The Press SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 21, 1935. Europe in Transition

Press, Volume LXXI, Issue 21584, 21 September 1935, Page 14

The Press SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 21, 1935. Europe in Transition

History must be rewritten from time to time if only because every age thinks differently of its meaning and purpose. To-day the swing is away from the interpretation of the past in terms of narrow and conflicting national traditions and towards the development of a sense of history as the common adventure of mankind; for as Mr H. G. Wells remarks there can be no common peace and prosperity without common historical ideas. It is with the development of a common European civilisation that Mr H. A. L. Fisher's "History of Europe" is concerned and the second volume, just published, takes up the stupendous task at the period when the medieval world was rocking on its foundations under the impact of the forces which were to produce the modern world. Mr Fisher is not only a great scholar, but he brings to his task a very real understanding of human nature, imagination, wit, and an easy, lucid style. The early chapters survey the sixteenth century, the age that worshipped the strong man, the Prince, and held with Machiavelli the conception of the independent sovereign state, unrestrained by considerations of either religion or morality, its doctrine power, its means war—a doctrine only too familiar still. But there is some reassurance in the fact that, though the seventeenth century was one of uninterrupted war, it also saw a tremendous development in European culture. Life too was made more pleasant by the introduction of ices and champagne, tea and coffee, and wax candles, while the first landscape gardener, the first statistician, and the first professional actress belong to the later half of the century; and though half Europe was. struggling for existence with Louis XIV., "French civilisation ruled supreme and gave "the law to every social group that aspired "to the faintest tinge of' culture." Nevertheless the medieval practice and ideal of internationalism had been dealt a smashing blow by the growth of national states. In England More, in France Sully and later the Abbe de St. Pierre, and Botero in Italy were visionaries, interesting historically as the first to construct a scheme for avoiding war. As for Grotius and his successors in the sphere of international law, they sought only to civilise war: it had not yet become scientific. The emergence of the Renaissance spirit of individualism in art, religion, and business makes a complete break in the medieval social organisation. Then, the individual had no existence apart from the group, and did his best in the service of God, to Whom alone remained the praise; but in the new age a love of personal glory was a feature. The anonymity of the builders of the great Gothic cathedrals of the Middle Ages flourishes to-day only in the correspondence column of the daily newspaper. In education* the .Renaissance ideal was, as today, to extend education to the masses, even to women. Ladies and. gentlemen studied the classics, French, and Italian, and many a village had its schoolmaster to teach the rustics Latin. But the Protestant Reformation so far dislocated the system that by the eighteenth century the staple intellectual and spiritual food of the poor and middle classes of England was the Bible.

The authority of this austere and melodious literature was unique and universal. In every parish church the Bible lay open and free to all to read. Here was a People's University. Plunging into this vast miscellany, where all that is most solemn and sublime from the distant East is mingled with the records of a savage antiquity, the peoples of England wandered unshepherded and unfettered.

Curiously enough, the modern mind owes less to the Renaissance" and the Reformation than to the expansion of Europe. The humanists were interested in man* not nature; and the classical trend in their educational system hampered the development of scientific knowledge. The Reformers were medieval in their conception of life, so that it was not until the seventeenth century that science came into its own, largely in response to the needs of an increasingly urban civilisation. Before the end of this century it had penetrated into every field of human interest, and captured the imagination of every educated man. As science advanced, there emerged the idea of progress, to be followed a little later by that of the perfectibility of mankind; and when the eighteenth century added the theory than men are born equal and that inequalities are the results of defects in the social organisation, all of which can' be remedied by "good; laws," the stage was reached where Fourier: could confidently look forward to a.France with thirty million scientists such as Newton and thirty million poets as great' as Shakespeare. Such faith in the power of legislation to improve human nature does not exist to-day. Rousseau, too, lacked it. For him, the " sovereign remedy for human "ills is virtue. The good state is one in which "each member contracts to conform his will " to the general will. The good state is based, " not on force, not on greed, but on the virtu- ", ous will of all its members." Precisely; but who is to tell where virtue lies? At first sight there does not seem to be any compatibility between the eighteenth century belief in legislation as a means of improving morality and its fervent demand for liberty to think, to speak, to write, to act. "Liberty," writes Mr Fisher, "was the universal remedy, the necessary "mainspring of all progress, for, given liberty, " all else would follow." Liberty, however, as the philosophers saw it, lay in conformity with the laws, imposed from above. Like Hitler and Mussolini, they had no faith in the common people. Their ideal ruler was a benevolent despot; and perhaps they were right. The people seem always to lack both the capacity and the desire to govern themselves. As Mr Fisher closes—against the opening of the French Revolution—it is impossible not to feel that in many respects'the eighteenth century was an enviable period. It believed in a harmonious world governed , by reason, in a code of ethics based on utility and happiness, in the ideals of humanity, toleration, pacificism, and cosmopolitanism. It was this age that saw

the beginning of the emancipation movement and of the humane and intelligent treatment of the insane and the criminal. There was no place for nationalist sentiment at all. Samuel Johnson could say that patriotism was the last refuge of a scoundrel, while Goethe observed that it is among the lowest stages of culture that national hatreds are strongest and most vigorous. Who to-day could be so optimistic as to declare himself in the words of a message recently discovered in a church steeple at Gotha and placed there in 1784? Our age occupies the happiest period in the eighteenth century. Enlightenment makes great strides. Sectarian hatred and persecution are vanishing. Love of mankind and freedom of thought are gaining the supremacy. Recognising how bravely and energetically we laboured to raise you to the position which you now hcjd, do the same for your descendants and be happy.