I. MISONEISM.
In the moral world the law which is seen to dominate all the others is the law of inertia. This law of inertia is so powerful that even after having been overcome by the friction of ages it always leaves, even among beings that have most progressed, traces of its original oscillation, in survivals, in rudimentary organs, when it is not renewed in all its completeness in certain atavistic forms.
Inertia in the moral world.—Granting that it were possible and desirable to contest this law in the organic world, it could certainly not be done in the moral world. In fact, although we are thought to be making great progress, yet if we form a graphic chart showing the progress made on the globe, we shall see to what miserable proportions it is reduced. It may be said that all Africa, except certain points encroached on by the Aryans, Australia, and a good half part of America, are almost in the prehistoric state, or at best in the state of the great Asiatic empires of the earliest historic epochs. Or perhaps (as in South America, Hayti, and Siberia) civilisation has only changed the appearances of primitive life, by substituting for immobility an unstable equilibrium, which is almost worse still.
The most certain proof of the extension and of the predominance in the moral world of the law of inertia, is the hatred of novelty, so little noticed, which we call Misoneism, and which arises from the effort and the repugnance we experience when we have to substitute a new sensation for an old one. And this is so common among animals that it can be regarded as a physiological character.
Minds feeble, enfeebled, or primitive in character, show themselves the most susceptible of repugnance to what is novel; it being understood, however, that it is not a question here of small innovations, such as fashion for women, the change from the elliptic to the circular, tattooing for savages, and sports for children; for not only have the latter no dread of such changes, but on the contrary they wish heartily for them, as they excite the nervous centres, which require change, without irritating them, and without causing pain.
But when the innovation is too radical, it is not merely the savage and the child who repel it with dread; the great majority of men, for whom misoneism is a law of nature, are sensible of a feeling of repugnance, as the result of the pain produced by the necessity in which they are placed of causing their brains to be traversed by too rapid transitions, a task not within their power, inertia and the repetition of movements (individual or atavistic) before performed, being natural to ordinary men, as to all animals.
Misoneism in manners.—This may be seen, for example, in the manners and customs of the modern Greeks; notwithstanding the vicissitudes of time, we find in them the ancient Greek.
The French of the nineteenth century are still in many respects such as they are depicted by Strabo (IV, 4), and by Cæsar (De Bello Gallico, IV, 5), lovers of arms and of ostentation, incurably vain, facile of speech, easily carried away by words, and imprudent in their resolves.
Misoneism in religion.—As much can be said of this in relation to religion, literature, and art, where we see misoneism triumph. With respect to religion it can even be affirmed that this is the institution most completely based on misoneism; to the extent that we see the Christian religion preserve of ancient religions, not only musical harmony (the chant), sacred vestments (the mitre and fibula of the Egyptian priests), the scapular and the sandals of the Roman plebeian, etc., but also the Mithraic legends in certain dogmas which have relation to the sun, and even to ancient fetichism.
Misoneism in morality.—The misoneistic instinct, fed by religion, may leave traces profound enough to form a morality sui generis, and provoke among savages remorse at having failed in a brutal custom, be it ever so repugnant, such as among us is provoked in good men by crime.
Misoneism in science.—In the domain of science the history of the various persecutions of men of genius, inventors or reformers, will suffice to prove the terrible influence of misoneism, which is the more intolerant and the more fanatical the more ignorant it is; and we need only cite the names of Columbus, of Galileo, and of Salomon de Caus, the first inventor of steam apparatus, who was sent to the Bicêtre by Richelieu.
Misoneism in literature.—Likewise to misoneism we owe, in great part, our admiration for old works and ancient ruins, however hideous they may be. Because admired by our fathers and by our forefathers they obtain, so to say, a way of entrance into us, to impose themselves on our veneration. Thus the Sanscrit language for the Hindoo, the Hebrew language for the Jews, and to some extent Latin for many Christian Europeans have become a kind of sacred tongue and linguistic fetich even outside the precincts of religious usage.
The enormous influence of grammarians in imperial Rome, and afterwards during the epoch of decadence, as well as in the middle ages, explains also the persistence of the modern fetichism for grammar, which seems absurd in an age of naturalists and mathematicians.
And from thence comes the not less absurd and yet unshakable faith in classicism, rooted deeply even in men worthy of respect, who cause us to lose the best years of life in stammering in an almost useless tongue.
Misoneism in politics.—The same may be said with much more fitness of many social and political institutions which are thought to be modern and which are only relics of other times; it is for this reason only that they attract the admiration and the respect of the majority of people, constituting true conventional lies, as Nordau calls them, but which have their bourgeois believers and apostles.
In fact, the past is so incorporated in our inward being that even the most refractory of us feel a powerful attraction towards it. Thus we may be as unbelieving as can be wished, and yet at every hour of the day we feel ourselves struck and attracted by the cajoleries of priests. We may be lovers of equality, but, as we have already said, we feel a secret veneration for the heirs of our barons. It is in vain that the uselessness of certain laws is accepted; he who upholds and defends them will meet with the approbation of multitudes, called forth by the sole circumstance that the laws have existed. And if civilisation progresses often, it is because it finds in the changes of climate, of race, or in the appearance of men of genius or madmen, circumstances which end in combining a great many small movements in such a manner as to make of them in time a great one. Max Nordau thinks (with some exaggeration) that progress is due more to a few enlightened despots than to all revolutionists. But this progress was very slow; he who wished to precipitate it, contravened the physiological nature of man; consequently a revolution which is not an evolution, is pathological and criminal.
Misoneism in the punishment of crimes against custom.—This is why in primitive legislation we see offences against custom constitute the maximum of delict, of immorality.