Part 16 (2/2)
M. Louis Reybaud, novelist by profession, economist on occasion, breveted by the Academy of Moral and Political Sciences for his anti-reformatory caricatures, and become, with the lapse of time, one of the writers most hostile to social ideas,--M. Louis Reybaud, whatever he may do, is none the less profoundly imbued with these same ideas: the opposition which he thus exhibits is neither in his heart nor in his mind; it is in the facts.
In the first edition of his ”Studies of Contemporary Reformers,”
M. Reybaud, moved by the sight of social sufferings as well as the courage of these founders of schools, who believed that they could reform the world by an explosion of sentimentalism, had formally expressed the opinion that the surviving feature of all their systems was a.s.sOCIATION. M. Dunoyer, one of M. Reybaud's judges, bore this testimony, the more flattering to M. Reybaud from being slightly ironical in form:
M. Reybaud, who has exposed with so much accuracy and talent, in a book which the French Academy has crowned, the vices of the three princ.i.p.al reformatory systems, holds fast to the principle common to them, which serves as their base,--a.s.sociation.
a.s.sociation in his eyes, he declares, is THE GREATEST PROBLEM OF MODERN TIMES. It is called, he says, to solve that of the distribution of the fruits of labor. Though authority can do nothing towards the solution of this problem, a.s.sociation COULD DO EVERYTHING. M. Reybaud speaks here like a writer of the phalansterian school. . . .
M. Reybaud had advanced a little, as one may see. Endowed with too much good sense and good faith not to perceive the precipice, he soon felt that he was straying, and began a retrograde movement. I do not call this about-face a crime on his part: M.
Reybaud is one of those men who cannot justly be held responsible for their metaphors. He had spoken before reflecting, he retracted: what more natural! If the socialists must blame any one, let it be M. Dunoyer, who had prompted M. Reybaud's recantation by this singular compliment.
M. Dunoyer was not slow in perceiving that his words had not fallen on closed ears. He relates, for the glory of sound principles, that, ”in a second edition of the 'Studies of Reformers,' M. Reybaud has himself tempered the absolute tone of his expressions. He has said, instead of could do EVERYTHING, could do MUCH.”
It was an important modification, as M. Dunoyer brought clearly to his notice, but it still permitted M. Reybaud to write at the same time:
These symptoms are grave; they may be considered as prophecies of a confused organization, in which labor would seek an equilibrium and a regularity which it now lacks. . . . At the bottom of all these efforts is hidden a principle, a.s.sociation, which it would be wrong to condemn on the strength of irregular manifestations.
Finally M. Reybaud has loudly declared himself a partisan of compet.i.tion, which means that he has decidedly abandoned the principle of a.s.sociation. For if by a.s.sociation we are to understand only the forms of partners.h.i.+p fixed by the commercial code, the philosophy of which has been summarized for us by MM.
Troplong and Delangle, it is no longer worth while to distinguish between socialists and economists, between one party which seeks a.s.sociation and another which maintains that a.s.sociation exists.
Let no one imagine, because M. Reybaud has happened to say heedlessly yes and no to a question of which he does not seem to have yet formed a clear idea, that I cla.s.s him among those speculators of socialism, who, after having launched a hoax into the world, begin immediately to make their retreat, under the pretext that, the idea now belonging to the public domain, there is nothing more for them to do but to leave it to make its way.
M. Reybaud, in my opinion, belongs rather to the category of dupes, which includes in its bosom so many honest people and people of so much brains. M. Reybaud will remain, then, in my eyes, the vir probus dicendi peritus, the conscientious and skilful writer, who may easily be caught napping, but who never expresses anything that he does not see or feel. Moreover, M.
Reybaud, once placed on the ground of economic ideas, would find the more difficulty in being consistent with himself because of the clearness of his mind and the accuracy of his reasoning. I am going to make this curious experiment under the reader's eyes.
If I could be understood by M. Reybaud, I would say to him: Take your stand in favor of compet.i.tion, you will be wrong; take your stand against compet.i.tion, still you will be wrong: which signifies that you will always be right. After that, if, convinced that you have not erred either in the first edition of your book or in the fourth, you should succeed in formulating your sentiment in an intelligible manner, I will look upon you as an economist of as great genius as Turgot and A. Smith; but I warn you that then you will resemble the latter, of whom you doubtless know little; you will be a believer in equality. Do you accept the wager?
To better prepare M. Reybaud for this sort of reconciliation with himself, let us show him first that this versatility of judgment, for which anybody else in my place would reproach him with insulting bitterness, is a treason, not on the part of the writer, but on the part of the facts of which he has made himself the interpreter.
In March, 1844, M. Reybaud published on oleaginous seeds--a subject which interested the city of Ma.r.s.eilles, his birthplace--an article in which he took vigorous ground in favor of free compet.i.tion and the oil of sesame. According to the facts gathered by the author, which seem authentic, sesame would yield from forty-five to forty-six per cent. of oil, while the poppy and the colza yield only twenty-five to thirty per cent., and the olive simply twenty to twenty-two. Sesame, for this reason, is disliked by the northern manufacturers, who have asked and obtained its prohibition. Nevertheless the English are on the watch, ready to take possession of this valuable branch of commerce. Let them prohibit the seed, says M. Reybaud, the oil will reach us mixed, in soap, or in some other way: we shall have lost the profit of manufacture. Moreover, the interest of our marine service requires the protection of this trade; it is a matter of no less than forty thousand casks of seed, which implies a maritime outfit of three hundred vessels and three thousand sailors.
These facts are conclusive: forty-five per cent. of oil instead of twenty-five; in quality superior to all the oils of France; reduction in the price of an article of prime necessity; a saving to consumers; three hundred s.h.i.+ps, three thousand sailors,--such would be the value to us of liberty of commerce. Therefore, long live compet.i.tion and sesame!
Then, in order to better a.s.sure these brilliant results, M.
Reybaud, impelled by his patriotism and going straight in pursuit of his idea, observes--very judiciously in our opinion--that the government should abstain henceforth from all treaties of reciprocity in the matter of transportation: he asks that French vessels may carry the imports as well as the exports of French commerce.
”What we call reciprocity,” he says, ”is a pure fiction, the advantage of which is reaped by whichever of the parties can furnish navigation at the smallest expense. Now, as in France the elements of navigation, such as the purchase of the s.h.i.+ps, the wages of the crews, and the costs of outfit, rise to an excessive figure, higher than in any of the other maritime nations, it follows that every reciprocity treaty is equivalent on our part to a treaty of abdication, and that, instead of agreeing to an act of mutual convenience, we resign ourselves, knowingly or involuntarily, to a sacrifice.”
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