Evening star., 1932-11-20

differently placed, can learn lesson
from them, is not what ideal they have
set up but the fact that it is an ideal
which has been erected, and that
women can respond to an idea so effec-
lively that governments and, indeed, in
the case of Russia, whole civilization
can be transformed
Any one who within the last few years
has spent any considerable time or even
a relatively brief time in Italy or Ger
many has been struck by the fact that
the ardent young supporters of FasciSm
in one and of the Nazi movement in the
other seldom are able or willing to dis
cuss their political faith in purely po-
litical terms. For the young Fascist,
Fascism is a new Risorgimento. 1t is
Italy come to life again, it is the rebirth
of nation. He will point proudly to
the new marine and engineering
achievements of italy, but no less
proudly to its educational program, to
what he believes are the elements of
renewed spiritual life, united manly and
Italian.
In Germany, though the young Nazi
Il myself have talked with dozens) may
be little short on economies or, indeed,
on food or funds, he will be long on
formulas, at once fervid and parrotlike
about the liberation of Germany from
bondage, about purifying the German
race and culture and a pure German
morality, about national awakening, ma
tional order, national discipline. If he
speaks of Hitler it will not be as one
speaks of political leader, but as one
speaks of a moral hero; and if he re-
fers, as he is almost certain to do, to
Hitler's autobiography, my Fight" far
from noble or eloquent book, it is pre-
cisely of its nobility and eloquence that
he will speak, and of the courage and
dignity of life devoted to a cause SO
high, so patriotic and SO pure.
THE foreigner, or even the German~not
- under the spell, looks askance at
the bigotry and the confusion, the abb
sence of a political or economic program,
or the futile hodge-podge of many pro-
grams that is Hitlerism. He may have
heard or have read Hitler and wondered
what Carlyle would have made of such
hero worship or such hero. Just as
the foreigner or the Italian recalling
Mazzini or Garibaldi may have his
doubts as to whether the pragmatic
success and even the decisiveness, clear
headed and effective, of Mussolini are
worth the price of oppression and regi-
mentation.
What the observer will be unable to
question or gainSay is the enthusiasm,
undiluted and genuine, of the young
sters who march in black shirts in
Munich; and If the observer happens
to be an American, familiar through
the contacts of teaching with many
young men and women, he will draw
from the spectacle a lesson that has
more to do with the followers of
Fascism and Nazism and Communism
than with the leaders.
It has become the fashion to explain
all political events through political
Vaccinations or economic pressure. Nor
can there be very much doubt that
Fascism was provoked in Italy by the
economic and political collapse and the
breakdown Of parliamentary institutions
after the war, just as it is the economic
breakdown and the paralysis of parlia-
mentary government that gave Hitler
his chance.
But those who would explain the
origins of these movements economically
and politically can hardly explain their
success with millions of very young peo-
pie in that fashion alone The fact Is
that these three political tides, as vari-