Deux petits enfants qu’une femme morte
Serre entre ses bras.)
The Downfall of the International
Another result of the war, already sufficiently crystallized, is the bankruptcy of the illusionary spirit of internationalism. In his remarkable book[1] Mr. Walling has taken the trouble of quoting resolutions of national sections of the Socialist party the world over, before and during the war. With a few significant exceptions the Socialists of the warring nations have had to exchange their erstwhile slogan “Workers of the world, be united!” for the less noble motto “Defend your country!” Even when the European armies had already been mobilized the Socialists held protest meetings at which they threatened to call a general strike if war should be declared. But with the first cannon boom the theoretic brotherhood evaporated and gave way to patriotic sentiments. The workers declared that they were Germans, Russians, etc., first, then Socialists. True, in the beginning the German Socialists claimed that they were fighting against the reactionary Czardom, while the Socialists of the Allies tried to justify the international carnage as the struggle against Prussian militarism; but ultimately such clear-headed thinkers as Kautsky and some of the English Socialists came to see the futility of endeavoring to discover idealistic causes for the mutual slaughter. The country is in danger, consequently we must defend it, regardless of the rightness or wrongness of its policy—this is the prevailing sentiment among the workers. The grandiose structure of the International has fallen in ruins; the “scientific” theories and calculations of the Marxians have received a blow by the underestimated imponderabilia, that of primitive patriotism. On the other hand, “applied” Socialism has won a considerable victory with the development of the war. Nearly all the belligerent countries have adopted State-Socialism in such measures as the nationalization of railways and means of production. The capitalists are evidently shrewd enough to utilize the doctrines of their opponents in time of need and thus to neutralize the sting of that very opposition. What will become of Socialism when at least its minimum-program is accepted and put into practice by the capitalistic order without the aid of a social revolution, the inevitability of which has been scientifically proven by Marx and his disciples?
[1] The Socialists and the War, by William English Walling. New York: Henry Holt and Company.
Artists should not see things as they are; they should see them fuller, simpler, stronger: to this end, however, a kind of youthfulness, of vernality, a sort of perpetual elation, must be peculiar to their lives.—Nietzsche.
“The Artist in Life”
Margaret C. Anderson
“People” has become to me a word that—crawls. If you have ever heard Mr. Bryan pronounce it you will know what I mean. He says it “peo-pul”....