488
VICTOR BROMBERT
for having lent themselves to the intellectual organization of
political fanaticism. Ironically enough (though not so ironically
for a Benda), a similar devaluation of intelligence and culture
can be observed in the socialist literature of the period. Karl
Kautsky used to call literary bohemians "vain concocters of pro–
jects." Hubert Lagardelle attributed to Greco-Latin education
the emergence of a group of dissatisfied, ambitious
deciasses
out
of touch with the masses, and considered the humanities useless
and perhaps even harmful to modern man.
s
Stigma III: The hybris of the mandarins
The same passage from PaIeologue's diary points to still
another sentiment attached to the new word. Brunetiere's
remark that the "Intellectuals" claim to constitute an aristocracy
of supennen clearly echoes a widespread resentment provoked
by the supposed arrogance and boundless pride of the "man–
darins" (the word is much used at the time), a thoroughly
laughable and unjustified arrogance, according to Brunetiere
and his friends. Paleologue recalls with what suspicion the
judges at the Rennes court-martial listened to the testimony
of "intellectuals," these "presumptuous pedants who take them–
selves for the aristocrats of the mind." Similar sounds are heard
from all sides:
((caste nobiliere,"
((
aristocrates de ['esprit,"
«aristocratie intellectuelle," ((mandarins des lettres," ((aristo–
crates de la pensee," ((elite intellectuelle"-these
are the most
common derogatory expressions. President Meline's most ad–
mired speech was probably the one delivered in the Chamber
of Deputies (28 February, 1898) in which he thundered against
the
intellectuel elite
with a sarcastic verve that provoked pro–
longed laughter and unanimous applause. In an article that ap–
pears two weeks later, Brunetiere repeats that nothing seems to
him less bearable than the idea of an intellectual aristocracy.
3. See
Le
Socialism~
et les carrieres lib/rales
and
Les Intellectuels devant
Ie socialisme.
