Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1893-1920, 1904-09-24
is FRANCE DECADENT I?
Impressions of Celebrated Men
on the Question.
HOPEFUL SIGNS TO THE CONTRARY

Country so Full OF IntcEIectual
Youth and Hope, Says Edmund
Gosse.
Theodore Stanton sends the Open
Court a number of letters on THE De
cadence of France" written by celebri-
ties. We give several letters:
Colonel Sir Howard Vincent, VI. p:
ITO this question there IS only one
response: no; a thousand times no" l
find myself in the happy condition to
make this statement. l have just COM
pleted journey through France. Ev-
erywhere IS order, everywhere prosper
fly, everywhere a quiet and happy
people well fed, well nurtured, gay.
content, hOspitable, generous. The
poor are not to be seen. Luxury is ex-
tensive Such are the impressions re-
ceived by my colleagues and myself,
No. no, no."
Edmund Gosse, librarian of the
house of lords:
MY reply IS peremptorily, categor
1cally, no.
What is 'decadenceT Is it not 4
phrase by which the timid often at
tempt TO mask their fear of what is
new. active and rebelliOus?
The only decadent nations are those
which do not dare TO change, which
live on I'm constant terror of encOur-
aging audacity of thought or perver-
slty of conduct. The living nations are
forever making new experiments at
which conventional people shudder and
scream.
1--WE may scour the horizon of the
world at this hour and see no nation
which seems so little to deserve the re
buke of decay as the French. To my
apprehension no country at the present
hour is so full of intellectual youth
and hope. offers to the observer so
great a variety of points of vitality or
draws the attention of the thoughtful
to it with so yivaciOus a sympathy as
France
"If by 'decadcnCe' you mean evOlu-
ton. the painful metamOrphosis of life
yes, If by 'decadence' you mean dull
ness. apathy, II sinking of the moral
and mental temperature. a thousand
times-nO.'
Lucas Malet: ..
THE question which you propose. I.
as n lover of France, venture to an
swer with an emphatic negative.
France is not in state OF decadence.
but she is. in my humble opinion, in q
state OF convaleSCenCe-and the Symp
toms OF the latter condition may easily.
by superficial observers. be mistaken
for those of the former. From the
middle of the eighteenth century she
has passed through n series of con
vulSions, both moral and material, of
experiments, of splendOrS and dis
asters, eliminating in the cruel trag
edy of 1ST0-11, which must always
remain to the student one of the amaZ-
ing chapters of human history. That
she should have retained her solidarity,
her genius and revived as a nation
shows a vitality so enormous, and an
intelligence SO adaptable and fertile
that il IS impossible to entertain mis-
Eivings as to her future. But the eff
feCts of her past sufferingS are still
upon her i'm Il certain nervousness and
sCnsitiveneSs. which result In episodes
painful TO her admirers. She is taken
with unreasonlng fears. and these lead
to violence both of feeling and of action
which strikes the observer as unworthy
episodes. having their rise in these
nervous terrorS. appear especially I'M
Fortunate refer to the 'Affaire Drey-
fuS' and the expulsion of the religious
orders. In the first case there was Il
fear of abstract justice. in the second
fear of religious liberty. As a Catho-
lie and n Liberal alike. it is inconceiv-
able to me that the highest interests
of any nation can ever he served by the
Reputation of such fundamental prin-
Ciples of social existence and of prog
reSs. Such Reputation, like all other
recourse To artificial and arbitrary rem
edieS. suggests a lack of faith in her
self and in her splendid destiny, which
might be alarming. did one not remem-
Der that she still bears the scars of
the tremendous adventures of the later
years of the eighteenth and nearly the
whole of the nineteenth century. Her
COnvaleScence must of necessity be
long. but there are surely already
signs that her restoration TO health Will
be complete and lasting. There are
perhaps nations in Europe whom we
could do without but France very
certainly Is not among these, Indeed.
II is not too much TO say that never
have the influence and traditions of the
Latin races been of more vital i'm
portanCe 10 the evolution OF a true and
noble civilization than at the present
moment"
Gilbert Murray. formerly professor of
Greek at Glasgow university:
Il hesitate 10 pronounce any opin-
ion upon subject so vast and so in
tricate. but there are two remarks
that l venture TO make
''First.-If France is decaying. then
the whole European civilization as at
present understood is decaying. The
same bad symptoms which appear in
France appear also in England. Ger
many, Italy, and, from what one hears.
81 the nations of Europe. Nor. cap.