In a series of articles appearing in the New Leader, entitled “The Danger of Orthodoxy,” Mr. J. Middleton Murry is making desperate efforts to graft on to Marxian economics a brand of emotionalism which he seems to think will make it more attractive. He finds Socialism, based on exact definitions and scientific analysis, too logical and convincing in a mathematical sense, but lacking in appeal to the heart. With him the heart should come first. He says :
“Therefore it is far more important that a man should be a complete Socialist at heart than that he should be a Marxist in his head. (It is not possible to be a complete Marxist in one’s head alone). For there is no difficulty in converting to Marxism a man who is a genuine Socialist at heart—that is, ready to give up everything for the establishment of complete economic equality among men.”
Now, a man does not think with his heart, but with his head. True, his heart has something to do with the process, as do all the organs of the body. To become a Socialist, however, a man must think, and thinking is the special function of the brain. Mr. Murry would not, of course, deny this. Even his “Socialist at heart” must first have what Mr. Murry calls the idea of “complete economic equality among men” in his head. But why he must be ready to give up so much for it is a mystery, seeing that he has nothing to give up but his slavery.
The brain is an organ that develops by use and is a better organ the more it is developed. But even the cross-word enthusiast does not rack his brains for the mere sake of development. There must always be an incentive to thought; usually it springs from material interests in some shape or other.
To use Mr. Murry’s phrase, the man who got the idea of “economic equality” must first have got the idea of economic inequality from his everyday experience. Consequently, however crude the process, it is a process of reasoning. Crude reasoning is often forcible, but seldom comprehensive, and the man who has only the two aforementioned ideas in his head is more easily confused or misled than the man who is capable of reasoning correctly from a series of connected facts or factors. The student of Marxian economics is, therefore, not only a better Socialist; he is better equipped to resist the wiles and intrigues of the political adventurer. But Mr. Murry will not have it that way. He says:—
“The fact is that Marxism, genuine dynamic Marxism, itself rests on an ethical postulate. It rests on the ethical postulate that the man who understands the historical process, and approves of what he believes must be its eventual outcome, will make himself the willing instrument of the process. Without this ethical resolve in the individual, Marxism becomes a mere armchair theory of revolutions.”
The words “historical process” are, of course, an abbreviation for the “materialist conception of history” discovered by Marx and Engels. The latter expresses it as follows:—
“That the economic structure of society at a given time furnishes the real foundations upon which the entire superstructure of political and juristic institutions, as well as the religious, philosophical and other abstract notions of a given period, are to be explained in the last instance.”
Abstract notions based on sentimental ideas of justice, duty, patriotism, brotherly love, etc., are quite common to the period in which we are living. They are the result of economic relationships. The class that owns all the means of wealth-production exacts duty and patriotism from the dispossessed. And while exploiting them do actually obtain brotherly love—or is it money-bag worship?—in place of a natural resentment. The well-paid moralists of the capitalist class have built up quite a respectable doctrine around the idea of self-sacrifice, and large numbers of workers are quite incapable of seeing realities, so strongly are they affected by these and similar sentiments.
Now, while it may be true that men often act purely from sentimental motives, Mr. Murry says that when actions are dictated by reason alone, non-action invariably follows. Reason and the will to act are common sense, while Socialism of the heart and ethical postulates are quite obviously abstract notions with no foundations on the solid earth. True, the heart has always been spoken of as the organ of good intentions ; but then, orthodoxy, that continually prates about this quality of the heart, is flatly opposed to Socialism. Consequently, Mr. Murry is responsible for a contradiction in terms, i.e., an ethical Socialist.
Moreover, according to him, the difference between the ethical Socialist and the Socialist without adjectives is the difference between action and inaction. The question of useful or useless action does not arise with him. Apparently that is irrelevant. Although the people most loudly advertising themselves as Socialists—the I.L.P.—have been nosing up a blind alley throughout their political existence. Even now, when their failure as a working-class party has forced them to take stock of their ideas, they are still befuddled with reforms that are based on capitalist ideas of justice, fairness, etc. The obvious course being to determine the cause of working-class poverty and the action necessary to end it.
The will to act in the case of the Socialist is not ethical, but an impulse to act which arises from self-interest. Convinced Socialists quite rightly assume that every worker who recognises the soundness of Socialism will act in accordance with his reasoned conclusions. Whether the new-comer does little or much in the movement depends on circumstances, temperament, opportunity, physical and mental qualities, etc. The totality of these individual efforts at a given moment constitutes the Socialist Movement, with the growth of which, individual effort becomes more and more unnecessary and only the question of counting heads remains.
The Socialist is not prompted by ethical considerations in his work for Socialism. He works according to the strength of his convictions and his desire for Socialism. There is no question of sacrifice. He puts time and effort into the movement that brings nearer the thing he wants. Mr. Murry calls this an ethical resolve in the individual. The capitalist calls it by other names. Much depends on the point of view, but Mr. Murry’s point of view does not square with either. The explanation, no doubt, lies with the party to which he belongs—a party that runs with the hare and hunts with the hounds.
F. Foan
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