The Moral Economy

by Ralph Barton Perry

III

Human progress, thus determined by the movement of life towards its more rational, that is, more provident, organization, is attended in all its stages with a very significant difference of emphasis. I refer to the old conflict between conservatism and radicalism. If this were merely a difference of temperamental bias, it would not need to detain us. But it is really an opposition between exaggerated truths, in which each is boldly and impressively defined.

The truth of conservatism lies, first, in its love of the existing order. Every established form of social life has had a certain wholeness and strength and perfection of its own. This is as true of savagery as it is of any type of civilization. Interests are in equilibrium, and are guaranteed security within certain limits that are generally understood. In other words, at least a measure of fulfilment may be counted on. The conservative is right in valuing this as a prodigious achievement. He knows that disorder is ruin, not to {145} any class, but to all; the paralysis, if not the absolute destruction, of all fruitful activities.

And secondly, conservatism proclaims the truth that since order conditions all activity, it is impossible to promote human welfare except by using order. The enemy of order threatens to destroy the instruments of power, and so to make himself weak and helpless with the rest. The conservative understands the real delicacy of these instruments, and the difficulty of remodelling them while still forced to use them. For nothing puts so great a strain on society as progress. It tends to destroy its rigidity, to dull its edge, and to spoil the fine adjustment without which so complex an organization cannot function. There could be no human life whatsoever, and still less a progressive life, were not the great mass of men content to remain steadily in their places, and so form parts of a stable structure. An organization cannot actually work until it is in equilibrium.

Now while the conservative fears to "swap horses while crossing the stream," the radical reminds him that if he does not do so he will never gain the farther shore. The conservative is satisfied to sit firmly in the saddle, but the radical thinks only of the long distance yet to go. There is a common misconception as to who is the real radical, the real menace to this existing order. {146} He is not the sceptic, but the man with a purpose; the man who believes in the possibility of better things, and so has a motive impelling him to abolish and reconstruct the present things. The sceptic, who holds all order to be conventional and arbitrary, is as well satisfied with one system as another. His natural course is a cynical acquiescence in the inveterate folly of mankind. Or, finding order convenient, and fearing that its true groundlessness will be exposed if it be made a matter for discussion, he advocates blind obedience to the authority of the day. Hence the disillusioned, especially if they occupy positions of power in church or state or trade, may be counted on as the leaders of conservative policy. The typical radical, on the other hand, is Socrates, who censured the men of his time because they were satisfied with something short of the best; and who was condemned because he offered men a good reason for reorganizing life.

The radical, like the conservative, is right. He is right, in the first place, because he points out that the stability of the established order is not proof of its finality. It may be, indeed always will be, largely due to habit. Society forfeits a greater good through mere inertia, through the tendency of any organization of interests which runs smoothly and brings a steady return, to perpetuate itself. The radical is the critic of {147} custom, condemning it for timidly clinging to the present good, and abandoning the original intent of life to attain to the maximum.

The radical is right, secondly, because he protests that so long as there is the least waste of life, the least wanton suppression or destruction of interests, the work of civilization is not done. He represents those interests which under any system are most heavily taxed, and presses for their relief.

Conservatism and radicalism, then, are the two half-truths into which the principle of progress is divided by the propensity of every human activity to override the mark, and by the confusion of mind that cannot fail to attend so venturesome and bewildering an undertaking as civilization.