474 



Jhe Review of Reviews^ 



June 1, I90b. 



in his attitude in relation to the Roman Catholic 

 Church. To him the Church is a kind of Devil 

 Fish, with the religious orders as the arms of the 

 octopus. I cannot read Victor Hugo's famous story 

 of the tremendous struggle in ' Les Travailleurs de 

 Mer " between his hero and the octopus without 

 recognising that M. Clemenceau and his friends feel 

 themselves and the Republic exactly in that posi- 

 tion. La picuvre, with its deadly sucker planted 

 thick along every writhing arm, draining the life- 

 blood of their victim — that is the anti-Clerical con- 

 ception of the Church of Rome. In an early num- 

 ber of Le Bloc M. Clemenceau began an article 

 headed " The Devil Fish " {La Picuvre) by saying : 

 " Perhaps you imagine, like many simple folk, that 

 a religious congregation is a society of men who 

 gather themselves together to adore God and to set 

 an example of a holy life far removed from the low 

 greed for earthly things. There are some such. But 

 there are thousands of religious communities de- 

 voted solely to vulgar trade for filthy lucre." 



He then proceeds to analvse an official return 

 .showing that there were then in France 2500 reli- 

 gious orders actively engaged in competing in busi- 

 ness with the lay citizens, and he invoked against 

 them the same kind of trad-s union prejudice that is 

 roused by the introduction of cheap Chinese labour. 

 These men celibates, without familv or civic ties, 

 undercut the marker againU honest fathers of 

 families. Thev flourish in the liquor business, 

 wholesale and retail, exploiting the most redoubt- 

 able of human vices in the interest of the coffers 

 of the Church. It is easy to im.igine the play which 

 this son of Voltaire makes with these clerical black- 

 legs, who keep pigs, manufacture false pearls, and 

 distil strong drink for the glory of God and the 

 profit of Holy Church. He was the powerful ad- 

 vocate of Disestablishment long before the Bloc felt 

 itself strong enough to grapple with the Church. 



THE GREAT ANTI-JIXGO OF FEAXCE. 



M. Clemenceau's great distinction has been his 

 resolute and unwavering opposition to a policv of 

 Imperialism. It was he who more than any man 

 deterred France from joining with us in our Egyp- 

 tian campaign. He was the inveterate enemv of M. 

 Fern', whom he relentlessly pursued and ultim.ately 

 overthrew for his policv of Asiatic expansion. It is 

 true that M. Clemenceau can hardly be said to be a 

 man of peace. He has fought manv duels, includ- 

 ing one with M. Dero\i!ede, who accused him of 

 being in the pay of Dr. Cornelius Herz and the 

 Panamist ring, and his antipathv to foreign expedi- 

 tions has usually -been attributed quite as much to 

 his distrust of Germany as to any humanitarian ob- 

 jections to making war on coloured races. With 

 him the memory of the Terrible Year is, still vivid. 

 He was mayor of Montmartre in the year of the 

 siege, and although he never speaks of Alsace and 

 Lorraine, he never forgets. He wrote last vear: — 



Tlie fundamental conditions of peace— not the peace I 

 should like, but the onl.7 one which is possible in the pre- 

 sent condition of Europe — la that we should dispose of 

 sufficient force to discourage every aggressor. Force, alas, 

 condiSLS of guns, rifles, and soldiers, as also of alliances and 

 agreements. 



HIS STAND FOR DEETTFUS. 



But if we can substitute the force of alliances and 

 agreements for the costly armaments which are ruin- 

 ing civilisation, no one will be better pleased than 

 M. Clemenceau. 



The second great distinction of M. Clemenceau is 

 the splendid part which he played in the Dreyfus 

 affair. He stands in the foremost fighting line of 

 the heroic few who stood for justice in the darkest 

 days of the reaction. As the Boer War was our 

 Dreyfus case, no one can sympathise so much with 

 M. Clemenceau as the pro-Boers, both in the hour 

 of our defeat and now in the hour of our victory. 

 M. Clemenceau who founded the Justice in 1880, 

 became the fighting man-at-arms of the Aiirore dur- 

 ing the prolonged Dreyfus combat, and rendered 

 yeoman's service to the cause of justice. Nor was 

 it only with his pen that he defended the right. He 

 pleaded the cause before the Court, and on one 

 occasion, in February, 1898, he made a powerful 

 use of the crucifix as an argument against the re- 

 fusal to reconsider the chose jugee: — 



""We hear much talk," said Clemenceau, "of the choie 

 jugee." M. Clemenceau raised his head t^ward^ the im- 

 mense painting of the Christ on the cross, hanging in view 

 of tl e entire companv over the he^ds of the scarlet^robed 

 judges. "Look here at the choge jugee. This image placed 

 in our judgment halls recalls the most m>Estro::s ,V-idicial 

 error which the world has kniwo." (There were ironical 

 cries from the audience.) " No. I am not one of His 

 ado"P'-«: l)nt I lo^e Him perhaps more than those who in- 

 voke Him so singularly, to preach religious proscription!" 



M. Clemenceau is no friend of_ the Russian al- 

 liance. If Russia were to become a constitutional 

 State that would be another affair. But for him, as 

 for most French Radicals, Russia is the enemy of 

 freedom and Japan the hope of civilisation in the 

 East. In the past he has never hesitated to defend 

 even the excesses of the Revolutionaries as the in- 

 evitable result of the repressive system which denies 

 to Russians the fundamental liberties of civilised 

 nations. He is per contra a warm friend of England 

 and the English, and has for a year or two past been 

 exp)ected as an honoured guest to visit London. 



M. CLEMENCEATJ AND " LE BLOC." 



For ten years, from 1883-1893, he was regarded 

 as the master and maker of ministries in France. 

 In 1893 he lost his seat for the Var amid the outcrv 

 raised over the Panama scandal. In 1901 he 

 founded the weekly paper Le Bloc. The title clung 

 to the party. The French Revolution, he said, was 

 a block, a thing which must be accepted or rejected 

 en bloc. In our villainous political slang, Le Bloc 

 was the party which went the whole hog for the 

 Revolution. In the following year he was elected 

 senator for his old constituency, the Var, and now 



