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for an apology from some of those men like Gentile who entered thefascist movement at the head of a group of liberal academicians andwriters. Mussolini had boasted that his fascist revolution was madewith cudgels. And the philosopher Gentile was so far from beinghorrified at this that he actually said that in the days before themarch on Rome "the cudgels of the squadristi seemed like the graceof God. The cudgel in its material brutality became the symbol ofthe fascist, extra-legal soul. . . . That is holy violence." Here is thedread cult of violence which becomes holy the moment it appears insupport of one's own special cult. Let no man suppose that it is onlyin Italy that a liberal philosopher can hold a brief for "holy violence."It was after the vulgar brutalities of the march to power, afternewspapers had been burned and editors beaten, political clubroomssacked, after the sacred cudgel by God's grace had done its holyviolence on its enemies and others had been gorged with castor oil,after thousands had been thrown into concentration camps andcountless other brave men had been driven from their country, afterMatteoti had been assassinated and Mussolini had proclaimed thatdemocracy was "a dirty rag to be crushed under foot," that WinstonChurchill, in January 1927, wrote to him, saying: "If I had beenan Italian I am sure I would have been entirely with you from thebeginning to the end of your victorious struggle against the bestialappetites and passions of Leninism." He assured the Duce that werehe an Italian he would "don the Fascist black shirt." And a yearlater, in Collier's Magazine, he wrote extolling Mussolini above Washingtonand Cromwell.Does this mean that Churchill approves of beating and suppressions?Hardly. Its significance lies in the revelation of the extent towhich evil deeds will be excused or tolerated or even defended whensome cherished public or religious or social crusade is the excuse.Man's capacity for cruelty—even the good man's capacity forcruelty—in the prosecution of a spiritual crusade is a phenomenon toaffright the soul.Mussolini—the same Mussolini whose career of violence and aggressionand tyranny had been widely advertised—has testimonials frommany Americans. Mr. Myron C. Taylor, until recently envoy to the70