with the gentleman who has elected to call himself "Anatole France", and
who writes under that name. The real patronym of M. "Anatole France" is, I
am informed, Monsieur Chaussepied, which interpreted into English means
"Mr. Shoe-horn". It is unnecessary to state that Hector France is content
with his own name, and would not have changed it even had it been less
noble than it really is, believing with us that a man's work are sufficient
title to nobility, however odd may be the cognomen bequeathed him from
bygone sires.
The appearance of this book in English will prove a godsend to Protestants
who may see in it only an attack on Catholicism. Let them hug no such
flattering unction to their souls. M. Hector France is no savage iconoclast
gone mad with sectarian hatred. He recognizes the good in all religions as
answering a temporary need in the evolution of Humanity, and for none has
he a more profound respect than the Catholic Church. Indeed the pomp and
magnificence, the architectural grandeur, the vast learning, wealth and
influence of this institution appeal to the imagination of both ignorant
and cultured alike. The aim of the distinguished writer of the "Grip of
Desire" is far removed from that of vulgar and gratuitous image-breaking.
He seeks to show the danger to human character that comes through meddling
with one of the most imperious of natural instincts. If in the
"Chastisement of Mansour" he bodies forth the consequences of unbridled
Libertinism, in the "Grip of Desire" he demonstrates the evils attendant on
a life of forced Celibacy. In the first we have the autocratic Reign of the
Flesh, in the second the Subjection of legitimate Carnal Desire.
The union of the female to the male is a law of Nature, as solid as the
granite bases of the world. No normally constituted man can disregard that
law without doing violence to himself and to his kind.
Kant says: "Man and woman constitute, when united, the whole and entire
being, one sex completes the other."
Schopenhauer asserts: "The sexual impulse is the most complete expression
of the will to live, in other words, it is the concentration of all
volition." And in another passage: "The affirmation of the will to live
concentrates itself in the act of procreation, which is its most positive
expression." Mainländer gives utterance to the opinion when he says: "The
sexual impulse is the centre of gravity for human existence. It alone
secures to the individual the life which he above all desires ... man
devotes himself more seriously to the business of procreation than to any
other; in the achievement of nothing else does he condense and concentrate
the intensity of his will in so remarkable a manner as in the act of
generation." And before all those, Buddha wrote: "Sexual desire is sharper
than the hook with which wild elephants are tamed; hotter than flame; it is
like an arrow that is shot into the heart of man."
The present work, if it teach anything at all, teaches that Celibacy is a
crime, and the Mother of crime, just as a venomous plant is a producer of
poison. The needs of his organization torment the single man until he robs
from others that which he lacks. Hence Seduction, Rape, Adultery, the
Invasion of trouble into families, and furious Jealousies with all their
prolific brood of Wrong-doing and Woe.
This is not the place to praise or to blame the book before us. Each man
will judge it according to his individual tastes, temperament and
character. The embryonic, thin-lipped man may consider it bold, far too
outspoken. The full-blooded reader more conversant with the realities of
life, will be inclined to look upon it with larger charity, having regard
to what the Author has _refrained from saying_, rather than to what he has
said.
"At the outset," says Camille Lemonnier, himself a well-known writer,
"these pages are conspicuously chaste; Temptation takes the form of
Mystical Sensuality, at first beaten back and then surging forwards
victorious; then, as the fire of passion grows more intense, the lamp of
the tabernacle dies gradually out; and Humanity, with the unchaining of
instinct, breaks forth, cries and howls like a mad gorilla from his cage."
Here again we witness the triumph of Eve; entangled in her long, flaxen
tresses she sweeps away the sinner's conscience, and while the Church
closes the door against them both, Nature opens out wide her own with a
kindly,
"Come in, my Children."
CHARLES CARRINGTON.
PARIS, 1st JUNE, 1898.
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