VI
THE RIDDLE OF AMERICA
In Argentina, there are vast and luxuriant valleys, over which the train seems to creep toward the very edge of a horizon which ever recedes as the traveller advances. From time to time, four or five red one-storied houses, clustered behind a station, recall to his mind the fact that this wilderness is actually inhabited. In Brazil, so far as the eye can see, there are ranges of mountains, shadowy even in brilliant daylight, in the midst of which, from time to time, one mountain stands out more distinctly than its fellows. The shadowy hills are those still covered by the primeval forest; the others, those where the timber has been burned off and replaced by coffee plantations; but even here there is no trace of human life. One must travel long hours by railroad before even catching sight of a village.
In North America, or at least in its Eastern States, there are vast and desolate tracts. From time to time a village appears, bristling with chimneys. Then the traveller slips on into the deserted country. Another village appears, only in its turn to disappear. Then all at once the train begins to rush through the midst of houses. On, on it goes. The houses never cease to follow it. Huge edifices rise from the midst of the little dwellings like giants from a crowd of dwarfs. Automobiles and trolley cars move through the streets. It is a great city; half a million, a million, two million men are crowded together there in the shadow of a thousand chimneys, surrounded on every side by an almost deserted country. What a strange sight are these wildernesses to a European accustomed to live in one of the crowded countries of the Old World where men have built their houses everywhere, from the shores of the sea up to the highest habitable slopes of the mountains!
In observing a phenomenon so novel to his experience, the historian of antiquity is deeply interested; and as he studies it, like so many other Europeans in the presence of the same spectacle, he forgets his own preoccupations. The riddle of America rises before him and the desire of finding an answer to it turns him from his former studies. For America is a true riddle to Europeans. During the past thirty years, not only the United States, but even smaller American countries like Brazil and Argentina, have impressed themselves sharply upon the attention of Europe. The Old World has been compelled to recognise that America has in her turn become a mighty historic force; and that she exercises an influence on the Old World which grows continuously greater. When one reflects that, only a century and a half ago, all these American states were merely poverty-stricken colonies of Europe, harshly exploited by their European masters, one cannot suppress amazement at the rapidity with which their destiny has changed.
What power is it which has worked this miracle? On this point, it is impossible to feel any doubt; the power is wealth. These plains and these mountains which look so deserted are tilled, mined, worked with intensest energy; and every year, with a generosity which seems inexhaustible, they yield to the men who have toiled over them prodigious quantities of cereals, tobacco, coffee, wool, gold, silver, iron, oil—an enormous torrent of riches which pours over the entire world. The great industrial cities of North America manufacture these raw materials with profits so large and swiftly won that to the Old World they seem fantastic. In these plains, in these valleys, in these mountains, in these cities, labourers receive higher wages, merchants and manufacturers make their fortunes faster, capitalists come into contact with mightier interests, landlords draw higher rents from this prosperity—all the sources of profit are more abundant than in Europe. And these conditions have made it possible for a few of Fortune’s favourites to pile up in the course of a single lifetime wealth whose vastness makes the brain swim. America has, in fact, succeeded in producing riches at a rate of speed that man has never yet attained elsewhere in the world. She has been the principal factor in the fabulous increase of the world’s wealth during the last fifty years. Her riches have become one of the historic forces of our civilisation, and one of the principal preoccupations of the European mind.
Whence come these vast riches and whither do they go? How is it that America can grow rich so much faster than Europe? Is it thanks to far more fortunate physical conditions, which bear no relation to the deserts of man? Or is it in consequence of moral and intellectual qualities which are lacking in Europeans? And what will be the ultimate effect of this economic superiority? Riches may be the goal of an individual’s efforts; for a nation they can only be means to conquer the other good things of life which we call civilisation: glory, grandeur, power, beauty, knowledge, moral refinement. Can America, and will she, make use of her riches to rob Europe of the intellectual and moral leadership which the latter still possesses? Or will these riches, too swiftly won, exercise an evil influence simultaneously upon Europe and America, by making both continents more materialistic?
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Such is the riddle of America, which, for some time past, has been steadily forcing itself upon the attention of Europe. To arrive at an answer, we must know whether the influence of a too swift economic development of the New World upon the higher activities of the mind, upon morals, upon science, art, and religion is beneficial or the reverse. The detractors of America—and there are many of them in Europe—affirm without hesitation that the Americans are barbarians laden with gold; that they think only of making money, and that, in consequence of their riches, they lower the level of Europe’s ancient civilisation and infect its beautiful traditions with a crass materialism. Admirers of America, on the contrary—and of these there are as many in Europe as there are detractors—will tell you that the New World is giving to the Old a unique example of energy, activity, intelligence, and daring. Let old Europe then give heed; beyond the Atlantic, young rivals are girding themselves with new weapons to dispute with her the superiority of which she is proud. What must one think of these conflicting answers to the puzzle?
Let us begin with the reasoning of the detractors: “Americans are barbarians laden with gold.” In order to simplify the discussion, let us limit our examination to the United States, which is justly entitled to represent contemporary America with all its qualities and all its defects. No long sojourn within the borders of the United States is necessary to convince a person that in the great Republic people think only of making money. A writer partial to paradox might well amuse himself with proving that the Americans are more idealistic than the Europeans, or even that they are a mystical people. Anyone who cares to find arguments to establish this thesis may well be embarrassed by their number. For instance, would a people which despised the higher activities of the mind have been able to create the philosophical doctrine which is popularly known to us under the name of “Pragmatism”? The Pragmatist affirms that all ideas capable of rendering useful service are true. He takes utility as his standard of the measure of truth. This theory has seemed to many writers of the Old World a decisive proof of the practical mind of the American people, who never forget their material interests, even in connection with metaphysical questions. This, however, is a mistake. Pragmatism does not propose to subordinate the ideal to practical interest. Its purpose is to reconcile opposing doctrines by proving that all ideas, even those which seem mutually exclusive, can help us to become wiser, stronger, better. What service is there then in struggling to make one idea triumph over another instead of allowing men to draw from each idea the good which each can yield? In a word, Pragmatism, as America has conceived it, is a mighty effort to give the right of expression in modern civilisation to all religious and philosophical doctrines which in the past have stained the world with their sanguinary struggles.
A beautiful doctrine this, which may lend itself to many objections; but true or false, it proves that the people who have conceived it, far from despising the ideal, have such respect for all ideas and all beliefs, that they have not the courage to repel a single one. Such a people wishes to learn all and understand all.