Evening star., 1937-10-03

triotic, but skillfully directed by people
with much wider aims-stemming
from the Vehmgericht and the
Tugendbund.
In Italy was the immense ramifca-
ton Of the Alta Vendita and the Car
bonari. linked with revolutionary
Grand Orient freemasonry
Restoration France seethed with
underground societies, where Jacobin
doctrine and the Robespierre- -"Grac-
chus" Babeuf tradition were kept
fiercely alive Chiefly by one Buona-
rotti. an illegitimate descendant of
the great Michaelangelo). These sue
cessfully made the Revolution of 1880
had it filched from them by the
bourgeois Louis Philippe, and con-
spired anew.
In Austria, in Spain. in Russia, SIM
liar "cellS"-to use the Communist
jargon OF today-were omnipresent.
All these secret societies were in COM
munication with one another, and
there is much evidence to suggest that
they were all directed by one occult
organization-just as our Left Wingers
Of today all line up at the word Of
command.
Giants at Work.
The advertised leaders had giants
among them. In England, Karl Marx,
not yet the creator of the First Inter-
national, was collaborating with Fried
rich Engels in the labors which. in
l847. would burst upon the world as
the Communist Manifesto, Bakunin
was already famous-and beginning
to quarrel with Marx. Lassalle was a
dynamic figure in Germany. Mazzini
was working in London for the estab-
lishment of that Italian Republic
which should be the first installment
Of the World Republic.
To all thinking men, decade after
decade. in the '20s. 30s and '4Os. it
seemed that cast social revolution
was ever more imminent.
The statesmen Of the period were in
acute dread Of that catastrophe, which
see emed not only imminent but almost
inescapable. They were fearful also,
just as statesmen are today, of the
outbreak OF = great European war
France was then the "despoiled"
country that Germany is today,
which would certainly detonate the
revolution, and which also-time after
time-seemed imminent and inescap-
able.
Contemporary diplomatic corre-
spondence is eloquent of that terror.
Particularly did Armageddon seem
dangerously imminent when-through-
out the l820s-Spain was torn by
the terrible Carlist war, where Eng
land and France played the roles
played today by Russia-France on the
one hand, and Germany Italy on the
other.
'Tnevitable' Awaited.
The revolutionaries waited fever
ishly for that general war which would
give them their chance. Unfortunately
for them, there was no revolutionary
great power, such as Soviet Russia
alphabetically is today. which could
deliberately and puissantly precipi-
tate it,
The inevitable" war, again and
again threatening. was dexterously
averted by scared diplomats. The rev.
olutionaries got tired of waiting. And
SO in 1848, the Year of Revolutions, :"
they exploded revolution in every
country.
There was one in France, followed
by bloody insurrection, bloodily sup
pressed. There was almost one in
England.
There were others in Prussia, in
Baden (not finally suppressed until
l849, in Bavaria, where Ludwig lost
his throne; in Austria, in Hungary, in
Russia, in Spain, in Mexico, in Ire
land, in the Kingdom of the Two Sici-
lies. In Rome, in Venice, in Tuscany.
The revolutionary volcano erupted
in the grandest display on record. Dis
appointingly for the revolutionaries,
no great power seized the opportunity
to 60 to war; each merely stamped out
the fire in its own house, save that the
Emperor Of Russia kindly helped the
Emperor OF Austria.
Fires Consume Themselves.
And the revolutionary fires burned
themselves out-Karl Marks futile
detonation OF the Paris Commune In
1871 was proof Of it-for more than
half century.
I hate to perturb our gentle left
wingers by suggesting that it is i'm
probable, despite all their efforts, that
there will again be Year Of Revolu-
tions" in the near future. They had
a better chance in 1848. Bolshevism
Is in worldwide recession-particu-
larly in Sovietland, where Stain
shoots the old Bolsheviks while he
creates . Nationalist Russia dicta-
torship, most unlikely to precipitate
an theological war
Always there will be wars and ru-
mors Of wars-but the Fascist Com
munist war will almost surely be .
rlmor that will fade into vacuity. One
dog doesn't want to fight, at least Just
now and for the reasons alleged. The
Other can't.