Portraits From Memory And Other Essays - Livres de poche

PORTRAITS FROM MEMORY and Other Essays by BERTRAND RUSSELL SIMON AND SCHUSTER NEW YORK 1956 VI CONTENTS PAGE Mind and Matter 1 45 The Cult of Common Usage 1 66 Knowledge and Wisdom i 7 3 A Philosophy for Our Time 1 78 A Plea for Clear Thinking 1 85 History As m Art 190 How I Write no The Road to Happiness 5 Symptoms of Orwells 1 984 2 2 1 Why 1 Am Not a Communist 229 Marts Peril 233 Steps toward Peace 239 Adaptation An Autobiographical Epitome FOR those who are too young to remember the world be fore 1914, it must be difficult to imagine the contrast for a man of my age between childhood memories and the world of the present day. I try, though with indifferent success, to accustom myself to a world of crumbling empires, Communism, atom bombs, Asian self-assertion, and aristo cratic downfall. In this strange insecure world where no one knows whether he will be alive tomorrow, and where ancient states vanish like morning mists, it is not easy for those who, in youth, were accustomed to ancient solidities to believe that what they are now experiencing is a reality and not a tran sient nightmare. Very little remains of institutions and ways of life that when I was a child appeared as indestructible as granite. I grew up in an atmosphere impregnated with tradi tion. My parents died before I can remember, and I was brought up by my grandparents. My grandfather was born in the early days of the French Revolution and was in Parlia ment while Napoleon was still Emperor. As a Whig who fol lowed Fox, he thought the English hostility to the French Revolution and Napoleon excessive, and he visited the ex iled Emperor in Elba. It was he who, in 1832, introduced the Reform Bill which started Englandon the road toward de mocracy. He was Prime Minister during the Mexican War and during the revolutions of 1848. In common with the 2 PORTRAITS FROM MEMORY whole Russell family, he inherited the peculiar brand of aris tocratic liberalism which characterized the Revolution of 1688 in which his ancestor played an important part. I was taught a kind of theoretic republicanism which was pre pared to tolerate a monarch so long as he recognized that he was an employee of the people and subject to dismissal if he proved unsatisfactory. My grandfather, who was no respecter of persons, used to explain this point of view to Queen Vic toria, and she was not altogether sympathetic. She did, how ever, give him the house in Richmond Park in which I spent all rny youth. Wjmbibed certain political principles and ex pectations, andp vfe on the whole retained the former in spite of being compelled to reject the latter. fThere was to be ordered progress throughout the world, no revolutions, a gradual cessation of war, and an extension of parliamentary government to all those unfortunate regions which did not yet enjoy it. My grandmother used to laugh about a conver sation she had had with the Russian Ambassador. She said to him, Perhaps some day you will have a parliament in Rus sia, and he replied, God forbid, my dear Lady John. The Russian Ambassador of today might give the same answer if he changed the first word. The hopes of that period seem now a little absurd. There was to be democracy, but it was as sumed that the people would always be ready to follow the advice of wise and experienced aristocrats. There was to be a disappearance of imperialism, but the subject races in Asia and Africa, whom theBritish would voluntarily cease to gov ern, would have learned the advantage of a bicameral legisla ture composed of Whigs and Tories in about equal numbers, and would reproduce in torrid zones the parliamentary duels of Disraeli and Gladstone which were at their most brilliant I4 HL. at the time whenXnimbibedH dominant political prejudices. The idea of any insecurity to British power never entered AN AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL EPITOME 3 anybodys head. Britannia ruled the waves, and that was that...