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to say that he was a Catholic of the period before the Council of Con–
stance. By which he meant before the confirmation of Roman supremacy,
and also before the final crushing of the heretics, John Russ and Jean
Petit, the French friar who advocated the legitimacy of tyrannicide.
Moreover, religion was to him a purely personal affair in which, Mari–
tain's solicitations notwithstanding, he did not tolerate any intrusion.
If
Peguy abandoned political socialism, it was after having watched with
a marvelously keen eye the transformation of Jauris, the apostle, into
J auris, the great orator, the successful party leader and clever parlamen–
tarian; and especially after having seen the great motive of the
affaire
Dreyfus
(which consisted for him in the absolute rejection of the
raison
d'Etat)
become the
instrumentum regni
of the radical-socialist commit–
tees. He found the sublimation of the ideals which had inflamed his
youth in the Christian themes. But he remained a disciple of Michelet,
and never yielded to the lures of reactionary classicism.
Bernanos is very different from Peguy. He has neither Peguy's
esprit de finesse
nor his peculiar gift for blending in one extremely
subtle and captivating line of argument the reasons of the heart and
the reasons of the mind. But he has certainly become infected with the
basic motives of Peguy's republicanism. For a French patriot of good
faith this course is properly speaking unavoidable, simply because the
opposite implies the attitude Bernanos finds so hateful in the French
bourgeoisie: the rejection of the great mass of the people.
To give his patriotism some kind of universal content, Be:;:-nanos
needs symbols like Chivalry, Honor, the Good Kings, with the beacon of
Christian faith illuminating the whole. The trouble is that for more
than a century, the French people have had no great use for such things.
The conviction that life is not worth living if it is not lived in the light
of an ideal of total regeneration (which for Bernanos cannot exist out–
side of Christianity) the French worker has already had. He called it
"socialism." Socialism to him meant very simply lite made reasonable.
He did not need historical symbols or Christian dogmas to express it,
precisely because it was a true conviction, and he did not want to
have it confused. For Bernanos, and for many others, it was a mediocre
kind of ideal. But, as a matter of fact, it has engendered tragedy rather
than vaudeville.
George Bernanos does not speak exclusively about France. He is
very much concerned with the destiny of Europe and the world in
general. On this subject also he has some eloquent things to say, gen–
erally in the tone of sarcasm and suspicion. As, for example, this sen–
tence about those realistic politicians who expect to reestablish order
with the help of "the millions of parishioners bedecked with blue, yellow,
green, red ribbons, and posted in line by the Jesuit Fathers. . . . A
desperate mistake, my dear friends . ... You count upon him to defend
your society, and he reasons after the same pattern: he counts on your
