THE PSYCHOLOGY OF QUISLINGS
SIR,—The truly horrible fact that Hitler seems to be able to find native-born traitors to betray every nation he invades points to a conclusion of great importance for the future. It is that Nationalism is not the supremely powerful force of today, but that it is on the wane. What really counts today is whether a man is for or against this new thing called Authoritarianism, and this loyalty takes precedence of all others. For its sake the Hitters and Mussolinis will betray their countries by ruining them just as readily as the Quislings. To run in one's mind through the list of those who have already betrayed their countries, of those who might perhaps try it here, and of those who for the past nine months of war have willingly and consistently lent themselves to become the microphones of Hitler's propaganda, is to see that all, whether of Right or Left, have one characteristic in common. They all admire Authoritarianism as such, and they all sneer at Liberty and the Democracy which tries to protect it.
The great variety of the circles from which Quislings are drawn shows that no one can wisely suppose that he is utterly immune from this temptation. The disease is in the air, and therefore we should guard ourselves against its early and almost unperceived symptoms. They consist, I believe, in a certain sus- pension of moral judgement in favour of a cause which engages our passions. It is seen whenever I take a plainly good thing and call it bad because my enemies do it, or, more commonly, when I say of a plainly bad thing that it is good because my cause benefits by it. The Gospel has something to say about this blindness. It calls it the Sin against the Holy Ghost.— Yours faithfully, ROGER LLOYD. Cheyney Court, The Close, Winchester.
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