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The Best Answer to Fanaticism--Liberalism Magazine Clipping, December 16, 1951
The New York Times Magazine
Dec. 16, 1951
Drawing by Bertrand Zadig
"The essence of the liberal outlook is a belief that men should be free to question anything if-they can support their questioning by solid arguments."
The Best Answer to Fanaticism-Liberalism
T
HE more I see of other countries
Its calm search for truth, viewed as dangerous
tries he is put in prison, and in Amer-
the more persuaded I become
ica he is thought unfit to perform any
that the English are a very odd
in many places, remains the hope of humanity.
public function. What you are to be
people. Their virtues are due to their
sure of depends, of course, upon your
vices, and their vices to their virtues.
longitude. East of the Elbe, it is ab-
They are tolerant-more so I think
By BERTRAND RUSSELL
solutely certain that capitalism is
than any other large nation-because
tottering; west of the Elbe, it is ab-
they consider ideas unimportant. In
persecution would be a more sincere
and Cavaliers and thought the impor-
solutely certain that capitalism is the
other countries ideas are thought im-
compliment.
tant thing was to learn to live at peace
salvation of mankind. The good citizen
There is, in the present day, a very
with one's neighbor, even if there were
portant and therefore dangerous; in
is not the man who attempts to be
general decay of liberalism, even in
matters about which one did not agree
England ideas are thought negligible
guided by the evidence but the man
countries where there has been an in-
with him. Locke based this attitude of
and therefore not worth persecuting.
who never resists longitudinal inspira-
crease of democracy. Liberalism is not
live-and-let-live on the fallibility of all
This was not always the case. In the
tion.
so much a creed as a disposition. It is,
human opinion. He thought nothing
seventeenth century, England had a
indeed, opposed to creeds. It began in
indubitable. He held that everything is
A
spate of ideologies leading to civil wars
MERICA, which imagines itself
and executions and thumbscrews, but
the late seventeenth century as a re-
open to question. He maintained that
the land of free enterprise, will not
action from the futile wars of religion
there is only probable opinion, and that
in 1688 the country decided that it had
permit free enterprise in the world of
had enough of earnestness and that
which, though they killed immense
the person who feels no doubt is stupid.
ideas. In America, almost as much as
numbers of people, left the balance of
Such an outlook, we are now assured,
anybody who believed anything at all
in Russia, you must think what your
power unchanged. I suppose that if
is a great drawback in battle, and is,
fervently was no gentleman. This de-
neighbor thinks, or rather what your
America and Russia were to fight each
therefore, to be decried. But the Eng-
cision was made all the easier by the
neighbor thinks that it pays to think.
other for a hundred and thirty years
lish, while they held this attitude,
fact that the most fanatical fanatics
Free enterprise is confined to the ma-
without either of them gaining any ad-
acquired their empire, defeated the
had gone to America. Ever since, Eng-
terial sphere. This is what Americans
lishmen who have beliefs are treated
vantage, there might, at the end of
French and the Spaniards and were
mean when they say that they are op-
that time, be a few people who would
as licensed buffoons or court jesters.
only defeated by the Americans, who
posed to materialism.
wonder whether the fighting was serv-
had the same attitude in an even more
There are no civil wars and nobody's
Those for whom free use of the intelli-
head is cut off. This is convenient,
ing any purpose. This is what happened
marked degree.
gence has made intellectual submission
in the second half of the seventeenth
but one sometimes feels that a little
T
difficult find themselves, wherever the
century.
happy days are past. Nowa-
government is persecuting, led into op-
BERTRAND RUSSELL, British philosopher,
The great apostle of liberalism was
days, the man who has any doubt
position to authority. But the liberal
won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1950.
Locke, who disliked both Roundheads
whatever is despised; in many coun-
attitude does (Continued on Page 40)
9
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The Best Answer to Fanaticism--Liberalism Magazine Clipping, December 16, 1951
Details
12/16/1951