GUIDE TO THE PHILOSOPHY 1938 - 1947.pdf - Rare Books at ...

THEORY OF FASCISM 623
of the people and in proportion to their knowledge of
circumstances". As to what liberty it is expedient for the
people to enjoy, the State is, as we have seen, the sole
arbiter and different liberties are appropriate to different
State needs. As Mussolini puts it: "There is a liberty for
times of war, another for times of peace; a liberty for
times of revolution, another for normal times; a liberty
for times of prosperity, another for times of stringency."
The view that individual liberty and development
should be subordinated to State convenience is common
to all forms ofFascism. Thus the advocates ofBritish Fascism,
comparatively undeveloped as it is, are already insisting
in their official organ that "Fascism . . . stands for the
cessation of present political life, and in this sense for the
suppression of political self-expression".
(6) Finally, there is a repudiation of wealth as a measure
of value and a disavowal of the psychology which inspired
the economics of the nineteenth century. It k not true
that man is motivated only by considerations of profit and
loss. It is not true that he only acts in such ways as he
thinks will redound to his economic advantage; and
emphatically it is not true that he ought so to act. "The
pursuit of a maximum aggregate wealth," writes Major
Barnes, "should be subordinated to the pursuit of a healthy
social system. In other words, general well-being is more
dependent on a healthy social system than on great
aggregate riches."
Reports are made from time to time that wages have
dropped in fascist countries. This, however, is not treated
as the calamity which democratic peoples are apt to consider
it, and discontented workers are exhorted to console
themselves with reflections upon the glory that Fascism
has brought to the nation and the respect which, under
fascist rule, it obtains from other nations. Nor are only
the workers exhorted to place the development of the spirit
before the filling of the pocket; the programs ofFascism both
in Germany and in Italy originally contained important
measures for curtailing the profits of wealthy capitalists.