BOOKS
259
he adduces for his own thesis, such as Bismarck's late conversion by Ger–
man industrialists to an expansionist program, serves as plausible support
for the thesis he is interested in refuting. And in spite of his persistent
attempt to read his materials almost exclusively in moral and psychologi–
cal terms, that very material will persuade many of his readers that among
the factors which make intelligible the generation of materialism the eco–
nomic ones play
essen~ial
if not exclusive roles.
Professor Hayes's book appears to the present reviewer as being
essentially a critique of secular explanations in general, and of natural–
istic theories of society in particular. The book shows beyond peradven–
ture that the uncritical acceptance of the conclusions of science in one
domain of inquiry as the norms for every other domain, is both poor
science and dangerous social policy. Had Professor Hayes been content
with making that claim, his book would have been uniformly enlightening.
He is
in
fact after more important game, and to at least one reader that
game appears to be the secular culture of post-reformation Europe. For
who can fail to understand how Professor Hayes would answer his own
rhetorical questions, whether the men of the 19th century "with all its
mechanical inventions and material gains, were actually any wiser or
happier or clearer-eyed or more virtuous than men of pre-machine ages"
(pg. 340), and "whether Europe or Western civilization can endure
if
cut off from its historic Christian roots" (pg. 135) ? His critique of
materialism cannot appear plausible to those who reject the assumptions
of scholastic metaphysics or who do not find their social ideals adequately
expressed in the aspirations of Catholic Christianity.
ERNEST NAGEL
LOOSE TALK ABOUT JOYCE
James Joyce. By Harry Levin. New Directions. $1.00
Works of art get us to talk to each other. Some day they may inspire
us to talk well. As long as there are authors who have something to say,
we too can say something. A French literary critic under the influence of
Stalinist anti-intellectualism once attacked Dostoyevsky on the grounds
that his novels provide topics for conversation. .Mais que voulez-vous,
monsieur? Why write about books if you think their function is to make
one mute?
Whoever does not look forward to being mute must grant that one of
the
values
of art is to augment his fund of what is significantly sayable.
One may properly ask, in evaluating a work: how many conversations has
it incited? There are books, it is true, which everybody, as the phrase
goes, talks about. But the phrase is inaccurate. The Bestseller is one of
the
modern devices for preventing people from realizing that they have
nothing whatever to say to each .other.
The art of James Joyce, characterized by the stupid as "uncommu–
nicative" has for twenty years been marvellously creative of conversations.
Nor has Joyce ceased to stimulate discourse and suggest that speech may
be
valuable.
