and grimaces in honour of the union of the classes. Unfortunately for these great thinkers, things do not happen in this way; violence does not diminish in the proportion that it should diminish according to the principles of advanced sociology. There are, in fact. Socialist scoundrels, who, profiting by middle -class cowardice, entice the masses into a movement which every day becomes less like that which ought to result from the sacrifices consented to by the middle class in order to obtain peace. If they dared, the sociologists would declare that the Socialists cheat and use unfair methods, so httle do the facts come up to their expectations. However, it was only to be expected that the Socialists would not allow themselves to be beaten without having used all the resources which the situation offered them. People who have devoted their life to a cause which they identify with the regeneration of the world, could not hesitate to make use of any weapon which might serve to develop to a greater degree the spirit of the class war, seeing that greater efforts were being made to suppress it. Existing social conditions favour the production of an infinite number of acts of violence, and there has been no hesitation in urging the workers not to refrain from brutality when this might do them service. Philan- thropic members of the middle class having given a kindly reception to members of the syndicates who were willing to come and discuss matters with them, in the hope that these workmen, proud of their aristocratic acquaintances, would give peaceful advice to their comrades, it is not to be wondered their fellow-workmen soon suspected them of treachery when they became upholders of ** social reform." Finally, and this is the most remarkable fact in the whole business, anti-patriotism becomes an essential element of the Syndicalist programme.^ ^ As we consider everything from the historical point of view, it is of small importance to know what reasons were actually in the mind of THE ETHICS OF VIOLENCE 213 The introduction of anti-patriotism into the working- class movement is all the more remarkable because it came just when the Government was about to put its theories about the solidarity of the classes into practice. It was in vain that Leon Bourgeois approached the proletariat with particularly amiable airs and graces; in vain that he assured the workers that capitalist society was one great family, and that the poor had a right to share in the general riches; he maintained that the whole of contemporary legislation was directed towards the appUcation of the principles of solidarity; the proletariat repUed to him by denying the social compact in the most brutal fashion — by denying the duty of patriotism. At the moment when it seemed that a means of suppressing the class war had been found, behold, it springs up again in a particularly displeasing form.^ Thus all the efforts of the worthy progressives only brought about results in fiat contradiction with their aims; it is enough to make one despair of sociology I If they had any common sense, and if they really desired to protect society against an increase of brutality, they would not drive the Socialists into the necessity of adopt- ing the tactics which are forced on them to-day; they would remain quiet instead of devoting themselves to *' social duty "; they would bless the propagandists of the general strike, who, as a matter of fact, endeavour to render the maintenance of Socialism compatible with the minimum of brutality. But these well-intentioned people are not blessed with common sense; and they have yet to suffer many blows, many humiliations, aoid many losses the first apostles of anti-patriotism; reasons of this kind are almost never the right ones; the essential thing is that for the revolutionary workers anti-patriotism appears an inseparable part of Socialism.
^ This propaganda produced results which went far beyond the expectations of its promoters, and which would be inexplicable without the revolutionary idea.
P 2i6 REFLECTIONS ON VIOLENCE of money, before they decide to allow Socialism to follow its own course.
II We must now carry our investigations farther, and enquire what are the motives behind the great aversion felt by moralists for acts of violence; a very brief simimary of a few very curious changes which have taken place in the manners of the working classes is first of all indis- pensable.
A. I observe, in the first place, that nothing is more remarkable than the change which has taken place in the methods of bringing up children; formerly it was believed that the rod was the most necessary instnunent of the schoolmaster; nowadays corporal punishments have disappeared from our public elementary schools. I believe that the competition which the latter had to maintain against the Church schools played a very great part in this progress; the Brothers applied the old principles of clerical pedagogy with extreme severity; and these, as is well known, involve an excessive amount of corporal punishment inflicted for the purpose of taming the demon who prompted so many of the child's bad habits.^ The Government was inteUigent enough to set up in opposition to this barbarous system a milder form of education which brought it a great deal of sympathy; it is not at all improbable that the severity of clerical punishments is largely responsible for the present tumult of hatred against which the Church is struggling with such difficulty. In 1901 I wrote: *' If (the Church) were well advised, it would suppress entirely that part of its activities which is devoted to children; it would do away 1 Cf. Renan, Histoire du peuple d'Jsrael, tome iv. pp. 289 and 296; Y. Guyot, La Morale, pp. 212-215; Alphonse Daudet, Numa Roumestan, chap. iv.
THE ETHICS OF VIOLENCE 217 with its schools and workshops; it would thus do away with the principal sources of anti-clericalism: far from showing any desire to adopt this course, it seems to be its intention to develop these establishments still further, and thus it is laying up for itself still further opportunities for displays of popular hatred for the clergy." ^ What has happened since 1901 surpasses my forecast.
In factories and workshops customs of great brutality formerly existed, especially in those where it was necessary to employ men of superior strength, to whom was given the name of "grosses culottes " (big breeches); in the end these men managed to get entrusted with the task of engaging other men, because " any individual taken on by others was subjected to an infinite number of humiUations and insults "; the man who wished to enter their workshop had to buy them drink, and on the follow- ing day to treat all his fellow- workers. " The notorious Whens it to he? (Quand est-ce?) ^ would be started; every- body gets tipsy...When's it to he? is the devourer of savings; in a workshop where When's it to he? is the custom, you must stand your turn or beware." Denis Poulot, from whom I borrow these details, observes that machinery did away with the prestige of the grosses culottes, who were scarcely more than a memory when he wrote in 1870.^ The manners of the compagnonnages * (a kind of trade « Quand est-ce? This was the question addressed to the new- comer in a workshop, to remind him that according to custom he must pay for drinks all round — " Pay your footing."
» Denis Poulot, Le Sublime, pp. 150-153. I quote from the edition of 1887. This author says that the grosses culottes very much hampered progress in the forges.
* The compagnonnages were very ancient workmen's associations, whose principal purpose was to enable carpenters, joiners, locksmiths, farriers, and others, to make a circular tour round France, in order to learn their trades thoroughly. In the towns on this circuit there was an hotel kept bj' the Mere des • compagnons; the newly arrived 2i8 REFLECTIONS ON VIOLENCE union) were for a long time remarkable for their brutality. Before 1840 there were constant brawls, often ending in bloodshed, between groups with different rites. Martin Saint Leon, in his book oh the compagnonnage, gives extracts from really barbarous songs. ^ Initiation into the lodge was accompanied by the severest tests; young men were treated as if they were pariahs in the " Devoirs de Jacques et de Suhise ": ^ " Compagnons (carpenters) have been known," says Perdiguier, " to call themselves the Scourge of the Foxes (candidates for admission), the Terror of the Foxes...In the provinces, a * fox ' rarely works in the towns; he is himted back, as they say, into the brushwood." ' There were many secessions when the tyranny of the companions came into opposition with the more liberal habits which prevailed in society. When the workers were no longer in need of protection, especially for the purpose of j&nding work, they were no longer so willing to submit to the demands which had formerly seemed to be of little consequence in comparison with the advantages of the compagnonnage. The struggle for work more than once brought candidates into opposi- tion with companions who wished to reserve certain privileges.* We might find still other reasons to explain workman was received there and the older men found him work. The compagnonnages are now in a state of decay.
* Each trade possessed often several rjval associations of workmen, which often engaged each other in bloody combats. Each association was called a Devoir. What was intended by de Jacques and de Subisf has long been forgotten. They are traditional words indicating the rules, and so by extension, the associations which follow these rules.
* In 1823, the companion joiners claimed La Rochelle as theirs, a town which they had for a long time neglected as being of too little importance; they had previously only stopped at Nantes and Bordeaux (Martin Saint-Leon, op. cit. p. 103). L' Union des travailleurs du tour de France was formed in 1830 to 1832 as a rival organisation to the THE ETHICS OF VIOLENCE 219 the decline of an institution which, while rendering many important services, had contributed very much to main- taining the idea of brutahty.
Everybody agrees that the disappearance of these old brutalities is an excellent thing. From this opinion it was so easy to pass to the idea that all violence is an evil, that this step was bound to have been taken; and, in fact, the great mass of the people, who are not accustomed to thinking, have come to this conclusion, which is accepted nowadays as a dogma by the bleating herd of moralists. They have not asked themselves what there is in brutahty which is reprehensible.
When we no longer remain content with current stupidity we discover that our ideas about the disappear- ance of violence depend much more on a very important transformation which has taken place in the criminal world than on ethical principles. I shall endeavour to prove this.
B. Middle-class scientists are very chary of touching on anything relating to the dangerous classes; ^ that is one of the reasons why their observations on the history of morals always remain superficial; it is not very difficult to see that it is a knowledge of these classes which alone enables us to penetrate the mysteries of the moral thought of peoples.
The dangerous classes of past times practised the simplest form of offence, that which was nearest to hand, that which is nowadays left to groups of young scoundrels without experience and without judgment. Offences of brutahty seem to us nowadays something abnormal; so cotnpagnonnage, following the refusals with which the latter had met a few rather modest demands for reforms presented by the candidates for election (pp. 108-116, 126, 131).
1 On March 30, 1906, Monis said in the Senate: " We cannot write in a legal text that prostitution exists in France for both sexes."
220 REFLECTIONS ON VIOLENCE much so, that when the brutaUty has been great we often ask ourselves whether the culprit is in possession of all his senses. This transformation has evidently not come about because criminals have become moral, but because they have changed their method of procedure to suit the new economic conditions, as we shall see farther on. This change has had the greatest influence on popular thought.
We all know that by using brutality, associations of criminals manage to maintain excellent discipline among themselves. When we see a child ill-treated we instinc- tively suppose that its parents have criminal habits. The methods used by the old schoolmasters, which the ecclesi- astical houses persist in preserving, are those of vagabonds who steal children to make clever acrobats or interesting beggars of them. Everything which reminds us of the habits of dangerous classes of former times is extremely odious to us.
There is a tendency for the old ferocity to be replaced by cunning, and many sociologists believe that this is a real progress. Some philosophers who are not in the habit of following the opinions of the herd, do not see exactly how this constitutes progress, from the point of view of morals: '* If we are revolted by the cruelty, by the brutality of past times," says Hartmann, ** it must not be forgotten that uprightness, sincerity, a lively sentiment of justice, pious respect before holiness of morals char- acterised the ancient peoples; while nowadays we see predominant lies, duplicity, treachery, the spirit of chicane, the contempt for property, disdain for instinctive probity and legitimate customs — the value of which is not even understood.^ Robbery, deceit, and fraud * Hartmann here bases his statements on the authority of the English naturalist Wallace, who has greatly praised the simplicity of life among the Malays; there must surely be a considerable element of exaggeration in this praise, although other travellers have made similar observations about some of the tribes of Sumatra. Hartmann wishes THE ETHICS OF VIOLENCE 221 increase in spite of legal repression more rapidly than brutal and violent crimes, like pillage, murder, and rape, etc., decrease. Egoism of the basest kind shamelessly breaks the sacred bonds of the family and friendship in every case in which these oppose its desires." ^ At the present time money losses are generally looked upon as accidents to which we are constantly exposed and easily made good again, while bodily accidents are not so easily reparable. Fraud is therefore regarded as infinitely less serious than brutality; criminals benefit from this change which has come about in legal sentences.
Our penal code was drawn up at a time when the citizen was pictured as a rural proprietor occupied solely with the administration of his property, as a good family man, saving to secure an honourable position for his children; large fortunes made in business, in politics, or by specula- tion were rare and were looked on as real monstrosities; the defence of the savings of the middle classes was one of the first concerns of the legislator. The previous judicial system had been still more severe in the punish- ment of fraud, for a royal declaration of August 5, 1725, punished a fraudulent bankrupt with death; it would be difiicult to imagine anything further removed from our customs. We are now inclined to consider that offences of this sort can, as a rule, only be committed as the result of the imprudence of the victims, and that it is only exceptionally that they deserve severe penalties; we, on the contrary, content ourselves with light punishment.
In a rich community where business is on a very large scale, and in which everybody is wide awake in defence of his own interests, as in America, crimes of fraud never have the same consequences as in a community which is forced to practise rigid economy; as a matter of fact, to show that there is no progress towards happiness, and this pre- occupation leads him to exaggerate the happiness of the ancients. * Hartmann, Philosophy of the Unconscious, French trans., pp. 464-465.
292 REFLECTIONS ON VIOLENCE these crimes seldom cause a serious and lasting disturbance in the economic system; it is for this reason that Americans put up with the excesses of their politicians and financiers with so little complaint. P. de Rousiers compares the American to the captain of a ship who, during a dangerous voyage, has no time to look after his thieving cook. " When you point out to Americans that they are being robbed by their politicians, they usually reply, ' Of course we are quite aware of that! But as long as business is good and politicians do not get in the way, it will not be very difficult for them to escape the punishment they deserve.' " * In Europe also, since it has become easy to gain money, ideas, analogous to those current in America, have spread among us. Great company promoters have been able to escape pimishment because in their hour of success they were clever enough to make friends in all circles. We have finally come to believe that it would be extremely unjust to condemn bankrupt merchants and lawyers who retire ruined after moderate catastrophes, while the princes of financial swindling continue to lead gay lives. Gradu- ally the new industrial system has created a new and extraordinary indulgence for all crimes of fraud in the great capitalist countries.* In those countries where the old parsimonious and non- speculative family economy still prevails, the relative estimation of acts of fraud and acts of brutality has not followed the same evolution as in America, England, and France; this is why Germany has preserved so many of the customs of former times,^ and does not feel the same ^ De Rousiers, La Vie amSricaine: I' Education et la socUU, p. 217.
« Several small countries have adopted these ideas, thinking by such imitation to reach the greatness of the large countries.
" It must be noticed that in Germany there are so many Jews in the world of speculation that American ideas do not spread very easily. The majority look upon the speculator as a foreigner who is robbing the nation.
THE ETHICS OF VIOLENCE 223 horror that we do for brutal punishments; these never seem to them, as they do to us, only suitable to the most dangerous classes.
Many philosophers have protested against this mitiga- tion of sentences; after what we have related earlier about Hartmann, we shall expect to meet him among those who protest. " We are already," he says, " approaching the time when theft and lying condemned by law will be despised as vulgar errors, as gross clumsiness, by the clever cheats who know how to preserve the letter of the law while infringing the rights of other people. For my part, I would much rather live amongst the ancient Germans, at the risk of being killed on occasion, than be obliged, as I am in modem cities, to look on every man as a swindler or a rogue imless I have evident proofs of his honesty." ^ Hartmann takes no account of economic conditions; he argues from an entirely personal point of view, and never looks at what goes on roimd him. Nobody to-day wants to run the risk of being slain by ancient Germans; fraud or a theft are very easily reparable.
C. Finally, in order to get to the heart of contemporary thought on this matter, it is necessary to examine the way in which the public judges the relations existing between the State and the criminal associations. Such relations have always existed; these associations, after having practised violence, have ended by employing craft alone, or at least their acts of violence have become somewhat exceptional.
Nowadays we should think it very strange if the magistrates were to put themselves at the head of armed bands, as they did in Rome during the last years of the Republic. In the course of the Zola trial, the Anti-Semites recruited bands of paid demonstrators, who were com- missioned to manifest patriotic indignation; the Govem- * Haxtmann, loc. cit., p. 465.
224 REFLECTIONS ON VIOLENCE ment of M61ine protected these antics, which for some months had considerable success and helped considerably in hindering a fair revision of the sentence on Dreyfus.
I believe that I am not mistaken in saying that these tactics of the partisans of the Church have been the principal cause of all the measures directed against Catholicism since 1901; the middle-class liberals would never have accepted these measures if they had not still been under the influence of the fear they had felt during the Dreyfus affair. The chief argument which Clemenceau used to stir up his followers to fight against the Church was that of fear; he never ceased to denounce the danger which the Republic ran in the continued existence of the Romish faction; the laws about the congregations, about education and the administration of the churches were made with the object of preventing the Catholic party again taking up its former warlike attitude, which Anatol France so often compared to that of the League; ^ they were laws inspired by fear. Many Conservatives felt this so strongly that they regarded with displeasure the resistance recently opposed to the inventories of churches; they considered that the employment of bands of pious apaches would make the middle classes still more hostile to their cause. ^ It was not a little surprising to see Brunetiere, who had been one of the admirers of the anti- Dreyfus apaches, advise submission; this was because experience had enlightened him as to the consequences of violence.
1 [The League was a political organisation directed by the partisans of the Due de Guise against the Protestants; it resisted Henri IV. for a considerable time. — Trans. Note.]
« At a meeting of the Municipal Council of Paris on March 26, 1906, the Prefect of Police said that the resistance was organised by a com- mittee sitting at 86. rue de Richelieu, which hired pious apaches at between three and four francs a day. He asserted that fifty-two Parisian cures had promised him either to facilitate the inventories or to be content with a merely passive resistance. He accused the Catholic politicians of having forced the hands of the clergy.
THE ETHICS OF VIOLENCE 225 Associations which work by craft provoke no such reactions in the public; in the time of the " clerical republic," ^ the society of Saint Vincent de Paul was an excellent centre of surveillance over officials of every order and grade; it is not surprising, then, that free- masonry has been able to render services to the Radical Government of exactly the same kind as those which Catholic philanthropy was able to render to former Governments. The history of recent spying scandals has shown very plainly what the point of view of the country actually was.
When the nationalists obtained possession of the docu- ments containing information about officers of the army, which had been compiled by the dignitaries of the masonic lodges, they believed that their opponents were lost; the panic which prevailed in the Radical camp for some time seemed to justify their hopes, but before long the democracy showed only derision for what they called the " petty virtue " of those who publicly denounced the methods of General Andr^ and his accomplices. In those difficult days Henry Berenger showed that he understood admirably the ethical standards of his contemporaries; he did not hesitate to approve of what he called the " legitimate supervision of the governing classes exercised by the organisations of the vanguard "; he denounced the cowardice of the Government which had " allowed those who had undertaken the difficult task of opposing the military caste and the Roman Church, of examining and denouncing them, to be branded as informers " {Action, Oct. 31, 1904); he loaded with insults the few Dreyfusards who dared to show their indignation; the attitude of Joseph Reinach appeared particularly scandalous to him; in his opinion the latter should have felt himself extremely honoured by being tolerated in the ** League of the Rights of Man," which had decided at last to lead " the good 1 \I.e. in the time when MacMahon was President. — Trans. Note.]
226 REFLECTIONS ON VIOLENCE fight for the defence of rights of the citizen, sacrificed too long to those of one man " [Action, Dec. 12, 1904). Finally, a law of amnesty was voted declaring that no one wanted to hear anything more of these trifles.
There was some opposition in the provinces,* but was it very serious? I am inclined to think not, when I read the documents published by Peguy in the ninth number of the sixth series of his Cahiers de la quinzaine. Several people, accustomed to speaking a verbose, sonorous, and nonsensical language, doubtless found themselves a Uttle imcomfortable under the smiles of the leading grocers and eminent chemists who constituted the ^lite of the lesimed and musical societies before which they had been accustomed to hold forth on Justice, Truth, and Light. They found it necessary to adopt a stoical attitude.
Could anything be finer than this passage from a letter of Professor Bougie, an eminent doctor of social science, which I find on page 13: "I am very happy to learn that at last the League is going to speak. Its silence astonishes and frightens us." He must be a man who is easily astonished and frightened! Francis de Pressens6 also suffered some anxiety of mind — he is a specialist in that kind of thing — but his feelings were of a very distinguished kind, as is only proper for an aristocratic Socialist; he was afraid that democracy was threatened with a new guillotine seche,^ resembling that which had done so much harm to virtuous democrats during the Panama scandal.^ When he saw that the public quietly accepted * The people in the provinces are not, as a matter of fact, so accustomed as the Parisians are to indulgence towards non-violent trickery and brigandage.
" [" Dry guillotine," popular expression meaning persecution — Trans.]
* Cahiers de la quinzaine 9th of the Vlth series, p. 9. F. de Pressensfe was at the time of the Panama affair H^brard's principal clerk; we know that the latter was one of the principal beneficiaries from the Panama booty, but that has not injured his position in the eyes of the austere Huguenots; the Temps continues to be the organ of moderate democracy and of the ministers of the Gospel.
THE ETHICS OF VIOLENCE 227