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PARTISAN REVIEW
they run the risk of falling into as the result of their communing
with God-with this exception, all those who have tried to deify
themselves however little-Caracalla, Hitler or Jules Romains–
all, whatever their technique of deification, have succeeded in
corrupting in themselves and debasing in those around them the
values which produce great men and permit the existence of a
human world. To be "a hero, a saint for oneself," ala Baudelaire
-perfect! But what is a god which would be god only in himself
and for himself? Every god must manifest himself. From the
Manuel de Deification
to the
Seven Mysteries,
Jules Romains has
only too plainly "manifested" himself, Romains the "unique."
If,
at least, this god, like the god of Nietzsche, was a dancing god!
If,
at least, this god, like the god of Nietzsche, was a dancing god!
Dieu-Farigoule would be rather a seated god, a "sitter." To make
an end of these "mystifications"-god takes himself seriously.
Only the impudence of a god who deceives himself could produce,
under the title of
Visit to the Americans,
the description of a Pull–
man car; only the impudence of a god who traps himself in his
own nets could put forth, under the title of
Plan for the 9th of
July,
the end-product of several cafe conversations, watered with
excellent cognac, between a dozen pretentious "intellectuals";
only the impudence of a god who believes himself assured of
immunity could write pages 219 and after in the French edition of
Seven Mysteries.
There it is recorded how at the
Ecole Normale Superieure
"sixty or so carefully chosen" young Frenchmen met with some
representatives of the Nazi movement: Abetz, and perhaps a lieu–
tenant of Baldur von Schirach. "These young people who sur–
rounded me," M. Jules Romains writes modestly, "were delighteJ
to ask a few questions of their German friends and to get from
them, if it was possible, some enlightenment." The Nazis talked
at their ease; then the Frenchmen were invited to ask some ques–
tions-by writing them on slips of paper. M. Jules Romains, who
"presided," collected the slips, deciphered them, and respectfully
transmitted to Mr. Abetz those questions which did not risk embar–
rassing these precious guests. As for the positive or precise ques–
tions, no one, except perhaps Jules Romains, ever knew what
became of them. Mine, for example. I was in fact one of the
"sixty," one of the "carefully chosen" (but I was not one of the
