THE FRENCH INTELLECTUAL
489
In his
"discours de combat,"
he grows even more violent, call–
ing Nietzsche "a professor of Greek, delirious with impotence
and pride." As to Barres, he too, of course,
is
outraged by these
"aristocrats of the mind" who are but "a bunch of people
crazy with pride"
(Scenes et doctrines).
Of this supposed ar–
rogance, Paul Bourget had given earlier a famous fictional
example in his Robert Greslou, who believes in an oligarchy
of scientists, and who dares to think (and to write) that a
man such as he must learn "not to consider as a law for us who
think what is and must be a law for those who do not think"
(Le Disciple).
Many of the anti-rationalistic attitudes of the 90's are in
conscious rebellion against the thinking of a Renan who, in
L'Avenir de la science,
had more than toyed with the idea of
new spiritual guides for humanity. Even before the publica–
tion of
L'Avenir de la science,
it is Renan, no doubt, whom
Bourget had in mind when, in the preface to
Le
Disciple,
he
alluded to the all too eloquent master whose paradoxes and
intellectualism had charmed, corrupted and spiritually dried
up the typical young Frenchman. Brunetiere
is
more blunt in
his
denunciation of Renan's "odious dream": he shuddered at
Renan's future world, controlled by an elite of scientists "plac–
ing unlimited terror at the service of truth."
It is true that in some cases the statements and attitudes
of certain "intellectuals" semed to justify accusations of ar–
rogance. Zola, during his trial, clumsily answered the judge: "I
do not know the law and I do not want to know
it."
To a
somewhat baffled jury he proudly declared that it was he who
was the true defender of France, and that his victories would
be more meaningful to posterity than those of any general. Even
in the calmer atmosphere of his study, he could not refrain from
formulating thoughts that exalted the writer over the statesman:
"Our lawmakers seem to me inefficient; I would like to see
the task entrusted to moralists, writers, poets"
(La
V lrite
en
