Internationalism
and Human Unity
THE
great necessity, then, and the great difficulty is to help this idea of
humanity which is already at work upon our minds and has even begun in a very
slight degree to influence from above our actions, and turn it into something
more than an idea, however strong, to make it a central motive and a fixed part
of our nature. Its satisfaction must become a necessity of our psychological
being, just as the family idea or the national idea has become each a
psychological motive with its own need of satisfaction. But how is this to 'be
done? The family idea had the advantage of growing out of a primary vital need
in our being and therefore it had not the least difficulty in becoming a
psychological motive and need; for our readiest and strongest mental motives
and psychological needs are those which grow out of our vital necessities and
instincts. The clan and the tribe ideas had a similar origin, less primary and
compelling, and therefore looser and more dissoluble; but still they arose from
the vital necessity in human nature for aggregation and the ready basis given
to it by the inevitable physical growth of the family into clan or tribe. These
were natural aggregations, evolutionary forms already prepared on the animal
level.
The nation
idea, on the contrary, did not arise from a primary vital need, but from a
secondary or even tertiary necessity which resulted not from anything inherent
in our vital nature, but from circumstances, from environmental evolution; it
arose not from a vital, but from a geographical and historical necessity. And
we notice that as one result it had to be created most commonly by force, force
of circumstances partly, no doubt, but also by physical force, by the power of
the king and the conquering tribe converted into a military and dominant State.
Or else it came by a reaction against force, a revolt against conquest and
domination that brought a slow or sudden compactness to
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peoples who,
though geographically or even historically and culturally one, had lacked power
of cohesion and remained too conscious of an original heterogeneity or of local
and regional and other divisions. But still the necessity was there, and the
nation form after many failures and false successes got into being, and the
psychological motive of patriotism, a sign of the growth of a conscious national
ego, arose in the form as the expression of its soul and the guarantee of its
durability. For without such a soul, such a psychological force and presence
within the frame, there can be no guarantee of durability. Without it, what circumstances have created,
circumstances easily will destroy. It was for this reason that the ancient
world failed to create nations, except on a small scale, little clans and small
regional nations of brief duration and usually of loose structure; it created
only artificial empires which went to pieces and left chaos behind them.
What then of this international unity now in
the first obscure throes of the preformatory state resembling a ferment of
cells drawing together for
amalgamation? What is the compelling necessity behind it? If we look at
outward things only, the necessity is much less direct and much less compelling
than any that preceded it. There is here no vital necessity; mankind as a whole
can get on well enough without international unity, so far as mere living goes;
it will not be at all a perfect, rational or ideal collective living of the
race, - but after all where is
there yet any element in human life or society which is perfect, rational or
ideal? As yet at least none; still we get on somehow with life, because the
vital man in us, who is the dominant element in our instincts and in our
actions, cares for none of these things and is quite satisfied with any just
tolerable or any precariously or partly agreeable form of living, because that
is all to which he is accustomed and all therefore that he feels to be
necessary. The men who are not satisfied, the thinkers, the idealists, are
always a minority and in the end an ineffectual minority, because though always
in the end they do get their way partly, their victory yet turns into a defeat;
for the vital man remains still the majority and degrades the apparent success
into a pitiful parody of their rational hope, their clear- sighted ideal or
their strong counsel of perfection.
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The geographical necessity for a unification of this
kind does not exist, unless we consider that it has been created through the
drawing closer together of the earth and its inhabitants by Science and her
magical lessening of physical distances and attenuation of barriers. But
whatever may happen in the future, this is as yet not sufficient; earth is
still large enough and her divisions still real enough for her to do without any
formal unity. If there is any strong need, it may be described- if such an
epithet can be applied to a thing in the present and the future - as a
historical necessity, that is, a need which has arisen as the result of certain
actual circumstances that have grown up in the evolution of international
relations. And that need is economic, political, mechanical, likely under
certain circumstances to create some tentative or preliminary frame- work, but
not at first a psychological reality which will vivify the frame. Moreover, it
is not yet sufficiently vital to be precisely a necessity; for it amounts
mainly to a need for the removal of certain perils and inconveniences, such as
the constant danger of war, and at most to the strong desirability of a better
international co-ordination. But by itself this creates only a possibility, not
even a moral certainty, of a first vague sketch and loose framework of unity
which mayor may not lead to something more close and real.
But there
is another power than that of external circumstance which we have a right to
take into consideration. For behind all the external circumstances and
necessities of which we are more easily aware in Nature, there is always an
internal necessity in the being, a will and a design in Nature itself which
precedes the outward signals of its development and in spite of all obstacles
and failures must in the long end inevitably get itself realised. Nowadays we
can see this truth everywhere in Nature down to her lowest forms; a will in the
very seed of the being, not quite conscious or only partially conscious in the
form itself, but still present there in Nature. It is subconscious or even
inconscient if you like, but it is still a blind will, a mute idea which
contains beforehand the form it is going to create, is aware of a necessity
other than the environmental, a necessity contained in the very being itself,
and creates persistently and
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inevitably a form that best answers to the, necessity,
however we may labour to interfere with or thwart its operations.
This is
true biologically, but it is also, though in a more subtle and variable way,
psychologically true. Now the very nature of man is that of an individual who
on one side is always emphasising and developing his individual being to the
extent of his power but who is also driven by the Idea or Truth within him to
unify himself with others of his species, to join himself to them or
agglutinate them to him, to create human groups, aggregates and collectivities.
And if there is an aggregate or collectivity which it is possible for him to
realise but is not yet realised, we may be sure that that too in the end he
will create. This will in him is not always or often quite conscient or fore-
seeing; it is often largely subconscient, but even then it is eventually
irresistible. And if it gets into his conscious mind, as the international idea
has now done, we may count on a more rapid evolution. Such a will in Nature
creates for itself favourable external circumstances and happenings or finds
them created for it in the stress of events. And even if they are insufficient,
she will still often use them beyond their apparent power of effectivity, not
minding the possibility of failure, for she knows that in the end she will
succeed and every experience of failure will help to better the eventual
success.
Well, then,
it may be said, let us trust to this inevitable will in Nature and let us
follow out her method of operation. Let us create anyhow this framework, any
framework of the aggregate; for she knows already the complete form she intends
and she will work out eventually in her own time by the power of the idea and
our will to realise it, by help of strong force of circumstances, by pressure
of all kinds, by physical force even, if need be, since that too seems still to
be a part of her necessary machinery; let us create it. Let us have the body;
the soul will grow in the body. And we need not mind if the bodily formation is
artificial with at first a small or no conscious psychological reality to
vivify it. That will begin to form itself as soon as the body has been formed;
for the nation too was at first more or less artificially formed out of
incoherent elements actually brought together by the necessity of a
subconscient idea, though
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apparently it was done only by physical force and the
force of circumstances. As a national ego formed which identified itself with
the geographical body of the nation and developed in it the psychological
instinct of national unity and the need of its satisfaction, so a collective
human ego will develop in the international body and will evolve in it the
psychological instinct of human unity and the need of its satisfaction. That
will be the guarantee of duration. And that possibly is how the thing will
happen, man being what he is; indeed if we cannot do better, it will so happen,
since happen somehow it must, whether in the worse way or the better.
It may be
as well to review here briefly in the light of these considerations the main
possibilities and powers which are shaping us towards such an end in the
present world conditions. The old means of unification, conquest by a single
great Power, which would reduce part of the world by force and bring the
remaining nations into the condition of dependencies, protectorates and
dependent allies, the whole forming the basic structure of a great final
unification, - this was the
character of the ancient Roman precedent, - does not seem immediately possible.
It would require a great predominance of force simultaneously by sea and land,1
()
an
irresistibly superior science and organisation and with all this a constantly
successful diplomacy and an invincible good fortune. If war and diplomacy are
still to be the decisive factors in international politics in the future as in
the past, it would be rash to predict that such a combination may not arise,
and if other means fail, it must arise; for there is nothing that can be set
down as impossible in the chances of the future, and the urge in Nature always
creates its own means. But, at present, the possibilities of the future do not
seem to point in this direction. There is, on the other hand, a very strong
possibility of the whole earth, or at least the three continents of the eastern
hemisphere, being dominated by three or four great empires largely increased in
extent of dominion, spheres of influence, protectorates, and thereby exercising
a pre-eminence which they could either maintain by agreements, avoiding all
causes of conflict, or in
1
Now also by air.
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a rivalry which would be the cause of fresh wars and
changes. This would normally have been the result of the great European
conflict.
But there
has struck across this possibility a revived strength of the idea of
nationality expressed in the novel formula of the principle of
self-determination to which the great world- empires have had to pay at least a
verbal homage. The idea of international unity to which this intervention of
the revived force of nationality is leading, takes the form of a so-called
League of Nations. Practically, however, the League of Nations under present
conditions or any likely to be immediately realised would still mean the
control of the earth by a few great Powers, - a control that would be checked only
by the necessity of conciliating the sympathy and support of the more numerous
smaller or less powerful nations. On the force and influence of these few would
rest practically, if not admittedly, the decision of all important debatable
questions. And without it there could be no chance of enforcing the decisions
of the majority against any recalcitrant great Power or combination of Powers.
The growth of democratic institutions would perhaps help to minimise the
chances of conflict and of the abuse of power, - though that is not at all
certain; but it would not alter this real character of the combination.
In all this
there is no immediate prospect of any such form of unification as would give
room for a real psychological sense of unity, much less necessitate its growth.
Such a form might evolve; but we should have to trust for it to the chapter of
accidents or at best to the already declared urge in Nature expressed in the
internationalist idea. On that side, there was at one time a possibility which
seemed to be very suddenly and rapidly growing into something more, the
emergence of a powerful party in all the advanced countries of the world
pledged to internationalism, conscious of its necessity as a first condition
for their other aims and more and more determined to give it precedence and to
unite internationally to bring it about. That combination of the intellectuals
with Labour which created the Socialist parties in Germany, Russia and Austria,
formed anew recently the Labour party in England and has had
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its counterparts in most other European countries,
seems to be travelling in that direction. This world-wide movement which made
internationalism and Labour rule its two main principles, had already created
the Russian revolution and seemed ready to bring about another great
socialistic revolution in central Europe. It was conceivable that this party
might everywhere draw together. By a chain of revolutions such as took place in
the nineteenth century and of less violent but still rapid evolutions brought
about by the pressure of their example, or even by simply growing into the
majority in each country, the party might control Europe. It might create
counterparts of itself in all the American republics and in Asiatic countries.
It might by using the machinery of the League of Nations or, where necessary,
by physical force or economic or other pressure persuade or compel all the
nations into some more stringent system of international unification. A
World-State or else a close confederation of democratic peoples might be
created with a common governing body for the decision of principles and for all
generally important affairs or at least for all properly international affairs
and problems; a common law of the nations might grow up and international
courts to administer it and some kind of system of international police control
to maintain and enforce it. In this way, by the general victory of an idea,
socialist or other, seeking to organise humanity according to its own model or
by any other yet unforeseen way, a sufficient formal unity might come into
existence.
The
question then arises, how out of this purely formal unity a real psychological
unity can be created and whether 'it can be made a living oneness. For a mere
formal, mechanical, administrative, political and economic union does not
necessarily create a psychological unity. None of the great empires have yet
succeeded in doing that, and even in the Roman where some sense of unity did
come into being, it was nothing very close and living; it could not withstand
all shocks from within and without, it could not prevent what was much more
dangerous, the peril of decay and devitalisation which the diminution of the
natural elements of free variation and helpful struggle brought with it. A
complete world-union would have indeed
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this advantage that it would have no need to fear,
forces from without, for no such forces would any longer exist. But this very absence
of outer pressure might well give greater room and power to internal elements
of disintegration and still more to the opportunities of decay. It might indeed
for a long time foster an internal intellectual and political activity and
social progress which would keep it living; but this principle of progress
would not be always secure against a natural tendency to exhaustion and
stagnation which every diminution of variety and even the very satisfaction of
social and economic well-being might well hasten. Disruption of unity would
then be necessary to restore humanity to life. Again, while the Roman Empire
appealed only to the idea of Roman unity, an artificial and accidental
principle, this World-State would appeal to the idea of human unity, a real and
vital principle. But if the idea of unity can appeal to the human mind, so too
can the idea of separative life, for both address themselves to vital instincts
of his nature. What guarantee will there be that the latter will not prevail
when man has once tried unity and finds perhaps that its advantages do not
satisfy his whole nature? Only the growth of some very powerful psychological
factor will make unity necessary to him, whatever other changes and
manipulations might be desirable to satisfy his other needs and instincts.
The formal
unification of mankind would come in upon us in the shape of a system which
would be born, grow, come to its culmination. But every system by the very
nature of things tends after its culmination to decay and die. To prevent the
organism from decaying and dying there must be such a psychological reality
within as will persist and survive all changes of its body. Nations have that
in a sort of collective national ego which persists through all vital changes.
But this ego is not by any means self-existent and immortal; it supports itself
on certain things with which it is identified. First, there is the geographical
body, the country; secondly, the common interests of all who inhabit the same
country, defence, economic well- being and progress, political liberty etc.;
thirdly, a common name, sentiment, culture. But we have to mark that this
national ego owes its life to the coalescence of the separative instinct and
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the instinct of unity; for the nation feels itself one
as distinguished from other nations; it owes its vitality to interchange with
them and struggle with them in all the activities of its nature. Nor are all
these altogether sufficient; there is a deeper factor. There must be a sort of
religion of country, a constant even if not always explicit recognition not
only of the sacredness of the physical mother, the land, but also, in however
obscure a way, of the nation as a collective soul which it is the first duty
and need of every man to keep alive, to defend from suppression or mortal
attaint or, if suppressed, then to watch, wait and struggle for its release and
rehabilitation, if sicklied over with the touch of any fatal spiritual ailment,
then to labour always to heal and revivify and save alive.
The
World-State will give its inhabitants the great advantages of peace, economic
well-being, general security, combination for intellectual, cultural, social
activity and progress. None of these are in themselves sufficient to create the
thing needed. Peace and security we all desire at present, because we have them
not in sufficiency; but we must remember that man has also within him the need
of combat, adventure, struggle, almost requires these for his growth and
healthy living; that instinct would be largely suppressed by a universal peace
and a flat security and it might rise up successfully against suppression.
Economic well-being by itself cannot permanently satisfy and the price paid for
it might be so heavy as to diminish its appeal and value. The human instinct
for liberty, individual and national, might well be a constant menace to the
World-State, unless it so skilfully arranged its system as to give them
sufficient free play. A common intellectual and cultural activity and progress
may do much, but need not by themselves be sufficient to bring into being the
fully powerful psychological factor that would be required. And the collective
ego created would have to rely on the instinct of unity alone; for it would be
in conflict with the separative instinct which gives the national ego half its
vitality.
It is not
impossible that the indispensable inner factor for this outer frame might be
increasingly created, in its very process of growth, but certain psychological
elements would have
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to be present in great strength. There would be needed,
to make the change persist, a religion of humanity or an equivalent sentiment
much more powerful, explicit, self-conscious, universal in its appeal than the
nationalist's religion of country; the clear recognition by man in all his
thought and life of a single soul in humanity of which each man and each people
is an incarnation and soul-form; an ascension of man beyond the principle of
ego which lives by separativeness, -
and yet there must be no destruction of individuality, for without that man
would stagnate; a principle and arrangement of the common life which would give
free play to the individual variation, interchange in diversity and the need of
adventure and conquest by which the soul of man lives and grows great, and
sufficient means of expressing all the resultant complex life and growth in a
flexible and progressive form of human society.
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