It was the first day of the New Year. Between two showers Monsieur
Bergeret and his daughter Pauline wended their way along the streets
still covered with fresh golden mud, to wish the compliments of the
season to a maternal aunt of Monsieur Bergeret’s who still survived,
but lived alone, if living it could be called, in a little Beguine’s
cell which stood in a kitchen garden, amid the sound of convent bells.
Pauline was happy without a reason simply because holidays such as
these, which marked the flight of time, made her the more conscious of
the delightful progress of her young life.
On this solemn day Monsieur Bergeret still observed his customary
indulgence, no longer expecting much good from his fellow-creatures
or from life itself, but knowing, like Monsieur Fagon, that one must
forgive nature a great deal. All along the road beggars of every
description, standing upright like candlesticks, or spread out like
temporary altars, formed the decorations of this social fête. They
had all come to help to adorn the bourgeois quarters, all our poor
unfortunates, lame, halt and blind; crooks, tramps, pickpockets,
malingerers, rogues, and hardened ruffians. Yielding, however, to the
general tendency to obliterate individual character, and to conform
with the universal mediocrity of manners, they did not expose to view
horrible malformations and ghastly sores as in the days of the great
Coësre. They did not bind their mutilated limbs with blood-stained
rags; they were modest and affected only endurable infirmities. One
of them hobbled nimbly after Monsieur Bergeret for some considerable
distance. Then he stopped and took up his position once more like a
lamp-post on the edge of the pavement. After which Monsieur Bergeret
remarked to his daughter:
“I have just committed a wicked action; I have given alms. In giving
a couple of sous to Monsieur Hobbler I tasted the shameful joy of
humiliating my fellow-man. I was a partner to the odious pact that
gives power to the strong and leaves the weak in their weakness. I have
sealed with my own seal the injustice of ages and contributed my share
to depriving this man of one half of his soul.”
“You’ve done all that, papa?” asked Pauline incredulously.
“Almost all that,” replied Monsieur Bergeret. “I have sold fraternity
to my brother Hobbler, using false weights, and in humiliating him I
have brought humiliation on myself, for almsgiving degrades both him
who gives and him who takes. I have done wrong.”
“I don’t think so,” said Pauline.
“You don’t think so,” replied Monsieur Bergeret, “because you have no
philosophy and are incapable of tracing from an apparently innocent
action the stupendous consequences which it bears within itself. This
fellow induced me to offer him alms. I could not resist the importunity
of his whining appeal. I pitied his bare thin neck, the knees of his
trousers, which, baggy from too long wear, bear such a depressing
resemblance to the knees of a camel, and his feet, on which his shoes
were gaping at the toes like a couple of ducks. Seducer! Dangerous
Hobbler! Through you my sous have produced their little share of
baseness and shame. Through you I have created with ten centimes a
little ugliness and evil. In handing you that tiny token of wealth and
power, I have ironically made you a capitalist, and invited you, an
unhonoured guest, to the banquet of society, the feast of civilization.
And as I did it I felt that I was one of the mighty of this world as
compared with you, a rich man compared with you, my gentle Hobbler,
exquisite mendicant and flatterer. I rejoiced and was proud, exulting
in my opulence and my greatness. O Hobbler, live for ever! _Pulcher
hymnus divitiarum pauper immortalis._
“An abominable practice, that of almsgiving! A barbarous pity, that of
charity! An ancient error, that of the well-to-do who give a penny and
think they are performing a good deed, who believe they have fulfilled
their whole duty to their fellow-man by means of the most miserable,
awkward, ridiculous, senseless and mean action which could possibly be
committed with a view to a better distribution of wealth. This habit of
almsgiving is contrary to beneficence and abhorrent to charity.”
“Really?” said Pauline good-humouredly.
“Almsgiving,” went on Monsieur Bergeret, “is no more to be compared
to beneficence than a monkey’s grimace to the smile of the Joconda.
Beneficence is as ingenious as almsgiving is inept. It is vigilant, and
proportions its efforts to the need. That is precisely what I did not
do with regard to brother Hobbler. The very name of beneficence evoked
the most beautiful ideas in the sensitive minds of the century of the
philosophers. It used to be believed that the name was first created by
the good Abbé de Saint-Pierre, but it is older still, and can be found
in the old Balzac. In the sixteenth century men said _bénéficence_, not
_bienfaisance_, but it is the same word. I must admit that I do not
find its pristine beauty in the word _bienfaisance_; for me it has
been spoiled by the Pharisees who have made too free a use of it. We
have many charitable institutions in our country, pawn-shops, provident
societies, mutual aid and insurance societies. Some of these are useful
and do good service. But their common defect is that they proceed to
aggravate the very social iniquity which they are intended to correct;
they are poisonous remedies. Universal beneficence would have every one
living by his own labours and not on the labours of others. Everything
but fair exchange and solidarity is vile and shameful and unfruitful.
Human charity is the co-operation of all in the production and division
of the fruits of labour.
“Charity is justice; it is love, and the poor are more skilled in it
than the rich. What rich man has ever practised human charity as fully
as Epictetus or Benoît Malon? True charity is the gift of each man’s
work to all; it is a beautiful kindness; it is the harmonious gesture
of the soul which bows itself like a vase of precious ointment, pouring
forth its benefits. It is Michael Angelo painting the Sistine Chapel,
or the deputies in the National Assembly on the night of the 4th of
August. It is giving, in all its happy completeness; it is money poured
forth together with love and thought. We have nothing that belongs to
us alone but ourselves; we truly give only when we give our work, our
minds, our genius. And this splendid offering of one’s whole self to
all men enriches the giver as much as the community.”
“But,” objected Pauline, “you could not give love and beauty to
Hobbler, so you gave him what was most convenient to him.”
“It is true that Hobbler has become a mere animal. Of all the good
things that gratify man, he cares only for alcohol. I conclude as much
from the fact that as he came towards me he reeked of brandy. But, such
as he is, he is our work. Our pride fathered and our sin mothered him;
he is the evil fruit of our vices. Every man in the world should both
give and receive. He has not given enough, doubtless because he has not
received enough.”
“He may be lazy,” said Pauline. “_Mon Dieu_, how can we do away with
poverty and weakness and idleness! Don’t you believe that men are
naturally good and that it is society that makes them wicked?”
“No, I don’t believe that men are naturally good,” replied Monsieur
Bergeret. “What I see is that they are emerging painfully and very
slowly from their primitive barbarism, and that with great effort
they are organizing a justice that is uncertain and a charity that is
precarious. The time is yet far distant when they will be kind and
gentle to one another. The time is yet far distant when they will not
war upon one another, and when pictures representing battle scenes
will be hidden away as affording an immoral and shameful spectacle.
I believe that the reign of violence will last a long time yet, that
for many years to come the nations will rend one another asunder for
trivial reasons; that for many years to come the people of the same
country will desperately snatch from one another the common necessaries
of life, instead of equitably dividing them. But I also believe that
men are least ferocious when they are least wretched, that in the
long run the progress of industry will produce a certain softening of
manners. A botanist has assured me that if a hawthorn be transplanted
from a stony to a fruitful soil its thorns will change into flowers.”
“There you are! You are an optimist, papa; I knew you were!” cried
Pauline, stopping short for a moment in the middle of the pavement to
gaze at her father with her dawn-grey eyes, full of gentle radiance and
morning coolness. “You are an optimist. You are working with a cheerful
heart to build the house of the future. That is good! It is a fine
thing to build the New Republic with men of good will.”
Monsieur Bergeret smiled at the hopeful words and youthful eyes.
“Yes,” he said, “it would be fine to lay the foundations for the new
society, where each man would receive the just price of his labour.”
“It will happen, won’t it? But when?” asked Pauline innocently.
“Do not ask me to prophesy, my child,” answered Monsieur Bergeret sadly
and gently. “It is not without reason that the ancients considered
the power of piercing the future as the most fatal gift that could be
bestowed upon man. If it were possible for us to see what is to come,
there would be nothing left for us but to die; or perhaps we should
fall stricken to death by grief or terror. We must work at the future
like weavers who work at their tapestries without seeing what they
accomplish.”
Thus conversing, the father and daughter proceeded on their way. In
front of the square in the Rue de Sèvres they met a solitary beggar
standing motionless on the pavement.
“I’ve no more change,” said Monsieur Bergeret. “Can you lend me a
couple of sous, Pauline? That outstretched hand bars my way. If it were
in the Place de la Concorde it would still bar my way. The outstretched
hand of a beggar is a barrier that I cannot pass. It is a weakness
that I cannot overcome. Give the man something. It’s pardonable. We
must not let ourselves exaggerate the harm we do.”
“Papa, I’d like to know what you will do with Hobbler in your Republic.
You can’t imagine he will live on the fruits of his labour?”
“My daughter,” said Monsieur Bergeret, “I think he will consent to
disappear. He is already greatly diminished. Idleness and a passion
for rest are urging him toward final elimination. He will return to
oblivion easily.”
“I believe, on the other hand, that he thoroughly enjoys being alive.”
“True, he has his joys. No doubt he delights in swallowing the vitriol
of the dram-shop. He will disappear altogether with the last drinking
house. There will be no publicans in my Republic, no buyers and no
sellers, no rich and no poor, and each will enjoy the fruits of his
labours.”
“We all shall be happy, papa.”
“No; for without suffering the sacred flame of pity which makes for
the beauty of the soul would perish. But that will never be. Moral
and physical evil, incessantly opposed, will share with happiness and
delight the empire of the earth, as day will follow night. Evil is
necessary; like good, it has its roots deep in human nature, and the
one cannot perish without the other. Suffering is the twin sister of
joy, and as they breathe upon the chords of our being they cause them
to vibrate harmoniously. The breath of happiness alone would produce
but a dull and tedious sound, like silence. But the artificial ills
arising out of social conditions will no longer be added to those that
are inevitable, commonplace and august, which arise out of our human
state. Men will no longer be deformed by iniquitous labours by which
they die rather than live. The slave will come out of his cell and the
factory will no longer devour the bodies of millions.
“And I anticipate that this delivery will come from machinery itself;
the engine that has mangled so many men will come gently and generously
to the aid of suffering human flesh. Cruel and hard to begin with,
machinery will become kind, favourable and friendly. How can it change
its soul? Listen. The spark that flashed from the Leyden jar, the
little subtle star that revealed itself in the last century to the
wonder-stricken philosopher, will accomplish this miracle. The Unknown
which has allowed itself to be conquered without revealing its nature,
the mysterious captive force, the intangible, seized by human hands,
the obedient lightning, bottled and distributed over the innumerable
wires that cover the face of the earth with their network—electricity
will yield up its energy, will give its help wherever it is needed:
in the houses, the rooms, the homes where father, mother, and children
will henceforth never be separated. This is no dream. The cruel machine
that crushes soul and body in the factory will become domestic,
intimate and familiar. But it is useless, quite useless for the
pulleys, wheels, connecting-rods, cranks, bearings and flywheels to
become humanized if men themselves remain iron-hearted.
“We are waiting for and appealing to a yet more wonderful change. The
day will come when the employer, growing in moral beauty, will become a
worker among the liberated workers; when there will be no more wages,
but only an exchange in kind. The great manufacturers, like the old
nobility, whose place they have taken and whom they are imitating,
will go through their 4th of August. They will abandon their disputed
profits and threatened privileges. They will become generous when they
feel that it is time to be so.
“What says the employer of to-day? That he is the mind and the thought,
and that without him his army of workers would be like a body deprived
of understanding. Well, if that be true, let him content himself
with so much joy and honour. Because a man is thought and soul must
he therefore gorge himself with riches? When the great Donatello and
his companions designed a bronze statue it was he who was the soul
of the creation. He placed the price paid for the work by the prince
and the citizens in a basket which hung from a pulley fixed to one of
the rafters of the studio, and each of his companions untied the rope
and took from the basket what he needed. Is not the joy of creative
intelligence enough, and does such an advantage exempt the master
worker from sharing the gain with his humble collaborators? But in my
Republic there will be no gain, no wages, and all will belong to each.”
“Papa, that’s collectivism,” said Pauline quietly.
“The most precious gifts,” replied Monsieur Bergeret, “are common
to all men and have always been so. Air and light are the common
property of all that breathes and sees the light of day. After the
secular labours of egoism and avarice, in spite of the violent efforts
of individuals to seize and keep wealth, the individual possessions
enjoyed by the wealthiest among us are little when compared with those
that belong without distinction to mankind in general. And even in
our society do you not notice that the most beautiful and splendid
possessions, such as roads, rivers, forests, which were once royal,
libraries and museums, belong to all? Not a single rich man has a
greater claim than I to an old oak-tree at Fontainebleau or a picture
in the Louvre. And they are more mine than the rich man’s if I can
appreciate them better. Collective property, dreaded like some remote
monster, is already among us in a thousand familiar forms. When
prophesied, it alarms, in spite of the fact that we already enjoy many
of the advantages which it affords.
“The Positivists who meet in the house of Auguste Comte, under the
leadership of the venerable Monsieur Pierre Laffitte, are in no hurry
to become Socialists. But one of them made the judicious remark that
all property springs from a social source. Nothing could be truer, for
all property acquired by individual effort was created, and subsists,
only by the co-operation of the whole community. And since private
property springs from a social source we neither forget its origin nor
corrupt its essence if we offer it to the community and entrust it to
the State upon which it necessarily depends. And what is the State?”
Mademoiselle Bergeret hastened to answer that question:
“The State, papa, is a wretched cross-grained person sitting behind a
counter-rail. You must see that no one will want to strip himself naked
for such as he.”
“I understand,” said Monsieur Bergeret with a smile. “I have always
tried to understand, and in so doing I have wasted much precious
energy. I am discovering late in life that not to understand is a
great faculty. It sometimes helps you to the conquest of the world.
If Napoleon had been as intelligent as Spinoza he would have lived
in a garret and written four books. I understand. But to return to
this wretched cross-grained man behind the counter-rail, you trust
your letters to him, Pauline, letters that you would not trust to the
Tricoche Agency. He manages a portion of your property, not the least
in extent or in value. He looks gloomy to you, but when he becomes
everything he will cease to be anything, or rather he will only be
ourselves. Annihilated by his universality, he will cease to appear
tiresome. One is no longer wicked, my daughter, when one ceases to
exist. What makes him unpleasant to-day is that he encroaches on
individual property, that he goes along filing and scratching, taking
a little bite from the fat and a big bite from the thin. That makes
him unbearable. He is greedy; he is needy. In my Republic he will be
without desires, like the gods. He will have all and nothing. We shall
not notice him because he will be like ourselves, indistinguishable
from ourselves; will be as though he didn’t exist. And when you say
that I sacrifice the individual to the State, the living man to an
abstraction, I am, on the contrary, subordinating the abstraction to
reality, to the State which I suppress, by identifying it with the
activities of the whole social organism.
“Even were my Republic never to exist I should be glad that I had
played with this idea of it. It is permissible to build in Utopia. And
Auguste Comte himself, who flattered himself that he built only on the
data of positive science, placed Campanella in the calendar of great
men.
“The dreams of philosophers have in all ages raised up men of action
who have set to work to realize those dreams. Our thought creates the
future. Statesmen work on the plans which we leave behind us. No, my
child, I am not building in Utopia. My dream, which in no way belongs
to me, but is, at this very moment, the dream of thousands upon
thousands of souls, is true and prophetic. All societies whose organs
no longer correspond to the functions for which they were created, and
whose members are not recompensed according to the useful work which
they accomplish, die. Deep-rooted disturbances and inward disorder
precede and proclaim their end.
“Feudal society was strongly constituted. When the clergy ceased
to represent learning, and the nobility to defend the labourer and
artisan by the sword, and these two orders became merely swollen and
dangerous members, the whole body perished. An unexpected and necessary
revolution carried off the patriot. Who can maintain that in modern
society the organs correspond with their functions and that all the
members are nourished in proportion to the useful work which they
perform? Who can maintain that there is a fair distribution of wealth?
Who, I say, can believe in the permanence of unrighteousness?”
“And how can we put an end to it, papa? How can we change the world?”
“By the force of speech, my child. Nothing is more powerful than
speech. The linking of powerful arguments and noble thoughts forms a
chain that nothing can break. Speech, like the sling of David, lays low
the violent and causes the mighty to fall. It is an invincible weapon,
without which the world would belong to armed brutes. What keeps them
in abeyance? Merely thought, naked and weaponless.
“I shall not see the new State. All changes in the social order, as
in the natural order, are slow and almost imperceptible. A geologist
of profound understanding, Charles Lyell by name, demonstrated that
those fearful traces of the glacial period, those monstrous rocks
carried into the valleys, the flora and the furry beasts of cold
countries succeeding to the flora and fauna of hot countries, those
apparent tokens of cataclysmic upheaval, were in reality only the
effect of prolonged and multiple action, and that those great changes,
produced with the merciful deliberation of natural forces, were not
even suspected by the innumerable generations of living creatures that
existed during their accomplishment. Social transformations operate
in the same way, insensibly and incessantly. The timid man fears, as
he would a future cataclysm, a change which began before he was born,
which is going on before his unconscious eyes, and which will become
noticeable only in a century’s time.”