Victor Hugo [pp. 81-90]

Victor Hugo.
solution of the problem whose factors they
are combining. Has the great German
statesman ever looked beyond the interests
of his country or his caste? He has succeeded marvelously well, and nowadays
Germany is ruled according to the most aristocratic and despotic principles. She is a
formidable military power, and the greatest
obstacle to universal peace that has ever existed So was France in the hands of Richelieu (I do not speak of Napoleon I.-a
passing hurricane.) Richelieu was followed
by Madame de Maintenon and Madame de
Pompadour, and his work went to pieces.
So will it be with Bismarck's-dura lex, sed
lex. Above the politicians we place the
thinkers, either philosophers or poets, mere
dreamers in the judgment of many, who devote their efforts to the advancement of mankind, and for whom civilization rests upon
moral foundations. There is also a scientific school, whose most illustrious representative is Herbert Spencer, but this school
seems to incline toward materialistic conceptions.
Victor Hugo is assuredly not a politician
of the order of Bismarck or Richelieu; never
did he seek the reputation of a practical man,
nor take place in a cabinet. He desired to
be a depute or senateur, only to ascend the
tribune, and thus gain a higher ground of
vantage for his ideal. No more is he a scientist.
"Le penseur est croyant, le savant est athee."
"The thinker is a believer, the scientist is
an atheist."
"' I know," he said, "that philosophers advance rapidly, while statesmen advance slowly; the latter, nevertheless, must in the end
join the former. If a timely union is effected, progress is established and revolutions
are avoided. But if this co6peration is too
long delayed, then danger arises. It is urgent that legislators consult with thinkers,
that politicians, so often superficial, take into
account the profound meditations of writers,
and that those who make laws, obey those
who make morals."
His voice, the voice of the people, a singing voice, like the chorus of ancient tragedy,
while denouncing abuses, requests and summons statesmen to find and apply practical
remedies.
Justice and truth, that is to say, anything
just and true, must, sooner or later, arrive at
actual embodiment. Such is the fundamental dogma of his political creed, and the supreme rule for the solution of international
as well as sociai problems. "We shall have
the United States of Europe supervening
upon the old world, as the new one has culminated in those great United States of
America.... To unite all European nations into a large family, to liberate commerce
impeded by frontiers, and industry paralyzed
by prohibitions, to emancipate labor enslaved
by luxury, land crushed by taxes, thought silenced by despotism, conscience fettered by
dogma."
We see from these citations what are some
of those objects that he had in view in calling into existence true and just principles of
action. A firm idealist, he constantly opposed the doctrines of those writers to whom
men are mere bodies, and whose politics
concentrates in the development of wealth,
without moral, artistic, or intellectual aims.
When Darwin's conception is applied to
public and international relations, how cruel
and unnatural it appears, as compared with
so great an Ideal! Struggle for life, survival
of the fittest, every one for himself, indulging all selfish instincts, and constructing his
own happiness from the unhappiness of others these are the Darwinistic substitutes for
justice and truth. Such principles are based
upon real facts, perhaps, but are more suitable to lower animals or to savages than to
civilized and Christian nations. Cholera,
also, is a reality; so is famine, as well as the
barbarity of the Middle Ages. If those
scourges have already measurably disappeared, why in like manner should not other
obstructive realities disappear, which are
equally unacceptable to enlightened minds?
All inferior races, it is asserted, shall die to
make room for a superior race: or, as Bismarck cynically says, "Force is prior to
law." In opposition to such maxims, Victor
Hugo believed in an endless perfectibility
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[July,