me a keen, rapid glance as he was reading. I was rather surprised at his taking so long in reading so little, when he said : " Oh ! I beg your pardon ; I'm very busy this morning, and was thinking of something else. Ah ! this letter from Hardman ye-e-s. Well ! what do you expect us to do ? " This abrupt conclusion a little disconcerted me. " This Concession," I began " Hardman says nothing about a Concession," he inter- rupted, " it's something about a Waterworks Company, or something of that sort." "I'll explain, if you'll allow me," I replied, " unless indeed you're too busy, in which case I'll call to-morrow and see your brother." " No, no ! " he said, " you'd better shortly explain to me what it is you want ; I'll talk it over with my brother, and let you know to-morrow what we think. Fire away." I shortly and concisely stated to him what my Concession was, and what I now wished to do with it. As I drew to the end of my discourse, I saw a twinkle in his eye and a quiver at the corners of his mouth, and the slight effort necessary for speaking was sufficient to cause him to lose control over the muscles of his face. " A very good statement, sir," he said, breaking into a broad smile. " Might I ask if you have ever dealt in Con- cessions before ? " " No," I said, " I have not, never." " You surprise me," he answered. " Well ! if you'll kindly call in to-morrow at eleven in the morning, I'll tell you what we think." As I went home I could not help reverting in my mind, over and over again, to what seemed to me to be his totally unnecessary smile. I half feared that, being unused to this kind of business, I might have made some foolish slip of expression which might cause him to form a poor opinion of my business-like capacity. I searched my memory to think what it could be, but nothing occurred to me, and I tried to conclude (though with poor success) that it was only a smile of politeness. The next morning when I presented myself I was im- mediately shown into the same room as before, and there found seated, one on each side of the writing-table, the two Messrs. Chowse. "I'm afraid," said Mr. Tommy Chowse, cocking his hat back, after the morning greetings, " very much afraid that we 27 400 THE WAYS OF BROKERS can't start that Concession for you. It's not precisely our line. You've no one with you, have you ? I mean you are sole Concessionnaire ? " " Yes," I replied, " I am quite alone." At this reply I thought I saw a scarcely perceptible wink pass between the brothers. " Who did you speak to before you saw Hardman ? " said Mr. Tommy. " Many people," I answered ; " amongst other, Mr. Dib- bings, of Barter & Co." " Ah," he replied ; " and what did he say ? " I told him what he had said, and again fancied I noticed a reciprocal wink of intelligence. " Yes, well you see, I don't know," said Mr. Tommy, "I'm afraid I agree with him. Dibbings's is a devilish good opinion what do you think, Alf ? " " Devilish," replied Mr. Alfred rather emphatically. " Mr. Smith seems pretty confident about the business, too ! " Mr. Tommy seemed to look upon this answer as conclusive. " I'm really beastly sorry," said he, " and I'm sure I don't want to discourage you or put you in a fix ; I'm afraid we aren't the people for you that's all." I thought there was some indecision in his voice, and so, remembering also the winks I had noticed, I began to hold forth on the merits of my Concession with eloquence ; but it was no use ; the more I talked, the more decided he seemed to grow that he would have nothing to do with it. " Well, gentlemen," I said, after trying my very best to move them. " I will trouble you no more ; but allow me to say that I am quite sure you will one day regret this as a lost opportunity." " Maybe ! " replied Mr. Tommy. " But although I can't do the business for you, I'm always glad to see a good chap or to help him. I'll give you a note to a friend of mine who is pretty good at the kind of thing, and if you'll look round any day at lunch time I'll be delighted to see you, or at any time give you a bit of friendly advice, if you want it." I caught at this with pleasure, for I was beginning to look with dread upon the impossibility of meeting the engagements I had taken in the Torriline Republic and of seeing my Con- cession lapse ; and when I left the office of Messrs. Bluff & Chowse, I determined to be a pretty frequent caller there in the future. Mr. Tommy's letter was addressed to Rowley Flasher, Esq. The result of my inquiries about him was not very encour- aging, in the sense that although no one said any harm of Mr. HOW I PLACED A CONCESSION IN LONDON 401 Flasher, I could not make out that he had any great influence, nor that he had ever been particularly successful. Many people told me he was an " awfully clever chap," " a wonder- ful fine talker," and a few seemed to know of some big concerns which he had nearly launched, and in treating which he had shown very considerable " smartness." On the whole, I concluded I had better pluck up my courage, smarten up my wits, and go for Mr. Rowley Flasher. I found him to be a tall thin man, with the pale face and light blue eyes which seem so common amongst City men and frequently to accompany a talent for smartness. I gave him Mr. Tommy's note, and in answer to his questions, which were wonderfully to the point, very soon explained my business to him " Wait a minute, please," he said suddenly, rising from his chair, and commencing to walk rapidly up and down the room with his hands in the side-pockets of his coat. I watched him in silence for a few minutes, when he as suddenly stopped, turned towards me, and began to speak. Then I sat in a state of alternate astonishment and rapt admiration. He began by speaking quietly of the business itself, running through a light sketch of what it was, far better than I could have done myself ; then he went on to develop a whole scheme of how it was to be set going in England : how this machine-factory, that engineer, the other contractor, and so on, must be interested ; how thus certain great financial houses could be led to support it. Passing on to the future formation of a company, he waxed warm and eloquent. " This, sir," he said, " is more than a mere business specu- lation ; it is a great patriotic work. Through it we shall effect the spread of English ideas, and let in a flood of light and civilisation upon countries now in a state of primitive barbarity. From this point of view we must approach men who, shrinking from business as a rule, will, nevertheless, consent to sit on the Board of so great an undertaking as is yours." He went on to propose that we should construct a variety of Boards ; a political Board, a technical Board, and a finan- cial Board. Lord Salisbury would be the chairman of the one, Lord Armstrong of the other, Lord Rothschild of the third. It might possibly, he thought, be better to turn the affair into an international concern ; there was quite room enough for everybody, and the Torriline Government was, politically, so suspicious. And so he went on, leading me through Elysian fields of imaginary prosperity, until I saw 402 MR. ROWLEY FLASHER myself as rich as Midas, and holding the destinies of nations in the hollow of my hand. Considering, he said, that almost the entire labour would fall upon him, and that the whole business would be mounted and set going by introductions coming through him, it was only fair that we should go half-and-half into the business, for expenses as for profits. I did not consent to this until I had had a day or two for reflection, and had taken as impartial advice as I could manage to obtain. When the business relations between us had thus been satisfactorily settled, we set to work. Mr. Rowley Flasher was a very much occupied man, and could not devote all his tune to this one business ; but he took the leadership, I acting under his direction. I was at first for obtaining the promises of the great men he had mentioned to serve as chairmen of the different Boards, and then, with the great advantage which would be lent by their names, to return to the big financial houses again, and see whether they would not think better of it. But he would not hear of it. I had already hawked the Concession about too much, he said we should get it depreciated ; he preferred doing things quietly. We did things so quietly, that I remained idle, though anxious, for days, until one morning he said that if I would accompany him to a friend of his, I should see that we had made more progress than I supposed. The name of his friend was Croker ; on our way to his office he explained to me that he was a man of enormous influence ; one of the very first Company-promoters in London. " And now do take care, Smith," he besought me. " You're not much accustomed to this kind of work, and I am really so awfully afraid of your letting yourself in. The best thing you can do is to keep your mouth shut. I will tell you honestly that I wouldn't take you with me, only as the Concession is originally yours. I want you as a kind of con- firmation of what I say. I don't mean to be rude, only Croker is as sharp as a needle, and will be through and through and in and out of every word you say, and before you know it you may have compromised everything. I'll talk ; you look confirmation." These warnings, upon which Flasher rang the changes all the way, made me feel some little trepidation when we entered Croker's offices. We were immediately shown into his own room, which was adjoining a much larger one in which several persons were sitting, " doing the antechamber." Croker and Flasher seemed to be old friends ; they shook hands cor- dially, and I was well received on Flasher's introduction. We HOW I PLACED A CONCESSION IN LONDON 403 came in in the midst of an incident which interested me so much that I think it is worth noting. A poor, common- looking man was there, to whom Croker addressed himself again, when he had finished greeting us. " Well, my good man," he said with resignation in his voice, " let's hear it again." The man then gave a laborious explanation of a method he had invented of making trousers by machinery without a seam in them. He said no one else could make them like that that it had cost him years of thought, and that he would sell it to Mr. Croker for a sum of money down. " But how," said Croker, " do you suppose I am going to make anything out of that ? " " Oh, well," said the man, " that's your look-out ! This is a first-class way of cutting trousers, and saving cloth ; I know as there's no one else can do it. And I've brought it to you. Just you look here," and he went off again into his laborious explanation right from the very beginning. Croker touched a bell which summoned a clerk. Then quite politely cutting his interlocutor short, he asked him to follow the clerk and explain the matter carefully to him : the clerk would write the explanation down, and he himself would be able to study it to better effect. The man, as he turned away, grumbled out something about preferring to deal with principals, and he left the room looking rather disconsolate. " It's a perfectly awful waste of time ! " exclaimed Croker, when we were alone ; " what the deuce can I do with a thing of that sort ? Those kind of chaps are such fools ; they are created, I do really believe, for the sole purpose of tempting one to make bogus companies. But I am always sorry for them and treat them well." Mr. Croker who was not a prepossessing-looking man, being small and dirty, and blessed with a squint could not have said anything which could have set me more in his favour. I could not, in my mind, help comparing him with certain men whose co-operation I had been forced to accept in the Torriline Republic, and congratulating myself on being an Englishman, and having to deal with my own countrymen, honest and compassionate. We now immediately began to talk over my business, with which Croker evidently had already a general acquaintance. Flasher did most of the talking, and wonderfully well he did it too, Mr. Croker every now and then asking a question or taking a note. " That'll do," [he said at last ; " and what do Eccles & Dumper say to it ? " 404 RAISING CAPITAL " Most satisfactory," answered Flasher. " They are red- hot to support it." This answer nearly made me jump, for Eccles & Bumper's is one of the biggest firms of contractors in the world. With great effort I suppressed all sign of pleasure and surprise, and looked carelessly in front of me, as if this welcome piece of news were quite ancient history to me. Indeed I had to continue the effort, as Flasher brought other names, both in the engineering line and financial, which were equally sur- prising and delightful. Now and then Croker looked at me as if for confirmation, but, knowing nothing and remem- bering Flasher's advice, I looked much and did not open my lips. " Well," said Croker, after some time, " it all seems in capital trim. I'm afraid I have no more time this morning ; come back to-morrow, will you ? and I'll tell you what I propose." Returning from Croker's office, I simultaneously con- gratulated Rowley Flasher on the extraordinary progress he had made, and reproached him for having kept me so much in the dark. " You ought at least," I said, " to have told me about Eccles & Dumper. I could have gone and seen them, and it would have been much more effective if I could have explicitly confirmed what you said, instead of sitting there like a stuck pig." " You acknowledge yourself I have done the thing thor- oughly well so far," said Flasher, " and I really must beg of you to allow me to conduct this business as I consider best. I must also ask you to take no steps without my consent. You do not know what smart men you have to deal with. On no account go and see Eccles & Dumper ; I am arranging with them, and if you interfere, things will only get muddled. You must have confidence in me." He spoke so decidedly, and had managed so successfully, that I thought better not to take offence at the implied rudeness of his speech, but to submit. The next morning we went back to Croker's office, and found that gentleman in a state of high delight. " We can do it, Rowley, my boy ! " he cried ; " we have only to talk out details a bit now, and put things down on paper. I can see my way." They talked a great deal and a long while, I sitting by most of the time in the quality of a listener. In fact, they only referred to me once, and then they utterly disagreed with my answer, and refused to follow my advice. " What," asked Rowley Flasher, " what capital do you think HOW I PLACED A CONCESSION IN LONDON 405 we shall want, remembering of course that you must add a good lot on for working capital, as the business may not pay in the first year or two, and that financing requires a good percentage ? " I had my answer pat, for I had thought of all this before. "Say three hundred thousand pounds," I replied. "Oh, nonsense, sir!" said Croker. "You haven't the least idea of the expense of floating companies, and you vastly under- estimate the capital required for the business itself." Flasher fully supported Croker 's view, whilst I somewhat hotly disputed it. Croker himself appeared to take notes of my arguments at first, and then to enter into a few calcu- lations. When he had finished them he broke in again. " It can't be done under a million," he said shortly ; " at least / won't have anything to do with it under that. I can't afford to have my name connected with a badly launched business. You are at perfect liberty, of course, to take the thing out of my hands, and go elsewhere with it." He fol- lowed up the impression which of course this made upon me by demonstrating the truth of his assertion, and at last I gave way to his superior authority. This point being settled, they referred no longer to me, but drew up a plan between them as to the formation of a com- pany. They entered into a variety of details which I could not very well follow, and presently came to the necessity of registering the Company. " Oh, as to that," said Croker, " we only want the usual association of seven persons for a lawful purpose, and we'll register at once. We'll get Clinker & Dance to draw up the memorandum. Do you agree, Mr. Smith, generally, to the terms ? You will be paid fifty thousand pounds, of which twenty-five thousand in cash on the first call and twenty- five thousand in shares. Naturally you will be a Director. Do you wish to name Directors ? " " No," I replied, " I don't." " Very good ! " answered Croker. " Then Flasher and I will name them. You had better leave all details to us. We will call a Board-meeting at the earliest opportunity, for the purpose of settling the purchase agreements and drawing up the prospectus, and we'll launch the Company as soon as possible. Please say, do you agree to the amount men- tioned for purchase ? " " Oh, yes ! " I said. " It is a fair price." I should think it was indeed ; it surpassed my highest expectations ! "Very good!" said Croker. "Then good morning! I shall set to work at once." 406 THE FIRST BOARD MEETING When we left him, Flasher told me I had better not bother myself any more until I heard from him again. I should only worry myself to no purpose. The matter was now in perfectly first-class hands, and would go on wheels. It was a week before I saw him again, and then only because I was asked to attend the first Board- meeting. I thought it much better not to interfere and get in the way of these excellent business men. I once meanwhile paid a call on Mr. Tommy Chowse, to thank him for his valuable introduction. He received my thanks in an off-hand manner, and seemed mightily tickled at something or other, which I could not quite make out. I shall not easily forget that first Board-meeting. To my great annoyance Rowley Flasher got a telegram a few minutes before it began, which absolutely prevented him from attend- ing it. " Awfully sorry, I am really," he protested ; " but it can't be helped ! It doesn't really much matter. Croker is a splendid chap to talk. You need only confirm what he says." When I went into Croker's office I found eight men already there whom Croker introduced to me as future Directors. The future Chairman bore a name well known in society ; and the names of two or three of the others were familiar to me as directors of various big companies. " We had better get to business at once, gentlemen," said Croker, after a little desultory chatter. " We are most of us pressed for time. In the first place, Mr. Smith, I must tell you that at a kind of preliminary meeting we had a day or two ago we decided to ask you to take your seat on the Board only after the Company is formed and all the purchase agreements, and so forth, executed. You being vendor, and we (the Company) purchasers, we think it not only looks better, but is better, leaves us all freer, to adopt that course. It seems to us the straightforward way to act. Do you agree ? " " I agree of course," I replied, " if you gentlemen are of that opinion. I object, however, to being kept in the dark as to what is going on, and must be kept fully informed." " Of course," said the Chairman, in a pleasant, bland voice, " Mr. Smith is right ; he must be kept informed." "No doubt whatever about it," said Croker. "Mr. Rowley Flasher will keep him fully informed. Then you do agree, Mr. Smith ? " " Oh, yes ! " said I. " Very well," continued Croker ; " then, gentlemen, I will just run over the chief points again ; Mr. Smith will correct me if I go wrong." HOW I PLACED A CONCESSION IN LONDON 407 He talked rapidly and almost as well as Flasher. His estimates seemed to me rather exaggerated, but I did not care to interrupt him on what was, after all, a mere matter of opinion. But presently he glibly declared that I had received promises of support from Eccles & Dumper, and all the other firms whom Flasher had named. " Oh, no ! " I said, " you are perfectly mistaken. I never said anything of the kind. I don't even know the firms." " Then you shouldn't have said you did," replied Croker ; " either Flasher spoke and you confirmed him, or you spoke and Flasher confirmed you ; it comes to precisely the same thing." I could not answer this, for truly I had confirmed Flasher by my silence. I consoled myself by thinking that Flasher was all right, and would not have dared play fast and loose with the names of such big firms. No other incident occurred worth noting until the signature of the purchase agreement with me. Then all the Directors congratulated me, we severally wished the business good luck, and the meeting broke up. I was not asked to come to another. Rowley Flasher kept me informed of progress ; the memorandum of association was signed ; the Company registered ; and prospectuses launched. I was astonished to see that, according to these, seven hundred and twenty-five thousand pounds' worth of shares had already been taken up. I also saw that the vendor, Mr. Smith, had already extensive connections and had assured himself of a large trade. " What do you mean by extensive connections ? " I asked Flasher. " Oh ! / don't know," he replied. " The President and that kind of thing. One must gas a little in this sort of business." I was also rather astonished to see that Messrs. Guldridge were to be the bankers, and I made the remark. " Oh, yes ! we've got them of course," answered Flasher, and I could get no more explanation out of him on the subject. I think what surprised me most was to hear that Barter & Co. were to bring the business out ; not only because Mr. Dibbings had been so extremely positive with me, but it hardly seemed worth while for them to trouble themselves about it when seven hundred and twenty-five thousand out of the million were already subscribed. But about this Mr. Flasher treated me as much de haut en bas as before ; he said the 4o8 MESSRS. ECCLES & DUMPER matter was now on quite a different footing, that Croker was a man of great standing and influence, and of course Barters would listen to him, and so on. It was a few days after this, and only two before the sub- scription was to be opened by Barter & Co., that I received a letter from Eccles & Dumper, asking me to come and see them at once. I immediately went, and was received by a short, dry little man, who made me a stiff bow, and asked me, point-blank, when we were left alone, whether I was responsible for the statement, industriously circulated in the City, that his firm was prepared largely to back the Torriline Waterworks Monopoly Company just about to be brought out. " Certainly not," I answered. " I never stated anything of the sort." " Kindly read those letters, Mr. Smith," said he. I read them. They were written in various styles of com- position, but all made the same statement, and asked the same question. In answer to their letters inquiring as to Mr. Smith's extensive connections, the correspondents were informed by letters signed by one or other of the Directors of the new Company, or by Mr. Hardman or Mr. Croker, that Mr. Smith had declared that Messrs. Eccles & Dumper were strongly supporting the Torriline Waterworks Monopoly Company. They begged that this might be confirmed. I sat aghast. " I ! / say so !. Mr. Eccles sir I assure you," I stam- mered, " I am absolutely innocent. But Mr. Flasher said you know Mr. Flasher ? " "Not I, sir," replied Mr. Eccles; "never met him in my life." " Good God, sir ! " I cried, " not know Mr. Flasher ! But Mr. Flasher " I really feared to go on, I did not know in what net I might not become entangled. " What answer have you made to these letters ? " I inquired at last, feebly. " So far," said Mr. Eccles drily, " none whatever. I strongly advise you, sir, to go and see Mr. Flasher at once." I did not require that advice twice. I flew as fast as a hansom cab could take me to Flasher's office, and let forth the vials of my wrath and fear upon that gentleman. He took no more notice of my objurgations than if I had been in an adjoining planet. He heard me out to the end ; then he shot one glance at me and muttered " D d fool ! " and I overheard him, as he left the room, saying, " overtalked myself, as usual," and he left me alone. I remained there, not knowing what to do, until he re- turned. " I've squared Eccles," he said unpleasantly ; " you HOW I PLACED A CONCESSION IN LONDON 409 entirely misunderstood the whole thing. I told you not to go there. That slip will have cost a pretty penny. Don't go meddling any more without consulting me ! All you've got to do is to keep out of the way." " Look here ! " I said decidedly. " Look here, Flasher ! Is this business all square ? I won't have my name, for fifty thousand or five hundred thousand pounds, mixed up in anything shady. I'll write to the papers as Concessionnaire, and declare that false statements have been made." " Mr. Smith," said Flasher, in a stately manner, " I will not presume, whatever my suspicions may be, to question your motives in behaving in this extraordinary way at the last hour. I will not talk to you in your present state of mind. If you have suspicions, pray go and talk them over with Clinker & Dance ; it's their business. I really have not time." I left him on the spot and went straight to Clinker & Dance. They reassured me ; they explained to me the pros- pectus throughout, and reminded me of the misunderstanding about Flasher's statements at the Board-meeting at which their representative had been present. They smoothed me down and flattered me up, and fully persuaded me that I had been quite wrong and Flasher quite bond fide. Two days afterwards Barter & Co. brought the Company out. When they closed, the shares were at a fine premium. They fell below par a few days later, and then large purchases began to take place. They were enormously in demand. They rose above the first premium ; I congratulated myself on a brilliant success. But my feeling of triumph soon disappeared ; the financial papers attacked the whole business in general, and me and the Directors in person, in a way which made me tingle. I wish at once to tell the truth as shortly as I can, dupe and fool though it may make me appear. I learnt it all from one of Clinker & Dance's chief clerks, an honest, little chap with whom I became intimate. It was one day when I was complaining bitterly to him, and declaring I would bring an action for libel against the Financial Planet, a leading City paper, that this man, whose name was Twigger, strongly advised me to drop any idea of the sort at once, and keep quiet. " If not," he said, " you will run into a nasty job which you may never get clear of. Lie still now, and at the outside in a few months' time the whole thing will be forgotten ; my strong advice to you is not to risk a storm." Then by dint of much persuasion and by swearing secrecy I managed to induce him to reveal the whole thing to me. It appeared that Croker & Flasher had both made very 410 A PRETEXT OF HONOUR large sums of money indeed, so had Messrs. Guldridge as a bank, Mr. Hardman personally, Barter & Co., Bluff & Chowse, and others. " At that Board Meeting at which you were," said Mr. Twigger, " you ought to have had some friend with you a little bit up to the business ; you were kept out of the Board on a pretext of honour. The real reason, you know, was that they didn't want you to know what was going on ; you had shown yourself touchy about honour and all that kind of thing, and might have got in their way." " Oh ! " I murmured mechanically, " got in their way ! " " Just so, sir ! " continued Mr. Twigger. " There was the memorandum of association to be signed, and all kinds of bogus agreements to be got up to be palmed off on the public. Seven hundred and twenty- five thousand pounds had been subscribed before the prospectus was issued. You perhaps do not know that you subscribed for twenty-five thousand of that ? " " No," I answered feebly, " I had no idea of it." " Ah ! " said Mr. Twigger, " yes, the twenty-five thousand pounds in shares which was part of the price given you they were included. Of the other seven hundred thousand, Mr. Croker and Mr. Flasher took about three-quarters and the other gentlemen took the rest. It was," said Mr. Twigger reflectively, " about as smart a thing in promotion- money as ever I saw arranged." " Do you mean to say," I asked incredulously, " that not one single penny had really been subscribed ? Why, I saw a tremendous list of shareholders ! " " Shareholders ! " said Mr. Twigger pityingly. " Fiddle- sticks, sir, begging your pardon ! Men of straw, all of them ; nominees of Croker, Flasher, etc. No, sir ! not one penny was subscribed. Bless you ! there are some rich men come out of this job. Barters too ! they were in the swim. The whole, or nearly the whole, of the other two hundred and fifty thousand they and Guldridges took up and held back. They couldn't have aUotted one in ninety ! The public had been played on beforehand (Eccles & Dumper were squared by Mr. Flasher after you had seen them, and lent their names for a good consideration but it was pretty touch and go, that was; Mr. Eccles was real riled) and there was a rush on Barters for the shares. Up they goes to a nice premium, and then Barters & Guldridges realised cleverly and made a tidy profit." " Then there was a fall," I reminded him. " There was, sir," said Mr. Twigger with a grin, " brought HOW I PLACED A CONCESSION IN LONDON 411 about by bogus sales. Mr. Croker and Mr. Flasher, et cetera, managed to buy up a good lot of what Barters had got rid of at a premium below par." " Then there was a rise," I said. " There was, sir ! " said Mr. Twigger in the same voice, and with the same grin, " brought about by bogus purchases. The gentlemen have realised a good lot since. I think you may say they've let off quite three-quarters on the public now." " But who did all the bogus buying and selling ? " I inquired. " Brokers must have known what a vile trick they were playing ! " " Brokers know ! " exclaimed Mr. Twigger compassion- ately. " Oh, Lord ! why, it was Bluff & Chowse did most of it, and they turned a pretty penny. They had their agents and friends who helped too. They'd have liked to have worked you all by themselves, but they couldn't quite manage it, and were obliged to let in partners to take a share of you." " Work me ! a share of me ! " I exclaimed warmly. " Really, Mr. Twigger, you seem to know an extraordinary deal. I am inclined to imagine that you are drawing on your imagination." " Not a bit of it, sir," said Mr. Twigger good-humouredly. " I am not surprised at your being riled. But you may take my word for it, it's all as true as gospel. Many of the men we've been talking about are clients of ours, and they've been chuckling about the business at our place. Mr. Croker laughed a good deal over a ' trouser-scene ' he'd got up, he said, on purpose to make you think what a good honest chap he was." " Then," I cried, my wrath rising again at the villainous way in which I had been gulled, "I'll expose the whole thing ! My estimate was right. Only three hundred thousand pounds of capital was necessary, and now in order to swindle out big profits, these people have palmed off a million on the public. I'll be no party to it ; I'll bring an action, I'll " " Don't do it, sir," said Mr. Twigger persuasively. " You'll be sure to lose. Clinker & Dance can sail as close to the wind as ever you like, and never let their clients do anything which will make them guilty before the law. Besides, they've so entangled you in it, that really, sir, begging your pardon, you might cut as bad a figure as any one." I felt hopelessly discouraged ; it seemed to me that I was wound round and round by a strong net from which I could not cut myself free. I gave vent to my feelings by pouring out a long invective upon the iniquity of financiers like the 412 A CONSPIRACY Barters and Guldridges, who rejected my business when it was honest, to fall upon it ravenously when it had become a swindle ; who forced me into the hands of men like Flasher and Croker, seemingly for the pleasure of making money dishonourably. " It is just like a conspiracy," I groaned. "Not like, sir," corrected Mr. Twigger, " it is a conspiracy; financial people form a kind of guild, and you can't work otherwise than the guild chooses ; they play into each other's hands, and every one makes bigger profits than they other- wise would. I don't know if it is possible to do a business of your kind honestly and above-board from beginning to end, in the City now. Only we don't call it swindling, we call it smart business." I have resolved never to touch a Concession again. JOHN SMITH (A Concessionaire). APPENDIX VI THE ESTHETIC ELEMENT IN THE EDUCATION OF THE INDIVIDUAL AND OF THE NATION An Address delivered to the Parents' National Educational Union, 1910, as reported in the " Parents' Review," March 1910, by Professor Charles Waldstein, Litt.D., Ph.D., L.H.D. From the very outset, I should like to guard against a misunderstanding. I wish it to be known that no one values more highly than I do the field sports and pastimes of our nation, the athletic games of England. They have played a very important part, not only in the physical education of the British race, but also in the formation of the British character, the manliness, the sense of fair play, which, how- ever much they may be possessed by other nations, must be considered one of our characteristic national qualities. But if I should, in the course of my remarks, say what may sound like censure of the part which sports play in our national life, a one-sidedness which has led to phiUstinism, I do not wish it to be understood that I do not value highly the im- portance which they have for us. So, also, I do not wish it to be thought it almost sounds like a platitude for me to say so that I in any way undervalue the importance of science, the intellectual and moral education of our people as individuals, and of ourselves as a nation. The develop- ment of the sense of truth, the striving for it in pure concen- tration and in the highest form, which we call science, is one of the central factors demanding the attention of the educator, and is one of the ennobling elements of the life of the nation. And if I should, in the course of what I have to say, point to some shortcomings of a too exclusive view as regards the importance of science in national education, I should not like to have it thought that I in any way depreciate the central importance and noble aims of science as a whole. In the same way, I hope I need hardly tell you that I do not undervalue the importance of morality for the individual 413 414 SCIENCE, MORALITY AND ART and for the nation, nor the study of morality in a system of ethics. It is a most important study, most worthy of our attention. But that point of view, when taken too exclu- sively in our own national consciousness, as an element to be striven after, may also, when it is thrust out of proportion, be harmful to our national intellectual sanity. I may perhaps recur to this in the course of what I have to say. And, finally, no one can have more reverence for that supreme attitude of mind in which the individual stands face to face with his ideals, with the ideals of human life, with the great relationship between the individual and the cosmos as a whole whatever we may call it : God, the higher spiritual life, religion. I do not wish it in any way to be thought that I undervalue the importance of religion in the conscious- ness of the individual and of a civilised nation. And yet, if I may appear to point to the shortcomings of a view exclusively religious, and out of place when other calls are before man and his consciousness, I should be sorry if I were misunderstood as in any way belittling, or not paying due respect to, that highest of all human intellectual attitudes of mind. I wish I had been in Birmingham yesterday and had had the privilege of listening to Sir Martin Conway's paper read, I have no doubt, most efficaciously by Mr. Wallis. I should have liked very much not only to have heard the paper, but also to have listened to the discussion. I should have liked to have heard in the evening the address which Mr. Alfred Lyttelton gave on " The National Drama." All that I could do was to read the accounts of these addresses and discussions in the morning paper. And I there also read in one of your papers, in the Post, a very interesting leading article, with which I was in great sympathy. Much was said yesterday by the various gentlemen with which I am in absolute accord. There are other points on which I differ from them, as may become apparent in the course of what I have now to say to you. I am also in sympathy with the criticisms, which I could only read in shortened extracts, of your art master, Mr. Catterson Smith. I feel deep sympathy with the view which, I take it, he expressed. He seemed to take umbrage at the statement contained in Sir Martin Conway's paper, that art was primarily meant to please. I absolutely agree with Sir Martin Conway. Art is primarily meant to please. But the question is, what pleasure means. And, therefore, I am in sympathy with the remarks that I could glean from the report of Mr. Catterson Smith, who insisted upon the seriousness of art, upon the serious moral THE ESTHETIC ELEMENT IN EDUCATION 415 aims which art has, and ought to hold before itself. He was speaking, I take it, rather as an art- worker, and every worker ought to do his best when he is working. " Whatso- ever thine hand findeth to do, do it with thy might." That means a sacrifice ; that means a serious attitude, that means a fight, and a struggle in the making of a work of art ; and the higher the aim of the art- worker, the higher his ultimate ideals, and the more he concentrates upon learn- ing his craft, and forcing his hand to follow his mind and his heart, the better, no doubt, will be the work. In so far the religious point of view belongs to all human activity ; it means no more than the sense of duty, the concentration of all our energies upon what we are doing. But it would not lead us much farther if we said that a man of science, who is bent upon discovering truth, must always consider the goodness and the Tightness of what he is doing. That will look after itself, if he really strives after truth. If the artist really strives after beauty, and after producing that pleasure which in itself is necessarily and essentially elevating and ennobling, he need not trouble further about the moral or the religious point of view; he is moral and he is religious. Art, remember, differs from the vocation which leads to and aims at utility. It differs from the scientific attitude which aims at truth. It differs from the moral attitude which, primarily and directly aims at goodness. They are all different attitudes of mind which must be concentrated upon at given moments. A proper development of each one of these sides in human nature and life constitutes moral health in the individual, and moral health and higher civilisation for a nation. But in each one of these cases we have definite tasks before us. Though art, and its aim of pleasing nobly, differs from utility (it may in one sense even be directly opposed to it), that does not mean that the two cannot live side by side ; and though that playful attitude of mind (spielend as Kant and Schiller called it) excludes for the time being concentration on use, truth, or goodness, on pragmatics, science, or ethics, that does not mean that we ought to be unpractical, untrue, or immoral. The aim of art is to please nobly. And art means the attitude of mind as regards the world of form, created by man or in nature, in which form becomes the essence. From this point of view we do not only consider works of art, but nature and life as well. It is chiefly with that attitude of mind that I mean to deal to-day. It is the aesthetic faculty of man, that inner need and fundamental instinct, with which 28 416 THE WIDER MEANING OF ART every healthy child is born, which makes for proportion, harmony, beauty whatever other term you wish to give to it. That is a fundamental instinct in man, and is an essential faculty in all healthily developed human beings, and it must be developed in every aspect of our existence. Art is the most direct way of satisfying this inner need, this primary instinct for proportion and harmony and beauty, as science is the most direct means of satisfying man's fundamental need for truth, though truth comes into every thought and action of our daily life. And that being the case, there are men singled out, because of their fitness for the task, to devote their chief attention in life to the satisfying of that instinct for beauty and form, however it manifests itself. There is a great misunderstanding concerning the nature of art in our country and in the English language. Most people think that art means painting. They may include sculpture, they may include architecture, they may even include decoration. They are not aware that art means all work of the human brain and hand which is meant directly to satisfy that fundamental desire for proportion and harmony and beauty : that music is art, only in a different form of expression, that painting and sculpture and architecture are art, that poetry is art ; that all forms of literature which are not directly intended to impart information and to teach and to discover truth, whenever the literary form is an essential part of the thing produced, are art. As Aristotle put it : " Form and matter fused together in harmony make up art." All the various forms of literature are art. The novel is a very pure and high form of art. Dancing is an art. In short, all those human activities which make for the satisfying of the fundamental aesthetic instinct inherent in man constitute art. Now, it is upon the more ultimate effect of that attitude of mind in education, in the education of the individual, and the education of the nation, that I wish to concentrate your attention this evening. And I shall begin with two para- doxes : " No moral tenet is practically efficacious unless it has become an element of taste." That sounds trite, and I mean it to be paradoxical. And my second proposition is : " No social law is efficacious unless it has become fashion- able." That is still more trite, almost immoral. But I mean it seriously, and I shall endeavour to show you what I mean. Every educational injunction and example has as its ultimate effect that it produces taste ; and taste is the im- portant element which, I claim, directs action. It ought thus to be one of the chief aims of the educator to produce good taste. Yet I venture to say that of all educational factors THE ESTHETIC ELEMENT IN EDUCATION 417 it is the one which comes least within the purview of the educator. Let me impress upon you, before I proceed, that in speaking of art and the aesthetic faculty I have not in mind the effemin- ate dilettanti, with whom you are familiar, who have long since been held up to ridicule in the powerful pages of Punch, who lose all sense of the proportion of life by self-complacently smacking their lips over recondite and select elements of beauty which the vulgar and lower do not know of, and in and out of place stultify their activity by thus self-complacently smacking their lips in artistic contemplation. They have arrogated to themselves the term " Hellenism." They know not what ancient Greece was. Theirs (the ancient Greeks) was a healthy life. Theirs were healthy ideals of manhood and of human life. All sides and all faculties, physical, mental, and moral, were to be developed in proportion ; and art and the appreciation of art formed a part of this. They were manly. These " aesthetes " are effeminate. We must find the proper position of art in life and its rela- tion to conduct. It is then not opposed to morality. But I even maintain and I am not exaggerating that, from the educational and practical point of view, morality itself must become aesthetic. That is, it must appeal to our sense of propor- tion and harmony and beauty, in order that it should become truly efficient in life. In other words, we must admire and love the good ; and that means a direct appeal to our artistic sense, not to the stern sense of intellectual cognition, realising truths only, but loving them, admiring them, and being moved by them. I claim that it is the development of this sense of beauty, this love of truth, or goodness, for utility, which makes science and ethics and all our life effective in the right direction ; that unless you can convert these moral principles which you wish to inculcate, unless you can convert them into emotion, into a taste, a habit, a preference for, a love, a passion, they will never be effective. I have not yet come to the question of how you can teach this ; nor will there be enough time to deal with this subject exhaustively. I take it from what I read that Sir Martin Conway quite rightly said you cannot teach taste. That is true and it is untrue. You cannot teach truth, you cannot teach goodness, if you merely say it, if it merely is seen if it is merely understood, by the meaning of the words. They must transpierce the heart and the character, and then they are effective. And that is the sum of education : no more, no less. But how can taste be taught ? Well, surround the child 418 THE TEACHING OF TASTE with beautiful things. If there is nobody to take it to the museum and explain the works to it there I differ, though, partly from my friend Mr. Wallis let it go there alone ; let it run in and out as it will. Some good will come of it. I should, of course, prefer that some one should go there and teach the child ; but to make the surroundings of children and parents beautiful is, as Sir Martin Conway said, pure gain. Educate the parents, make the surroundings beautiful and bright, that is the best way to foster good taste. Give the children beautiful things to look at, and do not allow them to see ugliness. I was walking through the streets as I arrived here to-day, and I saw in the shop windows toys for children, and I saw gollywogs, and I saw, still worse than that, things that were called biUikens. And I was told that they are bought by the thousands. Mind you, there is such a thing as the sense of the grotesque. That is an aesthetic quality. I do not mean to say that a grotesque object like a goliywog or a grotesque stupid thing like a billiken may not in the proper surroundings, as a contrast to beautiful things, produce a smile. But put it in its right place. You can only afford to be grotesque when you know what beauty is. If you begin by teaching the child how to limp and how to crawl along grotesquely, and do not teach it how to walk erect and normally, you are doing it harm physically for life. But, after you have taught it to walk and run correctly, you may allow it to dance and hop and cut capers at times. So to give to children who have not formed any sense of beauty these gollywogs, these things of ugliness, to play with which they love, I am told and to have in the homes of refined people on the mantel- pieces these vulgar things which I have seen in the shops, called billikens, cannot be elevating to the tone of people living surrounded by such objects. I am always afraid of exaggerating, I do not want to be too exclusive and ignore the sense of humour, the sense of fun, which may be in- herent in such a goliywog. I do not wish to exclude it. I am only questioning the proportion which it holds among the objects of play. Do not let it be the first thing. After the child has seen beautiful things, you may let it see some ugly things and learn to laugh at them. But I am told they do not laugh at them, they love them more than they do their most beautiful toys. There are ways of producing and training taste. Besides the direct means, standard things of beauty in literature and art (mind you, I mean art to include music and all other forms of beauty) must form the natural surroundings in which THE ESTHETIC ELEMENT IN EDUCATION 419 parents live and children are brought up. That will of itself in the end raise the standard of taste. How little is done in this respect and how much more could be done for the public in this country I have not time to bring before you this evening. But less directly than by present- ing works of art, the aesthetic attitude of mind, the satis- faction of that desire for beauty and proportion and harmony can be cultivated by parents, and in the schools, as a real mental habit in every stage of activity, so that it produces an atmosphere. In teaching the driest subjects in school, arithmetic, sums, grammar, geography mind, I do not mean to exclude the development of a sense of duty and of concentration on work, the serious side of education the aesthetic point of view can be profitably regarded and intro- duced. Cultivate the intellectual pleasure in the child, give it delight in form, in the form of sums, and the numbers that come before it, lead it to realise the mystery of arithmetic, the wonder that additions, subtractions, multiplications, and divisions should come out right. Make it love such work and see it as a work of art. Let children see how in grammar, like fretwork, the words are strung together to give definite meaning and to convey the deepest thoughts from one brain to another, and make them love this form and structure. In geography, dilate on the places and scenes and bring up a picture before them. Besides the sense of truth, the sense of duty, and concentration, you must give the playful attitude, the intellectual delight which is artistic, and this means taste. If we make our whole life beautiful and always develop the sense of proportion we are at the bottom of right action. Most of our mistakes, most of our sorrows no, I am not ex- aggerating come from the absence of a sense of proportion. If we can look at our own life and our own experiences in their due proportion we shall not be saddened, and we shall not have the whole sunlight of life shut out from our horizon. These misfortunes and imaginative causes of disappointment which arise, if we can only see them in their proper place, will appear small and unimportant. If you teach the child the proportion, the relationship, between its claims to happi- ness and joy and the claims of others, and the proportion which subsists in all relationships, if you can teach this as a matter of taste, of aesthetics, not as a matter of stern duty ; if you can imbue the child with that attitude of mind, if you can instil that which produces kindness and humour, and form the power of seeing things rightly, that sense of pro- portion, that sense of taste which never allows us to exaggerate, you have done much towards making a good man or a good 420 MORAL EFFECTIVENESS OF TASTE woman at all events one with whom it is pleasant to live. The philosopher Kant's Categorical Imperative is only effective when it becomes a matter of taste, of natural prefer- ence. " Act thus that thou always guardest the dignity of thy neighbour and the dignity of thyself." This will not be effective if merely enjoined or understood. But convert it into taste, convert it into a feeling, make it an emotion, a matter of art, so that the child or man or woman can see the grotesqueness, the want of proportion, between the claims that he or she makes upon a neighbour, and what he or she ought to be prepared to do, and it will be effective. The same applies to the duty to ourself. It is not merely a matter of duty, not merely a matter of hygiene, that we should care for our body and our soul, but it is effective when it becomes an artistic emotion, in which we appear to our- selves as beautiful and harmonious or ugly and deformed. Intellectual and moral injunctions are herein not as effective as the artistic emotion and taste. Think of what self-respect means. Self-respect means that we compare ourselves as we are with ourselves as we ought to be, the actual self with the ideal self. That regard and reverence for the ideal in our- selves make for self-respect : as we approach that ideal we respect ourselves, as we fall short of it we despise ourselves. Without an artistic imagination, without the sense of form, to picture to ourselves what a life ought to be, our moral sense will not be effective. As in a Greek statue the limbs are all in due proportion, so ought we to hold before our imagination perfection of body and of mind. If our physical and moral and intellectual faculties on all sides are not duly developed and our activities are not rounded and complete, and if our actions will not bear the test of beauty and harmony, if we have not that sense of right and proportion, the mere perception of moral or intellectual laws will not help us. I maintain that the only effectual way, the only practical atti- tude of life to make us act rightly, is when we have converted these moral conceptions, these religious conceptions, into feelings of form and beauty. I should like to touch, and I am not afraid to do so, upon a very delicate topic. Take sexual morality. You cannot make it effective with the young I defy you to do so unless you convert it into a taste. Religious tenets are not strong enough to do it ; that is not the right way to do it. They overshoot the mark. Something through which the human race continues to exist is not in itself wrong. It only becomes wrong when it is out of proportion, when it is out of place. How can you make people refrain, especially the young and THE ESTHETIC ELEMENT IN EDUCATION 421 impulsive, curb their passions and resist the strongest temp- tations ? I have experience of men as a teacher. As a friend among the young, I have the right to speak. Religion does not help them ; it is at once too wide in its injunctions and too remote. There are individual cases in which people are thus guided. There are rare cases in which people are directly guided by religious injunctions in the most ordinary or lowly events of life, but it is almost considered an aberration of mind in actual life. I remember a touching story of one of my friends who became a leading politician who told me that when he was young religion was so directly active in him that when he was playing in the football field he knelt down and made believe that he was tying his bootlace in order to pray that he might kick a goal. This sounds almost sacrilegious the grotesqueness of the idea that the whole course of nature should be changed to bring him success at play. But it was true with him, and showed how directly religion had entered into his life. Yet it is perhaps, fortunately not often present and effective to the same degree. In any case it is not often effective in the great passions of life. It is too remote and, moreover, it works too much through nervous channels. Religious exaltation is not best in leading us along the paths of sobriety. The great and violent religious movements have often been accompanied by excesses, because they have fed on a strong emotion. Morality alone will not do it. "Thou shalt not " is not enough. Nor will exaggeration, the wholesale condemnation of what is in itself right induce it. Taste will. You teach it as good old-fashioned nurses and good mothers unconsciously do. They can. We can teach the child by impressing upon it : " That is ugly." Produce disgust, and produce admiration, and you will efficiently modify action. You tell the young child, the young boy : "Be a strong man, and don't be a mean sneak," and the more you succeed in producing in the child the abhorrence, the dislike, the aesthetic disgust, of what is wrong, and the artistic delight and admiration of truth and goodness you have gone far towards making him strong in a moral sense. Let me leave the individual and turn to the wider com- munity. The ideas of right and wrong have been prac- tically the same from the religious and moral point of view. What have changed are the traditions, the leading tone, the taste of each period. Consider what the term " honour " meant in conduct in former days and what it means now. It has to be made an aesthetic quality; it has become a 422 INFLUENCE OF FASHION tradition, a taste. That is why I use the word " fashion." I mean fashion in its deeper sense ; that tone of taste in social intercourse which is set up by what is supposed to be the best element in each society ; and other social elements are affected and follow. Make that fashion, instead of being an ignoble and a low thing, make it a noble and a high thing and you have done much to influence public morality. What did honour mean ? Here, too, it is the public taste, the abundant tradition the fashion, if you like in each place and period which is effective in producing moral tone. In one period it meant fighting, nothing but fighting, duel- ling. I have friends to-day in Germany and elsewhere who say : " What ! You in England can do without duelling ? What do you do when, among men of honour, certain things happen ? " Honour means a tradition, a fashion, and as such is most effective. We need not look far back to see how that changes. There was a time in this country when in the best society even the leaders were habitually or frequently drunk. This was thought the right thing : all the great statesmen, the great men of the day, acted thus. There was a time, not so long ago, when it was considered a very smart thing to seduce a woman. The men who did this were the beaux, the leaders of fashion, and the ideals of the young men of fashion were built up on such examples. The preachers and the moral teachers fulminated without effect. It has gone out, thank God. At our Universities there has been the same change in tradition or fashion. One of my friends, the late Tom Trollope, who was much older than I was he died about twenty years ago gave me a picture of the life in my own University in his day. Then, every man who was supposed to be manly had to be drunk sometimes and there were other things about which I do not wish to speak. But they were then " good form," and the leading young men lived thus. That has gone by, all that has gone out, and now " good form " is something else, I am happy to say. There is a greater harmony between our professions and our ideas and our actions in our Universities ; and this is due, not to moral preaching and teaching, but to men who set up a standard of living which has become the dominant standard. It is good taste, " good form." Let me mention two men who, I am proud to say, were my friends, and who helped to establish such traditions : the late Henry Sidgwick and the late Henry Bradshaw. We have made the right thing fashionable, and that is the effective way to establish public morality. THE .ESTHETIC ELEMENT IN EDUCATION 423 All that I have said said, I am sorry to say, imperfectly is meant to show you the importance of developing taste in the individual and in the nation. And that is done most directly and immediately by the study of art in all its forms and by the development of the aesthetic faculty in every action of life ; by fostering in national life art and literature in every form what Matthew Arnold called " Culture." It is the main duty of those concerned with public life to advance the culture of the nation. I agree with the leader-writer I read in this morning's paper, and I agree with Mr. Lyttelton, when they maintain that we need not decry ourselves too much in England. It is always being said that we are such an inartistic nation. I do not think we are. Certain periods and conditions in our history and certain definite causes, which I could enumerate to you, the action of narrow religious views and the suppres- sion of all artistic instinct resulting from such traditions, have gone far to repress the national feeling for art. But, as a nation, we are not inartistic. If I look about me abroad (and I have travelled a good deal) I see our people at large standing fairly high. Where they have had a chance, in Yorkshire and in Lancashire and in other parts, they are not altogether inartistic. They are fond of music ; they sing a good deal, and sing well. They understand it. The gardens of our villages, the flowers before our labourers' cottages, all these cannot be equalled in France or in Germany. To come to another class, our bourgeoisie, our simple clerks in our offices the homes which we have in towns like Birmingham, London, and elsewhere, the interiors, are in much better taste than I have found the corresponding homes in France and Germany. That is due chiefly to the efforts of a few earnest teachers. I might single out two great men, Morris and Ruskin. They were great fighters. They fought against the age in which many of us were brought up I certainly was brought up then by the inspiration of this younger taste, when there was the fight against the coarseness of what Matthew Arnold called " Philistia," the coarse- ness resulting from our victories in the great war, after Waterloo. Wars do not always produce elevation of the national spirit as they did after the Persian wars of Greece. In a country where the army is but a small portion of the population, and the rest of the population do not go to war, but sit at home and benefit by it, successful wars may produce coarseness. It was also the period of the squirarchy, of the rule of the common, coarse squire, whose only ambition was to excel in the rural sports of that athletic age. And there 424 REFORMERS OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY was the power of the city merchant as he is portrayed by Thackeray and by Dickens ; stupid, narrow, coarse, con- ceited, material in his pleasures, inartistic, unintelligent, philistine. That is the dominant note of the England that produced the bad taste of that Early Victorian age. And then came the great fight. The first protagonist was Carlyle. But they were all exaggerators. Carlyle was one-sided and exaggerated, coarse in his tone. I do not mean to say that he was insincere ; but he was carried away by the power of his own voice into the admiration of strength in itself, which often meant brutality. He was narrow and limited, but he did good service in the fight all the same. Then followed great men and great deeds, great thinkers, the age of Darwin, of Mill, of the Inductive Philosophy which taught people noble sobriety and the seriousness of truth. It refined the sense of truth by the conscientious training of inductive methods as opposed to ready deduction and general- isation run riot in romanticism. Then came George Eliot and her social teaching. All fighting against the coarse spirit of philistinism. And then came that great spirit, that great prophet of beauty, Matthew Arnold, who extolled the ideals of a cultured people. But he, too, was narrow and limited. He did not see the beauty, the aesthetic side, the art- value of science, the ennobling side of science, which has to go hand in hand with the humanities to make a real civilisation. And then come the two I have already mentioned, Morris and Ruskin, and their great work of trying directly to foster and cultivate taste and love of beauty, and to bring it into the homes of the people. They too were narrow, were exagger- ators. They exaggerated the importance of art itself, and the part it is to play in the normal development of society. They had an exaggerated respect for medievalism. They were untrue in that respect ; they did not show the ugliness, the cruelty, the deformity of the Middle Ages ; the insecurity of the life of the poor, who could not call their homes their own, the filth of it, the narrowness of caste, the invidiousness of the life of the guilds which they extolled and poetised. They knew not the beauty and poetry of true science, the good that there is in modern life with its vitality and its broadening emancipation of all classes. They were too narrow, too limited ; but they did much. Their influence has been waning, and is largely spent. I am not a pessimist. I dislike those who can only see the darker side, and I see great brilliance ahead ; but I am afraid we are in a bad way now, at this very moment, on a back wave in this great flow onward. Those influences have THE ESTHETIC ELEMENT IN EDUCATION 425 spent themselves, and our ideals, our lives, are lower ; the tone of our life, the tone of our society, as it is called, the ideals of the young, of the individual and collectively, are lower. It is the age of the financier not even the commercial age, not the age of the man of business whom Thackeray drew, who had a sterling honesty in his own narrow groove. It is the age of rapidly accumulated wealth, of the manipulation of other people's money, of forming syndicates, not of gaining a good competence for one's family, but of amassing huge sums the age of the millionaire or billionaire. The young know that ; the women know that. And then it is an age of mechanism, of transportation. Do not let me exaggerate. I am delighted with all progress in transportation. I am far from undervaluing the beneficent influence of the bicycle, the motor car nay, of aerial navigation in the future. But they are a bad ideal for society as a whole to live on. If we should succeed in going from New York to Paris and London in a few hours, is that our ideal ? What should we find there ? What should we go there for ? Why should we wish to go from one place to the other so rapidly if we find nothing there, if the life consists in the continuous expenditure of energies to go faster in producing more iron, more steel, more machinery, more wealth going into single hands ? I am not talking politics. I do not know whether I am a Socialist or a Collectivist or an Individualist. But I ask you what good such ideals do to you and to future ages ? Where are our ideals of honour, honour for men, honour for women ? What are the young taught in school ? What do I hear boys saying : " What horse-power is your father's motor ? " I have heard parents say : " My boy takes a wonderful interest in mechanics; he is dreaming of nothing but motors and machines." Machines are good things, and those who work at them, if they work well, do well ; and a boy with a genius for mechanics should become a mechanician. But if that is the civilisation we are going to aim at, that a boy should dream only of getting faster from one place to another, where is that to end ? Surely there is something higher than this ? Then we come to the schools and universities. We hear of the wonderful strides that are being made in the new universities. We are going to have schools " in touch with all the things of life," we are going to have brewing and leather- manufacture, and everything is to be taught in the universities. Where is your humanity ? Where is the taste of the nation going, where is the thought of the nation going ? For it was the great pure science that produced 426 ENGLAND IS SHAKESPEARE the power to invent those motor-cars and aeroplanes ; and yet those men had no thought of gain. You do not help a nation by that. Germany is not beating us by that. It is beating us because with them the traditions and the love of learning for its own sake still exist, because they still have ideals of culture. That is why they are beating us, and for no other reason. Our technical schools will not help us if the man of science cannot think, if he has no imagina- tion (I wish I might have heard Canon Masterman's lecture) if the man of science has no imagination, no taste, no culture of the mind, how can he do his work properly ? Where are we going ? If you are going to have your schools, your children taught, without the great classics, without great literature (I do not mean only the literature of the Greeks and Romans : there are other literatures, though those of the ancient languages are still worthy of study and always will be), where shall we get to ? People are not to be taught French simply in order to be able to read French novels quickly. If that is all, that will not make a great nation of us. England is Shakespeare. That is what we are known by and shall be known by, and none of our statesmen and soldiers and sailors, no monarch, no man who has accumulated wealth or contributed to the wealth of this country, stands for England in the eyes of the world as Shakespeare does. England is Shakespeare. The other workers on the fabric are the hod-carriers or stonemasons, they are the foundation of the monument, of which the pinnacle is Shakespeare. It is our thought and our culture which make us a nation worthy of admiration, worthy of emulation. If that goes, then we can live like swine and die in the dust. Cultivate taste in the young, the admiration of beautiful and noble things; always cultivate the aesthetic element in your teaching, never neglect it, and you will have done much to bring up healthy, happy, and efficient children. And for the nation, remember that good taste, culture, is the highest asset a nation can have. INDEX Actions, duties to, 329-30, 336-46 Acton, Lord, 45 Adults, education of, 263 Allen, Grant, 115 Alliances, their instability, ix Altruism, not a substance but a force, 128-30, 225 Altruistic duties, the extreme im- portance of, 335 Amphyctionic Council, suggested constitution of, 157; terms of office, 157; power of appoint- ment, 158 ; proportional repre- sentation, 158, 159; local habitation, 159, 160 ; interna- tional army and navy, 160, 161 ; effect on life and thought of all nations, 161-3 ; language difficulty, 163-7 Angell, Norman, 105 Aristocratic radicalism, 194 Aristotle, 192 Armenia, viii, ix Arnold, Matthew, 171, 335, 339, 340 " Self-Dependence," 340 Art cannot replace religion, 350 in national life, 276, 277 of living, the, 18, 274-7, 369 Asia Minor, 97, 98, 100 Austria, i, 9, 10, 56 Bacon, F., 191, 329 Bagdad Railway, the, 56, 100 Balance of power, i Balkan States, i, 56, 88 Ball, Sir Robert, 248 Ballin, Heir, 12, 14 Barter favours lower standards of honour than commerce, 282 Bavaria, King of, 97 Beer, G. L., in The Forum, 97 Belgium, viii, 69, 97, 98 Bergson, M., 292, 296 Bernhardi, xii, 12, 42, 44, 98, 149 Bismarck, Prince, xii, 46-50, 54, 68, 88, 149 Blanqui, L'Eternitt par Us A sires, 185 Bluntschli, Prof., 88 Body, the cult of the, 240, 308 Brandes, G., "Aristocratic Radi- calism," 194 Friedrich Nietzsche, 183-6, 194-5 British Empire, the, and the Open Door, 95, 96, 98 national sentiment in, 96 Browning, R., In a Spanish Cloister, 70 Instans Tyrannus, 70 Billow, Prince, 68, 71 Butler, S., The Way of all Flesh, 206 Capital, international character of, 105-8 transportation of, 287, 288, 382-95 Carlyle, T., 73, 171 Castiglione, // Cortegiano, 280 Casuistry, moral, 258, 259 Chamberlain, Houston, Die Gund- lagen des xix Jahrhunderts, 53 Chauvinism, what it is, 41, 63 England's danger of contagion from, 44, 66, 67 Ethnological, 50-3 in modern Germany, 41-85, 103 cause of, 64-6 materialistic, spreading from Germany, 64 passages on, 357-74 Chesterfield, Lord, Letters to his Son, 280 China, 98, 100 Chivalry, 290, 291 Christ and Plato reconciled, 327 the teaching of, 198, 224-38 Civilisation confers no right of conquest, 93, 94 427 428 INDEX Civilisation, higher forms of, pre- vail over lower, 10 1 unity of, 142 Class-hatred in Germany, 70-2 Clifford, W. K., 171 Cohelet, 185 Commandments, the first and second, 214-16, 224 the third, 216, 217 the fourth, 217-219 its inadequacy in modern times, 217, 224 moral misapplication of, 218 the fifth, 219-21, 226 doubts and limitations un- just concerning, 220, 221 the sixth to the ninth, 221, 222, 233 the tenth, its supreme impor- tance, 222-4 the ten, see also Decalogue, the Commercial honour, 281-7 Commercialism, an enemy of individuality, 140 growth of, in Germany, 76-8 Company promoting, 286, 289 Competition, moral and immoral, 283-7 Comte, August, 170 Concentration on the work in hand, 336 Concession, placing a, 396-412 Conscience, 331, 332 in regard to impersonal duties, 337 Considerateness, 274 Copyright Law, 284, 285, 288, 289 Cosmopolitanism and Patriotism, co-ordination of, 130, 131, 137 passage on, 375-7 Coubertin, Baron Pierre de, 8 1 Cramb, Prof. J. A., 44, 57 Credit system of modern com- merce, dangers of, 283 Creeds, only those sincerely be- lieved to be subscribed to, 352 Culture, 296-305 Darwin, Charles, 171, 187, 188 190-3, 244, 245 Dawson, W. H., What is wrong with Germany, 45 Decalogue, the, 208-24 concerns duty to God, duty to one's self, and duty to man- kind, 214 embodies the idea of duty and justice for the modern world, 211 Decalogue, the, its greater part already embodied in the Law, 213, 224 Decentralisation, effect of, 23-5 Deity, spiritual conception of the, 214 tainted by anthro- pomorphism, 215 Democracy, versus Militarism, 6, 7 Denmark, 98 Dickinson, G. Lowes, Appear- ances, Essay " Culture," 301-5 Disarmament, partial, easily evaded, 154 total or partial called for, 153 Discipline and obedience, 226-8 contemporary need of, 227 home life necessary for their development, 227, 228 Disraeli, B., 90 Dogmas, only those sincerely believed to be subscribed to, 352 Dress, 308, 309 Dreyfus case, 231, 232 Duties beyond the family, neces- sity of progression in, 271-4 impersonal, 328-30 non-social, 328-30 the extreme importance of altruistic, 335 to the family, 127, 128, 133, 219-21, 226-8, 266-70 to humanity, 325-30 to ourself, 331-5 to the locality and community in which we live, 272, 273 to the State, 313-24 to things and actions, 329, 330, 336-46 Duty of truthfulness to religious ideas, 347 to God, 347-354 to make all work perfect, 339 Education by means of recreation, 261-3 of adults, 263 the higher, 296, 297 Egoist, the, 228, 229 Eliot, George, 117, 118, 130, 171, 252, 39, 341-3 " Stradivarius," 341-3 Ellis, Havelock, 1 1 5 England should take warning from the degradation of social life in Germany, 82-5 INDEX 429 England substituted for Russia as the primary foe by Germany, 1 2 Envy, a German national charac- teristic, 66-73 penetrating the world of science, 72,73 Erasmus, D., 164, 172 Ethical code of the ancient Jews not sufficient for modern needs, 207 education, the result of sec- tarian teaching in schools upon, 204, 205 example of the State in official action, the, 263, 264 teaching to be effective must pass through character, 264, 265 work by priests, the good done by, is undeniable, 205, 206 Ethics and Law, their interaction, 212 their relation one to the other, 211, 212 religion, the difference of their essential mental attitudes, 20 1, 202 cannot replace religion, 350 leads to religion, 347, 350, 351 Nietzsche's impeachment of the existing, 193, 194 recognition of the high position of teachers of, 259-261 social and political, origin of, 116-18 relation of, 137 the concern of the State in, has only been shown in social legis- lation of a material kind, 257 the necessarily logical literary treatment of, opposed to emo- tional and mystical manner appropriate to the religious spirit, 242, 243 the need for the reconstruction of, 198, 199, 239-46 the teaching of, in schools, 204, 205, 257 treatises on, confined to the foundations and abstract prin- ciples, 256 see also Morals Evolution, the need of conscious, 243 Family, the, 127, 128, 133, 219- 21, 226-8, 266-70 Federation of States, insufficient to abolish war, 152, 153 Finance, 287, 288 France, i, 8, 10, u, 17, 18, 51, 52, 67, 69, 81, 82, 98, 142 Frederick, Emperor, 25, 26 Free Trade, 96, 98, 99 Fuchs, Dr. W., 25 Generosity to the weak, 290 Gentleman, the, 278-312 German claim to disinterested- ness, 10 colonies in South American States, 101 commercial penetration of foreign countries, 96, 97 emigration, 97 expansion, 1 3 ignorance of French and English literature and art, 18, 19 Imperialism, 96-8 Kultur, 14-18, 21, 22, 48, 51, 52, 55, 93-5. 97, 98, 101. 102, 182 Nietzsche's estimate of, 182, 183 pre-eminence in certain depart- ments of culture, 16, 17 streberthum, 5, 15, 21-3, 47 Germanenthum, 50-3 Germany, absence of sense of fair play in, 65 class hatred in, 70-2 decline of Idealism in, 47, 49, 50 envy a national characteristic of, 66-73 penetrating the world of science in, 72, 73 French and English Govern- ment publications on the war forbidden in, 19 growth of Chauvinism in, 41, 85, i<>3 reasons for, 64-6 growth of Commercialism and Materialism in, 76-8 growth of Militarism in, 7, 41 growth of money-greed in, 72, 73 modern, Nietzsche's share in the making of, 181, 182 moral decline of, 43 old contrasted with the new, xii, 21-40, 73-6 the old, 21-40; the aristo- cratic class of, 33, 36 ; the artisan and labourer of, 38, 39 ; the educational system of, 26-9 ; 430 INDEX the men of science and learn- ing of, 36, 37 ; the tradesmen and shopkeepers of, 37, 38 ; typical ruler in, 29-33 Germany, political education of the people of, checked by Bis- marck, 48, 49 Gilchrist Educational Trust, 247- 250 God, duty to, 347-54 Goethe, 182, 254, 255 Greek Colonies, the reaction of their civilisation on the Mother Country, 101 Haeckel, 171 Hague Tribunal, the, 142, 152 Hartmann, E. von, 170, 172, 184, 185 Hay, Colonel John, 100 Helfferich, Soziale Kultur und Volkswohlfahrt wdhrend der ersten 25 Regierungsjahre Wil- helms II, 97 Holland, 98 Home life necessary for the development of obedience and discipline, 227, 228 Honour, barter favours lower standardsof, than commerce, 282 definition of, 278 need for progressive revision of its meaning, 279, 280 Nietzsche has no use for it, 279 the code of, fixed by the dominant class, 281 the man of, 278-82 " How I placed a Concession in London," in Murray's Maga- zine, 396-412 Human society, the perpendicu- lar and horizontal divisions of, 111-14, 135. 137. !38 solidarity, growing conscious- ness of, 109, 1 10 Humanities, the, 291, 299-305 Humanity, Christianity supple- ments Judaism in establishing the central idea of, 230, 231 duties to, 325-7 Huxley, 171, 248 Ibsen, H., 170, 172 Ibsen's teaching chiefly concerned with the relation of the sexes, 172, 173 Idealism, decline of, in Germany, 47. 49, So Idealism, its relation to vanity and self-respect, 331 Illimitable, the, predicated by limi- tation, 348, 349 Imperfection in man predicates perfection, 348, 349 Impersonal duties, 328-30 Improvement in working pro- cesses, immoral to impede, 338 Individualism to be reconciled with Socialism, 325, 326 Individuality, false conceptions of, 138, 139 the enemies of, 140 Industries destroyed by inven- tions of new processes, 337-9 Inequality with liberty and fra- ternity, 327 Inge, Dean, " Patriotism " in The Quarterly Review, 115, 144 Instincts not bad but needing control, 240 International Court, backed by adequate power, the only safe- guard of peace, 153, 154; see also Amphyctionic Council relations, conception of, 86-99 Internationalism, x Inventions throw many workers out of employment, 337-9 Italy, i, 51, 52, 56 J' Accuse, 60-2, 97 Jansey, Vicomte de, 81 Japan, 98, 141 sense of honour in, 281 Jebb, Sir Richard, 250 Jewish ancient ethical code not sufficient for modern needs, 207 religion and ritual, their effects upon morals, 209-11 Jews, the, 52, 94, 95, 106-8 Johnson, Dr., 115 Journalists, Address to Congress of German, 141, 142 Kant, Immanuel, 60, 122, 152, 187 Kierkegaard, 195 Kovalevsky, Prof., 252 Labour organisations, interna- tional tendencies of, 6, 104, 105, 108 Lassalle, F., 170 Latin, its reinstatement as a universal language, 164-7 Law and Ethics, their interaction, 212 INDEX 43i Law and Ethics, their relation one to the other, 211, 212 incredible to the savage that personal or tribal conflict should ever be superseded by, 148 Le Bon, Gustave, L'Homme et les Societes, 185 Legislation, social, 322, 323 Lewes, G. H., 252 Liberty, Fraternity, and Inequal- ity, 327 Liliencron, Unsurmountable Anti- pathy, 70, 71' Limitation predicates the illimit- able, 348, 349 Living, the art of, 18, 274-7, 369 Love, Christianity supplements Judaism in establishing the central idea of, 230, 231 the central force in man and nature, 229, 230, 234, 235 Loyalty, a virtue in itself, often perverted, 121 corporate and individual, neces- sity of continuous testing of, 125 sectarian and partisan, 123, 319, 320 to the body corporate, the abuse of, 120-31; the danger of exaggerating, 122 to the individual, the abuse of, 121, 127, 128 Luther, Martin, 172 Machiavelli, II Principe, 280 Maeterlinck, 171 Manners, importance of good, 291-6, 306 M. Bergson on good, 292-6 Marx, Karl, 170, 251, 252, 254 Materialism, growth of, in Ger- many, 76-8 Maxwell, In Cotton Wool, 228 Mazzini, 88 Meath, Lord, 227 Meredith, G., The Eoist, 228 Militarism, an enemy of indi- viduality, 140 defined, 41 England's danger of con- tagion from, 44 in modern Germany, 7, 41 leads to bullying, 66 versus democracy, 6, 7 Mill, J. S., 171 Modern life, the establishment of 29 the facts and needs of, as a basis for ethics, 243 Moltke, Field-Marshal von, 60 Money -greed, growth of, in Ger- many, 72, 73 Moral injunctions, discrimination between, when clashing, 258 Moral principles, Nietzsche's his- toric criticism of, 195, 196 sense, the, to create such and make it effective the whole aim of education, 226 the refinement and develop- ment of, 234 teaching, the absence of proper, 256 usurped by the churches, prevented the development of codes, 209 Morality, moral self-dependence the standard of effective, 332-4 the inadequacy of sectarian, 201, 203 Morals, elementary text-books of, 257 the codification of modern, 200-7, 209, 213, 241, 256 the difficulties in the way of, 242 the reasons why we have not hitherto had it, 201,209 see also Ethics Morris, William, 171 Moses, the teaching of, 198, 208-24 Mugwump, the, 321 Murray's Magazine, " How I placed a Concession in London," 289 Napoleon I, 88, 228 Nationalism, the racial founda- tion of, 89 the wrong and the right, 132-43 Natural instincts, the following of, leads to the dissolution of human society, 225 Newman, Cardinal J. H., The Idea of a University, 299, 300 Nietzsche, 98, 167, 170-99, 225, 239, 240, 243, 279 an idealist in spite of his opposition to idealism, 175 Dawn of Day, 180 Ecce Homo, 176, 178-80, 183 his aristocratic tendency, 194, 195. r 97 his estimate of German Kultitr, 182, 183 432 INDEX Nietzsche, his historic criticism of moral principles, 195, 196 his impeachment of the existing ethics, 193, 194 his misunderstanding of Dar- win, 187-91 his opposition to the State, 183, 184 his real achievement, 197 his share in the making of modern Germany, 181, 182 his share in the present war, 182, 184, 185 his superman the idealisation of the physiological, excluding the moral and social 176-81, 225 , the monstrosity of, 196 his truthfulness, 174, 175, 197 limitations of his idealism in constructing the superman, 176-81 the inspiration for his super- man derived from Siegfried, 173 the obtrusion of his own per- sonality, 174, 178 The Will to Power, 187 Thoughts out of Season, 195 Thus spake Zarathustra, 181, 183, 185, 186, 189, 190 Nippold, Prof., Der Deutsche Chau- vinismus, 8, 14, 25 Nobushige, Hozumi, Ancestor-wor- ship and Japanese Law, 353 Non-social duties, 328-30 Norway, 98 Open Door, international princi- ple of the, 96, 98, 100 Pacifist agitation out of place during the present struggle, vii Party politics, 318-21 Patent laws, 284, 285, 288, 289 Patriotism and Cosmopolitanism, co-ordination of, 130, 131 as national vanity, 102-4 neither ethnographical nor geographical, 112-14 the duty of, 315 the nobility of, 63, 115 what it is, 1 1 5-19 Peace, international, a certainty of the future, vii Perfection predicated by man's imperfection, 348, 349 Picturesqueness of poverty, 138, 139 Plato, 192, 242-46, 279, 330 and Christ reconciled, 327 as representing rational and practical idealism, 245, 246** Priests, the good ethical work done by, is undeniable, 205, 206 Pythagoras, 350 Racial unity cannot be claimed for any nation, 89-93 Rajon, Paul, 308 Rathenau, Herr, 14 Recreation as a means of educa- tion, 261-3 Referendum, the, 321 Religion and Ethics, the difference of their essential mental atti- tudes, 20 1, 202 cannot be replaced by Ethics, Science, or Art, 350 Religions, inherent opposition to change in all, 202, 204 Religious emotions, how and where to cultivate, 353 feelings, emotional and aesthetic education of, 351 ideals, duty of truthfulness to, 347. 349 Renaissance of Italy, 102 Renan, Ernest, 134-6, 140, 171 Reptilicnfond, the, 54-7 Roosevelt, President, 141 Ruskin, John, 115, 139, 140, 171, 174 Russia, I, 8-13, 53, 56, 91, 100 Russian literature and art, 15, 1 6 Schiemann, Prof., 19 Schiller, 122 Schopenhauer, 170, 172, 183, 187 Schweninger, Dr., 50 Science cannot replace religion, 350 Sectarian teaching in schools, its results upon ethical education, 204, 205 Self, duties to, 331-5 Self-dependence, moral, as stan- dard of effective morality, 332-4 Self-respect, its relation to vanity and idealism, 331 Self-sacrifice in war, 58 Serbia, 9, 10 Sermon on the Mount, the, 232, 238 aimed at a reforma- tion needed at the time it was spoken, 241 INDEX 433 Sermon on the Mount, the, as an advance on Mosaic law implies the need of further advances as conditions change, 241 influenced by the con- gregation to whom it was ad- dressed, 235, 236 intended to supple- ment the commandments, 232 parts of, at variance with modern ethics, 239, 240 Slav and Teuton, 10, n, 52 claims paramount in the Bal- kans, 13 Social legislation, 322, 323 life, degeneration of, in Ger- many, 79-81 reforms, the negative char- acter of, 168-72 responsibility, 276 Socialism, an enemy of individu- ality, 140 to be reconciled with individu- alism, 325, 326 Society respects wealth without considering how it is got, 287 South American Republics, 96-8, 101 Specialist, the, 297, 298 Speculation in modern commerce, dangers of, 283 Spencer, Herbert, 171, 188 Sports and Pastimes productive of the sense of fair play, 276 State, conceptions of the, 86-99, 114, 313 dishonesty towardsthe, 3 16, 3 1 7 duties to the, 313-24 duties to, compared with those to the family, 133 in official actions, the ethical example of the, 263, 264 interrelations between the, and the moral consciousness of its citizens, 313 justification of the existence of the, 132 moral and social ideas of the, 136 Nietzsche's opposition to the, 182, 183 obedience to the, 315, 316 subventions, 42 the, and Ethics, 257 the, as a soul, a spiritual prin- ciple, 134 the, confers distinction on even ill-gotten wealth, 287 State, the, its constitution and laws, 136 the, its duty to alleviate the suffer ing of worker sin industries destroyed by new inventions, 338, 339 the, its problem to reconcile Socialism with Individualism, 3 2 5. 326 the, not an entity apart from and above the people, 87 the practical reality of the ideals of the, 323 the, the national or social idea a compromise, 88 States, federation of, insufficient to abolish war, 152, 153 there is no constraining power to enforce equity between, 146 Stock Exchange, the, 285, 286 Strauss, 171 Superman, the forerunner of the, 190 the, how produced ? 190-3 the, the idealisation of the physiological to the exclusion of the moral and social, 176-81 Sweden, 98 Switzerland, 98 Sympathy, not a substance but a force, 128-30 Tact, 291 Tennyson, Lord, 130 Teuton and Slav, 10, n Things, duties to, 329, 330, 336-46 Tolstoy, 170 Treitschke, 42, 44-6, 88, 98, 150, 182, 183 Turkey, viii, i, 56 United States, the, ix-xi, 19, 100, 101 opportunity to protest against violation of inter- national law missed by, xi Unity of civilisation, 142 Universities, the, 297-305 Voting, wrong to abstain from, 318 Vanity, its relation to self-respect and idealism, 331 Wagner, R., 170, 172-4, 183, 228 Waldstein, C., Address to Congress of German Journalists, 141, 142 " The ^Esthetic Element in the Education of the Individual 434 INDEX and of the Nation," address as reported in The Parents' Review, 413-26 Waldstein, C. , The Balance of Emo- tion and Intellect, 226 Cui Bono ? 343-6 " England and Germany," in The Times, 368-70 The Expansion of Western Ideals, 154-7, 356-66 " The Ideal of a University," in North American Review, 298 The Jewish Question and the Mission to the Jews, 94, 95, 106-8, 135, 271, 278, 309-11, 367, 368, 370-4 " Origin of Nihilism and Pes- simism in Germany," in Nine- teenth Century, 73-6 Specialisation, a Morbid Ten- dency of the A ge, 297 The Political Confessions of a Practical Idealist, 287, 382-95 The Works of John Ruskin, 139, 140 " The World's Changes in the Past Thirty Years," in the New York Times, 378-81 War and the duel, 145, 146, 149-5 1 in civilised opinion an ab- surdity, 2 War neither a physiological, moral, nor social necessity, 145 prospect of, in 1911, 5 survival of the unfittest in, 144, H5 that some good springs from it admitted, 58 the cure of the disease of, 152- 67 the disease of, 144-51 the glorification of, 57-62 the paradox of, 142, 143 the unjustness of, 145, 146 the present, combatants often of the same race, 112, 113 French and English Government publications on, forbidden in Germany, 19 Germany fixes the most favourable date for, 8, 9 its cause, i neither England, France, nor Russia the primary aggres- sor, 9, 10 Nietzsche's share in, 182, 184, 185 Wealth, society and the State confer distinction on even ill- gotten, 287 Will to power, the, 186, 187 Work, concentration in, 336 Printed by Hazcll, V.'atson & Viney, Ld., London ar.l Aylesbury, Englan.i. 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