BOOKS OF THE DAY

PAGE

Morals and Politics (The Very Rev. W. R. Inge, 8o9

The Lion and the Fox (Richard Freund) ..

8 to A Modern Stockmar (E. F. Benson) .. 8to The Martyrdom of Spain (Archibald Lyall) . . • 811 The Complete Pacifist (Mary Agnes Hamilton) • 812 Edward Lear (Evelyn Waugh) .. • 813 The National Capital (Honor Croome) 814

PAG1

A Tour to the Hebrides (Kenneth Muir) .. .. . .

814

John Tiptoft (A. L. Rowse) .. .. .. . . 816 The Sonnets of Shakespeare and Southampton (W. J.

Lawrence) .. • • 818 Fiction (Kate O'Brien) . • 820 Scottish Books .. • • 822 The May Magazines 838

MORALS AND POLITICS

By W. R. INGE

THE title of this book accurately describes its contents. It is too long for a handbook, and not too technical for the general reader. Each chapter is followed by a short biblio- graphy, and the chief moral and political theories are discussed in turn. The author tells us quite plainly what his own convictions are ; the book is no colourless essay.

As might be expected from Mr. Joad's other writings— and from his choice of a publisher—he belongs definitely to the Left wing in politics. But he is also a Platonist, and a Liberal. It is refreshing to find a writer who says bluntly that the State is "a necessary nuisance," and that the sole business of politics, though not the sole end of life, is to promote happiness.

As a Platonist, he holds that there are certain ends, namely truth and beauty, which have an intrinsic value apart from human consciousness. The third ultimate value, moral goodness, and happiness, which he adds as a fourth, are, he thinks, states of human consciousness. I do not entirely agree. The contents of the sense of duty no doubt have this character ; but the concept of the " ought " is, I should say, superpersonal, and belongs to the same class as truth and beauty. As for happiness, it is not so much a fourth ultimate value as the state of mind which accompanies our " participa- tion " in any of the other three.

How did it come about that the close association of social or political and of private ethics, which was almost assumed as a matter of course by Plato and Aristotle, was in later thought ignored or repudiated ? For Plato, the State was the individual writ large. What is good for the hive is good for the bec, as Marcus Aurelius said ; and vice versa. Mr. Joad thinks that what he calls the " split " was the work of Christianity, which first taught the absolute worth of the individual soul. I should rather say that at the time when Europe became Christian the idea of the State was eclipsed ; there was no longer any " Polis " for a man to serve. In the West especially, feudalism took the place of the old patriotism, and obedience to the Church of respect to "the gods of the City."

But at the Renaissance, when nationalism began its long and disastrous career, State-worship came out of its retreat, and came out roaring. In Machiavelli, Hobbes, and Bacon it is not enough to say that there are two moral standards, public and private. Foreign politics are handed over to blatant immoralism. And yet it was not till the flowering time of German idealism that the doctrine that reasons of State override all considerations of right and wrong—a doctrine which Machiavelli rather noted cynically as the accepted practice than justified by theory—was openly accepted by thinkers of the highest reputation. The influence of Fichte and Hegel, especially the latter, was very strong in Victorian England. The State is almost deified by T. H. Green and Bernard Bosanquet, who were quite blind to the sinister developments which such teaching might logically assume. Some of our thinkers exalted the State against the individual in the interests of socialism ; they never guessed that they might live to see the God-State embodied in an individual dictator, and aggressive war glorified as a noble enterprise.

Admirers of Plato have often been made uncomfortable by

Guide to the Philosophy of Morals and Politics. By C. E. M. Joad. (Gollancz. 6s.) the close resemblance between his ideal Republic and the post- War totalitarian States. Apologists for Fascism have not been slow to claim that Hitler and Mussolini have brought down Plato's Republic from heaven to earth. What are the Duce and the Fiihrer but philosopher-kings, chosen because of their fitness to rule, and obeyed unquestioningly by subjects who acknowledge their superior wisdom ? They are not tyrants, because they are obeyed willingly. Philosophers they are ; they have certain ideologies, which they carry out in action with the ruthless driving force of men who know their own minds. Opposition is crushed ; would not Plato have crushed it ? Education is twisted to serve one political end ; this also is Platonic ; we remember his terrible "indelible dye." Scholarship, philosophy, and art are muzzled. Did not Plato wish to banish the poets ? A close parallel to Plato's guardians might be found in the ruling Parcel of Hitler and the repeatedly winnowed elite of Communists in Russia. Except that in Plato we cannot find anything like fanatical nationalism or racialism, the parallel is closer than many of us will relish.

And yet we ought not to be blind to the great services which Mussolini and Hitler have rendered to their countries. Mr. Joad tries to hold the scales fairly in his discussion of democracy, of which he still has hopes ; but he does not quite appreciate all the reasons which have helped to discredit it. Plato's great discovery was that unless the power of the purse is taken Out of the hands of those who would be tempted to abuse it, a State will not be justly or wisely governed. This is the principle of the totalitarian State, and so far, those who have the power have not used it to fill their own pockets, in Italy, in Germany, or even in Russia. Under a democracy politics is little more than competitive mass-bribery ; and though those who think that wealth is now too unevenly distributed may acquiesce in democracy as the best instrument for rectifying excessive inequal- ities, no one could maintain that a democratic government is likely to be just to minorities, or that it is likely to place power in the hands of the best and wisest men. It is significant that in all democratic countries politics is looked upon as a rather dirty trade, and that the most respectable of our Cabinet Ministers do not receive a tithe of the veneration which is lavished on Mussolini and Hitler, and even on such merciless ruffians as Kemal Ataturk and Stalin.

"Power always corrupts, and absolute power absolutely corrupts. All great men are bad." Such was Lord Acton's conclusion after a lifetime devoted to the study of history. But we cannot escape by putting little men in their place. They are no better, and less intelligent.

Mr. Joad thinks that the existence of independent nations is an irrational survival, and that we must come at last to one great World-State. I can imagine nothing less likely. Just as private property, the family, and religion will always be too strong for Communism, so, I fear, our native pugnacity will defeat any such eminently rational proposals as those of Mr. Joad and Mr. H. G. Wells. But as the British Empire is now a league of nations in being, it does not seem quite impossible that a United States of Europe, a league of independent nations, may some day come into existence. The one thing necessary—I entirely agree with Mr. Joad here—is to make an end of the political irrunoralism which poisons the intercourse of all governments with each other, and to covet for our country only those qualities and those rewards which an honourable man would desire for himself.