lp4guld

the corrupt politicians who ruled them. It is a fair statement thatin Italy, where parliamentary government had come late, there wasan early disillusionment about that republican government of whichso much had been said. Great numbers lost faith in it. It is notpossible to overestimate the gravity of this phenomenon—whereamong the ablest and most fortunate so many had been shaken intheir belief in the absolute soundness of the economic order underwhich they had flourished.Such a society, marked by a sense of frustration, loss of faith inexisting institutions and existing leaders, is of course a fertile soilfor the cultivation of another phenomenon, full of menace, whichnow appeared in Italy—the cult of the crusader and the adventurer.Benedetto Croce, Italy's foremost contemporary philosopher, hailedit but with misgivings. He called it a reaction against positivism.New voices cried out with disgust against all the grubbers in thesciences, in technology, in finance and economics built on the humdrumlife of facts and figures,wages, profits, interest, taxes, security,and work. All this was sordid. Men were made for better things—what the better things were remained obscure. Croce noted all thisas "a reawakening of national trends of thought." And this he definedas "a widely diffused spirit, half romantic, half mystical, towhich the crude simplifications of positivism were intolerable."There was a greater interest in great ideas. It was a time forgreatness. But he had to concede that the mind thus turned loose,thus emancipated from facts, took unexpected directions. "In theluxuriant revival of speculative enthusiasm," he said half apologetically,"there crept a dangerous and morbid element." 1 Croce, theone-time socialist, had forsaken that path for the heady heights ofromantic philosophy. He had rejected humanitarianism and pacifismand had approved Georges Sorel, at least for his opposition tothese ideals. He could imagine a philosophical use for violence andthought perhaps the Inquisition was such an instance. GiovanniGentile, another liberal philosopher, second in fame only to Croce,was also fascinated by this neo-idealism. He called it "faith in thenecessity of the advent of an ideal reality, a concept of life which^History of Italy, by Benedetto Croce, translated by Cecilia M. Ady, Clarendon Press,1929.35