Читать книгу Darkness and the Light - Olaf Stapledon - Страница 10

One power alone in all the world now remained to be brought within the Russian grasp, and this was potentially the greatest power of all, namely China. It was in the relations between Russia and China that the discrepancy in my experience first became evident, and the two parallel histories of mankind emerged. Since these two great peoples bulk so largely in my story, I shall dwell for a while on the forces which had moulded them.

The first Russian revolution, under Lenin, had been mainly a groping but sincere expression of the will for true community, and also an act of vengeance against a cruel and inefficient master class. When the leaders of the Revolution had established their power they proceeded to remake the whole economy of Russia for the benefit of the workers. Foreign hostility, however, forced them to sacrifice much to military necessity. Not only the physical but also the mental prosperity of the population suffered. What should have become a population of freely inquiring, critical, and responsible minds became instead a mentally- regimented population, prone to mob enthusiasm and contempt for unorthodoxy. Danger favoured the dictatorship of one man and the dominance of a disciplined and militarized party. The will for true community tended more and more to degenerate into the passion for conformity within the herd and for triumph over the herd's enemies.

For a long while, for many decades or possibly a few centuries, the struggle between the light and the darkness in Russia fluctuated. There were periods when it seemed that discipline would be relaxed for the sake of liberal advancement in education. But presently foreign danger, real or fictitious, or else some threat of internal conflict would become an excuse for the intensification of tyranny. Thousands of officials would be shot, the army and the factories purged of disaffected persons. Education would be cleansed of all tendency to foster critical thought.

The two military regimes which now vied with one another for control of the planet were in many respects alike. In each of them a minority held effective power over the whole society, and in each a single individual was at once the instrument and the wielder of that power. Each dictatorship imposed upon its subjects a strict discipline and a stereotyped ideology which, in spite of its much emphasized idiosyncracies, was in one respect at least identical with the ideology of its opponent; for both insisted on the absolute subordination of the individual to the state, yet in both peoples there was still a popular conviction that the aim of social planning should be fullness of life for all individuals.

Between the two world powers there were great differences. Russia had been first in the field, and had triumphed largely through the mental bankruptcy of European civilization. Though the Russian culture was itself an expression of that civilization, the Russians were relatively an uncivilized race which had found no great difficulty in breaking away from a lightly imposed alien ideology. China, on the other hand, boasted the oldest civilization of the planet, and one which was more conservative than any other. Moreover, while the Russians had asserted themselves against a decadent but partially civilized Europe, and had always been secretly overawed by Europe's cultural achievement, the Chinese had asserted themselves against a people whom they regarded as upstarts and barbarians, the Japanese. More consciously than the Russians they had fought not only for social justice but for civilization, for culture, and the continuity of their tradition.

Whatever the defects of the Chinese tradition, in one respect it had been indirectly of immense value. Among both rich and poor the cult of the family had persisted throughout Chinese history, and had survived even the modern revolutionary period. In many ways this cult, this obsession, had been a reactionary influence, but in two respects it had been beneficial. It had prevented decline of population; and, more important, it had prevented a decline of intelligence. In China as elsewhere the more intelligent had tended to rise into the more comfortable circumstances. But whereas in Europe and America the more prosperous classes had failed to breed adequately, in China the inveterate cult of family ensured that they should do so. In post- revolutionary China the old love of family was a useful stock on which to graft a new biologically-justified respect not merely for family as such but for those stocks which showed superior intelligence or superior social feeling. Unfortunately, though public opinion did for a while move in this direction, the old financial ruling families, seeing their dominance threatened by upstart strains, used all their power of propaganda and oppression to stamp out this new and heretical version of the old tradition. Thus, though on the whole the Chinese Empire was richer in intelligence than the Russian, it seriously squandered its resources in this most precious social asset. And later, as I shall tell, the reactionary policy of the ruling caste threatened this great people with complete bankruptcy of mental capacity.

In social organization there were differences between imperial Russia and imperial China. In Russia the heroic attempt to create a communist state had finally gone astray through the moral deterioration of the Communist Party. What had started as a devoted revolutionary corps had developed as a bureaucracy which in effect owned the whole wealth of the empire. Common ownership theoretically existed, but in effect it was confined to the Party, which thus became a sort of fabulously wealthy monastic order. In its earlier phase the Party was recruited by strict social and moral testing, but latterly the hereditary principle had crept in, so that the Party became an exclusive ruling caste. In China, under the influence partly of Russian communism, partly of European capitalism, a similar system evolved, but one in which the common ownership of the ruling caste as a whole was complicated by the fact that the great families of the caste secured a large measure of economic autonomy. As in Japan at an earlier stage, but more completely and definitely, each great department of production became the perquisite of a particular aristocratic, or rather plutocratic, family. Within each family, common ownership was strictly maintained.

There was a deep difference of temper between the two peoples. Though the Russian revolutionaries had prided themselves on their materialism, the Russian people retained a strong though unacknowledged tendency towards mysticism. Their veneration of Lenin, which centred round his embalmed body in the Kremlin, was originally simple respect for the founder of the new order; but little by little it acquired a character which would have called from Lenin himself condemnation and ridicule. The phraseology of dialectical materialism came to be fantastically reinterpreted in such a way as to enable the populace to think of 'matter' as a kind of deity, with Marx as the supreme prophet and Lenin as the terrestrial incarnation of the God himself. Marx's system was scientific in intention, and it claimed to be an expression of intelligence operating freely on the data of social life. But the early Marxists had insisted, quite rightly, that reason was no infallible guide, that it was an expression of social causes working through the individual's emotional needs. This sound psychological principle became in time a sacred dogma, and during the height of Russian imperial power the rejection of reason was as complete and as superstitious as it had been in Nazi Germany. Men were able, while accepting all the social and philosophical theories of Marx, to indulge in all kinds of mystical fantasies.

In this matter the Chinese were very different from the Russians. Whatever the truth about ancient China, the China that had freed itself from Japan was little interested in the mystical aspect of experience. For the Chinese of this period common sense was absolute. Even in regard to science, which for so many Russians had become almost a religion, the Chinese maintained their common-sense attitude. Science for them was not a gospel but an extremely useful collection of precepts for gaining comfort or power. When the educated Russian spoke of the far-reaching philosophical significance of materialistic science, the educated Chinese would generally smile and shrug his shoulders. Strange that the fanatical materialist was more addicted to metaphysical speculation and mystical fantasy, and the unspeculative adherent of common sense was in this respect capable of greater piety towards the occult depth of reality.

The culture of the new China was often regarded as 'Eighteenth Century' in spirit, but at its best it included also a tacit intuitive reverence for the mystery which encloses human existence. Even after the bitter struggle against the Japanese there remained something eighteenth century about the educated Chinese, something of the old urbanity and liking for decency and order. The old respect for learning, too, remained, though the kind of learning which was now necessary to the aspiring government official was very different from that which was required in an earlier age. Then, all that was demanded was familiarity with classical texts; now, the candidate had to show an equally minute acquaintance with the lore of physics, biology, psychology, economics, and social science. In the new China as in old, the supreme interest of the intellectuals was not theoretical, as it had been with the Greeks, nor religious, as with the Jews, nor mystical, as with the Indians, nor scientific and industrial, as with the Europeans, but social. For them, as for their still-revered ancestors, the all absorbing problem was to discover and practise the right way of living together.

To understand the Chinese social ideas of this period with their emphasis at once on freedom and self-discipline for the common task, one must bear in mind the effects of the Japanese wars. At the outset the Chinese had been hopelessly divided against themselves, and the Japanese had profited by their discord. But invasion united them, and to the surprise of the World they showed great skill and devotion in reorganizing their whole economy to resist the ruthless enemy. Though their armies were driven inland, they contrived to create a new China in the West. There, great factories sprang up, great universities were founded. There, the young men and women of the new China learned to believe in their people's mission to free the world from tyranny and to found a world-civilization which should combine the virtues of the ancient and the Modern.

During the first phase of the resistance against Japan, during the emergence of the new national consciousness which was also a new consciousness of mankind, the whole resources of the state and the whole energy of the people were concentrated on defence. Arms had to be bought or made, armies raised. And the new soldiers had to be politically trained so that each of them should be not merely an efficient fighter but also a radiating centre of the new ideas. Education, military and civilian, was one of the state's main cares. Under the influence of a number of brilliant minds there appeared the outline of the old new culture. Based on the ethics of the ancient China, but influenced also by Christianity, by European democracy, by European science, by Russian communism, it was at the same time novel through and through.

Unfortunately, though the ideas that inspired the new China included common service, common sacrifice, and common ownership, the structure of Chinese society was still in part capitalist. Though under the stress of War the commercial and financial oligarchy sacrificed much, freely or under compulsion, it managed to retain its position as the effective power behind the throne of the people's representatives, and later behind the dictator. In the period of acute danger this power had been exercised secretly, and had effected intrigues with the similar power in Japan. Later, when the tide had turned, when the Japanese armies were either surrounded or in flight to the coast, the plea of national danger was no longer sufficiently urgent to subdue or disguise the efforts of finance to re-establish itself. A period of violent internal strain was followed by a civil war. Once more the rice plains were overrun by troops and tanks, railways were destroyed, cities bombed, savage massacres perpetrated in the name of freedom or justice or security.

The result of the war was that Communism triumphed in the North, Capitalism in the South. For a while the two states maintained their independence, constantly intriguing against one another. The North, of course, depended largely on Russian support, and as Russia was at this time triumphantly expanding over Europe, it looked as though South China must soon succumb. But Russia, though by now the greatest military power in the world, was no longer a revolutionary and inspiring influence. The jargon of communism was still officially used, but its spirit had vanished; much as, in an earlier age, the jargon of liberal democracy was used in support of capitalist exploitation. Consequently the leaders of the South were able to defeat communist propaganda both in their own country and in the North by ardent appeals to Chinese nationalism. The result was that after a while the nationalists seized power in the North. There followed a solemn act of union between the North and South Chinese states. And thus was created the formidable Chinese financial-military dictatorship.

While the Russian Empire was busy digesting America and Africa, the Chinese would-be empire was consolidating itself throughout eastern Asia. In the north, Japan, Korea, Manchuria and Mongolia, in the south, Assam, Siam, Burma and the East Indies, were one by one brought within the new empire. Tibet, which had formerly been part of the ancient Chinese Empire, was able to main' a precarious independence by playing off each of its formidable neighbours against the other.

The period of human history that I have been describing may seem to have been one in which the will for darkness triumphed, but in fact it was not. It was merely as I have said, a phase in the long age of balance between the light and the dark. Neither of the two empires that now competed for mastery over the planet was wholly reactionary. In each great group of peoples a large part of the population, perhaps the majority, still believed in friendliness and reasonableness, and tried to practice them. When the sacrifice was not too great, they even succeeded. In personal contacts the form and often the spirit of Christian behaviour or of the ancient Chinese morality were still evident. Even in indirect social relations liberal impulses sometimes triumphed. Moreover in, both empires an active minority worked vigorously for the light, urging humane conduct and propagating the idea of a just social order in which all might find fulfilment. In fact on both sides the more intelligent of the adherents of the light confidently looked forward to a great and glorious Change, if not in the near future, at least in the lifetime of their children. Even the rulers themselves, the military-political groups which controlled the two empires, believed sincerely not indeed in radical change, but in their mission to rule the world and lead it to a vaguely conceived Utopia of discipline and martial virtue. In neither empire was there at this time the ruthless lust for power and delight in cruelty which had for a' while dominated Germany. Between the rulers of the two empires there was an ambiguous relationship. Though each desired to conquer the other by diplomacy or war, and though to each the social ideas and the forms of social behaviour propagated by the other were repugnant, yet, both agreed in regarding something else as more repugnant, namely the overthrow of their own state by their own progressive minority. Consequently their policy was guided not only by fluctuations in their power in relation to the enemy but also by the strength or weakness of their own progressives. Sincerely, and sometimes even with sincere reluctance, they used the plea of external danger to enforce stricter discipline at home. Yet at times when social upheaval seemed imminent they would not scruple to ask the external enemy to ease his pressure for a while. And invariably the request was granted; for neither of the ruling groups wished to see its opponents overthrown in revolution.