The Right and Wrong of Compulsion by the State by Auberon Herbert

The Right and Wrong of Compulsion by the State by Auberon Herbert

Author:Auberon Herbert [Herbert, Auberon]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00


ESSAY SEVEN

LOST IN THE REGION OF PHRASES

This and the previous essay, “Salvation by Force,” were the last two articles in the published debate between Herbert and J. A. Hobson which took place in the pages of The Humanitarian: A Monthly Review of Sociological Science. Herbert's “A Voluntaryist Appeal” (May 1898) called forth Hobson's critique, “Rich Man's Anarchism” (June 1898). Herbert replied in “Salvation by Force” (October 1898) and in this essay (May 1899). This essay especially responds to Hobson's organicism and his attack on metaphysical individualism.

I owe many apologies both to the editor and to Mr. Hobson for the long delay which has taken place as regards this discussion. I can only hope they may both be willing to forgive me. And now to our business in hand. I tried in my last paper to show that while Mr. Hobson had written with much literary skill an interesting paper about socialism, he had left the great fortress untaken, even unbesieged, which stands in the way of the advance of socialism. He made a delightful excursus into the region of metaphor and literary imagination, but he never troubled himself to convince us that force was a weapon which the larger number are morally justified in using against the smaller number, or that, when used, is likely to produce the happiness which we all desire. But if Mr. Hobson did not raise this all-important question, but passed it by, as skillful leaders sometimes pass by strong positions, which threaten heavy loss for those who attack them, he tried to open out a new road toward his end with no little literary ingenuity. By the way of metaphor and abstract conception he sought to steal our senses from us, inspiring us with the socialistic temperament, and leading us along pleasant and flowery paths toward that new form of Catholic church, in which he invites us to find our rest. Some of his readers probably felt much the same influence gently stealing over them as they have felt in listening to some of the great Jesuit teachers. In both cases the real issues are passed by, and side issues, sentimentally and artistically tricked out, are skillfully put in their place. It is only natural it should be so. Our socialist friends and the Jesuits plead for their own causes in much the same spirit. They both believe absolutely in great external organizations; they each put their own external organization above and before everything else; conscience, judgment, and will are, on a fixed system, bent and bowed before it; and reason and individual judgment, who always demand to stand at the gate with erect head, become to both of them as the voice of the Evil One moving man to his ruin. If I remember rightly, even Luther spoke of reason as “the harlot”—I presume because reason requires that every claim put forward by authority should first pass before its own tribunal.

Now let us examine Mr. Hobson's apology for socialism, and see how far it carries us.



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