_DUSK OR DAWN!_
Nordau’s theory is that the educated classes of the world are
degenerating; that the peculiarities in passions, tastes, pastimes, and
moods, bear witness to such degeneration; that the cause must be found
in the physical condition of the brains of such authors and artists as
for the time being have the ear and the eye of the public; that the
remedy against degeneration may be found in a moral quasi-compulsory
supervision on the part of the non-degenerate over degenerate authors
and artists. If we are not entirely exact in this summary of his
postulates and conclusions, it is to a great extent Nordau’s fault,
because nowhere does he give any decided statement of the scope of his
book.
In his first chapter he goes out of his way in order to protest against
the misconception which represents him as having insinuated that the
whole of humanity exhibited signs of decay, and he declares that his
remarks apply exclusively to the educated classes. Were this absolutely
true, there would have been but small occasion for his remarkable
work. But over and over again in the pages of _Degeneration_ he speaks
of the masses as partly affected by degeneration, and of the danger of
the contamination spreading from the educated classes to the masses. He
mentions the extreme Socialists and the Anarchists as the victims of
the mental disease he investigates. And yet he flatters himself that
the proletariat is not as the upper classes are, and bases his opinion
on the fact that they appear satisfied with the old forms of art and
poetry, that they prefer George Ohnet’s novels to the works of the
symbolists, and Mascagni’s music to that of Wagner.
These statements evidently emanate from one who has mingled little with
the people. The truth is that the newest books, the newest music, the
newest pictures, only slowly reach the working classes, and when such
works are the outcome of temporary fashion and mood, they might not
reach them at all. But this by no means proves that the working classes
do not experience the impulses which prompt the predilections of the
upper classes.
If Nordau’s views of the proletariat in general were confirmed by
actualities prevailing among the German proletariat, a heavy load would
be lifted from the shoulders of the German Government. But, judging
from the German Press—the official Press as well as the Socialistic—or
from the speeches of so high an authority as the Emperor himself,
there exists but little of the Philistine contentment with the present
order of things of which the author speaks. On the contrary, the
Emperor complains that the discontented working classes are losing
their respect for things that used to be sacred to them, such as
patriotism, feudal loyalty, religion, etc.
Does Nordau mean to tell us that the pornographic novels of certain
French authors, that the works of Émile Zola and other realists, are
not read by the masses in France? Who then pays for the enormous
editions issued after millions have read them in _feuilleton_? Or does
he wish us to believe that only the aristocracy and the upper classes
in France have been affected by the mysticism which finds its outlet in
the pilgrimage to Lourdes?
As to the working classes in the English-speaking countries, which, by
the way, signify so little to Nordau that he not even once mentions
them in his work, are they not children of their time, and do they
not reflect every tendency, every virtue, and every vice in the
upper classes? Not only would Nordau find, were he to investigate
the matter, that those stigmata of degeneration which he refers to
as such—Individualism and Anarchism—are making big strides among the
English-speaking working classes, but that the taste for criminal and
realistic literature is growing in popularity. He would even find
Wagner’s music intensely applauded by audiences recruited from the
working class.
Far from developing ethically in different directions, the upper and
the lower classes in this country move together, each simultaneously
influencing the other. While the lower classes follow the upper classes
in many things—for example, politics, dress, etc.—the upper classes
obtain their comic songs, their humorous stories, and most of their fun
from the lower classes.
The impartial observer cannot fail to notice the kinship which exists
between the proclivities of the two extremes of English society—the
wealthiest nobility and the poorest labourers. Both these classes are
intensely fond of sports, both degrade sport by betting, both are given
to lavish expenditure, both pride themselves on physical force and
pluck above everything. Both are prone to disregard the sanctity of
marriage. Both indulge freely in the pleasures of eating and drinking.
Individuals of both classes get on together better than they do with
the middle classes. And both are only superficially religious.
Perhaps this remarkable community of tastes and views may account
for what has always been an inexplicable enigma to foreigners,—the
conservative working man.
Nordau classes, among the indications of decay, the yearning for
freedom from outward control and for complete personal independence. It
is true he takes for granted that such yearnings for individual liberty
aim at the realization of bestial propensities now, according to him,
kept in check only by law, police, and public opinion. We shall, later
on, find that he has completely misunderstood the attempts to shake
off all shackles which he has noticed. Here it suffices to point out
that the longing for individual freedom, which manifests itself in a
thousand ways unobserved by Nordau, and in the upper classes takes
the shape of a revolt against conventionality, is conspicuous among
the working classes of Great Britain. This year’s elections have
proved beyond doubt that the tendency towards State Socialism which
characterized the Liberal policy is fast becoming distasteful to the
rank and file of voters. The tyranny, which, in the name of Socialism,
was exercised by the Trades Unions, will soon be a thing of the past.
When at its height of development the Trades Unions hardly comprised
one-fifth of the working classes, and now already the movement is in
full retrogression. The Free Labour Association, though only lately
called into existence, meets with increasing support, and may no doubt
be looked upon as an expression of our working classes’ new-born love
of freedom.
This change of mind, or, as Nordau would call it, this degeneration,
also accounts for the present halt in the advance of the Socialistic
propaganda and the rapid spread of moderate but decisive Anarchist
opinions which in no small degree contributed to the recent
Conservative victory at the polls.
What is here stated regarding the British working classes is true
regarding the working classes of all the English-speaking countries.
Everywhere we find a strong yearning for freedom from control. The
remarkable point about the expressions of this yearning is that, though
the votaries of the revolt against State tyranny have so far not been
able to formulate any complete or practical scheme for the life of
a State, or community, governed by the best instincts of the human
being instead of by law, their views are rapidly gaining ground. This
is especially the case in the United States, where Mr. Tucker, the
editor of a little journal called _Liberty_, is steadily extending his
influence.
The author of _Degeneration_ distorts reality when he supposes that
the upper classes of a country can be corrupt and degenerate, while
the masses conform to that German Philistine ideal—a very poor one
indeed—which Nordau would fain hold up to them. This is proved by the
fact that it is in their relations with the masses that the corruption
of the upper classes becomes conspicuous, and that only through
response from the masses can many forms of such corruptions become
possible.
It would take us too far to record all the proofs that actualities
furnish of this fact. We shall simply point out one of the many
conditions in the masses which promote corruption in the educated
classes, namely, poverty. The appalling, demoralizing, brutalising
poverty in the large modern cities—this poisonous fungus grown out of
modern government and political corruptions, not only kills the sense
of self-respect and decency in its victims, but renders prostitution,
through sheer hunger and suffering, the trade of millions. It is
poverty among the masses which undermines the artistic feeling of the
nation, stands in the way of applied art, and compels the caterer of
popular amusements to appeal to low passions and brutal instincts. Our
epoch is not the first example in history where masses of destitute
people exercise all their ingenuity in corrupting the wealthy citizens
in the hope of snatching some crumbs of their wealth.
Dire poverty it is, with its hovels, its rags, and its diseases, which
gives riches their immense value in the eyes of the people. It creates
a thirst for gold. No man thinks himself safe from falling into the
abyss of modern poverty until he has amassed a large fortune and placed
himself in the position of amassing more. The love of wealth corrupts
Literature, Art, the Press. It is at the base of all financial,
political, administrative scandals. It is responsible for mercenary
marriages, which fill the law courts, pollute society, and contaminate
the home.
The poverty of the masses paralyses the efforts of honest industries,
honest trades, and honest professions. The men who succeed are not
those who benefit their fellow-men, but those who ruthlessly trample
them under foot in their heedless race for gold. It is a well-known
fact that the upper classes are not prolific, and would die out were
they not recruited from the ranks; if therefore the state of the masses
is such as to allow its worst element to rise to influential positions
in society, demoralization of the masses must inevitably produce
demoralization of the classes.
We will leave it to the thinking public to consider to what extent
other conditions of the masses, besides poverty, react in all countries
on the upper classes—what the effects are, first on the masses, and
then on the classes, of corrupt and retrograde churches, compulsory
service in the army, police tyranny, bad and unjust laws, tutelage
under pragmatical Philistines, caste institutions, official newspapers,
State-regulated arts and entertainments, administrative favouritism,
etc.
But Nordau takes no heed of such all-powerful causes of corruption.
He sees degeneration only in the upper classes, and, placing the cart
before the horse, he regards what he considers the degenerated author
and artist as the cause of a state of affairs of which they are the
very last products.
There are many passages in his book that strongly suggest that he is
not completely sincere in his one-sided view. The savage blows he
sometimes deals at the Anarchists bear witness that this form of—as he
would call it—degeneration among the masses caused him a considerable
amount of uneasiness. Judging by the similarity of his language and
that of the Emperor of Germany, he might well be commissioned to brand
both Socialists and Anarchists as wild beasts. Be this as it may, his
few allusions to the corruption of the masses serve to enhance the
untrustworthiness of the signs of degeneration which he points out in
the upper classes.
Among these figure prominently—who would believe it?—modern female
toilets. And why? Not because they are indecent, as they have often
been in other periods, but because they are eccentric. Is there then a
normal dress for ladies? Or what code is there in existence to which
Nordau can appeal? Is it a sign of degeneration to hold that one of the
chief objects of toilets is to be beautiful and to enhance the beauty
of the wearer? And ought a lady who dresses according to this principle
to be put down as a dweller on the border-land of madness? If women
love to dress well, and men love to behold them well-dressed, would it
not be madness to adopt ugly and monotonous toilets?
It is, of course, not difficult to see that the author’s standard of
female toilet is the plain and ugly dress of the German housewife, and
that he has never realized the delight which an Englishman takes in
seeing his wife richly dressed, and in a way that suits her face and
form. If Nordau’s standard of female dress is the severe draperies of
the antique, he does not say so. But, if it be, we must remind him that
the beauty of the classic draperies was borrowed from the beauty of the
forms they revealed or partly displayed.
With the best will, we could not in northern Europe emulate the
Greeks in dress. There are two objections: the climate, which
demands warm covering; the sense of may-be false modesty, inherited
from the early Christian ages, which prevents the display of human
forms. The time will no doubt come when humanity is sufficiently
pure-minded—sufficiently degenerated, as Nordau would probably say—to
dress in clinging draperies, to expose the form more freely indoors
and in warm weather; and who would say that morality would not be
the gainer? A movement in this direction is already apparent. The
skirt-dance represents one stage. The appearance of an actress without
shoes or stockings might well herald a return to sandals, and the
abandonment of the barbarous fashion of cramping children’s feet in
pointed shoes.
But to call the women of European society degenerate because, under the
present circumstances, they do not go about in light tunics, displaying
their feet, their arms, and one leg, is hardly fair.
Our great alienist is very severe on the men of society as well, more
especially for the manner in which they trim their beards. We cannot
help sympathizing with men who wear a double-pointed beard when they
are told that they are on the high road to lunacy because they ape
Lucius Verrius, a gentleman whose portrait they have probably never
seen. Such stigmata of folly could have been pointed out only by a man
whose mind is completely devoid of a sense of the ridiculous.
To anybody who has not a special point to prove at all cost, it will be
patent that throughout the whole course of history educated men never
dressed more soberly than now. In this matter English fashion governs
the world, and the ruling ideas in Englishmen’s dress are durability,
comfort, and adaptability to the occasions on which it is worn.
Continental men may not adhere so strictly to these ideas, but there is
good reason to believe that in a short time they will do so.
Modern room and house decorations are, according to Nordau, so many
indications of degeneration and decay. That there are many rooms
and houses eccentrically furnished and decorated throughout the
civilized world no one would deny. But compared with the number of
houses and rooms chastely furnished and decorated in a manner which
is incomparably more pleasant and attractive than the average rooms,
especially in Germany and England thirty years ago, these abodes of
eccentrics sink into insignificance. As to the decoration of public
halls and places of amusement, we surely notice an improvement which
could not point to degeneration. Hardly in any European town would such
wall decorations be now permitted as disfigured the walls of public
places of amusement and dancing-halls in Germany some thirty years
ago—the Apollo Saal of Hamburg, to wit, the walls of which represented
hell in the worst taste possible.
Here, again, Nordau gives us no standard to go by. He does not tell
us what the house or the room of a rational being should be like, or
to what extent a wealthy man may indulge in a freak, or amuse his
friends by grotesque furniture and bizarre decorations, without being
degenerated.
The enjoyments of society especially present symptoms which cause our
psychologist to tremble for the sanity of the upper classes. Under this
head, we expected him to say something of the increasing taste for
healthy games and sport, for travel, and the amateur practice of the
arts for amusement’s sake. Had he been willing to look at the question
from both sides, he might have said something about the increasing love
of science, especially social science; of good books as well as bad
ones; of the high prices fetched by the paintings of the old masters,
even those not belonging to the pre-Raphaelite period, consequently
real works of art according to Nordau. He might have acknowledged
the improved tone in social gatherings and the marked diminution in
convivial drunkenness.
While sitting in judgment upon the upper classes of Europe, why
should he not have noticed the more serious side of their lives as
well as their enjoyments, as manifested in subscriptions to hospitals
or orphanages, and institutes of every description; sick-nursing
establishments, where ladies of high rank and wealth give their
personal services, sacrifices of time and comfort in the endeavour
to brighten the lives of the poor, to save fallen women, to assist
released prisoners, to protect children and even animals from cruelty?
We say, purposely, nothing of all the charitable work done in
connection with churches, because Nordau and his admirers might not
recognise any results of religious feeling as a proof of sanity.
But all these emphatic and unmistakable indications of the state of
society—at least as valuable as the manifestations of vice, hysteria,
and eccentricity—are ignored. On the other hand, he makes much of the
attempts which here and there have been made, especially in Paris,
with representations appealing to many senses at once; for instance,
pictures exhibited with music, musical recitals in darkened rooms,
etc. Such cases are not only extremely rare, but simply are another
combination of many arts hardly more complicated than that represented
by operas, in which dance[,] music, poetry, and painting are mingled in
order to please.
In what recorded period, and in what nation, have there not been
attempts to create new sources of enjoyment? Why should not attempts
be made at advance in amusements as well as in any other feature of
our civilization? That many of these experiments appear silly, and
end in utter failure, ought to surprise nobody, and scientists the
least. Any one who has tried to invent something new, to ascertain by
experiments some scientific fact, or to solve a physical or mechanical
problem, ought to know that a very large number of experiments are
bound to fail before success is achieved. It is strange to find in
our days a scientist condemning, as the beginning of folly, that
dissatisfaction with existing things which is the primary motor of all
progress and all knowledge. By doing so he ranges himself on the side
of those Philistines who burnt the apostles of progress as heretics and
imprisoned the pioneers of science as madmen.
The unrest which our psychologist notices in the educated classes
exists as well among all the lower classes of Europe, though among them
it reveals itself in other manifestations. It springs however from
the same source—a strong instinctive feeling, largely corroborated by
judgment, that human life in all spheres is, in the present epoch,
utterly out of harmony with nature, with our irresistible instincts,
and all those noble aspirations, on the realization of which our
self-respect, our ease of mind, and our happiness alone can be based.
It is not alone the present feeling of incongruity which disturbs
humanity, but the fast-ripening conviction that we are moving in a
wrong direction inspires despair, pessimism in some, and a desire for
hazardous new departures in others.
This sense of unrest, this craving for change, far from being symptoms
of degeneration, are the first faint indications of renewing vitality.
If decay there be, it is simply the fermentation which precedes
germination.
Two opposing principles, two different systems, two classes of
antagonistic institutions, cannot exist in the same place and at the
same time. When therefore old things have been tried _ad nauseam_ and
constantly found wanting, any unprejudiced man, nay, even an animal,
must experience a desire to destroy them. This feeling naturally
becomes strongest in the man with an imaginative and aspiring mind:
for besides the general disgust of old things, he sees in them the
chief obstacles to better and higher things. The axe must precede the
plough, because the forest cannot co-exist with the wheat-field. The
growing enmity against old dogmas, old authorities, old forms among
the educated and artistic classes, the kindling rage of the masses
against existing institutions, signal the clearing of the rank jungle
and the pestilential swamps prior to cultivation. The leading features
of modern culture have up till now been submission to authorities,
violation of nature, sacrifice of individual liberty, and progression
on Collectivist lines. What wonder then that those who keenly feel the
present degradation of man, achieved under old conditions, should turn,
against these and clamour for liberty, nature, and self?
Nordau, with his German-Philistine ideas, with his head crammed
full of authoritative teaching, and biassed by the clap-trap of the
commonest Collectivism, has utterly misunderstood the phenomena which
he has only partially observed. He does not allow for the mistakes,
the exaggerations, and the eccentricities committed by men who try to
give expression to their feelings, their yearnings, their aspirations,
unhampered by traditional bonds. He is bewildered because a movement
springing entirely from feeling and instinct does not follow a fixed
programme, or some dry philosophical system. He under-estimates the
value of an ethical revolution, because so far it has not reached
its constructive stage; and because the new apostles of liberty,
intoxicated by their self-liberation, run amuck indiscriminately
against all old things, be they good or bad; because the movement is in
the hands of extremists, enthusiasts, and sentimentalists, and still
awaits the guiding hand of the unbiassed logician, the cool-headed
sociologist and economist, capable of harmonizing it with practical
life and moral order.
Nordau, by his book, has forfeited his claim to be one of these.