From Communism to Christocracy
Christocracy. By John Middleton Murry. (Andrew Dakers. 6s.)
THERE are some people whose gift it is to "see life steadily and see it whole "—in Matthew Arnold's well-worn phrase ; there are others endowed with a gift of another kind ; certain aspects or elements of the world evoke in them a strong emotional reaction which fills the field of their consciousness. I think we should rightly regard Mr. Middleton Murry as belonging to the second class. He is a pacifist, and to most of us pacifists seem to be so possessed with the evil of war that they disregard those other factors of the situation which prevent us from taking the pacifist position. But it is lamentable if we engage in war without having present in our consciousness those evils connected with war which the pacifist exclusively sees, without our feeling strongly about them even if, in practice, our feeling has to compound with other considerations. Only we must hold, if we are not ourselves pacifists, that it would be unfortunate if the pacifists in our country were more than a minority.
Mr. Murry in this book, however, sets himself a task of some awkwardness and delicacy. While he in no way retracts his thorough-going pacifism, he recognises that he cannot expect the public whom he addresses to take that position, and the course he recommends is accordingly a kind of second best which those who will not be pacifists might, he thinks, follow with advantage. Two main ideas seem at present to occupy his mind. One is the precious- ness of "toleration;" threatened by all totalitarian forms of govern- ment: the other is the decentralisation which would allow the life of peoples to be carried on in relatively small local communities, subject indeed for certain purposes to some central authority, but yet with a social life of their own, producing locally for their needs many things now produced in the mass by huge congested industrial centres. Personally, I find myself very warmly in sympathy with Mr. Murry in regard to both these ideas. If the world is to be anything but a nightmare in days to come, there must be in the communities of men freedom for enquiry and criticism, for the utterance of honest individual opinion Totalitarian Gleichschakung is altogether hateful. How far his vision of small local democratic societies is realisable I do not know ; it would seem to require an extensive movement of mind, throughout great masses of men, which perhaps no individual could generate ; but I should say for myself that, if it is realisable, there is hope of a somewhat better world.
EDWYN BEVAN.
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